Important Importables: Doraemon

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Important Importables: Doraemon

by Jenni Lada on Apr 17, 2009 at 07:33 AM

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Doraemon Nobita Gian Jaian Suneo Shizuka When most people think of Japanese popular culture, the mascots come to mind. Characters like Hello Kitty, Godzilla and Pikachu who have become superstars due to games, toys, movies, stationary products and manga. Their popularity has become so great that they’ve become worldwide icons.

While Hello Kitty tends to steal the limelight most of the time, there is another cat mascot in Japan whose popularity rivals hers. I’m speaking, of course, about Doraemon. Doraemon hasn’t become the international star that Hello Kitty has, but in his own country he’s a household name.

So today in Important Importables we’ll go over everything you need to know about the blue robot cat Doraemon.

Doraemon manga volume 1

Who’s Doraemon?

As I mentioned a moment ago, Doraemon is a blue, earless robot cat from the 22nd century. Sadly, he’s not exactly a top-of-the-line robot cat. He has the fourth dimension pocket on his stomach, allowing him to pull out tons of gadgets, and possesses super running, jumping and propeller flying abilities, but he’s also blue instead of yellow, had a robot mouse gnaw off his ears and had many of his robotic features fail. He also has a younger sister, Dorami, who’s much more advanced and normal than him (and also has her own series).

Sewashi, a man living in the 22nd century who was poor, sent Doraemon into the past to aid his great-great-grandfather Nobita Nobi when he was a child. Sewashi figured that if Doraemon could help Nobita overcome the obstacles in his life, Nobita would end up a success instead of a failure, the future would change and Sewashi would then be a success as well.

Why’s Doraemon famous?

Doraemon began, like many popular series, as a children’s comic by Fujiko F Fujio. It first appeared in 1969 in six different magazines geared towards children. The series became so popular that in 1977 CoroCoro Comic magazine launched, running only the Doraemon comics.

There ended up being numerous animes created based on Doraemon’s adventures, all called Doraemon. There were also quite a few anime specials, as well as over 25 movies released. One of the Doraemon movies even inspired a musical play. Spin-off manga series have also appeared to capitalize on Doraemon‘s success, among them is Dorami’s series, The Doraemons and Dorabase.