For other uses of Doraemon, see the disambiguation page.
毎日の小さな努力のつみ重ねが、歴史を作っていくんだよ！！
The accumulation of small efforts every day creates history! !
— Doraemon, Winning Back Shizuka-chan (Part 2)
ぼくわたぬきじゃない!
I'm not a raccoon!
— Doraemon gets angry when someone calls him a raccoon
MS-903 "Doraemon" or simply Doraemon (ドラえもん Doraemon) is the titular protagonist and main character of the Doraemon franchise. After being manufactured in a Factory in the 22nd century, he is sent back in time by his owner, Sewashi Nobi, to help out his great-great-grandfather, Nobita Nobi, in becoming a successful person with a bright future.
Doraemon was voiced by Kosei Tomita in the early 1973 episodes and Masako Nozawa in the later 1973 episodes, Nobuyo Oyama in the 1979 anime, and Wasabi Mizuta in the 2005 anime.
Appearance
Doraemon is a blue cat robot corresponding (tints of pink-orange in earlier comic chapters and media) from the 22nd century.
Despite being based on a cat, hence his title as the "Gadget Cat from the Future" in the Americanized Doraemon dub, Doraemon resembles a racoon dog, and characters referring to him as such is a running gag throughout the series. In the American "Gadget Cat from the Future" dub, Doraemon is instead refereed to a seal because the racoon dog is not a familiar animal in North America.[1] He is blue in color while his face, chest, hands and feet are white in color. He has circular palms and feet. He has six whiskers on his face like cats. Although being made up of metal, he can be squeezed and stretched. He has big eyes, a red circular nose and a big mouth consisting of huge teeth. He had ears which were eaten by a mouse (a robot mouse that misunderstood an order in the OVA), hence why he more resembles a racoon dog. He has a red tail which acts like a power lever.
He's got a 4D Pocket and a red collar around his neck, featuring a bell.
History
Doraemon's history was constantly retconned and has differed in various iterations, but several aspects remained consistent.
Doraemon was manufactured in the Matsushiba Robot Factory in the year, 2112, bearing the code, MS-903. He was damaged by an electrical bolt during production which detached a critical screw from him, degrading his abilities in general while crippling a variety of external attachments. As with his peers purposed as mechanical child caretakers resembling cats, he also underwent training, though his performance is generally subpar and he is often regarded as an outmode. Sometime before he entered service, he was infatuated with another mechanical cat named Noramyako.
After he left production, Doraemon was adopted by an infant Sewashi Nobi, who he quickly bonds with. Being designed after a cat, he was not musophobic (afraid of mice). However, his ears were later damaged by mice, causing his phobia of them, and to his terror, eventually a failed surgery left him bald. Noramyako, who happened to visit him, laughs uncontrollably at his bald head, and their relationship sours. He is unable to obtain any replacements due to Sewashi's low income. Soon, he loses his bodywork in his depression and is left with the blue base paint, resulting in the manufacture of his sister model Dorami.
As per the request of Sewashi, Doraemon is later dispatched into the past and stays to help Sewashi's great-great grandfather Nobita in an attempt to alter the horrendous future of the Nobi family, setting the entire series' events into action. Doraemon, Nobita, and their friends embark on time-traveling adventures which mostly break the laws of time. Doraemon saves not only Nobita's life but also the lives of Shizuka, Suneo, Gian, and other characters.
Personality and Characteristics
Being a machine, he does not have some average needs of a regular person, whatever he consumes is automatically converted to energy within his nuclear furnace, although he does need the energy to keep him on the move. His mouth can expand, allowing him to devour larger chunks of food easily. While he has sensors which work similar to their organic, living counterparts on most creatures, his hide and fuselage are incredibly tough, not deforming even while under attack most of the time, although the sensors often end up paralyzing him (such as against biological agents and temperature). While his outer skin can be stained, it is not difficult to clean.
His favorite food is Dorayaki (Yummy Buns in the American English/ Bang Zoom! Entertainment dub). It was never specified as to how he developed this interest, as versions of the shows contradict each other slightly, although some iterations have attributed it to Noramyako, while others claim that he simply finds it tasty after eating one while he is in the past. Doraemon's love of dorayaki often leads him to getting exploited out of one, which leads into a fit of anger like in The Mecha Maker. He also likes to eat watermelon, pudding, tea, juice and various cakes.
Being also a cat automaton, he is easily infatuated by other cats, living or mechanical. He often acts as a peacekeeper to stop their arguments and gifts many items to them, ignoring his usual hobbies in the process. He would stop pursuing them if he is aware that they are better without him. However, he often gets extremely jealous if his love interests are occupied by others.
Doraemon often gets annoyed easily over anyone when criticize him for his performance or anyone who assumes he is a raccoon dog. His musophobia and iatrophobia often causes him to overreact, even threatening to detonate a nuclear weapon on the spot to kill a rat or refusing to attend to government-mandated robot check-ups. In a panic, Doraemon proves to be troublesome as he often messes up his current task carelessly and can produce hordes of irrelevant items from his 4D pocket, much to the annoyance of others.
Having no ears, Doraemon is quite shy around mechanical cats that have any, unless he is already acquainted with them.
The room-sized Dorayaki eaten by Doraemon himself. SFX: (Crash)
How Doraemon works
Textbox: No! Definitely no!
Name origin
The name "Doraemon" can be translated roughly to "stray." Unusually, the name "Doraemon" (ドラえもん) is written in a mixture of two Japanese scripts: Katakana (ドラ) and Hiragana (えもん). "Dora" derives from "dora neko" (brazen or stray cat), and is a corruption of nora (stray). "emon" is a component of male given names like Goemon, though no longer as popular as in the past. "Dora" is not derived from dora, meaning gong, but due to the homophony, the series puns on this, with Doraemon loving grilled Dorayaki.
In India, the name Doraemon is pronounced as "Do-r(a)e-mon", rather than "Do-ra-emon".
Relationships
Nobita Nobi
— Doraemon's opinion about Nobita in Stand By Me.
Doraemon hugs Nobita after his return from the future in Goodbye, Doraemon
Nobita and Doraemon are best friends. As seen in many episodes, they both have a strong bond and will never leave each other's side.
Most of the time, whenever Nobita comes home crying and whining about his bad day, Nobita would pounce on and/or wrap his arms around Doraemon begging for something to make him feel better. Nobita once insulted Doraemon by calling him "useless" because Doraemon had failed to help him on numerous occasions, such as when Nobita was being chased by Gian and Suneo, or when he needed help with his homework. These instances made Doraemon angry and he felt the need to prove Nobita wrong by using his gadgets to help him out.
"Because of this, I know that Nobita can't study, Nobita can't play, Nobita is useless but Nobita is a good person"
~Doraemon to Nobita
One of their best moments was after the events of All the Way From the Country of the Future, Doraemon and Nobita play baseball in the open lot. Nobita fails to catch an easy ball from Doraemon making Doraemon furious. Nobita wants to go home and said that he can't do anything but it was stopped by Doraemon. Doraemon said that he doesn't want to study, doesn't want to play, he never tries harder and that's the reason why he was useless. Nobita answered that just because he can't do anything, doesn't mean he's useless. Both of them argued. Nobita accidentally removes Doraemon's bells and he went to drainage. Nobita and Doraemon try their best to find it until it was sunset. Doraemon suggests Nobita go home and the bell is impossible to find in the dark and Nobita apologizes. As Nobita wears his shoes he finds Doraemon's bell in one of them and the two of them laugh. Doraemon thanks Nobita and says that he will remember it forever. Doraemon says that he realizes that even though Nobita cannot study harder, cannot play harder, but he is a kind and good person. This makes Nobita smile and the two go home. Doraemon had this memory stuck with him ever since, and in the events of the movie, is the reason he refuses to use a replacement bell when his original bell goes missing. Nobita doesn't remember that event until later in the movie. (Doraemon: Nobita's Secret Gadget Museum).
Despite the various complications that impeded his efforts to assist Nobita, Doraemon was undeterred and emerged victorious, managing to interfere with the past enough for Nobita to marry Shizuka and get him a better future.
— Nobita in the Robot Kingdom
Dorami
— Doraemon
Doraemon is very attached to Dorami, partially due to him being a defective model and also due to Dorami's purpose.
Dorami is sometimes critical of Doraemon's way of scolding and assisting Nobita in becoming better and succeeding in life, feeling that he should be more tough with Nobita by giving a square potion that made him more strict, but only ended up backfiring.
Whenever Doraemon is too scared to get his annual checkup back in the 22nd century, Dorami would get tough with him and drag him all the way from the present.
Shizuka Minamoto
— Doraemon's first impression of Shizuka., Stand by Me Doraemon
Shizuka and Doraemon are great friends. Shizuka often invites him to her house to taste her food, which is usually loved by both Doraemon and Nobita. It is shown in some episodes and movies that Doraemon cares for Shizuka and always makes sure she is out of danger.
Suneo Honekawa
Doraemon, Suneo and Gian
Doraemon and Suneo are good friends. He also cares for him like he does for Nobita and Gian and tries to keep them out of danger. At times, Suneo will find ways to irritate Doraemon, such as altering a photo of him to make him look like a tanuki which literally made him turned red in pure anger, or when Suneo dreamed about Doraemon being a worthless robot he found from the dumpster and then repaired to act like an idiotic friend. He even tricked Doraemon with the fake stick of gum trap, which totally enraged Doraemon to the point of seeking vengeance against Suneo for making him look stupid. This also applied when Suneo exploited Doraemon's weakness for dorayaki while using his gadgets for his selfish purposes and not giving him any dorayaki at all. Doraemon is also disgusted by Suneo's behaviour at points and sometimes is fed up with him, even allowing revenge. Suneo used to be jealous of Nobita because he has a cool robot cat (I, Honekawa Doraemon) but it is shown now that he is pretty happy with his own friendship with Doraemon, and does not envy Nobita as much anymore.
Takeshi Gouda
Gian and Doraemon
Doraemon is also good friends with Gian. Despite Gian's general hostility, Doraemon does help him in many episodes and also feels sorry for him on some occasions. Gian always tries to return the favor to Doraemon by helping him out with something or other whenever he lends assistance from Doraemon. Similar to others, Gian does attack Doraemon on occasions due to his menacing nature, only ending up with Doraemon defeating Gian instead in most episodes.
Mii Chan
More Information at Doraemon and Mii-chan
She is Doraemon's main love interest within the main time period that Nobita is in. The two frequently go on dates together with Doraemon being the one to bring gifts for her. However, whether Doraemon saw Mii-chan hanging with other cats, he would simply try to keep them separated and get Mii-chan back to him similar to Nobita did with Shizuka hanging out with Dekisugi.
Noramyako
She was Doraemon's 1st love interest in the 22nd century, but after mocking him for the loss of his ears, their relationship shattered and they are no longer in contact with each other for most of the series.
However, like most others, Noramyako isn't hesitant to help if Doraemon is in danger.
Names in different languages
| Language | Name |
|---|---|
| Arabic ?
|
عبقور (before) دورايمون (present) Eabqur (before) Doraemon (present) |
Bahasa Indonesia Indonesian
|
Doraemon |
Bengali
|
ডোরেমন Ḍoreman |
| Catalan ?
|
Doraemon |
Cebuano Filipino
|
Doraemon |
Chinese Chinese
|
哆啦A梦, 小叮噹，机器猫 Duō La A Mèng, Xiǎo Dīng Dāng |
English English  English
|
Albert (before) Doraemon (present) |
| FilipinoFilipino
|
Doraemon |
| Hebrew ?
|
דוֹרֵימוֹן Doraemon |
Hindi
|
डोरेमोन Ḍoremon |
Japanese Japanese
|
ドラえもん Doraemon |
Korean Korean
|
도라에몽 Doraemon |
Spanish Spanish
|
Doraemon |
Tamil Tamil
|
டோரேமோன் |
| TeluguTelugu
|
డోరేమాన్ Doraemon |
Thai Thai
|
โดราเอมอน Doraemon |
| Urdu ?
|
دورائےمون Doraemon |
Vietnamese Viatnamese
|
Đôrêmon (before) Doraemon (present) |
Trivia
Daku points out Doraemon's nakedness
- Doraemon's lack of clothing was lampshaded by Daku. However, since he's a robot, his nudity could be covered with his mechanical parts and there is not much design to his body besides an included 4D Pocket.
- In Japan, even after nearly forty years of the character's first appearance in the original manga, he is now considered to be a cultural icon and was voted one of Time Asia magazine's 22 "Asian Heroes" on April 22, 2002.
- In the manga publications by Take Minutes (Malaysian manga publication company), Doraemon was often confused as a "fox" and sometimes a "jungle cat". This confusion is because the Malay language lacks distinction between the species.
- He has had over forty video games to his name.
- He has been made "real" by Bandai through the Real Dream Doraemon Project (R.D.D.P.) as a remote control robot by the name of "Doraemon the Robot" (DTR-01B). However, Bandai had to stop the project in 2009 due to business failure.
- In March 2008, Japan's Foreign Ministry appointed Doraemon as the nation's first "anime ambassador". Ministry spokesman explained the novel decision as an attempt to help people in other countries to understand Japanese anime better and to deepen their interest in Japanese culture. The Foreign Ministry action confirms that Doraemon has come to be considered a Japanese cultural icon.
- In Dorabase, he is one of the Edogawa Dora's founders and initial members along with Kuroemon and five other cat-robots. Doraemon's position in the team is the pitcher and he has the jacket number 10. He had to leave the team later on in order to take care of Nobita.
- He is also the one who gave the name to his baseball team.
- In the 1973 anime, Doraemon came from the 21st century instead of the 22nd century. According to Gatchako, Doraemon was sent to the present time for training as he was an inferior student at the robot academy.
- In Vietnam, he was famous known as "Mèo Ú", literally "Rounded Cat" or "Fat Cat"
References
| Doraemon members Doraemon | Dora The Kid | Wang Dora | Dora-nichov | Dora-rinho | Dora Med III | El Matadora
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