Doraemon: Nobita and The Space Heroes is a 2015 anime superhero film from the Doraemon Film Series.
This time, the adventure is kicked off when Nobita, hooked on a toku show called "Galactic Guardians", tries getting himself involved into a superhero movie project filmed by Gian, Suneo and Shizuka. When Nobita gets casted as the show's monster and beaten up by Gian, as always he runs back to Doraemon for help, eventually convincing Doraemon (secretly a fan of "Galactic Guardians" himself despite denials) into using his gadgets for filming their show.
After Doraemon made himself their show's producer (with a robot gadget called a "Burger Director" being their supervisor), the gang unexpectedly encounters Aron, an alien from Planet Pokkoru, who mistook their filming antics to be real superheroics and asking them for help. As luck would have it, the whole gang - still under the impression they're filming a movie - ends up traveling to space alongside Aron, where they battle hostile alien bounty hunters and realize they're Planet Pokkoru's last hope.
Doraemon: Nobita and The Space Heroes contain examples of:
- Actually, That's My Assistant: Aron mistook the Burger Director to be the Miracle Guardians of the Galaxy's leader. In actuality, the Burger Director is just a random gadget belonging to Doraemon, the true leader.
- Adaptation Expansion: The movie is based on a manga short where Nobita and gang tries making a movie of their own using Doraemon's gadgets, with Doraemon forcing the gang to cast him as the Big Good or else he'd shut down production (though said short have Dekisugi in it, who's Adapted Out in the movie).
- Affectionate Parody: Of toku and modern-day superhero shows in general. It starts with the gang using gadgets to turn themselves into colour-coded superheroes (much like toku flicks) and find themselves unexpectedly battling ridiculous alien races. The story gets progressively sillier from there.
- Amusement Park of Doom: The Space Partners pretends to forge a partnership with the natives of Planet Pokkoru by creating an amusement park which will benefit the planet's economy, but in actuality said park is a front for developing their planet-destroying superweapon.
- And You Thought It Was Real: Inverted; the gang are shooting an overly realistic-looking toku using Doraemon's gadgets when they're approached by Aron, who thought they are real superheroes.
- Asteroid Thicket: In Aron's flashback, he managed to escape the Space Partners' mooks by hijacking one of their ships and using hyperspace to penetrate an asteroid field. The asteroid managed to cover Aron's tracks from his pursuers, but he suffers a hit in the process and crashes on earth.
- Bait-and-Switch: In the opening credits, the Miracle Guardians of the Galaxy are about to fight a Killer Robot, with Gian throwing a punch... and defeating the robot with Rock–Paper–Scissors.
- Beauty Is Never Tarnished: After the escape from Ikaros' prison, the boys - Doraemon, Nobita, Suneo and Gian - are shown getting bandaged all over from the various Amusing Injuries they received in the process. Shizuka on the other hand doesn't even have a scratch on her outside of one of her pigtails being slightly trimmed due to coming in contact with Hyde's drill.
- Big Bad: Ikaros leads the Space Partners in the secret takeover of Planet Pokkoru, plotting to destroy the planet by draining energy from it's core.
- Breather Episode: A comedic, light-hearted and funny superhero-themed adventure that follows the remake of Doraemon: Nobita and the Haunts of Evil (which has an emotionally-heavy, bittersweet conclusion) and Stand by Me Doraemon (the series' biggest tearjerker, by far).
- Book Ends: The first and final scene of the film have Nobita showing off his cat's cradle skill to a bunch of neighbourhood kids. Nobita's on his own in the start, but at the end the rest of the gang, Doraemon included, are watching Nobita playing with the kids. It gets even better when the two little girls at the start have learned Nobita's "broom" challenge in the ending.
- Close-Call Haircut: When Shizuka was held hostage by Hyde, the latter attempted to use his drill on her. During this time, Shizuka moved her head away from it, allowing the drill to excavate through one of her pigtails.
- Clothes Make the Superman: The gang's superpowers comes from their badges, which are attached to their collars. Nobita lose his badge at one point after falling down a well, and quickly turns back into his regular self, much to his horror.
- Collapsible Helmet: Aron wears one of this when attempting to flee from mooks during his botched infiltration, where he managed to hijack a spaceship and put on a compact, collar-sized machine, which then opens up into a complete space helmet covering his face. He unfolds his helmet after meeting Nobita and gang the first time.
- Colour Failure: When Aron mistook the Burger Director to be the leader of the Miracle Guardians of the Galaxy, causing the colour to comically drain from Doraemon's entire body.
- Comedic Underwear Exposure: When the entire gang, including Aron and the Burger Director, launches off on their first mission. Nobita, ever the Butt-Monkey, gets his pants ripped off twice! (firstly snagging on a branch, and later on his pants and underwear gets launched out of the exit... but not himself)
- Curb-Stomp Battle:
- Nobita during his Imagine Spot, when he defeats the Gian-Suneo lookalike monster.
- Ogon fighting Gian and Suneo for the first time after catching them off-guard, with Ogon effortlessly defeating Gian and snapping Suneo's drill, to Suneo's horror.
- Shizuka battling Meba in the finale have Shizuka's powers being upgraded that she can manipulate the flow of water. Meba learns the hard way.
- Denser and Wackier: While not without its dark premise, this is probably the most comedic installment of the post-2005 Doraemon movies, one which centers entirely on jokes and humor and easily among the funniest entries. It's pretty much the reboot's equivalent to Doraemon: Nobita and the Spiral City from the OG series.
- "Do It Yourself" Theme Tune: The movie features a unique version of the theme song sung by the main characters of the series.
- Elaborate Underground Base: Ikaros' hideout and quarters is built beneath the amusement park his minions scammed the local citizens of Planet Pokkoru to construct.
- Entertainment Below Their Age: Nobita is a huge fan of the toku show, "Galactic Guardians" - meant for children half his age. What's even better is that Doraemon, of all people, is a fan too...
- Exact Eavesdropping: When Aron found Nobita (sans his superhero outfit) in the heart of Ikaros' quarters, they both have to hide behind some machines as two mooks enters. And then they overhear the mooks talking about Ikaros' plan to drain Planet Pokkoru of it's energy and destroy it, causing Nobita to let out a Big "WHAT?!" and blow their cover.
- "Everybody Laughs" Ending: Everybody, including the bunch of little kids watching Nobita demonstrating his cat's cradle skills. Then the screen zooms in on Nobita before fading to the credits.
- Face Fault: While the gang uses their powers for the first time in fighting the Not Zilla monster. Gian uses his fists, Suneo have his weapons, Shizuka blasts sprays of water to counter the monster's flames, and Nobita… shoots two tiny, pathetic-looking threads. Everyone present does a mid-air fault while on Takecopters.
- Giant Crab: After arriving on Planet Pokkoru, one of the first threats the gang have to contend with is a giant robotic crab piloted by Ikaros' soldiers.
- Goofy Suit: When Nobita tries becoming part of the new movie filmed by Gian, Suneo and Shizuka, he gets cast as their show's Monster of the Week, wearing a derpy-looking monster outfit (which Suneo and Gian called "Nobigon") much to Nobita's dismay.
- Imagine Spot: After watching "Guardian Heroes", Nobita have a brief daydream where he's one of the many superheroes saving two princesses (one which is Shizuka, and one which is Doraemon Disguised in Drag [!!!]) from an alien monster looking like Gian and his snake monster lackey looking like Suneo. And then Tamako steps in and interrupts his daydream.
- Irony: Suneo, whose main flaw is lying, is the one who tells Aron the truth that the gang are not really superheroes.
- Mythology Gag: A bunch of nods to earlier Doraemon manga chapters are thrown around.
- The "Galactic Guardians" show Nobita is watching after the opening credits shows the toku characters fighting a monster lifted from the Doraemon manga short, "Doctrine Association Badges".
- The gang tries making a movie of their own, only to unexpectedly run into an alien seeking help, much like the earlier movie Doraemon: Nobita's Little Space War.
- Tamako's Delayed Reaction joke from Doraemon: Nobita and the Haunts of Evil gets recycled in an early scene.
Tamako: [realizing Nobita's rushing out the house] Where are you going?Nobita: To be a superhero! [leaves]Tamako: Ok, watch out for cars... huh?- During Aron's flashback, the part where Aron escapes through hyperspace have a quick shot of a galaxy made entirely of cookies. A nod towards one of the manga stories where Doraemon's gadgets accidentally caused a plate of cookies to self-duplicate every few minutes, resulting in Doraemon deciding to send them to space where they gradually become a cookie nebula.
- The action scene in an Amusement Park of Doom, not unlike Doraemon: Nobita in the Wan-Nyan Spacetime Odyssey.
- My God, You Are Serious!: When Doraemon and friends meets Aron for the first time, with Aron asking for their help to save Planet Pokkoru, they assume it's part of the Burger Director's script. But then hostile aliens serving Ikaros attack, and they realize they're fighting for real.
- Not So Above It All: When they first land in the amusement park on Pokkoru, Nobita, Gian, and Suneo all run off to play, even though they believe they're still in the middle of filming. Shizuka displays more self control, but soon rushes off after admitting that she wants to play in the empty amusement park too.
- Not Zilla: During the first filming test run conducted by the Burger Director, Suneo's stuffed dinosaur toy turns into a giant Godzilla-esque monster for the gang to test their powers on. And then Aron, having crash-landed on earth the night before and is seeking for help, sees the gang in action and mistakes them for real heroes.
- Pillar of Light: The draining of Planet Pokkoru's energy from it's core, courtesy of Ikaros activating his weapon, is manifested as a pillar of green energy shooting into the stratosphere.
- Race Against the Clock: The final action scene of the film have Ikaros, in a last-ditch effort to destroy Planet Pokkuru, activating the superweapon to drain the energy from her core, which will result in an Earth-Shattering Kaboom. Doraemon, Nobita and the other heroes must race against time to deactivate it and save the planet.
- Shot in the Ass: When meeting a bunch of Ikaros' soldiers in the amusement park shortly after their arrival, they realize they're in an adventure for real when the soldiers start firing their laser guns, one which hits Nobita in the rump. Thankfully they're in their superpowered forms, but Nobita still needs Shizuka to spray water on where he's hit.
- Shout-Out: Besides the toku vibes...
- In the opening sequence, the Miracle Guardians of the Galaxy are introduced as shadowy silohouttes against a blank background with light shining from above them, spoofing the first opening of Justice League.
- Nobita gets casted as a monster with the nickname "Nobigon", a reference to naming conventions of the Ultra Series where monsters are given names with "[insert prefix]-gon" (e.g. Ragon, Kanegon, Crazygon, Snowgon, Femigon, literally too many to list).
- Show Within a Show: The "Galactic Guardians" TV show, which Nobita is a fan of. His convincing of Doraemon in making a similar toku-themed show alongside his friends is what kickstarts the plot of the film.
- Skewed Priorities: When they pulled a Let's Split Up, Gang! Doraemon wonders if Gian and Suneo - controlling two flying machines - are properly searching for the villains' true hideout. Cue a Gilligan Cut of Gian and Suneo racing each other on their machines.
- Something We Forgot: The others forget that Nobita went missing during their final encounter with Ogon and Meba until he manages to teleport himself back after his own encounter with Ikaros, which is noted by Shizuka herself afterward.
- Superhero Episode: Of the Doraemon franchise in general, since this movie have the gang gaining assorted superpowers for filming a toku... only to be dragged into a mission to save another planet.
- Theme Music Power-Up: Further hammering in the toku / superhero inspiration of the film, this time the gang - in their superhero alter-egos - have their own theme music
, which plays in the background during fights where they're winning. - Villain with Good Publicity: How the Space Partners managed to scam the entire population of Planet Pokkoru to accept their deal - by posing as space entrepreneurs intending to open a theme park and improve the planet's economy and livelihood, making themselves powerful and influential community leaders in the process. And secretly building their base to siphon the energy from Planet Pokkoru's core...
- This Is Unforgivable!: Nobita says this to Ikaros after the latter cruelly states his intention to destroy Planet Pokkoru. And that's when Nobita's power upgrade comes and he uses it to subdue Ikaros.
- You Are Better Than You Think You Are: Aron gives this speech to the gang after learning the truth, saying they proved themselves to be real heroes by deciding to save Planet Pokkoru even though they knew it would be dangerous.
