Series Director of Wonderful Pretty Cure is Masanori SATO.
As title, I translated an interview with the WPC series director from the Monthly Animage September 2024.
This is his first time working on the anime series PreCure. However, he was previously an episode director for All Stars Memories.
It's a hassle, so I'll only translate the important parts.
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───In the proposal compiled by producer Maki TAKAHASHI (Toei Animation), it was written that "bring out the pairing of the dog team and the cat team" and "bonds with pets" were mentioned. What were your thoughts in response to that as the series director?
Sato (Series Director):
The image of the four of them that the producers and other planners first gave me was that the dog team was running in the same direction, and the cat team was back to back, taking care of each other.
Following that idea, I created an animation that portrayed the habits of dogs and cats in an interesting way.
───What do you pay attention to when checking the script for Wonderful Pretty Cure?
Sato (Series Director):
Perhaps many viewers feel that the drama in each episode of this work is weaker than in the past 20 Pretty Cure series.
But we have constructed this work as a single story throughout the entire series.
Each episode contains important elements that relate to the entire series. When you watch all the episodes, you will notice that one big drama is being formed.
───Does this mean that you deliberately reveal little by little the old tales about Animal Town and the setting of Toboe Shrine?
Sato (Series Director):
That's right.
I tried not to present information about the enemy from the beginning.
Since this work is about PreCure purifying the animals that have been turned into Garugaru, there was no need to push the enemy executives to the forefront of the story.
This piece has been in the making for a year.
So, In the initial stages, I thought it would be okay not to specifically introduce the enemy who is brainwashing and controlling the animals to turn them into Garugaru.
This is because the enemies will also become more powerful as the episodes progress.
In the second half of this series, the villain characters will become clear, and the story and tempo will pick up.
At that stage, we plan to add some variety to the action as well.
───As a series director, what do you pay attention to when creating each characters.
Sato (Series Director):
I'm mindful that they all don't look too childish.
In fact, even among us staff members, there is a tendency to think that Komugi has a very young mental age.
Of course, there are Komugi plush toys available for real children to take care of her, so I think she is someone that children can take care of.
However, since Komugi is currently a middle school student, I want to portray her in a way that doesn't make her seem out of place as a middle school student.
In reality, she doesn't like studying, though. (lol)
───About Iroha.
When Iroha is with Komugi, she is like an elder sister to her, looking after her.
But her own nature seems more innocent than I expected.
Sato (Series Director):
Yes. Actually, Iroha has many tasks to accomplish in this anime work.
She is a character who carries the theme of the work itself.
Therefore, when I express Iroha's character in the anime episodes, I try to make sure that the viewers understand that she is a kind girl who is able to take good care of animals and is sympathetic to their feelings.
But at the same time, since the dog team is a pair that "charges in the same direction," I want her to act as energetically and cheerfully as Cure Wonderful.
So even though she appears to be like an older sister to Komugi, she is fundamentally innocent and does not notice Satoru-kun's feelings. lol
───When I dug deeper into the mental ages, I got the impression that Yuki had the highest mental age out of the four.
Sato (Series Director):
Yuki is like the eldest sister to the three of them, and in fact she may be an adult.
To be honest, if I were to post her in a middle school setting, she might be more suitable to be one year above theirs, but to make the story easier to write, I made her a classmate in the same year as them.
When portraying her in the anime, I tried to make sure her personality wasn't too cold.
When she first appeared, she was almost like their enemy, so I thought that if her character was portrayed as it was, she would come across as cold.
Yuki certainly has affection for Mayu, and even though she appears to be cold, she is shy around Mayu and has a cute side to her, so I tried to make her a cute character.
───Mayu is set to be a transfer student, but did you guys first define her character's past trauma and then set her up that way?
Sato (Series Director):
When series writer Narita-san was first creating the character settings for the characters, Mayu was defined as "a girl who has painful memories of an old friend."
However, the move itself was prompted by her mother opening a new store.
It was a good opportunity for her to freshen up her environment.
───Ever since Mayu realized in episode 23 that Satoru had romantic feelings for Iroha, she's been teasing him quite often, right? lol
Sato (Series Director):
(lol)
To be honest, I thought that if Mayu continued to have a shy personality, it would be difficult for viewers to like her.
That's why I wanted to express her funny side.
When she transferred schools, we saw her funny side, but after that she remained just a quiet character.
So I wanted to show the viewers a funny side to her.
Of course, I intend to properly depict Satoru-kun's love drama as a story.
In any case, it was inevitable that Mayu or Yuki, or both, would realize his romantic feelings for Iroha before episode 23.
He and Iroha are friends to Mayu and Yuki, so Mayu especially will want to root for the development of their relationship.
───In the opening footage, the four of them appear to be one team, but I think it will be interesting to see the two teams, "Wonderful Precure" and "Nyanderful Precure", fighting together in the episode.
Sato (Series Director):
The reason Nyammy decided to cooperate with the other Precures was because Lillian was among them.
So I initially thought they should be paired up first.
I believe it is natural that the two pairs (two teams) will gradually deepen their bonds and come together as one team.
I wanted to emphasize the bond between the pets and their respective owners.
Also, we asked the composer to create a different BGM for the cat team's transformation than the dog team's.
Because of this, if there are only a few episodes using the BGM for the cat team and we soon get to a scene where all four of them transform at the same time, it would be a waste if the BGM gets used less frequently. lol
So we completely separated the transformation scenes into two teams.
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Finally
Sato: "The story really starts to move forward from around episode 30."
