If you could name one anime that fitted me like a glove, you’d probably say Pokémon. You’d be right .. though the anime is always something I had a bit of a meh experience with.. the good episodes are amazing… the filler in between.. meh! Another good guess of an anime that is very on brand with me would be Pretty Cure. I love it’s art so much.. yet until today I had not seen a single episode of it! Shame on me! Yet now I can take you on my journey through this franchise!
How to be Pretty?!
With 16ish seasons and the first one already having 50 episodes, it might be a bit too much to take you through every single episode. So how will our journey through Pretty Cure look like?! I will have about three to four episodes per series. Which follow a certain trend.
-The first part of a series will discuss the first episode of a series. My first impressions and expectations. Analysing the main character(s) and the general set up. I will review an episode in detail which means spoilers.
– The second part will come out after I reached the midway point of a series. A hype check of sorts, because I am mostly talking about my experience there will be spoilers. Why do I dislike or like characters.. what did I like and what did I not like. I won’t spoil the entire plot or details but the story in big lines will be discussed.
-The third part will talk about the second half of the show. Did I like the ending and the show in general. This one like the others will contain spoilers
-A possible fourth part will happen when I am really impressed with a season. Where I talk more in depth on why I love it, which characters I like and maybe something about cute Pretty Cure objects and such… call it a bonus episode. These might be replaced with episodes of Pinkie looking for a Waifu.. as after only 1 episode I can already tell the Yuri suggestions are real! With that said.. it is time to review the first episode of Pretty Cure ever!
The Negatives will all blow away
It only took me as long as reaching the opening to know I would like this show! While I do not think the transformations shown in this opening look as Pretty as some of the later Cure Girl’s I have seen the message is loud and clear. “Smile your troubles away” “All the Negatives will blow away” When we conquer a problem we get stronger! Such nice positive messages in this show’s opening alone. Really on brand with me as well. Especially about negativity blowing away. It’s a pretty cute opening as well. It feels a bit too rhythmic talky for me in the beginning but I like the budududududu thing’s showing Mepple and Mipple.. the cute companion creatures of the show. It’s timed nicely. Bududududu things… sometimes I am such a wordsmith. This opening had some pretty nineties vibes to me, despite only earing in 2005.. It also is very spoiler free which is a good thing so woop!
The first episode.. and assuming by the intro the rest of the series as well. Follows Nagisa , who is a Lacrosse playing jock and Honoka who has a very big brain for her age. They are in the 8th grade.. which puts them around the age of 13 or 14. Since that now is 14 year ago.. that would make them 28 right now.. so they might even be date material! Which is good because Honoka looks super cute! Nagisa is a bit tomboyish which she wears well. It’s not my style to date but the character does feel like her own thing rather than just another Orange headed tomboy girl.. What’s with Orange haired females being kind of hot heated? Could it be that hair color tells something about personality? Honoka is depicted as a cute but somewhat conventional looking girl with dark hair (like most studious girls in anime have) in a fairly traditional cut. I do like the creatures design as well. They feel unique and they feel precious something that needs protecting.. which works well in the first episode.
Oh it’s going to be THAT type of show?!
Don’t ask me why I have seen Cute Earth Defence Club Love before this show.. but what I loved best in that show was how aware the characters were in that show .. about how odd things where that were going on. It turns out that the PreCure or Pretty Cure series was the first magical “person” franchise who did this. Which already made me love it more! I figured this would just be one of those Sailor Moon Clones that focussed more on cuteness and less on dating boys. Yet for now I think there will be more to it than that. We see Nagisa getting a bunch of love letters, but they are all form girls. Yet she glanced at a boy in this episode so that must mean she is straight. Since Honoka is very popular with boys though and she rejected a popular one, I am gonna say she isn’t straight. Maybe that is just me hoping her 28 year old self would be available! Throughout the episode the characters both seem rather aware of having unreal abilities and odd things going on which makes the cuteness somehow more adorable. I really hope this will shine on through throughout the series as well as it would allow them to get away with such cute things by just saying… yeah well it is that trope!
The episode begins with two characters of different environments doing their thing. The Jock plays sports and the nerd pours two liquids into a beaker and it goes poof…with success though! Both are not really on each others level yet but we know that will soon change because after their looks cross we get that opening. There is some slight exposition about a meteor shower where Nagisa’s friends see it as ill omens Honoka sees it as a good sign. Superstition versus science and all. I guess that will be an element as well. No sure though. Of course it won’t just be meteors we all already know something will land in front of our two heroes. Both heroes get some flippy phone like thing with a bearish.. bunny look or a bunnyish bear look, that can talk .. and walk. Obviously that is the transforming mcguffin.
We see them transform into full bunnyish bears and bearish bunnies later on so I bet there is more to them. They also seem like a couple.. but with names like Mipple and Mepple they could also be brother and sister still, I mean Japan spells that one particular word in the english language with a silent W in the beginning. You know when your brother wrinkles your sheets. That one.
Four Cuties and an Edgelord
Nagisa is scared for the the phone creature at first. I mean I would be as well if a meteor came at me and then released a talking flippy phone. She shows her little brother who can’t see a thing about it. Moments after he walks out it begins walking again. So I assume Nagisa was chosen.. yet it still feels odd. Honoka got her flippy phone neatly gift wrapped in a neat little box. Her dog barked at the shed it was hidden in.. so she for some reason feels more chosen. Also random observation. Cats are often drawn very distinguishable from one another even black cats amongst each other. Yet everyone in anime seems to have the same labrador/ golden retriever dog! I guess that if they are not the main character .. they are just plain..but no matter what art style I look at the dog always feels the same.
Mepple.. the creature in Nagisa’s… thing.. I am sure it will get a name soon, begins to cry and tells it needs to go somewhere. Which leads to my favorite seen of the episode. In her lacrosse stick thing Nagisa carries Mepple around to where it wants to go.. still scared of it. It knows where it needs to go but only in a straight line. So we see Nagisa walking around with an alien phone thing trough restaurants and scaling walls just to be able to walk in a straight line as much as she can. That just makes sense to me as this little alien dude she is carrying would probably not know the street plan of her town.
Eventually they reach a theme park.. where some edgy as fudge guy is walking around. I mean he feels like a lead singer for an anime heavy metal band. He steals Mepple but gets distracted when Mipple and Honoka arrive at the scene. Using that scoopy net thing Nagisa has she whacks Mepple out of his hand and then the guy uses telekinesis to throw trash cans at them.. oh and road signs.. so maybe it is magnetism powers.. Not sure! Regardless this makes the situation so dire that the girls can transform. I really liked this transformation sequence because of now lewd it is… unless hand holding is lewd like the meme.. than it is really lewd. I do like the metallic look the girls get when transforming.. for some reason I do expect them to be more durable now. The transformation music was pretty cute as well.
The transformation prompts the bad guy to summon a demon ,which might just be a pokémon because it keeps shouting it’s name, that possesses a rollercoaster. It chases after the girls and shoots spikey stuff at them. Cure Black.. Nagisa’s alter ego clearly performs better in battle saving Honoka from a spiked wheel. Since she tries to pull Honaka up at the intro sequence as well I guess this will be a thing where Nagisa will punch things real hard and Honoka will help her fight more tactically. Which is a solid way to make a cast of two work well with each other without invalidating one or the other.
Like I stated earlier, both girls notice how they make some weird quotes about the light and how they are the Pretty Cure which I always find very amusing. It isn’t as silly as in Earth Defence Club Love though but instead cleverly works as a little bit of exposition. Do Mipple and Mepple possess them in some way or another.. because they also referred to themselves as Pretty cure later on and Mepple seems very similar to Nagisa so far. Mipple sounds a lot like Honoka. both have a very squeaky voice that while Kawaii kinda sounds like stepping on mice as well. The good guys defeat the roller coaster through the power of handholding and the demon transforms into a bunch of apologetic black stars.The edgie guy flies into space or at least high into the sky..surely to create a new monster of the week next episode. Leaving behind four cute things wondering what will happen next as we cut to the end. A beginning like any other but with a higher level of cuteness than average. Perfect! I am very interested in seeing this show progress. I think the tones of positivity and just the right amount of Meta and cuteness make this a great product for me. Now to watch tons and tons of episodes! Will I think it’s pretty from beginning to end or will i be cured by my insane curiosity of it?!
Pinkie's Paradise 