Map's Picture Map (known simply as "Map's Map", or just "the map", informally; not to be confused with the character himself) is a crucial part his character and, by proxy the franchise, most notably in Dora the Explorer.
Description
Map's Picture Map is what Map uses to help guide Dora on her adventures, often through use of simple pictures and graphics of locations on it. It was first mentioned by name during the trip to the Super Duper Fix-It Machine. Typically, it has three locations; the third being the destination, but on longer adventures, it has four locations, or the record; five, in the case of Dora in Troll Land, albeit an adventure at length of normal. In Season 4, Map would place large red checkmarks on locations successfully passed by Dora, Boots, and others.
Looks
Generally, the Picture Map is a pale yellow rectangular piece of paper that is shown to have wear and tear as evidenced by the few rips of the edges in Seasons 1-6 and the few episodes of Go, Diego, Go!, and rough edges all around in Seasons 7/8 and Dora and Friends: Into the City! (post-Return to the Rainforest). The Seasons 1-6 iteration not only has a red border around the picture portion, but a slightly folded upper-left corner of the paper showing the light blue reverse side.
The two colors previously mentioned share the same color palette as Map, a yellow front and blue back, however, the Seasons 7/8/ITC version does away with the red border and light blue corner fold, completely flattening the paper.
Example episodes that change the colors and/or appearance/style of the Picture Map include, but are not limited to:
- Lost and Found, the map's upper right corner is not folded.
- Quack! Quack!, the map's texture and design mimics a coloring page.
- What Happens Next? has the map styled to resemble a medieval map.
- Journey to the Purple Planet starts as normal, but when Map glides to the other places (because he is a rocket), the blue border disappears and the map falls away as the background transitions into, and remains in space for the duration of the segment.
- The Mixed-Up Seasons doesn't use a regular map that traces a path, but instead uses a season map showing all 4 seasons to show where Dora and Boots have to go to return the season friends back to their right places.
- Dora's World Adventure! does not use the picture map, but rather a world map: a globe because Dora and Swiper are traveling around the world.
- Dora Saves the Crystal Kingdom has a story map showing four pictures of each story to show where Dora, Boots and Allie have to go to find each of the crystals.
In the 1998 pilot, the Picture Map's overall design is vastly different than the ones in the 2000s and on. The colors and shapes give it a more bulletin board look than one of paper. Its main color is purple, the complete opposite of Map's current yellow. The border's patterning is of purple trapezoids and darker purple triangles. In each of the four corners, there's a dark purple square with a single yellow dot embedded.
Appearances
In most episodes where Map is present, the Picture Map usually comes included. See Map's Appearances section on his page.
Trivia
- The episode Little Map reveals how images on the map are drawn. It also seems to confirm the picture map is a part of the body of a map.
- In the episode The Fix-It Machine, Map's Map inexplicably has a hole in it. The Super Duper Fix-It Machine suggests the base color of the map is white instead of blue, which may be an error.
- After the location explanation during Map's segment in Dora's Big Birthday Adventure, the picture map, for the first time, flips to the light blue reverse side for a brief moment. In this instance, it reveals a moving picture of Dora's family and friends back home awaiting her and Boots' return.
- In this moment, Map is not seen again until the picture flips back to normal pale yellow side.
Gallery/Reference
You can find a collection of the maps used for a majority of the adventures here.