Sazae-san

The titular character, Sazae Fuguta.

An ancient Japanese comic strip that dates back to 1946 and, perhaps more notably, the longest running animated series of all time - new Sazae-san episodes have been airing since October 5, 1969, making it a pop culture staple of Japan. It almost always makes higher TV ratings in Japan than any other anime (peaking at nearly 40%), and by a significant margin. Despite this, it is not very well known outside of its home country.

The series centers around Sazae Fuguta, a somewhat typical Japanese housewife with very young siblings. Each episode of the anime is made up of three self-contained stories. It focuses on aspects of traditional Japanese daily life and culture, hearkens back to an earlier, simpler, less rushed time (since both series are so old), and relies on a Japanese sensibility to appreciate. The series has not seen any home video or streaming releases nor it has been dubbed in English or any language other than Japanese.

Selects from the comic have been translated into English under the title The Wonderful World of Sazae-san.

Notably, Sazae-san broadcaster Fuji TV currently owns 10% of Eiken, the producing animation studio.

Also notable for being one of the last anime series produced the "old fashioned," hand-drawn way; it only transitioned to digital production in 2013, because of the lack of materials (i.e. cels) and of subcontractors able to do it the "old fashioned" way.

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Tropes associated with/seen in this series include:

• Art Evolution: The animation style was much more cartoony in the very early episodes.
• Lipstick Mark
• Long Runner: The anime series began in 1969 and still runs to this day, over 55 years later. Over 2,000 half-hour episodes have been made.
  • Midori Kato has voiced Sazae for the series' entire run thus far, and along with Takako Sasuga as Tarao, was honored by the Guinness Book of World Records in 2019 as the voice actors with the longest tenure of voicing the same character. Since Sasuga's death in 2023, Kato now has this record all to herself.
  • The anime has been running longer than the comic it was based on, which lasted 28 years (1946 to 1974).
• Norio Wakamoto: He plays many, many characters on the show. No wonder it's been so successful.
• Pokémon-Speak
• Slice of Life
• Theme Naming: Most of the major characters are named after seafood, reflecting the time period the strip was created in (one of the aims of the creator was to hearken back to times of full stomachs.)
• Three Shorts: Since the first episode the show followed this format. Thus there's like 6,000 segments altogether.