Give me magical girls or give me depression

Tagging some big Precure and magical girls fan blogs for help:

@curestardust @seaprincessminami @mahou-furbies @bunnymajo @pro-magical-girl-enthusiast @gummmyshark @aquarterasian

@zinefeed @zine-scene @all-zine-apps

​​ ~Thanks!

Ryota as a 5th grader is pretty stand out, as technically I don't think any other Cures OR siblings are 5th graders except for maybe Nao's oldest younger sibling Keita. But as a two year long series, he ages up into this demographic of "potential cure age", only being a year younger than Hikari. But because Nagisa is herself on the upper end of "potential cure age range", he still firmly maintains the role of much younger sibling within the series.

Miki's younger brother by one year, is mostly treated narratively the same as a much younger brother. He's somewhat sickly which makes Miki protective of him, and due to their parents divorce they're inclined to make the most of the time they spend together. The only main difference is that due to their similar ages Kazuki is able to pass as a boyfriend to ward off unwanted male attention.

Akane's younger brother by one year is really of note for how little note he has. Not an older sibling to aspire to, not a much younger sibling to protect, and honestly they don't even have that vitriolic a relationship like Nagisa and Ryota.

Regina and Aguri aren't technically twins, but are basically twins. Rio and Ciel ARE twins. Regina and Rio are both villain siblings. Both actually do adopt Cure like roles post series, but are never quite given the official cure title. Circumstantially driven to the villain side, Regina and Rio are both major characters but on the antagonist side. The similarly aged sibling is used for mutual drama on both the side of the Cure and their sibling. They're largely extensions of their Cure siblings character. Rio plays a major role in the birth of Parfait, and as two halves of the same heart Regina and Aguri's characters are literally intertwined. These are the closest we've had to sibling Cures though, but they never officially were given Cure titles.

Lala and Lolo's relationship is somewhat opposite of Rio and Ciel where the younger, less successful twin, became the Cure. Also, Lolo's not a full fledged villain, just briefly, accidentally antagonistic for a couple episodes. Lolo is narratively treated similarly as a older brother to Lala due to his success compared to her. However, because its one of the few sibling reveals, it's able to actually do something with the premise of Cure with older sibling, where Lolo learns what Lala is truly capable of. But Lolo spends most of the series in space away from Lala, so we don't actually get a lot of their dynamic outside of the focus arc.

Which ultimate leaves Hugtto as somewhat bizarre in regards to Precure sibling dynamics. Until Tsubasa, Emiru was the only 12 year old cure. Which is quite frankly is an odd place to be because she's just shy of being in middle school with the other cures, but is too old to really be "team baby" like Ako is. Tsubasa the oddness works because the whole team is wildly varied in age. But its especially odd since Emiru is the same age as Hana's younger sister, Kotori. The only Cure Sibling to be in 6th grade, (with the exception of Ryota who aged into that grade) and also notably a sister, so qualified to be a potential Cure on a meta level, especially since the one who DOES become a cure is her classmate. (And her classmates Cure partner lives with her?)

Speaking of Emiru, her older brother is on the upper edge of this "potential cure age range". He is in the same school as the other Cures. Which, is an interesting dynamic that has never been reused. He's actually the same age as Nagisa in Max Heart, as Emiru is the same age as Ryota in Max Heart. Which is notable because of Hugtto's extensive use of All Stars elements. Nagisa and Emiru interact a decent amount, which I imagine must be kinda weird from Nagisa's perspective considering how otherwise violently protective she is of Ryota and how much she treats him like a child. But then again, Hikari IS only a year older than Ryota… but also Hikari plays support for the most part and is mostly protected by Nagisa and Honoka.

Now, Kotori is not the only sibling to a Cure and classmate to another Cure. That honor is also held by Momoka and Souta. Momoka whose classmate Yuri, became a Cure alone, several years pre-series while she was still of "potential cure range". And Souta who is a boy and a few year below "potential cure range", but his classmate Ako became a cure, despite being below "potential cure range" at least in a meta sense, because the plot of Suite Precure revolves around her family. But Ako and Yuri are classmates with another cure's sibling, because it highlights the unusualness of their situations.

Both Souta and Momoka are close friends with their Cure Classmate, and thus important parts of their Cure Classmates characters. Kotori is friends, though seemingly not that close, with Emiru.

Ako being the youngest, not magically aged up Cure, and the same age or younger as several cure's siblings I would imagine would be pretty funny in All-Stars contexts. Ako's a pretty mature 9 year old on account of all the trauma, and has some innate magic on account of being Princess of major Land. But she is still otherwise a normal 9 year old girl. She's the same age as her own teammates younger sibling, but due to her basically running circles around them causing problems, they recognize Ako as their teammate. Ako's character is Suite is built around the disconnect between her being young but growing stern from her rough circumstances. But to the other cures? Cure Bloom? Cure Black? Cure Soleil? Cure Chocolat especially? She has to inspiring annoying amounts of "must-protect" instincts in many of the other cures.

But that really does make Kotori and Emiru all the more bizarre. There is no real reason someone does become a cure and someone doesn't in-universe of course. But from a meta perspective, Emiru is just slightly weirdly young for a Cure, Kotori is just slightly weirdly old for a Cure's younger sister. But neither is really that unusual. But what is kinda weird is they exist in the same series, so they're actually in the same class. Kotori feels she should have more relevance to the plot. She's the main cure's sister, another cure's classmate, lives with the villain turned cure, is the main mascots aunt (Who may or may not be from a timeline where main cure died?). She does find out at some point, as does her mom AND grandmother at various points, but??? She feels like she should have been the Yui or Seiji of the team or something. As far as Kotori is concerned her classmate just hangs out with her older sisters friend group for some reason.

Don't get me wrong, being similar in age to Hana gives Hana and Kotori a relatively unique character dynamic as far as the franchise goes, and I do like their relationship. It actually reminds me a bit of Doremi and Pop from Ojamajo Doremi (but even then Pop did become a witch, even if Pop took a step back from Main Character status as the show added more main characters. Kotori doesn't have that same relevance).