Futari wa Precure: Splash☆Star

My first Pretty Cure series was Heartcatch Precure. I did see the first episode of the first series, Futari wa Pretty Cure way long ago, but I never went beyond it, partly because of other things, and partly because one mascot's voice was so grating and annoying I just couldn't stand it. But after I finished Heartcatch Precure thanks to a fellow blogger's praising it up the wazoo, I later watched the first 5 episodes of Smile, but I had to put it on hold due to other real life obligations. Then I found Splash Star on TVTropes and apparently people used to outright hateit back when it aired but now its held with higher regard. Out of curiosity and boredom after watching too much Pokemon and Sword Art Online, I decided to check it out. As of now, it is the second Pretty Cure series I have ever watched all the way through, and my second favorite, for very good reasons. This is a very good series, and it really needs to be seen by American little girls. Like the first series, it starts off with two girls who are very different from each other: the cheerful and sporty Saki Hyuuga, and the soft-spoken and artistic Mai Mishou. They actually met once when they were younger, but they separated since then, only reuniting once they enter middle school. But their reunion is quite a strange one: two fairies appear from a big tree in the neighborhood, Flappi and Choppi, claiming to be from a place called The Land of Fountains, which had been taken over by the evil organization called Dark Fall. The fairies give Saki and Mai giant cell phones which transform them into the warriors named Pretty Cure, Saki as Cure Bloom, and Mai as Cure Egret (for those wondering, the word egret is a medieval term used to describe white birds, usually herons, with long, graceful plumes during breeding season. Mai's powers are based on the wind and the sky, so it makes sense). Together, they have to defeat Dark Fall and restore the Land of Fountains back to its original state. But they also have to protect their own world, as Dark Fall won't spare it either, especially since they're also trying to find the elusive Fountain of the Sun, the only fountain they haven't destroyed or claimed yet. The animation...isn't really much to write home about. There is a lot of movement during the fight scenes, which is good considering the hard hitting attacks Pretty Cure is known for requires a lot of movement, but at times the characters look a bit off model, especially during later episodes. But they're minor, so they don't hurt the show entirely. One reason for this may be that Splash Star made a lot less money on its debut than the original series, probably because people were turned off by the character designs and premise looking way too similar to the original Pretty Cure series before it. No one really knows why Toei made Saki and Mai look so similar to Nagisa and Honoka of the original series, and the most common theory is that they were afraid of potential backlash from the audience that liked Nagisa and Honoka, fearing cries of "Replacement Scrappy!" But whatever the reason, that's still no reason to put off this show or dismiss it as a rip-off of the original series. Again, I haven't seen the first series and its sequel, Max Heart, so I can't properly judge it. The music, while admittedly not as good or dynamic as later seasons, still manages to be really solid. The music manages to capture the mood, atmosphere, and intents of all of its scenes really well, and nothing feels out of place, unlike some anime (Nurse Angel Ririka SOS, anyone?). I particularly liked the music that played when the Pretty Cures, in their new forms, unleash their final attacks on the monsters of the week, and I consider those pieces to be the high point of the entire OST. Also, the opening is extremely dynamic and catchy. It'll never leave your brain! I certainly liked it, and I don't see why American audiences wouldn't like it either. The Pretty Cure series is very reliant on character development. Some series do it well, and some...don't. Splash Star does it well. While Saki and Mai may look like rip-offs of Nagisa and Honoka, they're actually very different characters. Saki is cheerful, energetic, and friendly, but can be a little reckless and stubborn at times, Mai is sweet, soft spoken, slightly indecisive, and a little shy, but is very insightful. I personally liked seeing them interact and get along and influence each other throughout the series. Most anime tend to just give a character one trait and that's it. You don't see that in Splash Star. The main characters actually have hobbies and interests. Saki likes sports, but she also likes working in her parents' bakery, and she even tries her hand at drawing, even though she isn't very good. Mai likes drawing, but is also interested in astronomy. They have interesting lives! The other characters, like their family members and classmates, also have a strong presence, and don't just show up for one episode and then be gone forever. They all influence the main characters' growth in some way. I will admit though, I didn't like Michiru and Kaoru much. I always thought they were creepy until the very end of the series. Unfortunately, however, while the main characters are very well developed, I'm sad to say this isn't the case for the villains. While I appreciate them being intimidating and having some personality, in the end they're still typical, cliche, generic, power hungry villains who want to destroy the world for dumb reasons. Plus I felt there were a bit too many of them. I would have liked to see them be fleshed out some more. Yes, I know, it's a kids show, but that's still no excuse to not develop your villains. Sometimes kids like interesting villains who don't want to destroy the world. But one thing that really makes me respect this series is how realistically it handles its character conflicts. In one episode, Kenta spills a drink on Mai's brother's book, and Saki is extremely angry at him. But both of them know it's an accident, actually apologize to each other right after, and try to find a way to fix it. There's no overblown misunderstanding, no melodrama, no shouting "this has nothing to do with you!", etc. God, I've waited so long for a series to actually make characters understand each other's intentions, actually talk to each other, and be proactive in trying to solve them in the most down to earth way possible! I'm so sick and tired of anime making characters act really stupid and refusing to talk to each other for the sake of drama and padding things out for a really long time just for the sake of spicing things up when all it does is drag it down! Thank you, Splash Star! Splash Star may not be the best series in the franchise (for me, that honor goes to Heartcatch), but it definitely has a special place in my heart. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm gonna go watch Suite, because I'm enjoying it immensely! And seriously, why can't shows like this be faithfully dubbed in English for American TV? Little girls would love this kind of stuff!

Let's take another look at Toei's PreCure franchise. So far, I've looked at Futari wa, Max Heart & Doki Doki. This time around, let's talk about Splash Star. The third instalment of the franchise that ran from '06 to '07. How well does it hold up compared to the other instalments we've looked at? Let's take a look. Story: Young Mai is moving back to a city she used to live in. While exploring, she encounters a familiar looking girl, Saki, underneath the sky tree. The two encounter a pair of faeries, Flappy & Choppy, who remind them that they briefly encountered each other beneath thatsame tree five years ago. A brief instant that was so formative for the pair that it apparently caused their fates to intertwine because PreCure has never been subtle with its massive amounts of subtext. The two are confronted by a leafy looking menace who demands that the faeries disclose the location of the fountain of the Sun. Saki and Mai go to their defence, transforming into Cure Bloom and Cure Egret. Together, they set off on a mission to revive the holy fountains. Honestly, there aren't any major problems with the series. About the worst you can say about it is that it's very much a magical girl series with all the optimism, enemies of the week, transformation sequences and such that are prevalent in the genre. And there's nothing inherently wrong with a work in a genre being very much grounded in that genre. Especially when it's something like this with a young target audience. Splash Star has a lot of aspects that are kind of similar to Futari wa but that are also distinct. Both series feature an athletic girl and one who is into more intellectual pursuits. The characters even look a bit similar. But they're involved in different things and have different issues related to those interests. Both series have a generic male love interest who's barely acknowledged because every time he shows up for a moment with the girl who has a crush on him it's used to transition into a bigger moment for her with the other PreCure but Splash Star makes use of that a lot less and has different kinds of moments betwixt the girls as a result. In both of them, the athletic girl has a younger sibling. But the relationship dynamic that Nagisa had with her brother was a lot different from the one Saki has with her sister. I do like the pacing in Splash Star. It does a really good job of introducing a variety of major villains, giving them some time to be menaces and then bringing the next one in before you can get tired of the current one. Splash Star also features a superb redemption story with some surprisingly tragic moments within it. Darn it, PreCure writers, stop making me feel things. I'm supposed to be a cynical git. A cynical git who hates everything. Or so I've been told. There are some strong moments of tension in the series as well. They really make you curious about how Saki & Mai are going to resolve things. Although you know they will because it's PreCure. The climax is really well done too. The series is just generally fun, cute and endearing. Characters: There are some strong characters in Splash Star. Saki and Mai are great. Their families are a lot of fun. Michiru and Kaoru are great. The supporting cast has a lot of fun, colourful characters within it. In terms of antagonists, most of them are pretty standard. The big exception is Alex Louis Kintoleski. There is something utterly delightful about him and his techniques that have been passed down the Kintoleski line for generations. Shitataare and DoroDoron are kind of fun at times. The worst character, by far, is Moerumaba. He comes across as a strange blend of gay and Latin stereotypes. The faeries aren't particularly compelling, but they're decent enough. Art: There's a lot of praiseworthy aspects to the artwork. The backgrounds are nicely detailed with some very nicely done scenery. The action sequences can be absolutely amazing. I do love the way this franchise incorporates really physical brawling into its action sequences along with the special magic attacks and Splash Star is no exception to that. It does suffer from the same issue with the stock footage attacks that Futari wa did. Namely, that there are very few and they start to get dull after a while. This was before they'd learned to vary them a bit more, clearly. There are some really interesting villain designs. I can't stand Moerumba's and Alex Louis Kintoleski may be the best villain, but his design is kind of boring. He's just a golden muscle man. Those two aside, great villain designs. I do like the PreCure designs too. I like that Saki & Mai have multiple Cure forms and I like their outfits. The monster designs continue to be very creative and interesting. Which is another thing the franchise has been consistently good at. Sound: The best performances come from Kimoto Orie, Enomoto Atsuko, Fuchizaki Yuriko & Imai Yuka. There are plenty of other good performances as well. Sato Naoki is back for the soundtrack work and he does a really nice job. Ho-yay: Saki and Mai may be marginally more homo-erotic than Nagisa and Honoka were. They're heavily inspired by one another. They gain strength when their hearts come together as one. They talk about their fated meeting. They have a date where they actually feed one another home made bento. They talk about how energised they feel when they hold hands. I can only imagine how much that's going to increase when they get older and start snogging. In any case, their dynamic is adorable. Final Thoughts: So, that's Futari wa PreCure Splash Star. If you're a fan of the whole magical girl aesthetic, it's for you. You will almost certainly garner enjoyment from watching it. If you aren't a fan of the genre, it's not going to change your mind. For myself, I pretty thoroughly enjoyed it. Loved the characters. I give it a solid 8/10. Next week I'll look at Wolf Guy.

Now I’d read lots of praise about this Precure series, but for me it really didn't live up to it. tl;dr: Episodes without Kaoru and Michiru = average. Episodes with Kaoru and Michiru = good. I found the story was too slow paced with little happening and not interesting enough. Apart from Kaoru and Michiru of course, their part of the story was the best. Unfortunately it doesn't focus on them all of the time. Precure stories aren't the fastest pasted in anime, but this series seemed especially slow and dull compared to others. The main story itself is generic - a big bad guy with variousminions trying to destroy the universe/worlds. There's only one plot twist right at the end. I feel other Precure series handled this better, especially Fresh. I also felt like there was too much filler which wasn't the most entertaining. I think how there are only two main girls lets the filler down as there is only so much you can do with 49 episodes of the same two characters all the time. The filler wasn't up to the standard of other series. The animation was pretty bad. Lots of derpy faces and poor drawings, but what can you expect. The designs themselves are awful. Again, apart from Michiru and Kaoru. I really liked Michiru's as she reminds me of Will from W.I.T.C.H. Saki and Mai character wise are a bit different from Nagisa and Honoka, but that doesn't stop them from looking like poorly done rip off fan designs. The first outfits you can put up with, Saki's second outfit however is terrible! The colour is greeny-yellow! Who thought that looked good!? Another thing I disliked was that Saki and Mai just got beat up most of the time instead of getting stronger until the last few episodes. In other series the Cures actually get evidently stronger and beat enimies faster as time goes on. Saki and Mai just get punched down until the last moment of a fight when they fire their main big finishing attack. The fight scenes lacked compared to other series, but they seemed to be stronger cures in terms of their magical powers, they just didn’t use their fists enough. The writing is very good. No main character gets more unnecessary screen time than another. The characters themselves are good. I liked all of the fairies, Saki and Mai are likable (far from my favourite Cures though). The first villan is kind of dull and I hated Moerumba he was so annoying. I liked the rest of the villains. Ms. Shitataare is the best, she was really entertaining and added in good comedy. The series itself did make me laugh quite a few times. Kaoru and Michiru however are by far the best characters, their development is wonderful and they are really interesting. I like them a lot more than Saki and Mai. I know this review seems pretty negative, but this isn't a bad show itself. I just found the other Precure series I have watched to be better. (and no I haven't seen Doki Doki!)

I started watching Precure in its release order, avoiding the trouble of looking in thousands of threads to see which entry is the best one to start the series with. Thus, Splash Star is my second dive (third, if you count Max Heart separately) in this huge sea that I still have left to explore. First of all, I’ve read some people pointing out the similarities between the OG Futari wa and Splash Star. At first sight, it may seem impossible not to look at the two Splash Star protagonists and see our old friends Nagisa and Honoka, but as the episodes progressed different dynamics canbe seen between them that distinguish this instalment from its predecessor. With that said, I’ll try not to remark on any parallelism between both of them (even though I couldn’t stop doing comparisons between the two shows during my viewing lol). Story I think the story is the most remarkable thing about Splash Star and it’s all thanks to two characters. No, not Saki and Mai, but Kaoru and Michiru. These two managed to sustain and raise what at first seemed like the typical story about legendary warriors who need to save the Earth from dark villains. I got really invested in the bonds both Kaoru and Michiru created with the protagonists, as well as their whole character arc. The pacing is great, all the villains come and go at the right moment, and maybe when it can start to get a little tiresome, Kaoru and Michiru step in and refresh the story. Lastly, I’d like to point out how the anime conveys emotions in different situations very well through drawings, making Saki and Mai characters evolve. Characters Saki and Mai, both with their different personalities, balance each other nicely, giving some powerful and emotional moments. Regarding the side characters, I think Splash Star is capable of the best and worst. Ok, maybe not the worst, but there are a bunch of forgettable characters, like their girl friends and overall their families. Aside from Kaoru and Michiru, Kenta and Minori are the other two that I liked the most, bringing the first one a lot of funny moments and the last one extremely cute ones. The spirits or mascots were meh, I didn't particularly like or hate them. The villains were great though. I couldn’t stop laughing everytime Moerumba danced or teased Gooyaan, same with Mizu Shitatare getting mad at Saki for always saying her name wrong, and I liked how Kintoleski always made sure his opponents were fighting full strength. Art Not gonna talk much about the art, mainly cause I don’t really know what to say. Being a coastal city, there are some nice sea visuals, plus the giant tree of life that’s inside the town. The characters designs are good, it’s nice to see the protagonists have more than one battle outfit. Also, some fights are very well done, combining action with super powers, but overall I think they all looked pretty much the same. Sound The OP and the two EDs were energetic and catchy. The soundtrack was good as well, but, even though I said I wouldn't compare the two anime, I gotta say that there aren’t any cool insert songs like “Shining Star” or “Heart to Heart” in the OG Futari wa. Same as in Max Heart, where they repeat the instrumental version of the OP/EDs quite a lot. In conclusion, Splash Star is an enjoyable anime that’s worth recommending to anyone that loves mahou shoujo and has liked any other Precure entries. Don't be reluctant to watch this anime only because it may seem the same as the previous Futari wa, since Saki and Mai (and Kaoru and Michiru) will make sure to prove you wrong.

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