Guru Guru Pon-chan is a manga series created by Satomi Ikezawa, the creator of Othello.
It tells about a Labrador Retriever pup named Ponta, the Koizumi's family pet and trouble maker. One day, Grandpa Koizumi creates the Guru Guru Bone in order to make animals speak in English. When Ponta eats it, she turns into a little human girl. Ponta runs outside and meets Mirai Iwaki, the most popular boy in his school when he saves her from almost being hit by a car, falling in love with him at first sight before puking up the Guru Guru Bone and running away. Realising that she has fallen for Mirai, she resolves to become human so they can be together. By the time she recovers the Bone (which Mirai kept) she's aged enough that when she kisses it she takes the form of a cute teenage girl. Mirai likes her even after finding out she's a dog, but questions whether a relationship between human and canine can ever work, or whether he's doomed to become known as "the pervert who does it with dogs". And so their bumpy relationship begins...
The series ran in the shoujo magazine Bessatsu Friend from 1998 to 2000. The manga's chapters were compiled into 9 volumes, which were released in English by Del Rey Manga. A 4 volume spin-off sequel called Guru Guru Pon-chan Okawari ("Second Helping") was released several years later, which focused on a girl with a male chihuahua who becomes human instead of the original characters.
Tropes included:
- Back from the Dead: Well, Ponta wasn't actually dead, but considering she slept through her own funeral and had to be rescued from the crematorium oven it's hardly any different.
- Cloudcuckoolander: Ponta comes across like this sometimes due to being, well, a dog. Aoka is also nuttier than a fruitcake.
- Demoted to Extra: Soichiro and Mama are quickly reduced to having practically no role in the series. On the other hand, Papa never really made it beyond extra.
- Erotic Eating: The first time Ponta goes into heat, she eats a pear so delightfully that she hospitalises half the boys in school due to catastrophic blood loss. The second time she starts mouthing a Matsutake mushroom in an incredibly suggestive manner.
- Incredibly Lame Pun: The first time Ojii-chan has Ponta transform intentionally, she repeatedly spins around for a brief Transformation Sequence. "Guru guru" is "spin" in Japanese.
- Mood Whiplash: Sometimes hits really hard, especially at the end of the Ponta's pregnancy arc. The arc to that point had been about Ponta apparently being raped by Gang and becoming pregnant, Mirai agonizing over whether he'd be able to accept her after that and his eventual decision to be a father to her child no matter what it was like only to end with a giant constipation joke.
- Naked on Arrival: If Ponta is not wearing clothes as a dog and then turns human, she'll be completely nude.
- Teen Pregnancy: Subverted; Ponta gets pregnant and even seems to go into labor, but it turns out she's not pregnant, just really, really constipated. This is actually a common issue with female dogs.
- Yandere: Aoka initially seems to be like this, but is eventually revealed to be just a complete Cloudcuckoolander. Still quite probably insane (she thinks the fairies talk to her) but not malevolent.
