These cuddly little fantasy monsters, rascals really, are pals of the magical girl. They’re mascots, buddies, magical friends. They hop along for the ride. Magical girls usually encounter them once they enter the “other world” where they have been sent to save the people from the evil lord. These chipper little critters are not afraid of going to dangerous places with her. In fact, they’ll even throw themselves into harms way to protect her. Yes, they’ve even been known to give their lives for their magical friends. A tear or two has been shed over the loss of these brave little companions. There is no finer friend than a tiny manga monster.
They’re irresistibly cute, there’s no denying that. But can you teach someone to draw something irresistible? Is there a class in drawing irresistibility? Well, believe it or not, you can learn how to make something irresistible. The secret is twofold. So, we’ll start with the first element—the basis for all of these little manga monsters: animals. That’s right, cute little animals. And if you want to make them extra cute: baby animals. By using baby animals as your starting point, you can easily build a manga monster that tugs on the heartstrings of the reader. All you have to do is create a cartoon of the animal with some manga features and styling.
Cute Manga Bunny Critter #1
The entire body is one shape, just a little puffball.
Cute Manga Bunny Critter #2
The head and body are two different sections, but of equal size. Note the nice manga eyes, with shines.
Cute Manga Cat Creature
Notice that the manga version is a kitten. Baby animals are much cuter. Add a fantasy swirl off the forehead and a fantasy tail, as well as markings on the cheeks. You don’t have to destroy the form in order to turn it into a creature. You only have to make it seem like it belongs just this side of the fantasy realm.
Real Puppy Starting Point
Cute Manga Puppy Creature
The face has become rounder and younger-looking, with manga eyes. And the entire form is now ultrasimplified. That star marking on the forehead tells us that this is a fantasy creature. The body has been changed so that it no longer looks like a regular dog (note the weird leg formation).
Real Turtle Starting Point
Cute Manga Turtle Creature
Ever see a turtle walk on two legs? Or have eyelashes? Me neither. Walking on two legs gives the turtle-creature extraordinary speed. Does the mile in just under a week and a half.
Real Mouse Starting Point
Cute Manga Mouse Creature
Who wants to go three rounds with Squeaky the Tornado? Winner gets a week’s supply of cheddar.
Using animals as the basis for your cute manga mascots is only the first step. You can, as you progress, use anything you want as your starting point. Although animal-based monsters are the surest way to achieve a cuddly looking character, there have been many funny monsters based on plants and even inanimate objects. You can also make up shapes from your imagination.
But whatever you start with, your finished drawing must be in the realm of the fantasy kingdom. And that’s where the second element to designing magical mascots comes in. They’ve got to be part of the magical world of magical girls. We’ve got to believe that the mascot can zip in and out of different dimensions. If there’s too little in the way of a fantasy style, your mascot’s just going to look like a very weird pet. It needs to have an enchanting charm. Remember that term. It’s important that you aim for that in your drawings.
Let’s take a look at a bunch of manga mascots drawn two ways to show the contrast. The first versions show how a beginner might attempt them. Nothing wrong with that. In fact, they are pretty good first tries. But they’re not the types of characters that are ever going to be memorable or be favorites among readers. They just don’t have enough magic, enough sparkle, enough enchanting charm. The second examples show the same characters drawn with classic, fantasy-based motifs and styling. The characters are also adjusted to better fit the genre. Sometimes, all it takes is a simple adjustment of the posture. Other times, more fantasy decorations are included, or costumes are added.
Cats are always a little mysterious. In fact, they were the subject of much art in ancient Egypt, where they were considered sacred animals.
Superfantasy Cat Mascot
Sometimes a friend can pop out of nowhere to help guide a magical girl on her way or lift her spirits when she’s in the doldrums. Luckily for her, this little guy avoided becoming part of a Caesar salad long enough to point her in the right direction. He can suddenly sprout from the ground and offer a suggestion.
Superfantasy Surprise Friend
Ordinary Christmas Kitty
One big step in transforming your creature into a fantasy-based being is to give it an upright, human posture. When you further enhance your mascot by dressing it in a holiday outfit, it becomes charming—the perfect buddy to have at your side. Another holiday that offers many potential outfits is Halloween.
Superfantasy Christmas Kitty
This little forest helper can scamper about, tell the magical girl a secret that will aid her quest, and hop away just as quickly as it appeared. The challenge with all of these creations is in designing them to look like the original animal—but yet different enough so that it will look bewitched. You only need a few well-placed elements to convey the idea that it’s not a real rabbit. However, if given a choice between having too many fantasy “bells and whistles” or having it look too much like a rabbit, I would err on the side of having it look too much like a rabbit. The reason is simply because the “cute” factor of the rabbit is too appealing to tamper with. And by choosing a fantasy-based color—for example, making the rabbit pink or blue—you’re already taking it out of the realm of realism.
Superfantasy Rabbit Helper
You can often repeat a feature on an animal to create the fantasy idea. On this little hairball, it’s the tail, but you could invent a character with extra ears, noses, or even eyes.
Superfantasy Three-Tailed Cat
If you only draw these sea-loving buddies in the water, it’s too restrictive. After all, how many manga stories do you see that take place under the sea? So, what do you do? The answer is so obvious, you might have overlooked it: You show these water types “swimming” in the air. Does that sound awkward? It isn’t, actually. It’s a very cool look, and it works great on aquatic fantasy characters. This plump little guy should be able to throw lightning bolts as his special power. But I’m spilling the beans prematurely. We’re going to get into the special powers of manga mascots in a couple of pages.
Superfantasy Aqua Friend
Ordinary Flying Pup
Better have a very long leash, because when he sees an airplane fly past, he loves to chase after it! Wings are always a good, solid standby when you’re trying to come up with a fantasy characteristic to tack onto an animal. But one word of caution: Don’t make the wings the typical, realistic, feathered angel wings that you would see in a Rubens painting. That would make the dog look like an angel dog—in other words, to be blunt, a dead dog. Don’t want that. Give the pup fantasy wings, with curls and exaggerated feathery shapes.
Superfantasy Flying Pup
Ordinary Wolf Pup
It doesn’t really matter what type of animal you start with, even if it is, potentially, a threatening type, like a wolf. Just turn it into a baby with big eyes and a tiny nose. Who can resist that? Baby lions and baby grizzly bears are incredibly adorable, even if their parents send shivers down your spine.
Superfantasy Wolf Pup
Ordinary Goofy Cat-A-Roo
Yes, you can have a sidekick whose main attribute is that he’s just plain silly. Although he tries hard to help, the only thing he manages to do is to slow down the magical girl in her quest to save the day. But he’s so darn earnest, you gotta love him. This guy is usually a little hyper: Wind him up and watch him go! Yes, he’s aware that he’s only made things worse by his efforts. But he promises that he’ll redouble his efforts next time, which is exactly what you want him not to do!
Superfantasy Goofy Cat-A-Roo
Ordinary Water-Thudder
It’s tempting, when you draw a character that has a naturally round outline, like a whale, to just leave it at that. Just draw a simple football or blimp, and start working on the cute features of the face. Well sure, that’s okay, and you can invent some good characters like that. But if you want to bring out the cuteness of the character and make it so adorable that your friends will compliment you and your enemies will be so jealous that they’ll wish they were never born, then I’d suggest doing a little extra work on the far side of the outline of the face. Make sure that the orbit of the eye curves in slightly and the cheek area below it curves out slightly. Also, the horizontal marking across the face gives the subtle suggestion of a nose, without the need for nostrils or any added definition.
Superfantasy Water-Thudder
Ordinary Enchanted Fox
It’s not every day that you see a fox with four ears. So no whispering behind his back, ’cause he’ll hear you! The head is always a good place to put jewels, emblems, markings, or horns. You can do it very economically because the reader can’t avoid noticing them due to the fact that the reader is almost always looking at the character’s head. If you were to place special markings somewhere else on the character—for example, on the stomach—then you wouldn’t see them in this pose. Just don’t add too many, or you’ll clutter up the face.
Superfantasy Enchanted Fox
As we’ve seen, these little creatures are more than just buddies; they’re humorous sidekicks. One of the principles of humor is placing two incongruous things together. And that’s what happens with the special powers: We give these tiny, harmless-looking creatures oversized powers. It’s always a visual surprise to see such explosive force coming from such tiny containers!
Too bright to see. This mascot temporarily blinds the magical girl’s enemies.
Note the burst around the origin of the energy stream, which adds to the effect and makes it more brilliant.
This is the ability to see up to twenty miles away. You don’t have to stay with familiar powers, like superstrength or the ability to fly. You can invent very specific ones that give your manga mascots an advantage in unexpected ways.
Speed Hopper
Now you see this sidekick, now you don’t!
Sings You to Sleep
No matter how hard you try to resist, the sweet voice makes your eyes so heavy, you can’t keep them open. Kinda like being in geometry class only worse, if you can believe it.
When you put several of these magical friends together in a single scene and let them loose with their impressive powers, watch out! It should look like a hurricane hit the page.
Here they are, together where they belong—the magical girl and little monster friend. Sometimes, the monster friend will travel back to Earth with her. Maybe the magical girl will try to hide it in her school backpack, the way some grown-ups walk around with their Chihuahuas in their purses. But that won’t work for long. Magical friends are mischievous. You might be sitting in class and decide to peer into your backpack to check on your monster friend, only to discover that it has disappeared! Where’d it go? It has magically transported to the school cafeteria and is eating everyone’s dessert.
With her power-packed wand on one side and her flying buddy on the other, she has enough ammo to give any bad guy a fight. So who does what in the fight? You can stage it any way you like. But a tried-and-true method that audiences like is for the magical girl to fight the bad guy head on and sustain some setbacks while her little magical buddy buzzes him, distracting him long enough for her to regroup and launch a second attack that is, ultimately, successful. Believe it or not, it’s the first failure—and near defeat—of the magical girl that makes her ultimate victory so compelling. Without her near loss, the reader would never be pulled emotionally into the scene.
