Panyo Panyo Di Gi Charat

This is Toshiki Inoue's 4th best writing work behind Faiz, Mechanical Violator Hakaider, and most episodes of Galaxy Angel.

It's odd isn't it? What is the legendary Inoue doing writing the kiddy spinoff of Di Gi Charat? Meaningful content, that's what he's doing. This is a very different series from Di Gi Charat and Nyo~. There is a more earnest weight to the younger versions of the characters and their little quests to better their planet. This is a very important anime within the larger Dejiko sphere of influence.

Also MadHouse pulls off a slick move every once in a while during all of these series that ... leaves you wondering what you're watching at all.

Miyuki Sawashiro fans must watch all of DiGiCharat to see her roots in the industry. Puchiko's voice and character are interesting, aren't they? It's not what anyone would ever expect! And DiGiCharat is one of the only avenues to enjoy Asami Sanada's ear splitting screeching so don't miss it. Also Megumi Hayashibara as Piyocola Analogue III. These are important people.

First of all, this series is supposed to be for kids. Thus, if you have something against childish characters and plots and totally can't watch them, then you should just give up on this one. I gave this series a high score not because I think it's amazing, but because I really enjoyed watching it – something that I doubt everybody can.
Panyo Panyo Di Gi Charat is supposed to be some kind of "prequel" to the original Di Gi Charat series in term of plot, even though it was created later. With that said, what comes after this series is actually Di Gi Charat Nyo, ... which is an alternative version of the original Di Gi Charat. Therefore, you could say it's not directly connected to the original series it's based on.


Plot:
The story is set in the fictional world called Di Gi Charat and revolves around its princess – Deijiko. One day she reads a book and decides to help people around the planet. Thus, she sets out to help people along with her young sidekick, Puchiko, and a flying balloon which supposed to be a guardian - Gemma. They later meet two more characters who are willing to aid them in their mission. But guess what, there are also two evildoers who try to get in their way and cause mischief. That's the story in short and… well, that's pretty much the whole story. The series is simply a collection of different short stories which aren't usually connected to each other. While it doesn't have any complicated stories, because it's a childish series, each story is nice and cute in it's own way. At this point it's all up to you. You can either treat it as "childish" and think it's lame, or you can try to enjoy the stories as they are. If you capable of choosing the later, then you might see that the stories are actually pretty solid and are very entertaining. They can be funny, cute, touching and even somewhat dramatic. As long as they can make you smile at least a little bit, I believe they have accomplish their goal.


Characters:
In term of personality, most characters aren't something very original or coplex. But that's how it should be, because the series supposed to be "light" and "simple". On the other hand, the design is pretty good. The characters look nice with each of them having its own cute decorations such as Deijiko's bells or MeeK's stars. In addition, the characters tend to appear in many different costumes depending on the situation. The strong point about the characters would be the fact they are cute and each one of them in its own way. Also, every character ends its sentences in a different way such as "nya" or "myu". All this, combined with putting the characters in a variety of, sometimes absurd, situations makes them very enjoyable and adorable.

Art:
No much to say here, aside of the fact that everything is very cute and colorful. The characters are mostly cute chibi with big heads and their clothes, decorations as well as the backgrounds are very colorful. While not outstanding or amazing, it's definitely how it should be in this series, and I won't ask for something else.

Sound:
It has nice BGMs which can fit the different situation and sound both serious and cute at the same time. The voice acting is really great and aside from being cute, it's sounds just right in place and fits the cute chibi characters. For me, the voice acting played the most important part in delivering the cuteness of the series. What further great, especially in this series, is the fact that all songs are sung by the same people who do the voice acting. Sometimes they even sing during the episode itself. While the songs hardly have much sense, they sound nice and it's cute to see how cute characters sing.


Enjoyment:
To sum it up, I very enjoyed the series. It's not something outstanding and neither it's something amazing. But it was very enjoyable and I liked it. At least to me, it delivered it cuteness and managed to make me smile, and sometimes even laugh. Since every episode is very short, this anime is perfect for situation in which you have 10 spare minutes to waste. Even if you aren't sure you will love it, you can always try watching one episode when you have nothing else to do, and who knows – you may like it. At the very last, you might want to recommend it to your younger brother or sister.

Di Gi Charat has very little as far as story goes, like just about every zany comedy I've seen. The story that it does have is that there's a planet called Charat and its Princess, Dejiko, decides to bring happiness to everyone because she read a book with a similar premise. Unknown to her, an evil entity called Deji Devil and his companion, Piyoko, are trying to bring sadness to everyone. Hilarity ensues.

Broccoli entertainment is very skilled with zany comedy and it shows in series like Galaxy Angel. That being said, Di Gi Charat is not nearly as funny as Galaxy Angel. To its credit, ... it is a funny series. It also has what might just be the funniest chase scene I've ever seen. The main problem is that the episodes are really hit or miss. Most are funny but some are just stupid. Without going through every episode again and actually taking a tally, I would estimate that about a sixth of the episodes are misses which still leaves forty episodes worth watching but is something of a problem.

I'm not going to say much about the art Simply because I hate the art direction they take. I'm sure that it's competently done for what it is, but I really don't care for it. The voice acting is a bit over the top and kind of grating. I know that Sawashiro Miyuki, Sanada Asami, and Enomoto Atsuko are all capable voice actresses so I'm going to say that this is probably the director's fault.

I think a lot of what held Broccoli back on this project is that Di Gi Charat is a family comedy. So they couldn't use a lot of their more complex, adult humour that made Galaxy Angel so amazing.

I'm going to give the series a yuri factor of 4/10. It has no yuri, but you could easily interpret the relationship between the girls that way. Although they're supposed to be little kids so I don't know why you would want to.

My final rating is a 6/10, above average. The episodes are pretty funny overall and some are even clever. The problem is that they stick to the same theme for four episodes and sometimes the theme simply isn't funny. It's also held back by the art and the sub-par voice acting. It's still worth watching, especially since each episode is only eight minutes but it isn't Broccoli's best work and there are a lot of better comedic anime.