Dotto! Koni-chan

Characters roles, from left to right:[1] Top: Comic-relief, Gary Stu. Bottom: Hot-Blooded Iron Woobie, The Scrooge ,Ms. Fanservice

"It's something weird and bizarre what's coming up next
(Something never seen before!) [2]
But if you are smart enough you will comprehend this part
(Even the sanest person, here insane has gone)
What it's right, here could be wrong
Because in this world, nothing is normal

It's sensational!"
—LatinAmericanDub Intro song, (all blue)

Dotto! Koni-chan is anime television series, which premiered in Japan on Animax between November 26, 2000 and May 29, 2001. animated by Shaft and produced by Animax and Genco. It's directed by Shinichi Watanabe.

Practically unnoticed on its country of origin, the series was a hit in Latin America, especially in Mexico, Chile, Colombia and Argentina. The reason behind this is most likely due to its outstanding localized translation [3] , which can be easily compared to what American Dubbers did with Samurai Pizza Cats.

Being just an obscure Gag Series in Japan, the Latin American dub turned into a cult-classic and is more generally appreciated by fans. Just to help contrast, there is more information on the Spanish version of The Other Wiki about Koni Chan than the English and Japanese wiki combined.

The story involves Koni and his gang having lots of crazy and incoherent adventures in their equally crazy world. It's really a Widget Series, with No Fourth Wall, and lots of Lampshade Hanging and Parodies of tropes. Just to give the viewer an idea, the aforementioned adventures the protagonist have could range from fighting with their 'Lovely-Teacher' and dealing with Samurai fish, to kicking a can and driving a taxi, to confirming if 'The Armored-Guy's' wife has an affair and saving the world.

The cast consists of five weird character that descontruct known tropes. Koni is The Ace God Mode Sue, High is your usual Hot-Blooded anime heroe (who is always suffering one way or the other), Moro is Ms. Fanservice with some sort of crush with Koni, Nari is a self centered rich guy with a fixation for rounded things (therefore, with Koni), and Afro... the Afro-dog.

Tropes used in Dotto! Koni-chan include:

The Latin American Dub provides examples of:

  • Black Comedy Rape: In the "Chinese tale" episode, Emi comments that monsters might kidnap her and forcefully plug in their VHRs , DVDs, PlayStations and Nintendos, which can be considered rape since Emi is robot-girl. After saying this, Moro and Nari replays since there is nothing she can do about it, she should just relax and enjoy it.
  • Cultural Translation: Since the series is full of Japanese puns, a literally translation would have been pretty unsuccessful. The LAm dub replaced many hard to translate puns with allusions to Latin-American pop culture. It worked brilliantly.
  • Dub Name Change: The Armored-guy is refered to as "El Tal Iván" (lit: "That guy called Ivan"). This is a pun, since "El Tal Iván" sounds exactly like "El Talibán", which means "The Taliban". (since, you know, he is the bad guy and all)
    • Also, the fish-swordman is called "El Mero-Mero". This is yet another pun, since Mero means "Fish" but it also means "The best", so he is "The best of the best" or "The best fish".
  • Double Entendre/Unusual Euphemism: There are A LOT OF THIS. Since this is a kids show, things are usually mentioned by other name, but it's very clear what they are talking about.
  • Gag Dub: MANY parts of the dub makes fun of the animation of the series itself. Cheaply drawn background characters, exaggerated special effects, sudden improvement in quality of the art, and so on.
  • Getting Crap Past the Radar: Lots and lots of times. Besides what mentioned in the Japanese animation, there are lots of Unusual Euphemisms often used to mention things that parents will get but childrens don't. See the Double Entendre/Unusual Euphemism.
    • "Chamacos ayudantes de cocinero". Doubles as Stealth Insult.
    • Maybe the most triumphant example is the "Rocket-men" [5] episode, where one kid says that the rocket-men look like suppositories.
  • Hurricane of Puns: Oh god yes. Every 5 seconds or so.
  • Parental Bonus: Many of the Shout Outs are things kids are not likely to understand (like the fact that Nari's balls-obsession is a metaphor of homosexuality), recognize (like the He-man reference) or a lot of sexual things.
  • Shout-Out: Again, many of them.
    • To many Latin American songs.
      • "Allá en la fuente, habia un chorrito"
      • "Muévelo, muévelo (qué sabroso) muévelo, muévelo (cómo lo hace)"
      • "Si yo fuera rico"
      • "Levantando las manos, moviendo la cintura"
      • "Tú te vas por que yo quiero que te vayas"
      • "Qué calor, qué calor que tengo".
      • "Es casi una experiencia religiosa".
      • "Borondongo le dió a Bernabé, Bernabé le pegó a Muchilanga".
      • "A mover el rabo" -> "A mover el culo".
        • When they sing "A patear el bote" sounds like the rhythm of "A mover el culo". Have in mind "bote" is an Euphemism for "ass".
      • This song about a toy store, is suspicioulsy similar to the jingle of real mexican toy company.
    • The Super Sentai episode was changed in name to Koni Rangers, since Power Rangers is better-known in Latin America.
    • Moro says she would rather be watching Pokémon than being on a episode.
    • In the Dragon Quest episode, after seeing the sword, High says "for the power of Greyskull!"
    • "Las torturas ninjas" (Ninja tortures) -the name of an episode- is one letter away from "Las tortugas ninjas"
    • "Ivan el terrible" episode is named after "Daniel el terrible". (Most likely the American version)
    • The female-wrestler is called "the cousin of Aníbal Lecter".
    • Koni is told to "patear la lata (kick the can) forever, batman!".
    • An episode is named "Taxi Driver con [6] Koni DeNiro".
    • The episode named "Hormiguitaz" (little Antz).
    • The episode named "Los Indoblables" (the unbendables).
    • The grasshoppers ("Grillos") band "Los Grittles". High lampshades this.
    • Koni is said to be better than the Atomic Ant, and he replies that he actually played in the "Bascas-boys".
    • More threatens to go and start working in "Chapa y ½", a clear reference to "Ranma y ½"
    • The chapter in which Koni appears staring mangas has many, some of them which were changed in Latin America due to being too obscure
      • Dragon Ball Koni is even named "Dragon Ball Z" by hide.
      • The football manga which appears (based on Captain Tsubasa) is called "Los super koni-campeones", where as Captain Tsubasa J is called "los super campeones" (super champions) in Latin America.
      • The tribute to Love Hina (called Love Koni) was changed to Sailor Emi.
      • Koni cards is a clear tribute to Yu-Gi-Oh!. The other cards called "Garbash y Rascauele" is a tribute to "Magic the gathering".
      • There is a tribute to Detective Conan.
  • Unusual Euphemism: Besides the Double Entendre examples above, there are a lot of words referred to in a weird way, by very unusual euphismis. This is because they sound funnier that way, and allow to use different puns.
  1. ↑ (let's not count the mascot from the movie)
  2. ↑ Widget Series were uncommon in Latin America
  3. ↑ to give an example of localization, on one chapter they sing The Ketchup Song
  4. ↑ (and will never heard after either)
  5. ↑ some men that where rocket shaped
  6. ↑ lit with
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