The Little Prince (Le Petit Prince) is a French animated TV series with 52 episodes of 26 minutes in length, produced by Method Animation in 2010, adapted from the eponymous book by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.
More determined than ever to sink the Universe into gloom and darkness, the Snake is turning planets off... In order to save them, the Little Prince must leave his beloved Rose behind on Asteroid B-612, and begin a wild chase across the galaxy. Hopping from planet to planet with Fox, his faithful friend, the Little Prince thus discovers fascinating worlds ruled either by fanciful, eccentric, preposterous, or utopian laws.
Not to be confused with the earlier 1978 anime adaptation by Knack Productions which was shown on Nickelodeon during the 1980s, nor with the 2015 film adaptation The Little Prince.
The Little Prince provides examples of:
- Actionized Adaptation: Compared to the book, it has more action and adventure elements.
- Adaptational Villainy: The Snake, who in the book was a helpful (or at least, somewhat ambiguous) character, is here almost an equivalent to Satan.
- Adorable Evil Minions: The Gloomies.
- All-CGI Cartoon
- Anachronic Order: The first season starts In Medias Res without explaining why the Little Prince is traveling the universe and ends with a big finale where the snake is captured. The second season is set after most of the first but before the finale and includes flashbacks that tell us how the whole story started. The third season is set after the finale and starts with the snake escaping.
- Animated Adaptation
- Big Bad: The Snake.
- Call-Back: At one point in the Planet of the Giant the Little Prince gets lost in the desert, and the Snake taunts him by making the same offer to help him to "go back to his planet".
- Canine Companion: Fox.
- The Corrupter: The Snake's modus operandi is to compel the most important person on every planet to indulge in their whims, with always disastrous results for their world. Naturally, he attempts it with the title hero too, trying to convince him to return to Asteroid B612 and leave the Snake free to corrupt people. It turns into a bit of
Fridge Horror when you realize the finale states that the snake is everywhere at once and that he's always following the little prince around trying to get him to "return to your planet". There's even a bit in the first episode where the Little Prince almost falls off a clock tower and the citizen who grabs him asks "You're not thinking of departing already, are you?" (at least in the Korean dubbing). It's interesting to see the animated series for some reason didn't get rid of the weird suicide connotations of the original novel. - Damsel in Distress: The Rose.
- Idiosyncratic Episode Naming: Each episode title is an asteroid number followed by "The Planet of __".
- Honor Before Reason: Despite the Snake's goal being the destruction of all worlds, the protagonists are shocked, shocked, that he would stoop so low as to kidnap the innocent Rose.
- In Name Only: The show's premise only vaguely resembles that of the original book. That's because this is supposed to be less the original book and more a sequel to it.
- Lethal Lava Land: The Planet of the Firebird becomes this after said bird goes on a rampage.
- Manipulative Bastard: The Snake's modus operandi, as he corrupts people in every world he comes across to destroy them.
- Mecha-Mooks: Wind-powered clockwork mooks on the Planet of Wind.
- Mooks: The Gloomies.
- Omnicidal Maniac: The Snake wishes to plunge the universe into darkness by corrupting each planet to return to being the only being in existence, bar Rose.
- Perpetual Smiler: The Snake has this, perhaps justified, since being a snake his mouth is shaped like a smile. It seems that he is smiling all the time, he never changes his expression if he is angry, frustrated, or irritated. He is always with his permanent evil smile and his smile makes him look creepy.
- Planet of Hats: Planet of Wind, Planet of Music, etc.
- Reptiles Are Abhorrent: The Big Bad is an evil snake who wants to basically plunge the universe into infinite darkness.
- Royal Rapier: The Little Prince's seems to be made of light.
- Say My Name: "RRROOOOOSE!"
- Sealed Evil in a Can: The Snake at the end.
- Sizeshifter: The Snake can be of normal size or turn gigantic at will, mostly for intimidation purposes.
- Snakes Are Sinister: The Big Bad is a giant snake who's trying to ruin every planet in the universe.
- Snarky Non-Human Sidekick: Though Fox isn't too bad, he's still a scoundrel, and quite snarky.
- Summon Magic: What the powers of the Little Prince amount to; besides multi-usage sheep, he can summon many fantastic creatures or items for the task at hand. Strangely, despite this, he's always puzzled when people call him a wizard.
- Super Smoke: The Snake can turn into black smoke at will. This means he's completely impossible to confront physically; the Little Prince's efforts are entirely toward thwarting his plans, not fighting him.
- Talking Animal: Fox.
- Time Abyss: The Snake has existed since before planets were formed, being the first being in existence.
- Time Master: The Planet of Time has the Clockmaker, who governs all the clocks on the planet, and with them, has some control over time.
- Time Stands Still: On the Planet of Time, each town's time is self-contained and is controlled by the town's clock. Stopping that clock leaves its inhabitants frozen in time.
- Vile Villain, Saccharine Show: The series is kid-friendly, but the Snake makes a very creepy Big Bad.
- Villainous Crush: It is implied that The Snake was in love with The Rose and a reason why The Snake kidnapped her. The Snake seemed to be jealous of The Little Prince's romance with The Rose, as it appears that The Rose was the only thing that The Snake seemed to be interested in and made The Snake experience love for the first time. That started The Little Prince's journey to stop The Snake. In the last episodes of the series, The Snake kidnaps The Rose and takes her to his home planet which led The Little Prince to go to The Snake's planet to rescue her. After The Rose's death, The Little Prince tries to make The Snake confess that he was in love with her and was the reason why he kidnapped her. The Snake refuses to confess his romantic feelings for her and he affirms that he can find any Rose in the universe but The little prince rectifies that The Rose is the only one who the Snake can't have which makes the Snake angry.
- Wind Turbine Power: The inhabitants of the Planet of Wind have based their entire society on the wind. Most of their devices are powered by wind.
