A reunion special for the live action Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon series will air on Japanese TV on Christmas Day

Posted on December 7, 2023 by Adam

Fantastic news for fans of the live action Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon series! The original cast, Miyuu Sawai, Rika Izumi, Keiko Kitagawa, Mew Azama and Ayaka Komatsu, will appear in a live action series reunion which will be broadcast on Christmas day. In this look back at their time working on the series, known as PGSM or Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon to many fans, the cast will reminisce on their time auditioning and becoming friends while filming the show in 2003 and 2004.

This special will be broadcast on CBC Television (no relation to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation). I saw some discussion on Twitter where some fans in Japan were upset that this particular station is not broadcast throughout the country so that even parts of Tokyo wouldn’t be able to watch it. The announcement on the official site mentioned that broadcast details would come at a later date, so perhaps there will be additional channels added before Christmas. I honestly don’t know much about the details of Japanese television stations, except that CBC was the channel the show originally aired on. Their site still hosts the show’s web site. As a fan outside of Japan it does not look like there will be any international streaming options at this time. I certainly hope a copy of this special will be made available online and that some resourceful fans will work on a translation for it! I certainly don’t still have the Japanese file sharing program I used to use back in ’03 and ’04 to download raw episodes of PGSM hours after they aired!

It’s so exciting to see a live action series retrospective after the show has been ignored by anything official for so long. It’s often completely missed or glossed over when the history of Sailor Moon is looked at. This all changed recently when Keiko Kitagawa, Sailor Mars from the live action series, was cast as Sailor Cosmos in the second Sailor Moon Cosmos film. Now that we have this as part of the 20th anniversary I wonder if we could be seeing more from the live action series in 2024. The series was first release on DVD back when the show was originally airing, with a box set of those same discs being released in 2011. Now would be a good time for another release of the series!

While fans would be happy to see this show, originally released only on standard definition DVD, released on Blu-ray, this is likely impossible. The show was shot on 480i video so there is no film source to go to in order to get a high definition version. Some sort of AI assisted upscaling could always be done but it won’t look like a show that was shot on film ever could. When Discotek Media was asked about releasing the live action series in North America on a recent stream they said simply that the series was not available for license. Perhaps if the show became available again in Japan the rights would become available internationally as well. Am I being optimistic? Surely!

But as long as we’re dreaming how about a new “next generation” live action show? The original Sailor Guardians could all be mothers who’s children themselves become Sailor Guardians. Perhaps an older Sailor Luna, now around 30, could be the eldest of the Sailor Guardians and their mentor. We follow the lives of happy couples such as Usagi and Mamoru, Makoto and Motoki, Ami and Nephrite and of course Rei and Minako. Perhaps that’s a bit too optimistic, but with Sailor Moon Crystal now complete in Japan they could certainly use something else to have as an excuse to keep selling products to older Japanese fans. I’m real excited about this special so allow me to dream a little.

For now I’m just real happy to see this logo on the official site again.

Source: Official Sailor Moon site

Keiko Kitagawa, Sailor Mars from the live action Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon series, will voice Sailor Cosmos in Sailor Moon Cosmos Part 2

Posted on June 14, 2023 by Adam

In a shocking turn of events the voice of Sailor Cosmos from Sailor Moon Cosmos Part 2 is Keiko Kitagawa, a popular model and actress who is best known to Sailor Moon fans for portraying Rei Hino, Sailor Mars, in the live action Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon series! This comes as a surprise as many fans likely expected Sailor Cosmos to be voiced by Kotono Mitsuishi who voices Sailor Moon in Sailor Moon Crystal as well as Chibi Chibi. Keiko Kitagawa will also be voicing Guardian Cosmos who is a separate character who protects the Galaxy Cauldron where star seeds are born. Check out some footage of Sailor Cosmos as voiced by Keiko Kitagawa below.

Now it is time to speculate wildly about the true identity of Sailor Cosmos! The Le Mouvement Final musical cast Satomi Okubo as Sailor Cosmos because she’d previously played Sailor Moon which supports the idea that Sailor Cosmos is a future version of Sailor Moon. Since Kotono Mitsuishi voiced Sailor Moon back in the original 90s anime as well there wasn’t another Sailor Moon voice actor to fall back on, unless we consider Kae Araki, the voice of Chibiusa, who filled in for Kotono Mitsuishi when she was off sick at the end of the first season and start of Sailor Moon R. Instead by casting Keiko Kitagawa perhaps this means that Sailor Cosmos in this version is actually a future incarnation of Sailor Mars! Looks like that rivalry finally got settled and Rei got Usagi’s power!

A preview of Sailor Moon Cosmos Part 2 was shown to fans earlier today. Keiko Kitagawa met with Kotono Mitsuishi at a press event to discuss the film. They had previously worked together on Rikokatsu. While some fans were upset that Kotono Mitsuishi didn’t get the role she was quite supportive of Keiko Kitagawa and her performance. Naoko Takeuchi herself was also said to be at the recording of Sailor Cosmos’s lines! Kotono Mitsuishi is Sailor Moon royalty! She’s the star of this movie, the titular character and has been the face of the press of all things Sailor Moon Crystal for the past decade. There’s no need to be upset that she didn’t get to play a third voice in this movie which she’s already all over!

Source: Sailor Moon Official Site

Keep reading for more images from this trailer and the press event.

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Masaya Kikawada, Jouji Shibue and Miyuu Sawai who played Motoki, Mamoru and Usagi in the live action Sailor Moon series, will star in a Super Sentai film The Legacy of the Master’s Soul

Posted on September 12, 2021 by Adam

It’s a live action Sailor Moon series reunion as Masaya Kikawada, Jouji Shibue and Miyuu Sawai appear on screen together in the upcoming Super Sentai prequel special “The Legacy of the Master’s Soul”. All three actors appeared in the live action series as Motoki, Tuxedo Mask and Sailor Moon! The three are reprising their roles as Master Red, Master Blue and Master Pink from the Kishiryu Sentai Ryusoulger series which played in Japan starting in 2019. Masaya Kikawada, Jouji Shibue and Miyuu Sawai were not usually in the same episodes however all three were on screen together in the first episode of the series.

The film, which will serve as episode 0 for the series, will be made available to the Toei Tokusatsu Fan Club on October 17th. There’s currently no indication of how, if at all, the special might be made available outside of Japan. Scenes from the series were used as the basis for Power Rangers Dino Fury which aired on Nickelodeon earlier this year and is available on Netflix. No Japanese actors are seen in this version of the show as that footage is replaced with English speaking actors as is typically the case with Power Rangers series.

A trailer for the special can be seen on YouTube embedded below.

Did you watch Kishiryu Sentai Ryusoulger? If so, what did you think of these actors’ performances in the series?

Source: The Tokusatsu Network

Keiko Kitagawa and Kotono Mitsuishi star in the upcoming series Rikokatsu

Posted on April 14, 2021 by Adam

It’s a multi series Sailor Moon crossover event as Keiko Kitagawa, who played Sailor Mars in the live action Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon series, and Kotono Mitsuishi, the voice of Sailor Moon from the original Sailor Moon anime and Sailor Moon Crystal, play mother and daughter in the upcoming TV series Rikokatsu! The series will air on TBS Television starting this Friday, April 16th.

Update – April 14th: I mistakenly referred to this as a movie in my original post. This is in fact a TV series which will air starting this Friday on Japanese television. Perhaps a fan subbed version will make its way online in the coming weeks!

The plot of the show has Keiko Kitagawa’s character of Saki Mizuguchi falling in love with and marrying Koichi Obara, played by Japanese actor Eita. As they have conflicting personalities they intend to get a divorce and, to serve the high jynx plot of the series, do not tell their family about this. Kotono Mitsuishi plays Midori Mizuguchi, Saki’s mother.

Watch the trailer for the series embedded below:

Asian Drama series have a dedicated following outside of Japan. Do you any of you plan on following this series?

Source: Kotono Mitsuishi on Twitter, Rikokatsu official site, Rikokatsu Twitter account

Watch a short clip of Naoko Takeuchi mentioning that Super Sentai shows inspired her as a child

Posted on May 8, 2020 by Adam

Yesterday I found this photo of Naoko Takeuchi, the creator of Sailor Moon, with the Zyurangers, from the Super Sentai series which was adapted as the original Mighty Morphin Power Rangers series in North America. The photo was posted to Twitter by Tuxedo Unmasked, who runs a great web site by the same name. He later shared a link to the source video, which was a 20th Anniversary video of TOEI’s Sentai Series which aired on March 21st 1995. I can’t embed the video but you can watch the video on YouTube to see the brief appearance by Sailor Moon creator Naoko Takeuchi at 16 minutes and 57 seconds. This interview lasts less than 30 seconds.

Why is Naoko Takeuchi, who created Sailor Moon, wrote and drew the Sailor Moon manga, and provided work for various incarnations of the Sailor Moon series, appearing in a show about Super Sentai? As she mentions in this brief clip, she was inspired by Super Sentai series as a child. This special from 1995, which commemorates 20 years of Super Sentai series for TOEI, demonstrates that such series had been around a long time before Sailor Moon. It is often said that Sailor Moon, a series in which many girls transform into coloured uniforms and use attacks to defeat monsters, is a kind of Super Sentai type story about and for girls. This clip confirms that such series were a partial inspiration for the Sailor Moon manga and ultimately the anime and live action series as well.

I’ve certainly mentioned this similarity many times in the context of the live action series. The Live Action Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon series is a Tokusatsu (live action special effects) series much like Super Sentai series are. As Sailor Moon is a manga version of a Super Sentai series the live action version is a way of the franchise evolving into something even more similar to the shows which inspired it. The few recycled sets and even costumes are not proof of that, so much as the general similarities in the basic plots of these series.

Although Naoko Takeuchi likely drew at least partial inspiration from Super Sentai series, it’s not possible for her to actually have been inspired by Kyoryu Sentai Zyuranger, which was later adapted in North America as Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. That series first aired in February of 1992. The Codename: Sailor V manga started in August of 1991 and Sailor Moon, which has more similarities to a Super Sentai team show, was first published in December of 1991. The Sailor Moon anime series began airing in March of 1992, so it’s certainly easy to compare Sailor Moon to Kyoryu Sentai Zyuranger, because they were both on television at the same time, but without a time machine it’s impossible for either to have been an inspiration for the other.

Mighty Morphin Power Rangers didn’t start airing until August of 1993 which was still two years before Sailor Moon started airing on TV in the US and Canada in August of 1995. Though Mighty Morphin Power Rangers was adapted from three different Super Sentai series, they kept the Zyuranger outfits for all three of those seasons, so North American fans would mostly only be familiar with those costumes when Sailor Moon’s first 65 episodes played on TV until Power Rangers Zero started in April of 1996 after which the costumes for each series continued to change.

Source: Tuxedo Unmasked on Twitter

Could Toei’s new Tokusatsu YouTube Channel include the Live Action Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon series?

Posted on March 22, 2020 by Adam

Toei, the company which created both Sailor Moon anime series as well as the live action Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon series, will be launching Toei Tokusatsu World Official, a YouTube Channel dedicated to Toei’s Tokusatsu series. It will launch with episodes from 70 different Tokusatsu series. While the Tokusatsu series most familiar to worldwide audiences are Super Sentai shows like the ones which are adapted into various Power Rangers series, one Tokusatsu series created by Toei is the 2003 live action Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon series. The live action Sailor Moon series was not mentioned as one that will be part of the first batch of shows. As this would be a fairly high profile show, this likely means that we will not be seeing it on April 6th when the channel launches but it could be coming at a later date.

Live Action Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon Act 37 - Sailor Guardians fighting Putty type monsters

While one may not think of the live action Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon series as Tokusatsu, it most certainly is! Look at the intro paragraph on the Wikipedia page for the show:

Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon (美少女戦士セーラームーン, Bishōjo Senshi Sērā Mūn) is a Japanese tokusatsu television series based on the Sailor Moon manga created by Naoko Takeuchi. It was produced by Toei Company.

The term tokusatsu refers to a live action series which uses special effects. This dates back to monster movies like Godzilla and includes superhero series such as the Super Sentai series. The Sailor Moon manga was originally inspired by Super Sentai series in which there were teams of superheroes of various colours. This came full circle as the live action series was a tokusatsu version of the manga and anime series. The show often had similar costumes and effects to other tokusatsu series. Some costumes were also reused between series, such as the Zyurangers Golems, known as Putties in the Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers adaptation, being reused in Act 37 of the live action Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon series.

Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon Act 7

Zyuranger episode 5

There have also been locations which were used between series, such as the location used in Act 7 of Sailor Moon which was seen in episode 5 of Zyurangers which was adapted in the first season of Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers. There have also been scenes which were completely recycled such as one clip of the ground opening up which was used both in Zyurangers and Sailor Moon. The images below are from the televised version of the live action Sailor Moon series and from an old Power Rangers tape.

Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon

Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers

What do you think? Would you like to see the live action series on this platform? Do you think this is feasible?

Source: Toei Press Release

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Could Keiko Kitagawa be returning in Fast & Furious 9?

Posted on February 1, 2020 by Adam

The trailer for Fast and Furious 9 was released yesterday and it has been revealed that a number of characters from The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift will be returning in this film. This makes me wonder if Keiko Kitagawa, who played Sailor Mars in the live action Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon series and was also in Tokyo Drift, might be returning to the franchise? The returning actors that we see in the trailer are Sung Kang as Han, who was in many other Fast and the Furious films, Lucas Black who portrayed the main character Sean in the film, and Jason Tobin who was Earl in the film. You can watch the new trailer below.

In the film Earl frequently interacted with Keiko Kitagawa’s character Reiko so it would certainly make sense to have her join him. Since she’s not seen in the trailer however one might be inclined to believe that she won’t be making an appearance in this one. The two are in many scenes with Bow Wow’s character Twinkie. It would be nice to see him returning in the film as well. Can we have too many characters in a Fast and the Furious film? Box office history tells us that the answer is clearly no! Though Bow Wow would be a tougher get than Keiko Kitagawa, this franchise seems to have a near unlimited budget for big stars.

The return of Han is certainly an interesting twist in the Fast and the Furious franchise. Director Justin Lin, who’s first film in the series was Tokyo Drift, has gone to great lengths to include Han in as many movies as possible. Even though Han is killed during The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, the third film in the franchise, he is in a number of later movies which makes them take place earlier in the series. Tokyo Drift becomes a sort of flash forward for the series or alternatively we flash back to earlier films. This is why we still see flip phones in movies released years after they were obsolete. The events of Tokyo Drift finally occur during the timeline of Furious 7. It seem a movie and a half without Han was long enough so he’s been somehow brought back to life. This wouldn’t be a first for the franchise as Michelle Rodriguez’s character Letty was presumed dead after Fast and Furious but shown to be alive with amnesia in Fast Five. Maybe Gal Gadot can return as Gisele somehow as well? Why not? Would a CGI Brian be disrespectful to Paul Walker?

It remains to be seen if Keiko Kitagawa will be in the film. She is a Japanese actress and model who’s only Hollywood work is The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift. Her part in that film was fairly minor, even though it gave us this great deleted scene of her swearing. The Fast and the Furious films are always huge international box office draws thanks in no small part to their diverse cast from around the world as well as filming in many exotic locations. Including a Japanese actress in this film could only help with this trend.

I wonder how Han will feel about the fact that the team is now good buddies with the guy who attempted to kill him, not to mention Brian and his family, in earlier films? We will find out May 20th when the movie hits theatres!

Meet Kotono Mitsuishi, the voice of Sailor Moon, Keiko Han, the voice of Luna, and Katsuji Mori, the voice of Nephrite, at the Animazement convention in Raleigh, North Carolina May 24th to the 26th

Posted on March 17, 2019 by Adam

Great news for Sailor Moon fans in North Carolina! They will have a chance to meet the Japanese voices of Sailor Moon, Luna and Nephrite at the upcoming Animazement convention in Raleigh May 24th to the 26th! This includes Kotono Mitsuishi, the original voice of Sailor Moon as well as her voice in Sailor Moon Crystal! She has also done a number of other roles in other popular anime series such as Misato in Evangelion. Returning to Animazement is Keiko Han, the voice of Luna from the original Sailor Moon anime as well as the plush and CG Luna from the fantastic live action Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon series. Finally there is also Katsuji Mori, who voiced Nephrite in the original Sailor Moon anime. When not drinking chocolate parfaits Katsuji Mori is an anime voice acting veteran and the main star of many classic series having played Ken the Eagle in Gatchaman (Battle of the Planets), Tekkaman in the original Tekkaman series and Go Mifune (Speed Racer) in Mach GoGoGo.

A specific schedule doesn’t seem to be available quite yet but it stands to reason that they would be available for autographs and potentially some panels. Be sure to check out the full schedule when the event approaches. Are any of you in the area and planning to attend this convention? Let us know in the comments!

Check out Rika Izumi, live action Sailor Mercury, as Nami from One Piece

Posted on December 31, 2018 by Adam

Anime fans who’ve kept up with new stuff since the turn of the millennium will be happy to see Rika Izumi, who played Ami Mizuno in the live action Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon series, as Nami from One Piece in a commercial for Indeed. Rika Izumi, who went by the name Hama Chisaki back when the live action series was airing, appears in the commercial as the scantily clad Nami. I can’t say I know much about One Piece but it would seem Nami is one of the main characters from the very fact that she’s in this commercial. You can view the entire thing embedded below.

Indeed is a job searching web site. They claim that they are the #1 job search site in the world though this is the first I hear of them. In fairness I’m not looking for work and as you may be able to tell I’ve never even watched One Piece. I don’t exactly have my finger on the pulse of anything beyond the 90s.

Source: Natalie.mu via Crunchyroll

Rika Izumi, Live Action Sailor Mercury, appears alongside pages of the Sailor Moon manga in the latest issue of Tokyo Calendar

Posted on April 24, 2018 by Adam

Rika Izumi, who played Sailor Mercury in the live action Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon series, can be seen on the official Sailor Moon site although no mention of her involvement in the franchise accompanies it! Rika Izumi, who went by the name Hama Chisaki when she played Ami Mizuno, appears on the cover of the latest issue of Tokyo Calendar. The fact that the magazine’s cover model used to be on a Sailor Moon series actually has nothing to do with the magazine’s inclusion on the site. It is featured because of a story in its pages which discusses Sailor Moon taking place in the Azuba Juban area of Tokyo. Though the site only mentions that the article will be appearing in the next issue of the magazine the Tokyo Calendar site actually includes an online version of the article. Check it out to see an interview, in Japanese, with Sailor Moon’s editor Fumio Osano, Osabu, about Sailor Moon taking place in Azuba Juban.

You can also check out this article on dining in Azuba Juban which features Rika Izumi who is in this piece a normal Japanese adult and not dressed as a superhero or genius school girl.

I sometimes feel like the fantastic live action series is being completely forgotten by those who control the Sailor Moon property! It often receives little or no mention when various versions of the series are considered and this latest article is a fine example of that! Rather than acknowledge that this actress who had a major role in the only Sailor Moon series to be on TV during that entire decade the live action series remains firmly swept under the carpet like it was the Star Wars Holiday Special!

Meanwhile the cast of the series got together recently to celebrate Daigo’s 40th birthday. Daigo is Keiko Kitagawa’s husband. They regularly get together to celebrate each other’s birthdays or similar such events. I’m glad someone remembers this series favourably!

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