#Chiba Mamoru

[sailormoonandme]

#honestly. i think sometimes that. people just hate to see girls winning (being powerful)#male heroes are almost always paired with weaker women and no one bats an eye#those women have to be saved time and time again and no one bats an eye#and those tropes DO come from sexism where those women are often not characters but plot devices#whereas mamoru is treated like an actual character#and there is absolutely nothing wrong with having the romantic interest being there just for emotional and moral support#as long as they are treated like characters#female romantic interests are not given that treatment most of the time. mamoru is#and sure I LOVE joking about how takeuchi made mamoru pathetic on purpose but#he isn't even THAT pathetic#he just happens to be dating the most powerful being in the whole universe what is he supposed to do? 😭#sailor moon#and of course the fights are not gonna be focused on him#this was written by and for girls guys we're guests here

The vibe I personally got from the above (which I FULLY admit I might be misinterpreting and mean no offence if I have) is that the 'Mamoru is useless crowd' is coming sexist men who are saying it because they myopically expect a man to be strong and dominant and a woman to be weaker and submissive. Again, perhaps that was me misreading the intention behind the statement. However, if that was the intention (or close enough to it) I feel there are some important nuances to be taken under consideration here. Most particularly with the 'this was written by and for girls guys we're guests here'.

The first is that whilst the manga was 100% made for a female audience and happened to catch some male readers too,* the anime (the most famous and influential rendition of the franchise) was not.

Obviously, being the early 1990s you had a predominantly (though it should be noted, not exclusively) male staff who were adapting the source material, chielf among them being the 3 male over all directors of the anime. Their work was also responsive to the actors, and we know that in the case of Mamoru and Rei's voice actors their performance definitely influenced how they were consequently written and characterised.

Finally, the anime was not aimed exclusively at a female demographic, it was casting a wider net. To be certain, young girls was definitely their primary audience, and overwhelmingly so. But they absolutely had a mind towards aiming it at young boys and older family members as well. Whilst reading a manga is 9 times out of 10 a solitary experience, back in the pre-streaming days an anime TV show going out in the evenings was inevitably going to be more of a family affair as it was the glowing box in the corner of the living room everyone shared in.

Moving, on in my observations of the fandom from the last 15 years (I became a fan in 2010) the 'Mamoru is useless' crowd, whether they are saying it scathingly, mockingly or in an attempt at analysis have not overwhelmingly been male fans. As you would expect from a brand made by, about and exclusively/primarily for a female demographic the vast majority of the fanbase are women. Therefore, inevitably, the discourse and narratives surrounding the fandom or brand are almost exclusively generated and perpetuated by them. Of course, there ARE male fans who also perpetuate these narratives as well, but they are ultimately a minority within the fandom.

To be perhaps a bit scathing honestly, rather than coming from a place of prejudice wherein you expect men to be dominant and women to be passive, the 'Mamoru is useless' crowd seem to me to actually come from two places:

a) Post-modern/irony/meme internet culture which seems a bit allergic to sincerity and/or actually engaging with the material in proper context (snarkiness is the golden rule to live by)

b) Prejudice from women towards male characters

And the thing is this isn't really a matter of stereotypes being perpetuated so much as it is a matter of demographics.

The way the 'Mamoru is useless' crowd discuss or treat the character is practically identical to how a contingent of the Spider-Man fandom (which I am deeply familiar with) treat Mary Jane, or how I have observed some Superman fans treat Lois Lane. In both cases they are a minority and I'd like to believe the same is true of the Sailor Moon fandom, with the Mamo-haters being a mere vocal minority.

However, my larger point is this. If you have a franchise made by one gender, about a character of the same gender (especially if it is from their POV), aimed at an audience of the same gender, the audience are inevitably going to be both more sympathetic to their POV and also potentially less sympathetic to their love interest if they are of the opposite gender.

As I said, I am deeply familiar with the Spider-Man fandom (I am talking the comic books as well as adapted media, like I can tell you Mary Jane's ringtone) and honestly the Mamoru-bashers (again most of whom were women) were extremely similar to the Mary Jane-bahsers (most of whom were men).

Obviously, the specifics of their statements varied (though there were commonalities) but it amounted to the same thing.

By default, side with the main character, condemn the love interest whenever they were not 100% supportive and affirming of the main character (even if their point was valid). Maybe Usagi should study more rather than go out on dates. Maybe Peter Parker shouldn't fight the villain when he has a concussion.

Bash the love interest for being pointless to the narrative. 'He just throws roses and leaves!'/'She is just there to look pretty!'

Also bash them if they got 'too involved'**. 'He saves Sailor Moon every episode. This is sexist because it reinforces the idea of damsels-in-distress'/'Why can't Spider-Man psychoanalyse himself? Why does Mary Jane (the psychology major who has known him since he was 18 and, as an actress, is used to getting inside peoples heads) HAVE to be the person who tells him to let go of his crippling guilt (which is connected to childhood trauma) due to not saving someone this issue?'

Zero in on tiny actually insignificant traits or out of context moments of their characters and exaggerate them. See Mamoru being a jerk to Usagi for the first half of the first season when he didn't know her very well and then he NEVER treated her like that ever again for the consequent 170+ episodes/See the same handful of out of context comic book pages where Mary Jane is arguing with Spider-Man

Be utterly ALLERGIC to looking at situation from the love interest's POV. 'Why did Mamoru (the dubass 18 year old kid who grew up a lonely orphan which has given him obcious trust and social skill issues) have to break up with Usagi without telling her the truth! All that happened was he got frequent visions (like the ones that told him about the Silver Crystal in season 1) where a scary disembodied person told him and showed him that if he keeps dating Usagi she and the whole world will die.'/'Why can't Mary Jane stop being an angry bitch and be totally fine and supportive of her husband going out to fight a gang of super powered serial killers whilst he has a concussion and 3 broken ribs?'

This isn't a problem exclusive to either character, fandom or even contingents within the same fandom. Seiya bashers are very much a thing within Sailor Moon fandom. You best believe there are Rose Tyler haters within Doctor Who. Hell, I have seen no end of female Spider-Man readers apply all the above bullet points in the inverse, side with MJ (or whatever female character is in question) whilst bashing Peter Parker without looking at things from his point of view; or just bash Peter in general 'he is SO dumb for doing this thing that actually most people in that same situation with the same knowledge base as he had would do loloolololololololololol'.

It is a very sad and frustrating fact, but the default setting of fandoms is that the average audience member is going to default side with the main character or more frequently whatever character is of their gender, without ever trying to make the leap into looking at the OTHER person's POV.

Finally, I think 90% of the time the tropes and patterns we can observe in how the narratives themselves treat the superhero love interest character are simply a matter of a domino effect.

You are making a superhero story.

What do superheroes do? They save people and/or fight villains. Therefore, the optimal combination is they are saving people from the villains.

What is more engaging to the audience than saving random civilians? Saving characters the audience know.

What is even more engaging than that? Saving someone the audience know and care about.

How do you make them care? By investing time into who the person being saved is.

What is the optimal way of doing that? By making them a supporting character who therefore appears frequently.

What could justify them appearing frequently? They are part of the superhero main character's social circle, which raises the emotional stakes even higher as there will now be a direct personal cost to the hero's failure.

If they are going to be a supporting character probably the role they have in the hero's social circle should be one that naturally lends itself to drama, conflict and emotional engagement, regardless of if they are in jeopordy or not, what should that be? Well, if they are a love interest this means you can tell stories about them building a relationship, having ups and downs in that relationship, deal is jealousy, deal with romantic rivals and attach a subtextual emotional stake for the character's future as this love interest may well be who they marry, have children with, etc. This is therefore potentially even more potent than a friend or parental figure.

Are love and war perrennial topics most human beings are inherently interested in because, as ultimately very smart apes, we have evolved to be violent to survive and/or reproduce offspring so our genetics also survive? Yes we have, which is why sex and violence sells and also why action orientated stories (including superhero fiction) so often incorporates at least some romance elements.

Oh hey, what gender is your superhero going to be? Well, since most superheroes (including Sailor Moon) were created at a time where male or female were the only only two options people knew about or accepted, I guess one of those two. Probably the one I myself am (since statistically most people are cisgender) because it makes it easier for me to write them and writing is incredibly difficult as it is and I need to do it quickly enough to make money and afford food.

So what sexuality are you going to select for them? Well, since most superheroes were ALSO created at a time where heterosexual was the only socially acceptable option, I guess that one. But even if I was able to write my character as not heterosexual, I'd still give them a female love interest if they were male and a male love interest if they were female because statistically most people are heterosexual and/or grew up in a heteronormative society therefore it is very likely I myself have experience dating women (if I am a man) or men (if I am a woman) and I should probably stick with what I know because writing is incredibly difficult as it is and I need to to quickly to earn money to afford food.

Doesn't all the above make it extremely likely that if you are a man writing a superhero story you are going to frequently wind up writing a damsel-in-distress just as a consequence of following what would be the most narratively logical and engaging for your audience? Yes, it would.

Doesn't all the above ALSO make it extremely likely that if you are a woman writing a superhero story, or a man making a 1992 anime adaptation of a superhero created by a woman, you are going to frequently wind up writing a dude-in-distress for the exact same reasons? Yes it would.

Doesn't ever doing the damsel/dude-in-distress trope fundamentally undermine the agency and worth of the love interest character? Only if that is mainly or ALL they amount to, but NOT if they have a character in their own right, even one who's main role in the narrative is as a love interest (much the way Luna's main role is Usagi's mentor or J. Jonah Jameson's main role is Spidey's boss). To single them out because their main role is love interest is, if anything, an example of double standards as the same logic is not applied to any other supporting characters who are not love interests. Obviously, the top priority of any good superhero story is the characterisation and role of the main character, with the supporting characters existing to in fact support them in that capacity, not share truly equal priority. This is why my story is called 'Spider-Man'/'Sailor Moon' as opposed to 'Spider-Man and Mary Jane and J. Jonah Jameson'/'Sailor Moon and Tuxedo Mask and Luna'

Is there any precedence for writing superhero narratives like that, wherein you have supporting characters who' can be good characters in their own right but whose fundamental purpose is to ultimately uphold the main character? Yes there is, for example the Epic of Gilgamesh which is literally over 4000 years old.

It sounds as if criticism of the damsel/dude-in-distres trope should be nuanced and taken on a case by case basis wherein we put the specific narrative under examination into its full and proper context.

.

.

.

...Yes...

You choose a gender for your character. You choose a sexuality for them. You perhaps make the narrative choice to give them a love interest, because romance is a subject human beings have been engaged by love and war since forever, and

*Something some observers (IIRC including Takeuchi herself) attributed to the input from her male editor.

**Obviously as a fan, I DO want Sailor Moon or Spider-Man to be characters mainly saving the day and solving the problem in the story. But there is a balance and nuance to this. If Spider-Man is massively defined by his scientific intelligence I'd expect him to be the one to solve the scientific problem. If Usagi is massively defined by her empathy, I don't want Mamoru's to be the one shooting the heart shaped magic weapon powered by his compassion.

Mamoru is NOT useless in the Anime Part Tri: Power & Worth

Last time we compared Anime and Manga Mamoru's power levels in order to dissect the idea that anime Mamoru, in being less powerful than Usagi is unworthy of being her romantic partner.

However, there was a lot more I wanted to unpack from this particular idea the 'Mamoru is useless' brigade are prone to pushing. Specifically on the very notion of linking power to worthiness.

Power Creep

This is one of my shorter points but, its seems rather insane to suggest that Mamoru needs to be of a minimal power level to be worthy of Usagi.

Usagi in both versions is at least functionally the most powerful entity in the known universe. Even if we go arc by arc, she is almost always the most powerful person on the good guys team. The time period before she obtained the Silver Crystal was only time when the gap in power between herself and the other Senshi was in any way close, and even then it depended on who you were talking about. Mercury was clearly weaker than Usagi, her attack was a glorified smokescreen. Was she unworthy of Usagi's friendship? Were Makoto and Rei the MOST worthy of Usagi's friendship because they were the most powerful Senshi?

Did they all become progressively less worthy of her time and affection as Usagi steadily grew ever more powerful across the series? In Crystal Tokyo, when Usagi could transform the barren frozen Earth into a glittering utopia, did she have 0 friends because she was now just THAT powerful?

Was Star Serious Laser just so powerful that it meant Seiya ranked highest of all for Usagi's affections? After all, I do not see anyone arguing that Seiya was not powerful enough to be worthy of Usagi's love...almost like there is a double standard in play...

And how demeaning of Neo-Queen Serenity, who was so powerful she could terraform a lifeless planet Earth into a glittering utopia, to allow the now incalculably weaker King Endymion to have sex with her and thereby conceive Chibi-Usa.

Or...does this work by you simply have to be of a minimal power level and then you can be worthy of Usagi no matter how powerful she gets?

Please enlighten me fellow Moonies?

Power DOES NOT = Worthiness

Finally...isnt it just plain old reductive to equate power with worthiness?

Sailor moon is a super hero at the end of the day, so let's look at examples from other superhero fiction. In fact, lets look at the most famous example within the genre.

Superman is by far and away the most famous (though not necesarilly popular) of all superheroes across the globe. Superman can fly, has super streangth, super speed, enhanced durability, heat vision, x-ray vision and sometimes can freeze stuff with his breath. And whilst the exact degree of all of those abilities has varied (originally he was stronger than ten men, later he could pull multiple planets at the same time) he has always been mindbogglingly more powerful than even the most elite of human athletes.

And who has he frequently been paired up with from the past 85 years?

Oh, that's right. A human woman, Lois Lane. She might be extraordinary in her own way, but she isn't going to be bench-pressing a tank anytime soon.

Ah, but there are those who reject the most famous superhero couple in pop culture for that very reason, arguing that Superman should instead be with someone who is powerful in their own right like he is. Someone like, say, Wonder Woman?

The problem here being that...well...Wonder Woman is almost always weaker than Superman. By a WIDE margin. At the end of the day, she is incredibly strong but her strength has limits whilst Superman's are in fact dependant upon circumstances. If he absorbes enough yellow sunlight he is functionally limitless in how powerful he can become. So...is Wonder Woman unworthy of Superman too?

Regardless, let's instead turn our attentions to something more comparable to Sailor Moon.

In Dragon Ball Z the Goku and Vegeta and Gohan can annihilate whole Solar Systems but Mary human women, falling for them because of their strong, wilful and aggressive personalities.

In Yu Yu Hakusho, written by Naoko Takeuchi's husband, the main character is a demonic prince basically and falls for a normal human.

How about all the boxers, MMA fighters, wrestlers and action movie stars who marry people who are not in those kinds of professions, people who are physically weaker than them?

All of them unworthy too?

Power DOES NOT = Worthiness, regardless of gender

Ah, but these are all where the man is more powerful. But...if we argue that the situation is different in the reverse...isn't that just a classic (say it with me folks) double standard?

Are we to seriously entertain the rather backwards argument that a man is not worthy of a woman's affection if they are weaker than her?

If so let's look at some other examples.

She Hulk has dated normal humans Wyatt Wingfoot and John Jameson.

Carol Danvers has the power of a star and has fallen in love with War Machinw, who is a man with high tech armour nowhere close to that power level.

Jean Grey has been more powerful than her lovers Cyclops and Wolverine since even before she became the Phoenix, a cosmic entity so powerful it consumes stars for energy.

Wonder Woman has the power of the Greek Gods and her frequent lover, and in her original canon husband, was a regular human soldier.

In Cutey Honey F, the magical girl reboot of the classic 70s anime that helped inspire Sailor Moon, Honey can annihilate and create anything she can want. She is in love with a demonic prince, but ultimately marries a normal man and private eye who always had her back despite being put of this depth with the threats they faced.

And what about all the women in real life who have married, or remained married to men with disabilities? Men who by any metric are physically weaker than their wives? For example, all the women that married or remained married to soldiers who were horribly injured during either World War? Or, any of the wives of Stephen Hawkins, with even his first wife aware of his illness.

All of which is to say...maybe Mamo is worthy of Usagi's love regardless of him being less powerful than her.

Conclusion

Mamoru in the anime...

Is.

Not.

Useless.

Please.

For.

The.

Love.

Of.

<insert whatever/whomever you worship here>.

Fucking.

Stop.

Claiming.

He.

Is.

[animeglitch]

[thesailorguardians]

Wake up. It's a new Sailor Moon art

[cometblaster2070]

so basically mamoru chiba aka tuxedo mask is just a version of batman where bruce wayne decided to finish med school in this essay I will-

[dailytuxedomask]

[kideaternomnom]

UsaMamo/Mamoru antis: “Mamoru is such a bad boyfriend!” “He is too cold and abusive!” “He’s like a dad to Usagi more than a partner”

Usagi’s literal fcking canon thoughts:

[mostlyfate]

PRETTY GUARDIAN SAILOR MOON (2003) | Act. 14

[sailorheadcanons]

Serenity and Endymion would frequent a small candy stand when they went to earth. It was on the same spot that the Game Center Crown stands on.

[sorakazeno]

Mamoru vs. Seiya

I found this picture in a Facebook group years ago. Unfortunately I have no idea who the artist is. If you know please let me know and I will update and credit.

Sooo... Mamoru looks like he's interrupting something serious happening between Seiya and Usagi.

This artwork might have influenced some of the dynamic between these two when I was writing the second arc (Black Moon) of Chaos Theory.

This would have been such an interesting storyline in the 90s anime if the Starlights didn't leave to go back to Kinmoku.

Happy Sunday!

Back to outlining more chapters!

[rei-does-stuff]

I’m having so much fun with these TRANSFEM MAMORU IS REAL AND TRUE!!!

[lycheestar1]

I felt disappointed Mamoru wasn't in the Sailor Moon x Sanrio collab, so I drew my own art with Chococat as his partner. ૮꒰ ˶• ༝ •˶꒱ა🌹

[sailormoonandme]

Mamoru is NOT useless in the Anime

Yes, yes, the memes are funny and all, but this is simply objectively not true and I'm rather exhausted of folks critiquing the character/the anime as though it were.

I will hopefully kill his BS once and for all.

"He just throws a rose and leaves!"

For those who have actually watched the anime (or even just the very first episode) to describe Tuxedo Mask as 'useless' is reductionist to the point of being outright disingenuous. In particular when this argument is made in such a way as to negatively compare him to his manga counterpart, who is put over as allegedly superior on this point.

The original 1992 Sailor Moon anime had 200 episodes, 3 TV specials*, 2 theatrical shorts and 3 films, with these latter theatrical releases being dubiously canonical to the anime. Mamoru appears in the overwhelming majority of those 208 entires, even accounting for the final 34 episodes where he was dead/functionally absent almost all of the time. Even if we seriously low balled things, the majority of those appearances feature him partaking in the following scenario.

Sailor Moon, often with her fellow Senshi, are fighting the monster of the day (maybe it's a higher ranking villain, or a general threat they are dealing with).

They get into a tight spot where either they or whoever/whatever they are trying to protect is in danger from whatever threat they are combatting.

Then, out of the blue, a rose slices through the air and imbeds itself into the scenery like a dart. Typically, this action saves the lives of Sailor Moon, her friends or whomever they might be protecting.

Tuxedo mask gives a speech and either leaves or else sticks around to see Sailor Moon perform her finishing move that effectively ends whatever threat she was dealing with, often with Tuxedo Mask being the one to prompt her into performing this finshing move.

For the sake of argument lets pretend that the above is literally the sum totality of what Mamoru does in regards to the superheroics of Sailor Moon. How could anyone describe the above as 'useless'?

If his interventions regularly save Sailor Moon's life then that is a zillion miles away from useless. For him to be useless, his actions need to be superfluous, pointless, contribute nothing. Even if he contributed a little bit he would by definition not be useless. And saving the protagonist's life is much more than 'a little bit'. If the protagonist dies then the story is over. Evil has won, the world is doomed.

And this isn't even considering all the ways Mamoru contributes OUTSIDE of the above scenario.

He has, whilst untransformed, stabbed a Lemures with a knife to save Sailor Moon.

He has willingly acted as a magical life support system for Chibi-Usa when her Pure Heart was stolen, an act that maybe anyone else could have performed but it is still a noble thing to do, in particular when it freed up the more powerful characters to go get her heart back.

He personally met up with the Outer Senshi to learn about them on behalf of the other girls, going alone which might have been dangerous, but the episode also gives the impression that he, as the oldest member of the team, was better positioned to get info from the older Outer Senshi who has a demeaning view of the younger Inner Senshi. In this same episode, he tried to convince the Outers to join forces with the Inners, acting as a diplomat.

He went 1-on-1 with Rubeus to defend an injured Sailor Moon who was herself acting as a human shield for Chibi-Usa

He has personally gone on a one man mission to infiltrate the Black Moon Clan's HQ to rescue Sailor Moon from being sexually assaulted by Prince Demande.

Mere episodes later he and Artemis went on a scouting mission to learn more about the Malefic Black Crystal

He formed a double team with Sailor Moon to tackle a tennis themed Youma, an encounter that involved more than a singular rose throw and a speech. One of the multiple times he got more directly involved in fighting the monster of the day

He literally carried Sailor Moon on his back to save her when they were both trapped in an elevator courtesy of Nephrite

He was prepared to willingly reveal his identity and hand both himself and his Rainbow Crystals over to Zoisite in order to save Sailor Moon and her friends

The love he shared with Usagi directly led to the manifestation of the Silver Crystal, to the salvation of Chibi-Usa when she'd been brainwashed into Black Lady & the creation of a new weapon and transformation brooch for Usagi in season 3

As Prince Endymion, he went against his own subjects and risked his life to infiltrate the Moon Palace and warn his beloved Serenity that his home planet was going to invade her home

He took not one, not two, but three impalements to protect Sailor Moon's life

More often than not he has acted as reliable emotional support for Usagi and Chibi-Usa, encouraging them, helping them with homework or just being there for them. i.e. he is an imperfect, but ultimately good husband and father. Which is particularly impressive considering he hadn't yet married his wife nor conceived his child.

There are those who might scoff at the latter. Is emotional support really useful? Well, putting aside how the Sailor Moon universe clearly demonstrates how magical power/energy is directly linked to emotions, this is categorically true in the real world as well. There are no end of testimonies from fire fighters, doctors, people who have serious illnesses, or soldiers that the emotional support of thier loved ones have kept them going and kept them alive. So, this is rather useful for our heroine Usagi who's job is that of a Sailor Soldier.

The Outer Senshi

Furthermore, there is an inherent hypocrisy in the 'Mamoru is useless' narrative because such criticisms are never levelled against other characters whose typical role in the narrative are similar to Mamoru's.

The most popular season of the original anime was season 3 (Sailor Moon S) and one of the biggest reasons for that show's popularity were the fan favourite Outer Senshi: Sailors Uranus, Neptune, Pluto and Saturn. Let's exclude Saturn as she wasn't active as a Senshi for most of season 3. Uranus and Neptune's role in the first half of season 3 typically amounted to

Attacking the monster of the day, usually to the same end that Mamoru's rose throws did, i.e. a distraction or last minute save

Swiping the Pure Heart of that episode's victim

Checking it over before concluding it wasn't a Talisman

Leaving, or else at least standing by as Sailor Moon administered her finishing move on the monster of the day

Golly...that seems just as 'useless' as Mamoru now doesn't it? In fact, maybe more so considering they weren't even trying to help Sailor Moon in the first place. In fact, during their second appearance, they unintentionally saved the lives of a powerless Usagi, her friends and an innocent civilian to check a Pure Heart, then uncaringly left them all in danger.

You know who then saved them immediately after that? Mamoru!

Later when he too was overwhelmed by the monster he directly contributed to saving the day as his emotional bond with Usagi generated the Spiral Moon Heart Rod, upgrading Sailor Moon and giving her the power to save everyone.

During the third sub-arc of season 3 (where the recurring villain was Mimet of the Witches 5) Sailor Pluto joined the Outer Senshi's ranks and their role in the typical monster of the day plots became yet more minimal. More than once, the trio literally appeared but did nothing, something that had also happened at least once before Pluto joined the team. Examples include (but are not necessarily limited to) episodes 97 (The Labyrinth of Water – Ami Targeted), 116 (Sunny Skies After a Storm – A Friendship Dedicated to Hotaru) and 118 (Battle Inside the Demonic Space – The Sailor Guardians’ Gamble). In some of these instances the Outers deliberately choose to do nothing.

Barring 2 of the specials mentioned above (one of which was a clip show), the Outer Senshi were wholly absent in season 4/Sailor Moon SuperS. In one of those specials, upon learning that a new threat had arisen Uranus and Neptune...choose to continue their road trip and leave the fighting to Usagi and the others...How...useful???????

They, along with Pluto and Saturn get much more involved during the course of the final season/Sailor Stars. Even then, Saturn only appears in the first few episodes and the last few. Pluto only gets involved in the monster of the day schemes once or twice and Uranus and Neptune three or four times, if that. Whilst Mamoru is barely involved at all in this season, he at least has the excuse of being dead for most of it.

So, the fan favourite Outer Senshi got far LESS involved and were LESS useful than Mamoru typically was in the course of the whole show. In fact, even if we exclude the first two seasons where (exempting Pluto) the Outer Senshi hadn't appeared yet, Mamoru overwhelmingly contributed MORE than the Outer Senshi did.**

The Other Senshi

Much the same can be applied to the Sailor Starlights. The Starlights more often than not actually got MORE involved in fighting the monsters of the day during season 5 than the Outer Senshi did in season 3; or at least they were interested in defusing a direct and active threat to innocent lives. But even they literally showed up and did nothing on at least one occasion.

Whilst the Starlights are nowhere close to the Outer Senshi's popularity, they are also never subjected to the 'they are useless' narrative Mamoru frequently is.

Nor in fact are the Inner Senshi of Sailors venus, Mars, Jupiter and Mercury. Now, whilst it's easy to argue due to their superior screentime, the fact that they often initiate combat with the monster of the day and are generally heavily involved in whatever crisis is happening, that they are obviously more useful than Mamoru is.

And you know what, even including the rare occasions they too show up and do nothing else (or do a last minute save like Mamoru is prone to do) this is perfectly true. It is also perfectly true however that the quartet have rarely ever defeated any monster of the day on their own. The overwhelming majority of the time the Inner Senshi act as a distraction to the Monster of the day or else sufficiently lower its HP so that Sailor Moon can actually beat the monster. That might be more useful than Mamoru's typical contributions, but, call me crazy, it seems like Sailor Moon is doing the lion's share of the work there. So, how 'useful' are the Inner Senshi really if we run by the 'Mamoru is useless' narrative?

If Mamoru is useless so are many if not all of the more popular heroic characters in the series.

But...how useless is Mamoru in the anime compared to the Manga?????????

*Well, one special with three segments, but go with me on this.

**They were mostly absent from season 4 whilst he appeared routinely in that season. Meanwhile, in the season he was mostly absent, they rarely helped out.

Obviously, there are real life writing reasons behind that difference, but my point is why is the fandom not treating the Outer Senshi as 'useless' too?

[animeglitch]

[mostly-magical-polls]

Best Magical Boy - Round 1

[xhaperi]

One day, I will make some stickers out of it

[dailytuxedomask]