Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon SuperS: Sailor 9 Senshi Shuuketsu! Black Dream Hole no Kiseki

The best of the Sailor Moon movies to me, but also the one that feels the most reliant on having actually watched the series up to this point, since a lot of the things I found especially striking more stemmed from the nuances in the character writing here rather than the plot in itself. A ton of little themes continued on from the associated season, especially in regards to what it truly means to "grow up", all tied together with this clash between one's dreams for what an ideal existence is and the reality of those compromises that come with life. That dream sequence near ... the end was especially great because of that, combined with the overwhelming fairy tale imagery creating this utterly cloying atmosphere that perfectly played off the antagonists. The space lesbians also make a return here, so it's awesome based on that fact alone.

Even though this movie wasn't terrible, I find it to be an unnecessary inclusion to the Sailor Moon franchise. Looking at the release date, it's almost as if the employees at Toei Animation were like: "Oh shoot! We almost forgot to make a movie for this season! Uh... let's make it dream themed just like the regular show! We got to get it done before Christmas Eve!"

Putting my wacky theory on the movie's making aside, I do have to first address the obvious issue. Sailor Moon: Dream Adventure and its movie clearly focused way too much on Chibiusa. I don't hate this character. She was ... introduced in the Black Moon Arc, so it made sense for her to get attention and her friendship with Hotaru during the Infinity Arc was so wholesome. Don't you think that's enough spotlight time for her? I get that Pegasus chose Chibiusa's dream mirror to hide in from the Dead Moon Circus, but they could've limited her time to just her relationship with him. Seriously, I got mad seeing her get between Usagi and Mamoru over and over during the course of the Dream Arc. It was okay in the Black Moon Arc because it was yet to be revealed that she's their daughter, so there's literally no excuse to repeat this style of filler ever. And yes, I still refuse to call the fourth season its official name.

This movie's plot does something different with the dream theme. The evil Queen Badiane plans to create a Black Dream Hole that will swallow the Earth and trap everybody inside Dream Coffins where they will all sleep for eternity. First, she will need to gather "sugar energy" from human children to power up the Black Dream Hole, so she sends her fairy minions Poupelin, Banane, and Orangeat to lure children with a melody and trap them inside Dream Coffins. Meanwhile, Usagi and her friends are baking cookies where Usagi makes cookies that look perfect, but taste terrible while Chibiusa's cookies are the complete opposite. The latter decides to give her cookies to Mamoru (Of course!), but she meets and befriends a boy named Perle and ends up giving her cookies to him.

At night, Badiane's minions arrive to lure more children. This time, Chibiusa also falls for the melody's magic. Usagi and her friends noticed and Usagi was able to get Chibiusa back to her senses by span- oh wait a minute... people from Europe might be reading this, so I shouldn't use that word. Usagi was able to get Chibiusa back to her senses by slapping her rear end. Everybody transforms and they try to fight Poupelin. In the confusion, Perle appears begging his brother Poupelin to not go along with Badiane's plans. Having enjoyed his experiences on Earth and his friendship with Chibiusa, Perle has decided to betray Badiane. This causes Badiane to be interested in Chibiusa and orders Poupelin to seize her. From here, the Sailor Soldiers have to go rescue Chibiusa... AGAIN.

This is clearly a case of lack of originality. For starters, the main antagonist is an evil queen, as if the series didn't have enough of those. I already ranted about the spotlight being given to Chibiusa, but there is more about her I need to point out. In the main season, she interacted with Helios a lot to the point he became her first real crush. Here in the movie, she also falls in love with a male character who is also up against the villain. Do you see the problem with the Sailor Moon: Dream Adventure - The Movie yet? Sure, the villains here are not affiliated with the Dead Moon Circus, but Toei Animation made them way too similar. On top of that, the fairies use airships to travel between Badiane's base and the Earth which is how the Dead Moon Circus arrive in Japan in the Sailor Moon manga.

Now, I can forgive the Sailor Moon R movie for somewhat clashing with Usagi and Mamoru's childhood, but this movie pulls a move that basically proves that this movie is absolutely non-canon. Sailor Uranus, Sailor Neptune, AND Sailor Pluto also join the battle. See how I put "and" in all capital letters? That's because near the end of Sailor Moon S, Sailor Pluto used Time Stop to save Sailor Uranus and Sailor Neptune from a helicopter explosion. When the spell ran out, she disappeared in the explosion and does not appear again until the final season where she retrieves the Baby Hotaru to help the Sailor Soldiers fight against the returning Queen Nehelenia. This movie clashes with this fact and because of it, we cannot pinpoint where it can possibly take place in. We can for the previous two movies: Sailor Moon R's movie happens after Usagi and Mamoru got back together and Sailor Moon S's movie happens right before Hotaru is revealed to be Sailor Saturn.

One last gripe I have is how Sailor Moon and Sailor Chibi Moon defeat Queen Badiane. Sailor Chibi Moon gets her own Moon Kaleido Scope, which wasn't the case in the main season. Yes, she did get her own in the manga, but we're talking about the 1990s anime adaptation here. This clashes with how they fight Lemures. Sailor Chibi Moon would use the Crystal Carillon to summon Pegasus, who will use the Golden Crystal to power up Sailor Moon's Moon Kaleido Scope, so she can finish off the enemy. In fact, the issue I have with the Dream Arc is that this was required as the ONLY way to kill a Lemures. The Stars Arc has it too where only Sailor Moon's attack was the only method to defeat a Phage. I know she's usually the one to finish off an enemy, but in previous arcs there were rare instances that someone else other than Sailor Moon deals the finishing blow. Sailor Mars burned a Youma to a crisp in her introductory episode, the Inner Sailor Soldiers finished off some Cardians in early episodes of the Hell Tree Arc, Sailor Planet Attack was used on the final Droid, Sailor Uranus and Sailor Neptune were the ones to kill the first Daimon, and Sailor Jupiter overpowers a Daimon later on in the Infinity Arc.

So far, I've been negative towards this movie. I must really hate it, do I? Well, I do have things I like about this movie. I really like the opening sequence where they show off the Inner Sailor Soldiers when they were younger. They're all cute scenes and I love Minako's the best where she pretends to be in a Wild West gun fight and lost. The cookie baking scene was fitting and resembles all the filler the anime is known for. I love the fact that Sailor Moon uses Moon Tiara Action showing that even when her powers are upgraded every season, she still does have access to older moves. The villains' names are all French words. Badiane is French for Star Anise, Poupelin is a name of a pastry, and Banane and Orangeat are obviously based on fruits. Perle's name is also a French word, and it means Pearl. Finally, the ending song is good. I mean, all three movies have good ending songs. There's not much to say for openings as you can all guess, they all use Moonlight Legend. Voice acting for the main characters are the same as usual.

This movie does have its own charm, but it does suffer from lack of originality and clashing with established facts from the regular seasons. Overall, it's a mixed bag just like its parent season. I'd say 6/10 is the most fitting score for it. Seriously... how did we get this instead of an adaptation of Casablanca Memory? Oh well, if the Sailor Moon Crystal anime is going to do it, it will definitely be faithful to the manga version since it does take place somewhere in the middle of the Dark Kingdom arc as Dark Kingdom members appear in it.

Also, apparently this movie was released with a short film called Ami's First Love that plays right before it. I've seen it and I think it's just okay. I'll give it a 6 as well just because its contents are hardly relevant to the whole series.

The Sailor Moon SuperS Movie had a very high standard to live up to: the R and S Movies were both excellent in their own rights and had an astonishingly amount of enjoyable plot, emotional stakes, and a generally high animation quality, with the movies themselves looking even prettier than the main series the majority of the time (which is again, an achievement in itself given how massively appealing the series visually is). Unfortunately, if that didn't give it away, Sailor Moon SuperS fails to set a new standard for the movies to follow, and I'm afraid it doesn't even achieve the previous standard. The ... movie in my opinion is not that enjoyable at all; there are some elements to like, such as Queen Badiane's design (which oddly is reminiscent of the main villain in Stars), the fairies are a really cool element to the film, and the three o'clock fairy story is a nice touch. Unfortunately, it really does feel like the film spends most of its time dragging its feet.

The Bonbon Babies, as a main example, are a fight scene that for all intents and purposes, is repeatedly twice in the same scene, totaling approximately 15 minutes, and as another, the Outer Senshi show up later with no real explanation. Chibiusa is a great character to get invested to, and despite it working well for the majority of the SuperS season proper, it really feels like it fails to mesh properly with the other elements the story brings together. In a way, it does feel that the story that's trying to be told here does need a stronger grounding in reality, as it seems to be a bit too exaggerated to even buy on suspension of disbelief. The reason I believe that the other films do not experience this problem is primarily that the other films have a stronger sense of anticipation and tension, with greater stakes at play (such as referencing Silver Millennium lore and Mamoru's past). The movie unfortunately borders on overexaggerated and downright silly at times as well.

Even though the Sailor Moon SuperS movie was a very solid attempt, I can't say that it was personally enjoyable for me, which is a true shame. 4/10.