, also known by the title of its anime adaptation, , is a Japanese

manga Manga (Japanese: 漫画 ) are comics or graphic novels originating from Japan. Most manga conform to a style developed in Japan in the late 19th century, and the form has a long prehistory in earlier Japanese art. The term ''manga'' is u ...

series by Hekiru Hikawa that uses

parody A parody, also known as a spoof, a satire, a send-up, a take-off, a lampoon, a play on (something), or a caricature, is a creative work designed to imitate, comment on, and/or mock its subject by means of satiric or ironic imitation. Often its subj ...

, frequently referencing Japanese and American pop-culture in many ways. It features several first year students and their teachers in a school in Japan, though the main focus is on class 1-C. The manga was serialized in

Square Enix is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational holding company, production enterprise and entertainment conglomerate, best known for its ''Final Fantasy'', ''Dragon Quest'', ''Star Ocean'' and ''Kingdom Hearts'' role-playing video game ...

's ''

G Fantasy is a manga imprint owned by Square Enix Holdings. It originated as a manga imprint for Enix before the company re-branded as Square Enix. It publishes manga in several anthologies aimed at different reader demographic groups in the Japanese m ...

'' between the November 2000 and October 2011 issues, and the chapters are collected in 17 ''

tankōbon is the Japanese Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or cultur ...

'' volumes. A 26-episode

anime is Traditional animation, hand-drawn and computer animation, computer-generated animation originating from Japan. Outside of Japan and in English, ''anime'' refers specifically to animation produced in Japan. However, in Japan and in Japane ...

television series adaptation aired in Japan on

TV Tokyo JOTX-DTV (channel 7), branded as and known colloquially as , is a television station headquartered in the Sumitomo Fudosan Roppongi Grand Tower in Roppongi, Minato, Tokyo, Japan, owned and operated by the subsidiary of listed certified b ...

between July 4 and December 26, 2005 with its title renamed as ''Pani Poni Dash!''. The anime is licensed by

Funimation Crunchyroll, LLC, previously known as Funimation from 1994 to 2022, is an American entertainment company owned by Japanese conglomerate Sony as a joint venture between Sony Pictures and Sony Music Entertainment Japan's Aniplex that specializes ...

in North America. There have also been several

drama CD Radio drama (or audio drama, audio play, radio play, radio theatre, or audio theatre) is a dramatized, purely acoustic performance. With no visual component, radio drama depends on dialogue, music and sound effects to help the listener imagine ...

s created based on the TV series and manga. A special

OVA , abbreviated as OVA and sometimes as OAV (original animation video), are Japanese animated films and series made specially for release in home video formats without prior showings on television or in theaters, though the first part of an OVA s ...

was released with a DVD box set containing the anime series on April 15, 2009 in Japan.

Plot

''Pani Poni Dash!s central storyline revolves around Rebecca Miyamoto, a

child prodigy A child prodigy is defined in psychology research literature as a person under the age of ten who produces meaningful output in some domain at the level of an adult expert. The term is also applied more broadly to young people who are extraor ...

homeroom teacher, and the antics of her class 1-C. The characters attend a high school called the where Rebecca has taken up a job as one of the teachers after being the youngest graduate at

MIT The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the m ...

and is being watched by space aliens who screw up the story every now and then. Though the story hardly strays from the focus of the four first-year classes labeled 1-A through 1-D, the mishaps that occur in them, the teacher's lounge, and on school trips also become sources of material for

topical A topical medication is a medication that is applied to a particular place on or in the body. Most often topical medication means application to body surfaces such as the skin or mucous membranes to treat ailments via a large range of classes ...

allusions Allusion is a figure of speech, in which an object or circumstance from unrelated context is referred to covertly or indirectly. It is left to the audience to make the direct connection. Where the connection is directly and explicitly stated (as ...

regarding satire, anime, Internet, gaming, and popular culture.

Media

Manga

''Pani Poni'' was serialized in the manga magazine ''G Fantasy'' published by Square Enix between the November 2000 and October 2011 issues. Seventeen volumes were released in Japan. The translated versions of the manga are also released in

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...

and

South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and sharing a Korean Demilitarized Zone, land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed ...

, from

Chingwin Publishing Group Ching Win Publishing Co., Ltd. () is a Taiwanese Publishing Group famous for its large manga selection, established 1964 in Taipei. Though it was initially aimed as general publishing company, it changed its principle to mainly publishing manga, l ...

Taipei Taipei (), officially Taipei City, is the capital and a special municipality of the Republic of China (Taiwan). Located in Northern Taiwan, Taipei City is an enclave of the municipality of New Taipei City that sits about southwest of the n ...

and Haksan Culture Company in

Seoul Seoul (; ; ), officially known as the Seoul Special City, is the capital and largest metropolis of South Korea.Before 1972, Seoul was the ''de jure'' capital of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) as stated iArticle 103 ...

. There are four spin-offs of original ''Pani Poni'' manga. Most of them features

yonkoma , a comic strip format, generally consists of gag comic strips within four panels of equal size ordered from top to bottom. They also sometimes run right-to-left horizontally or use a hybrid 2×2 style, depending on the layout requirements of ...

style. is currently serialized in ''Tech Gian'' (

Enterbrain , formerly , is a Japanese publisher and division of Kadokawa Future Publishing founded on 30 January 1987 as . Magazines published by Enterbrain are generally focused on video games and computer entertainment as well as video game and strategy ...

) from July 2001, and focuses on Hikaru Nikaido (class 1-A) as a heroine. was serialized in ''

Dengeki Moeoh is a Japanese shōnen manga magazine published by ASCII Media Works (formerly MediaWorks) under the ''Dengeki'' brand. Many manga serialized in ''Dengeki Daioh'' were later published in ''tankōbon'' volumes under ASCII Media Works' Dengeki Co ...

'' between March 2002 and June 2008. It featured Kurumi Momose (1-C) as a heroine and illustrated her part-time job on a cafe. Rei Tachibana (1-C) also took part in some episodes as . was serialized in ''Ace Momogumi'' (

Kadokawa Shoten , formerly , is a Japanese publisher and division of Kadokawa Future Publishing based in Tokyo, Japan. It became an internal division of Kadokawa Corporation on October 1, 2013. Kadokawa publishes manga, light novels, manga anthology magazines su ...

) from June 2003 to December 2004, when the company discontinued the magazine. It described the fictional

Japanese idol An is a type of entertainer marketed for image, attractiveness, and personality in Japanese pop culture. Idols are primarily singers with training in acting, dancing, and modeling. Idols are commercialized through merchandise and endorsements b ...

group named ''Momo-gumi!!'' that Yuna Kashiwagi (1-A) belongs to. is alternately serialized in ''G Fantasy'' with ''Pani Poni'' from August 2006. It shows how Behoimi (1-D) became a "real"

magical girl is a subgenre of Japanese fantasy media (including anime, manga, light novels, and live-action media) centered around young girls who possess magical abilities, which they typically use through an ideal alter ego into which they can transfo ...

, and fights against the invaders from other planets.

Drama CDs

''Pani Poni'' has also created ten

s based on the series, the first of which was released in Japan on February 27, 2004. While the first seven preceded the anime, and thus were based on the manga version, the last three released have been based on the anime adaptation.

Anime

television series adaptation titled ''Pani Poni Dash!'' aired in Japan between July 4 and December 26, 2005, and contained 26 episodes. King Records subsidiary Starchild has the video and music rights for the anime. A special

was released with a DVD box set containing the anime series, on April 15, 2009. A Blu-ray box set of the series including the OVA was released in Japan on April 26, 2017. The anime was licensed

in North America (it was once licensed by

ADV Films A.D. Vision Holdings, Inc. (known simply as ADV and also referred to as ADV Films) was an American multimedia entertainment distributor headquartered in Houston, Texas, and founded in 1992 by video game fan John Ledford and anime fans Matt Gre ...

for $138,666 effective June 30, 2006; however, through a fallout of ADV's license partner Sojitz/ARM Corporation, ''Pani Poni'' was transferred to Funimation),

in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

, Mighty Media in Taiwan, and TVee.co.kr in South Korea. Funimation released a complete DVD box set on March 10, 2009. The episode names are based on

adage An adage (; Latin: adagium) is a memorable and usually philosophical aphorism that communicates an important truth derived from experience, custom, or both, and that many people consider true and credible because of its longeval tradition, i.e. ...

s and

proverb A proverb (from la, proverbium) is a simple and insightful, traditional saying that expresses a perceived truth based on common sense or experience. Proverbs are often metaphorical and use formulaic speech, formulaic language. A proverbial phra ...

s. Each episode is only loosely connected to the central plot. Many of the jokes in the series rely on satire, established character behavior, Japanese Internet and anime culture such as

emoticons An emoticon (, , rarely , ), short for "emotion icon", also known simply as an emote, is a pictorial representation of a facial expression using characters—usually punctuation marks, numbers, and letters—to express a person's feelings, m ...

(At some points in the series, a character's face is replaced by an emoticon.), or non sequitur comments and actions (especially by Ichijo). The series also contains numerous parodies and references to popular culture, which include ''

Planet of the Apes ''Planet of the Apes'' is an American science fiction media franchise consisting of films, books, television series, comics, and other media about a world in which humans and intelligent apes clash for control. The franchise is based on Frenc ...

'', ''

Star Trek ''Star Trek'' is an American science fiction media franchise created by Gene Roddenberry, which began with the eponymous 1960s television series and quickly became a worldwide pop-culture phenomenon. The franchise has expanded into vari ...

'', ''

The Exorcist ''The Exorcist'' is a 1973 American supernatural horror film directed by William Friedkin and written for the screen by William Peter Blatty, based on his 1971 novel of the same name. It stars Ellen Burstyn, Max von Sydow, Lee J. Cobb, Kitty W ...

'', ''

Gundam is a Japanese military fiction media franchise. Created by Yoshiyuki Tomino and Sunrise (now Bandai Namco Filmworks), the franchise features giant robots, or mecha, with the name "Gundam". The franchise began on April 7, 1979, with ''Mobile ...

'', ''

Devilman is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Go Nagai. The manga focuses on a high school student named Akira Fudo who absorbs the powers of the demon called "Amon" with help of his friend Ryo Asuka in order to battle ...

'', ''

Super Mario Bros. is a platform game developed and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). The successor to the 1983 arcade game '' Mario Bros.'' and the first game in the ''Super Mario'' series, it was first released in 1985 for ...

'', ''

Little Black Sambo ''The Story of Little Black Sambo'' is a children's book written and illustrated by Scottish author Helen Bannerman and published by Grant Richards in October 1899. As one in a series of small-format books called The Dumpy Books for Children, ...

'', ''

Usagi Yojimbo is a comic book series created by Stan Sakai. It is set primarily at the beginning of the Edo period of Japanese history and features anthropomorphic animals replacing humans. The main character is a rabbit ''rōnin'', Miyamoto Usagi, whom Sak ...

'', ''

Doctor Who ''Doctor Who'' is a British science fiction television series broadcast by the BBC since 1963. The series depicts the adventures of a Time Lord called the Doctor, an extraterrestrial being who appears to be human. The Doctor explores the u ...

'' and the ''

Cthulhu Mythos The Cthulhu Mythos is a mythopoeia and a shared fictional universe, originating in the works of American horror writer H. P. Lovecraft. The term was coined by August Derleth August William Derleth (February 24, 1909 – July 4, 1971) was an ...

''.

Music

;Opening themes # by Peach Moon Academy Class 1-C (feat. Himeko in TV episodes 2–9, 14, DVD episodes 1–8, 25 and OVA; feat.

Rei Rei or REI may refer to: Arts and entertainment *Rei, a story arc of the anime ''Higurashi When They Cry'' *Rei, a shapeshifting godlike dragon in the Australian webcomic series ''Vainglorious'' *Rei I, II and III, episodes of ''Neon Genesis Eva ...

in TV episodes 11, 13, 16; feat. Kurumi in TV episode 17 and DVD episode 15; feat. Rokugō in TV episodes 19, 22) # by Peach Moon Academy Class 1-C (feat. Ichijo in TV episodes 10, 12, 15, 18 and DVD episodes 9-14, 16) # by Peach Moon Academy Class 1-C (feat. Miyako in TV episodes 20–21, 23 and DVD episodes 17–23; feat. Rokugō in TV episode 24 and DVD episode 24) ;Ending themes # by Peach Moon Academy Class 1-A&B (in TV and DVD episodes 1–7, 9-12) # by Behoimi (in TV and DVD episodes 8) # by Rebecca Miyamoto (in TV and DVD episodes 13, 25) # by Peach Moon Academy Class 1-D (in TV and DVD episodes 14-23 and OVA) # by Rebecca Miyamoto (in TV and DVD episode 24) # by Peach Moon Academy Class 1-C (feat. Himeko in TV and DVD episode 26)

Internet radio shows

''Pani Poni Dash'' has two

internet radio Online radio (also web radio, net radio, streaming radio, e-radio, IP radio, Internet radio) is a digital audio service transmitted via the Internet. Broadcasting on the Internet is usually referred to as webcasting since it is not transmitted ...

shows titled and . The first one was aired from November 2005 to February 2006, while the latter one was aired from December 2005 to September 2006, both on

Animate TV Animation is a method by which still figures are manipulated to appear as moving images. In traditional animation, images are drawn or painted by hand on transparent celluloid sheets to be photographed and exhibited on film. Today, most anim ...

. The shows were hosted by

Mai Kadowaki is a Japanese voice actress and singer from Tokyo, Japan. She was previously known as 門脇舞 (pronunciation identical). Biography She is popular as a radio actress who wears glasses. She is also known for portraying meganekko characters on a ...

and Chiwa Saito who played Behoimi (1-D) and Rebecca "Becky" Miyamoto in the anime respectively. While the latter one was remixed as "DJCD"s, the former has never been officially released.

Notes

References

;General * ;Specific

External links

Manga official website

Anime official website

''Pani Poni Dash!'' anime
at

''Pani Poni Dash!'' anime
at

* {{Shin Oonuma 2000 manga 2005 anime television series debuts 2009 anime OVAs ADV Films Funimation Gangan Comics manga Parody anime and manga School life in anime and manga Shaft (company) Shōnen manga