Rilakkuma

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Bus in Rilakkuma design

Rilakkuma ( Japanese リ ラ ッ ク マ ) is a fictional character from the Japanese company San-X and was created by Aki Kondo . Rilakkuma is a popular mascot that is used for many merchandise products, such as picture books, writing utensils, dishes, backpacks, cuddly toys or stickers . On April 19, 2019, the web series Rilakkuma and Kaoru started on Netflix .

Notoriety

Rilakkuma has been around since 2003. Rilakkuma has been described as very successful in Japan by the New York Times . As of May 2010, Rilakkuma was number 5 on the Character Databank Charts .

Rilakkuma rose to become a popular advertising figure. For example, it is used on notebooks or provides the topic for a café.

Character and backstory

The name “Rilakkuma” is made up of リ ラ ッ ク ス rirakkusu , the Japanese transliteration for the English word “relax”, and ク マ（Kanji : 熊）kuma , the Japanese word for “ bear ”. According to Rilakkuma's background story, he suddenly appeared in the apartment of Kaoru, an employee of Samejima GmbH. Rilakkuma decided to live and relax with her there, along with Korilakkuma and Kiiroitori .

Rilakkuma first appeared in the picture book Rilakkuma Seikatsu by San-X. In the picture book, Rilakkuma wears different costumes. It is suggested that even in his normal appearance he is in a costume. So his lower body is supposed to be a costume.

relationship

Rilakkuma is often with his friend Korilakkuma, a white she-bear. She wears a red button on her chest. Kiiroitori called it Korilakkuma because it looks like a smaller version of Rilakkuma ( ko means 'small' in Japanese). Kiiroitori is a yellow bird that belongs to Kaoru. He lives in a bird cage, but now leaves it at his own discretion to blame Rilakkuma for his laziness and Korilakkuma for their glee. He sometimes wonders if he isn't scolding them too often. He is very different from Rilakumma in character, hard working and neat. Korilakkuma often plays tricks on Rilakkuma, e.g. B. when he sleeps.

Another brown bear named Koguma was introduced in 2016 . In the fictional backstory, Korilakkuma met Koguma in the honey forest.

Video games

Web links

Commons : Rilakkuma  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Rilakkuma and Kaoru. In: Netflix . Retrieved October 22, 2018 .
  2. ↑ Hiroko Tabuchi: In Search of Adorable, as Hello Kitty Gets Closer to Goodbye. In: The New York Times . May 14, 2010, accessed October 6, 2018 .
  3. ↑ What's in such a bear. In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung . April 24, 2019, accessed April 26, 2019 .
  4. ↑ Liz Ohanesian: Cute Japanese Character Rilakkuma Hits Los Angeles with Parties at JapanLA, Umami Burger. In: LA Weekly . August 17, 2010, accessed October 6, 2018 .
  5. ^ Declaration on the Twitter account on Rilakkuma , May 24, 2016 (Japanese).