A Little Snow Fairy Sugar (Chicchana Yukitsukai Sugar) is an original anime produced by J.C. Staff, with character designs by Koge-Donbo. The anime aired from October 2001 to March 2002 for 24 episodes. It also has a manga adaptation by Botan Hanayashiki (under the name BH Snow+Clinic) which was serialized in Dragon Junior while the anime aired and compiled into three volumes. Volume 1 was released not long after the anime premiered. The plot starts off identical to the anime but later takes a dramatic turn away from it. The manga also renamed the town Guttenburg.
Tropes used:
- Bathtub Bonding: Saga and Sugar often share a bath while discussing the day's events. Salt and Pepper sometimes join in, too.
- Bifauxnen: Cheryl when she is performing in the Bear Pianist play, much to the surprise of Norma, who gave her a bunch of flowers thinking she was a guy.
- Big Eater: Some of the fairies, especially Sugar herself, are capable of eating several waffles per meal, each individual waffle being larger than the average fairy.
- Bittersweet Ending: Sugar passes her test, but vanishes as a result, as Saga can't see any fairies anymore after that (although she can apparently still see their starry flight trails). It's also hinted that Sugar still hangs around Saga, despite being unable to communicate with her directly.
- "Blind Idiot" Translation: A minor moment in episode 14 with Pepper's friend Robby, referred to as "Robby the robin" in both the dub and official English subtitle track - in spite of the fact that Robby is very clearly a sparrow.
- Book Ends: Both the beginning of the first episode and the ending of the second and final OVA have Saga ask the viewers if they know what season fairies are.
- Butt-Monkey: Greta. Barely an episode goes by without something humiliating happening to her, to the point where it verges on a more benign version of Break the Haughty.
- By the Eyes of the Blind: Saga is one very rare human who is able to see and hear season fairies.
- Catchphrase: Sugar often cries out "WAFFO!" whenever waffles are shown or mentioned.
- Cats Are Mean: A cat chased Sugar and Salt for interrupting his nap; Pepper's reasoning didn't work.
- Creator Provincialism: The series takes place in Germany, and while many details are accurate, some would make more sense if the setting was Japan rather than Germany:
- Saga and her friends were stated to be 11 years old, and they are still in their elementary school year. In German school system, normally students graduated from elementary school (Grundschule) at 10 years old. By the time they reach 11 years old, they already enrolled in secondary schools (Gymnasium,Realschule, or Hauptschule).
- In one story, the fairies are away on a trip and are delayed in getting home because of a typhoon in the area. Germany doesn't have typhoons (because they're tropical storms that form specifically in the Pacific Ocean), and a tornado outbreak would have been a more accurate type of storm to use for the setting.
- Dramatic Irony: Done for dramatic effect in Episode 6. As Saga and Sugar go to apologize to each other for what they did, we get to see both of their perspectives. Sugar writes her apology unknowingly on Saga's beloved sheet music—the same music Saga's deceased mother played for her when she was younger. Meanwhile, Saga goes to bring cookies upstairs as an apology gift for Sugar. This makes it all that more tragic when Saga sees her ruined sheet music.
- Edible Theme Naming: Season fairies are all named after seasonings.
- Expy: Sugar and Saga are respectively reminiscent of two earlier lead characters from Koge-Donbo: Misha and Kotarou. The formers share similar personalities, relationships to the protagonist, pink hair, and have wings, whereas the latters are comically serious, constantly busy, and sarcasm incarnate elementary school students with a Missing Mom and both can see supernatural things nobody else can.
- Flashback: Saga's early childhood, when her mother was still alive, is often seen.
- Forgot About His Powers: Sugar and the other faeries seem to sometimes forget they can fly when it's convenient to the plot.
- Friend to All Living Things: Pepper has a strong connection with animals and can speak their "languages."
- Furo Scene: Quite a few, often combined with bathtub bonding between Saga and Sugar. Don't expect any Fanservice, though.
- Generation Xerox: Saga's mother, Ingrid Bergman, was a talented pianist as well.
- Heroic BSoD: Saga, after one of her friends received as a birthday present her mother's piano, which she didn't actually own, from the music shop she just played it at, and offered to let her play it any time.
- History Repeats: Later on in the show, Saga eventually teaches a child she has to babysit how to play a song on the miniature piano she owns, the same way her mother taught her (and also the same song she learnt).
- Hopeless Suitor: The Fairy Elder is obsessed with Ginger, even though she already has feelings for Tumeric.
- Hyperspace Arsenal: The pouches that the season fairies keep their instruments in are entirely too small to fit them.
- Invisible to Normals: The Season Fairies are visible to very few humans.
- A Lizard Named "Liz": Robby the Robin, although, he's actually a sparrow.
- Leitmotif: Each of the Season Fairies has one built around the melodies played on their respective instruments; there's also Greta's dramatic violin theme and, most importantly, the piano piece written by Saga's mom (called Memory of Mother
on the soundtrack).
- Mad Scientist: One of Saga's friends Phil wants to be an inventor. He can get carried away when discussing or showing off his creations.
- Magic Music: The Season Fairies control the weather using musical instruments, except the Elder.
- Mascots Love Sugar: Sugar has to have at least one waffle every day.
- Missing Mom: Saga's mother is not around anymore, so she lives with her grandmother. It's eventually shown that she died.
- Noble Womans Laugh: Greta laughs like this whenever she talks to her rival Saga.
- No Antagonist: The show is mainly a Slice of Life work, save for the obvious mystical element. The closest this series has to a villain is Greta, and not only is she more like Saga's Sitcom Archnemesis than an actual Alpha Bitch, but she and Saga eventually become friends.
- No Communities Were Harmed: The story takes place in the fictional city Mühlenburg (as can be deducted from the Mühlenburg Festival in episode 18 and episode 23's title "Tiny Miracle at Mühlenburg") In the manga, the city is called Guttenburg. Either way, its based on Rothenburg ob der Tauber, with is a small bavarian city famous for its well-preserved medieval old town.
- Once an Episode: Every episode has a scene with Saga taking a bath, except Episode 22 which shows Greta taking a bath instead.
- Our Fairies Are Different: Fairies are small, winged beings that few people can see, and they use Magic Music to create the weather, with each fairy specializing in a different kind of weather and musical instrument.
- Parental Abandonment: No mention is ever made of Saga's father, and her mother is dead.
- Painting the Frost on Windows: The fairies use their instruments to create the weather.
- Rich Bitch: Greta tries to act this way, waving her wealth and high-brow lifestyle around to brag to people, but she is most often ignored. And the one time her actions actually affect Saga—it's not at all the way Greta wanted it to.
- Schedule Fanatic: Saga. She planned out her entire day to the minute until the fairies arrived.
- Shown Their Work: The team who did the anime version of Sugar did some pretty in-depth research on various German towns before they designed Saga's hometown. DVD extras show how many things in Saga's hometown line up nicely with various actual landmarks and buildings in Real Life.
- Solemn Ending Theme: The ending theme, Snow Flower, is much more serious and sad than the upbeat opening.
- Squirrels in My Pants: Well, fairies in Greta's shirt and her hair.
- Stationary Wings: Sugar and her fairy pals' wings seem to be little more than decorations. They fly simply because they want to.
- Those Two Guys: Norma and Anne for the girls, Jan and Alan for the boys, and Basil and Cinnamon for the fairies.
- Trademark Favorite Food: Sugar really digs waffles, which she calls "waffo". It becomes her Catchphrase later on.
- Tragic Keepsake: Saga holds the sheet music of her mother's piano music very dearly to her. Unfortunately, Sugar unknowingly writes over it when she tries to write a letter to Saga.
- Unsettling Gender-Reveal: Norma finds out the "guy" actor she crushes on is a woman. She still thinks she's cool, though.
- White-and-Grey Morality: The closest things has to a "villain" would be Joe Crow, who is not so much that as just a typical bully. Ginger is fairly callous, Basil and Cinnamon are rather mischevious, Greta is a rich snob and sees Saga as a rival, but everyone else in the show is usually super-nice to one another.
