A new CD featuring character songs went on sale today, February 10th, in Japan. The full title of the album is “Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon Eternal Character Song Collection Eternal Collection”. Character songs are hardly new to Sailor Moon! These are songs which are performed by voice actors from the series as those characters. I don’t know what, if any, of these songs will actually appear in the films. Often character song don’t actually appear in the film or series they’re associated with but in some cases they have.

The album is available to stream on a number of platforms. Many of these, including Spotify, are restricted only to users in those areas. Apple Music allowed me to play 90 seconds of each track which gives a nice impression of most songs. This was a longer preview than I found on any other servies.

Update: You can stream the entire album on Spotify!

You can also order this from online stores. I usually order my Sailor Moon CDs from Amazon Japan but for whatever reason this album is not in stock. It is available to order from CD Japan for 3500 yen, $33.50 US. There are two versions of the album. The “cheaper” version, which is still expensive by North American standards, has an MSRP of 3500 yen. The “Luxury Edition” costs over double that price with an MSRP of 7800 yen, almost $75 US. This comes with a “Moon Crisis Bangle”, which is a nice word for bracelet, as well as a ticket to the Eternal Weekend Party event in Japan on March 21st. Needless to say I don’t expect that this version of the album would have much appeal to fans outside of Japan.

There are a number of vendor specific bonuses for those particular retailers. These include things like stickers, magnets and file folders.

The album has quite a large number of tracks by many of the actors in the films. This includes all of the Sailor Guardians, Tuxedo Mask, the Amazoness Quartet and the Amazon Trio. For the individual tracks all Sailor Guardians are credited as Super Sailor ___ while in the final track which includes all Sailor Guardians they are all credited as Eternal Sailor ___. A full track list with character and actors is included below.

1. ETERNAL MYSTAR by Kotono Mitsuishi as Super Sailor Moon
2. formula in blue by Hisako Kanemoto as Super Sailor Mercury
3. Signpost by Rina Sato as Super Sailor Mars
4. Don’t Look Back by Ami Koshimizu as Super Sailor Jupiter
5. I’m gonna be an IDOL! by Shizuka Ito as Super Sailor Venus
6. Dream colored fist love by Misato Fukuen as Super Sailor Chibi Moon and Yoshitsugu Matsuoka as Helios
7. Astral Mission by Junko Minagawa as Super Sailor Uranus, Sayaka Ohara as Super Sailor Neptune, Ai Maeda as Super Sailor Pluto and Yukiyo Fujii as Super Sailor Saturn
8. Welcome to the circus by Reina Ueda as CereCere, Sumire Morohoshi as PallaPalla, Yuko Hara as JunJun and Rie Takahashi as VesVes
9. Dream’s Eyes by Satoshi Hino as Tiger’s Eye, Toshiyuki Toyonaga as Hawk’s Eye and Shota Aoi as Fish Eye
10. Ray of light by Kenji Nojima as Tuxedo Mask
11. Moon Effect by Kotono Mitsuishi as Eternal Sailor Moon, Misato Fukuen as Eternal Sailor Chibi Moon, Hisako Kanemoto as Eternal Sailor Mercury, Rina Sato as Eternal Sailor Mars, Ami Koshimizu as Eternal Sailor Jupiter, Shizuka Ito as Eternal Sailor Venus, Junko Minagawa as Eternal Sailor Uranus, Sayaka Ohara as Eternal Sailor Neptune, Ai Maeda as Eternal Sailor Pluto and Yukiyo Fujii as Eternal Sailor Saturn

Sailor Moon Eternal Part 1 is already out in theatres in Japan with Part 2 coming out tomorrow, February 11th. Fans are still awaiting some confirmation of when we might be able to see the films outside of Japan. Though it seems likely the movies will be streamed on Netflix, there has been no indication of when that might be.

Source: Sailor Moon Official Site

The latest Blu-Ray release for Sailor Moon Crystal’s Infinity Arc was released on July 27th in Japan. This is the second of three releases covering this story arc and includes episodes 30 through 33. The set also includes a 24 page booklet with episode descriptions, interviews and character art. This is a Japanese only release with no English subtitles. You can order it from online retailers such as Amazon Japan for 6516 yen, about $65 US.

The packaging for this release highlights Sailor Uranus and Neptune with a great cover image on the Blu-Ray itself. The colours on the box match Sailor Uranus’s Sailor Fuku with a yellow bow.

Episodes included in this release are Act 30, Infinity 4 – Sailor Uranus – Haruka Tenoh – Sailor Neptune – Michiru Kaioh, Act 31 – Sailor Pluto – Setsuna Meioh, Act 32 – Infinity 6 – Three Guardians, and Act 33 – Infinity 7 – Transformation – Super Sailor Moon. These cover the Witches 5’s Viluy, Tellu, Cyprine and Ptitlol, the appearance of Setsuna Meioh and Sailor Pluto as well as the origins of the Holy Grail and Sailor Moon’s transformation into Super Sailor Moon. Also included is the first appearance of Sailor Saturn, but only in flashback form, and a brief appearance by Mistress 9.

I watched all four episodes and didn’t notice any changes in animation from the original streaming release as had been done with the first 26 episodes. As there were no changes to the last release either I suspect we won’t be seeing any changes to the episodes of this story arc.

The packaging advertises a 28 page booklet. Funny I only counted 24. I suppose we could be really creative and count the cover page and back cover as “pages”? Like with other booklets this includes episode summaries, interviews and character art. This one includes interviews with five voice actors Misato Fukuen, Sailor Chibi Moon, Junko Minagawa, Sailor Uranus, Sayaka Ohara, Sailor Neptune, Yukiyo Fujii, Sailor Saturn and Ai Maeda, Sailor Pluto.

Some audio commentaries are also included with the episodes themselves. The same voice actors appear for all four of the commentaries. This includes Hisako Kanemoto, Ami, Rina Sato, Rei, Misato Fukuen, Chibiusa and Yukiyo Fujii, Hotaru. I don’t speak Japanese so I don’t know what they talk about.

It’s a bit hard to justify buying this Japanese only release at this price which is close to what you’d pay for the entire 14 episode Dark Kingdom story arc in Japanese and English. Surely the four episodes per disc is a better deal than with earlier releases but since there are no changes to the animation this time around you can still watch the streaming version for free instead of buying this.

The third volume, including the final five episodes of this story arc, will be released on Blu-Ray on August 31st. You can preorder it online from sites like Amazon Japan. It costs a bit more, with an MSRP of 10,584 yen, about $105 US dollars. This post on the Sailor Moon official site indicates that the version will include a box to store all three volumes in, which seems to justify this roughly 50% increase from the previous volumes.

Keep reading for more images of the packaging including photos of all pages of the included special booklet.

The latest volume of Sailor Moon Crystal was released on Blu-Ray July 8th. As always my review is so late that the next volume, volume 11, is about to be released on August 12th. Regardless, let’s talk about volume 10. This set, like many others, includes two episodes on Blu-Ray in Japanese only. You can order it from sites such as Amazon Japan for 5194 yen, which is about $42 US plus shipping.

The art for this release features the often neglected but never forgotten Sailor Pluto! This is fitting since her character is featured prominently on the disk. We have Act 19, Time Warp – Sailor Pluto, and Act 20, Crystal Tokyo – King Endymion.

The charm is Sailor Jupiter’s Star Power Stick. This fits with the trend we’d been seeing.

Included as always is a 20 page full colour special book. This includes summaries for Act 19 and 20, art, character designs for Sailor Pluto and some of the Black Moon Clan, a page for Fumio Osano, Osabu, as well as two interviews. The first interview is with Akiko Kosaka, a composer who provided many songs for the original anime as well as Gekkou, the ending theme for Sailor Moon Crystal. The second is with Ai Maeda, the voice of Sailor Pluto.

Quality for this release is great, as always. The video is 1080p and looks better than the streaming releases. There are a lot of minor changes to the animation from the original version. Nothing from these episodes in particular jumped out as me as being significant. You can always check out Crystal Comparisons to see changes for any episodes, includes the acts 19 and 20 which are provided in this set.

The disk is Japanese only and also include a commentary track featuring Munehisa Sakai, the series director, as well as Shizuka Ito, the voice of Sailor Venus, and Misato Fukuen, the voice of Chibiusa. I can’t really comment on the content of these commentaries, as I don’t actually speak Japanese.

I can’t tell you whether or not it’s worth it to buy this set. Do what you did with the last 9. The video quality is great and it’s worth having for a hardcore collector but North American fans who like their money may find it makes sense to wait for the English dubbed and subbed release we will be getting at some point in the future.

Keep reading for more photos of this set including pictures of all pages of the included special book.

A trailer for the second story arc of Sailor Moon Crystal, set to begin on January 17th, has been added to the official Sailor Moon web site. This trailer features scenes with Chibiusa and Sailor Pluto. Check it out below.

This was shown at an event in Japan today where Misato Fukuen was revealed to be the voice of Chibiusa and Ai Maeda was revealed as the voice of Sailor Pluto.

Clips in this trailer cover many events from the second story arc, which though technically part of Sailor Moon Crystal’s first year and therefore first season, is being referred to by many as the second season of the series. This second story arc is also being referred as the second phase. The main thing shown is Chibiusa, who appears from the future to threaten Usagi with a gun. More clips show her with Luna P and jump ahead quite a bit to show us the Space-Time Door, Sailor Pluto, Crystal Tokyo, Nemesis and the Evil Black Crystal. Also pictured are new transformation items for the Sailor Guardians including Sailor Moon’s Star Pendant.

The note at the end of the trailer mentions the next episode showing on January 3rd though it does not seem likely that any of these clips will be appearing in act 13 which will be released on that date. Chibiusa will be appearing in act 14, An Ending and Then a Beginning – Petite Étrangère, along with the Black Moon Clan who are not shown in this trailer. The banner in the image shown from today’s event mentions January 17th when act 14 will be available. This will mark the end of the Dark Kingdom arc and the beginning of the Black Moon arc.

Keep reading for more screenshots from this trailer.