Referenced By / Care Bears

Fan Works

• In the Punch-Out!! fanfic Ma Fille, Bear Hugger's online username is "carebear".

Films - Animated

• The Spanish animated movie Unicorn Wars features a cast of cute multicolored bears very similar in appearence to the Care Bears in a dark, violent tale about the cruelty of war and religious fanaticism.

Literature

• Lydia from Call Me Sunflower first appears in a Care Bear T-shirt.
• Tommy from Like No Other Boy wears Care Bear pajamas.
• In Unimaa, Brady mentions that the Care Bears were the closest things he had to friends before he joined Frida's Friends Club. Given the fact that the story is set during the late 1990s when the Care Bears franchise was dormant before its revival a few years later, this is a dead giveaway to Lumi that Brady (and the other members of Frida's Friends Club) had been trapped in Unimaa for at least 10 years.

Live-Action TV

• Bear in the Big Blue House: The episode about sharing is called "Share, Bear", which is a Pun-Based Title referencing one of the Care Bears' names.
• Impractical Jokers: The season 9 episode "The Bachelor Party" featured a challenge entitled "Out of Toon" where the guys pitched ridiculous cartoon ideas to a focus group; Joe's idea was called "Can't Bears◊", which is an obvious parody of Care Bears.
• In Stranger Things, a member of Kali's gang, appropriately nicknamed Funshine, wears a Care Bear mask.

Music

• A Care Bear shows up in the music video, The Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny as one of the combatants. It ambushed Jackie Chan and Shaq with its "Care Bear stare".
• The Your Favorite Martian song Orphan Tears (renamed "Orphan Tears Part 1") has Puff, DeeJay, and Cartoon Wax hallucination after drinking an drink called "Orphan Tears". Puff mentions that he see's Tender Heart having a boxing match with Jesus.

Toys

• Wacky Packages has used a variety of Care Bears merchandise as parodies for the sticker line. These include:
  • "Who Cares Bears?" (a parody of the Bedtime Bear figure, from All New Series 1)
  • "ScareBearStare" (a parody of The Hub iteration of the franchise as a billboard, from All New Series 10)
  • "The Scare Bears: Rain of Terror" (a parody of the "Care Bears: Rainy-Day Activities" VHS, released in Flashback Series 2, originally meant for the Lost 1992 Series)

Video Games

• The Epic variation of the Pango species in My Singing Monsters turns them into a Care Bears Cousin design. Despite being a cyclops with scraggly hair, they turn pastel blue and gain an ice cream cone belly badge, which their bio explicitly describes as such. The bio also mentions that they use the belly badge to "[project] their sweet disposition to the world". As a final reference, one of the possible randomly generated names for them is "CareStare".

Webcomics

• One Bug Martini comic has Bug's collection of furniture leaving his date unimpressed, including his childhood bed of Care Bears stickers on the headboard that he claimed he bought at a thrift store.

Web Animation

• The Madballs episode "Care Balls" is a joke dub of the Care Bears episode "The Care-A-Lot Games". The Madballs are superimposed into the episode, with a humorous dub to fit this change.

Web Video

• Athena P discusses the lore of the 1980s iteration in one of her Lore videos, in which she nicknames Professor Coldheart "Joe Biden".
• When PhantomStrider discusses his gripes with the movie A Troll in Central Park, he mentions that he thought it was too saccharine even as a child, and he still thought the Care Bears were cool back then.

Western Animation

• The Party Bears from the Adventure Time episode "The Belly of the Beast" are a clear reference to the franchise, being multi-colored little bears with tummy symbols.
• One sketch in MAD titled "Green Care Bear" features Green Lantern teaming up with the Care Bears to defeat an evil Funshine.
• Robot Chicken:
  • A sketch from "Password: Swordfish" features the Care Bears performing a genocide on the Care Bear Cousins. When they succeed, the Great Cloudkeeper in the Sky punishes them by turning Care-A-Lot into New Jersey. The sketch itself is also referring to the Care Bear Cousins' notable absence from the main Care Bear franchise during that period.
  • A sketch from "That Hurts Me" features a man named Doug being killed in an archery accident and reincarnated into a Huggytime Bear named Doug-A-Lot. At the end of the sketch, it is revealed to be a Near-Death Experience.
  • A sketch from "Slaughterhouse on the Prairie" features a commercial for the Intensive Care Bears.
  • A sketch from "Eaten By Cats" features Cheer Bear trying unsuccessfully to get a man to convert to the Care Bears' religion.
  • A sketch from "Botched Jewel Heist" features a Care Bear on a phone sex line, and using his Care Bear stare as an analogy for an ejaculation.
  • A sketch from "May Cause the Need for Speed" features a girl named Anna getting her first period. Menstrual Care Bear shows up to help Anna go through her menstrual cycle.
• The Dummi Bears from Rugrats (1991) is a Show Within a Show that's a parody of Care Bears. It is revealed in "Meet the Carmichaels" that Susie's father, Randy, is the show's head writer, and in "Dummi Bear Dinner Disaster" that Paul Gatsby is the show's creator.
• The Simpsons: In "The Fat and the Furriest", one of the bears who appears in Homer's fantasy is an "Intensive Care Bear", a seven-foot Care Bear with a crowbar.
  Homer: [trembling] Why does a bear need a crowbar?
  ICB: [shrugs] Eh, I don't like to get my hands dirty.

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