Pucca

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Originally a cute little character created by Korean company Vooz, plenty of merchandise goodies and Web Animation series and later television series, Pucca is a young girl who lives with her uncles, a trio of Chinese chefs. Pucca is in Mad Love with her "boyfriend" Garu, a Ninja who is none too keen on her outlandish displays of affection. The series takes place in the town of Sooga, an Adventure Town with plenty of Eccentric Townsfolk, including off-season Santa, who spends the 364 other days of the year in town relaxing.

Pucca became popular worldwide because it relies on visual and gag humor rather than language, much like the Pink Panther, the Road Runner and other pantomime cartoons. Though the series has since picked up dialog, translation has worked well enough and the series remain mostly silent. Both show leads, Garu and Pucca, are Heroic Mimes, though they do laugh, sigh and make other sounds.

Tropes used in Pucca include:

• All Cloth Unravels: In "Woolen Warrior" Pucca uses this on a sheep's wool, Muji's hair and a test pattern on the TV to knit a sweater for Garu.
• Alpha Bitch: Ring-Ring.
• American Robot: Texas Lugie and Sloppy Sue have two impressive mechas, one of which transforms from their mobile home and the other from their SUV.
• Animesque
• Aww, Look! He Really Does Love Her: This seems to depend on the writer, but at least a few of the web episodes show that Garu does love Pucca back - he just doesn't show it very often. Perhaps the most obvious example is the episode "The Ring". There's also the episodes "Flower Delivery" and "Dreaming".
• Back-to-Back Badasses: Cowboy episode.
• Badass Adorable: Pucca, Garu, Ching, and Abyo pretty much have this covered.
• Balloon Belly: Pucca in "Noodle Round the World" after sucking up the record-breaking noodle Garu was pulling in order to steal a kiss.
  • And again in "Four-Alarm Fire" after drinking a whole lake.
• Battle Strip: Abyo, though sometimes he does it after beating up the bad guys.
• Berserk Button: It's a bad idea to insult or harm Garu in any form in front of Pucca if you don't want your ass kicked.
  • Also, don't undo Pucca's twin odango. You're warned.
• Beta Couple: Abyo and Ching, on and off.
• Betty and Veronica: Pucca (Betty) and Ring-Ring (Veronica) to Garu.
• Beware the Nice Ones: Ching, Pucca's best friend. She's a sweet Pollyanna who knows real well how to use her twin swords, after all.
• Bruce Lee Clone: Abyo. He even wears the famous yellow and black jumpsuit at least twice. His dad is also named Bruce.
• Character Exaggeration: The TV series takes Pucca and Garu's Mad Love to really annoying extremes.
• The Chew Toy: Poor Dada!
• Clingy Jealous Girl: Pucca, sometimes Ching (but much less).
• Conservation of Ninjitsu
• Cooking Duel: Pucca's trio of adoptive chef parents often have to defend their culinary honor.
• Costumer: Some episodes are set in different time periods, such as Greece ("Gold Medal Garu"), Egypt ("Puccapatra"), and the 1950s ("Ching It On").
• Cute Bruiser: Pucca, Ching and Ling-Ling. All of them are tiny, pre teen Action Girl types.
• A Day in The Limelight: Ching, Dada, Abyo, Tobe, and Ring-Ring all get oneshots. The three chefs get two.
• Deus Ex Machina: These happen all the time. Mostly with Pucca, to the point of making her a God Mode Sue.
  • One episode has a virus going around turning people into chickens. When the virus tries to infect Pucca it bounces off her, showing she's immune for no reason other than plot convenience.
• Digging to China: Inverted; one episode has the characters winding up through a hole in a Western (in most every sense) counterpart of Sooga, whose version of Garu (who is a cowboy drifter here) takes a liking to Pucca; but then there's Pucca's own counterpart...
• Double Standard: If the genders of the two leads were switched, this show would be much creepier.
  • Naturally, this is played with in one episode. Pucca figures out a way to use the moon to get Garu to fall head over heels in love with her, constantly chasing her down in her own style, and stealing kisses when possible. In the end, she turns things back to normal because she couldn't stand it.
  • Double Standard Rape Female On Male
  • Double Standard Rape Sci Fi: Pucca uses magical ways to charm Garu more than once (as the example above). Everyone is ok with that, even when they know "normal" Garu doesn't want to be with Pucca.
• Eagle Land / Everything Is Big in Texas: Texas Lugie and Sloppy Sue are both type 2 Americans. They throw packs of dollars into the faces of the people of Sooga, pollute the environment with crude oil and smoke, make people unhealthy and fat with their greasy and unhealthy fast food, and generally just wreak havoc with their obnoxious personalities and their indifference to the people of Sooga.
• Eyes Always Shut: Pucca, except for one episode in which a sock turns her evil and her eyes are opened for a few seconds.
• Faceless Masses: Rendered as blue and pink waist-high smiley faced gum-drop people. Averted because Sooga has a lot of extras and no real need for them.
• Far East: Sooga village and its denizens have elements of Japanese, Chinese and Korean culture.
• Fun With Flushing: Pucca pulls a drain under the lake after saving Garu from a shark. They get stuck in the pipes and Dada inadvertently saves them while unclogging one of the toilets, freeing them both.
• Getting Crap Past the Radar: All the time. Notably the birthday episode, where Garu glared at an animate statue - who made a farting noise and dropped a brick. And not five minutes later, the police station falls down to reveal Bruce sitting on the toilet.
• Head Pet: Won, Ching's chicken.
• Here We Go Again: "Feud Fight"
• Heroic Mime: Pucca and Garu, though they do make some noises.
• Hot Amazon: More like Cute Amazon, but hey. A whole episode is dedicated to Ching trying several plans to get Abyo's attention, and only succeeds when she saves his life.
• Incredible Shrinking Man: "Cat Toy"
• Jerkass: Abyo, from time to time.
• Karma Houdini: In "Noodle Round the World" Pucca gets away with eating her guardians' world record entry before it can be judged just so she can steal a kiss from Garu. Her guardians are just happy that they finished the noodle, but she didn't know this.
• Mad Love: Pucca and Garu's constant cat-and-mouse chase for her to steal kisses.
• Made of Iron: Pucca, although mostly for a Running Gag.
• Make Me Wanna Shout: Ring-Ring (again) example here (begins at 5:42)
• Martial Arts and Crafts
• Motor Mouth: This is one of the few examples of a trope whose aversion was subverted. In the episode "Trial By Fury," Garu is called to the witness stand. The scene cuts to Judge Santa telling him to step down, after which he whispers, "I thought he'd never shut up."
• Never Bring a Knife To A Fist Fight: Pucca never fights armed, and though Tobe uses a katana, he's lucky if he can get a swing in edgewise.
• New Powers As the Plot Demands: Pucca will sometimes have a new power out of nowhere when it suits the plot. Like when she used her hair buns as a beacon to contact aliens.
• Ocular Gushers: Pucca creates a literal waterfall when she can't find any of her friends on her birthday. The blast get turned on Garu and knocks him away!
• Once an Episode: Several running gags, like the misfortune of Santa and Dada, and Abyo ripping his shirts, could count. One of Tobe's ninjas screwing up is also a constant.
• The Only One Allowed to Defeat You: Tobe is Garu's sworn rival. In a sense Abyo also fits, though more in a friendly way.
• Personal Raincloud Pucca gets one that turns into a hurricane.
• Pretty Boy: Garu is described as one in the opening song.
• Real Men Wear Pink: Garu is apparently better at knitting than Pucca is in "Woolen Warrior".
• Redshirt Army: Tobe's Ninjas.
• The Rival: Tobe to Garu.
• Rule of Funny: The whole show pretty much lives off of this trope.
• Running Gag: Various; the most frequent is Abyo randomly tearing off his shirt, which comes close to being a Once an Episode event.
  • Don't forget the misfortunes that befalls Santa Once an Episode.
    • Dada has it even worse...
      • Hungry Vagabonds.
• Scenery Porn: The web episode "Fragrance of Spring".
• Serial Escalation: The TV series seems to thrive on becoming as weird as possible, then topping it. Santa is secretly a ninja ex-thief? We got that. A jive-talking, lounge-singing dragon being added to the supporting cast partway through the series? We got that. An entire episode revolving around a sock that turns anyone who touches it evil? We got that. The web animations are a bit less bizarre.
• Serious Business: The three uncles' perseverance to be the best noodle cooks in Sooga.
• Shown Their Work: Occasionally things get a bit Off-Model, but the animation is generally very good.
• She Is Not My Girlfriend: Garu, for Pucca. However, there are a few instances in the web animations where he does seem to have feelings for her - an example is when he actually melts down his beloved sword to make a ring for her, which he also uses as a holder for a long, rolled up note that he intends to give to her. He is later horrified when she completely fails to notice the ring, throwing it away and fawning over the letter instead.
• Scout Out: The Dragon Girls.
• Shout Out: The TV series does this a lot. One episode even features a character who is a blatant reference to Lara Croft.
• Something Completely Different: We've had Tarzan, Jacques Cousteau, Roman games, and more.
• Spaghetti Kiss: Done with Pucca and Garu in "Noodle Round the World" with the world's longest noodle.
• Stalker With a Crush: Pucca, on occasion.
• Terrible Trio: The Vagabond Clan; Chief, Shaman, and Clown. Not exactly evil since most of their schemes center around getting food.
• The Stoic: Garu, foiled because Pucca's schemes to steal a kiss succeed often.
• Thick Line Animation: Oh yeah.
• Throw the Dog A Bone: One episode is all about Garu trying to perfect a move and Pucca's interference constantly both impeding and progressing the progress. He perfects the technique, making him intangible. Pucca attempts to glomp him, but fails, giving Garu a much needed happy ending.
  • Another episode gave the Chew Toy Dada a temporary level in badass, using his janitorial skills to fight in a tournament.
    • There's a food drive for the Vagabonds in "Jingle Cans".
• Ultimate Job Security: Dada screws up so much it's a miracle he hasn't been fired.
• Unholy Matrimony: Tobe almost had this with Chief in one episode, before the love potion wore off.
• Why Do You Keep Changing Jobs?: Santa Claus. No, really. He's had A Day in The Limelight episode or two, but he's mostly there to be whatever strange job is needed, from ticket taker, to "guy in a frog costume." Since he only works his well-known job one day a year, he seems to have a lot of hobbies and side jobs.
• Verbal Tic: Officer Bruce. Over.
  • Clown, eh!
• Violently Protective Girlfriend: Pucca, when Garu is in trouble. Despite being very peaceful and child-like, she can be roused into the most powerful martial artist in Sooga.
• Yandere: Pucca.