‘Nuff said.
Futari wa Pretty Cure is the first series in the PreCure franchise, which so far has had one 48 to 50 episode series coming out each year since 2004. Each series stands on its own (with the exception of the occasional sequel) but follows the same formula: two or more young teenage girls encounter cute (but usually annoying) mascot animals who give them special powers to fight evil. They use their powers to fight increasingly powerful monsters while encountering various more mundane troubles in their daily lives, but through the power of friendship and the occassional flying kick overcome them, to ultimately triumph over the Big Bad pulling the strings in the background. A typical magical girl/mahou shoujo franchise, one which is incredibly popular in Japan but almost unavailable in its original form outside of it (at least in English speaking countries). You may however have heard of Glitter Force, which adapted one of the series into something supposedly more palatable to American tastes.
True, the PreCure series are aimed at kids and are rather formulaic plotwise: Pretty Cure has to overcome some everyday challenge or adversity, the monster of the week shows up halfway through, they fight and defeat them, cut back to their ordinary lives and the resolution of the problem they faced; rinse, repeat. Personally I don’t mind this, as the execution of this formula is done decently, the characters are likeable and there’s enough “candy” in the form of well executed fight scenes to keep me interested. Not something perhaps to sit down to watch for, but more than good enough to have on while still being able to do something else. And, as you can see, when the animators are on point, they’re on point, like Tatsuo Yamada here in these excerpts.
The original Futari wa Pretty Cure series is available on Crunchyroll (but not in the Netherlands!) while Glitter Force can be found on Netflix. Videos via Sakugabooru.
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