#mepple wants to write

[mprimn]

I hate POP MART figures.

My first impression to them is just slightly more expensive gachapons. Most of them aren't even that pretty. Especially the ones called LABUBU. They're somehow very overrated in my country despite those ugly teeth they all have.

So imagine my surprise when I followed my friend into a POP MART store in Shibuya, only for me to ended up buying one instead of them. We were browsing through the different designs (while trying to be as quiet as possible because there were so many customers from our country it's kind of embarrassing) when one set stood out to me. It got me staring into the glass container for quite a moment.

An Alice in Wonderland themed POP MART :

Like. Wow. The artist actually did their homework on this one.

We usually have a favorite to aim for when opening blind boxes or doing gachas, right? Which is why I usually look through sites like mercari first so that I wouldn't have to waste my money on hopeless gambling. But I don't hate a single design in this set at all. The in-store price wasn't so different from the resales on mercari either, so I grabbed one from the shelf, headed to the counter, and cracked the box open...

I have acquired The March Hare. He is now sitting on the top shelf along with the goods I bought and the doujins my friends asked me to buy for them. I should start thinking about when to deliver some of these back home because my single luggage cannot fit them all.

Other than my character development arc towards POP MART (I still hate LABUBU though), I have to mention how I almost got a heat stroke while riding a bicycle to the train station.

It wasn't even that hot in the evening. I checked the weather report and everything before heading out. Yet right after I parked my bicycle and went up to the ground floor, my eyes became blurry and I couldn't stand straight. I somehow managed to make my way (literally half crawling) to the nearest vending machine and was saved by a bottle of cold water.

Who would have thought that summer in Japan can be this hot? Even the exchange students from SEA complained about the heat. Some of them who already returned told me that they'd rather tolerate summer at home than whatever is going on here. Global warming is real and it's getting to us.

Summer isn't a good season to save money, but since I've never experienced snow in my whole life, my real challenge would be in winter. An electric fan is enough to help me through the summer. But the freeze I felt to my bones when I arrived in Narita Airport during spring?

I will need those money for my heater bills.

It has been stormy lately because of the passing typhoon, but that didn't stop me and my uni classmates from reuniting in Tokyo a couple weeks ago. We stayed together in an Airbnb and it was a very chaotic experience. I wasn't really close to any of them but watching them throw hands at each other (in a friendly way, I suppose) had been entertaining. Though, the Airbnb caretaker who lived upstairs probably hated us to the core because we were being loud almost every night.

Before heading to Tokyo, we were invited to watch an annual fireworks show in a reserved area thanks to a Japanese friend. I've only seen fireworks from afar during new year countdowns so I wouldn't lie when I was a bit frightened by how close the explosions? bangs? were to where we were sitting. Let me show you some photos I took.

Here is what the area looks like. I, of course, brought the plushie with me so I can pretend we were dating under the fireworks light.

And here are the fireworks! The show was about an hour long if I remember correctly.

The blue one was screenshoted from a video but I personally think it's the best photo.

There were smoke everywhere once the show is over. Everything smelled burnt. Like we were barbeque sticks on a grill or something. It became really crowded when everyone started heading home at the same time, but the Japanese friend's family was very kind and took care of us so well. Apparently, the father used to live in our country and is still a huge fan as he kept telling us he couldn't wait to visit the capital again in a few months. We wish him the best.

Now that I'm getting hungry (it's midnight) I shall end the post here. I will try to upload some smaller posts so that I can make up for the months I have missed.

The way I actually had a draft for this post days ago but ended up rewriting everything again just because. You will forever be in my heart, little draft.

[leafonground]

discounting the part where im disappointed about futari wa being overall a bit mid and the purported gay not actually being there. i think mepple is the one thing in the show that keeps me enjoying myself as i watch. what a little bastard. what an absolute fucking goblin. hes the fucking best.

look at this little fucker. hes causing problems on purpose and hes loving every minute of it. he knows hes necessary to save the world so therefore he can be as annoying as he wants and its great. i have no idea how they managed to make him work from a writing standpoint but hes my favourite part of the show so far. am i only 11 episodes in? yeah. but i feel like thats enough to know what parts of a show you like and what parts you dont. and i like mepple. hes the fucking worst and i love him for that.

[paulisliveblogs]

Yeah, buddy, this was inevitable.

They killed another one. Where's the gem? I mean I don't think I ever saw one on him so maybe he wasn't trusted enough to get one? Or like his strength was enough? Or I never noticed.

They're holding hands. One or both is going to go hmph and let go.

They're going to actually talk now? Please? Like Nagisa has gotta apologize and Honoka already did but maybe she's also gotta apologize for leaving Nagisa and Mipple.

Girls, plz, you killed a man. Again.

Maybe it does get easier.

Nagisa, channeling the power of KYS

Called it.

Stop being frustrating and hug each other.

Nagisa, she saved your life, just a thank you shouldn't hurt your pride that much.

They took the wrong one didn't they?

Honoka will see a disastrous attempt at trying to figure out how to apologize, after all.

Honoka shouldn't have been able to have write anything as she had given up Mepple but honestly I've been so mistaken on how these girls' powers work that maybe Nagisa will see how this affected her in there.

I mean, I get why Honoka wouldn't want to keep trying to talk to her, after what Nagisa said, and having apologized twice, it would feel like you're being annoying as hell and there's not anything more to say.

But hadn't Nagisa decided to apologize to her? Like where did that go? Honoka got snappy. Shouldn't Nagisa expect that after what she said?

[veeranger]

So you want to watch Precure!

Version 1.3

(Google Docs Vers & Changelog)

Maybe you follow people who like it, maybe you just love magical girls and never got into Precure, but there are over a dozen seasons and you don’t know how to jump in. Never fear, this masterpost is here to give you a rundown of Precure, and hopefully by the end you’ll have an idea of where you want to start. 

What Is Precure?

Precure (short for Pretty Cure) is a Toei Animation franchise started in 2004 and has been on the air nonstop since then. It’s a magical girl franchise, y’know like sailor moon or ojamajo doremi or other such shows. The main demographic is children so you don’t have to worry about any weird “fanservice” or panty shots or anything nasty like that, it’s very G rated. 

What Are The Shows About?

In a general sense, Precure is about a team of 2-6 middle school age magical girls fighting bad guys and giant monsters and saving the world on a weekly basis with pretty outfits and big flashy finishers and the power of love and friendship. Each season follows a pretty standard formula (toku fans should be pretty familiar with it for the most part), and each season is around 48-50 episodes long. 

In keeping with this toku-esque formula, most seasons will feature mid season additions to the cast, in the form of new precure heroes. For the sake of not spoiling these shows, these mid season cures will not be mentioned in our plot overviews unless they appear extremely early or something like that. Just know that almost every season will feature an additional cure joining the team later in the show. 

Additionally, every season has at least one movie, these days there’s usually two per season. Usually you’ll find the movies are a standalone self-contained romp, and a crossover movie with the preceding seasons, with a focus on the most recent 2-3 teams. These movies might as well exist in a continuity of their own, and have absolutely no bearing on the plot whatsoever, save for one except which I’ll mention when we get to that season. 

Why Should I Watch Precure?

Because it’s good. It’s a really stellar franchise with a ton of content and genuinely engaging characters and stories. Also this isn’t your mom’s magical girl show, these girls throw punches, and kicks, and big lasers. Precure is pretty well known for being extremely hands on with its combat compared to other magical girl shows, though don’t expect the same kind of fights you’d find in kamen rider or anything. Also a main draw for a lot of people is the amount of gay subtext in, frankly, every season. While there’s only one season with an explicitly confirmed gay relationship between two cures, every season has varying levels of subtext between cures, it’s pretty cool. We won’t discuss the subtext in every season overview but trust us, it’s in there. 

What Show Should I Start With?

It doesn’t actually matter which season you watch, every season is a new setting and with new characters and set in a new world (except for two sequel seasons i’ll explain later), so you’re free to watch whatever you want in any order! We’re going to spend the rest of this post talking about each season to give you, the beloved reader, a glimpse at what each season has to uniquely offer. Don’t worry, there’s no spoilers down there. 

Futari Wa Precure (We Are Pretty Cure) & Futari Wa Precure Max Heart

The original precure show that aired in 2004, and even received an english dub. Misumi Nagisa is a star lacrosse player living a normal life until one day a shooting star she wishes on turns out to be a fairy that careens right into her room, or rather, smacks her right in the face. The fairy, named Mepple, explains he comes from the Garden of Light, another world that’s been taken over by the evil Dark King and his Dark Zone in order to capture the Prism Stones, a number of heart shaped crystals that, if collected, could give Dark King the power to destroy not only the Garden of Light but also the Garden of Rainbows, Earth itself. Meanwhile, Yukishiro Honoka finds a box in her grandmother’s shed containing an item just like the one that smacked Nagisa in the face, and inside is the fairy Mipple, who explains the situation to Honoka. The two fairies, seeking to be reunited, drag Nagisa and Honoka along and the four of them end up meeting up, but are attacked by an emissary of the Dark Zone. Mepple and Mipple grant the confused duo the power to transform into the warriors of legend, Precure. As Cure Black and Cure White, Nagisa and Honoka manage to fight off their attacker and protect their new fairy partners. The girls are then more or less dragged into the battle against the Dark Zone, as the only hope for both Gardens, they fulfill their duty as legendary warriors despite their hesitations and desires to go back to being normal teenagers.

Futari Wa doesn’t exactly have any major themes to speak of, it’s just your standard magical girl vs evil bad guys kind of thing, forgive it for being the first season. What it does have to offer is the relationship between Nagisa and Honoka, as well as the action in fight scenes. The girls don’t start the season as best friends, in fact they barely even know each other’s names when they’re first flung together. It takes a few episodes and a major fight between the girls for them to really start opening up to each other, but soon enough they become inseparable and support each other in everything they do. It’s clear, especially near the end, that the girls cling to each other for support and strength in the face of the increasingly overwhelming odds they face as the Dark Zone gains strength. It’s very compelling to see their relationship deepen in the early season and see how deep their bonds truly go near the end. 

Futari Wa received a sequel show, Futari Wa Precure Max Heart, picking up the story where it left off in the first season’s finale. Honoka and Nagisa are still the main characters, and they’re still fighting the Dark Zone, but this time they’re joined by a mysterious girl named Hikari, who can transform into Shiny Luminous, not a precure but precure-ish. This time the girls are trying to recover the heart and soul of the Queen of the Garden of Light, before the Dark Zone can recover and destroy the queen in her weakened state. Also their precure costumes have changed slightly. 

The first season (that is to say, not max heart) is currently one of the few seasons available with official english subtitles on the streaming platform Crunchyroll

Futari Wa Precure Splash Star

Hyuuga Saki (Cure Bloom), a tomboy who loves playing softball, and Mishou Mai (Cure Egret), a quiet transfer student and aspiring artist, meet each other by chance one day under the Sky Tree, where they discover two creatures from the Land of Fountains named Flappy and Choppy. The two girls transform into the legendary Precure and are tasked with restoring Princess Filia and the Seven Holy Fountains, which were sapped of their power by the evil forces of Dark Fall.

Splash Star's main theme is the appreciation of nature. The main focus is on the girls rediscovering their relationships with their town and the nature and people in it. You get to meet a whole cast of characters in their community, who have a lot of heart and charm behind their writing and the show does a good job of getting you genuinely invested in their stories.

Unfortunately the romance in Splash Star isn’t much better than Futari Wa's (sorry to any Fujimura/Kazuya fans), but the main girls themselves are so engaging that it's easy to ignore. The villains are pretty goofy, but entertaining if you can accept that the show doesn’t take itself very seriously. There are two villains in the latter half of the season that really stand out, though. Without spoiling too much, I can promise you their character arcs will tear at your heartstrings in the best way.

If you've watched Futari wa Precure, Splash Star will probably feel familiar. Although it's the first "reboot" series in the franchise with completely new characters, Toei overall played it safe and Saki and Mai in many ways still feel like "Nagisa and Honoka 2.0". Splash Star is different in enough other ways to make the show stand on its own merits, but if you watch it immediately after Futari wa you might find yourself feeling some deja vu. Personally, I think it's interesting to see what Splash Star builds on and explores when compared to Futari wa, since it has many of the same themes and character archetypes but they play out quite differently.

Yes! Precure 5 & Yes! Precure 5 GoGo!

Nozomi is a cheerful, carefree girl, but she doesn’t have a dream. One day she meets a hot guy and finds a mysterious item called the Dream Collet, capable of granting any wish once all the fairies known as Pinkies are gathered inside it, in the school library. She discovers that the hot guy is actually a tanuki from Palmier Kingdom named Coco, and that the Kingdom has been destroyed by the Nightmare. Coco’s dream is to restore his kingdom using the Dream Collet, and Nozomi decides to make it hers as well. 

She’s joined by her jock friend Rin, Urara, an aspiring actress, Komachi, a writer, and the rich student council president Karen. Together they form Yes Sentai Fiveranger Yes Precure 5 and work together to prevent Nightmare from obtaining the Dream Collet before they can gather all the Pinkies. They also save Coco’s “”””””friend””””””” and fellow hot guy squirrel, Nuts, and he joins them as the second mascot/handsome love interest.

The theme of Yes is dreams and heterosexual furry romance. It pulls off the dreams part very nicely. The het furry romance is bad, mostly because Coco is Nozomi’s teacher at school and also her love interest. However, Coco and Nuts are fairly gay and if you look past the romance part they have very good dadly relationships with the rest of the team. 

Yespre, like Futari Wa, received a sequel show, Yes! Precure 5 GoGo!. After the defeat of Nightmare some time ago, a new faction called Eternal rises up and starts stealing treasures from various dimensions. When Eternal targets the Rose Pact belonging to the Cure Rose Garden, the precure are called back into action to fight against Eternal, with new cure outfits, a new fairy named Syrup, and a new cure-like teammate named Milky Rose.

Fresh Precure!

Fresh is sort of the defining series for modern Precure, introducing a lot of plot and thematic elements to the franchise that would be used repeatedly later on. 

A concert Momozono Love attends is attacked by a monster called a Nakewameke. When Love stands up to it, she is nearly killed, but is saved when she is chosen by a mysterious power to become Cure Peach. She is joined by Inori and Miki as Cure Pine and Cure Berry, and, together with the talking ferret from the Kingdom of Sweets, Tarte, they have to prevent Labyrinth, a grey world led by Mobius, from taking over the Parallel Worlds and transforming them into identical, machine-like dictatorships, and also figure out the secret behind the Magic Baby, Chiffon, that Tarte is entrusted with. 

Fresh’s themes are happiness and nature/technology and donuts. The donuts are important. Labyrinth operates by gathering misery; the Nakewameke are created from it and their function is to create more of it and fill the Sorrow Gauge. All the girls (and the mascot) have love interests and their familial relationships are explored a lot to bring out the general stakes and emphasise what they’re fighting for.

While Fresh is very strong in characters, plot, and thematics, its lack of budget is very apparent. It looks terrible. Fortunately, it isn’t that difficult to get used to the bad animation once you get into the show, although the lack of means tends to show up at inopportune moments, like new powerups.

Heartcatch Precure!

Featuring character designs and art direction from Ojamajo Doremi’s character designer Umakoshi Yoshihiko, and written by Ojamajo Doremi and Onegai My Melody writer Yamada Takashi, Heartcatch should look and feel familiar to fans of either franchise, especially Doremi.

After having a reoccurring dream about someone called Cure Moonlight being defeated trying to defend the “Great Heart Tree”, the shy and reserved Hanasaki Tsubomi moves in with her grandmother and ends up inheriting the will of Cure Moonlight and becomes the newest precure, Cure Blossom. Finding out her grandmother used to be the legendary Cure Flower, Tsubomi vows to protect the world as a precure and learn to change herself for the better. She’s joined by her new friend and the first person she saved as a precure, Kurumi Erika, a loud girl with a big heart who means well, but doesn’t hesitate to speak her mind. Erika becomes Cure Marine and the two become Heartcatch Precure, the newest precure in the long legacy of those who have stood up to the evil Dune, a mysterious invader who destroys planets and turns them into lifeless deserts. Heartcatch Precure fights against Dune’s minions: the mask wearing Professor Sabaku, his Desert Apostles, and the mysterious Dark Precure. Along the way they meet the former Cure Moonlight, now stripped of her power, and try to help her cope with her defeat.

Heartcatch Precure’s main theme is flowers and flower language. Everyone has a “heart flower” that the Desert Apostles take and use to create their monsters every week. As an interesting result of this, the monster of the week will be the main character in the plot of the week and often their big monster form will vent about their issues which will usually lead to a resolution when the precure return them to their regular bodies. Heartcatch also has a very nice backstory and lore to it. Unlike most iterations of precure, the Heartcatch girls are not the first precure to exist in their world, there are dozens maybe hundreds of precure that came before them, fighting against Dune and his forces for hundreds of years. It adds a lot to the narrative in small ways, especially later on in the season. Also the fight scenes are extremely excellent, especially when Moonlight is involved. 

Suite Precure♪

The musical paradise of Major Land falls under siege by the forces of Minor Land, led by King Mephisto. His goal is to steal the living notes of the “Melody of Happiness” and remake them into the “Melody of Sorrow”, throwing the world into a permanent depressive state. As a last resort, Queen Aphrodite scatters the notes into the human world and tasks Hummy, the cat-like fairy, and the Fairy Tones, to find the notes before the forces of Minor Lands can capture them. In the human world, Hummy meets Hojo Hibiki and Minamino Kanade, two girls who were best friends as children, but drifted apart as teenagers because of their tendency to bicker with each other. The two find themselves thrown together again by fate and transform into Cure Melody and Cure Rhythm to protect the things they hold dear. Not long after, the two rekindle their relationship and become closer than before, despite their bickering. Soon the girls run into the mysterious Cure Muse, a girl who appears to be a precure like them, but hides her face with a mask and refuses to join in their fight, claiming to be neither friend nor enemy. Melody and Rhythm battle against Minor Land and the giant Negatones they create from the notes they gather, as well as Siren, another cat-like fairy who used to be Hummy’s best friend before turning to evil and joining Minor Land. 

Suite Precure’s main theme is music, and it is a very encompassing theme. Hibiki and Kanade bond over their piano practice, the town they live in celebrates music frequently and is aesthetically music themed, and their powers take the form of musical instruments. Harmony is also a large theme for the two girls. Their precure power increases as they harmonize with each other, and the early season is very much about them learning to harmonize with each other. Suite also features several extremely well done mystery arcs, about the identity of Cure Muse, and various other things that I can’t very well talk about without risking spoiling things myself. If you manage to go into Suite not knowing anything consider yourself extremely lucky and be super sure not to get spoiled. The show staff went to great lengths to hide certain things, including leaking fake cure designs, and creating a second version of the second dance ending to further mask the identity of Cure Muse until her true reveal. 

Also something to note, usually precure movies have nothing to do with the plot of the show itself and can be watched whenever but the Suite movie is best enjoyed right after the arc revealing Cure Muse’s identity is concluded, it has a nice resolution to plot elements in that arc and sets the stage for the last few arcs of the show, so be sure to watch it then.

Smile Precure!

Written by Kamen Rider Kabuto head writer Yonemura Shoji, Smile Precure is the second season to feature a 5 girl team after Yes! Precure 5 Gogo!. Running late to her first day of school, resident happy-go-lucky klutz Hoshizora Miyuki runs face first into a small creature called Candy, a fairy from a place called Märchenland. The two are attacked by an anthropomorphic wolf named Wolfrun, and Miyuki transforms into Cure Happy to fight against Wolfrun and the big clown faced monster he summons called an Akanbe. After Candy explains that the legends say there are five precure, Miyuki recruits four new friends: the hot blooded Akane (Cure Sunny), shy artist Yayoi (Cure Peace), responsible older sister Nao (Cure March), and refined student council vice-president Reika (Cure Beauty). The five of them become Smile Precure and fight against Wolfrun and his allies in the Bad End Kingdom, who attempt to revive the slumbering Pierrot by trying to put the world in a “Bad End”. 

Smile Precure’s main theme is fairy tales, in a general sense. The Bad End trio are based off of the big bad wolf (Wolfrun), the oni from Momotaro (Akaoni), and the witch from Snow White (Majorina), and Miyuki herself is utterly captivated by fairy tales. The secondary theme is happiness, and the happy go lucky tone of the series often turns on its head during serious arcs to deliver extremely powerful emotional moments. Smile Precure is light on plot, and most episodes are an ultra happy experience, but the show knows how to get serious when it needs to and Smile is exceedingly competent at pulling off drama when the time comes. Smile knows how to get you invested in its characters and use that to pull on your heartstrings during the big moments. The last 10 episodes of the show are the absolute pinnacle of the show’s emotional drama, and each cure gets her own episode for closure before the finale sets in and emotionally destroys you. Also you get to play rock paper scissors with Cure Peace during her roll call so that’s always fun.

Doki Doki! Precure

Doki opens with Trump Kingdom’s destruction by the Selfishness as Cure Sword looks on, helpless. Switching to our world and brighter topics, we meet Aida Mana, Student Council President of Oogai Middle School, whose dream is to become the Prime Minister of Japan. Whenever Mana sees someone in trouble, she’ll help them out, so when a monster attacks the city, Mana does the obvious and tries to stop it. And when, chosen by the fairy Charuru (Charles? Cheryle? Cherry?) to become a Precure and defend the world, she meets Cure Sword, she has to befriend her and help her restore Trump Kingdom and find her happiness. 

Mana (Cure Heart) is joined by Rikka (Cure Diamond), her studious companion and supporter, and also the immeasurably powerful and rich (in that order) Alice (Cure Rosetta). Together they have to unravel the mystery of the man who gave them their transformation items, the missing princess of Trump Kingdom, the strange, evil girl called Regina, and Ai, the chaotic neutral baby who hatches out of an egg. 

Dokipre’s theme is love and selflessness. It also has Deep Lore, a lot of which is established in extra-series material. The show does try to explore concepts like past cures and manages a very nice repeating pattern effect with the plot, in terms of past and future happenings. There’s a lot of foreshadowing. Compared to most Precure seasons it’s very plot-heavy and even the filler usually ends up being plot-relevant. 

Happiness Charge Precure!

The 10th anniversary of Precure! The Phantom Empire is spreading across the world, and Precure are rising up all over the globe to fight them off. In Japan there are two active cures, Cure Fortune, strong and capable, and Cure Princess, scared and unsure of herself. As Cure Princess, Shirayuki Hime, struggles desperately to do her duty as precure, Cure Fortune refuses to work with her for reasons Hime doesn’t fully understand. Realizing her only hope is to find a partner to work with, Hime bumps into Aino Megumi, a super friendly girl who has a tendency to drop everything and help others any time she sees someone in need. Megumi becomes Cure Lovely, and bolstering Hime’s confidence, the two of them become Happiness Charge Precure, tasked with protecting Japan from Queen Mirage and her Phantom Empire. The two are joined by Cure Honey, and eventually Cure Fortune, and the four of them receive support from Blue, the God of Planet Earth. As the girls continue to fight and defend Japan, they are assaulted by Phantom, the ruthless Precure Hunter who has defeated and trapped countless Precure in his Precure Graveyard, and the Oresky Trio, the Phantom Empire generals who oversee the invasion of Japan. 

Happiness Charge Precure’s themes are romance and happiness. There are several arcs dedicated to the budding romances of the cures, and the backstory of the show is heavily tied to romance. Happiness might as well be Megumi’s middle name, she makes it her business to spread happiness to as many people as she can, and takes every chance she can to help others. Happiness Charge is also the first season to have form changes for the precure, each cure has a small selection of forms they can change to for different big attacks, and this concept would later be expanded and used as a core concept in Maho Girls Precure. Like Heartcatch before it, Happiness Charge exists in a world where multiple precure exist, but unlike Heartcatch all those precure exist at the same time in the present day. Other precure teams make cameos every so often and the concept creates a great world in which the whole planet is being protected by teenage girls with superpowers, creating a wonderful sense of scale that really makes the big victories of Happiness Charge Precure feel even bigger. 

Go! Princess Precure

The first precure series to take place at a boarding school! Years ago, a young girl named Haruno Haruka meets a very royal looking person named Kanata who gives her a Dress-Up Key, a big key shaped like a dress. A teenager now, Haruka starts attending Noble Academy, a prestigious boarding school, all the while holding tight to her dream of becoming a true princess, in a quasi-literal sense. Not long after starting the school year, Haruka meets Pafu and Aroma, two fairies from the Hope Kingdom desperate to revive the legendary precure to fight back against Dyspear and her minions who steal dreams to create their giant Zetsuborgs. Realizing what her Dress-Up Key is meant for, Haruka uses it and the Princess Perfume to become Cure Flora. Together with student council president Kaido Minami (Cure Mermaid), and Amanogawa Kirara (Cure Twinkle) a fashion model with huge aspirations, they become the new Princess Precure, tasked with learning to become true princesses along with protecting the Dress-Up Keys from Dyspear’s forces. 

Go! Princess Precure’s main themes are princesses (duh) and dreams. Dreams are a driving force behind all of the cures, and most of the plot of the week characters. Dyspear steals dreams to make monsters, and the precure fight to return those dreams. Characters follow their dreams with conviction, pride, and full commitment. This is also where the princess theme intersects, since it’s Haruka’s dream to become a true princess. One should note that princess is used sort of liberally in this series, it’s not that Haruka wants to somehow become someone of noble birth or have political power, she just wants to be strong, kind, and beautiful, the traits of a true princess in Princess Precure’s own terms. Also she wants to wear pretty dresses and such but who can blame her really. 

Mahou Tsukai Precure! (Maho Girls Precure!)

Quite literally putting the magic in magical girls for the first time in the franchise, Mahou Tsukai Precure was the first season to have its cures be actual magicians. Izumi Riko lives in the magical world, a world where magic is real and she attends a magical academy to hone her craft. She leaves the magical world to travel to the “non-magic” world, to search for a legendary item called the Linkle Stone Emerald. In the non-magic world she ends up catching the attention of another girl, Asahina Mirai, who sees her using magic. After trying to show off some magic and messing it up, Riko is attacked by Batty, a servant of the dark wizard Dokurokushe, who is seeking the Linkle Stone Emerald as well. As fate would have it, both Mirai and Riko carry stones that turn out to be the Linkle Stones Diamond, and the two of them use them to become Cure Miracle and Cure Magical, the legendary Mahou Tsukai Precure. Additionally, the power of the Linkle Stones grants life to Mirai’s lifelong companion, a teddy bear named Mofurun. Having discovered the world of magic and become a precure, Mirai is invited to spend time in the magical world learning magic alongside Riko, before the two, joined by Mofurun and a baby fairy named Ha, return to the non-magical world to search for the Emerald and protect it from Dokurokushe and his minions.

Mahou Tsukai Precure’s main themes are bonds and separation. It’s strengths lie in how it shows the relationship between Mirai and Riko. The show takes its time building their relationship in the first dozen or so episodes of their adventures in the magic world, highlighting their similarities and differences as they grow closer and learn to live with each other and fight as precure together. Well before the halfway mark it’s clear how strong their bond is and how deeply they care for each other, and the lengths they would go to for one another. Mahou Tsukai is an emotional ride in so many ways, every emotional moment hits its mark and the more you get attached to the characters the more the show will hit harder and harder with its moments, both sad and happy. Even side characters get satisfying and emotional conclusions to their storylines outside of the episodes they’re introduced in, it’s all wonderfully crafted.

KiraKira☆Precure A La Mode

Another return to the five cure format, Kirapre is also the second season to feature a sixth team member after Yes! Precure 5 Gogo!, as well as the second season to feature high school age precure after Heartcatch Precure. Usami Ichika is in her second year of middle school and loves sweets, especially making sweets. One day a hungry fairy named Pekorin finds her way into Ichika’s kitchen, and after being fed teaches Ichika about Kirakiraru, an energy source that exists in all sweets, and something that can be stolen and used for evil, leaving the sweets gray and tasteless. Utilizing the power of kirakraru in the shortcake she baked for her mother, Ichika becomes Cure Whip, one of the legendary patissiers, Precure. One by one other precure appear, the smart but shy Arisugawa Himari (Cure Custard), the rock band headliner Tategami Aoi (Cure Gelato), the fickle catlike Kotozume Yukari (Cure Macaron), and the responsible and helpful Kenjou Akira (Cure Chocolat). The five of them fight against the evils of Noir and those he has influenced: Julio, the mysterious masked boy who runs “experiments'' using kirakiraru, and Bibury, a mean spirited girl who uses her talking doll to steal kirakiraru and create monsters.

Kirapre’s main motifs are sweets and animals, and it has a pretty general togetherness and happiness theme going on, the standard precure stuff, mostly viewed through the lense of sweets and sweets-making. All the precure work as patissiers for one reason or another and it’s the main way the team bonds early on. The team, as well as the people of their small town, love sweets as a part of their culture and sweets maintain an important role as the emotional tie that binds most things together in the story. Overall Kirapre is a wonderful show with a great cast on both sides of the conflict, and a lot of care has been put into the show to make sure characters have their moments to interact with each other as well as have their own stories , even on a team of six every precure gets more than enough time to shine on her own. Kirapre is at it’s best when it takes two girls and puts them together for an episode, letting each unique dynamic play out in a fun and satisfying way. Kirapre is also noteworthy for the almost inarguably canonical relationship between two of the cures. It's not exactly explicit and it does leave something to be desired, since this is a Toei children's show, but there’s not really any other way to read the evolution of their relationship or their duet song, so I’m more than satisfied calling it canon.

This season is currently one of the few seasons available with official english subtitles on the streaming platform Crunchyroll 

HUGtto! Precure

Precure’s 15th anniversary! This season is in many ways a celebration of all things Precure, bringing together a lot of familiar elements from past shows into one. Hugtto! is another five cure season whose main themes are destiny and future. Nono Hana (Cure Yell) is a thirteen-year-old girl whose dream is to be a "cool and stylish woman," although she worries that others see her as childish. One day, a hamster named Harryham Harry and a magical baby named Hugtan fall out of the sky into Hana's house. They're being chased from the future by an evil organization called Criasu Corporation, who are trying to use Hugtan's power to freeze time forever. Hana makes friends with two of her classmates: the responsible class representative Yakushiji Saaya (Cure Ange) and the reclusive ex-figure skater Kagayaki Homare (Cure Etoile), and together they fight Criasu while taking care of Hugtan and figuring out the many mysteries surrounding her. Expect some light sc-fi elements and an emphasis on modern technology/social media.

Hugtto! explores its themes primarily through the lenses of childcare and the workplace, giving us a look at how each girl comes to terms with the transition from childhood to adulthood. This season does a good job of letting each member of the team shine; you spend several episodes with each girl (or duo of girls) and there's a real sense of a complete character arc for all of them. The romance aspect is, unfortunately, pretty bad: there’s a return of hetero furry romance between Harry and Homare, and Hana’s love interest exhibits some really creepy behavior towards her. There’s uncomfortable age gaps in both of these relationships too so it’s a just a bit…. Yikes. Thankfully, it’s fairly easy to ignore like past seasons, but a warning for it nonetheless.

Something that makes this season stand out is its LGBT subtext; there's a TON of it even compared to the normal amount that Precure is known for. Without giving away too much, two of the cures this season are heavily coded as lesbians (though not with each other per se), and there's a subplot concerning a side character who is pretty explicitly (well, as explicit as Toei dares to be) a gender non-conforming man/nonbinary person in love with another man, and it's all very wholesome and presented in a positive light. Again, this is Toei, so don't expect anything too radical, but I have to admit I was pleasantly surprised with how Hugpre handles it.

Finally I'll just say that while Hugpre is a fantastic season on its own, I would personally recommend waiting to watch it after you've seen some other seasons (notably Futari wa). It's not required, but since Hugpre is an anniversary season, there are a few episodes (especially near the end) that will really hit different if you have an emotional connection to the franchise already. Ultimately though this is a fairly minor part of the show, so watching this season first won’t ruin it or anything like that, it’s just something to keep in mind.

Star☆Twinkle Precure

Precure… in space! Our protagonist, Hoshina Hikaru (Cure Star) loves space and cryptids, to the point of drawing her own constellations. One of her constellations is an adorable alien puffball, who warps into Hikaru’s room almost immediately after she draws it. The puffball quickly befriends Hikaru, who names her Fuwa. They are later joined by Prunce, the team dad friend/alien mascot, and Lala (Cure Milky), a humanoid alien who is an adult in her own culture. After our initial duo gets off to a bit of a rocky start, they are joined by the student council president, Kaguya Madoka  (Cure Selene) and a biracial upperclassman who is considered to be the “sun” of the school, Amamiya Elena (Cure Soleil). Together, they explore the universe and befriend all sorts of aliens, while also defending them from the Notraiders, who want to rid the universe of all imagination. On top of that, the universe is dying and the cures need to find the 12 astrologically themed Star Pens to save it and the 12 Star Princesses. This series is notable for attempting to break the “monster of the week” format, instead making it a “fight of the week”.

The major themes of Star Twinkle are space, imagination, and maturity. The cures have to explore the universe to find the Star Pens, and in doing so, visit a bunch of different planets. About half the series is spent on Earth, but the world still feels developed! Honestly speaking, the theme of imagination is forgotten pretty quickly and I’d refer to it more as free will. The theme of maturity is where Star Twinkle really shines. All of the cures have had to grow up too fast in some way, and the series is partially about just allowing them to goof off. Lala is considered an adult on her planet, and this plot point is treated realistically. Well, as realistically as it can be. This is one series I’d recommend avoiding spoilers like the plague for, because part of the fun is in how the plot twists are pulled off. Also Star Twinkle is notable for featuring the first ever dark skinned precure, as Elena is half-hispanic. 

Healin’ Good Precure

The currently airing Precure season, as of this writing. The Byogens seek to revive their king by inflicting viruses on Earth, the Healing Garden sends three medical interns to combat them. These interns, fairies named Rabirin, Pegitan, and Nyatoran, along with a baby fairy princess named Latte, journey to Earth to find partners to become Precure. They end up meeting Hanadera Nodoka, a kindhearted girl who was hospitalized for most of her young childhood. After Nodoka risks her life to protect Latte, Rabirin chooses her to become Cure Grace. Joined by older sister type Sawaizumi Chiyu (Cure Fontaine) and the outgoing Hiramitsu Hinata (Cure Sparkle), they form Healin’ Good Precure, and defend their friends and the Earth from the Byogen’s newest wave of attacks. 

This season is currently one of the few seasons available with official english subtitles on the streaming platform Crunchyroll.

Where To Watch Precure Online

Unfortunately for us, Precure isn’t really a thing in the west. There was a dub of Futari Wa back in the early 2000’s and Smile and Doki both got “adapted” into Glitter Force over on netflix (I don’t really recommend checking those out), but really Precure just doesn’t exist over here.

However, as mentioned above, there are currently three seasons avalible for streaming on crunchyroll. The original Futari Wa Precure, Kira Kira Precure A La Mode, and the current season, Healin’ Good Precure.

Beyond these isolated examples of official releases, you can really only watch precure online on streaming sites or through torrents. You can find precure pretty much on any major anime streaming site, kissanime, gogoanime, the works. You can also try your luck torrenting the seasons, i’ve found that pretty much every season has a working torrent you can find on sites like nyaa.si or the like. For more recent seasons you should have little difficulty getting torrents, and last time i checked every season was on one of the aforementioned streaming sites. What I’m saying really is there’s no single place to find precure, but it’s not impossible to find for sure.

Thanks for reading this post, I hope you decide to check out precure and I really hope you end up loving it.Thanks to my wonderful friend @meltorights​ for writing the sections on Yespre, Fresh, and Dokipre, to @wonderlilane​ for writing the sections on Splash Star and Huggto, and @cure-cosmo​ for writing the segment on Starpre. 

If you have questions feel free to drop me an ask I’d be happy to help. I will literally go out of my way to help you if it means getting someone new into precure so please do not hesitate by any means. 

[precuredaily]

Precure Bonus Day - Leap Day Episodes

Today is February 29th, that special day that only comes once every four years, so I thought I’d commemorate the event with another look at all the episodes that have ever aired on this date! Let’s dig in, shall we?

Episode: Futari wa Precure episode 5 - “Crisis! Pissard Puts it All on the Line!” Original air date: 29 February 2004

Man we’re so early in this season that Nagisa has only met Fuji-P once. Feels like forever ago. Anyway in this episode, Mepple butters Nagisa into going to see Honoka (so he can see Mipple) and goads her about not having a boyfriend. On the way she encounters Fuji-P, whom she talks to briefly. He doesn’t much remember her, but they have a nice chat. Later on, Honoka asks her if there’s anyone she likes, and Nagisa’s mind wanders to him, but she says there’s nobody. There is this gem of a line, though.

Honoka: “If I go out with a boy, I’d want there to be mutual respect between us.” Nagisa: “It sounds difficult.”

I’m not sure whether that speaks to Nagisa’s pessimism or just the reality of the dating scene because that’s a very low bar, and yet obviously a lot of people fail to meet it. But time to move on to the next episode....

Episode: Futari wa Precure episode 5 - “Crisis! Pissard Puts it All on the Line!” Original air date: 29 February 2004

Ah, a classic episode. Nagisa and Honoka go out to the park to let Mipple and Mepple play, but they’re harassed by some boys. Nagisa wants to just ignore them but Honoka gives them a real chewing out, and Nagisa has to drag her away before she scolds them any further! Iconic! A great leap day episode. What’s next?

Episode: Futari wa Precure episode 5 - “Crisis! Pissard Puts it All on the Line!” Original air date: 29 February 2004

Okay so this is a really sweet episode where Nagisa takes Honoka to Akane’s takoyaki stand for the first time. In fact, it’s the first time we see Akane at all! There’s a funny exchange before this where they’re deciding where to get food and all Nagisa can suggest are foods with “yaki” in them: taiyaki, yakisoba, okonomiyaki, and nabeyaki udon. Honoka tries to rebut her with some more normal suggestions but ultimately Nagisa takes her to Akane’s. They chat and bond over some delicious food and do some window shopping before going their separate ways.

Episode: Futari wa Precure episode 5 - “Crisis! Pissard Puts it All on the Line!” Original air date: 29 February 2004

Oh man this is a thrilling episode! Pissard confronts Honoka on her own, demanding that she give him the Prism Stones! She obviously refuses, but he chases her across town into a construction lot. He knows that she can’t transform without Nagisa around, and he wants to take advantage of this. Honoka still refuses to help him, because he’s self-centered and only wants to preserve his own life when the Dark King controls everything, he doesn’t care for anybody else’s well being. He throws all the equipment in the construction site at her, including heavy machinery, but she stands her ground! Fortunately Nagisa shows up at the last moment and they’re able to transform and fight. Next one!

Episode: Futari wa Precure episode 5 - “Crisis! Pissard Puts it All on the Line!” Original air date: 29 February 2004

All the Leap Day episodes so far have been fantastic but this one, THIS ONE takes the cake. Pissard is out for blood, because the other generals have made it clear they have no confidence in his abilities, so he wants to prove himself. He manages to get Honoka alone but Nagisa shows up to transform with her. He confidently believes he can challenge them all on his own, and their fight travels from a construction site, to the top of a train, to a riverbank. They exchange blows, each claiming the upper hand during the battle, because Cure Black and White are still novice to this and their teamwork isn’t as good as it will become later. However, when they try to attack him with the Marble Screw, he fires back with a blast of lightning. The two sides are evenly matched, but when he tells them to just surrender to the Dusk Zone, they get righteously mad and lecture him about the value of life and independent thought. They reject his message and, with their hearts in sync, their attack powers up and Pissard can’t hold it back any more. He is destroyed by their Marble Screw, and leaves behind his Prism Stone. Honoka cries, thinking they’ve just killed someone, but Mipple assures her he’ll return in another form, without the influence of darkness. It’s an outstanding episode, an early victory for the girls and a moment of bonding and character growth for their friendship. Hands down the best leap day episode.

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Okay so yes, there’s only been one episode that ever aired on February 29, because 2004 was the last time it was a Sunday. The next time that happens will be all the way in 2032, and who knows if Precure will still be around that long. Let’s hope it is, and if so, and if I’m still around, I’ll be here to write about it for you! I hope you enjoyed my list, and i hope you had a good Leap Day! Look forward to more Precure Daily coming to you really soon!

[purplestar555]

My Precure Collection:Futari wa Precure Videogame 3/3.

ANALYSIS FUTARI GAME  

“Futari wa Pretty Cure: I Can't Believe This! The Dream Garden is a huge labyrinth!”  (ふたりはプリキュア ・ あり��な～い！ 夢の園は大迷宮) is  a GameBoy Advance video game and was the first ever Pretty Cure video game.

Story *

The story is that the Elder from the Garden of Light has called Nagisa and Honoka over to tell them the Evil King has stolen the Power of Dreams from the Garden of Dreams. Since this is the source of people's dreams, it's essential to take it back to where it belongs right away. While the Power was being transported, an accident broke it into many pieces. The girls are tasked with getting these fragments, which take the shape of hearts, back from five different worlds.

Gameplay

The game consists of controlling Black and White (not simultaneously) in order to collect the 7 hearts scattered throughout the levels and reach the goal with both of them,before you run out of time.You have to solve small puzzles to be able to catch the hearts.For example: make a character stay on top of a button to keep a door open, so that the other character can enter and take the heart.Within the levels there are Zakennas (you can defeat them if you attack them) and other traps. You only die if you run out of time, if you are attacked by a Zakenna or you fall into a trap you lose 10 seconds.I

In the game there are 5 worlds, each one contains 10 levels, with level 10 being the boss of the world.In bosses, you can only control Black (White moves automatically and copies your movements) and to defeat him you have to use the traps on the stage.When defeating the bosses, the images of Black and White come out performing the Marble Screw or Rainbow Storm.

In the levels there are also cards that you can collect (although this is optional),they are used to play a minigame.They are somewhere on the level and some are inside the Zakennas.

When you defeat the boss of World 5, you will be able to see the final scene and the credits. After this, another 5 worlds will appear. They are copies of the previous worlds, but modified to make them more difficult and put the other half of the total cards of the game.The differences that I have been able to notice are: more enemies (more together), more spikes, more water and the scenarios of the bosses are different (but the bosses are the same).(In case someone doubts, the end is the same)

Once some cards have been collected, a new option can be selected from the title screen, where the player can play a mini-game guessing which of 9 cards fits a given description, study the 9 cards which will be used in the mini-game, or view the cards they have collected in the main game. The mini-game uses a random selection of 9 cards from a fixed set of 16 cards (numbers 2-5, 12, 21-24, 27-30, 33, 35, 36). *

Controls and Menus

When you turn on the console and when the game has loaded, you will see the main menu, first you will hear Nagisa and Honoka say the name of the game and then you will hear a remix of the opening of the season.There are 3 buttons:

1: Mipple, serves to start from the beginning. You will see the story and then you will start the tutorial. Important Note: If you finish the level, the game will save and you will lose the previous game.

2: Mepple, to continue from where you left off or to choose world and level.

3: Porun, inside there are 3 submenus:

1-To play the minigame.

2-See the description of the cards.

3-See all the cards you have.

Controls within the levels:

Button A:Jump.

Button B:Attack.

RL buttons:Switch Cure.

Star button:Pause menu.

The pause menu contains:

1: Continue.

2: Restart the level.

3: Exit the level.

4: Change controls.

Select button:Move the camera to see the level. (While you're like this, time stops).

The story* and how the minigame* works I got from here: https://prettycure.fandom.com/wiki/Futari_wa_Pretty_Cure:_Ariena~i!_Yume_no_Sono_wa_Daimeikyuu

Two little things that I forgot to write: The story scenes and the end are images from episode 25. And Porun, within the levels, helps you by teaching you, saying how many hearts are left to collect and things like that.

And for now this is all I have told you about the game.I wanted to write everything I could about the game (that's why I have written all the menus and controls, in truth, the game is very easy).For now, I have only taken photos of the most important.Now, I will take some photos so that you can see a little the worlds, enemies and our dear Precure.If you have any questions, comment!

[venus-says]

Futari wa Precure Episodes 01-26

Am I rewatching precure? I can't believe this!

Yes, this is not a fever dream, I'm really rewatching precure, and not just Futari wa but THE WHOLE FRANCHISE. Am I crazy? Yes, because I'm already watching too much stuff at the same time and I barely have time for that as of right now, but I love screwing myself over so here we are!

I can't really remember the exact thing that sprung this desire of rewatching precure on me, but I've been thinking about it for quite some time now, at least since I wrapped up on the Aikatsu marathon before On Parade started, in fact, one of the reasons I started doing the old Kamen Rider reviews was because of this. I just didn't start it earlier because I'm the kind of crazy that picked a calendar, looked at the dates, and made the calcs, and realized I could watch pretty much everything in one year so I decided to keep this "project" for 2020 and start the new decade with a bang.

So this is how it'll go: I'll be dividing each season into quarters and pretty much covering one season per month with posts coming out weekly every Wednesday, the only exceptions for this rule are Futari wa and Yes! since these are the only seasons with sequels so instead of dividing into quarters I'll divide them in half and watch two seasons in a month rather than just one. Also, different from Kamen Rider's case, since I'm more familiar with the franchise and I know how the movies go I'll also be watching the movies and posting about them as I go along (All stars movies will come out usually in between the first and the second week, while solo movies will be in between the third and the forth). I really hope I don't go nuts and that this can go as smoothly as possible. XD In any case, it's precure time!

I promised myself I'd keep nostalgia out of these rewatches and do them like if it was my first time watching the series so that I can be less biased on certain aspects, but when it comes to the OGs is really difficult to not have my thoughts clouded by it. I may not have been around since Precure first aired, but Futari wa was effectively my first precure season too, I joined this bandwagon when Heartcatch was airing and I was so in love that I wanted to watch the past seasons and Futari was was my first choice and it holds a very special place in my heart because of that. I tried my best to keep those feelings out of this review and in some cases I was able to it effectively while on others not so much so, I apologize for that. XD

I usually try to separate these reviews on blocks of Plot, Characters, Designs, and commentary on specific episodes and I'm gonna try to apply this structure here more or less.

Talking about the plot... there's not a lot of it. XD

Like yeah, there's the whole Dark Kingdom attacking the Garden of Light thing, and the sort of scavenger hunt for the Prism Stones (not the Pretty Rhythm ones, just to be clear) and all of that, but there's not a whole lot going on beside it, is just Nagisa and Honoka goofing around while their friendship solidifies, they sometimes bump heads but that's pretty much it. And honestly, that's not bad, as while isn't a story about Nagisa and Fujipi the more slice-of-life portions are amazing.

The cure portion that is the problem, to start the action in these 26 episodes isn't the greatest, most of the time is just the cures being thrown away until they get fed up, say "I'll never forgive you!", hold hands, and they throw either a Marble Screw or, in rare occasions, a Rainbow Therapy. Of course, special fights with generals sometimes get a little more flare, but in general, they're pretty lackluster. Also, it feels like things weren't paced properly with the beginning and the end happening very fast and the middle being overly long in comparison. And of course, there's the element of defeating a villain or a set villains while there's still half a season ahead which means change of villains for people who we never knew existed before and apparently were a big deal, and if you read my Kamen Rider review you know how I feel about huge changes affecting the antagonists...

But oh well, I have lots of things to get through so I won't hammer on this for too long. MOVING ON.

Futari wa's biggest strength, at least for this first half, is CHARACTERS. The side cast has many hits or misses, but the protagonists Nagisa and Honoka more than compensate for it. One fun thing of this whole experience was kinda re-discovering them? Because I never watched the OG precure and Max Heart again after my first time watching like 10 years ago and I also don't have the best memory so I forgot a lot of minor things, like how Nagisa is such a downer in regards to their mission, and how positive and bright Honoka is and these are traits that are kinda opposites to their personalities with Nagisa being more outgoing and energetic and Honoka being more calm and polite, and this is so perfect and so much fun, I love it to that. Speaking of surprises I forgot how much of a savage Honoka was, like, the girl put a group of thieves on the line by just yelling at them. THAT'S THE DEFINITION OF POWER.

Unfortunately, they don't come alone. Their fairy partners, Mepple and Mipple, are... annoying. Mipple not so much, she has moments where I go "Really queen?" but for the most part she doesn't bother me, in fact, I'm sympathetic towards her who has to be partnered romantically with such a piece of crap of a male that Mepple is. I don't know why but I completely forgot the jerk that Mepple actually is and let me tell you, it wasn't fun seeing him being misogynist, selfish, and just plain rude, not just to Nagisa regularly but also with Mepple, it's actually very sad. I don't remember if he gets any better in the future, but for now, I'm hating him.

The side characters aren't very special, the girls in the Lacrosse Team and the Science Club are more or less just extensions and supporters or Nagisa and Honoka but I overall like them. The major highlights in terms of side characters are Akane and Fujipi. Akane is a huge positive because she has great energy, she's very fun, and he not only provides a meeting point for the girls but also has a mentor role, though its a very little one, that is great to see. Fujimura on the other hand... I admit, the dude is okay, he never really did anything relevant so there's nothing to hate on him per se, but he's a love interest and his situation with Nagisa never develops on any sort of way is just a very flat experience which makes his relevance even smaller so I can't help but think "what is he still doing here, just disappear with him already" every time he's up on the screen.

There's no other way to put this, the villains are plane as hell. Some of them have good designs but overall, they're very band. Pissard seems like it could've been a cool dude but we spent only 5 episodes with him, that's not enough time with him to make him interesting. Gekidrago is the boring and stereotypical "dumb villain", I think I don't need to write anything else after that. Irukubo is the stoic powerful villain, but much like in Pissard's case, we barely see him in action so it's not enough to make me care for him, and the Dark King is just a horrible CGI blob of darkness. The best villains of this first half are the siblings Poisony and Kiriya, Poisony is actually the best one of the generals seeing that she's a strategist and most of her plans were all pretty good so she was always able to get the cures corned in some way, she may have flunked her cover in that episode where she disguises as Honoka for not doing her research well before assuming the role, but overall she's amazing. Kiriya is the villain that never attacked the cures directly, as far as I remember he never summoned a Zakkenna, and putting it like this may sound like a bad thing, but trust me, it's not. He's the first precure villain to get a "redemption" and as rushed as it was his presence in the story and his arc as a character was also pretty well done so he deserves to share the podium with his sister as best villains.

Since we're talking about villains let's talk about the cures now. Black and White have a very simple design and that's not a bad thing, they're simple but they're still pretty different from each other and it's not a difference that screams to the eyes like id there was something wrong, they complement each other perfectly which only helps in making them this iconic duo that they are. The transformation items, as well as the Prism Hopeish and that notepad thingy, are very 2000's but they have their charm. I think the thing that didn't age very well were the effects for the transformations and the attacks, don't get me wrong I love their original transformation, there's a frame on it that is just marvelous, but watching with 2020's eyes there are parts that feel very wonky. Following the theme, the attacks have a very simple animation but in this case, it works because they can make some very interesting stuff with it, like launching a Marble Screw through Poisony's Umbra Witch hair.

Going into more detail on the episodes, these 26 ones feel like a normal seasonal anime, despite the pacing problems if these 26 episodes were a single season it would've worked well because there was no loose end lost in the mix, maybe the Fujipi stuff would be the only thing that would end with no proper closure, but then again that's not important so it would be a satisfying end. There were four major arcs inside this mini-season so I'll comment on them separately.

The first and shortest arc is the introductory arc that goes from Episodes 1 to 5. And there's not a lot to say here, they introduce the characters, the mission, and the character relations on a good way, there was nothing stellar but it's a good introduction to the series, the only let down is the fighting portion that is very lackluster, in special the final fight against Pissard that was supposed to be a big important moment but that in the end was just very not impressive at all.

The second arc goes from Episode 6 to 11. This is probably the most boring arc of all despite some interesting happening here, we have the introduction to the Prism Stones and the Prism Hopeish, they first use the Rainbow Therapy here, and we also have the famous arc where Nagisa and Honoka fight for the first time and tighten their bonds. These are all interesting points but the set-up for these things to happen weren't the best, like for example Nagisa and Honoka's fight, I always remembered this as a very important moment, AND IT IS, the lesson learned at the end is pretty good and it results on them calling each other for their first name which is a key moment, but all of that happened because of Nagisa's feelings for Fujipi and all that misunderstanding and ughhh that's such a boring reason to make them fight, it was really a letdown. I think after everything the thing that stroke me the most was Honoka's birthday episode and how badass she was for putting some sense into the head of three adult men, which was really magnificent. Also, the first proper fight happened in this arc in the final battle against Gekidrago, it was short but it was good nonetheless.

The biggest arc is the third one that goes from Episodes 12 to 21. This is my favorite arc and a big part of it is because Poisony and Kiriya start to get active here. I don't know how to explain but their addition to the cast made things more dynamic and interesting to watch. Poisony's plans always led to interesting situations like when she hypnotized their classmates that were playing dress-up as the cures, or when she trapped them inside that mirror dimension, or even her last moments in the show where she used that old trick of impersonating someone and making the protagonist having to choose who's the real and who's the fake one, you know even if the precure portions weren't the best, they were put in the most interesting situations in this arc. Together with that, we have Kiriya that goes through a very interesting arc, until now I don't really know why he infiltrated in the school since, as I mentioned, he never acted directly as a villain against the precure (not as far as I can remember) but his interactions with the crew and especially his relationship with Honoka was quite interesting to see it develop. My high points from this arc were episode 18, the one where a girl confesses her feelings for Kiriya - there's a lot of interesting stuff happening here, and episode 20, Poisony's defeat and one of the best fights of this portion of the season. My low point would be episode 19 more because Mepple is being a jerk here than anything else, but I didn't enjoy this episode as much as I did to the other in this arc.

The final arc of this portion is another small one, it covers episodes 22 to 26, and this one is very odd. We start with a filler centered around Honoka's dog of all things that are followed by two two-parters that wrap-up this first half. I'm gonna be honest I don't like this arc, one because it introduces Pollun and two because the "final" fight is very unimpressive, yeah Shining Star debuts here and is a big moment but overall isn't the best, which is understandable after all are two girls launching a beam at a giant dark blob of CGI and there's not a whole lot there, but its fun to see a preview of what will become the Extreme Luminario in the next season. I also don't like how they didn't let the episode finish on a downer note with both of the girls missing their partners and such. But oh well, at least we had Episodes 23 and 24 here there were very interesting, they had this mystery/horror film vibe to it and I loved it.

And that's pretty much all I had to say! Thank you for reading all of this mess, I really appreciate it, I'm very excited to be doing this and I hope I can count with your support through this year. What are your thoughts on Futari wa? Let me know in the comments. I'll see you, folks, on a next time, and don't forget, if you ever see a shooting star be careful with what you wish for, a cellphone thing may fall from the sky right on your head and unless if you're an anime girl you will be in risk of having a concussion. XD In any case, see you around. o/

[mprimn]

If I were to make an excuse for why I haven't uploaded anything in a month, this game is to blame.

The new idolm@ster game? Nah, I'm not playing that. I'm already busy with Star Rail and other stuff. The system also looks complicated. I don't want to touch any game like umamusume ever agaiー

Errr, what just happened...? And why is it 2am now...?

That, and this weird guilty feeling where if I haven't completed my homework, I shouldn't be writing here. I've been getting a lot of assignments where I have to write at least a thousand Japanese character report for multiple subjects. I don't have the mood to do some of them right now, so I decided to write something here instead (if I keep on waiting to finish all my work, I'll probably never get to update this blog).

As much as I wanted to complain about how unfair it is that the English class only has to write 500 words for the same subject for the millionth time, I should be talking about other things like how I went to Tokyo with my fellow university friends.

Going to Tokyo wasn't in my weekend plan, but I'm still too nervous to travel by myself so I came along for experience. Some of our classmates are currently studying in Tokyo, so they kindly allowed us to stay at their dorm. We went to this fair that has a theme of our country only to be disappointed at how bland the food taste. It was also getting crowded, thus we moved elsewhere.

We spent half a day walking around Tokyo, looking for specific spots that was used as background in the movie Kimi no Na Wa because my friend is a huge fan. She made me take a lot of pictures for her even though I know nothing about how to take a good photo (whoever travels with her was destined to become her personal photographer at least once or more).

She kept saying she gained weight and that she looks fat but I honestly couldn't tell. To each their own, I guess.

This photo was a quick one I did before having to take a video of my friend walking up and down the stairs. There were less than 10 tourists there including us so we all had the place to ourselves. I might've gotten a cleaner shot without people if I waited a bit longer but I'm happy with this one.

On the last day before going back, we went to Harajuku with other friends of a friend (I couldn't remember who is who anymore). I volunteered to take care of our bags because every coin locker in the train station was full so while my friend went shopping, I was sipping iced cocoa in starbucks. I wasn't in the mood to walk and I've been here before anyway. I even completed half of my assignment while waiting for them too.

Apparently, the hardest part of travelling to Tokyo was actually the way back. The way we had to rush onto one of the last few buses of the day to get back to our dorm. Thank god we made it because I'd rather commit unalive than having to walk while dragging a large suitcase for a whole hour. The poor junior who went with us almost couldn't make it back as he was late by a few minutes. Me and my friend thought he had to sleep at the station for the night.

I immediately became busy for the next 3 weeks. I had to prepare for a presentation about "something interesting I found in town", went on 2 field trips for different classes that I have to write those long reports after, got addicted to a new game(?), and went to do an interview for the part time job.

To my surprise, they accepted me even though I intentionally screwed up half of my quiz answers. I was starting to get lazy because after recording my expenses for 2 months, I found out that I can survive without getting a job. Though, I'm more than glad to have some extra cash to compensate that 50k yen taxi fee and to cover my foolish purchases in the future, which might as well be now since my junior just pointed out that there actually is an animate where we live.

Looking forward to snatch some gakumas goods if they don't sold out. First time I went there only Sena, China, and especially Sumika were left. And I thought she's the popular one...

[mprimn]

There were so many things to talk about that I can hear the thoughts in my head crashing against each other.

I've been typing and deleting a single sentence for well over 15 minutes now. I haven't written a post in a while, but I really wanted to write something. To be fair, there wasn't anything relatively interesting to talk about until last week.

Most of the days went on the same. I go study, come back, play games, sleep, and repeat. Sometimes I'd join a group of exchange students that cook and share food from their countries at dinner time. Thank to them, my meals now have more variety than frozen food or cafeteria lunch that I never bother to change my order.

Me and the classmate that came to this same exchange program has been getting along well. She usually let me hang out in her room while she cooks. I mostly help with washing the dishes because, well, that should be obvious. One day last week I was still at her room while we chat about random stuff. It was getting late, and I was thinking of going back to my room. We suddenly heard a loud noise.

And before we knew it, the whole room was shaking.

My first earthquake experience was a 5.0 magnitude with the center right in the province I live in.

Luckily, the shake lasted a couple of seconds. It was so short that fear didn't even get a chance to register in my brain. A small aftershock also followed after, but it was nothing compared to the main quake so no one really cared. I guess this is what it feels like to live in a country where earthquake is a normal occurrence.

Few days later me and a couple other exchange students went to Hitachi Seaside Park. We all got crowded on a small car of this kind Japanese friend who was living to drive us there. The whole ride was chaotic because the junior from my country kept trolling the poor Japanese guy to say bad words in our language.

Before seeing the Nemophila, we hung around the amusement park area first. Half of the group decided to get on some rides while the other half chose to spend money on consumables.

Here is my failed attempt at taking a photo of the two-tone ice cream because right after the seller handed it to me, the thing started melting too soon that I had to finish it all.

Fortunately, I had enough time to get a second cone because some weren't done with the attractions yet (the ice cream also tasted so good that I was willing to have another one despite the expensive price).

Once everyone gathered up, we finally headed to the most popular spot of the park, and the view was breathtaking.

The Nemophila field looks just like what I saw on the TV so it kind of felt unreal to me. Both local and foreigner tourists can be seen on every part of the field because this was the last few days before the seasonal flower gets changed.

We found a couple of cosplayers at the park too. There were Riddle, Ace, and Deuce from twst who came as a group, Artoria Caster from fgo who seem to come with her photographer, and Frieren Himmel duo who were done with their shoot and was taking photos with everyone who passed their way. They then got misunderstood as characters from Evangelion by a random couple who were behind us. Seriously baffled at how they could guess so wrong.

I of course didn't miss the chance of taking photos of my oshi plushie in this stunning scenery. Please witness them below.

My yumejoshi brain considered this trip our date.

I had several more photos of the plushie, but most of them are with food with similar angles so they're rather boring looking if put together. I will need to look for more photo ideas from now on.

[mprimn]

The sakura trees at Senba Lake were gorgeous.

I'm glad to have such an outgoing friend because I can count on them to invite me to join their trip or else I'd be in my room all day and my mother wouldn't like that.

Me and the others had some ramen at a shop in Mito station first (the shoyu ramen tasted so bad I was offended at how they fumbled on such a basic menu) then we got on a taxi to the location because Japanese bus schedule is a pain in the ass.

Because it is currently spring, the sakura was in full bloom which explained the amount of people there. All my friends waited in queue to rent a pedal boat while I chose to stay on land.

Thanks to the windy weather, I successfully complete 1 whole round around the lake without breaking a sweat. That somehow impressed my friends who all gave up and waited for me at the entrance. Well, I didn't spend 30 minutes screaming for life while pedaling a boat, so I obviously have more energy to spare.

Since there were so many people, I couldn't help but feel like I was being silently judged whenever I take out my oshi's nesoberi. Would I get the same treatment if the plushie wasn't an anime character? I ignored the stares and managed to get a couple of photos.

This is where I proudly presented my masterpiece;

I like to imagine we sat here together for a moment as we stared into the distance, watching the ducks floating by.

Some sakura branches were low enough for me to reach so I of course had to put him next to the flowers.

And now, my most favorite one so far;

This one was actually taken at a park near my dorm the week before, but it also has sakura so I wanted to put it here. I tried to do the same at Senba Lake but the sakura petals immediately fell from my touch. The flowers had been blooming for quite some time, after all (they mostly all fell by now as I noticed from the trees in my university).

It was getting late, so we headed back to Mito station and have dinner at an Italian restaurant. I heard another group of exchange students went to the same place, but I didn't expect to run into them here as we didn't see them at the lake. Our seats were even at the opposite side of each other.

I ordered carbonara spaghetti and ice cream for dessert. Everything tasted lovely. If the shop isn't so far away from the dorm I would like to eat here often.

Tomorrow I'm finally meeting with my tutor after class to finish my official documents. We barely talk at all, and I honestly feel kind of bad. There is actually a requirement where I have to meet up with the tutor at least once a week, but I've only met her once on the first day. We need to get to know each other better very soon.

[mprimn]

Second week in and I already caught a cold.

It lightly rains all day long, which is so annoying. People here don't seem to bother using an umbrella when you can barely feel the rain either. I thought I would be fine, but now I have a sore throat and nonstop runny nose (a tissue is plucked into my nose as I'm writing).

Yesterday, I went to the station in the city with a friend and got a Miku keychain from DAISO. She will now guard my dorm key for the rest of my stay if she doesn't choose to run away first.

As we explored the mall, we found a floor that only sells second-hand items. I saw a glass that looked identical to the one my mom bought from a Japanese second-hand store in my country, so I had to take a picture and send it to my family group chat.

Mom confirmed that it's the same glass.

The world can feel so small sometimes.

There were also cheap figurines and anime goods that were still in decent condition. I actually found a couple of twst plushies for only 200 yen each. That's crazy cheap for a popular franchise. I ended up leaving the plushies where they were as I, unfortunately, am a horrible owner when it comes to keeping dolls.

Talking about twst, I got both Vil's SSRs from the event and his newest birthday gacha in 80 pulls. I usually have to reach 100 pity for his majesty to grace upon my account with double SSRs, which isn't that bad because nothing will ever top the Fairy Gala Leona incident (I switched my oshi to Vil because of that). Can't wait for the event to be over so I can groovy the event SSR.

Classes will be starting on Thursday. Japanese courses are determined by a small test me and other exchange students did last week. I may have done too well as I was put in the highest level, making me have to beg the Japanese teachers to put me in a lower class. In tears. By accident.

I could've skipped the harder questions, but I was afraid my score would be too low as people already know I have N2. I'm just not mentally ready to study N1, especially in Japan. Studying isn't my main priority here. The teachers suggested that I try first class on both levels first before I make my decision. I've already made my mind but agreed anyway.

And instead of runny nose, my nose has become stuffed. I'm glad I postponed the meeting with my Japanese tutor to another day because I'm not feeling very well right now.

I think I'm going to sleep a bit more until it's noon and shower later.

[mprimn]

It has been 3 days since I arrived in Japan.

They wouldn't allow students to enter the dorm until a specific date, so I flew on the day before as I didn't want to spend money on hotels. It was a late-night flight so it was mostly peaceful, except that one toddler in the far front who cried from time to time.

A girl in front of me decided to watch 2005 version of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory so I just watched from her screen the whole flight. There were so many details and scenes that I have forgotten because I saw the movie when I was very young.

The flight attendants kept mistaking me and the Japanese lady's nationality during service which I found quite funny. They thought the Japanese lady was from my country, but when they realized she wasn't they somehow assumed I was also Japanese. I replied to them in Japanese anyway because why not. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

When the plane landed it started raining, making the temperature a lot cooler than I expected. The immigration process took so long that once I got out of the airport I only have a few hours left to travel to the appointed destination. I went down to the train, but the ticket booth was super crowded that I'd have to wait for another train for almost an hour. The bus had only 1 trip per day to my destination won't be coming soon, so I bit the bullet and got on a taxi.

There is a reason why Japanese people avoid taxis.

The service was top notch, but it came with a price.

A ridiculously expensive one.

(And that I also told the driver to take the fastest route, so it costed even higher)

Dear my parents, if you're reading this, I'm so sorry I spent 50k yen on 2 and a half hour ride from Narita to Mito. I will make sure to find a part time job once I know of my study schedule.

After reaching the destination, I paid the driver with my credit card so I signed the receipt with my signature in my language.

Apparently, that's when the driver realized I'm a foreigner.

He seemed shocked and amazed because after apologizing (I asked him to repeat something, but he didn't make it sound easier to understand so I just nodded), he complimented my accent saying how natural it was.

It may have something to do with my appearance too since I'm Asian. Even the local students at the dorm said I look like a Japanese. It was kind of fun at first, but I'm starting to feel like it's more of a debuff because instead of yasashii nihongo, I will be hit with normal level speech that can be very hard to listen.

In the evening of the first day, me and other 2 students from my country went to 3 different supermarkets to find items for our dorm. They even rode bicycles to a Donki far deep in the city to buy pillows (only mattress is provided in the dorm), utensils, and so much more. There were only 2 bicycles available so I just waited for them at the lounge, praying for their safety because one said they almost crashed into a car.

The two bought lots of ingredients to cook food on their own while I mostly bought instant meals. I don't feel like cooking because I'll have to wash the dishes, so I bought different food and put them together.

Personally, I think it turned out great.

The students from my country came from the same university and one is a classmate of mine. They are a cheerful person and a socializer. They probably befriended most of the exchange students already at this point. Thanks to them introducing me to others, I was able to talk and make friends with more people. Everyone was really kind. Some students' Japanese or English skills might not be very strong, but nothing can stop any of them from having fun together.

Tomorrow after sending in our documents at the City Hall, the exchange students are planning to have a barbeque party. I also heard another party will be held after too. It hasn't been a week, yet everyone seemed to close to each other. From a view of someone who's socially awkward, I find that fascinating.

I hope to get to know more of everyone soon.

[mprimn]

2.1 update, and a dream come true.

Happy 1st Anniversary to Honkai Star Rail!

I'm so glad the update came a few days before my flight or else I'd be distracted from everything. Though, I already am distracted because I should be packing my stuff right now. I'll leave that to me in the future.

As someone who used to play Guns Girl Z it's nice to see how far miHoYo had come, especially HOYO-MiX. While I couldn't say much about the story (I unfortunately am a dialogue skipper), I've always loved their music. Sometimes I would boot GGZ up only to go to the OST section and listen to my favorite tracks for hours. Even after I dropped Genshin Impact from burnout, I still find myself checking out OST of newer updates from time to time. Heck, whenever my brain gets too loud at night, I would calm myself down with Liyue or Dragonspine playlist. Yet somehow, it's different when it comes to HSR.

But before that let me slide one of my favorite tracks from GGZ here ;

There is something about older music that sounds simpler yet enjoyable when compared to what we usually hear now. A banger from the past. Not saying one is better than another, of course. HOYO-MiX always delivers.

HSR OSTs are really good. I honestly don't know why it didn't hit me as hard as the other two games. There is only one track so far that strike my interest enough to make me hunt it down on YouTube so I can loop it while laying on my bed as I stare at the ceiling (the one named "Stade du Miroir" if you're curious). I've also said above that I'm a story skipper. Then what exactly keeps me on hook? To be fair, I've always felt neutral about HSR.

Until he arrived.

Look at this man.

A beauty bestowed upon Xianzhou Luofu.

I was intrigued.

From that day on, my goal was set.

Meta or whatever.

If he isn't E6 I'm not pulling for anyone else.

It was a miracle that I managed to get Luocha to E2 on his first banner. I couldn't remember how much I pulledーNo, I'm not a whale. I'm but a little dolphin who purchased a couple of monthly passes. Welt also came home on one of the pulls along with Luocha. Maybe he's trying to stop this pretty blonde from reaching me. After all, his past encounters with similar looking men didn't end well. I had a feeling I got the 3rd Luocha on a solo a day or two before the banner disappeared too.

Charming new characters appeared left and right as the story progress, but I stayed strong (I didn't. I accidentally got Blade while trying to build pity, tried for Argenti and stopped before I hit 50/50 then lost about 50 pulls to Ratio LC). Sunday and Aventurine worried me because oh boy, how would I be able to resist those two. Thankfully, as I'm writing, Luocha's rerun came together with Acheron. I would've lost it if Aventurine was first.

Long story short, this is the final result after around 250 pulls.

I have 21k stellar jades left, so I may be able to save enough for Aventurine (or Sunday if he is confirmed to be playable). Though, I'll have to wait for guides to help me collect chest because my head still hurt after completing the main story. Penacony maps make me feel dizzy and somehow the main story makes it even worse.

Now I have an excuse to stop playing HSR for a few days so I can continue preparing for my flight.

Sigh...Can I skip every process and just warp there?

[mprimn]

Honestly, I have no idea where to start.

The last time I successfully journal something was probably when I first visited Japan. It was an 8-day trip where I got to spend most of my time at the countryside of Takasaki, along with other students. As proud as I am to be part of this program where we didn't have to pay a single penny (personal expenses excluded), I couldn't help but feel jealous of the other group from the paid program where they got to tour a planetarium and even went to an amusement park. Meanwhile, we had to impress the locals and were told to maintain our public image over and over again. The only time I felt free was during the last 2 days where we finally get to be in Tokyo to buy souvenirs. But enough of that for now.

A couple of years had passed since then. As I've continued studying Japanese, I managed to apply for a one-year exchange program and will be flying in less than 2 weeks. So, I think it will be a good time to attempt journaling again. My original plan was to do it on Facebook, but the recent reel update was my last straw (short form content will forever be my enemy). Because of that, I dusted off this Tumblr to document my upcoming experience in the foreign country.

I couldn't help but feel nervous. I may have been to Japan once, but I was accompanied by the teachers. All I had to do was just follow what they say. If anything happens, I know I could count on the adults to solve the problem. But this time is different. I will be on the plane alone (as in without people I know). I have to travel to the meeting point on my own. I have to do so many things by myself. I am the adult.

I've been living with my parents my whole life, so I'm unsure of what lies ahead. Which is exactly why I need to go out there. To step out of my comfort zone. While I despise the idea of growing up, it's inevitable. I sincerely hope that this opportunity will help me improve as a person because if I want to support my oshis, I need to able to support myself first.

In the end, I guess I just want to be able to pay for my most favorite band in the world for the rest of my life.

TLDR; weeb wants to get back into journaling and have a sustainable life to support their oshi

[paulisliveblogs]

So she didn't tell Mipple.

Mepple be like: I go to sleep and when I wake up you've messed thing up THIS badly?

We all do girlie.

You know that you have to apologize or that Mipple wants you to apologize?

Are you going to write your apology in the marketable diary?

So me except I never did homework until last minute and badly because there's nothing I avoid more than hw. Avoiding homework motivates me into fixing my interpersonal relationships messes.

Gurl.

[precuredaily]

Precure Bonus Day: “Futari wa" Era Overview

Across the last year and 4 months, I rewatched all of the Futari wa Precure branded shows that ran from 2004-2007. These three shows form the foundation of the Pretty Cure franchise that currently spans 16 television series, 27 movies, and multiple stage shows. The end of the FW era marks the beginning of a shift away from the franchise’s roots, so before I dive into Yes! Precure 5 and beyond, I want to take the time to reflect and analyze the past three seasons as a whole. What did they have in common? What aspects did they change? Where did each show succeed and fail, and what common threads are there between these successes and failures?

Hopefully it goes without saying that there will be spoilers, but just in case, I will be discussing each of these series in their entireity, including plot twists and details about their finales.

Futari wa Precure (2004)

Obviously, this is the show that kicked it all off. Toei made this two years after their highly popular Ojamajo Doremi series ended, with the gap year 2003 being filled with a non-magical girl shoujo anime called Ashita no Nadja. I don’t think they meant to start a franchise, and honestly I don’t think they even meant to make it a year-long show. The plot wraps up pretty nicely in episode 26: Nagisa and Honoka have defeated all the henchmen and the main villain and they can return to their normal lives, having become great friends along the way. However, it was popular and the merchandise sold well, so they continued it. At least that’s my theory, maybe it really was meant to be an annual show, but the back half feels extremely stagnant and not particularly connected to the first half. They changed the objective, changed the villains, and the animation quality went down the toilet.

Nonetheless, it established important concepts for this era: most obviously, the two-girl team. It’s in the title: “We Two are Pretty Cure” (there’s a reason you don’t see it translated much, lol) The two girls also come from different walks of life, and would probably not have much reason to interact if it weren’t for being Precure. This first season in particular establishes something of a yin-yang theme with the two. Short hair and long hair, sporty and scientific, middle class and upper class, black and white. While less prominent, this idea of girls from diverse backgrounds coming together will remain a theme well beyond the FW era, to the point where the current (as of this writing) team consists of two space aliens. A key element of the two-girl teams is that they have to transform together. They cannot operate as individuals; they are a pair and they are strongest when they work together. From a writing standpoint, this is an excellent idea that allows for a lot of scenarios that can test and strengthen their partnership.

Another big aspect of FWPC is the supporting cast that flesh out the world. Nagisa and Honoka have friends other than each other, who sometimes have their own story arcs despite not being the main characters. Shiho stands out from this series, as we saw her develop and explore an interest in theater, but possibly the unexpected breakout character was Odajima Yuka. I’m getting ahead of myself, because she didn’t really click with me until her single appearance in Max Heart, but that wouldn’t have been meaningful without her sporadic presence in this show. There are also a half dozen other characters who get a focus episode and then recur in the background throughout the show, and I love the consistency. The girls have love interests and we get to see them wrestle with their feelings. It all makes the girls feel more ordinary, despite their secret lives as superheroes. They have normal lives with normal problems. The girls aren’t the center of the universe, they just happen to be the focus of the show, and there are lots of other people that also inhabit it, going about their lives, whose paths sometimes cross with the main characters’.

FWPC established a bit of a trend for the villain faction: they were fronted by a big, giant monster of literal darkness and each of the subordinate generals has a portion of the macguffin. Each general had a gimmick in how they plotted and attacked, be it brute force, overwrought scheming, subterfuge, or infiltration. The inevitable result of this was that some villains felt more interesting than each other, of course. Pisard and Gekidrago were nothing but archetypes. Poisony had a personality, because she played off of her brother Kiriya, and he had his own arc where he learned to appreciate the good side of humanity. Ilkubo combines aspects of several of them, being extremely powerful and basically the Dark King’s right hand, but for all his gesturing he doesn’t amount to much. The Three Seeds of Darkness from the second half of the show have less going for them. They have personality quirks but they’re not particularly memorable as characters. A lot of their time was spent sitting around saying “We need to find the macguffin.” Their most interesting moment was when they realized that they would be consumed by the Dark King, and tried to betray him (unsuccessfully), otherwise they were just kind of there to pad out the series.

Aside from the down-to-earth nature of the characters and the world, the other biggest element that FW gives us, which the series became famous for, is the fighting. The show’s director, Nishio Daisuke, had recently come off of work on the Dragon Ball series, and he went into Precure with the mindset that “girls like action too.” The combat is physical, the girls kick and punch the monsters rather than fighting with magic wands or special attacks, except for the finisher. This set Precure apart from the crowd and I honestly think it was a big contributor to its early success. It offered little girls something they didn’t often get without branching out into the other Sunday morning offerings, which were targeted at boys. Nishio was good at directing action and he made the fights entertaining to watch.

The major failures of FWPC are some truncated character arcs. Kiriya deserved better than to be forgotten halfway through the series, only to come back as something of a guiding spirit at the end and then die an unsatisfying death. Yumiko (the lacrosse captain) was completely forgettable despite the show trying to make her a notable recurring character. Some of the early guest characters of the week had really lame reasons to exist, like Mayu (the girl who looked like Nagisa). The Seeds of Darkness were utterly lame villains so the second half of the show feels less compelling than the first half. Also, the ending is just kind of strange. Mipple, Mepple, and Porun go to sleep seemingly forever, and Nagisa and Honoka’s graduation feels bittersweet when they think about that and see a boy that looks like Kiriya. I’m still not sure if the ending was so sad because they knew the sequel was coming or despite it, so if it’s the former, it’s a strange choice that only kinda works if they knew that the audience knew that Max Heart would be starting the next week and all the sad stuff would be undone. If it’s the latter, then it’s a bold choice to have a downer ending that was undercut by the show’s own popularity. Either way, I don’t think it was effective given the direction Max Heart took. Without Max Heart I’d consider it strong, but I can’t ignore the effect of the sequel. Art doesn’t exist in a vacuum.

Futari wa Precure Max Heart (2005)

Max Heart is an interesting animal. As the sequel to a fairly closed-ended series, it has to invent a reason to exist and uh.... it doesn’t do that very well. The Dark King apparently attacked the Queen of Light before his defeat, and now a few months later she dies and splits into her life, heart, and 12 wills, each of which are marketable in their own way. It essentially turns into another Macguffin quest, but the girls aren’t even actively seeking out the Heartiels, they just come to them. And unlike FWPC’s quest which wrapped up in the first half of that show, they stretch this one out for the entire season, so it gets tiring. That’s my big criticism of MH, but it’s not all bad.

Nagisa and Honoka were enjoyable characters in the first season and I am beyond delighted to get to spend another year with them. This season sees them deepening their friendship as they deal with their new leadership positions in their clubs, offering advice to underclassmen who are struggling with issues they dealt with in the first season, and further exploring Nagisa’s romantic feelings. She finally confesses to Fuji-P at the end of the show, even if he doesn’t actually hear her and consequently nothing comes from it. Season 1 Nagisa would never have gotten that far. Honoka’s development is rather subdued. She learns how to be a good club leader, and in episode 17 she helps push the club out of safe territory for the sake of their passion, but there’s really not much else to be said. She acts as Nagisa’s life coach sometimes when she has anxiety about her future, and helps her confess to Fuji-P, but she really does take a backseat this season next to Hikari. With that said, let’s talk about Hikari!

Hikari is, of course, a new character for this show, and thus her character arc is the most prominent of the trio. She also has more room to grow, since she starts out as basically an empty shell. Even if she is the Queen’s Life, she fully develops into her own person with her own life, friends, interests, and personality. Her overall kindness is probably a side effect of the Queen but she’s still not the Queen. She goes to school, makes friends, gets a job, builds a family, and generally discovers the joy of life. She’s a really enjoyable character to follow, because her journey isn’t just friendship like Nagisa and Honoka’s was, but becoming human. The tragic irony of her character is that the more of an individual person she becomes, the closer the Queen’s resurrection is, which means losing Hikari, and by rights this should form the backbone of the show’s conflict, but they don’t really seem to get this until the last quarter. They raise the question periodically but they don’t give it the discussion it deserves, and that’s a major weakness of the series. They ignore the problem until they can’t anymore. If they had given the audience the sense that this was intentional, that they were actively ignoring the matter, then it could have been interesting. Unfortunately, we never get the sense that Nagisa and Honoka were deliberately ignoring the inevitable question, and it seemed more like they just didn’t care.

As Shiny Luminous, Hikari somewhat changes the team dynamic, but she’s also not just a third fighter like Black and White. She is less combative, except when she has to be, and instead her abilities are more support-oriented. She stays back and activates barriers, slows down the enemy’s movements, and powers up Black and White. Her lack of combat skills means that sometimes Black and White have to protect or save her during fights, which interrupts the flow of battle and can make the fights a bit more drawn out than in the first season. I appreciate what they were trying to do by adding Luminous, and I am not in any way calling her a bad addition to the team, but her particular skills aren’t a very good fit for the style of fights that this show was built on. A lot of times she hides away from fights instead of transforming, making her more vulnerable. It seems like the staff wrote themselves into a corner with that aspect of her, and weren’t sure how to properly utilize her abilities.

The villains in Max Heart are an odd bunch. They’re slightly more memorable than the Seeds of Darkness, but no more competent. Their fights are meaningless, because Baldez is the only one who understands what’s going on with Hikari and Hikaru and the Dark King’s resurrection, and he doesn’t explain anything to the other three, so sometimes they just straight up defy his orders because he hasn’t told them what their objective is. I’m fine with villain infighting but I want there to be a good reason, a clash of ideals or something, not just straight up lack of communication. They have personalities, but that doesn’t play into their fighting styles in any meaningful way. The most interesting thing about them is how they form a family around Hikaru, and try to nurture and protect him while he grows. It brings out the soft side in some of them at home, and causes them to lash out in anger if he comes in contact with the girls somehow. Watching how Hikaru grows and parallels Hikari’s growth was a nice subplot. I’ve never been certain if the audience was supposed to recognize that he was the Dark King’s life before they reveal it in the series, but I really hope they were. Hikaru goes from a carefree kid content with living in the manor to wanting to get out of the house and see more of the world, which leads him into contact with Hikari on a few occasions, spiking each of their innate powers. Since he’s younger, though, he never reaches Hikari’s level of emotional maturity, which actually makes him a little more tragic because he’s just a little kid who unknowingly hosts this great evil. He just wants to do his own thing. Fortunately, in the end he is able to have a life with Hikari and Akane, even after the Dark King is destroyed. Which brings me to.....

Baldez. The final arc where Baldez revives the Dark King and then reveals that he himself now has the power of the Dark King is a neat subversion on expectations. He was always the most mysterious villain of the bunch, he was absent for half of the series and when he was around he played his cards close to his chest. He encouraged Hikaru’s growth by stoking Hikari’s development, and got in the way of Uraganos, Circulas, and Viblis when they tried to defeat her outright. He was a large threat to the girls whenever he did appear, and in a lot of aspects he seems like a precursor to Gohyaan. Ultimately though I can’t say he left a big impression. Most of the time he sat around the mansion saying “They’re developing nicely, the Dark King’s revival is soon....” and rarely set foot on the battlefield. He had no personality to speak of, and didn’t answer to anybody, so he was just flat and boring.

The next thing I want to discuss about Max Heart are some continuing storylines. I discussed the evolution of Nagisa and Honoka’s characters, but their friends get some further development as well. Shiho comes to mind, of course. In the first season she flexed her creative muscles by directing the action version of Romeo and Juliet for the cultural festival. In the sequel she goes a step further, deciding that she wants to be a Hollywood movie director, and chooses to incorporate special effects into their school play. It’s not a lot, but since not a lot of the side characters even get a character arc, it sticks out. However, there’s one character from the first series who didn’t get much to work with who suddenly is a lot more interesting when she recurs in this season, and that is Odajima Yuka, which is especially surprising since she only appeared in one episode, but due to it, all her past appearances suddenly make more sense. This is the episode where she, as a high schooler, joins the middle school science and lacrosse teams on their annual retreat, and ends up challenging Nagisa in a game. She gets out there, works her hardest at a sport she’s never played, and goes toe to toe with the team’s star player. They never outright say this, but what Yuka needed was to be challenged, to compete against somebody at her level. In all of her encounters, Nagisa is the only person who can outrun her. Nagisa may be clumsy at times, but she excels at athletics and gives Yuka the challenge she craves. In fact I think Yuka even envied Nagisa’s laid-back lifestyle. It is remarkable to me that the writers brought her back for Max Heart at all, and saw fit to conclude her story. She was never an important character, but she was memorable, largely because of this season. Later seasons with more main characters tend to sideline their supporting cast, so it’s nice that a minor character gets this kind of focus.

Lastly, there was some attempt to develop Akane early on. There was a three episode arc where a man from her old job stopped by and the girls all thought he was trying to pull her back into an office job. In the end, she declined his offer but he was still interested in dating her. She seemed to take to the idea, and there had been some hints that she wanted to get married and have kids someday, but after this arc, her potential suitor was never seen again and nothing more ever came out of it, beyond her effectively adopting Hikari and Hikaru as her children. It would be interesting to see adult romance play out, even in the background. The first season had Ms. Yoshimi getting married but we never saw any of her life outside the classroom, so giving Akane a little bit more spotlight would have been nice. Sadly, this was not the direction the show took.

Max Heart also got the theatrical treatment, and the movies were honestly very good. Famously, it’s the only series to get two movies, because the first film was originally intended to be just a FWPC film. They share a premise of whisking the girls off to a different land to resolve a problem that the locals are having, and they have their friendship tested along the way before coming out as better and stronger friends than before, acquiring exclusive new forms to defeat the villains. These would become signature elements of all Precure movies.

As I said earlier, the ending to FWPC was very finite, and that was strange juxtaposed to the fact that there was an imminent second season. There’s some strange irony, then, that the finale to Max Heart, the final series that will ever follow this cast of characters, feels a lot more open. It ties off loose ends, of course, and Nagisa and Honoka graduate from middle school, but while it’s implied that Mepple and Mipple go to sleep again, and Hikari is gone after reviving the Queen, less than two minutes pass for the viewer before they find out she and Hikaru are living with Akane, and that all their fairies are awake and as energetic as ever. Even though there ultimately weren’t any shows with these characters, there is room for more. Could they have known what the franchise would become? Could they have had any idea that these characters would still be popular 15 years later?

Futari wa Precure Splash Star (2006)

Splash Star is of course the first full reboot. I don’t know why, maybe they didn’t think they could continue the story of Nagisa and Honoka into high school. Could’ve been neat, but I’ll save the “what ifs” for another time. It rebooted the series, and that set a precedent for shows to follow. It keeps the two girl dynamic of course, and the visual similarities are hard to ignore, but those are fairly superficial, and it manages to find its own identity while improving on the ideas of the prior shows. The theme of the show changes from yin and yang to nature, and that affects everything: the aesthetics of the heroines and villains, the objectives they fight for, and most especially the combat style.

Once again, one girl is athletic while the other has a more academic hobby. Saki has two major friends on the softball team where Nagisa had two major friends on the lacrosse team, but Mai’s companion in the art club is less notable than Yuriko was to Honoka. This time they attend a coed school, and their circle of friends includes a couple of boys, as well as another girl who isn’t a member of either of their teams. Splash Star does the best job at managing its recurring and ensemble cast out of these three seasons. Characters are introduced, have their focus episode, and continue to make notable appearances, often hanging out with the main characters. Kenta even helped Miyasako find a hobby outside of being a class representative. They keep the number of recurring characters lower than FW/MH, use them in better roles, and the result is that they’re better developed and remembered. The romance plots are less fleshed out than in FW, but that’s about the only drawback. Also, Saki and Mai’s relationship with each other is much more immediate. Nagisa and Honoka took a few episodes to warm up to each other and only really cemented their friendship after a big fight, but Saki and Mai are fast friends by the second episode, and all attempts by the villains to introduce discord just backfire because they have absolute trust in each other. 

The villains are also extremely fun and memorable. Whether you like them or not, they leave a distinct impression, much like the generals in the first half of FW. They have unique designs, quirky personalities, and at the end of the series we get to see them interact with each other. Karehaan was fairly straight-laced and I don’t like him much. Moerumba has a spicy personality, his problem is his short-sightedness. Dorodoron gets a laugh from me for being so timid. He might have been boring on his own, but he got to spitball with the Kiryuus, which helped him a lot. Miss Shitataare is powerful and cocky but completely inept. Kintolesky was easily my favorite of the lot, being honorable and straightforward and impeccably muscular. Aside from Karehaan’s overall blandness their biggest problem is not having enough cross talk with each other, with that being saved for their revival arc. Later shows do this a lot more often and better, thankfully.

Speaking of villains, however, Gohyaan stands out. He kind of serves multiple roles as both the comic relief of the villains, like the Zakenna Butlers, and as the right hand to the big bad. He spends most of his time sucking up to Akudaikaan, but occasionally he does go out on the field and demonstrates how powerful he actually is. His memorable personality and the twist where he reveals he’s the mastermind all make him a welcome addition. And just to reiterate, that twist had very minimal foreshadowing! Akudaikaan himself was the opposite, very not memorable, he’s blander than the Dark King, and that’s no easy feat. The most interesting thing about him is his physical design, as rather than being an amorphous blob like the Dark King, he has a defined face and a robe. His head resembles a Samurai helmet and a demon mask, and he has fire in his eyes. It’s a shame this theme didn’t really amount to anything.

Michiru and Kaoru’s redemption arc has to be the highlight of the show. The writers took some cues from Kiriya’s similar storyline in the first show but they gave the sisters a lot more time in the limelight, which allowed their characters to be better fleshed out. Over the course of the second quarter of the show, we get to see these girls go from a faux friendship with Saki and Mai into a legitimate one, because they actually listened and learned about the beauty of the natural world. They start to understand what it means to be cared for, to be appreciated for who you are, and not have your value be dependent on what you can provide for someone else. If more villains would take the time to see things from the perspective of the people they’re trying to defeat, they might also understand this, and truly some of them do. We’ll explore several types of redeemed villains in the shows to come, and I look forward to comparing and contrasting them with this. The biggest problem I have with the Kiryuus is that they were absent between episodes 25 and 41, and barely mentioned. Mai and Saki worried for them, and Miss Shitataare gave them hints that they were still alive, but it was sad to see them shoved aside for half the show with no particular explanation being given about what Gohyaan was doing with them. That’s my only major strike against Splash Star.

The fighting in the series is still punchy, but this time the spirits spice things up. There’s bursts of spirit energy whenever they kick and punch, they can concentrate the spirit power in certain parts of their bodies to jump farther, punch harder, and block attacks. As Bright and Windy they have elemental attacks using the light and wind. It’s an evolution of what the first series started, and I enjoy it. Finally, the victories feel meaningful, because every battle they get the reward of a Miracle Drop. Every seven episodes or so they collect enough drops to revive a fountain, and Princess Filia grows more and more complete. There is constant progress throughout the series, so even the slow parts of the show feel meaningful.

Of course, the series got a movie, and it was very similar to the prior two in overall plot: Tension arises between the two, they’re thrust into another world before they can resolve their feelings, the villain takes advantage of their personal conflict to overpower them, they get separated, then they make up with each other and come together stronger to defeat the villain. The closes they get to a movie form in this one is a glowing outline surrounded by the spirits of the zodiac, somewhat bucking the trend, but it’s an excellent movie. That really isn’t something I can say about all of them, so I’m grateful that these early films are so strong.

Splash Star has been described as the perfection of the Futari wa formula, and overall I have to agree. Of the three shows, it is the most consistent in all regards. There’s constant progression, character growth, meaningful supporting characters who you really sympathize with, and a fun and enjoyable cast of both heroes and villains. The first half of FWPC may be more fun, but the second half drags it down. Max Heart as a whole isn’t really sure where it wants to go. Splash Star sets a destination and arrives there at the right time, with some twists and turns along the way. I strongly recommend it to anyone trying to get into the series for the first time.

Unfortunately, despite Splash Star being arguably the best of the three seasons (both Eastern and Western fans ranked it above Max Heart), it tanked in sales after its first quarter, so it was decided that, if the franchise was going to continue, they needed a new look. Thus, they turned to the most enduringly popular magical girl series around for inspiration for their next season. But that’s a story for later.

Analysis

The most obvious shared elements between the three shows is the two-girl team, which they each used slightly differently. In FWPC, it’s the two of them against the world. That’s it. Max Heart switches things up with a third hero, who is not combative, but supports them, and they have to protect her at times, sidetracking their fights. Splash Star goes as far as to introduce two more fighters whose power stems from the darkness but they use it for good. They help the Cures out and the Cures help them out, but it’s Bloom and Egret at the core. The key aspect of this period of Precure is that the duo are regular girls who can only transform when they’re together, and that their powers become stronger when their feelings are in harmony. The shows each explore the pros and cons of this setup, concluding that their teamwork is the most powerful force in the word, and this is quite possibly the best thing to come out of this period of the series. The thing I especially like, however, is that being Pretty Cures means that the protagonists have an especially close bond with each other, moreso than their other friends. Since they have to transform and work together, they more intimately understand each other, and they share experiences their other friends will never know about. They look out for each other in every aspect of their daily lives, they have absolute trust in each other, and they will go through hell to protect each other. Pretty Cure’s most powerful weapon is friendship.

As far as their individual personalities go, Saki tends to be more optimistic than her counterpart. Nagisa is lovable and relatable as all heck, but she had kind of a pessimistic view of the world at times. It’s evident even in their catchphrases: Nagisa always says “I can’t believe this!” while Saki proclaims she’s “In top form!” Neither of them would ever hesitate to help a friend, and especially their partner, but during the daily grind Nagisa is more likely to be upset at her circumstances. Meanwhile, Honoka and Mai are even more dissimilar to each other. Honoka has a scientific mind, she’s very astute and good at picking up details. She kind of struggles with making friends but she tries to help people out, always, especially when they don’t want to help themselves. She puts up with a lot of crap but she will chew you out in the name of making you a better person. Mai, however, is observant but she tends to hyperfocus on one thing while drawing and space out a lot. She is a little timid but not afraid to express when she’s upset. Both Mai and Honoka serve to temper and balance out their more energetic partner, serving as the voice of reason when they get heated, and in general keeping them grounded. I love how, despite the differences in their friendships, both sets of partners help to round each other out and make each other better people. It’s a testament to what a good friend can do for you, and of course the central motif of the shows.

Consequently, other friendships form a big part of these shows, too. The small cast means that the girls have friends besides each other, and in each series we see how the protagonists influence their friends, their friends influence them, and we even get to see Hikari make new friends of her own. Again, all the shows handle this well, and it’s something that will be missed next season, since the larger team size means their friendships are more insular. Having friends outside the team grounds the shows in relatable situations as the protagonists go about their daily lives, hanging out with their friends who become beloved characters and get story arcs of their own. Shiho, Rina, Yuriko, Nao, Miu, Hitomi, Yuuko, Kenta, Miyasako, and Kayo are all memorable and important pillars of the shows. They encourage the leads when necessary, get into hijinks with them, explore their own interests, hang out, and have fun together. This also allows conflicts to be resolved without the Precure. In most superhero media the central conflict of the episode is between people’s feelings or beliefs rather than a physical altercation, but the fight usually resolves things somehow, while in Precure, since the combatants are often not the ones with a disagreement, it instead helps them figure out how to help their friends resolve their troubles.

Since these are the stories of regular girls dealing with regular adolescent issues, love is not a strange subject. Nagisa and Saki each had crushes on slightly older boys in their shows, and they handle it remarkably similarly. They get flustered, embarrassed, and have trouble even speaking to their partner about it. However, Honoka is shrewd enough to discern Nagisa’s feelings, while Mai never learns that Saki has a crush on her brother. The writers even approach their romances differently. Nagisa tends to be more proactive in exploring her feelings. She makes active efforts to make gifts for Fuji-P and confess her love to him, ultimately culminating in that fateful Max Heart Christmas episode where she yells it for all the world (but him) to hear. Meanwhile, Saki tended to just admire Kazuya from a distance, except when he came to her. She got jealous when it appeared he had a girlfriend, but she never acted on her affections in a direct way. I theorized that Fuji-P might actually suspect Nagisa’s feelings, and possibly share them, but he wants her to be ready to tell him. Meanwhile, as far as we can tell, while Kazuya finds Saki interesting, he doesn’t really see her as anything more than a friend. I like these different representations of young love, they show how much or how little of a priority it can have in someone’s life.

Famously, Honoka also got a brief pseudo-romance with Kiriya. She helped him grow as a person, he challenged some of her overbearing ways, but they clearly respected each other. She was distraught when he was taken back to the Dusk Zone, and that was one of the most heartfelt episodes in the entire series so far. There were echoes of his impact on her in the rest of the first series, but I never felt like they explored that story to its full potential, and he was not even mentioned in Max Heart. Mai never got a corresponding love interest, and Hikari’s love was more familial: for Nagisa and Honoka as her partners, for Akane as her guardian, and for Hikaru as the only person who could possibly understand her existential crisis. She learned about romantic love but never experienced it herself, which is fine. Girl has enough to worry about as it is.

The physical fighting pioneered in FWPC set the groundwork for the rest of the series, and you can see it slightly evolve over the course of these three shows. While FW is pure punching and kicking except for finishing moves, Max Heart introduces a character with support spells to help the team, and Splash Star gives the combat a bit of flair and style with the spirit trails and elemental attacks. Each show has carved out its own little niche, and I really think that’s one of the fascinating elements of the series. YPC5 will usher in special weapons, which are a genre staple that the original trilogy avoided. That will become standard for all series going forward, so these three shows with their almost entirely unarmed battles are a true highlight of early Precure to me. They manage to keep the fights interesting, always, it’s not just straightforward sparring. The girls do a lot of jumping around, flipping, fighting in sync with each other or tag-teaming. They always have to find weaknesses in monsters that are designed specifically to be hard to beat. Sometimes they’re fast, other times armored, or they’re heavily offensive, they have special abilities of their own, or the commander is threatening someone else. Always, the heroines find an innovative way to defeat their opponent and save the day in a visually exciting manner.

When it’s not showcasing awesome girls fighting for friendship and love, Precure is about selling toys. Bandai has a long history of designing toys to coincide with Toei’s Sunday morning shows, and they put their experience to work here. Nonetheless, they had some difficulty with the rather nondescript themes of the early shows, so the toys sometimes come across as very out-of-place. The transformation toys are generally cutesy enough to pass, the powerup braces stand out, the mid-season fairy’s compact forms are extremely gaudy (ESPECIALLY the Splash Commune, it’s literally just a computer in a show about nature), and the macguffin storage object of each show (Prism Hopish, Queen Chairect, Fairy Carafe) starts a proud Precure tradition of being a large, expensive toy first and a sacred artifact later. Additionally, there’s at least one object in each show that is Precure-branded merch in the real world which has no combat use and is forced into the plot of one episode before being quickly forgotten. As the years go on, the toys will be more unified with the theme of the show, and we’ll see some new patterns emerge.

One last element I realize that I forgot to bring up before now, but that becomes a franchise trend, is a trademark food and a restaurant of sorts. In FWPC and Max Heart, of course, their food of choice is takoyaki from Akane’s Tako Stand, where Hikari winds up working in Max Heart. Splash Star’s restaurant is Panpaka PAN, the Hyuuga family bakery, and their signature food is chocolate coronets. The restaurant or food stand is always a recurring location, where the girls and their friends often meet to talk and hang out and eat some delicious food. This is certainly not exclusive to Precure, or even the magical girl genre, as having recurring locations saves on the budget, both in animation and live-action, and food is an easy way to get people to congregate. Nonetheless, it’s sort of brought up in Precure All Stars, and there’s some truly great food ahead of us, so I wanted to point out that the trend goes all the way to the start of the series.

Obviously, 2004′s Futari wa Precure wasn’t intended to kick off a franchise, so when it got popular they stuck to what they knew for the second season. I’m not sure why they didn’t take the Doremi approach and keep aging them up a year for more seasons, but perhaps they thought they had exhausted the storytelling potential of the original cast and realized that it had franchise potential if they followed the annual reboot model of other superhero shows. The biggest issues with the first two shows are pacing, which is fixed in Splash Star, and you can see them tweaking and refining the formula in other ways through the three shows as well. If I had to describe this era in a word, relative to the overall franchise, it would be innovative. While the two-girl partnership would take a break for a few years after this, these shows laid the foundation for plot structure, villain organization, toy integration, and combat that would be utilized and enhanced by the rest of the franchise, so it’s cool to trace the roots of many Precure conventions back to their origins. What began as a humble action show for girls meant to sell some toys got popular, and continued past its intended conclusion. It was even referenced in other pop culture of the time.

Powerpuff Girls Z (2006)

The series had gotten the attention of the masses and was a proven success. We got five memorable and lovable heroines, a bunch of beloved supporting characters, some wonderful villains, and even some welcoming food stands. Of course, there were bumps in the road. The series was still finding its footing during this period, and will continue to do so as we head into Yes 5, but without these three shows laying the groundwork for the franchise, I might not be here talking about it.

That’s my ode to the Futari Wa era of Precure, I hope you enjoyed it, I’m sorry that it took so long to get out. Look forward to Yes! Precure 5 reviews coming your way shortly, and remember:

Your best! My best! Ups and downs! Together We are Pretty Cure!