Julio (October 15, 1963 - February 2, 2015) was Bruno Mars' personal assistant, and, behind the facade that Bruno had given him, a soldier, a convicted war criminal, a Homer Simpson prototype, and Bruno's closest friend.
Biography[]
Julio was born on October 15, 1963. He was raised in an abusive household, as he was choked on a regular basis and generally abused, as seen in the childhood image shown in this article. His parents hated him and felt no remorse for abusing him. In fact, they were proud of it seeing as they had the audacity to take pictures of them abusing him. They would choke him and say "Why you little!" and made home videos of it, which ended up inspiring the identical gag seen in The Simpsons (which came out near the end of the war) where Homer chokes Bart.
Julio as a child, getting choked by his abusive parents
Despite their bonding over torturing Julio, his parents otherwise had a pretty lame relationship and were constantly cheating on each other, which was a bad example for Julio, because he ended up not learning proper romantic commitment.
Eventually, he was fed up with his parents' abusive behavior towards him, so he ran away to El Salvador in the late 1970s, when he was a teenager. He got caught up in the wrong crowd and somehow ended participating in the coup d'état of El Salvador, thus becoming a member of the Revolutionary Government Junta. He committed many atrocities during his military service. The worst thing he ever did was choking prisoners and saying, "Why you little!" just like his parents did to him. His childhood trauma led to his ruthless treatment of enemy soldiers in the Salvadoran Civil War. He only treated prisoners of war as bad as his parents had treated him. By the end of the Salvadoran Civil War, he was convicted as a war criminal for what he had done. He just barely managed to escape to the United States, where he would plan to lay low for the rest of his life.
Luckily, he had made many powerful allies in his years in El Salvador, so work was easy to find. He worked as a butler for some of his powerful friends. Unfortunately, they later got imprisoned as they had committed war crimes too, so to help him escape and to spare him that same fate, they recommended him to various celebrities so he could keep working. He spent many years switching between different celebrities, under many facades, before he finally became a butler for Bruno Mars, who would become his favorite employer.
After moving into his new humble quarters in Bruno's $300k cellar, Julio began living comfortably alongside Bruno and his girlfriend. Julio was then caught having sexual relations with Bruno's girlfriend. It turned out that because since Julio's parents were always cheating on each other, Julio didn't actually know boundaries when it came to people's relationships, resulting in this unfortunate and awkward situation for everyone in the house.
Despite this, Bruno came to terms with this and they lived happily together despite this. Bruno remarked in an interview that although these affairs made their relationship tough at times, it ultimately made their relationship stronger.
Julio's conviction as a war criminal and over three decades of being a butler managed to change him as person. Of all of Bruno Mars' friends, he experienced the most character development, going from a mean soldier during his time in the Salvadoran Civil War, to becoming a flawed but well-meaning friend to Bruno.
The truth is, Julio always had a good heart, but he never had any role models in life growing up. All he was ever taught, from the time he was little until the end of the Salvadoran Civil War, was solving problems by choking people like his parents choked him. He was too scared to communicate his feelings with people, because his parents only ever responded with violence. But when he met Bruno, he learned what true friendship was, and he was able to become the best version of himself.
However, this comfort was short-lived, as Julio began feeling inadequate. He started worrying that Bruno didn't really care about him, and that he was only in Bruno's interest for the sole purpose of "getting the strap". This is stated in Uptown Funk when Bruno says "Julio, get the stretch!" that is a mere typo because the original line was "Julio, get the strap!"
Eventually, Julio got tired of this and told Bruno to get it himself. Then, someone posted a video of Julio's refusal to Vine on January 4, 2015, which got 14,300 views.[1]
Thankfully, Bruno and Julio were able to talk things out, and Julio stopped feeling insecure.
Julio tells Bruno that he doesn't want to get the stretch anymore
He was skilled at cooking[2] and was the designated driver for the group[3].
It has been rumored by some that Julio was gay or bisexual, although this was never confirmed.
Illness & Death[]
Sadly, shortly after Julio gained a new sense of self-confidence, he passed away of natural causes on February 2, 2015.
Julio was never in the best of health. He was malnourished and frequently injured by his parents as a child, so his health would always be fragile. Couple that with the fact that he fought in the Salvadoran Civil War for 12 years, resulting in even more injuries, and he worked hard as a butler for 23 years, despite already having fragile health from his war injuries. He also never had check-ups at the doctor, and only went for life-threatening emergencies. All of these factors culminated in Julio dying from complications of his poor health. In his lifetime, Julio was very resilient, and eventually his body couldn't keep up with him anymore.
On the day Julio passed, Bruno Mars addressed the identity of Julio on his Twitter, saying that it was better that people didn't know who he was (possibly referencing his status as a convicted war criminal) and confirmed his passing.
Bruno Mars later mentioned him posthumously in his song That's What I Like, which he made in Julio's memory and honor.