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Jan 16, 2025
Codename: Sailor V is a very interesting prequel manga to Sailor Moon. Please note that for this review, this will be treated standalone from the main Sailor Moon manga. Also of note is that I'm not considering the implications this has on the main Sailor Moon manga. Codename: Sailor V is quite an interesting case; in contrast to the length of the main Sailor Moon manga, Codename: Sailor V is quite short at only 16 chapters, and the chapters vary quite a lot in quality and plot. Some of the chapters are shorter than others and are purely filler or comedic, while others take on
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a more serious attempt at a plot.
I believe that, as a standalone character, Minako does a great job of holding the viewer's attention: while similar on a surface level to Usagi, Minako has enough differentiating characters to not be considered a "rip-off" or clone of Usagi, or vice-versa for Minako. For instance, Minako has a lot more innate determination and focus on what she sets her mind to than Usagi, which gives the story more of an initiative-driven pace that helps stop things from slowing down. However, Minako's light-heart nature also lends itself well to the comedic aspects of the series. Despite the fact that these work well, the manga does seem somewhat distracted; despite having a lot of chapters that work quite well in standalone format, they don't really work well together as a singular story. As such, many of the villains and story arcs (such as the Pet Stories Arc) play off much more like monster of the day fights rather than genuine threats. It also appears at times that Naoko is unsure what to do with Minako's character besides write stories about Minako falling in love and it not working out. I am aware that this is the intent, but it makes the series appear more formulaic than it is.
Despite these issues, Codename: Sailor V has a lot of tense moments, interesting plot developments, and good comedy. I highly recommend it alongside the main manga. 9/10.
Reviewer’s Rating: 9
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Jan 5, 2025
Sailor Moon Sailor Stars is one of the more memorable seasons of the 90's anime. Sailor Moon Sailor Stars is one of the more interesting seasons of the anime. Please note that the Nehelenia arc will be considered a part of Sailor Stars, as it aired with the season. That said, let's begin there, since it's easier to talk about. Nehelenia's story arc in SuperS, while lacking, was expanded greatly and gave her some moments in Sailor Stars, that fleshed her out from a somewhat vain but dangerous character, into a woman whose tragedy is relived in full. The vengeance she takes against the White
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Moon (particularly, against Usagi) cannot be understated and is the driving force for the entirety of her story arc. In short, if Queen Beryl represented jealousy and envy, and how a grudge will follow you into a next life, Queen Nehelenia doubles down on this and adds true heartbreak and tragedy to an already grim tale where there's seemingly no happy ending at all. It really truly fits poetically as a footnote to Sailor Moon SuperS too, because as much as that season was focused on light-hearted, playful and goofy antics, the Nehelenia arc is nothing short of nightmarish hallucinations, trickery, and pure evil, intended to sadistically destroy Usagi from the inside out. And Usagi's endless resolve in even this endeavor to never give up is what allows her to finally reach her ultimate source of power, even against the most impossibly trying times when hope already seems completely lost. In fact, the same can be said about the Sailor Star Song itself, which not only adds to the pathos of the entire arc, but is a masterpiece that even rivals the genius of the other series' moments. In short, the Nehelenia arc is one of the most beautiful and emotional arcs in the entire anime, and is a pure joy to sit through. As for the majority of the season, things get a bit more complicated.
To start with the good of Sailor Stars, we should mention that the entire situation has been changed massively in incomprehensible ways with Sailor Senshi. Opening the path for villains to become Sailor Senshi sets such an expansive level of world-building into the plot that it's truly mesmerizing. If Sailor Saturn being revered as essentially the "evil" Sailor Senshi in S was a moment that made the series seem dark, consider it nothing but foreshadowing for the truth of Sailor Stars. This truly does twist the series, as only "good" characters were previously confirmed to be Sailor Senshi, and audiences had assumed it was only our primary ten. By adding this level of world-building, they can truly flesh out and adopt new characters in extremely unique ways, such as the quirky Sailor Iron Mouse, the comedy duo-like Sailor Aluminum Siren and Sailor Lead Crow, and Sailor Galaxia, with a cold bloodlust for power. What's truly interesting is that they don't share any traits with the Sailor Senshi at all; despite the fact that Haruka and Michiru may have had different views than the Inner Senshi in S, this is nothing compared to the vast difference, which works out well.
The Sailor Starlights are a different case entirely, however. The Sailor Starlights tend to play in a role that was identical to the Outer Senshi did in S, albeit from outside the solar system, rendering them an enemy to all Solar System Sailor Senshi, aside from Usagi. Despite the originality in this concept, it plays off too similarly like the Starlights are a stand-in for another variation of the Outer Senshi's role in S, which isn't far from how things are presented. Even though this does set up interesting dynamics, the plot somewhat tends to not focus on the drama much of the time. Instead, the primary part of the season where this would come into play is delegated towards the Starlights' time as idols and Seiya's attempts to romance Usagi, which is the next thing I'll be discussing.
Initially, Seiya's attempts to romance Usagi come off as, mildly put, off-putting at best and weird at worst. The primary issue with these concerns is the fact that Usagi explicitly states that Mamoru is her boyfriend, and Seiya shows a lack of boundaries and continues his romancing of Usagi despite that, as well as Usagi herself stating her explicit disinterest most of the time in these endeavors. This means that for most of these attempts, Seiya's behavior borders on creepy, self-righteous in his pursuit of love at best, while at worst, Seiya appears to be violating Usagi's boundaries, his behavior bordering on harassment. The other issue with the Starlights is the way their characters are portrayed; in the way they're presented, their characters are condescending on humans at best, taking advantage of women's love for them and having a cold, blatant disregard for the concept of Earth love. At worst, the Starlights are self-righteous and fickle, seeming to decide at whim when an issue is their concern or not. As an example, the Starlights at one point complain about not wanting to be burdened in helping take care of the Earth, but regularly save the Sailor Senshi and relying on them. That said, this can be difficult to deal with, since the Starlights take up a significant amount of screentime.
Another issue with Sailor Stars is that the Outer Sailor Senshi are highly inconsistent in their screentime. From the time the Nehelenia part of the storyline ended until midway through the main season, the Outer Senshi are inexplicably completely absent, with no mention at all as to their whereabouts or what happened to them whatsoever. Hotaru and Setsuna are treated even more unfairly in this regard, as they are inexplicably gone until the last third of the series, with absolutely no questions asked about where any of them have been. More than inconsistent, this feels disrespectful to the characters, who at least had explanations given for why they left in S. Despite these flaws, Sailor Stars is truly a groundbreaking season which capitalizes on the opportunities set up for it by the previous seasons' extensive care in worldbuilding, resulting in a fleshed out finale that embodies the core values of Usagi Tsukino to the end of the series. In this sense, Sailor Stars is truly the perfect end a series could ask for, holding on to hope even after all seems lost, as Usagi herself does. Because of these, Sailor Stars gets a 10/10.
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As for the entirety of the Sailor Moon anime in itself, Sailor Moon is one of the most groundbreaking magical girl shows to ever exist for a plethora of reasons. Sailor Moon arguably has some of the best character development and worldbuilding of almost any other magical girl series, with each of the characters not only having thorough personalities that hold great degrees of depth, but also feel like natural real people. The Sailor Senshi think and rationalize as normal humans would, giving their actions, thoughts, and emotions weight. Usagi herself is the most significant case of these developments, as she grows throughout the series from a selfish, immature and lazy crybaby with no sense of responsibility at the beginning of the series. By the end of the series, Usagi has not only grown and matured significantly, she has become a person who would willingly, literally or metaphorically, leap into the fire to save the lives of others, representing her true nature and change into a person who accepts all, a true embodiment of hope and beacon of light, in a literal and non-literal sense. This can be seen throughout the series in numerous forms, such as her bonds with Chibiusa or learning of the trauma of her past life, but being duty-bound to fight, to countless others. Usagi has seen hope and joy, which is tempered by depths of despair, anguish, and loneliness, forming her into the person she is.
Sailor Moon's storyline is also quite intense, being filled with countless twists, turns, and exciting plot revelations. While at times the formula does show its age of course, the series handles story events and light-hearted filler with ease, maintaining a perfect and entertaining balance that is sure to bring a smile to many a viewer's face. Sailor Moon's primary theme is love, which is shown to exist in numerous forms, whether it be the romantic love of Princess Serenity and Prince Endymion, to the loving bond between a mother and her daughter, to sympathy such as that exhibited toward Nehelenia.
Ultimately, Sailor Moon is a highly enjoyable franchise and is one of the most well-known magical girl series, despite it being fairly old by now, for a reason. Sailor Moon has withstood the test of time and continued to be highly enjoyable and is filled with many important takeaways that numerous viewers may even come to different conclusions upon viewing. Sailor Moon was an absolute pleasure to rewatch and is rewarding not only in a plot sense, but in terms of romance, friendship, action, and many other values. The entirety of the franchise receives a 10/10 and a strong recommendation.
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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Dec 18, 2024
Sailor Moon SuperS is one of the more interesting of the five total seasons of Sailor Moon (although the fifth season wasn't dubbed, I'm still not considering this the final season). To start, SuperS makes the rather daring decision to have a focus shift completely away from Usagi and the other Sailor Senshi and instead focus almost solely on Chibiusa. Now, I will say up front that this depends on your thoughts about Chibiusa; if you happened to find her unbearable in Sailor Moon R, then this review will be taken negatively. However, I will be addressing this from the perspective of a viewer who
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has at minimum, tolerated Chibiusa's antics up until this point.
As previously mentioned, the focus of SuperS is on Chibiusa, Sailor Moon's daughter. The season has a very strong emphasis on dreams in particular, with the hopes and dreams of other people being featured in almost every single episode of the season. While this is a good element to work with, the series simply doesn't utilize the tools at its disposal to get its message across in the way it wants. As a result, some of the messages in SuperS come across as having unfortunate implications; this is primarily due to the formula, which sometimes restricts the amount of development that can be focused into a character of the day. However, for the most part, dreams are shown in a realistic manner and, barring a few exceptionally bad episodes, the series has done well with having the Sailor Senshi help many of these people's dreams come to fruition. There actually is a wide diversity in the dreams of the people in the season, and we're shown that dreams can take different forms and are not always seen as literal; the monsters in the series and villain designs are also very unique, exaggerated, and vibrant with energy. What this creates is a situation where the lighter themes of "dreams" act as a sort of parallel to the Dead Moon Circus, which would symbolize nightmares.
This viewpoint works out quite well, as while the Dead Moon Circus would hardly be considered threatening (even in-universe), it fits well with the cold and detached view of adulthood that the Dead Moon Circus has. This also serves well as a parallel to the Sailor Senshi's own dreams of adulthood for various reasons (which have already been explored across the entire series), putting them at unintentional odds with the villains. The comedy and light-hearted moments (with the villains working for a literal circus) also works well, making their antics cartoony and exaggerated. Only a few instances go over the top and take this too far for the most part.
However, the Amazon Trio are somewhat too simplistic to work as villains despite this working to an extent. While they all have interesting dynamics, traits, and monsters, they are simply too one-dimensional to be serviceable to the plot, an issue made only more glaring by their prolonged duration on the season, taking up at minimum half of the entire series, over twice as long as the average Sailor Moon villain. This makes their antics, while enjoyable, become old fairly quickly, and the series struggles to find new ways to utilize them as it progresses. The Amazoness Quartet are fine villains; rather, they would be fine, but the series heavily underutilizes them, ironically; of the four Quartet members, only VesVes is utilized for the most part. As an example, CereCere only gets about two episodes as the primary focus villain, leaving the others severely underdeveloped aside from perhaps PallaPalla.
The primary flaw for SuperS is that the pacing is, unfortunately, unbearably slow. The Sailor Senshi do not receive power-ups until approximately 21 episodes into the 39 episode series. Keep in mind that this is especially crucial because they have not received power-up episodes since R two seasons ago, and their prolonged delay is unnecessary; the series has given them plenty of opportunities to upgrade, only to not use these. This is particularly glaring because the Sailor Senshi have an extraordinarily small role this season. The Inner Senshi have almost no unique role to play unless they are the focus of a particular episode, while the Outer Senshi are completely gone due to the events of Sailor Moon S, leaving the series rather bare of characters. This only reinforces the isolating, standalone focus on Chibiusa that some viewers cannot tolerate, which reinforces their views on the season.
Nehelenia's backstory is quite interesting and draws from various mythology and folklore, making her one of the best characters in the show to be developed. However, her character is hardly delved into in detail until the near-end, at which point the information given is not enough for her motives and backstory to be sympathized with, despite the fact that her themes of rejecting adulthood fit very well with the Dead Moon Circus. There are almost no attempts pre-Amazoness Quartet to flesh out either Zirconia or Nehelenia as villains, which doesn't help their characters much.
While Sailor Moon SuperS can be frustrating to some viewers, I think that the perspectives of dreams and adulthood the series has fits well with the overall theme of maturity that Sailor Moon as a whole has had since Sailor Moon R. Despite the fact that the Inner Senshi's lack of development is frustrating and that Nehelenia's origin is quite late, I found SuperS very entertaining with its combination of themes, comedy, and character development. This season is highly recommended as part of Sailor Moon. 8/10.
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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Sep 26, 2024
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
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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.
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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Sep 21, 2024
Ami's First Love is one of the other specials of Sailor Moon SuperS, with this one playing right before the Sailor Moon SuperS Movie. This one has a sweet premise: focusing on Ami and trying to build off her personality to be more than that of a simple bookworm by introducing....a love interest, in case the title didn't give that away. Personally, I think this is good; barring a few episodes related to swimming or chess (and I do mean LITERALLY "a few"), Ami's entire character has more or less been: studying, asking the girls to study with her, or studying during an episode's events,
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so it was a really great idea to have her branch out, especially since Ami has been the least involved with love of all the Senshi, by a long shot.
Unfortunately, they can't stray too far from Ami's roots, so they give her a study rival interest who has a lot of mystery built around him, as well as a creature called Bonnon which seems to prey on Ami's "selfish desires" of love. The execution of this is both good and bad for all involved: on Ami's part, it comes off really well because it gives her some much-needed depth while also relating to one of the core aspects of her character, even though it in practice doesn't change much about her at all, despite their best efforts. Mercurius (her rival) had potential to be extremely well-written; while I like the aspect of keeping a character's true motives and identity itself hidden or ambiguous (and Sailor Moon pulls this off exceptionally well 90% of the time), this just isn't the place to do that in a special like this. There's not nearly enough time in a 15 minute episode to flesh out a character like this meaningfully (even Umino took several episodes to come into his own), even if he isn't that interesting of a character, because the special is BUILT around him and why Ami is attracted to him. So it's important to know more about him, keeping in mind the special is 15 minutes. Meaning, he gets less screentime than a standard victim of the day in a generic filler episode. Also, Bonnon, the secondary antagonist, suffers from some one-dimensionality as well; she's barely on-screen for more than three minutes of meaningful screentime at absolute best (she is also silhouetted and not revealed immediately), which makes her nice as cannon fodder and for Ami to unleash a new attack, but gives her practically no development in doing so. Still, it's really nice to see that Ami got an episode to herself and that this turned out fairly well, given the time constraints. It's definitely worth a watch if you can handle its few shortcomings, as other than the criticisms listed, it's quite enjoyable; the humor is as clever as always, and they deliver on the action and tension that is present. 7/10.
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
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Sep 21, 2024
The Sailor Moon SuperS Specials are 3 episodes that are overall really well done, each focusing on something unique. I think they work really well as side stories, and not the least of these reasons being because they re-introduce Haruka and Michiru (who were excluded from the main season of SuperS for some reason). The stories are really entertaining and give some good time in the spotlight to all the Sailor Senshi and Chibiusa at once. Even though this normally wouldn't be special, their attention as individual characters has diminished slightly over time, so it's good to see that they're still usable as great characters.
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Honestly, the episode with the vampire speaks to me the most, because it perfectly blends a sense of the early season-one style: that is, hyped-up suspense that works well, provides a bit of tension, but leaves things "open" in the end by not really giving a full conclusion, and is also really funny on top of that.
Even though there may not be much to say about all three episodes collectively without spoiling them (as they only total to around approximately 18 minutes each), I think they work incredibly well as a tool to revitalize some interest in Sailor Moon. They're just extras, but they fit right in with the main season in case you find it a bit boring.
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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Sep 8, 2024
The Sailor Moon S Movie has come a long way from the Sailor Moon R Movie. While that movie was also amazing in its own right, the Sailor Moon S Movie gives its own take on a brand new story that cuts ties with Sailor Moon S (the season) completely, rather than the R Movie's somewhat reliance on the premise of Ail and An to work. This is a good thing, as the star of this movie is actually Luna, who gets really great development.
Off the bat, I'd like to say the idea of giving Luna character development is really interesting. While she was never
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by any means a one-dimensional character, nor can I ever say she's been neglected during the series, her (and Artemis') screentime has been slowly dwindling and chipping away from relevance after the first season, as there wasn't much left in the plot for them to do. And it's fitting that in the way that Usagi's childlike and naive nature allowed her to find love in the first season, so too is it that Luna would fall in love with something equally taboo to Usagi's. While for Usagi, this was the case of an older man (though the actual degree of how "taboo" this was at least at the time is questionable), for Luna this tended to be the case for a human. Even though it does seem like a case of a missed opportunity to pair her with Artemis right off the bat, I think pairing Luna with a human actually works better for the movie's premise. Primarily, just like the human characters themselves, Luna seems to greatly care for the lives of people, perhaps moreso than the Sailor Senshi even, and she's obviously connected to the stars and astrology very heavily, which makes the premise a lot more appealing. Furthermore, the movie heavily discusses Luna's desire to be a human in a longing sense, which adds a really deep emotional value to the entire premise, as she wants to do so for selfless reasons.
Even though Luna is the star of the movie, she eventually turns out to fight with NASA copilot Himeko, a character who I am unfortunately not a fan of, not even as Kakeru's love interest. In my perspective, throughout the film, Himeko comes across as rather one-dimensional, and only serves to exist as a counterpart and "foil" to Kakeru; the more grounding presence to the man lost in his daydreams and fantasies (of meeting Princess Kaguya.) Frankly, Himeko isn't all that interesting as a character either, which is unfortunate, as this is one of the movie's big selling points (that Kakeru loves Himeko truly, not Luna). Other than that, the use of Princess "Snow" Kaguya was really well thought-out, and I like her backstory a lot. Everyone also has a lot of beautiful designs and artwork in the movie, which clearly had much better production than the main series.
One of the other unfortunate aspects is that Hotaru wasn't added to the plot; it does somewhat cheapen the finale to have only nine Sailor Senshi present, which is depressing. After all, as all three Outer Senshi are present, and Chibiusa was around even before this point, there's no real reason Hotaru should be missing. It's also not like they haven't taken liberties before, as Chibiusa had no real reason to be in the Sailor Moon R movie (at a point where she could also somehow fit into the main series, without taking some massive liberties), so it's incredibly disappointing that the "star" of the S SEASON was missing from her own season's movie.
Overall, the Sailor Moon S Movie is really beautiful, and has a lot of the magic, mystery and awe that likely captivated fan's hearts as soon as they watched the series proper for the first time, and focuses on some really touching and caring scenes for characters that have gone less and less appreciated throughout the series. I wholeheartedly recommend this romantic movie.
Reviewer’s Rating: 9
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Sep 7, 2024
Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon S: Kotaete Moon Call! is...pretty strange, honestly. Set in a weird state where things appear simultaneously canon but also not quite set in the mainstream of Sailor Moon S, add in a very unique and odd premise, and you have yourself this special. This appears to actually be a special episode to promote a toy game called the Terebikko and not a regular episode.
I think personally that the idea of the Terebikko is good; it's a really cute and fun idea to have interactive trivia about various things from across the series asked by various audience members, along with a unique
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premise that fits both Haruka and Michiru (although oddly, Hotaru and Setsuna are not present), and it seems like a lot of fun for kids to play along with and watch. Unfortunately, it's limited to its audience because it is incredibly formulaic, even by Sailor Moon standards. Anything not directly related to the Terebikko is dragged out for quite a while, and even things that *are* directly related to it can drag on, mostly because it's incredibly hard to keep a consistent pacing of an actual story in a game while retaining the structure laid out for this premise to work. That said, the premise is still really unique and interesting, and despite it being an apparent lost media that is rather low quality and only available apparently through an obscure Youtube video, it's still worth watching, as it still has the same blend of humor and silliness that makes the series proper shine, if you can handle its drawbacks.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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Sep 6, 2024
Sailor Moon S, if you ask any Sailor Moon fan, will usually agree that Sailor Moon S is one of the most hyped and exciting seasons of the anime, and a lot of people consider it their favorite. These are also for really good reasons: while the "Inner Senshi" (Mercury through Venus) were established as being kind-hearted, emotional, and "idealistic" (which is a word frequently used to describe them in the season), the Outer Senshi form not only a solid contrast but actually a quite interesting one layered with complexities and nuances. While it should go without saying that Usagi especially has a great deal
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of depth and probably needs no explanation of her character by this point (after all, I spent the two reviews of prior seasons analyzing her character endlessly), the Outer Senshi actually have what are some pretty debatable reasons and philosophies. I have little doubt that this was actually intentional, meant to contrast a sort of cold, unfeeling, but logical and practical approach versus the Inners' "soft" approach to life and kindness. I know this is very divisive in Sailor Moon, but I'm actually perfectly fine with this, because a lot of the Outer Senshi's actions are understandable and reasonable from their perspective, just as the Inners' are.
The main thing to like about the Outer Senshi (of course, besides their cool factor, which they definitely deliver on) is how they deal with the consequences of their actions. They understand that sacrifice is necessary and while they do show little emotion, they actually do seem to feel at least slightly sorry for the people being sacrificed. As this was also literally "their fight" (with the Death Busters being from outer space), I'm also slightly inclined to actually buy the idea that they are truly stronger than the Inners, and that it was intended to be "their fight" (or even "their season", if you will). Additionally, the series has a really unique blend of action and comedy. It arguably coalesces the best parts of Sailor Moon as a whole: their comedy and tense episodes have previously been generally wholly separate, but through Daimons, we get the first season where we're actually truly able to combine these two, with Daimons being over the top and ridiculous, which lets the filler and plot episodes stay "cool" and focus on tense action or drama. This is really refreshing as it hardly happened before, and really gives some leeway to whether an episode or particular fight was outright bad or good. The Death Busters are the same way: the professor is a really interesting and complexly nuanced villain. Even though he may seem like a generic mad scientist (which is true), he's given the same treatment, which nuances him as a character into not just a maniacal madman who can crack jokes, but also into a tense and serious villain who can genuinely amp up tension to terrifying heights rather quickly. This is also mirrored by his and Hotaru (arguably the other star of the season)'s "dual personas", who switch back and forth between their sides, further highlighting their rather interesting relationship with not only the cast, but each other, which only grows more complex and obscure with each passing episode. The Outer Senshi even have to challenge their philosophy with a shocking plot development in the middle of the season that makes one question if they'll re-evaluate their entire direction. The other Death Busters are really interesting and have a great design as well.
Unfortunately, despite all the good that Sailor Moon S has going for it, it's an INCREDIBLY tough sell to make this a truly recommended season due to a multitude of factors. All of those good parts of the series that were just mentioned only come into play when the series actually is on the right footing; otherwise, even the good aspects of the plot (such as a lot of filler episodes) tend to be outright boring and pointless, especially when they're back to back with top notch action.
Even one of the Witches 5, the best part of the season, (Mimete, in particular) takes a staggering 9 episodes of screentime, while Kaolinite and Eudial also stick around a long time. Even though this is really innocuous in of itself, the fact is that Mimete's entire story and pacing brings a whole host of problems and essentially grinds the progress to a screeching halt. The series neither has the chance to nor the timing, pacing, or execution to successfully give both Mimete AND Hotaru the time they deserve to truly flesh out as characters; when one of them has a really good episode, the other suffers, usually by not appearing at all. This is made worse by the fact Hotaru wasn't even in the season before the end of Eudial's arc (which was also rather long, as was Kaolinite's), and Hotaru gets pushed to the side in most of her own episodes even. She has only about 2-3 interactions with any of the Inners (not even in-depth ones at that, mind you), which makes the entire relationship blatantly feel very shallow and superficial, and she hardly even interacts with Usagi herself. It's also extremely tough to establish her relationship to Chibiusa in that timespan; even with Usagi and Mamoru, most fans probably needed around at minimum 30 episodes to build up to the idea of them being together, and the series can't afford to cram all that development into the timeframe given without seriously mangling the plot.
Thus, Sailor Moon S feels very 'cramped': the series struggles to focus on more than one plot point at a time, which is crucial considering how intense the story is, although half the time the actually dangerous and creepy parts never get a chance to be more than a passing mention at a time. Even the other Witches 5, scary or one-dimensional as they are, are completely shoved aside: the last three members of the Witches 5 have their screentime completely consumed, and they only get ONE episode each as a main villain.
Now, I'll say that it's one thing to do this for a monster of the day. After all, Cenicienta was a brief but intimidating villain, but she needed the two-episode buildup to really show that she was a threat, as an example. It's another thing entirely when the actual core of the series' pacing is so bad that the MAIN VILLAINS the series has actually been TRYING to show as threats don't appear as more than silhouettes for more than a single episode, and this is meant literally in the most sincere sense possible. Even the Outer Senshi aren't free from the constraints of this. I mentioned earlier that when they get into plot-relevant action, they show their best stuff, which is definitely true. However, when they DON'T, they wind up useless.
As badass and worth watching for intense drama as the Outers are, they are completely stifled in the latter half of the season. Essentially, they have their inner conflict resolved only halfway through the season. After this, Sailor Moon S seemingly has no clue what to do with them, and they languish practically in limbo, watching the episodes from the sidelines and contributing exactly nothing until it's time for the plot to begin again. I WISH I could say this was an exaggeration, I truly do. But Haruka, Michiru and Setsuna go from interesting, conflicted and flawed characters to....not one-dimensional, for sure. But they lose a lot of their depth and motive to do much of anything besides what the plot requires, and all the buildup and lore in the world can't save them from that.
Overall, Sailor Moon S definitely has a lot of praise to be given as a fan favorite series to many. But it has also has some serious, horrible flaws that prevent it from unlocking its whole potential as one of the true "best of the bests," and I'm afraid the positives, numerous as they are, can't even begin to excuse all of the numerous flaws Sailor Moon S had from the ground up. Others may enjoy this series, and I truly wish I could have as well.
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
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Aug 12, 2024
If the season of Sailor Moon R was arguably better than the first, then the same is true of the Sailor Moon R movie for the R season itself, which improves on the season in a number of ways; namely, the focus seems to be primarily a remake of the Makaijuu arc, with the theme of an alien from outer space and the concept of a bizarre interpretation on love being the most direct influences. Please note that during this review I may not discuss certain plot elements in detail so as to avoid spoilers.
The Sailor Moon R movie's main focus is on Mamoru, and
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more specifically, the origin on how he got his roses and what they may symbolize on a greater scale. While Mamoru's roses did play a significant role in the first anime season, this movie shows how he got his roses and what it means and signifies to another to receive one, and the movie appears to tell a tale of a gift that is able to touch affections across time and space. Along the way to this message, there are many themes covered: the most prominent are loneliness, symbolism, and love, and each of them plays a key role in gleaning the movie's primary message, which may be less obvious than it seems. Fiore's loneliness in the movie is the primary and most striking aspect and is the primary motivation for the events of the movie, which seems to be fueled and manipulated by the jealousy of the evil Xenian Flower. Throughout, Fiore rants about not being betrayed by Mamoru and how everyone else is being deceived by Usagi, which as we know from the series, is wholly incorrect by our current perception. This creates an interesting dynamic that breaks up the usual dynamic (that of Sailor Moon being bailed out of trouble, by this time having Mamoru in a unique contextual situation with Fiore), which results in some much different scenes, such as Sailor Moon being forced to come to terms with her relationship with Mamoru. In a way, this scene also successfully draws parallels between itself and the first season, as they share many of the same themes, messages and even scenes that appear to be NEAR a 1:1 of those found in the series (such as Mamoru being impaled, Usagi's desire to not have more human life be put at risk for her sake, and others). While I am unsure if this was intentional, I believe this works well to reinforce that Usagi is in a similar yet different position to where she was in the first season; the Sailor Senshi also have their backstories before meeting Usagi expanded, and we see their past lives without her, in particular: their loneliness and how being with Usagi shaped them into the type of people they are, which was a really well thought-out addition. While the animation, music, and direction all got a massive step up, I believe the best aspect of the Sailor Moon R movie is none of these and is simply the fact that it feels much more special than a simple movie, likely because of how much care was put in to show the girls' bond and care for each other. Beyond a simple "season-finale"-esque moment, the series perfectly embodies the girls' relationship with each other very quickly and is very easy to become invested in, the same being true for Mamoru and Fiore despite his absence in the series up to this point. One of the most iconic scenes in my opinion is Usagi and Mamoru's decision to refer to each other as their family, which isn't just a sweet moment: it ties back into the core of the latter half of the first season, Mamoru's own struggle with loneliness and Usagi's desperate resolve to save him.
I believe that the Xenian Flower was a wonderful enemy as well for the movie: manipulative, controlling, and seemingly evil, it served perfectly well as a vehicle to drive Fiore's actions and emotional state without one of them overshadowing the other, and it can even be represented as a stand-in for his own conscience. It also works on a symbolic level beautifully, with flowers being an object of nurtured beauty and growth, which is wonderfully inverted.
Overall, the Sailor Moon R movie makes several welcome changes and improvements upon the original, and is a recommendation not simply for all of these elements, but for the fact the movie is enjoyable even without them, and feels right at home, setting a high standard for the anime to upkeep, which it no doubt will. 10/10.
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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