Anime / Mewkledreamy

From left to right:
First row: Peko, Kotoko, Su
Second row: Maira, Mew, Tokiwa
Third row: Rei, Nene
Fourth row: Yume, Asahi
Fifth row: Yuni, Hagi, Tsugi, Haruhito

"Mewkle! Twirling! Mewkledreamy!"

One day, in Miracle Dreamy Kingdom, the kingdom above the sky, the queen and her worker fairies were working on plushes that were designed to be "Dream Partners", but then, one of them, Mew, fell from the sky, and landed in the hands of recently new middle schooler Yume Hinata. Together, they are able to enter the dreams of others and collect dreamy stones.

Mewkledreamy is a Magical Girl anime series directed by Hiroaki Sakurai, written by Hiroko Kanasugi and animated by J.C. Staff, based on the character franchise of the same name created by Sanrio. It ran from April 5, 2020 to April 4, 2021 on TV Tokyo, with overall 48 episodes.

In December 4th, 2020, a second season of the show was announced, titled Mewkledreamy Mix!. unlike the first season, this one, which's aimed at the preschool demographic this time, has the Ichi-Naru episodes, which's half live action segment featuring the titular duo ^NoteWho are a Youtuber duo since 2015. doing various activities and half recap for the previous episodes narrated by the Dreamy Mates, that air after (usually) three episodes in a month. it ran from April 11, 2021 to March 27, 2022, with overall 50 episodes (37 animated episodes^note Or just 36, since the last animated episode is just a Clip Show. and 13 Ichi-Naru ones).

---

This show provides dreams about:

• A Birthday, Not a Break: Maira's mother died on her 11th birthday.
• Accidental Misnaming: Early on, Yuni would called different names occasionally, such as "Wani" or "Bumi".
• Affably Evil: Ackey. While he is his brother's replacement as Yuni's partner in Mix, he has no vengeful intents and his will to spread nightmares wasn't out of any past experience unlike him, he is just trying to use his role as villain as he thinks it can help make true his visioned virtual world future. And while he seems to enjoy his bad guy spot, he does seem to be genuinely kind to Yume and co., and he appreciated the time Yuni's trio threw a birthday party for him once even if he didn't wanted one.
• All There in the Script: Lucia and Lyra are never reffered by name, only as "The Queen Above the Skies" and "The Queen of Nightmares" respectively. Their real names are revealed at the credits of the first Mix episode.
• Always in Class One: Yume and all of her friends are all in class 1-1.
• Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: First a giant octopus, then a giant robot, and that's only the few first Monsters of the week.
• "Awkward Silence" Entrance: At the end of episode 45, Lyra was eating rice with Takuan until the Dreamy Mates suddenly entered her room.
• Birthday Buddies: Asahi and Haruhito were both born on November 15th.
• Bizarre Taste in Food: The ice cream shop owner in episode 42 mixes ice cream with seafood.
• Bland-Name Product: In episode 9, Yume and Dream Q go inside a store named "15-jugo".
• Blonde, Brunette, Redhead: Yume, Hana, and Kaede.
  • Or, if we're talking main characters only: Yume, Maira, and Tokiwa.
• Boke and Tsukkomi Routine: Maira and Peko like doing this sort of comedy.
• Brainwashed: Happens to Haruhito in episode 24.
• Breaking the Fourth Wall: In episode 10, when Yume is upset about there being less exciting things thanks to the rain, Maira comments on the fact that she looks tinier and more poorly drawn.
  • Later on in the same episode, when Maira faints after trying (and failing) to get a picture of Haruhito while he's stuck in the fangirl crowd, she suddenly starts to look like some sort of white blob to the point where Yume questions if that's even her anymore.
• Brought Down to Normal: Should anyone find out about Mew talking, she'll become just a normal plush. Yuri's an exception, likely because she was needed right at that moment. She doesn't seem to be affected by animals, though, since she can be with Q just fine.
• Came from the Sky: The dream partners are met by their owners like this.
• Cardboard Box Home: Yuni, Tsugi and Hagi lived in one until Lyra gave them a new house to live in.
• Catchphrase: Maira and Peko's "A-pon!".
• Cheer Up Episode: In episode 16, Yume feels sad about not being able to see Haruhito on the tennis club anymore, so her friends try to cheer her up before Yuni uses a black abyss on her.
• Childhood Friends: Yume and Asahi are not just childhood friends, but also childhood neighbors.
• Christmas Episode: Episode 36, where the gang has a christmas party.
• Collector of the Strange: Yume's dad is a rock collector.
• Comedy as a Weapon: Episode 8 has Peko beat the Monster of the Week by freezing them using his cold puns.
• Dancing Theme: The ending theme "Tokimeki Collector".
• Does Not Like Spam: Yume hates cherry tomatoes.
• Dreaming of Things to Come: In episode 19, Yume gets a dream where Morimura confesses to Asahi, which happens later in the episode.
• Even the Girls Want Her: Kotoko receives lots of letters from girls in her locker. There's like a mountain of them.
• Evolving Credits: Starting with episode 13, the opening starts to feature Tokiwa, Nene and Rei.
  • Starting with episode 27, Asahi and Rei appear more frequently than before, due to their promotion to main character.
• Faceless Masses: This show uses stars with human faces as background characters.
• Fake Interactivity: In Mix; Yume and the crew asks the audience to power up the Mewkle Rain-Bow by cheering for them.
• Fun with Subtitles: The fansubbers sure love to reference the "no thoughts head empty" meme whenever they get the perfect chance to.
• Gadgeteer Genius: Kotoko is great at inventing robots and leads the computer club at school, which consists at starting up robots and programming.
• Goggles Do Something Unusual: Su's glasses can be used to see black abysses, as well as rewinding to previous events.
• Got Me Doing It: Nana, Yume's cousin, borrows Yuni's "-nyui" once she gets possesed by a black abyss.
• Halloween Episode: Episode 29, which involves a costume contest.
• Heel–Face Revolving Door: After Lyra reunited with Lucia, the Yuni gang left Haruhito to head where the wind takes them... only to return to villainy in Mix thanks to Akumu scouting them.
• "I Know You're in There Somewhere" Fight: In episode 5, Kotoko tries to convince Kotokoto, possesed by Yuni's black abyss in her dream, to return to his original self.
• I Owe You My Life: The reason why Yuni serves The Nightmare Queen is because she is the reason why he's alive in the first place. Tsugi and Hagi also owe their lives to Yuni, for the same reason.
• I'll Never Tell You What I'm Telling You!: In episode 4, Yuni says that the protagonists should introduce themselves before him, but then Tsugi and Hagi say "just like Yuni says".
  • Yuni himself does it in episode 22, after explaining how did he mess up the school:
    Kotoko: But why were you aiming for Yume-chan's class?
    Maira: She's right. Why were ya lookin' through the shoe rack, class, and changing room?
    Yuni: Tee hee hee hee hee... I can't just tell you that a new stuffed animal has already been picked up by someone, can i-nyui?
    Tsugi: Don't say it so carelessly-tsugi!
    Yume: What?
    Yuni: I also can't tell you that the one who picked him up is a boy you're all familiar with-nyui.
    Hagi: Don't tell them everything-hagi!
• Instant Fan Club: Sugiyama has one. What's crazy about it, however, is that it somehow counts as an actual school club!
• Journey to the Center of the Mind: Yume and Mew must travel other's dreams to collect the dreamy stones that are corrupting them.
• Live-Action Adaptation: Inverted, before the anime debuted in April 2020. Between December 2017 and January 2018, Sanrio created three live-action shorts starring Mew from their Japanese Youtube channel.
• Love Triangle: Asahi is in love with Yume, who is in love with Haruhito, who may or may not like Yuri. although Yume gets over her feeling for Haruhito at the end of season 1.
  • Mix has another love triangle, this time between Asahi and Ackey toward Yume.
• Meaningful Name: Yume means "Dream".
  • Peko's name comes from the word pekopeko, meaning "very hungry", referencing to the fact that he can get hungry unlike Mew.
• Mistaken for Romance: In episode 15, Morimura asks Asahi to accompany her to the festival. He refuses, due to other things. However, he finished them earlier than he thought and went to the festival with Yume once she offered. Mori became so upset after finding out. Granted, Asahi does have a crush on Yume, but they're still not a couple.
• Oblivious to Love: Asahi's dream pictures a Yume dancing and laughing happily at the beach, a thing that clearly points out to him having a crush on her. Yume herself doesn't seem to realize this, however. Although, as seen at the end of episode 26, she eventually starts developing a crush on him too.
  • Kotoko doesn't even know which kind of "love" the multitude of love letters she gets refer to. And when a mind-reading robot she made said Erito had feelings for her, she just ignores it.
• "On the Next Episode of..." Catch-Phrase:
  Yume: Next time, let's go with Mew-chan...
  Mew: ...into the world of dreams!
  Both: Twirling! Mewkledreamy!
• Only the Chosen May Wield: Sorry, but if you're not a dreamy mate, or your dreamy mate isn't Mew, then you cannot use Dream Synchro. Averted in Mix, only for the dreamy partners.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Whenever someone acts extremely strange compared to how they are, it must be the work of a black abyss.
• Piggyback Cute: Asahi gives one to Yume at the end of episode 10, where she falls asleep on a rainy night.
• Please, Don't Leave Me: After being concerned about what'll happen to Mew after getting all the dreamy stones, Yume starts having nightmares about being told that Mew will "graduate from being her dream partner", and in episode 38, she becomes reluctant to use the Mewkle Stick and purify the black abyss until Mew talked to her about it.
• Quest for a Wish: Once Yume fills the dreamy box with dreamy stones, she'll be granted a wish. She wished for her friends' memories with their dreamy mates to come back.
  • ...except it doesn't count, because Lyra's evildoings made Yume wish that, so now she has to think of her actual wish throughout the second season.
• Recurring Dreams: In episode 13, Tokiwa gets this same dream about being trapped in an endless videogame. Nene reveals at the end that it was caused by the anxiety of moving into a new place.
• Robot Buddy: Kotoko has Kotokoto^NoteNotice the extra "to", so you don't confuse the two of them, her first robot.
• School Clubs Are Serious Business: Welcome to Ichigo Junior High, where even fan clubs are considered normal school clubs!
• Serious Business: Maira and Peko freak out whenever they imagine a duo (or trio) that could be a formidable comedy foe, even though said duo isn't into comedy.
• Shared Dream: Kanta and Kenta, Tokiwa's little brothers, frequently have these, as seen in episode 21 where they have the same dream about fighting a kappa.
• Shout-Out: In episode 3, in the flashback where Maira auditioned for the model applications, she can be seen doing the "SHEEEH" pose from Osomatsu-Kun.
  • In episode 13, there’s a scene where Haruhito is seen reading out loud in the english class. This is the line he reads in the book:
    Haruhito: There are places I remember, I’m on the outside, looking inside, what do I see? Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy?
  • The cherry-tomato man from episode 17 may likely be a reference to Literature/Anpanman due to the fact that it's a superhero with food for its head and gives out a piece of it.
  • There's a scene in episode 19 where Yume catches a submarine. Said submarine's design contains various references to The Demon Girl Next Door:
    • The label has the number "56562", Momo's house's password.
    • You can see Yuko's horns at the top.
    • And heck, the person inside it sounds like Yuko herself!
  • In episode 23, when Yume's gang asks why did Hana, under the effect of the Black Schema, decide to quit manga, she says that contests are "muda muda muda muda!".
• Sixth Ranger: Tokiwa and Nene take this role starting with episode 13.
  • Asahi and Rei who, despite meeting in episode 20, don't really join the gang until episode 25.
• Spiritual Successor: To Jewelpet (specifically Jewelpet Happiness from the same director) and, to some extent, Onegai My Melody, Sanrio's previous Magical Girl series starring cute talking animals.
• Spoiler Cover: The second visual of the show includes Haruhito in his dream world form.
• Successful Sibling Syndrome: Akihito has always been better than Haruhito every since they were little, despite Akki being the youngest, this makes Haruhito always try his best to beat his level.
  • Lyra had a similar experience with Lucia, which made her want Haruhito to join her.
• Terrible Trio: Yuni, Tsugi and Hagi.
• The Matchmaker: In "A Big Fight At School Camp!?", Kaede tries to set up Wakaba with Asahi. Turns out she was setting her up with the wrong person, since Wakaba liked Shouhei.
• Trademark Favorite Food: Maira loves milk.
• Transformation Is a Free Action: Subverted once in Episode 19, since Asahi was looking for her, Yume had to stop the transformation before he saw anything.
• Unperson: In episode 41, the Monster of the Week created by Yuni's Yunicchi abyss was causing chocolate and Valentine's Day to be erased from existence. Luckily, Asahi was able to stop it in time.
• Unwilling Roboticisation: The shock of seeing Suu speaking caused Kotoko to faint and turn into a robot in her dream.
• Valentine's Day Episode: Episode 41.
• Verbal Tic: Mew has "mya", and Yuni has "nyui", while Tsugi and Hagi have their names as tics.
• Wholesome Crossdresser: A one-time example. In episode 41 Asahi dressed up as a girl so he can give all the unpopular boys Valentines day candy and that way make the Monster of the Week dissapear.
• Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Mew is scared of dogs.

---

It seems that if you have a dream about TV Tropes, you've been browsing too much TV Tropes.