Wait, who is Akko-chan?
She’s the protagonist of the series “The Secrets of Akko-chan” (Himitsu no Akko-chan), a magical girl manga started in 1962 by Akatsuka. She can transform into whatever she’d like with her magic mirror!
Her full name is Atsuko Kagami, and she looks rather familiar:
Of course, the anime adaptations’ character designers tend to make her look a little different enough when you compare her to the ways Totoko’s drawn in -kun and -san anime. Bunnymajo has more about the Akko-chan versions on her blog!
Since Totoko and Akko are basically the same character model in Akatsuka’s Star System, you tend to only see one or the other represented when there’s promotional art of his characters or a work crossing over the different titles (and it’s usually Akko, but Totoko does get used in Moretsu Ataro). But you do get commemorative art like this with them being surprised to see each other. It’s a cute piece all around:
The 1988 Akko-chan anime even actually ran on the same network as the ‘88 -kun, Fuji TV, though it was handled by Toei and not Pierrot. That’s probably why the animators snuck in little in-jokes like having Choromatsu reading a “Ganmo” manga in one episode. The movie for the series was also released at the same festival that the -kun “Watermelon Planet” movie was, and there’s a gag where Totoko pulls out a compact to transform but gets stopped.
And then because Toei had the rights to do a new Ataro anime while Pierrot was still using the Osomatsu and Bakabon casts in the early ‘90s (but the animals from Ataro were back in their hands), the staff had to compromise by making a brand new character with those girls’ design, Momoko. It seems like she showed up in the brief ‘90s revival of the manga as well.
Totoko and Akko are described as being like “two peas in a pod” by FujioPro, to allude to how identical they are, and it’s been said that Akatsuka himself once stated “Totoko equals Akko”. But when it comes to Pierrot’s animated versions of Totoko (-kun and -san) having become pretty memorable, some might not think so and be used to the wackier, greedy Totoko and think “how is she like Akko?”, or Momoko who lacks the tomboyish traits of the original manga Totoko.
