Masha and the Bear (Russian:Maша и Медвeдь,romanized: Masha i Medved',pronounced[ˈmaʂəɪmʲɪdˈvʲetʲ]) is a Russianpreschoolcomedy animated television series created by Oleg Kuzovkov and produced byAnimaccord Animation Studio, loosely based on the oral children'sfolk story of the same name. The series focuses on the adventures of a very young girl named Masha and a bear (whom she dubs "Mishka"), her caring friend who always keeps her safe from disasters.
Masha and The Bear is the most watched preschool series in the world, with 36 times more requests than the average. It is also the fifth most-watched youth series (3–7) worldwide, just ahead ofPeppa Pig.[1][better source needed]
Many of the episodes have been successful onYouTube. In particular, the original Russian-language version of the episode "Recipe for Disaster" (Russian:Маша плюс каша,romanized: Masha plyus kasha) has over 4.6 billion views as of August 2025, making it the site'sfifteenth most viewed video of all time, and the most viewed video on YouTube that is not a music video.[2]
The show was first launched on 7 January 2009, and it was the first Russian-produced animated TV show to be released in 4K.[citation needed]
The show provides the basis for the Masha and The Bear Land of Laughter, an area with attractions aimed at younger children at the theme parkThe Land of Legends, nearAntalya,Turkey.[3]
Plot
Masha is a four-year-old girl who lives in the forest in an unspecified location in Russia (possibly inTver Oblast) with her pig, goat, and dog. In the first episode, it is shown that all the animals in the forest are afraid of her, as she is constantly forcing them to play with her. Then Masha sees a butterfly and inadvertently follows it inside the home of the Bear, who has gone fishing. While playing there, she makes a big mess. When he returns, he sees the disaster caused by Masha. The Bear tries to get rid of Masha but after multiple failed attempts, the unlikely duo become friends.[4]
In each episode of the show, Masha is portrayed as a bright little girl who loves exploring the world around her. Masha's shenanigans result in unexpected but entertaining situations that are at the heart of the show's episodes. The kind-hearted Bear is always trying to keep Masha out of trouble. There are several supporting characters in the series, including Masha's cousin Dasha, a penguin adopted by the Bear, a young panda cub from China (the Bear's cousin), two wolves who live in an oldUAZ ambulance, a tiger that used to work with the Bear in the circus, and a Female Bear that is the object of the Bear's affections. Characters also include a hare, squirrels and hedgehogs, a pig called Rosie, a goat, and a dog who all live in Masha's front yard.[5]
Characters
Main characters
Masha
Masha is a 4-year-old girl who is portrayed as naughty and hyperactive, and always thinks about playing. She lives in a house near arailway station; near her house there is a path that leads to the Bear's house. Masha loves the bear very much, but in her games she tends to create problems for him. She loves sweets, jumping in a bucket, and looking at drawings of her and Bear. Masha's character combines the characteristics of 4-year-old (making grammatical errors when speaking, crying when she is not given what she wants, throwing tantrums) with adult skills (playing tennis, fishing, making preserves, playing electric guitar and speaking perfectly). In the episode "God Save the Queen", it is revealed that Masha hassuper strength, as she managed to pull a multi-ton train near her house just to give an elephant reception for the Lion King. She is voiced by Alina Kukushkina in Russian, and in English byElsie Fisher.[6] In subsequent seasons, Masha was dubbed by Rebecca Bloom (ep. 28–39), Angelica Keamy (ep. 40–52), Kaitlyn McCormick (53–78, Masha’s Songs S4 EP 1), Adriana Figuredo (79-84) and now dubbed by West Rubin and Sofia Calasso. She is usually shown wearing a white shirt under a reddish-magenta dress with a reddish-magenta kerchief covering her short blonde hair.
Bear
The bear is a retired circusbrown bear inMoscow who lives in a house hollowed out of a tree in the forest. His past occupation makes him very talented in performing arts (like juggling, unicycling, and even stage magic) although he's also known to dabble into other hobbies and even some intellectual pursuits. Some episodes feature flashbacks in which he remembers his childhood as a cub in the same house. In the Russian-language version, Masha calls him "Mishka" (Russian:Мишка, or named Medved in the intro), a diminutive form of the nameMikhail (i.e. "Mikey"), which is also the traditional name given to bears inRussian tales. He is a huge bear with a big heart and he is Masha's father-like figure, as well as a friendly figure to her. He was voiced by Boris Kutnevich, Denis Naskarov and Irina Kukushkina. He became as pink as he is (aBarbie-styled Bear) with his hair flipped at the end of “Shower Power”.
Masha's pets
Aterrier (dog), agoat and apig (and in the episode "How They Met", threechickens) who live outside Masha's house in her front yard (currently live in a well), but almost every time Masha comes out, they hide themselves to avoid her. The Pig is often forced to play with Masha, who makes it dress up like a baby in a stroller. In the episode "Dance Fever" it is revealed that the pig's name is Rosie. In the episodes “Laundry Day”, “Growing Potion”, “New Kids on the Block” and other episodes, it is revealed that the pig (Rosie) is a baby.
The wild animals
The wild animals are abunny,red squirrels,hedgehogs and twowolves. Masha and a certain Hare—in "One, two three! Light the Christmas Tree", Father Frost's list calls him 'Bunny' (he was also named Bunny in “Tracks of Unknown Animals” and “No Trespassing”), and in "Surprise! Surprise!" he delivers painted eggs—often play hockey together. Bunny is occasionally an antagonist of the Bear, due to stealing carrots from the Bear's garden. The two Wolves live in a derelict ambulance car on top of a hill, often looking for something to eat, and act as medics for any apparent injuries or illnesses, though they sometimes fear Masha (living in an ambulance cab and acting as medics is a pun on the idiomatic expression, "wolves are orderlies of the woods").
Lady Bear
The Lady Bear is a femalegrizzly bear. The Bear has a crush on her and sometimes goes out of his way to impress her. The first time she rebuffed him in favor of the Black Bear, only to later realize how self-absorbed the Rival Bear is. Another time, she turned her nose up at the Bear'sclassical guitar playing as she preferred more modern music.[7] Even so, the She-Bear usually opens up to the Bear, such as the time she agreed to have a dinner with him, and she is sometimes kind to Masha, such as giving her a fashion magazine, helping to train her for her tennis match against the Black Bear, and helping her learn to ice-skate.
Dasha
Dasha is Masha's cousin fromMoscow, who looks exactly like Masha, but is more "ladylike", has platinum-blonde hair and blue eyes (Masha's are green), wears boxy, blue-rimmed glasses and a red-orange dress. She is afraid of the Bear and calls him "Shaggy", "Monster" and "Beast".[8] She is voiced byAlina Kukushkina.
Panda
Panda is apanda cub and the Bear's young cousin from China. He and Masha are rivals, often bickering every time he comes for a visit, but they occasionally get along and have fun together.
Recurring characters
King Lion III
A lion wearing a crown, who is a good friend of the bear. He sometimes visits the bear, to play together the game of chess or for collective outdoor adventures. He was always disturbed by Masha, sometimes being advised to him not to help bear as a king is not supposed to help anyone. Once the lion offered his crown to Masha, making her a queen for temporary basis.
Whiskers n' Stripes
AnAmur tiger or also known as aSiberian tiger who is Bear's best friend from their days performing together in theMoscow circus.
Rival Bear
AHimalayan bear, who is Bear's worst enemy and Bear's chief rival for the attentions of the Lady Bear. The Rival Bear has an arrogant and unsportsmanlike personality, cheating to win against Masha in a tennis game, and laughing at her when she grows gigantic. Bear's biggest fear is if Black Bear and Lady Bear marry, which is shown in Game Over when Bear imagines what will happen if he plays games his whole life.
Penguin
AnAdélie penguin that first appears in "The Foundling", as an egg that Masha finds and makes the Bear hatch. The Penguin quickly imprints on the Bear as his parental-figure and the Bear forms a sincere bond with him, but chooses to send the Penguin to live in Antarctica for his own health.[9] Even so, they stay in touch and the Penguin once visited.
A trio of alien specimens who accidentally crashed on Earth. They were helped by Bear and Masha to get back to their spaceship.
January and Winter
They appeared in “The Legend of the Twelve Months”. January only appeared in one Season 7 episode.
Other Months
They also appeared in “The Legend of the Twelve Months”. February and March only appeared in “Masha and the Bear Shorties” (April will appear in the 8th season of Masha and the Bear).
Tourists
They appear in “Princess and the Beast” (as usual appearances, they only did one).
Bear Impostor and His Assistant
They only appear in two episodes from Season 7.
Sources
According to the project's director, Denis Chervyatsov,
Masha was based on a real person ... In the 1990s, the project's artistic director, Oleg Kuzovkov, was on holiday when he saw a little girl on the beach. The child was so genuine and open that she could easily walk up to a stranger and play chess with him or pick up his flippers and go swimming. However, after a few days, the vacationers began to hide from the girl – she was too active and intrusive.[10]
The series' production has been handled domestically at Animaccord Animation Studio since 2008.[10] The scenario for each episode is written by Oleg Kuzovkov, creator of the cartoon. Then the storyboarding is developed in accordance with the script and, in general, consists of at least 2000 slides. After the team finalizes the plot of an episode, the work for the 2D animatic kicks off. At this stage, animators define the duration of each scene in an episode, how characters are placed in it and interact with each other. After this step of the production is finished, the episode is passed for dubbing. Dubbing must be completed before 3D animation is applied, as the 3D animators need to know the characters' dialogue, intonations, and emotions in advance in order to keep their lip movements synchronized to the audio and make their facial expressions look realistic.[11]
3D animation
The 3D animation process begins right after dubbing has been finished. Animators manipulate all the movements that happen during the scenes, such as opening doors, taking books from bookshelves, and creating all the bodily movements required to bring the characters to life.[citation needed]
Rendering Manager
Rendering Manager brings all the processes together. Renderers colorize grey 3D models and add such details as the Bear's fur, Masha's hair, etc. They create the lighting and weather in the scene as determined by the script.[citation needed]
Compositing
Compositing is the final stage of production, where the compositors review all shots of an episode, checking the color intensities, smoothing the edges of 3D models, adding 2D/3D effects and bringing all the components together to form a complete episode. Then the work is approved by the director and script-writer and uploaded to the show's official YouTube channel 'Masha and the Bear - Official Channel' formerly 'MashaBearTV' before it can be shown on TV.[citation needed]
Actors
Masha, her cousin Dasha, and Father Frost are the only characters who speak. The others communicate through gibberish or wordless sounds.
For the first two seasons, Masha's voice in the original Russian version was performed by Alina Kukushkina, who was 6 years old when she began to dub Masha. For the third season (seven years later in 2015), the officials of Animaccord animation studio confirmed that the new voice of Masha would be 6-year-old Barbara Sarantseva and then replaced again by Yulia Zunikova in 2020. The show's sound designer, Boris Kutnevich and Denis Naskarov, provide voices of Bear. Mark Kutnevich provides the voice of Bunny.
For the English version,Elsie Fisher – the voice of Agnes Gru in theDespicable Me films – dubbed the voice of Masha in the first season. In subsequent seasons Masha was dubbed byRebecca Bloom (ep. 27-39) and Angelica Keamy (ep. 40–52), Kaitlyn McCormick (ep. 53-78), Adriana Figuredo (ep. 78-84) and now dubbed by West Rubin and Sofia Calasso.
Soundtrack
The soundtrack for each episode is written by Russian composer Vasily Bogatyrev.[citation needed] Many compositions are stylized for famous works:Moonlight Sonata,Beethoven's Symphony No. 5, a circus theme from the filmCircus, and in the episode "One-Hit Wonder" the rockstar Masha performs a song in the style of the groupAC/DC. Most of the songs used in the cartoon, such as the soundtracks of "Laundry Day" and "The Grand Piano Lesson" episodes, became popular in Russia and abroad.[citation needed]
In January 2015, the cartoon was included into a list of "TV Shows Destined to be Classics", which was compiled by the cartoon industry's periodical Animation Magazine to mark its 250 issue.[citation needed]
In February 2015,Masha and the Bear won a 2015 Kidscreen Award for Best Animation in the Creative Talent.[12]
In October 2015, Kidscreen Magazine named Animaccord Animation Studios as one of the top 50 leaders in the world of animation (Kidscreen Hot50) and the top 10 production companies of the year.[citation needed]
In 2018, the cartoon was included in the Guinness World Records as the most-watched animated video on YouTube, with the episode "Recipe for Disaster" that today counts over 4.4 billion views.[13] The episode was included in themost viewed video of all time, together with such well-known artists as Ed Sheeran with "Shape of You" video and Luis Fonsi ft. Daddy Yankee with "Despacito".[citation needed]
According to theAssociated Press, "Masha, who is dressed in a folk costume with a headscarf, became a household name in manyMuslim nations includingIndonesia."[14] Dmitry Loveyko, managing director of Animaccord, said that "It's a Muslim country, so we thought we're lucky she wears a headscarf and her legs are covered!"[14]
Mobile apps
The firstMasha and the Bear mobile app was released by Apps Ministry in August 2011.[citation needed] In 2013 the first mobile gameMasha and the Bear: Search and Rescue was published by Apps Ministry. Later more publishers such as Indigo Kids, PSV Studio, Noviy Disk developed and released games and apps featuring Masha and the Bear.[citation needed]
Distribution
This section needs to beupdated. Please help update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information.(December 2018)
Netflix has released 27 of the first 29 episodes in 9 episodes of 3 segments each.[citation needed] Many of the videos were uploaded multiple times on three different YouTube channels ("Маша и Медведь", "Get Movies" and "Masha and The Bear") so their view counts across up to three channels have been combined.[15][16][17]
Aspin-off series to the show titledMasha's Tales is also available on Netflix. In the show Masha (voiced by a much older actress) tells classicRussian fairy tales as well as someGrimms' Fairy Tales to her toys. However, Masha makes up her own way of telling the stories (Such as putting a magical nutcracker who turns into a prince when she adaptsCinderella). She also mixes up the morals of the stories by often adding an additional ending so that way it could fit with what she is telling her toys.Masha's Tales premiered onCartoon Network UK's sister pre-school channel,Cartoonito, on 20 June 2016.[25]
^"Universal Kids Schedule Archive".Twitter. 12 December 2022.Archived from the original on 28 December 2022. Retrieved11 August 2023.Masha and the Bear is leaving Universal Kids after 5 1/2 years on the channel, leaving after December 31, 2022.
