#i tried to find as much as i could likethis is 200 episodes + Crystal + various artist alongside ADs and CDs

[crystalbehindthescenes]

Sorry, but what's the difference between Rei's hairstyles?

This post got very long

Naoko has like 3 ways of drawing depending on when she’s rushed, habit, or when she has time, and just her style changes throughout the years.

In older art like the Prototypes and Tankoban and majority of Arc 1 and 2, Rei’s hair was pretty straight and wide, her bangs swoop to the side like Makoto and Minako but covers majority of her forehead and ears. There was a rogue strand of hair from time to time, sometimes Rei’s hair is in a part, sometimes it’s not

This is what Tadano used when designing SM Classic, Naoko has more free reign to change Rei’s hair cus it’s a manga but since anime is well, animated, the other 90s CDs were all kind of stuck with the designs Tadano left them with. 

Tadano

Tominaga

Itoh

(This is Sailor Stars settei but this is Itoh’s style)

Tamegai

Tamegai’s style in Stars is a little special cus he yeets most of Tadano’s style out the window and uses Naoko style at the time for the most reference, even the settei for Eternal Sailor Moon is strikingly similar to the one Naoko made.

anyway;

Naoko’s early style, early 90s.

Later on Rei’s hair gets more “round” and curves inward similar to Ami and it’s not as flat (most of her hair drawings end up losing that straighter look) and Rei’s bangs usually ends in a big ol puff. Usually when she’s rushed Naoko draws everyones hair in that kind of way. I wanna say you see this style around Arc 3 and later on. 

Shinsoban takes this later style but is just basically softer and cuter, same for Kanzenban but that tries to go back to the roots and makes Rei’s hair a lot straighter and flatter compared to everyone else. The bangs now open in a part. There is the occasional rogue strand. 

Crystal is tricky cus you need to know where Sakou gets the inspiration from. Which is Kanzenban and inside the manga (where Rei’s hair comes out in the puff more often than the covers and splash pages), and then you gotta know the later designers; Takahashi and Tadano take from the previous style.

Like the 90s, the CDs of Crystal were all kind of stuck with the designs Sakou left them with while they add their own spin to it

So Sakou as we all know takes from Kanzenban but also from various forms of Naoko’s style during the years. And Tadano and Takahashi just follow suit so there’s not much difference between Sakou and Takahashi outside of artstyle. . While the artstyle may have changed, the designs really haven’t. So Takahashi still draws Rei’s hair strands coming inward, like Sakou, so I feel Tadano might do the same? 

There’s a very boxy style to Sakou’s designs, more use of squares than circles.

Takahashi 

(Sakou)

The art we see in the game art is that Rei’s hair seems to be taking inspo from the 90s more-so with the bangs covering her entire forehead, how it curves backward like Minako, instead of inward like Ami and the lack of a part, the shape being more Itoh or Tamegai based, this game style feels very 90s style but late-in-the-series 90s style. I can’t pinpoint it exactly… but since we have Sakou and Takahashi together to compare I can’t see the Crystal style besides the zigzag highlight on every strand (Sakou defintely, Tadano and most of teh 90s anime’s zig zag highlights took up the hair in a rectangular way) and the color.

Oddly enough now that I stare at it, it kind of reminds me of Fukano’s style, maybe even Tominaga?? 

There’s definitely more 90s in this design more than Crystal, imo