Thinking about all the missed opportunities there were for toys based on Invader Zim.
Like, imagine if they made like a Zim's house dollhouse/diorama type thing where you could buy separate components that all connect to each other and can be arranged any way you want to form the subterranean chambers of the base. Every chamber has some moving pieces or mechanical components for tactile stimulation and immersive play, like a button you can press to shoot air up into a tube to make it look like you launched a chicken into space, or a little tiltable pod with a joystick like the one Zim used to remotely pilot the Massive in Backseat Drivers. And you could take your little character figurines and pretend like you're Zim doing an experiment, or Dib sneaking in, or GIR making a huge mess. You could have some extra large deluxe characters like Ultra Peepi, Megaboy 3000, and Giganto Baby to recreate scenes of the base falling under attack.
big boy always reminds me of this guy josh from college who would greet you by shouting “big boy!” and doing an extremely hard top down high five.
would also call you a small boy when disappointed and this whole shtick came with like, scientific orders of magnitude depending on the vibe (megaboy, microboy, picoboy). he was certainly a character.
Okay so today I wanna talk about the mascot managers of WITH boys. They don't quite have it officially; however, their seiyuu did create some on their first live event, for a "what-if" segment.
1. Sorazou
Asahi's mascot, made by Kobayashi Tatsuyuki!
The name explains what it is, sora (sky) + zou (elephant). Kobatatsu came up with this mascot because he wanted to express Asahi's cheerful personality with bright blue sky and white clouds motif.
Why elephant? Because there's no elephant mascot yet and he felt that it would be cute.
This mascot can't speak, only makes deep "sora" noises (contrary to the cute appearance ww).
2. Purufu
Koyoi's mascot by Tsuchida Reiou, a purple wolf.
This mascot was made after Reiou came up with the "Avocado machine gun" background settings for Koyoi, so he wanted the mascot to have a cool, wild feelings; hence a wolf. (Tbh I'm gonna need a full separate post to talk about Reiou's influence on Koyoi's official background story. I'll do that later.)
His catchphrase is "I'm not a dog/cat! I'll bite you!" and he doesn't acknowledge Shougo and Asahi as Koyoi's teammates. In reality, he's just a tsundere and actually likes WITH. Reiou specifically designed him with Asahi and Shougo's colors included (in the earcuff, eye and bangs color).
3. Unicon
Shougo's mascot by Yamashita Seiichirou. Despite its name, it's not related to unicorns, it's actually... a flying sea urchin (uni).
But why? Because it came to him after he thought about other mascots' names, especially Punicorn. So he based it off Punicorn mixed with sea urchin. Like Punicorn, Unicon can also fly, have wings, a curly tail, and a pair of arms.
Also, when Shougo completes his Idol Time, Unicon would literally rip some part of his face off and offer it to him as a meal. (According to Seichi, that's the sea urchin meat you usually eat as sushi toppings / uni sashimi; see the image below.)
Unicon can't speak, but he makes cute "unicon" noises. Seichi wants to voice it himself, but if he's rejected by the director, he'd ask Megaboy's seiyuu to voice it.
None of these mascots are used as official PriPara materials. However, Seichi still draws Unicon pretty often on his personal Twitter, so much that it's now his own mascot rather than Shougo's. On March 2023, Seichi even launched a series of Unicon goods under his own label.
Kobatatsu and Reiou also commented on Unicon goods launching here. (They basically congratulated him but also lowkey dissed Unicon lol)
So in terms of popularity, although Purufu won the fan favorites on the day they were created, I guess we can say that Unicon is the most successful and popular now. All thanks to Seichi's persistence on drawing him.
And as a closing, have a Unicon human form drawing that Reiou made here! Thanks for tuning in to my wizu ted talk 🐰
What I love the most about the “Megaboy 3000” track is how it literally sounds like when you think you’ve defeated a major boss and then a whole second health bar pops up on the screen while the option to flee disappears
which when you think about it from the perspective of Zim was more or less exactly what was happening during that sequence
I have never realized how much zoom (2006) shaped my taste in music. Like damn I know my parents playing Chinese music, pop, and metal had an influence but there are just so many bops that I forget were in here.