Distaff Counterpart / Western Animation

Distaff and Spear Counterparts in western animation.

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Distaff Counterparts:

• Many classic cartoon characters have female counterparts, usually serving as their love interest:
  • (Pictured) Mickey Mouse and Minnie Mouse.
  • Donald Duck and Daisy Duck.
  • Bugs Bunny and Lola Bunny.
  • Daffy Duck and Melissa Duck (Tina Russo in The Looney Tunes Show).
  • Popeye the Sailor and Olive Oyl.
  • Woody Woodpecker and Winnie Woodpecker.
• In Transformers: Animated, the essentially-immortal Starscream creates a squad of five clones which, as the female clone points out, are each based on an aspect of his personality: A suck-up, a coward, a pathological liar, an egomaniac, and the female clone. When Starscream asks her what part of him she's from, she simply states, "Don't ask."
• In "Dr. Quym, Medicine Woman", the Venture Brothers meet female counterparts of the main cast in the jungle, including a violent hulking female bodyguard and a pair of twin sleuths.
• Alvin and the Chipmunks, whose distaff counterparts are Brittany and the Chipettes.
  • Alvin — Brittany: The leader of the group, argumentative, superficial, most likely to follow traditional gender roles.
  • Simon — Jeanette: Tall, nerdy, wears glasses. (Simon is way more snarky than Jeanette though. Sometimes they're distinguished by Jeanette being a literary geek, rather than a science geek like Simon.)
  • Theodore — Eleanor: Short, plump, loves to eat (but Eleanor has still managed to become good at sports).
• Superjail! — Ultra-Prison, with female counterparts for all the main cast. Strangely, there were no female counterparts for the Twins... though this was probably for the better.
• My Friends Tigger & Pooh features a six-year-old, red-haired tomboy named Darby in the lead role instead of Christopher Robin, though he's still in it as a supporting character.
• He-Man and the Masters of the Universe (1983) —> She-Ra: Princess of Power. (Although they could hardly call her "She-Woman".)
  • The original spin-off was going to be He-Ro, an ancestor of He-Man, before eventually being dropped in favour of She-Ra. There was also talk of a He-Ro, son of He-Man, series in the mid 90s.
  • She-Ra's very name is this, as it's a reference to the Egyptian sun god Ra.
• Gimpy of Undergrads, whose online alias is G-Prime, has a Distaff Counterpart in SHE-Prime; she's also his rival/love interest. Ironically, they don't realize they live next to each other.
• Dial Tone's feminization in some newer G.I. Joe works.
• Family Guy has Penelope, the female version of Stewie.
• Danny Phantom has a female clone who is pretty much this (albeit a younger one).
• South Park gives us Katherine and Katie Queef, the female counterparts of Canadian comedy duo Terrence and Phillip, whom they marry.
  • Season 21 actually has a number of these, with Strong Woman and Miss Conduct serving as the female counterparts to PC Principal and Mr. Mackey respective. However the most shocking of them all is Heidi Turner becoming the female counterpart to Eric Cartman.
• One episode of The Fairly OddParents! had a one-shot character in the form of Kimmy, a female version of Timmy. She appears as Sanjay's date for the school dance in that episode (and the fact that she resembles Timmy probably explains why he asked her).
• An episode of Garfield and Friends has Jon Arbuckle date Jean Arbinkle, who looks exactly like him but as a woman, and even dresses similarly (light blue sweater, but she wears a skirt instead of trousers) and has the same kind of klutzy personality. Garfield even lampshades that she is a female version of Jon.
• Time Squad introduced another time squad with Tuddrussel's ex-wife who is very smart and actually competent and her robot partner being high tech and up to date and serious about his job.
• Tiny Toon Adventures had an episode at a dance where Arnold showed up with his date who looked just like him, only in a dress.
• Total Drama:
  • The third season's Aftermath co-host Blaineley is the female version of main series host Chris McLean, sharing his sadistic jerkassery and love of conflict, as well as his narcissistic Attention Whore tendencies.
  • Sugar from Pahkitew Island to Owen, being similarly dimwitted, overweight, and possessing gross habits (although personality-wise Sugar is more like his Evil Counterpart).
• In The Mr. Men Show Mr Scatterbrain and Mr Stubborn are Mr Men counterparts to their Little Miss book counterparts.
• Grojband has The Newmans, the musical rivals of the titular band. Three fourths of this band are female versions of the male Grojband members, whilst the remaining fourth, Lenny, is a male version of Laney, the only female Grojband member.
• The Smurfs (1981) have Clockwork Smurfette for Clockwork Smurf.
  • The TV show introduces Hogatha, who is basically a female version of Gargamel.
• Orel's mutual crush Christina in Moral Orel is this, while their respective family members are the same gender. Both puppets even have the same head, but with different haircuts.
• Little Bill has his cousin, Fuschia. She is of the same age, is part of his main group of friends, and is Little Bill's classmate.
• The Batman introduced Smoke, a female sidekick for Mirror Master, and Blaze, a female sidekick for Firefly. So far they're both Canon Foreigners and have yet to appear in the actual DC Universe.
• In Muppet Babies (1984), Skeeter was the Canon Foreigner tomboy to nerdy Scooter.
• Dan Vs.: Elise can be seen as a Distaff Counterpart to the protagonist, Dan. Both are snarky, cynical, deceptive Determinators from abusive families who are so vindictive that they can (and do) go to crazy lengths to seek revenge on whatever has wronged them. In addition, both are associated with Chris to the extent that they serve as Vitriolic Best Buds to him. Elise has admitted that she actually enjoys some of Dan's revenge schemes. She even does the Skyward Scream whenever something angers her, and in one episode literally participates in Dan's opening scream.
• Uncle Grandpa once fought Aunt Grandma, a woman who tried to act as a more practical and efficient replacement to him by simply giving kids gifts instead of taking them on outlandish adventures. This is because when she was a kid in the 90s, he took her on an adventure when she asked him to repair a tiny chipped-off piece on her baking soda volcano and she got 2nd place in her science fair, so years later she wants to run him out of business so other kids don't suffer the same.
• SheZow has DudePow, his gender-flipped alternate dimension counterpart who dons a male costume instead.
• In the Rick and Morty Mobile Phone Game Pocket Mortys, one of the Alternate Universe version of Morty is a female version named Morticia. According to the in-game description, she is the result of her mother’s womb being 32.54 degrees Fahrenheit degrees warmer during the early stages of gastrulation. The moon was also 384,900km away.
• The Bump in the Night Christmas Episode "Twas the Night Before Bumpy" had the toy robot Destructo's Christmas present being a female version of him named Destructette.
• Abby Hatcher can be seen as this for PAW Patrol, as they both revolve around an elementary school kid who helps people in their town with the help of Ridiculously Cute Critters, and are both created by Spin Master.
• Ms Nowhere in Fast & Furious: Spy Racers is the leader of a covert ops team, like the similarly named Mr Nobody from Furious 7 and The Fate of the Furious.
• In Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, the Space Adventure episode introduces Quoodles, the female counterpart of Toodles, who is pink and purple in color and features eyelashes and a bow on her head.
• The Clone High episode "Cloney Island: Twist!" has Scudworth and Mr. Butlertron meet Scudworth's long-lost lover Sandra Sandria and her robotic assistant Mrs. C. Aside from Sandria being a different ethnicity, the women are more or less female versions of Scudworth and Mr. B.

Spear Counterparts:

• Blaze and the Monster Machines is one for Dora the Explorer, as they both involve two heroes, one human and one non-human (but with the roles switched around) going on adventures together. Both shows have three major places to go to, a rival trying to stop them, and a "Setting Off" Song playing as they start the adventure and head off. Both shows are also interactive and have a major themed focus of teaching in return (STEM for the former, Spanish for the latter).
• As mentioned above, Ultra-Prison was a Distaff Counterpart to Superjail!. Alice had her very own Spear Counterpart in Bruce.
• The Powerpuff Girls have the Rowdyruff Boys, a team of male counterparts created by Mojo Jojo out of snips, snails, and puppydog tails. They love causing mayhem, mischief, and chaos.
• Total Drama:
  • The third season introduces Alejandro as this to Heather (who is his rival and love interest), with both characters sharing the same ruthless, self-centered, narcissistic, and manipulative characterizations.
  • Wayne and Raj from Island (2023) are basically Katie and Sadie if they were male and were very passionate about hockey, as both duos are inseparable.
  • Ripper from Island (2023) is this to Sugar, being just as much of an Evil Counterpart of Owen as Sugar is.
• Dora the Explorer — Go, Diego, Go!
• In My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic, Pinkie Pie gets her own Spear Counterpart, Cheese Sandwich, who is every bit the excited, hyper party pony she is. And also happens to be "Weird Al" Yankovic in pony form.
• Scooby-Doo! Legend of the Phantosaur introduced Winsor, a graduate student who eerily resembles Velma.
• Littlest Pet Shop (2012): in "The Treasure of Henrietta Twombly" we see the Biskit Twins' ancestors the Biskit Brothers, who look and sound exactly like their descendants, except they have facial hair.
• Totally Spies! (A show about three spy girls) had a spin-off called The Amazing Spiez! (A show featuring a spy team of three boys and a girl).
• 'The Simpsons'':
  • The Crazy Cat Lady has a male counterpart called the Crazy Dog Man.
  • In "Regarding Margie'', Patty and Selma take Marge speed dating, where she meets a handsome bachelor who had his brothers similarly take him speed dating. Said brothers have curly hair and raspy voices, and frequently smoke cigars - they're essentially male versions of Patty and Selma. The two men are actually from a set of quintuplets, three of which had died. After Marge and the bachelor leave, the two men naturally try to set up dates with Patty and Selma, but fail.
• Shellsea's boyfriend from Fish Hooks Michael is basically a male version of her, having a very similar appearance, personality and mannerisms.
• Ricky from the The Fairly OddParents! episode "The Odd Couple" looks almost exactly like Vicky, is a Babysitter from Hell just like her, and also shares her same greedy and Jerkass personality.
• One episode from Rugrats revealed Betty DeVille has a brother named Frederick, who seems to be her male counterpart, having the Mars symbol on his shirt.

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