Yes! Pretty Cure 5

[Guido]

I found this pic at 2chan. For the record it's not mine. I only wanted to post it here.

[chrno]

Hahahahaha!!! Talk about similarities. Did I not say this? I have yet to watch the show. I DL'ded the first ep. I'm almost scared now. Should I keep it and share it or should I watch it and leave it alone? And do I really want to another magical girl show? I'm still doing 'MH'. I'm shocked that the group that normally does the 'PC' series wanted to do this one. The other group was doing 'SS'. I finally finished 'SS' and the ending wasn't bad.

Well, if I can sit through almost 90+ episodes of 'Gash Bell', the first 2 'PC' series and the spin off, then I guess I can sit through this craziness.

What the hell has become of me? I WAS NEVER A 'SM' FAN!! I DON'T WANT TO START WATCHING GIRLIE SHOWS!!!!

Like I said, I'll be back with my first feelings. When I get around to watching.

At least the doujin artist will be able to find some worthy material out of this one. Don't they always?

[Maximum Burst]

The first episode was great. I'm really expecting great things out of this one. Other than "Metamorphose" in the opening, there doesn't seem to be too much relation to Tokyo Mew Mew. The original season was good, Max Heart was good, Splash Star was great (though I haven't seen the whole thing...just when Michiru and Kaoru come back >.>), and natually, Yes 5 should be a fun time.

Cure Rouge looks like she's going to be my favorite.

[Guido]

The legend says it all. To me looks like TOEI restrengthened the franchise or put lots of vigor and gung-ho ness.

The introduction for episode one hit with a bang.

I can assume that the whole deal with the Nightmares has been going on for years under people's noses and nobody was awared of it, unlike the previous Pretty Cure shows that the flurry, little mascots escape their already taken or battered homeworld and the Dark King or Dark Fall forces follow them to Earth and the whole battle starts.

Did anyone noticed the animation and desing for the backgrounds and the scenery? I swear it looks too similar to that of Princess Tutu, in fact, I am feeling if all the town comes out from a fairy-tale.

Ok. ANN mistook.

Spoiler:

Coco as well can transform into a guy too.

And interesting that Nozomi fell for his charms on human form.

The Nightmares.

Spoiler:

Insect dude is freakish from the head to the toe, but I am finding it tolerable because he goes to the point; intimidating, bullying, forceful, sneaky to get what he wants.

He leaves no room for the characters to catch a fresh breath.

I may find him odd, but his design is a step ahead and different from the classic Pretty Cure villains.

By the way, what's the name of the monsters for this season?

It looks like those Nightmare dude throw some creepy masks at inanimate objects, and then spring alive with a shadow body of Zakenna but wearing said mask at the same time.

What I love much about this episode is that they get started with the plot right away, carrying to the point; they did not spend too much time for introductions.

Dreams are the theme for this Pretty Cure season. Interestingly, My-Otome's first half also dealt with the theme of goal dreams.

Spoiler:

In fact, Nozomi/Cure Dream emulates Arika by expressing to Nuts that she's becoming Pretty Cure to fulfill his wish, and that is her dream she has picked up.

[Maximum Burst]

This first villain is immediately my favorite of all because his CV is the King of Screaming, Nobuyuki Hiyama.

[Quarkboy]

Originally Posted by Guido

By the way, what's the name of the monsters for this season?

They are called "Kowaina"s

To review:

Season 1&2: "Zakenna" = Messin' Arounds
Splash Star: "Uzaina" = Annoyings
YPC5: "Kowaina" = Scarys

[mintyfresh]

Yeah, I'm definitely liking this show more than I thought I would.

I don't watch Naruto, but Junko Takeuchi did a great performance of Rin in the second episode (her scream is nothing to be taken lightly.. (;´Д`) ). And speaking of her performance..

"itai no, itai no, tondekee~"


*rolls around in the cuteness*
And that's all I have to say about that.

[mippa]

I am in total agreement, Rin-chan is great--heck, all the characters in this series are turning out to be really endearing so far. <3 I cannot wait for next week's episode!

Quarkboy, great work on the TLing, this is such a fun project! (Now back to work on Hataraki Man...@.@ )

[Guido]

This Pretty Cure is turning even better than what I expected episode by episode.

The aerial combat style from the first Pretty Cure series is back for this season.

The villains are elaborated into a global corporation. Girinma (mantis-dude) sure knows how to threaten a lady at first meeting.

The powers of each Pretty Cure are of elemental magic.

I have reasons to believe that the writers are toying with the rules of the magic-girls genre in this series.

Spoiler:

1. For instance, Nozomi wanted to show her transformation to Rin but tripped onto Coco before she was able to show it to her.
I think the writers are teaching the audience that magical heroines cannot transform needlessly or without a reason to do so or else they'll be caught with a bad luck streak to prevent the secret from spilling out.

2. Girinma's boss, Bunbi, at first glance looks completely human to me. It's certain that Girinma is NO human given the abnormal traits of his face, his build, and supernatural abilities; he is able to pull out his powers while in disguised, human form.
I wonder if the other Nightmares executives are also non-humans, as well?

I have a theory that it might be possible that the Nightmares are sort of mutated. That is originally all of them were (corrupted, greedy) humans who were granted dark powers and transformed into their Nightmare forms.
However, on traditional anime terms that would be another violation to the rules of the magical-girl genre. Humans can only become villains or antagonists if they are transformed into monsters, if they are possessed, or seduced, or brainwashed by dark dwellers. But they cannot become an antagonist, which would pose a real threat to the magical girls squad, by their own FREE WILL. That is to choose to become a villain out of grudge against the whole world, to carry a vengeance, or to further his or her selfishness.

Though I can only say that the Nightmares are FRIGHTENING not because they are monsters, because all of them take on the form and disguise of greedy, corporative, bureaucratic, EXECUTIVES, and that's scary.

But it would be even more psychotically HORRIFYING if in fact the Nightmares are a conglomerate of POLITICIANS scheming to take over the world behind the shadows. Brrr... I tremble at the thought of Illuminati-like politicians plotting the end of the world in Pretty Cure.

[Quarkboy]

I had some interesting thoughts on some things revealed in episode 2:

(these are not really spoilers)

Looking at the bad guys' and their motivation we see a couple of things:

1. Girinma is motivated by pleasing his supervisor so that he will get promoted.
2. He's constantly fearful of all the other "employees" taking his job.
3. The goals of the corporation override whatever moral principals one might have... the employees are nothing but tools in order to please the head boss, Desubaraia.

Which leads me to think that they are commenting on the status of large corporations and the stresses of job promotion. BUT.... to do this, in a Japanese setting would be viewed in a bad light, as criticizing Japanese companies, so the show is set in a distinctly NON japanese world to avoid this.


Am I reading WAY too much into this?

[Tatiana Razajev]

The first two episodes definitely show promise and thus I'm sticking with this. Then again I liked the previous three seasons so go figure. I'm going to make a prediction here. The last two members will join around the same time as in during the same episode. Not sure why, but I have a feeling that will be the case. Either way just as long all five join straight in a row. Simply because I prefer to not have to wait a long period for the final member to join. I guess part of me is anxious to see what each is like as soon as possible.

[Guido]

Originally Posted by Tatiana Razajev

The first two episodes definitely show promise and thus I'm sticking with this. Then again I liked the previous three seasons so go figure. I'm going to make a prediction here. The last two members will join around the same time as in during the same episode. Not sure why, but I have a feeling that will be the case. Either way just as long all five join straight in a row. Simply because I prefer to not have to wait a long period for the final member to join. I guess part of me is anxious to see what each is like as soon as possible.

Exactly my same thoughts. Both Karen and Komachi will be joining the team around episode four, and I have a certainty that this Pretty Cure is going to run for about 48 episodes, that's my gut feeling.

[honeysempai]

Question: Is this show good? I can't decide to watch it or not...

[NoSanninWa]

Why not just download 2 episodes and figure it out for yourself? The SD version is only 99MB per episode. That doesn't take very long to download and 2 episodes is not much of a time investment.

Everyone's tastes vary, so only you can really answer this question for yourself.

[Maximum Burst]

Just two episodes out so far, and I'm already amazed by the show. I love Rin-chan, and Nozomi has her charms as well. Their chemisty is great. Shiny Lemon looks like she's going to be a cure character as well. As for the green-haired Honoka and Kaoru v2, they don't seem to be appealing to me as much.

Hearing the name Desubaraia, I can't help but think it's "Death-something". I just can't seem to think what a "Baraia" could be lol. I don't know. Desubaraia doesn't seem like a play on words like "Akudaikan".

[Guido]

Pretty Cure Five continues to amaze me. The story is running on at a very fast pace, as they are introducing new characters per episode and developing the gist of the plot.

They broke a rule for the magic-girl genre.
Urara happened by to discover that Nozomi is Cure Dream at plain sight from episode two, though this would be rather a loophole to said rule, that the magic girls must keep their identities hidden from public sight.

The loophole is that Urara was destined to become the Cure Lemonade (Pretty Cure on yellow), and it happened in this episode.

Another rule was broken that the moment that Urara came in contact with her yellow butterfly, she metamorphosed right away into her Pretty Cure self without Coco (yellow squirrel) to instruct her to do so.

And it also looks like bad guys or evil managers are getting rotated after certain number of failures per episode. Unlike the previous Pretty Cure series when the evil generals are either destroyed or reformed, the Nightmares are literally "laid-off" or fired in the business context.
Bubbi forced Girinma (mantis dude) to take a literal vacation by opening a hatch door underneath his subordinate, and mantis dude fell into the void of darkness below.

However, it is not revealed if the Nightmares are killed or fired, since Bubbi not mentioned whether Girinmas' vacations were temporal or permanent.

The next Nightmare that took Girinma's place is Gamao. In human form he looks perfectly normal in contrast to Girinma's human disguise.

Gamao is a chubby, mid-teenager wearing a cap, long pants, and a sleeveless shirt. In his nightmare form, he turns into an orange-white, fat, humanoid bull-frog with a spiky mohawk.

[Maximum Burst]

Where are all the Precure fans? I've somehow gotten so absorbed into this series (oh, the lengths I went to to get the Gambalance de Dance single...); I could just go on and on about it all lol. Clearly, there aren't very many fans here

Spoiler:

Anyway, episode 4 was ok. There's some obvious drop in animation quality, which is a shame (Rin's pupil not being filled in, a soccer player's uniform changing colors). I was sort of expecting Mint and Aqua to be recruited at the same time. Based on the preview, it seems that Aqua won't be joining in episode 5. I'm kind of wondering why the villains are being switched around so much. There's probably going to be 5 or so, but they're introducing them quickly just like with the heroines. Oh well, new episode eventually. I can't wait.

[Tatiana Razajev]

I'm definitely still watching the series myself. It's just I don't post as often as I should in general. In any case I just finished watching episode 05 raw and thus I don't understand everything, but...

Spoiler:

Poor Karen fails to become Cure Aqua in this episode. Ie the butterfly appears, but fails to turn into a watch. I believe it's a case of needing more confidence. Although the preview for episode 06 gives the indication she'll gain what she needs to become Cure Aqua.

[mintyfresh]

I'm still watching this show, too. It's one of the only shows I'm actively watching every week (the other being Rocket Girls). It's really gotten me hooked on Pretty Cure all over again..

I so far like all the characters, really, but I knew Karen would be an interesting one. And with this episode we already get signs of that being so. Man, I can't wait until her and Komachi's background episode.. (;´Д`)

[CrowKenobi]

The OP/ED single is out! Here's the cover: