Mikuru’s Mask Moves… – Star Detective Precure Ep.41

Main Staff

脚本 Script: 村山功 Isao Murayama <<Series Composition for this series. Presumed freelance, is also Series Composition on Maho Girls Precure and its sequel series Maho Girls Precure: Mirai Days. This year, he also wrote the script for Doraemon the Movie: New Nobita’s Undersea Fortress.>>

絵コンテ Storyboard: 横内一樹 Kazuki Yokouchi <<In the industry since 2014, has been part of Precure’s directorial staff since Hirogaru Sky Precure in 2023. Previously at CL Corporation, is now seemingly affiliated with Toei Animation.>>

演出 Episode Director: 飯村正之 Masayuki Iimura <<Started in the industry at Studio OX, seemingly freelance. Previously directed Ep.9 and 12 of Girls Band Cry at Toei Animation.>>

作画監督 Animation Director:

松田りおん Lion Matsuda <<Animator and Character Designer currently at TMS Studio 6. Character Designer for Gals Can’t Be Kind to Otaku!?. >>

藤井愛子 Aiko Fujii <<Not much known about this animator. Was an Animation Director in TMS’s To You in the Beyond affiliated with TETRA.>>

朴乾河 Geon-Ha Park (박건하) <<Animator and Character Designer at CJT, who also had several animators on this episode.>>

制作協力 Production Cooperation: トムス・エンタテインメント/第6スタジオ TMS Entertainment/Studio 6

The full Staff list for Star Detective Precure can be found on Keyframe Staff List!

What does Production Cooperation Mean?

This’ll be the first time giving out my thoughts of a Precure episode but I think this one is particularly notable considering the production circumstances of this episode and also having seen some reactions about it online. I’ll also explain a couple of things so think of this as a bit of an episode of The Word Count too!

The first thing we need to talk about is that Production Cooperation credit to TMS Studio 6. What this means is that instead of Toei Animation handling the production of the episode as usual, the production is handed over to TMS for this episode. The term we use to describe this is called Gross Outsourcing.

This isn’t the first episode to have been gross outsourced in Star Detective Precure, and this season is not the first to have had this treatment. For this season alone, we’ve seen WIT Studio, Magic Bus and Rising Force also take on episodes. In previous seasons we’ve notably seen Gallop regularly take on episodes in the early 2020s, which we also saw on Digimon’s productions at that time as well.

I want to make it clear that gross outsourcing does not mean that the episode will look “better” or “worse” than what is usually produced at Toei. Some Precure fans have been a bit over dramatic in their assessment of what that means for episodes and what it means is that Toei is simply giving another studio a crack at handling an episode!

You see this with voice talent and animation staff alike, but you might not believe this but…people actually want to work on the Precure series! For some staff, this was their first taste of working on Precure and it was an honour for them to be a part of the history of the series just as much as the many people that rise up through the ranks at Toei Animation itself.

But what about the episode?

An episode of this magnitude being outsourced is pretty crazy! It’s why I was so surprised about it being handled elsewhere because I would have thought that it would have been handled in house. This is an episode exploring Mikuru’s deep held secrets. Secrets that Precure fans have been chomping at the bit to try and extract from the show.

I actually think it’s very cute of Kawasaki and Murayama to have crafted a series where one of the main characters of the show is one that is as mysterious as Mikuru. I mean, it’s almost as if her name kinda gives it away really. She’s got a mystique about her and as we would later find out in the episode itself, like Anna, we don’t actually know the real Mikuru.

Some Precure fans tend to have this view that “characters need to have focus”, “we can’t leave a main character behind”. I feel this is a very narrow minded way of thinking about a story in general. Like, why can’t we have a character be mysterious? In a show like Star Detective Precure, a show that is all about solving mysteries, why can’t one of the main characters be one where despite us having seen her for 40 episodes up to this point be an enigma?

Kurea even says that Mikuru, together with Anna, saved her and allowed her to regain her memories of being Cure Eclair again and eventually regain her bond with Luluka. Mikuru has been a pivotal part of everything in the show. Which is why it hits so much more that we see her insecurities and her anxieties play out.

The storyboards from Yokouchi were really well done. Lots of really nice framing throughout the episode and even a very rare fisheye lens shot to really nail how broken Mikuru is when she can’t bring herself to transform into Cure Mystique. One thing I do want to highlight from today’s episode is the terminology of zenkage and its opposite form kagenashi. These terms refer to characters either being in full shadow (zenkage) or no shadow at all (kagenashi). Some anime are particularly known for using these techniques to a pretty significant degree. To me, this is most notable in Mobile Suit Victory Gundam where much of the show uses kagenashi, and to some people it looks quite pleasant to look at.

Precure has had these techniques used in it before, even in this very season, but I think it’s a good idea to explain what it is to everyone reading, just in case they don’t know what it is!

Also a big highlight will have to go to Lion Matsuda, who was one of the Animation Directors of this episode. Not someone that I have seen much work from but she recently became a Character Designer this year, and seeing some of her work on Otagal, you can see some of this episode’s attention to highlights and shading on characters being a lot more pronounced than usual. People more acclimatised to her work has attributed a lot of corrections to her and I really liked the way this episode looked!

Fujio Suzuki notably appeared on this episode, and you could say it was his Precure debut if not for the fact that he also worked on Detective Conan: The Gold-Star Answer, the Detective Conan side of the Precure crossover earlier this year. A veteran animator, Suzuki got his start at Anime Torotoro in the late 80s and actually worked on some Toei productions in his early career. So you could say he’s come full circle with today’s episode! He mostly appears on TMS productions, including Conan, Lupin III and his most recent Character Design work on Baki in 2018.

I am very much looking forward to the second half of this two parter next week, where we may see more of Mikuru’s feelings and that her facade that she has held up for so long may finally end up slipping. If you want to hear more of my thoughts about Precure as well as a bit of staff analysis, do be sure to let me know! I’ll be happy to do this more often!