It tells the story of a 20th-century Japanese boy named Kan who finds an ancient bottle that contains two genies (the titular Hakushon Daimaō and his daughter Akubi) who are brought out and grant wishes whenever somebody sneezes or yawns nearby. Unfortunately, Mao is clumsy, and is often combined with Kan-chan's occasional selfishness as well as Akubi's tendency to cause mischief. As a result, Hilarity Ensues.
It got an English dub by Saban called Bob in a Bottle, but unfortunately it never caught on, and this series is now incredibly obscure in the U.S., although it aired in Canada on YTV during the 1990s. It's still very popular in Japan, Mexico and Europe though. Another English dub called The Sneezing Magician was made for Cartoon Network's Asian feed in the late 90s.
The main character appeared in the Japanese version of Tatsunoko vs. Capcom, but unfortunately, he had to be removed from the international version due to licensing issues.
As further proof of the show's enduring popularity in Japan, Akubi later got two TV spinoffs of her own in the 2000s. She was also able to get the spotlight in a 2019 crossover movie with Monster Strike, titled Pandora and Akubi. There she gets to travel with that game's Medusa as they go through the desert, with a host of other Tatsunoko and Monster Strike characters along for the ride.
A sequel series, titled Hakushon Daimaō 2020 (titled internationally as Genie Family 2020), celebrating the original show's 50th anniversary aired on Yomiuri TV, Nippon Television and other affiliates during 2020. Set 50 years after the original show, the show focuses on Akubi, who is now on her journey to ascend the throne, accompanied by the family's new addition, her little brother Pūta. The genies are later unleashed to the human world once again by Kantarou Yodama, Ken's grandson. Now, Akubi and Kantarou go on various adventures, get jobs and learn the importance of dreams. Crunchyroll streamed the series in the Americas while Viz Media acquired distribution, merchandising and streaming rights in said region.
This show provides examples of:
- All Just a Dream:
- Kan dreamed once he and Mao were turned into fishes by an evil mermaid, caught by his dad and almost cooked by his mom until the dream was over.
- Mao dreamed once he's trying to find a mother for Akubi.
- Amusing Injuries: Usually suffered by both Kan-chan and Mao.
- Animal Battle Aura: The bear is this for Ikuzo Kumayama.
- Annoying Younger Sibling: Puuta is a troublemaker, even worse than his older sister Akubi, who became more mature between 1969 and 2020.
- Antiquated Linguistics: Mao ends most of his sentences with de gojaru, which is a corruption of de gozaru, a obsolete variation of the de aru copula, which in modern times is only used in fiction in historical settings, by samurai-coded, or otaku-coded characters.
- Art Shift: The start of the latest anime shows all the genies in a style not unlike Tatsunoko's other reboots... before they go to the human world and the art style turns into a more updated version of the show's style.
- Baseball Episode: Episode 14 shows Kan and some friends playing baseball against Gezigon's team. After Akubi uses a "spell" on the equipment, Kan's team soon take the lead and it seems to be a Curb-Stomp Battle. But then Kan yawns because he's bored, Akubi goes back into the bottle, Kan thinks the equipment is now back to normal and because his confidence is gone, the opposing team can catch up. Kan asks Mao to enchant the equipment again and learns the truth: it wasn't enchanted in the first place. The boy's confidence returns and he is able to score the decisive point.
- Bedlah Babe: In Hakushon Daimao 2020, Akubi's portrayed wearing midriff-baring clothes.
- Benevolent Genie: Mao tries to be this, but he usually messes up due to his own extreme clumsiness.
- Big Eater: Mao loves to eat hanbāgu and can eat dozens of these meat patties at once.
- Bigfoot, Sasquatch, and Yeti: Akubi befriends a Yeti-family in episode 31.
- The Blank: Once, Mao and his friends had to deal with a ghost who steals girl's faces.
- Book Dumb: Kan's grades are bad.
- Bratty Half-Pint: Mao's daughter Akubi, who lives with her father in the bottle.
- Brutish Bulls: Mao fights one when he's in Spain.
- Bully Bulldog: Bullko, a dog who always chases Kan-chan.
- Butt Biter: Bullko, the bulldog, did this to both Kan-chan and Mao, complete with underwear exposure and in Kan's case, complete butt exposure twice.
- Camping Episode: Hakushon Daimao 2020, episode 13.
- Cinderella Plot: One episode was a Cinderella parody.
- Crush Blush: Kan, who has a crush on Yuriko.
- Crying a River: Mao tends to this. For example, when the genie meets Kan's grandson for the first time, he floods the whole room with his tears because he thinks his magic has become completely useless due to technological advances.
- Disguised in Drag: Kan and Mao did this as a bait for a ghost who steals girl's faces.
- Disney Acid Sequence: This happens to the antagonists from episode 45.
- The Ditz: Mao usually messes up due to his own extreme clumsiness.
- Don't Make Me Take My Belt Off!: Kan-chan's parents had no qualms about spanking him.
- Dub Name Change: Very common in most foriegn dubs, given the MeaningfulNames of Hakushon Daimao and Akubi.
- In Bob in a Bottle, Mao, Akubi and Kan-chan were renamed Bob, Llana (pronounced Yawn-a) and Joey respectively.
- In Japanese, Kan is called "Kan-chan" because he's a kid. The Sneezing Magician English dub kept this without explanation (and so did the Italian version) while dropping all other honorifics, thus making his name sound like "Kanchan", though that probably wasn't the intention.
- In the first Latin American Spanish dub, Kan-chan was renamed as Ken, which is also a proper Japanese name.
- Ending Theme: Starting with episode 14, the opening and ending themes switched places (The original ending theme became the opening theme, and vice versa)
- Fat Idiot: Mao usually messes up due to his own extreme clumsiness.
- Food Fight: Yuriko's guests start one after one of Akubi's pranks during the Birthday Episode.
- Forgotten Birthday: The episode "Akubi's Birthday." Kan and Mao visit Yuriko's birthday party, forgetting Akubi's birthday. Out of envy, she ruins the party. But at the end of this episode, Mao and Kan's family organize a party for her without any consequences for her misbehaviour at Yuriko's birthday party.
- Gag Series: Focused on humor except for the Sudden Downer Ending.
- Gang of Bullies: A trio of them frequently harassed Kan-chan.
- Genie in a Bottle: Two, actually. They're summoned depending on whether the nearest person sneezes (Mao) or yawns (Akubi). The new show airing in 2020, celebrating the original show's 50th anniversary introduces Akubi's younger brother Poota, who's summoned by farts.
- Heel–Face Turn: By the end of the series, all of Kan-chan's antagonists have come around to the boy's side, brought together by their connection with the genies. Especially notable in the case of Bullko, who has a case of Death Equals Redemption, where he basically loses his malicious traits after death and his soul becoming Daimaou's actual adoring pet.
- History Repeats: The 2020 series has two cases.
- Like the original, the genies must part from the human world in what may be practically forever to the humans. The human cast do their damnest to ensure the bottle and the genies never leave, but they're overpowered by the magic and goodbyes are forced to be said.
- As a result of the above, Kantaro Did Not Get the Girl, like his grandfather, who apparently did not succeed in confessing and thus getting together with Yuriko because he was too scared to take the chance. While the younger Kan-chan managed to follow his grandfather's advice, fate prevented Kantaro and Akubi from staying together.
- Jackass Genie: Akubi may not be evil, but she is mischievous and so deliberately twists people's wishes to mess with them. She mellows out by the time of her spinoff and the 2020 series.
- In the 2020 series Akubi's younger brother Puuta is an irritating troublemaker, usually partaking in disproportionate Infantilization Retaliation.
- Love Interest:
- Kan-chan has a crush on Yuriko.
- His grandson 50 years later, also named Kan-chan, has one in the form of Akubi herself, upon seeing her real non-chibi and very beautiful real form when he got sucked into the bottle one time. Initially, he has a hard time reconciling her cute child-like form and the tall, slender maiden he grew attracted to, but that stopped mattering.
- Loyal Phlebotinum: Zigzagged; while Kan-chan technically owned the genie bottle, Mao and Akubi would grant the wishes of whoever sneezed or yawned, whether or not it was Kan-chan. Local bulldog Bullko exploits this in one episode, swiping the bottle from Kan-chan and then sneezing to summon Mao to grant all his wishes.
- Magical Land: One episode has Mao and Akubi taking Kan-chan, his schoolmates and even the bulldog to their homeland of genies. Hilarity Ensues when the bully trio decides to steal some of the genie treasures.
- Magic Feather: Akubi's "spell" to help Kan-chan win in the aforementioned Baseball Episode.
- Magic Versus Science: When he first meets Kan's grandson, Mao tries to impress him with magic, but the child has no use for many of the spells because technology marched on during the last 50 years (e.g. the genie conjures up tons of manga only to learn that the child prefers his manga as eBooks).
- Meaningful Name: "Hakushon" is Japanese onomatopoeia for sneezing, while "Akubi" means yawn. Thus they were renamed Achoo and Yawn in the Sneezing Magician dub.
- Mind-Control Eyes: Kan, when he's hypnotisized in episode 39.
- Mistaken for Special Guest: In Spain, Mao's mistaken for a bullfighter.
- Never Say "Die": In one of the episodes, Mao helps out a poor family whose mother has passed away from getting evicted from paying bills by faking the father's death, even went as far as having a funeral cremating the living body. However, in Bob in the Bottle, Saban heavily edited it into the mother being in a hospital to take care of the family's sick grandmother and the father faking hospitalization from a contagious disease called Jibberitus.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: Mirano from the 2020 series resembles Cesar Millan (name, job,...)
- No Ontological Inertia: The magic spells of Mao and his children lose their effect as soon as the genie has returned to the bottle.
- Ocular Gushers: Mao tends to this. For example, when the genie meets Kan's grandson for the first time, he floods the whole room with his tears because he thinks his magic has become completely useless due to technological advances.
- Out of Focus: In the 1969 series there are some episodes where Akubi chan dosen't appear, most notably in the early episodes.
- Precocious Crush: In the 2020 series Kantaro feels attracted to Akubi's Shōjo-styled true form.
- Similarly, Kantaro's bestie Mario hopelessly crushes towards Akubi in her teenager/young adult form, who he believes to be a relative of Kantaro.
- Razor Apples: In episode 13, Mao accidentally deep-fried a cleaver.
- Real-World Episode: In episode 15 of Hakushon Daimao 2020, Akubi and friends help producing Hakushon Daimao 2020.
- Shout-Out: One episode of the 2020 series features a parody of the main protagonist of Case Closed.
- Spin-Offspring: Akubi got two, one in 2001 and the other one in 2006, called Yobarete, Tobidete! Akubi-chan and Akubi Girl respectively. They both had remarkably similar premises about Akubi befriending a young girl, though the second had a romantic subplot while the first one was free of romance. Tōru Ōhira, the voice of Mao, reprised his role in the 2001 series, although Akubi was recast for both spinoffs. The 2020 series technically counts since Akubi is still the protagonist genie this time, with her father and baby brother serving as supporting characters.
- Spoiler Title: The last episode's title "Sayonara Daimao" indicates that all efforts to keep Mao and Akubi here on Earth are in vain. Same for the last Hakushon Daimao 2020 episode with a similar title ("Sayonara Akubi") and plot.
- Sudden Downer Ending / Drama Bomb Finale: Mao and Akubi are forced to leave the Earth for 100 years. Mao is okay with just waiting it out until he can be with Kan-chan again, until it's pointed out that Kan-chan won't be around after all that time. Kan-chan thus tries his best not to sneeze and yawn but to no avail, and they're sucked into their bottle one last time. Then despite Kan-chan's efforts, the bottle floats away into the sky. History Repeats once more in the 2020 series, which is especially more painful, because Kantaro had just come to terms with his feelings for Akubi, even going as far as to say he wanted to marry her. Thankfully, unlike the original series, we don't have to wait till a sequel series to see that this Kan-chan is and will be alright without his genie friend.
- Bittersweet Ending: Alas, History Repeats once more in the 2020 series, which is especially more painful, because Kantaro had just come to terms with his feelings for Akubi, even going as far as to say he wanted to marry her. Thankfully, unlike the original series, we don't have to wait till a sequel series to see that this Kan-chan is and will be alright without his genie friend. This also retroactively applies to the original series. The original, now aged Kan-chan would never have thought to see his old genie friends again, given the 100 year thing. Though old Kan-chan will now never truly ever see Daimaou and Akubi again, at least he got to see them one more time.
- Sultry Belly Dancer: A troupe of them perform for Mao and friends when they visit the genie homeland. Kan-chan is smitten with the dancers and dances with them until an upset Akubi uses her magic to change them all into a monster.
- Swapped Roles: In one episode, Kan and Akubi became adults, while Kan's parents became kids. Mao splits his personality: One part is an adult, the other a child.
- Taken for Granite: This happens to the Gang of Bullies when they visit the genie homeland.
- Through a Face Full of Fur: A horse blushed when it got a price. This happens sometimes to Bullko, too.
- Toilet Humor: Poota is summoned by farts. Hilarity Ensues, for example when Kan-chan tries different ways to get bloated, encouraged by Akubi as a Pom-Pom Girl.
- Trademark Favorite Food: Mao loves to eat hanbāgu, known as "Hamburg steak" or "Salisbury steak" outside Japan. The English version translated this as "hamburgers", which is technically correct since "hamburger steak" is another variation of the term, despite "hamburger" by itself usually connoting a sandwich made using the hamburger "steak", really patty. The Italian dub Il Mago Pancione changed it to polpette, meaning Italian meatballs.
- Weaksauce Weakness: Mirrors are this for Akubi.
- Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Mao hates doing math homework. He's even allergic.
- Young Future Famous People: The ending theme was sung by a 12-year-old girl named Mitsuko Horie, who would in time become a legend in the anime music pantheon.