Cutey Honey Flash

Mangaka: Yukako Iisaka
Pub. Date: 1997
# of Vols.: 4

TV Series: 1997 (39 Episodes)
1 Movie in 1997

Kisaragi Honey attends St. Chapel Academy and is a very popular student among her classmates. She's athletic (a fencer), beautiful, and has brains. One eventful day she runs out to meet her father but suddenly has him kidnapped before her eyes and her whole life turned upside down in moments. And to top it off she's just turned 16 as it's her birthday. She tells herself her father's abduction is only a bad dream, but returns to her home to find it only ashes and cinders. Alone and not knowing what happened or what to do about it, a mysterious man appears and gives her two items left to her by her father: a ring and a choker, both with small hearts on them and the ability for Honey to use them to channel her love and emotions to transform into any form she desires (whether a photographer, nurse, or super-heroine). The man who she will come to call the Twilight Prince tells her he will always watch over her, and he seems to though it isn't clear how he knows her father or what his role in Honey's mission will be. What ensues is Honey's personal struggle to find her father and defeat the forces of Panther Claw.

I found myself quite taken with this show from the get go. It gets right into the action and the story and Honey herself is a quite capable young woman; admirable in her strength, perseverence, and with the right touch of sexiness to top everything off. In fact, this was one element which struck me very much about the show, it balances very well having a heroine who's meant to embody the sexiness of womanhood and at the same time portraying the subtle beauty of coming into that womanhood. And this is shown through the constant imagery of flowers (the golden flowers set as a backdrop behind Honey with her golden hair, or red roses and petals against the red-haired Cutey Honey, not to mention the white or silver lilies the Prince leaves behind for Honey). When Honey is first given her accessories to transform with, her heart begins to beat and she feels her own power inside herself. She says, "I'm going to change!" and we suddenly see the buds on the branch in a backdrop bloom. The change of course while referring to her henshin, also is more importantly Honey's vow to become stronger and change from the girl who's been a simple student at the Academy into a strong woman who's going to beat the odds destiny put before her.

Her transformations each represent an aspect of herself. Scoop Honey is the confident, able side, ready to get into the heat of things or chase down leads. But she also has Hurricane Honey, Elegant Honey, Nurse Honey, etc. But she calls Cutey Honey her true form. And Cutey Honey is the heroine who embodies all the things of each side of Honey, her confidence, bravery, pride, intelligence, compassion, etc. Her magic, besides her henshin phrase "Honey Flash!" includes her "Honey Boomerang", which shoots off her wrist at the enemy, and her signature "Honey Lightening Flare!" This move possibly is taken from the legendary fiction swordsman Zorro who'd leave a Z for his mark. Cutey Honey says the phrase and then creates a fanciful F upon the monster which destroys them from the energy she marks them with.

Cutey Honey Flash took over the timeslot of Sailor Stars when the series ended its television run. But the series has a longer history than the show made to appeal to the young girls finishing the end of Sailor Moon. It began as a shounen creation (targeted at adolescent boys) back in the 70s and was a creation by Go Nagai. But... The original Honey is always counted in merchandise and specials concerning magical girl history, so she's as much part of the mahou shoujo canon as Flash. In the originals Honey is not a human, but a machine, but for her shoujo incarnation of the 90s she was made a human girl. But when he created her, he called her his version of a magical girl and his ideal of a woman. Later the Shin OVAs of Cutey Honey were produced (making it the second incarnation of the show), and finally later Flash came along and shifted the target audience to girls. While Go Nagai had done some manga of Cutey Honey, it too was still not aimed primarily for market purposes at young women, and so when it was time to do Flash, Yukiko Iisaka was approached for the project. She helped make the television series, and after, the manga version, into a shoujo incarnation for the new demographic.

Magical Phrase
Honey Flash
Honey Boomerang
Honey Lightening Flare

Magical Items
Choker
Sword