pretty cure! 
pretty cure (often shortened to "precure") is an anime series made by toei that started in 2004 and has continued to this day. it's one of my favorite things ever ! i only got into the series relatively recently, but i've been in anime communities online my whole life, so i always knew of it, i just never started watching it until 2019's star twinkle precure.
for those who are completely unaware, precure is a magical girl series with a bit of a twist. while "magic" is used, and the pretty cures have their own special abilities that manifest as pretty colors and shapes, most of the fights are carried out with good old fashioned fisticuffs. the pretty cures rely on the physical strength their transformation offers them to defeat their enemies rather than focusing on magic. that's what gives pretty cure a lot of its charm to many, including myself!
there isn't really a "plot" to precure, as most of the seasons are self contained stories outside of the first few ones prior to 2010. each season has a new setting, cast of characters, story, and lore, so there really is no "best season" to start with.
if you're looking to get into the series, i'd reccomend going to the wiki and picking a season that looks interesting to you! each season has a particular theme that it uses, such as nature, astrology, or the future. each season has something to offer, but you don't need to watch them all to be a fan! i mean, i haven't! :p
to your right is a list of every season. click to see my progress in them + my thoughts!
i haven't seen every season, so some a lot will be blank!
every precure season in order!
the animation in this season is blowing me away! the fight scenes are exciting and i love nagisa and honoka's dynamic.
the energy of this series is infectious! i love how earnest and happy it is!
i love the designs of the cures in this season!
moforun is probably my favorite mascot of the entire series!
i really love the cure designs from this series, cure ange is probably my favorite in terms of design out of the whole series. the music is amazing too!
bwaaaah there's so much about this series i love. please please watch starpre!!! from the characters to the plot to the theming it's all perfect! stan lala hagoromo or else
as someone who spent a lot of time in the hospital as a kid/preteen, i will defend cure grace with my life
i do have a few criticisms of this season, mostly related to how despite being a slice of life, the characters outside of natsuumi and laura don't get much development, but i still love this series! the last few episodes we're actually pretty amazing, with the story of the witch of delays and aunette!
i'm sorry, but pre-final form godatz/fennel was really, really funny. his catlike final form i loved a lot, since it called back to ginger (his and cinnamon's master) in a way and showed just how influential of a character he was. but, before that he (fennel) looked like someones 5th grade D&D character...
man, that final episode though... it was so sweet how nicely everything got wrapped up. all of those characters deserve a happy ending. sora's appearance in the after-credits baton pass was so cute! i can tell hirogaru is going to be a blast.
as a thank you to this wonderful season, here is a tiny kome-kome i edited for transparency. use her as you will...
the characterization of this season is genuinely amazing! i love how sora's ideals of heroism are portrayed as both a strength and a weakness. though, i do wish we'd get to see a new villain... kabaton is overstaying his welcome. ^^; tsubasa yuunagi/cure wings introduction was also handled so well! i can tell he is probably going to be my favorite cure in this team.
precure is basically a toy show, so obviously it has a ton of merch! i have been working on my own collection of precure toys, games, plushies and other items for a few years, roughly starting in 2020. here is a picture of it! >>
some of my personal chase items that i'm so happy to own are the card commune + a complete deck & card commune holder, osewashite fuwa twinkle book, and the mermaid aqua pact + tropical carry, which is a very recent addition to my collection!
my current goal: collect all pretty cure videogames (3/17)
technically i have more, but i pirated so i don't count it.
UPDATE 3/30: MIRROR PAD
the release of hirogaru sky! precure came with a new activity toy. the
"めざせ！あこがれのわたし プリキュアミラーパッド！オールスター！"
for brevity's sake, i will just be calling it the mirror pad.
look at the back of it! so many cute little easter eggs to older seasons of the show...
the main feature of the mirror pad is the ability to play games featuring older precure teams. you have to unlock each teams game by playing the ones you already have unlocked, and it goes all the way back to futari wa!
each game also features every cure from that seasons team, which i am really happy about! of course, it also has many more games specific to the hirosky team, a "chat" feature (one of the hirosky team will ask you a question, and you pick from a set of 3 options), and a few simple games for studying reading, writing and arithmetic. as well as a new "manners lesson" mode that aims to teach proper greetings, safety rules and table manners.
the other big feature is that, kinda like the mermaid aqua pot, it has a camera! it only has an inner one, but it has a lot of cute games and features that use the camera, like fortune telling and a sort of AR dress-up game. it's really cute!
i might update this section more as i play with it to give a fuller sort of idea of what the mirror pad is!
UPDATE 2/3: HUGTTO & MORE!
i finally have some new additions to my collection! i got a lot of hugtto! items last month, which included the nari kid's park switch game as well as a preheart + mirai crystals. i was also able to get one of the futari wa GBA games, the max heart one to be specific! (no pics of that, sadly!)
(below is a slightly edited section from my older pretty cure page)
i want to talk about something for a bit. a lot of these toys have a sort of "save file" system, where you can enter little bits of information about yourself to mark the device as yours. given that i use a proxy service (buyee) to get most if not all of my pretty cure merchandise, a lot of it ends up having these leftover from the kids who originally had them.
when i got my card commune it had that data on it, as something that old (and complete), was bound to have been deeply loved by the original owner. the original owner was apparently someone named natsumi.
i didn't expect that reading the small bits of information available to me, such as natsumi's favorite food, her friends and even her crush would make me feel what i felt. i still don't really have the words for it, to be honest! it felt like stumbling upon someone elses time capsule.
both my card commune and twinkle book had data on it. the twinkle book actually had an almost complete save file from someone called misaki! i felt really bad resetting it honestly. ;-; but i wanted to play the game from the start!
i'm pretty sure if i looked my heartful commune would also have some save data on it, but i need to give it a deep clean since some of the buttons are unresponsive.
you may have seen elsewhere on moonview that i am an adult. so why is it that i love this show aimed at predominantly young kids so much?
one of the biggest reasons isn't entirely related to precure itself, but to the broader anime industry. every year, more and more anime are focused on fanservice mostly aimed towards men. every season there are at least 2 or 3 isekai light novel adaptations that offer little more than wish fulfillment fantasies for their audience. of course that isn't to say that there aren't good anime coming out anymore, but i'm tired of these anime that pander to the lowest common denominator instead of actually offering anything.
in a lot of anime, female characters are either allowed to be the "evil dommy mommy who could step on me and i'd thank her" or the cutesy moe-blob with zero personality outside of being turned into marketable plushies. pretty cure is not like that, which i find honestly is a breath of fresh air. it really is fun to just watch a group of close friends defy the odds and destroy evil with the power of friendship!
a lot of the plots can be surprisingly emotional, too. which i find very resonant. unlike a lot of kids shows, precure can tackle some pretty dark subject matter with tact and respect. an episode from star twinkle actually talks about non-japanese kids who feel alienated living in japan, which is honestly surprising! it had a basic "accept everybody" message, but i really respect how they decided to tackle that particular subject, given the fact the character is one of cure soleil's siblings, cure soleil being the first (and currently only) mixed-race cure.
it's also just incredibly cute... like, i do stand by all the reasons i just gave for liking it (obviously) but pretty cure to me is a weekly comfort i get to indulge in when things get tough. i have my deeper reasons for enjoying it as much as i do, but the most important thing is just that it makes me happy, and that's all the reason i need! sometimes i really just need to turn my brain off and watch the beams of color and light destroy the bad guy while the pretty cures save the day.