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This Week in Anime - What's So Great About Tropical-Rouge! Precure?

Where Super Sentai and Kamen Rider doggedly refuse to cast female leads (all you pedants about to type "ShinkenRed" can kindly sit down, you know they did her dirty), Precure has gone so far as to even allow boys to be Pretty Cures!

As for Sentai and Rider, KR has been making a lot of interesting strides. Since Gaim, they've had some sort of female Rider in almost every season (save for Ghost/Build/Drive, though should have had Kiriko, but they just didn't). Valkyrie was a main character through Zero-One, and I know Saber just introduced a female Rider as well. If anything, PreCure is a bit of a middle ground between KR and Sentai (which is a bit more traditional and stubborn IMO). PreCure has it's traditions, but it also appears to be taking interesting and new strides within the franchise.

I think this is the most fun I've had with a seasonal Precure premiere since Mahoutsukai, everything is so confidently silly. The designs also work great for me but I have the tastes of a gradeschooler when it comes to color.
And oh boy Laura, her inclusion as the typical fairy mascot replacement was bold, puzzling (having such a human-but-not-quite girl in the group messes so hard with the formula) and highly effective. Although sassy mascots are always fun, Milk forever.

Now, let's not be too dishonest here: Henry was a cure for about 4 minutes, consciously named himself, was working on borrowed power and in the end it tied in with absolutely the whole world getting a powerup. Although the previous season did feature a guy that was a cure in everything but name, he got done dirty (weren't there rumors that he was supposed to be Cure Pancake but later scrapped?).
Meanwhile Super Sentai has the obligatory female team member or two every season and Kamen Rider features a female Rider every now and then (I think? Honestly I only followed Gaim and the one female Rider there was an antagonist).
Not like there's anything wrong with having a girl superhero team, they're quite rare as it stands, but Precure is definitely not more inclusive than its toku counterparts.

Yeah, that attempt at trying to take a shot as toku seemed... really odd... given how many great female ranger and riders there are.

I've been out of toku for a while but the only female rider I remember is Kivala from Decade. There have been female rangers who were the leader of their groups (GekiYellow from Gekiranger) but most of the time it feels like it's in name only.

Jean-Karlo's theory about reacting to Healin' Good is interesting. I don't remember if it was ever confirmed (because this was 10 years ago) but there was at least thought Kamen Rider Fourze was super light and fluffy on purpose as a result of the 3/11 disaster.

And Wizard was...fine? Little underbaked, but had a banger of an opening.

A similar theory was sprung about Suite Precure, which was a bit acid since Hibiki and Kanade were constantly at odds and Siren was pretty angsty for a talking cat. One earthquake later, the tension between those two was gone and everyone became much goofier.

I think it's unlikely Suite was changed in any major way as a result of 3/11. I think Suite was always meant to be the way it is.

Yuvelir wrote:

A similar theory was sprung about Suite Precure, which was a bit acid since Hibiki and Kanade were constantly at odds and Siren was pretty angsty for a talking cat. One earthquake later, the tension between those two was gone and everyone became much goofier.

These series are written and planned a long time in advance with a lot of behind the scenes production They have to figure out all the different characters, their upgrades, and plan when the merchandise comes out to manufacturers and retailers well in advanced. That's how we usually get leaks for tokusatsu shows - toy catalogs that show up well in advance.

spoiler[Heck, we already knew who the 5th Precure in Tropical Rouge was before the series even aired]

I think it's unlikely Suite was changed in any major way as a result of 3/11. I think Suite was always meant to be the way it is. A very laid back and low stakes series. Trio de Minor were goofball villains right from the get go spoiler[ until their upgrade forms later, anyway]

It was actually confirmed in later interviews that Suite was intended to be a fairly dark season, and 3/11 DID change it a lot.

These series are written and planned a long time in advance with a lot of behind the scenes production They have to figure out all the different characters, their upgrades, and plan when the merchandise comes out to manufacturers and retailers well in advanced. That's how we usually get leaks for tokusatsu shows - toy catalogs that show up well in advance.

I think it's unlikely Suite was changed in any major way as a result of 3/11. I think Suite was always meant to be the way it is. A very laid back and low stakes series. Trio de Minor were goofball villains right from the get go spoiler[ until their upgrade forms later, anyway]