#crystalminuscaps

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I do enjoy being pandered to with nostalgic imagery, but it also would've been neat to get something brand new.

What an absolute delight to see Hotaru happy after all these years of grim duty and tragedy.

More nostalgia.

Okay, I think I ship this. Unless they're supposed to be siblings, but they seem extra cuddly. I feel like I rarely know in this franchise when the cousins are actually lesbians and when the devoted and emotionally intimate men really are brothers even in the original. The 90's dub left lasting doubt in me.

This affected me a bit.

This also stirred something in me, which caught me by surprise.

And this affected me a lot.

If I'm being honest, I don't think my deepest heart is truly awake enough to fully appreciate this, but I definitely enjoyed it.

I'm probably gonna need repeat viewings, supplemental materials, and meta analysis to fully understand all of the details. The time travel seems to be a confusing mix of Back to the Future rules and Trunks rules.

I'm thankful that the story was able to be finished at all, but I still would've preferred seasons over movies. There's something to be said for that time spent between episodes, dangling on a cliffhanger, hyping and theorizing about what's to come, as well as for the time spent falling in love with the character and transformation music as it repeats each week.

Yasuharu Takanashi has definitely left a lasting impression on me. I caught half an episode of Boruto that my mom and step-dad were watching and immediately both recognized his style and enjoyed the score. And I definitely loved his work in Cosmos, even though I'm realizing that having time to sit with the music between episodes and hear certain themes repeat lets me savor the flavor even more.

Then there's also the time to let story beats breathe and the time to let characters make more of an impression.

It's been about ten years of hoping to see the missing Animamates fully realized, and most of them got the approximate screen time of a 90's monster-of-the-week (or less.) And I'm assuming their roles weren't very big in the manga (I can finally let myself read that now!) either, like how the Spectre Sisters had smaller roles in the Black Moon Arc than in the 90's counterpart, but I still feel like even they had a bit more presence than most of the Animamates got in this movie. Maybe it's more due to the time in between with the fandom making posts and art than the actual screen time, but either way I don't feel like I got enough of them.

At the end of the day we got what we got and I'm still grateful for it. When I first got on Tumblr in 2011, Crystal hadn't even been announced. As far as any of us knew, the 90's anime was all we would ever get and those manga-exclusive characters and scenes would forever stay in the manga. I remember the hype for this. I remember the bickering about this. I remember when we weren't even sure if the third and fourth arcs were going to happen at all, let alone the fifth. I remember the long and bumpy ride it's taken to finally get here. (Much as I've come to appreciate a little time between installments, ten years for five arcs is perhaps too far in the other direction.) This franchise had already given me a lot of memories and the last ten years with this reboot series have made even more.

I look forward to binge-rewatching the series as a whole, probably the English dub next time. It's gonna feel weird not having a new installment of this reboot to look forward to anymore. I'm really not sure how to process that fact right now.

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In general, the 90's anime would be my recommendation, but I may be biased because that's where I started. It can also depend on what kind of stuff you like. The 90's anime is very episodic and character-driven, with slice of life and humor elements, though the plot really pops off sometimes. Crystal and the Manga are much more plot-focused in general, with slice of life character stuff being relatively rarer (especially in later arcs) though not absent. I haven't seen all of PGSM, but I remember it being a little more slice of life than Crystal, while also a little more plot-focused than most of the 90's arcs. The 90's anime is the longest; the others are shorter. Any of them would probably be fine, as each is designed to be its own story. If you're drawn to one, just start there and then decide if you want to see what other versions did with their take on things.

if i wanted to get into sailor moon, where should i start? codename sailor v, the original manga, the 90s anime, the live action adaptation, the crystal movies, or is there a secret 6th option? i've absorbed enough knowledge through cultural osmosis (your blog) to become interested in the series but i have no idea where to start

You know, this is such a tough question because I don't think you can go wrong with any of these options. I would personally do the manga or 90s anime first, though.

Codename Sailor V is very cute and fun, but it's definitely not required reading material to start Sailor Moon (in fact, Naoko Takeuchi didn't even finish the series until after Sailor Moon ended). PGSM (the live-action adaptation of the first arc) is amazing, but I also think it's something you'd enjoy more having seen the anime/manga; what makes PGSM so cool is how it deviates from and expands on the source material, so you'd definitely enjoy it more if you were familiar with said source material.

You know what, just for fun, I'm gonna have my followers weigh in!

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Finally some confirmation. The Sailor Moon Eternal movies are coming to Netflix.

Now for the second time in three days I can use this reaction gif:

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Spotted at Wal-Mart.

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Crystal S3 available for pre-order and English version of the Perfect Edition Manga is coming

Viz announced the next set of English dubbed/subbed Sailor Moon Crystal Blu-rays today. Releasing December 2017. Pre-order early for their usual suncatcher GWP. RightStuf Link

They also mentioned that Kodansha is releasing the new "Eternal Edition" of the Manga starting in January 2018. Evidently the Amazan pre-order page has been up for a little bit. This is based on the Japanese "Perfect Edition," with premium white paper, the larger size (7" x 10"), collected into ten volumes, and is said to feature a new, revised translation.

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If I remember correctly, the newest edition of the manga - the one SMC has been following act by act - has a total of 11 chapters/acts, the first one of which is double-length (similarly to the Infinity arc), while the remaining ten are standard length. That would give as a total of 12 episodes of a tv series. The duration of one whole episode minus OP/ED is 20 min. 12 x 20 min. = 240 min. So, two 120 min. movies could easily cover 12 episodes' worth of material without any cuts.

Sounds promising. Assuming we do actually get 120 minutes and not 90 minutes each. I’ve been seeing people expressing concern that there won’t be enough time for everything in the Dream arc, but since I still haven’t read the manga, I’m kind of just having to take everybody’s word for it. It’s a little confusing among the fandom right now, but most of what I’m seeing is people who were concerned that they’d have trouble squeezing everything into a regular season and now they’re doubly concerned about squeezing it all into two movies.

(At this point, I probably won’t read the manga until after Crystal is done. Or at least not read past the point that Crystal has gotten to. I can’t count the number of movies that fell flat for me because I read the book first. I’d like my first experience with each arc to be Crystal and then I’ll read the manga after.)

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Plus, having an equivalent of six episodes (except that made with a movie budget level of animation) to devour once or twice a year seems more appealing than having to wait week by week for every new episode and with a perspective of the inevitable wonky animation somewhere along the way.

I do get the appeal of the binge watch. Waiting a week or more between episodes makes it difficult to maintain enthusiasm. I love the Netflix approach of just dropping a bunch of episodes at once. Or even the Carmilla season 3 approach of releasing the season in three large batches. Two movies isn’t radically different to that and I’ll enjoy that aspect.

However, while I’ve yet to read the manga, I hear that the Dream/Dead Moon arc is particularly dense and packed with character development. At the most optimistic estimate, each movie might be two hours, for a total of 240 minutes, which is still a little over half an hour less screen time than a 13 episode season, for an arc that is said to cover more material than any of the others. And that’s if we get two hour movies.

Personally, I’d rather put up with a bit of wonky animation and all the waiting between episodes if it meant more content in the long run.

It doesn’t really matter though because the milk’s already spilt and we’re gonna get whatever we’re gonna get. I’m sure I’ll enjoy the movies, but I just wish Crystal hadn’t had so many missteps, you know?

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I mean, the 90's anime is still the only one I've fully seen, so...

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Toei Exec 1: We just can't seem to grow a fan base for Sailor Moon Crystal.

Toei Exec 2: I have an idea. You know how season one started out online, then season three was online and on TV?

TE1: Yes.

TE2: Let's take it off of every platform everyone has ever watched it on.

TE1: Sounds promising.

TE2: Then we make it so people have to leave the comfort of their homes and spend extra money to see it.

TE1: Interesting concept. What else ya got?

TE2: You know how international audiences had a subtitled version to watch right away?

TE1: Yes.

TE2: Instead of that, let's make them wait months before they can see it legally at all.

TE1: Genius! This is surely the best possible way to grow the audience for it. I see no flaws in this approach at all.

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i haven't watched sailor moon crystal in a really long time. since the 2nd season which i never finished. what's a better site than cruncyroll to watch on?

I don’t know about “better,” but https://www.viz.com/sailormoon lets you watch them all via Hulu player.

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Parts of my innner monologue lately, as spoken by some of my favorite fictional characters.

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I still say Act 25 was great and I wish they'd tried to refine that style rather than just imitating the 90's anime style...which I can already get by watching the 90's anime. That being said, the Eternal movies are probably the best Sailor Moon has ever looked.

What was it like being a Sailor Moon fan when Crystal first came out?

DRAMATIC. There was lots of drama and infighting because the first season of Crystal had infamously wonky animation (that was later largely fixed in the Blu-ray release), so the fandom was split into camps of people who defended Crystal, people who bashed it, and people who fell in-between. I was one of the defenders of Crystal, btw.

I still feel like the hate towards Crystal was overblown, but I do agree that Toei dropped the ball. If only we could have gotten the season 3 or Eternal animation from the beginning, Crystal would have a much better reputation in the fandom. I still wish it could have gone better and the fandom could have celebrated as one, but Toei's mishandling ruined the chances of that, lol.

So my memories of the first season of Crystal aren't very bright, but I still had some good times!

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Wow, Netflix won't even let me take a screenshot to add to this post. (Meanwhile there are already at least 5 torrents of the movies, so this inconvenience serves no actual worthwhile function.)

So anyway, that was the Dream Arc. I'd heard for a long time that this arc was one of the most changed arcs in the 90's anime. As someone who has not yet read the Manga, there definitely were a lot of things here that I never saw in the 90's version. It was an enjoyable watch, to be sure.

I mostly just find myself wishing there had been more of it. These movies throw a lot of concepts out there and I wish they would have delved a bit deeper into each of the ideas. Like, oh Sailor Crystals, can we learn more? No? Oh, Phobos and Deimos have human forms, care to explain? No? And there's Artemis' human form? Are we gonna talk about it or just accept it? Who are these priestesses with Usagi's hair? And I haven't been living under a rock so I knew the Amazoness Quartet were some kind of senshi. When Saturn was telling them to wake up I got interested. I was really hoping there'd be a bit more for them as senshi than just showing up at the end and peacing out.

I remember seeing discussions, back when it was first announced that this arc was being adapted into movies instead of episodes, where people were worrying that there wouldn't be enough screentime to go into everything. I don't know the precise nature of what was left out, included, or changed, but I will say that these movies felt somewhat condensed. Like they tried to pack a lot of stuff into the screentime they had. Maybe the Manga's just like that, tossing out ideas at a mile a minute, never stopping to dig deeper into any of it, but I have my doubts. I remember people hoping optimistically that each movie might be two hours, which would amount to almost the same amount of screentime as a season's worth of episodes. Neither movie even reaches a full 90 minutes, let alone 120, so I can only assume a lot of stuff was either compressed or cut.

One of these days I'll read the Manga. I bought the books back around the time of Crystal S3, but I told myself I'd wait and let Crystal be my first experience of the story and then get into comparing them. Little did I know I'd be waiting five years just to get the Dream Arc (and who knows if the Stars Arc will even get an adaptation?)

At any rate, I do kind of wish this could have been a series of episodes. For the increase in screentime and also just to put a little space between the events. Especially the parts where the inner senshi were discovering their Sailor Crystals started to feel kind of repetitive in this format, but if they'd been separate episodes it probably wouldn't have had quite the same effect.

And it seems odd to me that the inners weren't talking to each other about the Sailor Crystals. Maybe if they'd presented it in a way to suggest each senshi was discovering her Crystal at the same time it would've minimized the repetitive sense, as well as explaining why none of them would let the others know to expect this kind of thing.

But those are all just my nitpicks. On the whole it was an engaging and entertaining experience. I enjoyed watching it. Most of my concerns are just that I wanted even more of it.

Hopefully it won't be another five years waiting for the Stars Arc because I'm looking forward to experiencing the Crystal/Eternal version of that story as well.

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Yes, I've just checked and it turns out all the Digimon Tri files saved to my computer have a one day earlier date than the official premiere dates listed on MAL. That's why I'm optimistic about SMC as well; there's no way all those official streaming sites would want to wait for Sailor Moon of all things, knowing how popular the franchise is, and I also don't think Toei would make any problems with its international distribution.

Fair enough. I hope they do that.

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Why would they make international fans wait for the movies though? The Digimon movies are available online with English subs (in an episodic format at that) the very same day they have their premiere in theaters in Japan and it's the same damn animation studio. I'm sure they know Sailor Moon is more popular internationally than Digimon can ever dream to be and streaming sites like CR will want to have SMC as soon as possible to share with their viewers.

Was Digimon same day? I thought it was later? (I don’t follow the franchise, but I saw a post where someone else was making the comparison.)

At any rate, like I said in the tags, I really hope my post ages poorly. If the Dream arc movies get a same day online release for international fans, then that would be lovely.