credit: Dora the Explorer
Apart from SpongeBob SquarePants, another oldie-but-goodie animated cartoon that most kids today would recognize is Dora the Explorer. Despite the main character, Dora being a subject of ridicule in memes nowadays due to her apparent inability to find obvious objects, the show never failed to capture the attention of its young viewers.
Today, like Dora, we will go on an adventure. However, today’s adventure will be down memory lane as we will get to know the characters that once made up this wonderful show. How many of them do you still recognize?
1. Dora Márquez
Dora is the main character of the show and is its eponym. She usually appeared as a short girl with bowl hair, a purple shirt, orange pants, yellow socks, and white shoes.
In every episode, she had an adventure (hence her epithet, the explorer) or a mission to accomplish. On its completion, she and her friend Boots would sing “We Did It” as a celebration.
She was also characterized as someone who would switch to Spanish in some instances, making her viewers subtly take up random Spanish vocabulary
credit: Dora the Explorer
2. Boots
Boots is a blue anthropomorphic monkey that was Dora’s best friend and was always there to keep her happy. He was named after the huge red boots that he could be seen wearing.
Being a monkey, he could climb trees and hang himself down a branch with his tail. He can also do backflips.
3. Map
Map is, well, a map. He looked like a rolled piece of paper with a beige exterior and blue interior. His usual role in the series was to provide Dora a route towards their destination, often in the form of three checkpoints. His name is just “Map,” but during his introductory segment, he was referred to with a definite article (the).
4. Backpack
Like Map, her name sums up what she is. She is a purple bag that seems to rival Doraemon’s pocket in terms of how many objects one could take out from it. Backpack’s stuff always helped Dora to accomplish her daily mission.
Map lives in her side pocket.
credit: Dora the Explorer
5. Swiper
Swiper is an orange fox that often walks on two legs. He wore a blue bandana and blue gloves. In the show, he was always seen to be the thief who always stole Dora’s possessions or anything important to the story. He could be repelled by chanting “Swiper, no swiping” to him. Sometimes, he could still be successful in stealing the objects, adding a burden to Dora. If he was successfully repelled, he would snap his fingers and say, “Oh man!” and run away.
6. Tico the Squirrel
Tico is a purple squirrel with a colorful vest whose native language is Spanish. He and Señor Tucán are the only characters that appear to speak Spanish as a first language. Thanks to this, his main role outside of the show was to introduce Spanish phrases to the audience. In the show, his purpose was to drive vehicles that Dora couldn’t have driven by herself.
7. Isa the Iguana
Isa is a green iguana with no common piece of clothing on her. Her outfit largely depends on the context. She is intelligent and serves as the brain of the team when needed. She knows how to navigate through the forest and solve problems.
8. Benny the Bull
Benny is a blue bull with black ends of limbs and a yellow tail. He had a huge appetite and heart and would help Dora whenever he could. However, his huge body size meant he had more difficulty controlling her body, making him clumsy and accident-prone.
9. Big Red Chicken
His name sums up his physical appearance. In the show, he could be seen as the party guy who loved organizing a party and making it happen. He was a silly chicken who loved magic and playing games. He is larger than Dora, even though chickens in real life tend to be smaller than kids.
10. Grumpy Old Troll
He is a troll with yellow fur covering his whole body and a long orange beard. He guards the Troll Bridge, his home, and poses a riddle to everyone who tried to go across his bridge, including Dora and her company.
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