List of Tokyo Mew Mew Characters - Mew Mews

Mew Mews

The Mew Mews are young girls who have been injected with the genes of endangered species, giving them the ability to transform into Mew Mews. The project chose endangered species because they felt that these species would have the strongest desire to preserve their kind. The superheroes are biological weapons tasked with fighting the chimera anima, the monsters created when alien parasites infect a living host. They are later called on to fight the aliens that were the source of the chimera anima invasion. The creation of the first five Mew Mews occurred accidentally; the head of the project, Ryô Shirogane, originally intended to inject a chimera anima with the endangered animal genes directly, to see if that would reverse the effects of the infection.

The Mew Project was started by Ryô's father, Dr. Shirogane, five years before Tokyo Mew Mew is set. The manga never explains why the project was started or how they knew about chimera animas and the aliens, but Dr. Shirogane does mention that they must learn how to inject animal genes into human DNA in order to fight the aliens. In the anime adaptation, Dr. Shirogane discovered the fossilized remains of an ancient civilization, called the Chimera, during an archaeological dig and began researching the race of people who lived there, with his assistant Keiichirô Akasaka. This would eventually become the Mew Project. A laboratory explosion kills Dr. Shirogane and his wife, leaving then 10-year-old Ryô orphaned. He moved to Japan, with Keiichirô, to continue the Mew Project. According to the anime, the lab explosion was caused by a Chimera fossil that woke up, setting the house on fire.

In Tokyo Mew Mew, there are five Mew Mews: Ichigo Momomiya, Mint Aizawa, Lettuce Midorikawa, Pudding Fong, and Zacro Fujiwara. Each Mew Mew has a "mew mark" left on her body, identifying her as a Mew Mew. Each mark is unique to the girl, representing an aspect of their power, such as Mew Ichigo's mark, located on her inner thigh, being shaped like her Strawberry Bell Bell weapon, and Mew Mint's being a wing symbol on her back. The girls have powers related to their animal DNA when transformed. They can also boost Mew Ichigo's power by combining their powers. The group were originally called the "Mew Mews", until they were accidentally caught on live television and Mew Ichigo introduced the group to the viewers as "Tokyo Mew Mew". This became the name the public would call them thereafter. As part of being Mew Mews, the girls work as waitresses at the Cafe Mew Mew, their headquarters, from where they gather information on chimera anima activity. In Tokyo Mew Mew a La Mode Ichigo moves to England for a little while and a sixth Mew Mew, Berry Shirayuki, fills in for Ichigo as the leader of the Mew Mews.