There are also attempts to fool the audience (Serenity, Moonlight Knight) which I think are funny but I understand are just meant for kids who have fun being able to guess what’s really going on.

As for Beryl and Mamoru vs. Mamoru and Rei there isn’t really a fundamental difference. Just sort of wondering if anyone actually ships Beryl and him together? It’s simply not something I see people posting about. I have no problem with her having feelings for him. On the contrary it would be nice to see it explored more. Simply commenting on the lack of fan appreciation for that coupling. It may have something more to do with the whole brainwashing nature of the relationship. Mamoru returned Rei’s affections. He does not return Beryl’s. Not without some mind control on her part.

I’m a “gay male” and I don’t think he read too much into it at all. I haven’t seen Sailor Moon Crystal, but Motoki is shown hanging all over Endou in the comic book, just like in the picture in this blog posting. I’ve always thought there was an obvious, unsettling homosexual overtone between them that made Endou even more creepy – like he and Motoki are flirting with each other right in front of Usagi. Remember, Usagi also had feelings for Motoki. Seeing the two guys she has feelings for interacting with each other like that must have made her even more uncomfortable. “Endou” is trying to torture her. I always thought that was one of the ways he was doing it.

(And I do think Takeuchi did it in purpose.)

“I never thought they were meant to be seen as gay when I read the manga considering Motoki is in love with Reika and had made comments about how cute Usagi and her friends were in previous volumes.”

First of all, that’s not really Motoki – he’s possessed by Endymion. Endymion’s controlling him. The way Motoki acts when he’s possessed has nothing to do with the way he feels when he’s not possessed.

And secondly, he didn’t say they were “gay”, he said their _relationship_ was “a bit gay”. “Homosexuality” doesn’t mean “gay people”. It more correctly refers to actions, feelings, and situations, not to people.

It seems you might not understand the correct use of that terminology. You pointed out that cross-dressing doesn’t necessarily mean someone is “gay”. Two people having homosexual interactions (like Motoki and Endou, or Rei and Minako who are sometimes shown hanging all over each other) also doesn’t mean they’re “gay”. That’s why he said their “relationship” was “a bit gay”, not that the characters were.

“Homosexuality” doesn’t specifically describe people (even though it’s most often used that way, as in “a homosexual male”). It describes _interactions_ between people. Check it out on Wikipedia if this doesn’t make sense – it says “Homosexuality…is romantic attraction, sexual attraction or sexual behavior between members of the same sex or gender.” Two males touching each other in a way that others might identify as “sexual” is “homosexual” even if the two men identify as “straight” and feel no sexual attraction to each other at all.

I noticed (and appreciate) that the author of this blog knows how to use the terminology correctly and was very careful in the way he phrased what he said.

“And what gay villains were there in the first story arc of the manga?”

Again, he said “Indeed the examples of homosexuality in the first arc of the manga and subsequently the first season of the anime, are amongst villains,” not “all the gay peoplez wuz evil”. He was referring to Motoki and Endou in the comic and Zoisite and Kunzite in the cartoon.

“Also, it seems a bit of a double standard that the author is a big Rei/Mamoru fan even though they’re non-canon and are never going to happen yet dismisses Beryl’s feelings for Mamoru even though it’s always been canon. Does the author give any reason why they don’t like Beryl’s feelings for Mamoru? They’re as legit as Rei’s brief dating in the first anime if not more so as they’re both girls who had feelings for Mamoru but lost him to Usagi.”

He didn’t “dismiss” her feelings for him. He asked if there were any people who “shipped” them as a couple – meaning, if there were people who actively wanted them to get together. I’d be curious to know the answer to that question, too, because I’ve never been able to envision them as a couple either. Once again, I think Takeuchi did that on purpose. It’s a tragedy, after all – we can tell that no matter what happened, Endymion was never going to love Beryl, and, in my opinion, that they wouldn’t have made a good couple anyway.

His thinking that Rei and Mamoru make a good couple is not a “double standard”, and it has nothing to do with the gross overuse of the term “canon” as an adjective. (The word is “canonical”.)

I think you’re reading things into this post that aren’t there.