Trivia / Doki Doki! PreCure

• Acting for Two:
  • The individual Jikochuus with each other.
  • Raquel and Episode 5's Victim of the Week Haruna.
• Cast the Runner-Up: Rie Kugimiya had auditioned for the main four Cures before becoming the infamous Sixth Ranger Cure Ace.
• Contractual Obligation Project: Glitter Force Doki Doki was the result of Toei foisting the obligation to dub Pretty Cure on Saban during negotiations for the rights to the Digimon dub, the same deal that led to Smile getting dubbed. Saban wanted nothing to do with it and the rights to Glitter Force were shelved back to Toei as soon as possible. Not surprisingly, this led to both Glitter Force seasons having incredibly troubled productions, but it hit Doki-Doki much harder as seen below.
• The Danza: Word of God has confirmed that Yashima's, Nikaidou's, and Momota's first names are Chihiro (Ikki), Takuya (Satou), and Tsubasa (Sakurai), respectively.
• Dueling Movies: While they're aimed towards a different but overlapping audience, it's still kinda hilarious that Doki Doki's Non-Serial Movie premiered on the same date as Puella Magi Madoka Magica The Movie: Rebellion. One might think that the kids show would do better, but while Doki Doki's film did very good, the Madoka film sold more tickets. Amusingly, both movies involve a Lotus-Eater Machine.
• Executive Meddling: Originally, Cure Sword was supposed to join the team at the season's halfway mark, as showcased when she hesitated to accept Mana's help at the beginning. However, Toei already decided to include Cure Sword in New Stage 2, so the writers was forced to have her join the team much earlier than expected. This also had the unfortunate side effect of her backstory and character arc getting mostly gutted to rush her onto the team.
• Franchise Killer: While the main franchise is still going strong today, the underperformance of Glitter Force DokiDoki put the final nail in Saban's attempts to localize the franchise.
• God Never Said That: Fans flew into a panic when a magazine article stated that Doki Doki would end in December, a whole month earlier than usual.^note Most Pretty Cure series end at the end of January/beginning of February, usually just ahead of that year's Super Sentai series The director of the series went onto his Twitter that very day and reassured fans that it was still committed to a full 49 episode series.
• Irony as She Is Cast:
  • Back in Glitter Force, Debi Derryberry voiced Candy as the pixie partner, but in Doki Doki, she returned to play one of the main heroines, Maya.
  • Cast members Erica Mendez & Stephanie Sheh, who voiced Davi & Mackenzie had roles reversed from their Viz Sailor Moon roles, Haruka & Usagi.
• Missing Episode: 19 episodes and the movie are missing from the Glitter Force dub. The first half wasn't hit as hard in that at least episodes were merged to keep critical story elements so while the pacing can feel rushed, the show is still coherent. By the back half of the series, though, entire episodes were just completely removed. The entire Blood Ring arc is absent from Glitter Force, which meant that the episodes where the Cures developed new powers were also gone. The main problem with this decision was that the Cures uses their new powers for the final two episodes, so without the context from the Blood Ring arc, these new abilities may seem like complete Ass Pulls to the average viewer.
• Non-Singing Voice: Only for the end song, which has Cure Sword singing but is not done by her voice actress, Kanako Miyamoto, who has sung for the series in the past, but instead is done by Hitomi Yoshida.
• Playing Against Type:
  • Not that Hitomi Nabatame never did a Genki Girl like Mana, but her most known portfolio is mostly about Cool Big Sis, Hard-Drinking Party Girl, mature women, or lesbians. Although, considering the heavy Les Yay subtext of the Precure series, you could say the last one MIGHT be a lil' spot on.
  • Rie Kugimiya playing a non-Tsundere Tagalong Kid who grows into a matured Cool Big Sis. Even Aguri does not sound like Kugimiya's typical Tsundere Lolis.
  • Chihiro Suzuki usually plays badass Jerk with a Heart of Gold characters. Jun, however, is a weak Shrinking Violet.
• Promoted Fangirl: Like Nana Mizuki before, Hitomi Nabatame has looked up to the Precure franchise ever since its first launch and she was still a newbie. She admitted crying like a baby when she noticed that she got the role as Mana.
• Referenced by...: In Chapter 2 of The Glitch from Kedabory's Elmore Chronicles, Anais sees Aguri Madoka's silhouette in the void when a tremor opens up.
• Sequel in Another Medium: On January 25, 2024, it was confirmed that there will be a novel released to show the aftermath of the season's conclusion.
• Trolling Creator: Way to go teasing the fanbase with Cure Ace's identity, Toei. It was confirmed in an interview that this "materialized a completely fresh breeze".
• Troubled Production: Not for the actual show itself, but for the Glitter Force Doki Doki dub. Executive Meddling from the first Glitter Force's lack of success resulted in Saban Brands receiving an extremely tight budget, forcing them to remove and splice a bunch of episodes (resulting in the Blood Ring and New Powers arcs getting completely axed) until they met Netflix's bare minimum requirements for hosting. Not helping was Saban backing out of the deal towards the end of production, shelving everything back to Toei (except for the first season of Glitter Force) at the last minute.
• What Could Have Been: The DokiDoki Precure Official Complete Book reveals the following scrapped plots:
  • Prototype designs for the five Precures.
  • An episode with Mana liking Alice's brother Hiromichi; cut due to her "charity" personality.
  • A Slice of Life spin-off of the Precures' daily lives.
  • Mana, Alice, and Makoto were considered for the "loving a single person" episode before settling Rikka.
  • A love relationship between Mana and Jun. Female producers also vetoed a Mana and Joe relationship.
  • Cure Sword was meant to have a longer character arc building up to her joining the team and would've went more into her backstory, including how she had to watch her two former teammates die in order to take down Lust and Gouma, but all of this ended up getting scrapped due to Toei insisting she appears in All-Stars New Stage 2. (see Executive Meddling)
  • Alice at another school.
  • An episode with only Mana and Alice; cut due to Cure Sword's popularity.
  • #10 would have Mana noticing Rikka's jealousy of Makoto; cut because "it wasn't that good".
  • Ira making a Heroic Sacrifice for Rikka.
  • A sad ending where Makoto departs to the kingdom with the fairies after a farewell concert, says "Goodbye" and Disappears into Light.

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