It’s been a while since I made one of these, last time it was talking about my favorite romantic couples and that was fun. So I figured I would go back to Sailor Moon, but this time just put out my opinions on the series in general.
The next thing I want to talk about is the manga, which I have some history with. You see, as a kid I couldn’t get into the manga, the art threw me for a loop and stayed away from it. I couldn’t tell you why the art was the reason I didn’t read it, it was just me being a weird kid. Flash forward to today and not only do I love the art of the manga but I enjoy the darker tone with the manga being a cosmic horror story with romance. If the anime is more Super Sentai, then the manga is more Kamen Rider by comparison, I think it’s a matter of which do you like more.
Finally we get to Sailor Moon Crystal, easily the most divisive piece of Sailor Moon media in my opinion. I for one never hated the show, I hated how Toei handled it in the beginning (Same with Dragon Ball Super around the same time), the poor animation and bi-weekly schedule was not cutting it, and it left a bitter taste in many fans mouths. I kinda like the art style of the first two seasons, as it’s the most faithful to the manga, though I don’t know if it translates well to anime. Fortunately Crystal would get better with season three and the Eternal and Cosmos movies, not gonna lie I was worried with how Crystal started we wouldn’t see it finished but I’m glad the production team powered through it. Overall I approve of this adaptation of the manga.
Now I know there’s more Sailor Moon stuff out there, but I unfortunately haven’t seen the other stuff so I’ll just briefly talk about them here. The musicals I hear are pretty good, and there’s so many and they’re still going. Many fans proclaim that the live action show is arguably the best thing to come from the series, which also proves Sailor Moon can do live action stuff. And I’ve never played any of the games, whether they be the Game Boy or Super Nintendo games, maybe a new Sailor Moon game could fix that? Or a Sailor V adaptation? One can only hope, and hopefully good things are in store for the series going forward.
It's interesting I was planning on making a couple of Toei SM review blogs myself once I finished my fifth watch through of the series (on Stars atm. It's interesting to see your opinions on the series you've seen so I will go through my thoughts on the six main versions of the series
ReplyDeleteToei Sailor Moon: Without spoiling my reviews a ton, I don't really agree with your views on filler, I think the series is bloated and also can be rather mean-spirited, particularly towards Usagi. With that said the Toei Anime serves a special place in my heart and has a ton of fantastic episodes as well as being by far the most iconic and influential Magical Girl series of all time.
Manga: The Manga is my favorite series of all time obviously and you've seen my Chapter by Chapter review blogs so you know why.
Crystal: I agree that the hate for Crystal was definitely overblown. That said the two times I've watched Crystal in its entirety most of the time I was kind of thinking "why am I not just reading the manga." There are plenty of things I like in Crystal but 99% of the time they were in the manga. Because I am more of a comics/manga person, to me Crystal is very often "the Manga, expect slower and the first arc is worse."
PGSM: Easily the best overall characterization for the Guardian Senshi. It's not untouchable, Episodes 173-174 from Toei Anime or like Chapter 40 from the Manga I think reach the same level but it's consistently great character writing if that's what you want. You do kinda have to look past the fact that the special effects budget was just nonexistent and Sailor Luna can be... a bit much
Sera Myu: Really fun. Stage 1 has some problems cause they didn't know what they were doing yet (adult humans in Luna/Artemis costumes in the first Musical is pretty weird) but you get a lot of cool stuff you don't get anywhere else as well as a super underrated version of Tuxedo Kamen. Like my second favorite version after the Manga.
Another Story: Basically just fanservice if you already love the franchise mostly based on the anime with some manga references and a ton of references to the first three arcs. It has some weird JRPG grinding and difficult spikes and flows but I love even this very slight attempt to create a Sailor Moon Mythos involving multiple series.