[Guppy]

Originally Posted by Guido

I also have to digress at how all the Kowainaa are getting thrashed. In fact, Cure Dream is the one who ends up turning them to dust while the other Pretty Cure shower the Kowainaa on the justification to weaken them.

Spoiler for eps. 5-6:

Signs of improved teamwork started to show up in episode 6. In particular, Aqua seems to be (predictably) the tactical brain of the group, and she, Mint and Rouge end up tackling the weekly Kowainaa (aka the captured Pinky) together. Dream and Lemonade together have a go at the Nightmare boss, and interestingly enough it's Dream who goes in as the first-wave diversion while Lemonade follows up (although Dream does, in the end, launch the last attack that convinces him to retreat).

Originally Posted by Guido

The blue butterfly came to Karen, but as it just sparkled to give her the watch the light suddenly vanished, rendering Karin in a disappointingly shock.

This mostly attributed to Karen's fear of witnessing for herself that what Nozomi and the others told her was the truth about Pretty Cure and felt overwhelmed with fear upon the presence of Bubbi.

Interesting. I didn't think Karen's fear was the cause of her failure at all. The butterfly came to her because she honestly wanted to help - it was the way she wanted to help that I suspect was the problem. As the butterfly alighted, Karen wasn't thinking "I want to be part of this group and help out!" but rather "I'm going to have to save the day by myself again..."

Pretty Cure (especially this version of Pretty Cure) is a team, and the butterflies clearly aren't interested in candidates who view themselves as solo acts. The second time around, Karen expressed her desire in terms of wanting to support the others and the butterfly immediately accepted her as Cure Aqua.