This weekend, June 3rd to the 5th, is Villains Con at the David S. Palmer arena in Danville, Illinois. The convention will feature Jennifer Cihi, who provided the vocals for a number of songs from the English dub of the original Sailor Moon anime, and Lauren Landa, the new voice of Sailor Neptune for Viz’s new dub of the original Sailor Moon anime and Sailor Moon Crystal.
Here at Sailor Moon News I occasionally get questions via e-mail, Facebook or other social media accounts. The vast majority of those questions in the past 6 months have basically been “When are we getting the new English dub of Sailor Moon S??!!”. I respond with words but I never really have a good answer and we still don’t have one. Here’s a clip from that new dub from Viz’s official Sailor Moon panel at MomoCon yesterday, May 28th, at 7pm in Atlanta Georgia.
This clip features Erica Mendez as Sailor Uranus and Lauren Landa as Sailor Neptune from Sailor Moon S episode 106, The Bond of Destiny: Uranus’s Distant Past. Both voice actors were announced almost a year ago on July 3rd at Anime Expo. Yes we have been waiting a really long time to see these episodes! The video caption says “More news soon!” and we certainly hope this is true. With other new dubbed episodes they are usually announced with some clips and then a Moonlight Party when they appear on Hulu. This is usually part of an advertisement campaign for the next home video release. Season Moon R part 2 has been out since October and was announced long before that.
Here’s hoping for something “soon”!
Update 2016-05-31: The original clip was removed so I’ve added different footage from the same YouTube user comparing the new dub to the original.
Anime North is this weekend, May 27th to the 29th, at the Toronto Congress Center and 9 actors from the original dub of the first Sailor Moon anime will be there! This includes two voices of Sailor Moon. The first voice of Sailor Moon Tracey Moore, provided her voice for only the first 11 episodes as well as another four throughout the series. Linda Ballantyne was the third voice of Sailor Moon, providing her voice for the S and SuperS seasons. Also appearing are Katie Griffin, the voice of Sailor Mars, Susan Roman, the voice of Sailor Jupiter, Barbara Radecki, the voice of Sailor Neptune, Jill Frappier, the voice of Luna, Ron Rubin, the voice of Artemis, Toby Proctor, the second voice of Tuxedo Mask, and John Stocker, voice director for Sailor Moon S and SuperS. Toby Proctor, having himself replaced Rino Romano as the second voice of Tuxedo Mask, mostly acted alongside Terry Hawkes and not the two Sailor Moon voice actors in attendance, though he did appear in four episodes with Tracey Moore.
The panel with these voice actors will take place on Friday at 5pm. On Sunday at 11am Tracey Moore and John Stocker will be holding a behind the scenes of voice acting panel. The voice actors will be signing autographs throughout the weekend. Check out the Anime North schedule for the exact times.
The convention is full of Sailor Moon related events. A Sailor Moon panel will be held Saturday at 10am and a Sailor Moon Merchandise presentation will be held Sunday at 11am.
Though I am Canadian I don’t live in Toronto. I’ve been to Anime North a number of times and have always had fun but unfortunately I won’t be attending this year.
After Act 26 was released in English on Hulu last Friday some users were hoping that the new episodes of the Infinity arc would already be dubbed and released starting last night. This didn’t seem likely as these episodes were only released in Japanese recently and the process to dub episodes is quite involved. Now that Friday night has come and gone with nothing new we have confirmation that the English episodes of the Infinity arc of Sailor Moon Crystal will not be released right away.
We continue to wait for some news about Sailor Moon S being dubbed. The cast was announced last summer at Anime Expo. Sailor Moon R has been completed released on video since December. The gap between episodes being released has been significantly longer than any other, but we still have no specifics about when the first episodes of Sailor Moon S will be released on Hulu or on home video. This is by far the most common question I get asked on this site and I never have a good answer. We will likely have another Moonlight Party with some sample episodes released when the DVD and Blu-Ray are first announced but there’s no telling when that might be. As always when I hear any news about this I’ll post something to the site.
This is it! Episode 200 of Sailor Moon Sailor Stars is now available on Hulu and Neon Alley. This is the last episode of the series, making the entire 200 episode run of the original Sailor Moon anime available to watch in Japanese with English subtitles for free… if you live in the right country. There’s no telling how long these episodes will remain available to free Hulu users as older episodes of some shows will often be available only to those with paid Hulu Plus subscriptions. This episode is rated TV-MA, no doubt because of the lengthy nude scene which isn’t terribly high on detail. I first watched the second half of this episode before seeing any of Sailor Stars at my local anime club. It was unsubtitled and I really didn’t know what was going on, but thanks to VKLL I later saw the rest of the series and figured out what was what.
Episode 200, Usagi’s Love: The Moonlight Illuminates the Galaxy, wraps everything up quite well. Chibi Chibi became a light and then turns into a Star Seed and then into a sword. A bit crazy but the idea is basically that Chibi Chibi is the light of hope, which is not at all what she is in the manga. She is Galaxia’s Star Seed, ejected out of her when Chaos began to take over her body. How does a Star Seed continue to have autonomy outside of the host? The Silver Crystal never seemed to have a mind of its own, but Chibi Chibi is sort of like the good half of Galaxia, removing itself from the body which is evil. Usagi transforms into Princess Serenity with wings, which is a very cool form I’ve always appreciated. Princess Serenity, ever kind and forgiving, does not want to use the sword to attack Galaxia. This is messed up! Galaxia’s Star Seed is begging Usagi to kill Galaxia and she’s refusing. Can you imagine if a part of you left your body and gained some sort of agency and then tried to kill you? Galaxia is like Devon Sawa in Idle Hands! Galaxia lost her Star Seed and now it’s time for Sailor Moon to lose her clothes. This is where the TV-MA rating comes in. Usagi starts flying around totally naked. What are they going to do, cancel the show? This is the last episode! There’s a bit of sparring and finally the light of the Silver Crystal reaches good girl Galaxia who is somewhere inside evil Galaxia. The good Galaxia inside evil Galaxia’s brain takes Sailor Moon’s hand just as real Galaxia does and poof, she’s healed! We assume at this point that Galaxia’s true Star Seed is somehow reincorporated into Galaxia, merging their memories. Does Chibi Chibi die? Does the Silver Crystal let Galaxia be good without a Star Seed while Chibi Chibi still exists, as she’s seen flying around later? Speaking of Star Seeds, all those Star Seeds Galaxia gathered are released like Pokémon let back into the wild. This is good news for all of Usagi’s up to now dead friends, including Mamoru who returns as Endymion because that is his coolest form. Chibiusa? Not around. Makes me wonder why Galaxia didn’t go to the future to get her and Diana’s Star Seeds. Perhaps she should have captured a bunch of Sailor Guardians and bred in a sort of Star Seed farm to keep making more!
Everyone’s alive and it’s time for the Sailor Starlights to head back home. Seiya says his farewells to Usagi who is still ignorant of how he really feels about her. Luna shows some serious lust for Yaten, which doesn’t make Artemis very happy. We then see Hotaru and Setsuna, happily chilling with their murderers Haruka and Michiru. I guess that was all part of the plan? Hotaru must be getting used to those two trying to kill her at this point. Usagi and Mamoru share a moment alone in front of the moon, exchange pleasantries and kiss. With a series full of constant interruptions to their romance, they are at last at peace and can be together. In an homage to the famous quote from the first season, Usagi states that she’s 16 years old and a bit of a klutz and a crybaby, but that she’s actually a Guardian of love and justice, Sailor Moon. When Usagi used to say these words it was more like “Oh isn’t this weird but I’m a superhero” but here her tone is totally different. It’s like she’s saying “I look unsuspecting and I’m a bit emotional, but I’m a badass superhero and I’ve got this shit covered.”. What a perfect line to bookend the series and demonstrate just how much she’s grown not just in power but as a character who uses love and kindness over her sheer power. These final end credits are accompanied by the original opening theme, Moonlight Densetsu, which was not used elsewhere in the season, as well as a lovely montage of images.
The end.
For those who’ve seen the series before, I hope you enjoyed revisiting it. For those who are seeing it for the first time, I hope you loved it. The manga is its own thing in many ways, so check that out if you haven’t. Hopefully Sailor Moon Crystal makes it all the way to the end and we can see a totally different ending to the series and a very different origin for Chibi Chibi.
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Update: The episode will actually be referred to as Act 27 – Infinity 1 – Premonition – Second Part. Such a confusing title.
The next new episode of Sailor Moon Crystal will air on Japanese TV tomorrow at 11pm Japan Standard Time. This will be 10am Eastern Time, 7am Pacific Time, and the stream should be available on Crunchyroll, Hulu and Neon Alley shortly afterwards. Last week the episode was available around 10:45am Eastern Time, some 15 minutes after the episode would have concluded on Japanese TV. There’s a countdown on the Act 28 page at Crunchyroll which is counting down to 10:30am Eastern Time. I would recommend watching it on Crunchyroll which has a free and paid commercial free option as well as apps to watch those episodes on, though some of you who live in a country which Hulu doesn’t hate may already have a subscription with them. Last week Hulu restricted the episode to Hulu Plus only for a while, thought it was immediately available to watch on Viz’s web site Neon Alley which is a different way of watching Hulu content. Free users watching on Hulu should go to the Neon Alley page if they can’t find the episode right away.
This week we get Act 28, Infinity 1 – Premonition – The 2nd Part. This is the direct continuation of the half episode we got last week as the manga chapter for Act 27 has now been split in two in order to make this story arc 13 episodes long. The gang will travel to an amusement park where Chibiusa will meet Hotaru for the first time. We only briefly saw Hotaru last week. She’ll be wearing a Mugen Academy school uniform, which Usagi will also have thanks to her Disguise Pen.
This episode will also feature our first look at Sailor Uranus and Neptune. Last week we saw Haruka and Michiru but we haven’t yet seen them transformed. Of course promotional material, the opening and ending themes and the commercial break bumpers have featured these two prominently so we won’t be too surprised to see them.
This weekend is Emerald City Comicon at the Washington State Convention Center in Seattle. In attendance will be Linda Ballantyne, the voice of Sailor Moon, and Susan Roman, the voice of Sailor Jupiter. Linda Ballantyne was the 3rd voice of Sailor Moon who appeared throughout the Sailor Moon S and SuperS seasons. Susan Roman voiced Sailor Jupiter throughout the entire series.
The two will be hosting a panel, Stories from the Moon Kingdom, on Saturday from 12:15pm to 1:1pm. They will also be signing autographs throughout the day on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
There are a lot of other cool guests at the convention including Kim Possible and Ron Stoppable!
Sailor Moon Sailor Stars is almost complete! This week we get episodes 198 and 199 on Hulu and Neon Alley which leaves us with only one episode left for next week. As we left things Sailor Uranus and Neptune were evil for some reason and we’re slowly building up to the final confrontation between Galaxia and Sailor Moon. Episode 199 comes with a warning on Hulu stating “The following is intended for mature audiences. Viewer discretion is advised.”. Why? There’s a ton of nudity in episode 200 which we will see next week but nothing about this particular episode some any more “mature” than the last few. I guess there’s so much nudity in episode 200 that the warning spills over into other episodes!
Episode 198, Dying Stars: Uranus and Neptune’s Last Stand, starts off with these two being evil. They kind of killed their good friends Sailor Saturn and Pluto last time which was not cool at all. Sailor Uranus attacks Sailor Moon with World Shaking, which good old Sailor Star Fighter attempts to block with Star Serious laser. This causes a sort of uncounscious semi dead Usagi who wakes up in a world of pastels where everyone is nice. All her friends are there and Haruka and Michiru are cool again. They were just faking it and we can all be friends again. Oh and guess what it’s Mamoru and Chibiusa. Remember them? They used to be in this show before the Three Lights showed up. Cool dream! All fake. Anyway Sailor Uranus and Neptune are still evil and when they’re just about to take the Sailor Starlights’ Star Seeds they … turn on Galaxia. So it really was a trick. Works decently too only when Galaxia is shot with those little spikey light things that look like something from a ramen bowl her Star Seed doesn’t come out. It’s like she doesn’t have one. We’ll find out why soon enough. Galaxia take her bracelets back and, as she’s already taken these two’s Star Seeds, they die. How sad.
Episode 199, The Light of Hope: the Final Battle for the Galaxy, begins the confrontation with Galaxia. We start with a little background! Choas, this great evil thing in the universe, was sealed within the most powerful Sailor Guardian … Sailor Galaxia. Oh damn. Seemed like a good idea at the time I guess but it sort of made her evil and now she’s totally destroying the Universe and collecting Star Seeds. Sailor Moon, always looking for a solution that centers around love and friendship and such, wonders if there wasn’t a better way in which everyone worked together and did great things. We can finally have some sympathy for this seemingly terrible person. Evil Sailor Galaxia of course is totally happy with the arrangement since she likes being evil and collecting Star Seeds. There’s a bit of a chase and Sailor Moon tries to heal Galaxia which seems to work just a bit, but Galaxia shakes it off and destroys Sailor Moon’s Eternal Tiare weapon. Sailor Galaxia tries to kill the Sailor Starlights but Sailor Moon jumps in with her Star Seed in front of her. This seems like a good plan. What could go wrong? Oh no Sailor Galaxia took the Star Seed! Sailor Moon does that pink ribbon thing she is known to do. More backstory. As Chaos took over Galaxia’s body she removed her Star Seed and sent it away where Chaos couldn’t find her. The Light of Hope is Galaxia’s Star Seed. Sailor Chibi Chibi Moon cries and irradiates a light which Sailor Galaxia recognises as the Light of Hope. So… Chibi Chibi has the Light of Hope or is the Light of Hope?
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This week on Hulu and Neon Alley‘s new episodes of Sailor Moon Sailor Stars everyone dies! With episodes 196 and 197 Sailor Galaxia has laid siege to the city and she’s going through Star Seeds like candy. This includes some favourite characters and someone who it turns out has been dead for most of the season. Also we find a convoluted reason to get good guy superheroes fighting each other, something I despise and which film critics seem to be sick of too!
Episode 196, Countdown to Destruction: the Sailor Guardians’ Last Battle, is pretty much what the title says. Galaxia is destroying the city and collecting Star Seeds. She got one earlier in the season, then one last episode and now she’s going for a whole bunch. Did she get others through the season on other planets or did she do that earlier? Not really important. What is important is the return of Sailor Saturn! She arrives already transformed of course, because there was no money for a transformation sequence I guess. We start off with the Sailor Starlights confronting Galaxia and then Sailor Chibi Chibi Moon brings the gang in to assist. This does not go very well as she kills Sailor Mercury, Mars, Jupiter and Venus. It’s really all about Sailor Mars though. It’s always all about Sailor Mars. This mirrors the first time everyone died in the first season where Mars is the last to go and the first ghost to touch Usagi. It’s never Mercury, Mars, Jupiter and Venus. It’s Mars and the rest. It’s Rei and the rest. Once again we see Sailor Moon single out Sailor Mars as her single closest friend. She has a big heart and has a love for all of her friends, but there is something special about this relationship which transcends all others. As if that weren’t enough we see the Star Seeds join others and Sailor Moon recognizes one that shines brighter than any other. Mamoru’s Star Seed. It turns out there was a good reason he hasn’t been returning her letters and that’s because he’s dead. Having Usagi be generally unaware of Mamoru’s death was a big change from the Manga, but one which I think worked well with the story of the Manga. Usagi thought he was being distant and her relationship with Seiya was a distraction from this. Turns out he was not being a jerk at all. Sailor Star Fighter sees this Star Seed and all I can read from her face is “Wow. Even this guy’s Star Seed is cooler than me.”. Poor Seiya never had a chance.
Episode 197, Ruler of the Galaxy: the Menace of Galaxia, isn’t done killing people off. First we see what happened to Mamoru. As we know he never got to the states, but it wasn’t clear what happened on that plane. Galaxia faced off against him and took his Star Seed. Tuxedo Mask’s reaction to this is priceless. He does not fear what she will do because he knows that Usagi will defeat her. I wonder what happened to the rest of the plane. Surely if it had gone down or everyone had been killed it would have made headlines and Usagi would have heard about it. Perhaps in this world of superheroes and weekly monster attacks on the city a missing plane doesn’t get noticed. So the gang is teleported away from Galaxia, which is very temporary. Enter Sailor Uranus, Neptune, Pluto and Saturn who are once again already transformed. We learn that Sailor Galaxia is the one who orchestrated the return of Nehelenia to awaken Sailor Saturn so that she could have another True Star Seed that wasn’t otherwise in the game. This is like using a cheat device to catch Mew even though he’s not in the game. This makes me wonder why Hotaru didn’t have a True Star Seed inside of her prior to becoming Sailor Saturn again. Is that really how this works? After a little fight it seems like Sailor Uranus and Neptune decide to be evil. Is this what happened with the Sailor Animamates? It got the impression that they were slaves but getting Sailor Galaxia’s bracelets does not seem to cognitively affect these two. We get a fight between good guys. This is a pet peeve of mine in comics and comic based properties, but here it isn’t about who would actually win. I’m sick and tired of excuses in Avengers movies for the heroes to fight each other and now in the summer of movies that are nothing more than convoluted reasons to have good guys fight each other I think I’ve hit a saturation point of tolerating this kind of Batman V Superman and Civil War nonsense. So Sailor Uranus and Neptune kill Sailor Pluto and Saturn. The rest of the gang arrives just at the right time to see them die. Oh well I guess this means no transformation sequence for Sailor Saturn ever! Maybe in Sailor Moon Crystal we will see this. So Sailor Uranus and Neptune seem to be evil and Usagi’s next. To be continued!
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The two latest episode of Sailor Moon Sailor Stars have been added to Hulu and Neon Alley. This week with episodes 194 and 195 we learn a lot more about Sailor Galaxia as we get pretty much all of the anime’s time with Princess Kakyuu. It’s a bad week for Seiya’s relationships as Usagi starts to come to terms with Mamoru’s absence. Also to note there are no more monsters of the week for the rest of the series. The last Phage was in episode 192!
Episode 194, Crusade for the Galaxy: Legend of the Sailor Wars, gives us a ton of back story. Princess Kakyuu is here and she seems to be the one with all the answers, and is willing to give us just a few of them. We get a description of the Sailor Wars. Some great Sailor Guardian sealed Chaos inside herself and became totally evil. That’s Sailor Galaxia. She’s treating Star Seeds like Pokémon and she won’t stop until she’s caught ‘em all. Usagi is missing Mamoru quite a bit and calls him and … his answering machine picks up. Did Mamoru keep his massive apartment in downtown Tokyo while he went to study in the United States where a physical answering machine is located or has he just left his phone line with voice mail set up? Did he pay for all of this with his part time job at the resort he showed up for once a year ago? Who exactly is continuing to pay these bills while he’s not even available to return phone calls and mail to his girlfriend? Seiya meanwhile gets a busy signal while calling Usagi who is trying to call her boyfriend. Oh boy, that’s a symbolic busy signal! Seiya then mistakes Kakyuu for Usagi. Tell me about it. There are a bunch of jokes about keeping Usagi safe in this episode. Fair enough! She’s the princess and that’s kind of what these people need to be doing. Sailor Tin Nyanko shows up at the school, masquerading as student Nyanko Suzu. Once again no monster as Sailor Tin Nyanko attacks Usagi, who tries to take her on alone. The fight is interrupted by a red rose which is tossed into the fray. Wow! WTF? Chills. The rose was tossed by… Seiya. Damn. A fight ensues and Sailor Moon half heals Sailor Tin Nyanko with Silver Moon Crystal Power Kiss. We’ll see how that goes later. Usagi breaks down crying at this point with the rose reminding her of Mamoru. Seiya asks if he’s not good enough for her. It’s not looking great for Seiya.
Episode 195, Princess Kakyu Perishes: Advent of Galaxia, is sort of a double spoiler title. It’s just doubly terrible. Anyway. The Three Lights are doing one last concert! Why? They found their Princess! Well now they are looking for the Light of Hope, which apparently is the thing that can stop Galaxia. Why just do one concert to call the Light of Hope? Either they’re done and don’t need to sing anymore or they aren’t and it should just be status quo. Whatever. It’s their last concert. More importantly, Mamoru is totally off the grid. Usagi admits to Rei that he hasn’t actually responded to any of her letters. When Ami looks into it he never arrived in America. He’s not in his old apartment, which still has an active phone line and perhaps an answering machine, so where is he? How is he paying his bills? So Mamoru is not in US but we saw him and the plane with that light and the … oh boy let’s think about something else. So concert. Sailor Tin Nyanko attacks the concert and she’s totally messed up. She was half healed with the Silver Moon Crystal Power Kiss “attack” last episode so she’s sort of like Two Face only without the coin. This is sort of tragic. The Animamates aren’t evil at all. They are being controlled. Sailor Moon has the power to heal them but has failed to do so at every attempt. Tragic. Lots of other people are at the fight like Sailor Uranus and Neptune. Oh wait of course no Sailor Saturn. Whatever. Galaxia shows up and she’s collecting all the Star Seeds. She takes Sailor Tin Nyanko and then Princess Kakyuu tries to hold her off while the Starlights escape. Princess Kakyuu has her Star Seed taken. Wow that was kind of quick. I kind of thought maybe she’d transform into a Sailor Guardian and maybe have some kind of fireball attack but she doesn’t really do much. Oh well moving on. As Kakyuu is dying Sailor Chibi Chibi Moon takes her hand and with her last breath says that Princess Kakyuu feels the Light of Hope. Whatever that is! I guess this means Princess Kakyuu isn’t Chibi Chibi like I thought!
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