The members of the "main" four groups of Tsukipro. (From top to bottom) QUELLnote , SolidSnote , Growthnote , SOARAnote
Tsukipro is a franchise consisting of albums, drama CDs, mobile games, anime, and stage plays featuring 13 fictional idol groups - 10 male, 2 female, and 1 mixed - under Tsukino Talent Productions. The series exists in 2.5 dimensions, as the characters of the series themselves are made to interact with producers and other people in real life. The franchise started with Tsukiuta, a collaboration between voice actors and Vocaloid producers.
The franchise is divided into parts:
- Tsukiuta: Based on the twelve months in a year. It is separated into its own franchise. Each group has six members.
- Six Gravity (boy group, December-May, debuted in 2012)
- Procellarum (boy group, June-November, debuted in 2012)
- Fluna (girl group, December-May, debuted in 2014)
- Seleas (girl group, June-November, debuted in 2014)
- ALIVE: Based on the elements earth/wood and air.
- SOARA (five-member boy band, air theme, debuted in 2015)
- Growth (four-member boy group, wood theme, debuted in 2015)
- SQ: Based on the elements fire and water. Each group has four members.
- SolidS (boy band, fire theme, debuted in 2015)
- QUELL (boy ballad group, water theme, debuted in 2016)
- Vazzrock: Based on birthstones. Each group has six members.
- VAZZY (boy group, debuted in 2017)
- ROCK DOWN (boy group, debuted in 2017)
- Infinit0 (pronounced "Infinite Zero") (two-man unit, debuted in 2018)
- TOBARI (two-man unit)
- pioniX (four-man collab unit formed by the members of Infinit0 and TOBARI)
- Swiiiiiits! (six-member mixed group formed by five male idols and one female idol)
- ALTAIR THEATER (nineteen-man boy group; initially had only twelve members)
An anime about the first four groups, Tsukiuta the Animation, aired in the summer of 2016, while another series focusing on the SQ and ALIVE groups aired in the Fall 2017 Anime season. Tsukiuta the Animation 2 ran in 2020, and Tsukipro the Animation 2 in 2021. Vazzrock the Animation released in 2022.
The SQ groups and Alive groups have separate stage play series, SQS (pronounced "Square Stage") and Alivestage.
There are also two live action movies about SOARA.
A mobile Rhythm Game,Tsukino Paradise, was in service from 2017-2020. A character collecting game called Tsukino Park ran from 2015-2019, when it was replaced with an app called Tsukino World.
All groups show examples of:
- Alice Allusion: Soara's theme for the Fairy Tale Collection line in the 2018-19 run of the annual pop-up shop in Harajuku.
- Battle of the Bands: Soara and Growth got into the label through a competition. Their journey in this is shown in their audio dramas.
- Baroque Pop: John's compositions for Soara, SolidS, and Growth - especially Growth. They are simply magnificent. Quell's music is by a separate composer, but theirs is also quite baroque.
- Connected All Along: Several of the 12 idol groups have one member that was part of a very popular disbanded idol group. SolidS' Shiki, QUELL's Shu, VAZZY's Takaaki, and both members of Infinit0 were five of those 6 or 7 members.
- Cast Full of Pretty Boys: 68 of them, and 13 girls.
- Clap Your Hands If You Believe: Apparently, Mamoru's worshipping his pachira plant caused it to become a fairy.
- Classical Elements Ensemble: The idol group is based around this theming—Solid S is Fire, Quell is Water, SOARA is Air, Growth is Earth. The units' music reflects their elements—Solid S is heated, sexy, and always changing; Quell is calm and soothing yet also dark and deep; SOARA is light and youthful; Growth is the one that subverts expectations — their interpretation of "earth" is that they're world-traveling (or multiverse-traveling) princely flowers, and their music is fantasy-tinged Baroque Pop.
- Comic-Book Time: Averted. Every real time year Tsukipro is active is another year added onto the characters' profiles. They all age accordingly too, with their character pages showing what they did during certain eras.
- Geodesic Cast: The series started with the Tsukiuta series of two units, centered around their kinglike leaders, with themes and tones that reflect each other. The next unit to be introduced was SolidS, who did not have a companion unit at first, but after the Alive series was made as a pair of units like Gravi and Procella, SolidS was given a partner unit, Quell, to form SQ. VazzRock continues this, with companion units Vazzy and Rockdown. Gekidan Altair, Infinit0, and Swiiiiiits! are exceptions, however.
- Hair-Contrast Duo: Each series' leaders follow this with the first group's leaders having dark hair, and the second group's having light hair. Starting with Tsukiuta's Hajime and Shun, and Yuki and Tsubaki, SQ's Shiki and Shu are a milder example; Sora and Koki are even milder, possibly reflecting the lighter, airier nature of the Alive series compared to the rest of the franchise. But Vazzrock's leaders are back to the Tsukiuta pattern.
- Half-Identical Twins: Lico and Gli count for this.
- Intercourse with You:
- Tsubasa (SolidS)'s "Shout it Out" is a rock song all about a romantic tryst, as are his duets "Lady Joker" (with Shiki) and "Kiss Me Quick" with Dai. And Shiki and Rikka have a duet called "Between the Sheets".
- Shuu and Eichi's Re:Start series duet "Hidden Eclipse". The first line is "After the kids are asleep," and it basically is about what the parents can do once they're alone together - another side to their "kazoquell" image.
- Product Placement: Continuing the Moe Anthropomorphism theme, The Wizard of Twins: Lico and Gli are gijinka Pocky. They are essentially advertising mascots for the snack. And their birthday is on 11/11 - Pocky Day.
- Series Mascot: Each group has their own individual mascots, but all of them pretty much take the same shape of a cartoon plushie with an oblong body.
- The Smurfette Principle: Lico is the only female member of Swiiiiiits!, and the only female idol introduced in Tsukipro after Tsukiuta.
- Solar and Lunar: Just as all of these idols fall under Tsukino Production, there exists a Sun Production with its own idols. Growth's rival unit, Zix, is under this production company. Three of the four Growth members were previously there, but they left to start a new unit with Mamoru. Another of SunPro's units, Tobari, has collaborated with Infinit0 to form a four-member unit known as pioniX.
Tropes applying to Tsukipro the Animation:
- 2D Visuals, 3D Effects: Much like the Tsukiuta adaptaion, the main source of this phenomenon is the four CGI performances used as the opening themes for the show, as well as the final musical number in the last episode.
- Action Dress Rip: Rikka, acting as the princess in the makeup commercial, rips the bottom half of it to make himself out to be tougher than initially appeared.
- Actor Allusion: Takuya Eguchi's infamous doodle creatures Daioh and Pen-kun make a cameo in the anime as toys in Shiki's room. Being Shiki's seiyuu, it comes across as a tongue in cheek nod to the man.
- The Cameo: While the Tsukiuta men show up from time to time, only one of the women, Asagiri of Seleas, made a small appearance on the show, being one of the MUSIC TIME opening acts in episode 8.
- Continuity Nod: Episode 9 has a reference to the Tsukiuta adaptation, with Hajime's cosmetic commercial being a big enough hit that the company contacted Tsukipro for another one years later.
- Escort Distraction: In one episode, the characters think Shiki and Shu are fighting, so they plan a party to make them get along. They have Eichi take Shu out while they set up, and Eichi and Shu have a nice emotional talk... and when they get back, it turns out that the idea that they're fighting was all a prank. it was actually Eichi that they wanted to get out of the way, because they were planning a surprise party for his birthday.
- Formula-Breaking Episode: The last two episodes are a live event and a concert respectively, compared to the previous episodes which focused more on the characters and their various situations.
- Lady and Knight: The commercial Dai and Rikka star in have this theme, Dai as the knight and Rikka as the Lady. The characters discuss this a little bit, saying that they chose the theme because it's a very popular fantasy for girls. It's worth noting that Rikka has no issues with being a princess, and the episode focuses on Dai's insecurity about whether or not he can be a good enough performer to star opposite Rikka.
- Logging onto the Fourth Wall: Whenever the boys ask for audience input on their shows, they point to the official Tsukipro anime website every time.
- Next Sunday A.D.: A lot of the first season of the anime series takes place throughout the 2017 year in universe, ending on a concert taking place Christmas 2017. The first season itself aired throughout Fall 2017, inverting this for a lot of the run and then eventually matching up dates.
- Recap Episode: Episode 12 does this with the framing device of SOARA and Growth hosting the Road to Budokan live program, reminiscing over the past year's various events leading up to the Tsukino Production concert in December.
- Shout-Out: The live action drama Shu was working on, Running Away is Disgraceful, But it's Better Than Dying, has its title reference the Japanese title of The Full Time Wife Escapist (Nigeru wa Haji daga Yaku ni Tatsu / Running Away is Shameful, but Useful), of whose live action adaptaion was running at the time.
