Doraemon became a cultural icon by mastering every genre

polygon.com:

On April 7, the world tragically lost Motoo Abiko, a mangaka of nearly 70 years and one half of the comic book-writing duo known collectively as Fujiko Fujio, the creator(s) of Doraemon. During the 52 years since its creation, the titular robot cat, who travels from the future to help out a 10-year-old boy using an array of sci-fi inventions, has become a Japanese pop culture icon. The Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs actually designated the character an “anime ambassador,” and Eiichiro Oda even cited the manga as an inspiration for Devil Fruits in One Piece.

But there’s another part of Doraemon’s legacy that rarely gets talked about. Ever since the first Doraemon story was published in December 1969, the franchise has turned out movies and TV episodes in almost every genre ever, and whenever it did, it totally crushed it. Here are a few choice examples of Doraemon’s versatility across genres:

Doraemon is essentially the perfect encapsulation of popular forms of Japanese comedy like manzai, the Japanese double-act stand-up that usually features a pitiful “funny man” as the figurative punching bag. It’s not the kindest form of comedy and often relies on meanness, from how the story’s other main character — the good-hearted but lazy/sneaky 10-year-old Nobita Nobi — is constantly the butt of every joke all the way to the franchise’s premise.

Doraemon is sent to the past by Nobita’s grandson to stop him from ruining his life by falling into poverty and, apparently equally importantly since it’s brought up a lot, marrying a fat girl. Yes, she wasn’t Nobita’s true love or whatever, but the story makes dark comedy of a person risking erasing themself from existence because their grandma didn’t conform to traditional beauty