Papa started out as Bakabon's troublemaking dad, but he's basically the main character now—he completely stole the show. His whole thing is saying "Kore de ii no da" (これでいいのだ, "It'll be allright") whenever he's trying to rope someone into one of his ridiculous schemes. The formula is pretty simple: Papa either completely botches some basic task or dreams up an elaborate stupid plan to do something straightforward, then drags Bakabon into it and everything falls apart. Sometimes he actually asks his son for advice first, which somehow makes it worse.
There's backstory too—Papa used to be genuinely intelligent before an accident turned him into the idiot he is today. He's got his look locked down though: you can't miss him with his trademark hachimaki headband. Octopus is his go-to food.
Papa's become kind of an anime institution in Japan. He ranked Number 9 on TV Asahi's 2002 Top 100 Anime Characters list, which honestly feels about right for how much he's stuck around in people's memories.
Content compiled by AnimeList.moe from publicly available sources.
