Some Smash Bros. Ultimate players are pointing out what they believe to be racist stereotypes in Spirits mode

There's a massive conversation going on with Smash Bros. Ultimate players right now concerning the three images above. The images come from Spirits mode in the game, and some players consider the Spirit pairings to be racist. By and large, those defending the Spirit choices do state that they believe the pairings to still be misguided at best. For those wondering about the explanations for the pairings, here's what users have come up with.

Diddy Kong and Dee Jay's fighting styles do share a couple of moves that are similar. There's also the fact that Dee Jay and Diddy Kong's initials, D.K., are similar sounding.

With Mr. Sandman and Donkey Kong, those who've played Punch-Out!! on Wii know that Donkey Kong appears as a final boss.

With Villager and Tac, a connection is drawn by the fact that Tac uses his sack to snag Kirby's copy ability, while Villager can use his net to capture items in a similar fashion. This doesn't explain the choice of skin tone for Villager, though.

Again, these are not official explanations of the Spirit pairings by Nintendo, but instead, fan theories as to why they were chosen. We'll have to see if Nintendo speaks up on this discussion to either explain the pairings, or remove them altogether.