Dojikko - Television Tropes & Idioms

I don't even have legs, but I still manage to fall down...

—Sayo, Mahou Sensei Negima

Today's Resolution! I will not trip where there is nothing to trip on! ...Waugh!

—Sae Sawanoguchi, Magic User's Club

(Pronounced like "Doh Jee Koh".)

This character type is a carefully constructed set of character traits and personality type designed to be one of the most popular forms of Moe in Japan. The most notable features of a Dojikko are her klutziness and her ditziness, however, other notable features go into her construction. She must also be non-threatening, generally positive (except when they suddenly need someone to cheer them up), and have a submissive or passive personality, as her target demographic believes in an ideal female that gives them someone they feel they could protect, for the betterment of their egos.

Like many other klutz characters, a dojikko's clumsiness rarely does her serious harm, but can often set off Rube Goldberg-like chain reactions of disasters. She's never seriously injured, though, and she always pops back up with a good-natured, but rueful, smile. If these disasters tend to take care of her enemies without her even realizing it, she is also The Fool. It is almost inevitable that at some point her clumsiness will result in a Crash Into Hello.

As another aspect of the character, Fanservice plays a large role in the character type. "Accidental" pratfalls often result in Panty Shots (no Magic Skirts here), and there is often plenty of overlap with Ms Fanservice in this trope.

The popularity of this character among the nerds of the anime subculture of Japan has led to a proliferation of these characters in anime in recent years, thanks in no small part to their ability to sell The Merch. Expect figurines

, wall scrolls, and full-sized body pillows. Because of this, they may be added as a way of expanding the marketability of a show, much like the Token Loli.

While the dojikko can be a separate character, it is not rare for this to overlap with other female character types, especially The Ditz. A Meganekko is fairly similar to this character in personality, different in that her non-threatening nature is generated by glasses rather than clumsiness, although it only requires placing glasses on a dojikko to make a Meganekko twofer. There's also rare male versions, designed to draw in the female crowd by making a similar desire to take him home and be his "big sister". Either way, expect Tareme.

Was once part of Cute Clumsy Girl.

open/close all folders

Anime & Manga

Mihoshi in Tenchi Muyo.
Kaho in Sister Princess.
Minako Aino/Sailor Venus in Sailor Moon
- Also Usagi Tsukino/Sailor Moon.
In Read Or Die, Joker's assistant Wendy, to the point where she considers it a major triumph to deliver a tray of tea unscathed. (However, by the TV series she appears to have lost all her clumsiness, probably as part of her transformation into The Dragon.)
- Well, even in the TV series' epilogue she does manage to drop a tray off-screen, giving one of the few signs of still being her old self underneath it all.
Wagashino Azuki from Sweet Ninja Girl Azuki, so much so that "I'm so sorry Master Sanae!" might well be her Catch Phrase. Combines this with Genki Girl traits, with disastrous(ly comical) results.
Similarly, Mutsumi Otohime of Love Hina.
Taeko from Ai Yori Aoshi.
Nodame of Nodame Cantabile.
Tashigi from One Piece.
Tessa from Full Metal Panic. At times it's hard to believe a girl who can't even keep her balance while walking is the captain of the world's most advanced submarine.
Lucia from Mermaid Melody Pichi Pichi Pitch.
Ayu from Kanon.
Misuzu from AIR; the reason we can tell her past life the first time we see her is by her Crash Into Hello introduction.
ME-Tan, Anthropomorphic Personification of the Windows ME operating system from the "OS-Tan" Internet meme, has a tendency to crash a lot. Just like the operating system.
Matsuri from Ichigo Mashimaro. Lampshaded in an episode which summarizes her average day, showing that she can barely get through a day of school without constant help from Ana. After hearing the summary, Miu comments "That's the usual!? This isn't a manga for crying out loud! Do you really think Matsuri will be able to function in the real world!?"
Deconstructed messily by Kisaragi from Elfen Lied. Unfortunately, despite being one of the few characters with any significant dialogue in the first episode, she gets her head ripped off ten minutes in.
- Nana also counts. It's justified since all her limbs were sliced off by Lucy, and she has to use artificial limbs controlled by her vectors. In fact, they constantly become detached due to her clumsiness.
One of Doremi's (Ojamajo Doremi) classmates gives her the nickname Dojimi.
Kimura's wife from Azumanga Daioh.
Mignon from King Of Fighters: Maximum Impact; her introduction in both games is to run into the arena... and trip on the door. When she uses her super moves, they typically throw her back several feet.
Male example: Hanatarô Yamada◊ in Bleach. Also, sometimes Orihime Inoue - she even provides one of the examples listed (banging head into male lead's head)...heck, her first appearance is when she bumps into him and falls down.
Miyuki in Lucky Star. Also deconstructed by Konata: Kagami asks her if she acts out this trope at her job at a cosplay cafe, like dropping her drinks (complete with demonstration◊), but Konata dismisses it as something cute in fiction but just annoying in real life.
The title character of Karin has so much trouble when excited that she might as well be wearing stilts on roller skates.
Priscilla from Claymore was introduced as one of these, first seen falling on her face, then babbling apologies for being held up by some youma in joining the hunt team she was assigned to. Shortly afterwards we (and her aggravated colleagues) look around the corner to see how many youma she just plowed through.
Haruko Akagi in Slam Dunk. A more-or-less recurring running gag is to have Haruko tripping over her own feet and falling to the ground when she attempts to play seriously. She's Genre Savvy enough to prefer cheering and helping the others out rather than playing, since her clumsiness would hinder her efforts at playing in her school's team.
- The lead Hanamichi Sakuragi is actually a male example in the beginning. As he learns more about basketball he loses some of the dojikko traits. Not all of them.
Tokino Akiyama in the Genshiken spinoff Kujibiki Unbalance. As demonstrated in the swimming contest.
- Though she might have been faking on that one- she was supposed to stall for time so that the aliens would have to use the bathroom.
The eponymous Princess Tutu. A ballet student who's actually a duck in diguise, Ahiru is constantly falling out of bed, messing up her ballet moves, and crashing into the other characters. Her walk is described as looking like a duck's waddle on at least one occasion.
Sakura Shinguji from Sakura Taisen is a little bit of a dojikko, but she's not nearly as bad as Erica Fontaine from the third and fourth games. In the latest installment of the series for the DS, Erica can actually trip while your party's walking around and lose HP (which doesn't stay cute for long).
Chiri from Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei tries to be a dojikko in one episode (which is the exact opposite of how she normally acts) because she thinks they get more love. This naturally ends in disaster.
Toujo Aya and Mukai Kozue of Strawberry 100% definitely fall into this, although Aya starts out as Hollywood Homely.
Minawa from Mahoromatic has never met an object she can't repeatedly trip over. This accounts for most of the apologies she spends all her time making. On the bright side, she's very unlikely to hurt herself.
Haruka Amami from The Idolm@ster.
Azmaria Hendrich in Chrono Crusade.
Rio Takeuchi in Spiral is a subversion. She acts like a Dojikko to appear cute and harmless, even pathetic. She kills a man by tripping in front of him, and then stabbing him when he helps her up. This man was previously established as cautious and intelligent, but having already formed an opinion of her as a meek and unlucky girl, he drops his guard, and she murders him right in the middle of a school.
Male example: Eisuke Hondou from Detective Conan A lampshade is hung on this when one of the characters comments that he would be very cute if he were a girl.
Sayo in Mahou Sensei Negima, who somehow manages to trip over her own feet despite being a ghost that doesn't have feet.
- Justified when she gets a body though: Having feet for the first time in decades can do that to you.
- Nodoka also noted that she "falls over a lot" as a justification for carrying some first aid.
  - One of the first things she does in the series is fall off of a staircase while carrying a massive stack of books.
Sakuno Ryuzaki in the Prince Of Tennis anime. In the manga, not as much.
- A male example is Satoshi Horio, Ryoma's classmate and friend who claims to have two years of prior tennis experience, but fails when he's gotta show it off.
Amelia Will Tesla Sailunne from Slayers frequently has her attempts at dramatic entrances foiled because of this.
A very rare example of a dojikko who's not a source of comic relief is Princess Oboro from Basilisk. Her absolute lack of martial arts skills, united with her being a Technical Pacifist and a Shrinking Violet, has made her the "black sheep" of the Iga Tsubagakure.
Suzuka's personal maid Farin from Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha. The only scene that centered on her involved her spinning herself to dizziness from a cat and Yuuno running around her, with Nanoha and Suzuka barely saving the tray she's carrying. Cue loud "Gomen nasaaai!" and Shinobu and Noel commenting on how she's done it again.
- In the 4komas, Ginga is a dojikko. A big one. To the point that when she's brainwashed by the bad guys, the heroes recognize her because of the thing on her path...
Athena from ARIA, to the point where one starts to wonder how she keeps herself and her customers from serious injury while steering a gondola. Except that she's revealed to be actually capable of not being clumsy, but normally doesn't do it because it's tiring.
Saya "Sae" Sawanoguchi from Magic User's Club, as above quote states, once resolves to stop tripping when there's nothing to trip over, to stop running into walls, and to not collide with other people. Naturally, she does all three in short order.
Mega Man Powered Up for PSP makes Roll look like this — whenever she teleports into a stage, she's a couple of feet off the ground and lands on her rump. (It's cute the first few times.) The question here is who's actually operating the teleporter.
If Mikuru Asahina from The Melancholy Of Haruhi Suzumiya doesn't do this herself, Haruhi actually goes out of her way to make her drop the tea...
- She's actually a subversion in that while she has all the stereotypical personality traits fitting the trope, and isn't exactly athletic, she isn't least bit clumsy in normal, everyday activities. Haruhi, who wants to follow tropes at all costs berates her for forgetting to drop the tea tray every now and then.
Mayu of Goshuushou-sama Ninomiya-kun has this to such an extent that she's described as a natural weapon, devastating an entire island of armed men. "Waugh! Gomenasai!"
Momiji from Blue Seed often shows her panties by tripping over everything.
Dawn's Piplup is a mon version of this. When it tries to stretch itself up in ego, it falls over.
Masaki from Ice Revolution; especially sad in that she's a fairly skilled martial artist who wants to be a figure skater.
Tomoko in Great Teacher Onizuka is another example.
Chise in Saikano both falls into and inverts this trope. Normally she's rather klutzy, but in her Ultimate Weapon mode she is incredibly, horrifically graceful and efficient.
- In the OVA she's seen stumbling cutely in the battlefield to the confusion of the American soldiers who try to determine if she's a threat or not. Then she vaporizes everything in a mile radius.
Shurelia from Ar Tonelico starts off as a somewhat cold Lady of War, but after you actually get her into your party and put her into a costume other than the Linker suit, it becomes apparent that she's incredibly clumsy. She will actually fall over after casting spells, and gets lost repeatedly in the course of the game. In spite of all of this, she's probably the smartest character in the game.
Hinata Hyuuga fits the bill when around her crush; otherwise, she seems to be fairly competent, although typically pretty Moe.
Lolo in Klonoa 2: Lunatea's Veil. Resolves to be more careful in holding on to the Elements and wastes no time in proving her point by dropping one. And she falls on her face in just about every other cutscene, including her variant of the title screen intro.
Even Katamari Damacy invokes this with Royal Cousin Honey; the King describes her with "She's very clumsy, but We think that's what makes her so cute!"
That is the first opinion Ritsu gave to Yui in K-On!.
Miyako from Sasameki Koto. Though her Moe appearance hides a somewhat manipulative personality.
Saki from Hayate No Gotoku.
Satsuki Miyanoshita from Ghost Stories shows of her panties to the same boy once each in the first two episodes. One with a thoughtless fall in a new room of her new house, once when tripping on a can purposefully put in her place.
Kisaragi from GA Geijutsuka Art Design Class—she broke her class teacher's mug 4 times in the same episode, and has mentioned that she kept being the "it" in tag—in this case, she was "it" for a whole 157 minutes.
Hiwamari from xxxHolic spoiler: inflicts this on other people due to a rather nasty, irremovable curse.
Takamizawa has a crush on a girl who resembles his favorite fictional character to exact proportions, said girl following this trope dead on. She bumped into a street light reading a book, apologized to it, and then walked off embarrassed.
In Tona Gura, starting with Chapter 35 of the manga, Tojo Haya, the bipolar junior partner in photography to Yuuji and Marie's Dad has been annoying and causing problems for the entire cast, to the point Kazuki seems to find her more annoying than Yuuji's intrusive grabbiness, and that is a real trick. Her tendency to yell out at the most awkward possible moment almost seems to unite the would-be couple.

Close Anime & Manga

Video Games

The DS Castlevania games feature the "Student Witch", whose main attack is to take to the air on her broomstick, then fall on you when you walk under her. Yes, even the servants of Dracula can be Moe Moe.
- Maria has an annoying tendency to randomly trip during certain moves in Judgment. While it fits the game's interpretation of her character, this is worse than it sounds; even if her move connects, any opponent can land a half-lifebar super on her at no risk.
Meru from The Legend of Dragoon has a victory pose where she proudly thrusts her hammer skyward, then falls over. She then sits up and rubs the back of her head in embarrassment.
Viki from the Suikoden series. Her clumsiness manifests in her tendency to sneeze herself through time and space. At the end of each game, she accidently teleports herself from the victory banquet into the next game, despite each game being set many years apart, and not in chronological order. As a result, Viki has served in at least five wars non-stop. Six if you count the time there was two of her in Suikoden III.
Carol from Wild ARMs 5. Her regular attack consists of her shooting a rocket launcher bigger than she is, then falling on her butt. She also tends to trip and fall when confronted with boys and is in general adorable.
Linu from Neverwinter Nights has got to be the clumsiest of them all. She brings disaster everywhere she goes (to those around her). So clumsy you fear being around her and one possible remark from the player is: "I think I'm going to go someplace safer.. like a dragon's cave."
Colette, The Chosen One of Tales Of Symphonia, possesses "Divine Clumsiness". She's constantly tripping (even when she has wings!), but her antics tend to disable traps, uncover lost artifacts, and so forth. Her most powerful attack in the game, Holy Judgment, is unlocked when she stumbles with her incantation in battle. She is also the only character with a stealing ability... which consists of her tripping on them.
Talim from Soul Calibur IV has an attack like this. It's quite hilarious when you manage to knock out an opponent with this one attack.