stylized as ''BanG Dream! Girls Band Party! ☆ PICO'' and also known as ''Garupa ☆ Pico'', is a Japanese chibi short

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

series by

Bushiroad is a Japanese entertainment company, producer of collectible card games and trading cards, and publisher of mobile apps and games, which was founded in 2007 by Takaaki Kidani and is headquartered in Tokyo. Bushiroad created and owns various med ...

. Animated by

Sanzigen is a Japanese animation studio specializing in CGI animation. The studio was founded in 2003, later becoming formally incorporated in 2006 by former employees of Gonzo, and has contributed to various anime series and films. Its name is derived ...

in collaboration with DMM.futureworks, it is a spin-off of the main ''

BanG Dream! ''BanG Dream!'', also known as , is a Japanese music media franchise owned by Bushiroad. Created by Bushiroad president Takaaki Kidani in January 2015 with original story by Kō Nakamura, the project began as a manga before ex ...

'' series with characters from the mobile game ''

BanG Dream! Girls Band Party! also known as ''Garupa'', is a mobile rhythm game developed by Craft Egg and published by Bushiroad for the Android and iOS platforms. Part of Bushiroad's ''BanG Dream!'' music franchise, it was released in Japan in March 2017, and worldwide ...

''. , the show consists of three seasons.

Series overview

Episodes

''BanG Dream! Girls Band Party! Pico'' (2018)

''BanG Dream! Girls Band Party! Pico: Ohmori'' (2020)

''BanG Dream! Girls Band Party! Pico Fever!'' (2021–2022)

Production

The first season aired from July 5 to December 27, 2018, with episodes being aired live on the ''BanG Dream! TV''

variety show Variety show, also known as variety arts or variety entertainment, is entertainment made up of a variety of acts including musical performances, sketch comedy, magic, acrobatics, juggling, and ventriloquism. It is normally introduced by a comp� ...

Tokyo MX JOMX-DTV (channel 9), branded as Tokyo MX (officially stylized as TOKYO MX), is an independent station, independent television station in Tokyo, Japan, owned by the . It is the only television station that exclusively serves the city and parts ...

SUN The Sun is the star at the centre of the Solar System. It is a massive, nearly perfect sphere of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core, radiating the energy from its surface mainly as visible light a ...

, and online on

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

. Consisting of 26 three-minute episodes, the show aired from July to December. A second season titled aired from May 7 to October 29, 2020. The episodes were live streamed on YouTube and

Periscope A periscope is an instrument for observation over, around or through an object, obstacle or condition that prevents direct line-of-sight observation from an observer's current position. In its simplest form, it consists of an outer case with ...

for ''BanG Dream! TV''. The 26-episode season ran from May to October. aired from October 7, 2021, to March 31, 2022. The show uses three pieces of

theme music Theme music is a musical composition which is often written specifically for radio programming, television shows, video games, or films and is usually played during the title sequence, opening credits, closing credits, and in some instances at ...

by the franchise's vocalists: (''Pico''), (''Ohmori''), and (''Fever!''). The first two themes were released as singles on August 22, 2018, and August 12, 2020, respectively; "Quintuple Smile" and "TWINKLE CiRCLE", both of which are theme songs for the game, were coupling tracks. "Pico! Papi! Girls Band Party! PICO!!!" peaked at tenth on the

Oricon Weekly Singles Chart The Oricon Singles Chart is the Japanese music industry-standard singles popularity chart issued daily, weekly, monthly and yearly by Oricon. Chart rankings are based on physical singles' sales. Until 2017, Oricon did not track download sales. In ...

, while "One Extra Large! Garupa Pico" topped at 13th.

Elements Garden Elements Garden is a Japanese group of music composers, or a "music production brand" as they call themselves. They generally produce music for video games, anime and recording artists. They are attached to Aria Entertainment. The group was form ...

's Ryota Suemasu and Asuka Oda were the composer and lyricist for the first theme, respectively, and

Junpei Fujita is a Japanese arranger and composer, and a founding member of Elements Garden. His work includes composition and arrangement of some tracks of singles and albums of Nana Mizuki including albums ''Hybrid Universe'', ''Ultimate Diamond'' and ''Impac ...

took over composition for the second. Seiya Miyajima serves as the director and animated character designer for both seasons, while

Takaaki Kidani is a Japanese video game developer and entrepreneur born in Kanazawa, Japan. He is the founder, CEO and president of Bushiroad. Kidani has also served as the chairman of New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW). He continues to be involved with NJPW throug ...

is the executive producer. Elements Garden oversees music production, with

Noriyasu Agematsu is a Japanese composer, arranger and Record producer, music producer, as well as founding member of the musical group Elements Garden. He composed and arranged tracks on Nana Mizuki's singles ''Massive Wonders'' and ''Eternal Blaze'', ''"Brave ...

and Fujita as producers. Sanzigen and Dmm.futureworks are assisted with animation by Passione and

Creators in Pack is a Japanese animation studio An animation studio is a company producing animation, animated media. The broadest such companies conceive of products to produce, own the physical equipment for production, employ operators for that equipment, a ...

. The voice actresses from the parent ''BanG Dream!'' anime reprise their roles for ''Pico''.

Other media

A manga based on the show, ''BanG Dream! Garupa Pico Comic Anthology'', was released on March 14, 2019, by Bushiroad and

Kadokawa Corporation , formerly is a Japanese Conglomerate (company), conglomerate based in Fujimi, Chiyoda, Tokyo. Created as a result of the merger of the original Kadokawa Corporation and Dwango (company), Dwango Co., Ltd. on October 1, 2014, the company has ...

. The anthology features comics from 17 artists, including Miyajima, who illustrated the cover and opening chapter.

Notes

References

External links

* *
English website
*
''Ohmori'' English website
*
''Fever!'' English website
* ** ** {{Sanzigen G Anime spin-offs Bushiroad Comedy anime and manga Music in anime and manga Sanzigen Tokyo MX original programming