Fresh Precure! Movie: Omocha no Kuni wa Himitsu ga Ippai!?

I've talked about the Precure franchise many times. Fresh Precure being the most recent series I reviewed and one of the best. So, this film festival week we're going to look at the film based off of that series. Omocha no Kuni wa Himitsu ga Ippai!? It came out in 2009 while the series was still airing. Is it a good addition? Let's check it out.

Story:

We open with the girls planning to have three nights worth of pajama parties. Unbeknownst to them, toys are disappearing around the city while they're playing around. Naturally, when they find out they assume it's Labyrinth only to find ... out that they have nothing to do with it. That's when Love's old stuffed rabbit, Usapyon, emerges from the closet to tell them that the trouble originates from the kingdom of toys and a being called Toymajin.

The big issue with the film is that the twists are all way too obvious. I understand that the Precure franchise is intended for a young audience but there's a point where things are so obvious that you're actively insulting that audience. And this doesn't quite cross that point but it comes very close.

On the positive side, the film does have a strong sense of fun to it. The antagonist also has a legitimate grievance which does make things more interesting. I also appreciate the overall message of appreciating what you have. I also like the way each of our main protagonists has her own challenge to overcome. It's kind of reminiscent of the X-men story where they get taken to different challenges in Arcade's Murder World.

Characters:

Our main cast are as endearing as ever and all four of them get a chance to showcase the personality aspects that make them such. The two major characters who get added in for the sake of the film are Usapyon & Toymajin. Usapyon is quite a likable character. Toymajin is more compelling than the antagonists we usually get in Precure films since he actually has a genuine complaint unlike, say, the antagonist of the Gogo film.

Art:

The artwork and animation are really good. It looks very much like the series. The only real issue would be the length of time spent on the stock footage scenes. The film doesn't condense or combine the transformation sequences. So, we get to see all four one after the other with their full lengths.

Sound:

The acting is really good. Oki Kanae, Komatsu Yuka, Nakagawa Akiko & Kitamura Eri are all really strong in their roles. The film adds Sakamoto Chika and Tsuru Hiromi who are both solid in their roles. The film uses the same music as the series proper and it's still fantastic.

Ho-yay:

The girls in this continue to read as a polyamorous lesbian grouping. There's about as much les-yay in the film as there is in a standard episode after Cure Passion joins the roster.

Areas of Improvement:

Combining the transformation sequences would have allowed for extra time for more important content.

The film would have benefited from being less obvious with its plot line.

I would have liked to see more of the girls just interacting with each other.

Final Thoughts:

This film is pretty enjoyable. If you're a fan of Fresh Precure, you'll most likely enjoy it. It's basically a long, stand alone episode. I'm going to give it an 8/10.

The movie occurs in the same place Chiffon teleported to in episode 35, the Kingdom of Toys, which I won't go over because it's frankly obvious and you can likely imagine what it's made of. Anyway, they find Usopyrin or something, Love's toy she left in the closet as a kid. The girls need to find and defeat Toymajin, who is a compilation of abandoned and lost toys. The Cures are tricked by his roulette assistant in an annoying manner; they see Love "play the game" to get the king, get tricked, and they all decide to play his bogus games anyway (since as he ... says, "it's more fun," but no. Not really.) As I said, Toymajin is made of abandoned toys, which means Usopyrin felt abandoned and joins with him or something. Love is able to convince every child on Earth to open their hearts to their lost toys, and she uses the power of their hearts to upgrade into Cure Angel, who uses Lovely True Heart to free all the toys, leaving the real Toymajin to be a simply teddy bear. Later, they do a yard sale and he's given to a cute little girl who loves him. This was pretty good, but tbh it was also just a tad boring unfortunately. I will give it a 6/10!

If a single movie can destroy the liking you have for its 50-episode main series, you know it's in a bad place. I watched this film not long after I finished Fresh Precure, a season where my liking towards it was already on thin ice. This film tipped it over the edge.

This film can generally be summed up as the Precure franchise's take on Toy Story- Very very literally. But unlike the Pixar classic, the plot of the Fresh Movie is extremely generic and too predictable for it to be truly compelling. Predictability doesn't always make stories uncompelling, but it indicates a lack of effort ... to try and structure or express the same message differently with the context in mind, which I think this movie was unable to do. I managed to correctly predict the ending halfway into the movie, and the resolution wasn't a convincing enough message for me to take away.

The only Cure that had any sort of relevance in this film was Peach, and the other three practically didn't need to be here at all. And I get it; Lead Cure ftw, but there have been movies that have done this relevancy issue better even if the story is focused on mostly one Cure (Suite, MahoPre, StarPre, to name a few). So from the get-go, the success of this movie was dependent on Love. And she failed.

Years later, Mahoutsukai Precure would feature a similar Cure-Toy story in Mirai and Mofurun, which was put into the spotlight properly in both series and movie, that created one of the best Cure-Mascot relations and Precure movies of all time. Fresh's movie brought in Usapyon as a movie-exclusive character, who had no impact on the main series whatsoever. It created too much of a burden towards making a deep story between Love and Usapyon for the "Forgotten toy" prompt to be emotionally powerful. Love's defence and promise to Usapyon did not convince me and came off as a spoon-fed message.

Maybe it's to do with how I never really liked Fresh Precure, but this movie was TERRIBLY boring. The board game concept slowed down the pace drastically and only Passion's individual fight scene really made me bat an eye. The CGI for the final battle was jarring as heck and the villain has zero personality. All comedic relief did nothing; I recorded my reaction and as I looked back through it I don't think there were even 5 moments where I was truly engaged. It was more like "Yes yes let's kick the villain's butt and get out of here." As basically a mega-fan of Precure for 4 years, this attitude of mine was unfathomable. But there's a first time for everything.

I've lost count of how many of my Precure friends I've ranted to about this film, going as far as saying "This movie wasted my time." I do feel my disdain towards this film is partly subjective, and I've tried to keep most of it outside of this review. Generally, this film was a bore-fest and it led to Fresh Precure being the only season of the franchise I left hating it. The series had good qualities, but this one- I cannot excuse.