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Minazuki Karen (水無月かれん)? is one of the five main Cures in Yes! Pretty Cure 5 and Yes! Pretty Cure 5 GoGo!. She is a third-year student at L'École des Cinq Lumières, and is in the same class as Komachi and is also the student council president.

Her alter ego is Cure Aqua (キュアアクア)? and she is known as the Pretty Cure of Intelligence.

Bio[]

Appearance[]

Karen has dark blue eyes with thick eyebrows. Her matching colored hair is worn loose with some strands over the left shoulder and her bangs brushed to the left. In GoGo! her casual outfit is a bluish-gray top and skirt with a bow on the back, and navy heels.

In Yes! Pretty Cure 5: Kagami no Kuni no Miracle Daibouken!, Karen wore a light purple jacket with fluffy trim over a dark teal outfit with light grey boots.

As an adult, Karen wears a dark blue jacket, a cyan blouse, a light brown buckle belt, an ivory knee-length skirt, and Yale blue sneakers with yellow laces. Her right strands of hair has also outgrown those on her left.

Her other causal outfit as an adult is usually a dark lavender blue blouse, a dark blueberry skirt, and black boots. She also wears a necklace with a blue oval gemstone.

As a doctor, Karen wears a long white coat, dull blue uniform , pens on her coat pocket, and dull white sneakers. She also ties her hair up into a long ponytail with a silver hairclip.

As Cure Aqua, her eyes and hair turn bright blue, with her hair growing out into a straightened ponytail held with a blue butterfly adorned by a red gem. She also gains blue butterfly earrings. Her outfit is styled like Cure Mint's, a white mini-dress with blue lining and bow around the waist and pale yellow straps circling the off-shoulder sleeves. These are trim with pale blue ruffles to match the secondary skirt layer, and on the chest is a butterfly, but this one is pale yellow. She also gains dark blue shorts and blue boots with a butterfly, and gloves to match her dress with a light blue butterfly on the hand, her Pinky Catch worn on the wrist.

As Super Cure Aqua, the ruffles on her sleeves and boots grow longer while her skirt gains an extra layer. She has large blue butterfly wings.

In GoGo!, her earrings and shorts remain the same, while her hair butterfly loses it's gem in favor of a magenta flower. Her gloves and boots change in style, along with her chest butterfly, which connects to her CureMo. Her dress loses it's outer layer in favor of a pastel blue vest lined in blue, accenting the new straps of her full sleeves. The ruffles have become pale chiffon.

As Super Cure Aqua, her outfit is similar to Shining Dream's. She has pale pink roses on her chest and her hair ornament and small gold wings and has more color.

Personality[]

Karen is strongly admired for being calm and stoic, a mature young woman who has come to cover up her insecurities and feelings of loneliness. She dearly misses her parents as they are usually away, but out of obligation and feeling that everything rests on her shoulders she refuses to let it get to her, she has come to think she needs to do everything by herself. She was originally very enthusiastic about being class representative prior to meeting Komachi, but by the time it began wearing her down she was forced to keep going to be there for her. Because of her position, Karen is able to memorize all the names and faces of all the Cinq Lumières students, and also easily takes responsibility when something happens to the school, as seen in the second episode where she wants Nozomi to explain what happened to the library the other day.

While usually calm in temperament, when pushed enough she can sometimes get to a point where she ends up saying hurtful or offensive things to other people, shown in episode 23, where she called Komachi naïve and indecisive, even though she wasn't involved in the issue that upset her.

In episode 5 and 6, Karen acted as though her time with the Pretty Cure had been a made up story. But with their company, she had a lot of fun. When she meets Coco, she was quite stunned and scared after they were attacked. She wanted to help her friends after they got hurt, but when the blue butterfly disappeared, she was shocked and held a lot of grief and depression. But encouraged by Nozomi and stunned by her hopes and friendship, she was happy and dealt with it the best she could. Finally, she became a Pretty Cure at the end of Episode 6 and the more she spends time with her teammates, the more she has fun with them. In episode 29, Jii-ya was happy to see her making jokes, glad to see she's began to open up.

Relationships[]

  • Akimoto Komachi: Karen's best friend, along with fellow student council member. In episode 28, it was explained that the two met when they were in their first year of middle school and were performing a class project, which Karen, who was class representative back then, was about to give up on. Komachi, however, inspired her to keep trying and the two succeeded, becoming best friends afterwards. They remain inseparable, and often lean on each other to cheer the other up.
  • Milk: Karen has a close, loving and protective relationship with her. Milk admires Karen for her mature and graceful nature. Karen's relationship with her is similar to those between Nozomi and Coco, Komachi and Nuts, and Urara and Syrup.
  • Natsuki Rin: At first Rin wanted nothing to do with Karen, and the feeling was mutual. Their personalities, along with colors and elements were seen to be as different as night and day, and due to this they often bickered. However, after growing to understand each other and realize they share things in common as well, they grow closer as friends.
  • Jii-ya/Sakamoto: Her butler and caretaker. Karen respects and cares for him, and listens to his advice.
  • Shinozaki Nana: Her patient. Initially, Karen struggles to help Nana, who is distrustful and uncooperative towards her treatment. But after Karen takes a more empathetic approach, Nana eventually trusts her and becomes more accepting and cooperative towards Karen's assistance.

Etymology[]

Minazuki (水無月)?: 水無月 is the ancient Japanese term for June, a rainy month in Asia. Mi ()? also translates to "water", obviously referring to her water-based powers as Cure Aqua.

Karen (かれん)?: can be both a Japanese and English name. The most common and likely intended Japanese meaning is "lovely" (可憐), while there are many other ways to be written in kanji. As an English name, the origin of Greek is "pure".

Cure Aqua: This name signifies her control over water, as "aqua" is Latin for "water." Aqua is also a color that falls exactly between blue and green.

History[]

Past[]

As a child, Karen always missed her parents when they were away, even though she pretended not to. This often worried her butler, Sakamoto, who always worried about her for being lonely and friendless.

In episode 28, it reveals how Karen and Komachi began their friendship. When she was older and was in school, she was a Class Representative, full of enthusiasm starting it. One day, she got a call from a factory that her class was going to had to cancel the tour, because one of the machines broke down. She and the Class were disappointed about this bad news, until the quiet Komachi rose up and encouraged Karen that they still can't give up until the end, and volunteered to help Karen find another factory to do the project. Through many rejections, they finally made a reservation, did the brochures and completed the tour for the class. With this experience, Karen became Komachi's friend.

Sometime after being elected as the Student Council President, she became more focused on her position and became more responsible, therefore losing her enthusiasm, which she would regain after becoming Cure Aqua. Because of needing to perform her job alone, it caused her to believe that she had to do everything to right and perfect, thus distancing herself from others.

Yes! Pretty Cure 5[]

One day after school, Karen is in the school library with Komachi, when they are interrupted by Yumehara Nozomi, who insists that someone had entered the library without either of them noticing, which was clearly impossible. A few minutes after Noozomi wanders off to look for her imaginary friend, Karen and Komachi hear strange noises. Investigating, they find damage to the floor and shelves in one part of the library, with no obvious origin. Stranger still, the damage mysteriously repairs itself when both Karen and Komachi leave briefly.YPC501 From this point on, Karen and Komachi try to talk to Nozomi in order to find out what had happened, as both believe that the junior was most likely involved.

During these investigations, Karen realizes that Nozomi and her best friend, Natsuki Rin, had become friends with the new student Kasugano Urara, even though they had nothing in common. Both Karen and Komachi also become involved as well after the three girls told them some ridiculous story about "Pretty Cure".YPC504 Despite her best efforts, the four invite themselves over to Karen's house to try to convince her of their story. However, in the middle of an unconvincing explanation involving Coco, a living fluffy animal, the girls are suddenly attacked by Bunbee, who steals another strange creature and turns Karen's gazebo into a monster. The frightened Karen runs and hides, but it becomes clear that the others don't stand a chance unless she is able to transform herself. A blue butterfly flies out and lands on her wrist, but immediately disappears upon noticing Karen's indecision, leaving Karen to watch helplessly as Bunbee escapes with the Pinky he had captured. Karen admits that Nozomi and the others had been telling the truth, but sadly says she could not help them.YPC505

Nozomi, however, is incredibly stubborn and annoying about it, and just refuse to get Karen's message, even getting Karen's butler Jii-ya to tell her things for some reason. Frustrated, Karen storms off, but Nozomi follows and tells Karen that what they have in common is their love for their parents. Karen is shocked by the idea that Nozomi actually understands her, and agrees that, Pretty Cure matter aside, they can be friends. Then Bunbee attacks again and turns the Pinky from before into a Kowaina, but Karen is determined to help the others this time. The blue butterfly returns, this time giving Karen the ability to transform, and under her direction, the girls save the Pinky and defeat Bunbee.YPC506

Once gathered, the five Cures are able to rescue Coco's friend, Nuts, from the Dream Collet. Nuts raises the question of who was the leader of Pretty Cure, and while Nozomi suggests Karen, Karen hastily turns down the position and nominates Nozomi herself, a suggestion immediately supported by the others. After Nuts starts living in a small storehouse that Karen is certain as being too small for the purpose, YPC507 Karen brings Nuts a housewarming gift, which is a small pot of blue Chinese bellflowers from her greenhouse. This, however, leads into conflict with Rin, who brings in a pot of bright red tulips. Eventually, by being forced to fight Arachnea together, Karen and Rin learn to get along, and become better friends.YPC508

Karen, the serious student council president, almost immediately begins to get in the way of the more free-spirited Nozomi's ideas. First, she shoots down Nozomi's plan to advertise Natts's accessories by bringing them to school, pointing out that this is against school rulesYPC510. Not much later, understandably unimpressed by Nozomi's poor grades and study habits, Karen tries to force the Pretty Cure leader to study, but eventually relents in favor of setting more gradual goals.YPC511 There are apparently no hard feelings, however, as Nozomi and the others are more than willing to help Karen solve the various student organizations' budget problems when the chairwoman refuses to give them any more money.YPC514

As Cure Aqua, meanwhile, Karen makes a habit of rescuing Masuko Mika when she is in danger.YPC509 Mika, meanwhile, interviews Karen for the Cinq Lumieres News, with unflattering results.YPC518

When a new creature from Palmier Kingdom, Milk, comes into the picture, Nozomi accidentally destroys the butterfly decoration the others had been working on, and Karen joins Rin in lambasting her about her carelessness. Both Karen and Rin also call Komachi out for being wishy-washy over her attempt to not take sides. Komachi immediately tried to take back her words, but Karen and her other friends continue to bother Komachi until the following afternoon, when Karen's attempt at an apology is interrupted by an attack by an insane, powered-up Girinma. Cure Aqua and Cure Mint are defeated almost immediately, then are caught by Kawarino. Cure Aqua is forced into a nightmare in which an illusion of herself as Karen lectured her about her tendency to remain distant from others, resulting in her lacking close friends and, ultimately, being alone. Cure Aqua is thus easily placed under the control of a Mask of Despair.YPC523 The controlled Cure Aqua completely ignores Nozomi's attempts to remove the mask, and even tries restraining Cure Dream. Along with the other Cures, Cure Aqua is eventually restored to her normal self by Cure Dream's efforts at reaching out to her and the other Cures.YPC524 After this incident, Karen becomes more open towards her friends about her friends, and has also become close friends with Milk.

When Milk has gotten a fever, Karen becomes the one to look after Milk. Jii-ya teaches Karen on how to take care of Milk, and Karen follows his advice. Aqua also tries her best to protect Milk from Hadenya, before the other Cures arrive to help her. With this experience, Karen and Milk's friendship is strengthened. Karen also becomes interested in medicine after looking after Milk.YPC534

By the end of Yes! 5, Karen has become interested in the medical field, and considers pursuing a goal related to it.YPC549

Yes! Pretty Cure 5 GoGo![]

Karen later resumes being a Cure, after she and her friends encounter the new enemy Scorp. YPC5GG01 Throughout the season, she and the other Cures fight against the forces of the evil Eternal and its head Boss.

After setting up a suggestion box on behalf of the Student Council, Karen receives a letter, which is about the Art Club having their work stolen, that troubles her. She later finds out that Bunbee is the culprit behind the Art Club's stolen works. Syrup tries convincing Aqua to escape, but Aqua refuses as she wants to help the letter's sender to retrieve the lost artworks, which earns her the attack Sapphire Arrow. Karen is later thanked by the Art Club for having retrieved their artworks, much to her happiness. YPC5GG05

By episode 19, Karen finally musters up the courage to tell her parents that she plans on becoming a doctor. She also begins practicing her medical skills by the end of GoGo!, by helping Palmier Kingdom's injured and sick residents.YPC5GG48

Kibou no Chikara ~Otona Pretty Cure '23~[]

Years later, Karen has become a doctor. Despite succeeding in achieving her dream, Karen starts facing difficulties when she can't help all of the patients recover.KnCOPC02 Karen then meets her old friends again, who she hasn't seen in years.KnCOPC01

Later, Karen is assigned to help a patient named Shinozaki Nana, a high school student who has a serious leg fracture. However, despite Karen's kindness and politeness, Nana refuses to cooperate with Karen's help. After congratulating Nozomi for being able to transform again, Karen tells her friends that she is worried about Nana but assures them that she can handle her. But Karen still can't help Nana who is uncooperative with the treatment, so she believes there is a reason why the girl is behaving the way she is. When taking care of Kurumi, who got too drunk after their dinner, Karen remembers that Kurumi is the reason for why she decided to become a doctor. She then takes a more empathetic approach to connect with Nana through her own past, and regains her power of transforming into Cure Aqua by protecting the sleeping Nana from the Shadows. She then defeats the Shadows with the arrival of Milky Rose. In the end, she is finally trusted by Nana, who now cooperates with her treatment. KnCOPC03

Karen would later start treating patients who have their shadows being stolen. According to her observations, the patients are not endangered, but they cannot wake up due to the Shadows not being purified.KnCOPC04

On the way home from a Pretty Cure meeting, Karen admits to Rin about her poor sleeping habits. A few days later, Rin visits Karen to give her aromatherapy oils. Karen shows Rin a video from Dark Night Light, as she is concerned about them mentioning a dog-like Shadow. Karen then goes to Panpaka Bakery with Rin, where they decide to go for a walk. While standing beneath a big tree, Karen learns about what is bothering Rin, and tells her to lean on others for support. Karen then transforms into Cure Aqua when Shadows appear, and manages to defeat them after Rin joins her as Cure Rouge. Later that day, Karen tells Saki that she believes the Sky Tree is what made Rin open up.KnCOPC06

In the end, Karen continues helping her patients as a doctor, hoping to change the future for the better. While happy that Nozomi has recovered, she is also surprised when she walks in on Nozomi and Coco being affectionate with each other.KnCOPC12

Cure Aqua[]

Metamorphose Cure Aqua poses

Cure Aqua's pose in the first season

"The blue spring of intelligence, Cure Aqua!"
知性の青き泉、キュアアクア!
Chisei no aoki izumi, Kyua Akua!

Cure Aqua (キュアアクア)? is the Pretty Cure alter ego of Karen. In order to transform, she needs the Pinky Catch in the first season. She controls the power of water.

Aqua2

Cure Aqua's pose in the second season

In the next season, she needs the CureMo to transform. Her main attack is Sapphire Arrow.

Super Cure Aqua[]

Supercureaqua

Super Cure Aqua

Super Cure Aqua (スーパーキュアアクア)? is the upgrade Cure Aqua receives in Yes! Pretty Cure 5: Kagami no Kuni no Miracle Daibouken!. Thanks to the Miracle Lights, her powers are greatly increased. She can now fly because of her butterfly wings. Her dress has an extra row of frills on her sleeves and dress. Her arm warmers are now longer and her boots are wilder.

Cure Rainbow Aqua[]

DX3 Cure Rainbow Aqua

Cure Rainbow Aqua

Cure Rainbow Aqua (キュアレインボーアクア)? is an upgrade Cure Aqua gains in Pretty Cure All Stars DX 2: Kibou no Hikari - Rainbow Jewel o Mamore!. Together with the others' upgrades, the group of seventeen girls forms the group Cure Rainbow. This upgraded outfit vaguely resembles that of Shining Dream from Yes! Pretty Cure 5 GoGo!: Okashi no Kuni no Happy Birthday!, except with the color blue instead of pink and a pair of small golden wings instead of grand white ones.

Transformations[]

Pretty Cure Metamorphose - "Pretty Cure metamorphose!" is the official transformation phrase Karen uses to transform into Cure Aqua in Yes! Pretty Cure 5 and Yes! Pretty Cure 5 GoGo!

In Yes! Pretty Cure 5, Karen's Pinky Catch opens and she shouts, "Pretty Cure..." She makes a circular motion with her arm and shouts, "...metamorphose!" Her body then gets covered in a blue glow. Her top and brooch appear first, followed by her arm warmers, skirt, and shoes. Her hair gets styled, her Pinky Catch closes and Cure Aqua recites her introductory speech.

In Yes! Pretty Cure 5 GoGo!, Karen's CureMo opens and she presses the buttons while saying, "Pretty Cure metamorphose!" The CureMo's screen glows and her body gets surrounded in blue light. A blue tunnel then appears with light showing at the end. Karen appears with her body glowing blue and surrounded by streams of water. She becomes encased in a globe of water and when it bursts, Karen is fully clothed. Cure Aqua then flies down, opens her eyes and recites her introductory speech.

Attacks[]

Y5 Aqua Stream

Songs[]

Karen's voice actor Maeda Ai, has participated in several image songs for the character she voices. Many of them include duets with Sanpei Yuko, who voices Yumehara Nozomi, Takeuchi Junko, who voices Natsuki Rin, Ise Mariya, who voices Kasugano Urara, Nagano Ai, who voices Akimoto Komachi, and later, Sendai Eri, who voices Milk/Mimino Kurumi.

Group Songs[]

Trivia[]

  • Karen is the first Cure to:
  • Cure Aqua is so far the only Cure not to receive a new name in the English adaptions.
  • She likes drinking grape juice, and oolong tea.
  • In the Pretty Cure All Stars Suite Flower Card Collection, Karen is represented by the iris, which symbolizes love and sympathy in the Language of Flowers.
  • Karen appeared as Cure Aqua to give the 10th Anniversary Congratulatory Message at the beginning of episode 7 in Happiness Charge Pretty Cure!.
  • Coincidentally, Karen & Komachi's voice actors both share the given name Ai.
  • Her voice actor married Okiayu Ryoutarou, Mucardia's voice actor, in 2013, which was four years after GoGo! was broadcasted.
  • Karen isn't good at cooking. She also is unaware that crepe and pancakes are two different kinds of food, before her friends tell her the differences.YPC5GG21
  • Due to being a doctor, Karen usually avoids drinking alcohol, so she can stay sober when being called for emergencies.KnCOPC02

Gallery[]

Main Page: Minazuki Karen/Image Gallery

References[]

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