Pretty Cure Containment Zone
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 Hello, everyone. I would consider myself a fan of PreCure and decided to make a page for it. This is my general PreCure containment zone resource, but maybe this will help someone else get into the franchise as well. Contact me if I need to add or revise information. Here's some music!

Overview Questions: What is Pretty Cure / PreCure?

 PreCure is a magical girl / action anime that airs on TV Asahi's children programming block at 8:30 JST since 2004 with Futari wa Pretty Cure. Although not well-known in the West, it has considerable viewership among children and adults alike in Japan.

What is PreCure about?

 Each season has a formulatic plot around girls who turn into legendary heroes / warriors / wizards / whatever known as Pretty Cure. Usually they receive their powers from a "fairy" and fight dark forces. Episodes typically have a "monster of the week" style structure where they transform and fight at the end.

What makes PreCure unique?

 PreCure has been airing weekly for over 20 years now, with over 1000 episodes broadcast in total. The best way I can describe PreCure is a mix between Super Sentai / Power Rangers and a magical girl anime. The watching experience gives a different feel than say, Cardcaptor Sakura for multiple reasons. For one, PreCure is known for melee combat with fists and explosions like Tokusatsu media. Two, PreCure is made into an original anime every year with the express purpose of selling toys to children (Bandai). Contrasting with other shoujo magical girl series which are instead adapted into anime from manga, PreCure's themes, tone, and aesthetics are much more colorful, flashy, and "kiddish". (Altough there are dark themes as well.)

Isn't this a show for kids?

 Yes, it has a core demographic of 4-9 year old girls. However, anyone can enjoy PreCure. The companies behind PreCure also consider the older fanbase with figures, expensive collector DVDs, garage kits, sequel anime in late night timeslots, even lingerie (yes really, for adult female fans of the OG anime)!

 I fully acknowledge that I enjoy a kids show. To me it's not ultimately that different from adults enjoying Saturday morning cartoons, Bluey, or something from Cartoon Network. Like most weeb-adjacent interests in my life, I will keep hobby private from my coworkers or acquaintances, but I feel no shame lmao.

Why do you like PreCure?

 The atmosphere is comforting. The simple story can be calming in the same way someone may rewatch a sitcom multiple times. I enjoy the cutesy aesthetics and action-packed fight scenes.

How does PreCure "work"?

 Every year (with a currently two older exceptions) a season will have completely new characters and aesthetics. You can watch PreCure out of order because of this. A season will start at the beginning of February and stop at the end of January. There will usually be around 50 episodes for nearly every week of the year. There will also be 1-2 movies, with the movies either being a crossover event or a stand-alone movie. Trademarks have been dropping around late November lately, so that's when the next season will be announced.

Should I (the reader) watch PreCure?

 Ask yourself 3 questions. Would you be okay watching a show made for kids (even if it's still enjoyable)? Do you like "monster of the week" and "slice of life" style plots? Do you enjoy series such as Sailor Moon? If so, you may like it! If you're sick of constant ~dark and edgy~ or ecchi magical girl stuff, then maybe give Heartcatch or Hugtto a go. There's darker moments, but the show is played straight and isn't try-hard.



How many seasons have you watched / how big of a fan are you?

 I am not a superfan nor do I claim to be. I have been a fan since December 2022ish. I actually got into through Sailor Guardian Hope's PreCure Iceburg video on YouTube (now deleted). I watch the anime, the movies, read the manga, light novels, started watching the stage plays... I recently came to the somewhat disturbing realization that I'm probably going to watch most or all of Precure at some point... It just makes me so happy. I'll also make sure to summarize the light novels at a certain point in case non-Japanese speaking fans are interested in the plot-details.



What's your favorite season(s) that you've seen?

 So far it's Tropical-Rouge! Pretty Cure and Heartcatch PreCure!



What seasons should you watch first if you want to get into PreCure?

 You could watch the original Futari wa Pretty Cure. That's what I did and enjoyed it. But a lot of the fanbase recommends and celebrates HeartCatch PreCure!, Go! Princess PreCure, and HUGtto! PreCure.



Who's your favorite cure so far?
 Cure Marine and Cure Milky as my top two. But I also love Cure Summer and Cure La Mer.

Is there any yuri / lesbian content in PreCure?

  I love shipping Honoka x Nagisa / Cure Black x Cure White!!! Also the two leads from Mahoutsukai Precure! They kiss (kinda) in the official manga! Riko and Mirari are a popular pairing. Another pairing is Cure Chocolat / Akira x Cure Macaron / Yukari. They are based on a cat and dog and sing a romantic duet together. They are based on Sailor Uranus and Neptune according to a staff interview ♥ Their pairing is referenced quite often in official material. Also Cure Chocolat is based off of Takarazuka musicals, so check out Kirakira☆Precure A La Mode!



Do you ship any characters in PreCure?
 See my Ships section for more!

What is some PreCure merch, and how can I buy it?

 It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that PreCure makes money off of selling toys. There's the plastic toys, plushies, dolls, figures, keychain, knick-knacks, CDs, DVDs, Blu-rays, manga, clothing, calendars, school supplies, artbooks, coloring books, light novels (for some), fanbooks, magazines, art, tapestries, and more that come with mostly every season. Plus a lot of movies and live-events and extra stuff too. Essentially PreCure is merchandized in every way you can think of.

 For PreCure stuff in general, I would use Amazon.jp or AmiAmi for new goods. Secondhand stores, ebay, and Yahoo Auctions will have older goods. Always keep in mind that shipping costs will be high overseas.

 I personally try to hold off on buying the plastic toys to minimize just buying stuff to buy stuff. I do have a pretty sweet Futari wa figure though. And I like buying the ebook version of manga / light novels. (They're cheaper than a McDonald's cheeseburger.) I kinda do want the Talking Kururun plush, but I want to hold off on CONSOOMING for a little bit. She's not going anywhere!

Where can I watch PreCure?

 If you are not in Japan, Crunchyroll currently licenses some PreCure seasons on their streaming service. As of writing, 11 out of 21 seasons are on Crunchyroll along with Otona PreCure. I expect all seasons to arrive before too long. There's also Glitter Force, the Netlix English dub for Smile...

Your other opinions are... buying blu-rays without subs and well, yeah. You're kind of SOL legally for the rest of the series and movies. Do what you will with that information. However, Toei has stated in shareholder meetings that they plan to focus on international markets for PreCure. That likely means primarly East Asian or SEA audiences like Korea (Wonderful will be dubbed in Korean)... BUTTTT with the increase of legally advailable Cruncyroll seasons, I predict it will be more popular and accessible than ever to my fellow North American friends!

How did you get into PreCure?

 One day in very late November of 2022 (I think like the 29th?), I watched a video of Sailor Guardian Hope's PreCure Iceberg. The cideo's now deleted, but the actual iceberg is here BTW please go support her channel, she is awesome! ANYWAYS, I watched it, and it just fascinated me... I could not stop thinking about PreCure. I know that's silly, but it's true! I really liked Ojamajo Doremi which I consider to be a proto-PreCure-adjacent series.

 So one day... I just started watching it! I didn't know where to start, so I started with Futari wa. And I loved it! The rest is history. I'm trying to watch around one episode a day, and I don't regret anything... Let's see 489 episodes as of writing plus the 94 from Hugtto and Healin' Good plus the 50 from Wonderful... 633 episodes... meaning that I need to watch 2 more seasons by late November if I wanna stary on track. It might be slightly off, but I'm still roughly doing it!


List of PreCure Seasons:

 I know the basic themes and characters of every season through talking to other PreCure fans. But I try not to give firm opinions or engage in content until I watch certain seasons myself. YES, I have seen every stand-alone movie from the seasons I watch. NO, I have not watch any All-Stars movies EXCEPT for All-Stars F (which I love). 11/8/24: Taking a little break from PreCure, but almost done with Hugtto and Healin' Good! Keeping up with WanPuri weekly.

Season Watched it? Number Episodes Favorite Cure
Futari wa Pretty Cure ✔ 1 49 Cure White?
(hardest choice)
Futari wa Pretty Cure: Max Heart ✗ 2 47 -
Futari wa Pretty Cure: Splash☆Star ✔ 3 49 Cure Egret
Yes! Precure 5 ✗ 4 49 -
Yes! Precure 5 Gogo! ✗ 5 48 -
Fresh Precure! ✗ 6 50 -
Heartcatch Precure! ✔ 7 49 Cure Marine
Suite Precure♪ ✗ 8 48 -
Smile Precure! ✔ 9 48 Cure Sunny
Dokidoki! Precure ✗ 10 49 -
Happiness Charge Precure! ✗ 11 49 -
Go! Princess Precure ✔ 12 50 Cure Flora
Mahoutsukai Precure ✔ 13 50 Cure Felice
Kirakira☆Precure A La Mode ✔ 14 49 Cure Chocolat
Cure Custard
Hug tto! Precure ~ 15 49 -
Star☆Twinkle Precure ✔ 16 49 Cure Milky
Healin' Good♡Precure ~ 17 45 -
Tropical-Rouge! Precure ✔ 18 46 Cure Summer
Delicious Party♡Precure ✗ 19 45 -
Hirogaru Sky! Precure ✔ 20 50 Cure Butterfly
Wonderful Precure! ~ 21 - -
Total Episodes of Completed Seasons
(In-Progress Pending)		 489 - - -
Favorite Cure So Far Cure Marine - - -
Favorite Seasons So Far 1) Heartcatch
2) Tropical-Rouge
3) Futari wa		 - - -
Least Favorite Season So Far Mahoutsukai - - -

 (6/27/24): And again, I am not claiming to be a superfan. I don't think I can even call myself a real fan since I haven't watched every season. But I am making my way through. I am not a NEET, enjoy non-precure content and hobbies, and have been a fan for less than two years (started very late November 2022). What do you guys think of my list so far?

Some PreCure Slang / Jargon / Fandom Concepts - a Glossary:

Lead: The main character of the season. Usually pink.

Fairy: A fairy is a character (usually a mascot character) who is an ally to the cures. They typically give the girls the power to transform or are required in their transformation. Fairies tend to look like chibi animals or babies.

Sixth Ranger / Mid-Season Cure / Late-Season Cure: A cure who is not apart of the original cast, but later joins the team. Mid-season cure is the term most-used for those who join around the 20ish episode mark, but I have also seen late-season cure for those who join after episode 30. Sixth Ranger is a phrase from the Super Sentai series.
 Most sixth rangers are not officially revealed at the beginning of the series as a surprise. Some PreCure fans go to great lengths to figure out everything they can possibly know about the sixth ranger ahead of time. See Toy-Hacking.

General: A recurring villian, subordiant to the main antigonist. Usually summons the main monsters for the cures to fight.

Baton-Pass: Starting from HappinessCharge PreCure!, the current lead will introduce or cameo the lead of the next season during the last episode.

Henshin: The Japanese word for transformation. Fans will enjoy, compare, and critique henshin sequences which are in every episode. The transformation will use a transformation item or henshin item.

PreCure Colors: Fans like to group cures by colors. The official colors of each cure can sometimes be inconsistent over time. Examples of cures in color arguments: Shiny Luminous (pink or yellow?), Cure Finale (gold or purple?), Cure Parfait (green multicolored?). The most common team color scheme is Pink, Yellow, Blue, Purple.

Color Archetypes:

♥ Pink Cures: Usually leads. Similar to to the red of Super Sentai leaders, but pink for girls. Genki, sometimes airheaded, passionate, and inspiring.

♥ Red Cures (and Orange Cures): Very passionate and intense.

♥ Blue Cures: The parter to the pink one. Calm, intelligent, mature, and beautiful.

♥ Yellow Cures: Usually a supporting role. Cutesy, happy, and kind.

♥ Green Cures: Not a common color. Many fans openly wish for a green cure in new seasons.

♥ Purple Cures: Cool, mysterious, calm, or mystical. Common midseason-cure color.

Toy-Hacking: When trying to figure out the mid-season cure, many fans will try to mess with the toys of the series to see if there is any information about characters who come later. For example, many transformation items will use insertable for different characters. Different insertables will press down different buttons interally to give a voice line. If you hold down these internal buttons with toothpicks, you may trigger a voice line for a character who comes later.

Mana-Sue: The main character of DokiDoki! Precure, Mana Aida, is often criticized as being a Mary Sue.

Aguri / Regina / Cure Ace: Spoilers for DokiDoki! PreCure. A very infamous plot point in PreCure history. Essentially, Regina, a established character, was expected to become the mid-season cure. Instead, a character introduced out of seemingly nowhere, Aguri, becomes Cure Ace.

Can you tell I'm not looking forward to watching Dokidoki?

Miracle Lights: These are plastic toys that are given to the audience for the PreCure movies. Kids are encouraged to use them in the climax of the movie to cheer on the cures.

Glitter Force: The Netflix dub of Smile PreCure and Dokidoki! Precure. Very disliked within fandom for editing content, names, colors, etc as well as localizing the series for an American audience.

All Stars: Crossover movies with characters from other seasons. All Stars F, the latest All Stars movie, featured all 78 main cures.

Themes / Motifs: Every season will have a different theme and/or motif. These can aesthetics (such as Yes! Precure 5's butterflies) or messages (such as Star Twinkle's focus on imagination).

Kamikita Futago / PreCure Manga: Two twin sisters who have created the official PreCure manga adaptation from the very beginning in 2004. They are very active on X / Twitter and constantly post art for character birthdays and events as well. Their art style is very unique and lovely in my opinion. The PreCure manga adaptations are usually more slice-of-life focused. Some PreCure Sites / Online Spaces / Articles:

Let me know if I need to add anything! I probably should archive these sooner or later too.

Official PreCure Anime site

Official Toei site

Anime News Network article about PreCure 101

Another great article on PreCure history by MahouShoujoFiles

Differences between Glitter Force and PreCure by MahouShoujoFiles

PreCure Subreddit

The 4Chan thread is on /a/.

Fansite (Dual Aurora Wave) dedicated to the OG Futari Wa

Wordpress (Magical Shoujo) with lots of PreCure reviews (Wordpress / Livejournal was where PreCure in the anglosphere was limited to online for a very long time!)

Detailed Precure fansite (Miracle All Stars)

PreCure Wiki, very comprehensive and active.

There's lots of PreCure YouTubers. Here's three that I like. Videos are nice in the background for doing mindless chores / work:

♥ https://www.youtube.com/@sghope

♥ https://www.youtube.com/@doreimani

♥ https://www.youtube.com/@ScienceProject99

I also recommend staying away from English-speaking PreCure Twitter and Discord for the most part. Lots of degeneracy like 4Chan, actual children on social media, and pointless drama. I don't use Tiktok, but it's probably trash as well. However if you want lots of lovely fanart and to see the Japanese fandom, then Twitter and Pixiv are the way to go. I'll link more Japanese / other websites later.
 There's also this site (Safebooru) which seems to work somewhat well as a SFW booru source for anime fanart. This is a great way to find fan-artists if you look at the image sources.

Japanese PreCure article website sourced from 2chan threads. Japanese-only and not for kids lol
Random PreCure Opinions:

 As always, feel free to disagree with any or all of these!

I really like the Splash Star designs. The color schemes are unique and visible. They look like 80's glam rockstars. The designs aren't only not bad, but some of the best.
The Delicious Party designs and art style are excellent.
I do not have a problem with names like "Cure Yum-Yum" or "Cure Nyammy".
I CAN NOT WAIT until Dancing☆Star Pretty Cure The Stage comes out on BluRay. It needs to be a spin-off anime. Millions of women (including me) would be so happy. Please Toei. Also all of the Dancing☆Star boys are yaoi boys.
Similarly, I do not care if there are occasional male Cures.
I like seeing non-pink lead Cures. I doubt they will ever match the amount of pink leaders. I want to see more takes on pink cures too (different shades of pink, designs, non-yellow or pink hair, etc).
I really don't like "color-blob" characters in general. What's a colorblob? A colorblob a term I invented for characters that are too monochromatic. It is why I do not like the Smile designs very much. Just making the colors different would make them amazing.
The Happiness Charge art is ugly. It looks like a parody of an anime inside an anime. I hate the vests.
I prefer uniqueness to matching uniforms in Cure designs. I don't like overcomplicated designs either. Star☆Twinkle is an season of great designs for example (except the zodiac ones).
PreCure doesn't need to be super dark, but I enjoy when seasons have intense fights and depth. Heartcatch was great for a reason. It's dumb to expect some Madoka Magica stuff to come out, but they can allude to more serious topics.
Mepple wasn't ever bad, I thought it was funny how he rags on Nagisa sometimes. Pollun sucks bigtime though. Most annoying character ever. I would never want to see him seriously hurt though!
I was disappointed in the quality of animation during the Snow Princess movie. Tropical-Rouge and Heartcatch are my favorites!! Still fun though.
Cure Felice should have been a WHITE Cure (with pink hair tips)! See my redesign to the right. Actually now that I think about it, I kinda want to recolor her flowers and accessories too. Hm.
I don't mind romance in PreCure seasons, but it's not something I really look forward to either.
I think baby mascots are ugly bigtime. I wish fairies were always animals.
Shipping wars are completely unneeded. People can pair whatever characters together that they want. You can like or dislike any pairing. Also anyone can watch PreCure for whatever reason. If you only watch PreCure for the fights, that doesn't make you a "fake fan" (but there's probably better shows for that lol).
Splash☆Star should have been rewritten to have Cure Bright and Cure Windy as official midseason cures with a story to support that. You know what I'm talking about if you've seen it.
I like melee fights in PreCure, and it is disappointing to have less of a focus on action in Wonderful (and Kirakira).
I consider teal-colored cures to be green. I think lots of shades of green aren't that pretty, so I can understand the focus on teal. I would enjoy seeing a mint-colored or pastel-green cure though!

トロピカ I・N・G (the first Tropical Rouge ED) is an amazing song. I was surprised to hear that people don't like it.

Color discourse: Realistic things I want to see in a future series: Things I generally don't like: Differences between the OG Futari wa duo and the Splash Star:

 Many people new to the series think that Saki and Mai are different forms of Nagisa and Honoka. This is incorrect! They look very similar, but there are lots of differences in appearance and personality. Here's a list.

Click here to see Nagisa (orange) AND Honoka (blue) in the first pic. Saki (orange) and Mai (purple) are in the second.

 These are all differences I have noticed myself and have thought about for a bit. If you have watched the early seasons of PreCure and have other differences you've noticed, PLEASE let me know! GUESTBOOK HERE! I'm tired of people saying they are different personality-wise and never explaining why to newcomers.

I LOOVE the old Kamikita Futago art style from the Futari wa era (2004-2006, before Yes 5)!! Tell me it's not peak. Eyes remind me of 90's Toei Sailor Moon.

I don't like how Cure Gelato's gloves match perfectly with her hair. It clashes so much and makes her hands disappear!


Favorite Songs! (WIP):

 Each PreCure season has an OPs, EDs, character songs for each Cure, and more. Here are some of my favorite songs for seasons I have seen. Click the title of each season to reveal or hide the songs. These are all on Spotify! KIRAMEKUUUUU HOSHI NO CHIKARA DEEEEE
Futari wa Pretty Cure
  • DANZEN!ふたりはプリキュア (DANZEN! Futari wa Purikyua)
  • ゲッチュウ!らぶらぶぅ?! (Getchū! Rabu Rabu~u?!)
  • 雨のち天晴れ (Ame Nochi Appare)
  • 好きなのに…ビミョ～！！(Daisuki na no ni...Bimyo~!)
  • ありったけの笑顔で (Arittake no Egao de)
  • プリキュア登場!～VOCAL RAINBOW STORM～ (Pretty Cure Tōjō! ~VOCAL RAINBOW STORM~)
  • ここにいるよ (Koko ni Iru yo)
Futari wa Pretty Cure: Splash☆Star
Heartcatch PreCure! (BOP WARNING)
  • Alright!ハートキャッチプリキュア!, only the original
  • ハートキャッチ☆パラダイス！ (Heartcatch☆Paradise!)
  • つ.ぼ.み〜Future Flower〜 (Tsu.Bo.Mi ~Future Flower~), both the original and remix
  • スペシャル*カラフル (Special*Colorful), both the original and remix
  • 変身！ (Transform!)
  • 太陽のシンフォニー
  • FULL MOON〜月が満ちるまで〜
  • HEART GOES ON
  • LET'S GO!
  • あしたのあたし(The Me Of Tomorrow)
  • Power of Shine, the remix in particular
  • MOON ～月光～ ATTACK (MOON ～MOONLIGHT～ ATTACK), both the original and remix
Go! Princess PreCure
Mahoutsukai PreCure
Kirakira☆PreCure A La Mode
Star☆Twinkle PreCure
  • キラリ☆彡スター☆トゥインクルプリキュア(Sparkle☆彡Star☆Twinkle Pretty Cure)
  • コズミック☆ミステリー☆ガール(Cosmic☆Mystery☆Girl)
  • ドキドキ☆La・La・Lun TOUR (Exciting☆La・La・Lun TOUR)
  • Moonlight Signal
  • TO BE LOVE ～扉～ (TO BE LOVE ～Door～)
Tropical-Rouge! Pretty Cure
  • Viva! Spark!トロピカル～ジュ！プリキュア (Viva! Spark! Tropical-Rouge! Pretty Cure)
  • トロピカ I・N・G (Tropica I・N・G)
  • OH! TEMPT SUMMER DAY
  • アクアプリズム (Aqua Prism)
  • プリティル～ジュデイズ！ (Pretty Rouge Days!)
Hirogaru Sky! PreCure
Wonderful PreCure!

Merch:

 What do you guys think of my little shrine? You can see my Love Live books and Rin figures as well in this picture! :P I have a little cabinet in my home office with some merch stuff... perfect for PreCure! These are my Precious Moments lol.

 The crown jewel is obviously the huge Tamashii Premier figure. I love it so much! Cure Black and White look so badass. It's huge, and the background is great as well!

 I also would like to pick up the Cure Black S.H.Figuarts (maybe Shiny Luminous too) and the rest of the Heartcatch girls too at some point. I also have ebooks of the manga and of some light novels! Not pictured obviously HAHA


Ships:

 I don't ship every single popular pairing...but I like to have fun! Again, I'm not some ship wacko... live and let live... ship and let ship... I don't GAF if you hate whatever I ship as long as we agree to disagree. And if you don't agree to disagree? Well...

 I'll save my BokuPuri ships and yaoi science for that sub-shrine... for now... muahaha.

Nagisa x Honoka ❤️
Honoka x Kiriya ❤️
Nozomi x Coco
Mirai x Liko
Akari x Yukari
Manatsu x Laura ❤️
Sora x Mashiro
Mashiro x Battamonda
Ageha x Tsubasa ❤️ (with an older Tsubasa or less of an age gap, examples here: X, X, X, X, X)
Yuki x Mayu
Iroha x Satoru
Daifuku x Satoru
Fanworks:
Fanart by mwah (click to see)... more art here!

Sub-Shrines:

 If there's anything I'm WORSE at than actually finishing seasons, it's finishing shrines. Here's some sub-shrines. They're always a WIP, take them or leave them!

Fanlistings:
Poll:
Are you a fan of PreCure? ♡
 
pollcode.com free polls

Anyways, that's enough for now. .. but I'll probably add more later. Thanks for reading and/or taking the poll. I love PreCure!
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