Masha and the Bear (2009)

Masha and the Bear (Russian: Maша и Медвeдь, romanized: Masha i Medved', pronounced [ˈmaʂə ɪ mʲɪdˈvʲetʲ]) is a Russian preschool comedy animated television series created by Oleg Kuzovkov and produced by Animaccord Animation Studio, loosely based on the oral children's folk 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.

The episode "Recipe for Disaster" (Russian: Маша плюс каша, romanized: Masha plyus kasha) has over 4.6 billion views on YouTube as of June 2026, making it the site's sixteenth most viewed video of all time.

The show was first launched on 7 January 2009.

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 park The Land of Legends, near Antalya, Turkey.

Plot

Masha is a four-year-old girl who lives in the forest in an unspecified location in Russia (possibly in Tver 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.

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 old UAZ 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.

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 a railway 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 has super 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 by Elsie Fisher. 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 circus brown bear in Moscow 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 name Mikhail (i.e. "Mikey"), which is also the traditional name given to bears in Russian 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 (a Barbie-styled Bear) with his hair flipped at the end of "Shower Power".

Masha's pets

A terrier (dog), a goat and a pig (and in the episode "How They Met", three chickens) 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 a rabbit, red squirrels, hedgehogs and two wolves. 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 female brown 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's classical guitar playing as she preferred more modern music. 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 from Moscow, 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". She is voiced by Alina Kukushkina.

Panda

Panda is a panda 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

A Siberian tiger who is Bear's best friend from their days performing together in the Moscow circus.

Rival Bear

A Himalayan black 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

An Adélie 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. Even so, they stay in touch and the Penguin once visited.

Santa Claus (Father Frost)

Santa Claus appears in Christmas-themed episodes.

Four-eyed aliens

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.

Production

The series' production has been handled domestically at Animaccord Animation Studio since 2008. 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.

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 the Despicable Me films – dubbed the voice of Masha in the first season. In subsequent seasons Masha was dubbed by Rebecca 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. Many compositions are stylized for famous works: Moonlight Sonata, Beethoven's Symphony No. 5, a circus theme from the film Circus, and in the episode "One-Hit Wonder" the rockstar Masha performs a song in the style of the group AC/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.

Reception

Within Russia, the influence of Masha and the Bear was the subject of debate. Detractors compared it negatively to Western children's shows and saw Masha's behaviour as setting a bad example for Russian children. Lidia Matveeva, a professor at the Faculty of Psychology at Moscow State University, stated that Masha contradicts "traditional values" about the role of women and fathers in Russian society. She believes that Masha receives positive reinforcement for her disrespect towards the Bear, whom Matveeva described as both a father figure and a representation of Russia, and general disregard for social norms. Conversely, Egor Moskvitin of Ogonyok argued that the show promotes progressive pedagogy, in that it portrays Masha learning from her mistakes through experience and gentle help from the Bear rather than through punishment.

The success of Masha and the Bear abroad was analysed both within and outside Russia. Moskvitin compared the slapstick style to that of Leonid Gaidai and the Marx Brothers, which he believes appeals to a broad range of viewers across the world. Nataliya Vasilyeva of the Associated Press noted the show's popularity in many Muslim countries, particularly Indonesia, and attributed it to Masha's "folk costume with a headscarf". A number of European politicians and media outlets have argued that Masha and the Bear is an instrument of Russian soft power. Priit Hõbemägi, an Estonian journalist and lecturer at Tallinn University, stated that the bear is a symbol commonly associated with Russia and that its portrayal in the show aims to form a positive image of the country in children. Mark Galeotti, a British historian and expert on Russia, argued that fears about Masha and the Bear were greatly exaggerated and risked fueling unnecessary censorship and xenophobic attitudes toward Russian culture. Animaccord stated that their project is independent and they have never received funding from the Russian government. During the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian war, the show is still accessible on YouTube in its Ukrainian-language version and remains highly popular in Ukraine.

Censorship

On 21 August 2026, Ukraine sanctioned Animaccord and other individuals involved in producing and distributing Masha and the Bear for allegedly spreading "pro-Russian narratives" and posing a threat to national security. The decision means that the show could no longer be broadcast in the country. A representative for Animaccord described the accusations as "false and defamatory" and noted that the studio operates independently and has never received funding from the Russian government.

Awards and achievements

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.

In February 2015, Masha and the Bear won a 2015 Kidscreen Award for Best Animation in the Creative Talent.

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.

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. The episode was included in the most 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".

Mobile apps

The first Masha and the Bear mobile app was released by Apps Ministry in August 2011. In 2013 the first mobile game Masha 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.

Distribution

Netflix has released 27 of the first 29 episodes in 9 episodes of 3 segments each. Many of the videos were uploaded multiple times on three YouTube channels ("Маша и Медведь", "Get Movies" and "Masha and The Bear") so their view counts across up to three channels have been combined.

Episodes

Season 1

Season 2

Season 3

Season 4

Season 5

Season 6

Season 7

Shorties

Specials

International versions

English (United States; all English-speaking countries) – Masha and the Bear

Teletoon (2016–2017)

Treehouse TV (2017–2020)

Universal Kids (2017–2025)

Disney Junior

Tiny Pop (2017–2026)

Pop Plus

Kabillion

ABC Kids

DreamWorks Channel

Netflix

Cartoonito

National Communications Network

A2Z (2021, 2023, 2026–present)

All TV (2026–present)

Kapamilya Channel (2022, 2026–present)

Yey! (13–30 June 2020)

iWantTFC (2020; 2023)

Cartoonito

French (Canada) – Masha et Michka

Télé-Québec (formerly)

Télétoon (formerly)

French (France) – Masha et Michka

Piwi+

France 5 (Zouzous block)

RTBF

La Trois

German (Germany) – Mascha und der Bär

KiKA

Boomerang (formerly)

ORF 1 (formerly)

SRF 1

SRF zwei (formerly)

Swiss German (Switzerland) – Mascha und dä Bär

SRF 1

Greek (Greece) - Η Μάσα και ο Αρκούδος

Boomerang (formerly)

Star Channel

Ukrainian – Маша та Ведмідь

1+1 (formerly)

PlusPlus (formerly)

ТЕТ (formerly)

Hungarian, Czech, Serbian, Romanian, Slovene

Minimax

Urdu (Pakistan)

LTN Family

Vietnamese

K+

Arabic (Middle East And North Africa) – ماشا و الدب

Spacetoon (2015–present)

Indonesian

ANTV (2013; 2023–2025)

VTV Indonesia (2023–present)

Kids TV (2022-present)

Masha and the Bear left Universal Kids in the US on 1 January 2023, but cable TV providers like Charter Spectrum and DirecTV state that it is still there, and also streaming services like FuboTV, YouTube TV, Hulu with Live TV, and DirecTV Stream. The show returned to Universal Kids in the US from 4 August 2023 until the Universal Kids' closure on 6 March 2025.

Spin-offs

Masha's Tales

A spin-off series to the show titled Masha's Tales is also available on Netflix. In the show Masha (voiced by a much older actress) tells classic Russian fairy tales as well as some Grimms' 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 adapts Cinderella). 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 on Cartoon Network UK's sister pre-school channel, Cartoonito, on 20 June 2016.

Debut dates listed per Treehouse TV:

Masha's Spooky Stories

Masha's Spooky Stories premiered on Cartoonito UK and Netflix on Halloween 2016.

Debuts dates listed are for English releases in Canada on Treehouse TV, original air dates in Russia unknown:

See also

List of most-viewed YouTube videos

Be-Be-Bears

List of most-subscribed YouTube channels

References

External links

Masha and the Bear at IMDb

Masha and The Bear in YouTube

Маша и Медведь in YouTube