Monica's Gang

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Monica's Gang (originally titled Turma da Mônica in Portuguese) is a popular Brazilian comic book series. The series was created by Mauricio de Sousa, who signs his work as "Mauricio". Plots are centered on the adventures of a group of seven-year-old friends in the ficctional neighborhood of "Bairro do Limoeiro" in São Paulo.

[edit] Characters

Monica

The four main characters of Monica's Gang are:

Monica (Mônica) is the main character of the series and is a bright girl with powerful (usually even superhuman) strength. She is known by the other charactes as the "owner of the street" (which makes Jimmy Five extremely jealous of her). She is always carrying her blue rabbit toy called Samson (Sansão). She defends her friends whenever they meet trouble, but is also always ready to provide them her own punishment. She is often at odds with Jimmy Five, but backs him up whenever he gets into trouble Monica's best friend is Magali. Mauricio says he based the character on his own daughter, which is also named Monica. Monica's hair, in fact is due to a haircut his daughter's younger sister Magali gave her once when she was a kid.

Jimmy Five

Jimmy Five (Cebolinha - Portuguese for scallion, due to his scallion-like hair) is a funny and wise character, which is always plotting to steal either Samson or the title of "owner of the street" from Monica with his "infallible plans". On some stories he gathers the other boys of the gang just to pick on Monica. In some earlier stories, he devised background plans to find out the secret of her strength, but he always ended up beaten solely by her. Even with these frictions, Jimmy and Monica are still good friends to each other. So much, it's a common non-canonical statement between readers that they might have a "love affair". In the futuristic special edition stories, they are often portrayed as a married or dating each other. Another characteristic of Jimmy is that he is incapable of pronoucing the sound of the r letter. Jimmy Five's best friend is Smudge. Mauricio says he based the character on a child he knew while growing up in Mogi das Cruzes.

Smudge

Smudge (Cascão) is Jimmy's best friend who is always convinced or even blackmailed to participate on his "infallible plans". Smudge is immensely scared of water, and because of that, has never, throughout the entire series, taken a bath (though he was once illegally portrayed in a brazillian shower commercial taking a bath). Smudge's personality was, initially, of a "garbage addicted"; but he became a person who recycles old stuff in order to make new toys to play with. He is the gang's handyman, often fixing the other kids's broken toys. He dates Cascuda - a girl who hates water just like him, but takes a bath every few stories, unlike Smudge. Smudge loves soccer and his favorite team is Corinthians. Mauricio also says he based the character on a child he knew while growing up in Mogi das Cruzes.

Maggy

Maggy (Magali) is Monica's best friend. She and Monica are also deeply fond of Smudge and Jimmy Five, although they never agree at things (usually, the girls have a different opinion of the boys). Magali is a sweet and kind girl that loves food - a lot of food. Magali dates with Quindinho, the son of the baker. Her favourite food is watermelons, but she will eat (literally) anything she can get her hands on. Mauricio claims he based the character on his daughter Magali, whose biggest desire when a child was to eat a whole watermelon at once. She is often the referee between Monica and the boys, making sure neither side will say or do something they will later regret.

Mauricio began his comic universe in 1959 with a newspaper comic strip titled Bidu. Cebolinha followed in 1960. The character Mônica first saw the light of day in 1963. Comic books featuring the characters started appearing: Mônica (1970), Cebolinha (1972), and many more. The stories have been translated to several languages and sold in dozens of countries. The series has been running steady for over forty years, and generated uncountable spin-offs in the realms of merchandising, animated cartoons, video games, theme parks, and more. Mauricio employs a large staff to execute these projects.

The characters are drawn in a simple cartoon style and the stories often finish with a happy ending, for the children. In the end of each comic book, there are three panels with a quick joke, such as newspaper strips. Comparing with the Peanuts characters, Monica's gang is less reflective and a bit more fantastic, less psychological and more active.

Characters often break the fourth wall, acknowledging they are performing or even talking to the writers from inside the papersheet. In some stories, they go "behind the sets", as if they were filming a TV show or a movie. In one story,"O Concurso das Denises" (The Denise Try-outs) a secondary character named Denise decides she's had enough of the madcap gang when Monica (accidentally) hits her. When the main characters try to calm her down ("Calm down Denise! It's just the story-line!")she bellows out "MY NAME IS MARIA CREUSA!!! NOT DENISE!!!" and storms out.

[edit] Related works

Most other works made by Sousa are related to Monica's Gang. They are usually separated storie at all from Monica's gang, but sometimes some cross-overs are presented. Just Chuck Billy (originally Chico Bento), which actually came in the same year (1963) as Monica itself, has a separate comic book, but once in a while there are stories from one into another book.

Quoting the official website, about Chuck Billy:

Silly country bumpkins who are comical yet so very wise in their ways. They'll love you; you'll love them. In Chuck Billy's world - a small country village complete with church square, bandshell and schoolhouse surrounded by farmland and rolling countryside - everybody knows everybody and life is full of wit and creativity.