The cast for the Sailor Moon Prism On Ice show includes Anza, Evgenia Medvedeva, Kurt Browning and many more world class figure skaters

Sailor Moon Prism on Ice - Evgenia Medvedeva as Sailor Moon

The Sailor Moon official site has posted a lot of details about the upcoming Sailor Moon Prism On Ice show which was announced last summer. The event will be taking place June 5th to the 7th at the KOSÉ Shin Yokohama Skate Center in Tokyo. We had previously learned that Evgenia Medvedeva, a Russian figure skater and Olympic medalist, was going to be in the show. We now have confirmation that she will be playing Sailor Moon herself! An article at Oricon includes photos of Evgenia Medvedeva in her Sailor Moon costume! The rest of the cast includes Sailor Mercury, Mars, Jupiter and Venus as well as Tuxedo Mask. The villains are the Dark Kingdom’s Queen Bery, Jadeite, Nephrite, Zoisite and Kunzite. All of the above mentioned characters will be portrayed by figure skaters, most of whom are world class competitive skaters, from around the world.

Anza

Also appearing in the musical is Anza as Queen Serenity. Anza is best known to Sailor Moon fans as the first to play Sailor Moon in a Sailor Moon musical. She continued in this role for many years. The other special guest, who’s role is not mentioned, is Kurt Browning. He is a World Champion figure skater who was a well known sports celebrity here in Canada in the 1990s.

Sailor Moon Prism on Ice

The show will also have a voice cast which includes the main cast from Sailor Moon Crystal. Only the Sailor Guardians currently have voice actors listed at this time. This could mean that the show will mainly feature those characters in spoken roles or perhaps the others will be announced at a later time. The details on the site list them as being the voice actors from the Sailor Moon Eternal films. As the Dark Kingdom specific characters will not be in the Sailor Moon Eternal films, they may not have been mentioned for this reason. It may also prove more complicated in booking voice talent from a previous season when there hadn’t been an expectation for them to be reprising their roles in the future.

Anza and Akiko Kosaka from the Sailor Moon Crystal visual book

Music will be by Akiko Kosaka, who has been involved with music in the original Sailor Moon anime, the Sailor Moon Musicals and Sailor Moon Crystal.

A full translated cast list in included below:

Sailor Moon/Usagi Tsukino: Evgenia Medvedeva
Sailor Mercury/Ami Mizuno: Satoko Miyahara
Sailor Mars/Rei Hino: Mirai Nagasu
Sailor Jupiter/Makoto Kino: Alissa Czisny
Sailor Venus/Minako Aino: Becky Bereswill
Tuxedo Mask/Mamoru Chiba: Andrew Poje
Queen Serenity: ANZA
Kunzite: Jason Brown
Jadeite: Takahito Mura
Nephrite: Dylan Moscovitch
Zoisite: Seiya Hashimoto
Queen Beryl: Shinko Sakamaki

Additional skaters: Youji Nakano, Shigeru Matsumura, Koichi Kobayashi, Kohei Yoshino, Yuka Kono, Takana Ito

Special guest appearance: Kurt Browning

Voice cast:

Sailor Moon/Tsukino Usagi: Kotono Mitsuishi
Sailor Mercury/Ami Mizuno: Hisako Kanemoto
Sailor Mars/Rei Hino: Rina Sato
Sailor Jupiter/Makoto Kino: Ami Koshimizu
Sailor Venus/Minako Aino: Shizuka Ito

Other staff:

Screenplay: Takuya Hiramitsu
Choreography: Yuka Sato, Benji Schwimer (Assistant)
Music: Akiko Kosaka, Lunar Eclipse Meeting

As I put the list from the official site through Google Translate some of the names that aren’t hyperlinks may be incorrect. I’ve included Wikipedia links when I found them to give some insight into what those athletes have done.

Sailor Moon Prism on Ice - Evgenia Medvedeva as Sailor Moon

Are you excited for this event? Will any of you be making the trip to Japan to check out this show in June? Who are you most excited to see?

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Some thoughts on the Sailor Moon x Akiko Kosaka 45th Anniversary Music History concert which took place November 9th and 10th

Sailor Moon x Akiko Kosaka 45th Anniversary Music History

We had previously reported on the then upcoming Sailor Moon x Akiko Kosaka 45th Anniversary Music History Supported By Pretty Guardians concert. At the time there was still quite a bit that was unknown about the concert which took place on November 9th and the 10th, a Saturday and Sunday. One lucky reader was able to attend the November 10th performance and passed on his thoughts about the concert which I’m happy to share. I’ll be paraphrasing some of the highlights of his experience.

Sailor Moon x Akiko Kosaka 45th Anniversary Music History

The concert took place at Quest Hall, which is located in Harajuku, a district in the Shibuya Ward of Tokyo, which is next to Minato, where Azabu Juban and most locations in the Sailor Moon manga take place. The venue housed a couple hundred people which is quite small compared to what would be used for something like a Sailor Moon musical. The audience was mostly composed of women who would have been old enough to be watching Sailor Moon in the 90s, though there were some younger fans as well.

The goal of this event was to celebrate Akiko Kosaka’s career. She has contributed a lot of music to the Sailor Moon musicals as well as the original Sailor Moon anime and Sailor Moon Crystal. This event seems to have been mostly focused on the musicals, though there were a few songs from the anime as well. Akiko Kosaka performed at the piano for the entirety of the concert, with her music being complemented by a keyboard, guitar, bass and drums. A full set list for both days was posted to the official Sailor Moon Twitter account. You can see those set lists below.

Sailor Moon x Akiko Kosaka 45th Anniversary Music History - November 9th set list

Sailor Moon x Akiko Kosaka 45th Anniversary Music History - November 10th set list

The performers were not in costume though they did wear Music History t-shirts for the second half of the performance. They moved about the stage acting out some of the songs with a small amount of dancing, using the space provided.

The highlights of the show mentioned were the performance of Triple Dreams, a song first performed as part of the 1995 SuperS musical Dream Warriors – Love – Into Eternity… It was also mentioned that Anza, the first actress to play Sailor Moon, and Hikari Ono, who performed a number of roles throughout many musicals, stole the show. The audience seems to have enjoyed the show immensely.

Sailor Moon x Akiko Kosaka 45th Anniversary Music History - Merch

There weren’t a ton of products available at the show. A post on the Sailor Moon official site highlighted some of these, which includes pamphlets, magnets, shirts and water bottles. Artists were also selling some of their own merchandise which were in fairly limited stock. Those in the premium seats got extra merchandise which included a booklet of piano sheet music for three songs and a CD including piano versions of some Sailor Moon songs. In the past such items have been sold on Japanese auctions sites such as Mercari for very high prices.

It does not appear that the show was filmed, making a DVD or Blu-Ray release of this concert unlikely. Though it was not mentioned it is always possible that an audio recording was made for a potential future CD release.

Were any of you lucky enough to attend this concert? What are your thoughts on it?

A two day concert, Akiko Kosaka 45th Anniversary Sailor Moon Music History Supported by Pretty Guardians, is coming to Tokyo November 9th and 10th

Anza and Akiko Kosaka from the Sailor Moon Crystal visual book

A two day concert named “Akiko Kosaka’s 45th Anniversary Sailor Moon Music History Supported by Pretty Guardians” will be taking place in Tokyo on November 9th and 10th. This two days concert will actually include two different performances with completely different artists on each day. November 9th will be a relaxed piano concert with some conversations and the 10th will have a band performance. So what exactly is this? Akiko Kosaka is well known for having written many songs for the original Sailor Moon anime as well as Sailor Moon Crystal but in this case it is likely her involvement writing many songs for the Sailor Moon musicals which is the basis for this concert. We can tell from the other artists appearing at this event that this will almost certainly involve performances of a number of Sailor Moon musical songs as this will involve performers from the musicals. Across the two days actresses who portrayed almost all of the Sailor Guardians in the musicals, that being everyone but Sailor Pluto, as well as others will be performing. Sailor Pluto is likely only absent because Yuuko Hosaka, who originally played Sailor Pluto in some musicals, was originally scheduled to be involved with the event but had to cancel.

With this year’s Sailor Moon musical being delayed until 2020 this concert may serve as a nice alternative for some fans. I can only speculate as to the specific format but with there being performers to represent each characters with no duplicates it seems likely that some effort to have someone take the part of the Sailor Guardian they previously portrayed is likely. Will they wear some sort of costume or just sing some classic songs? Who knows! Here’s a breakdown of who’s going to be involved and when.

Anza as Usagi from the first Sailor Moon musical

Not everyone is going to be involved with both days, but here’s a list of the actors which are going to be there for both November 9th and 10th. Akiko Kosaka, who’s career is being celebrated with this concert, will evidently be there for both days. Anza, the first actress to play Sailor Moon in a musical from 1993 to 1998, will likely be performing as Sailor Moon. Hisano Akamine, the third actress to play Sailor Mercury from 1999 to 2000, will likely be performing as Sailor Mercury. Misako Kotani, the second actress to play Sailor Mars from 1994 to 1997, will likely be performing as Sailor Mars. Emi Kuriyama, the seventh actress to play Sailor Jupiter from 1999 to 2000, will likely be performing as Sailor Jupiter. Akiko Miyazawa, the fourth actress to play Sailor Venus also played Queen Beryl and musical exclusive characters Bilhah Emerald and Elizabeth Bathory, a vampire. She will likely be performing as Sailor Venus. Sanae Kimura, the first actress to play Sailor Uranus from 1994 to 1997, will likely be performing as Sailor Uranus.

Yuuta Mochizuki, the second actor to play Tuxedo Mask, also played Kunzite in the very first musical and later the musical exclusive character Count Dracul. He is also well known for playing the Red Power Ranger in Zyuurangers, the series which was adapted in North America as the original Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers. He will likely be performing as Tuxedo Mask. Hikari Ono has played Hawk’s Eye, Sailor Star Maker, Loof Merrow, a musical exclusive pirate, Bloody Dracul Vampir, a musical exclusive vampire who is Dracula’s daughter, and Prince Demande. It isn’t clear who she would be portraying in this concert as there doesn’t seem to be an actress to represent each of the Sailor Starlights.

The only person who will only be at the first day performance is Sakoto Yoshioka who played Princess Kakyuu in a musical in 1997. While it’s possible that she could be reprising her role as Princess Kakyuu, there is currently only one Sailor Starlight scheduled to be present on the first day so it doesn’t really add up.

There are a more performers who will only be there on the second day. This is when the full cast was originally planned to be together all at once. Yuuka Asami, the sixth actress to play Sailor Neptune from 1999 to 2002, later returned to play Jadeite in 2003. She will likely be performing as Sailor Neptune. Mao Mita, the fourth actress to play Sailor Saturn from 1999 to 2000, will likely be performing as Sailor Saturn. Tamaki Dia Shirai, the third actress to play Chibiusa from 1995 to 1996, will likely be performing as Sailor Chibi Moon. Ryuuji Kasahara played a number of characters including Kunzite, Death Ra, a musical exclusive member of the Death Busters, Tiger’s Eye, MC Fly, a musical exclusive minion of Galaxia, Chaos, Professor Tomoe, Baron Gilles de Rais, a musical exclusive vampire, and Dark Nibiru, a musical exclusive character. It’s not clear who he will be portraying. Momoko Okuyama, the first actress to play Sailor Star Healer in musicals from 1996 to 1998, may be reprising her role but once again as there is no Sailor Star Fighter actress involved we can’t be sure what role she will be playing.

Akiko Kosaka 45th Anniversary Music history

With this event only taking place on a single day it may prove more difficult to get tickets than other musicals. Do any of you hope to be able to make it to this concert? I’m certainly hoping a CD or video release will be made available for fans who aren’t likely to attend.

Source: Sailor Moon official site Original Story with an Update.

Sailor Moon Crystal Blu-Ray vol. 10 review

Sailor Moon Crystal Blu-Ray vol. 10 - Cover

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.

Sailor Moon Crystal Blu-Ray vol. 10 - Full cover

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.

Sailor Moon Crystal Blu-Ray vol. 10 - Sailor Jupiter's Star Power Stick

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

Sailor Moon Crystal Blu-Ray vol. 10 - Special Book - Pages 16 and 17 - Backgrounds

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.

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The Sailor Moon Crystal opening theme “Moon Pride” and ending theme “Gekkou” by Momoiro Clover Z

Moon Pride single cover art - Momoiro Clover Z

Yesterday we saw the first footage from new Sailor Moon anime, Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon Crystal, and with that we got a preview of the new theme song, “Moon Pride”. As was previously announced this theme song and the ending theme are performed by the group Momoiro Clover Z. The song will be out on a single CD July 30th which will include both the opening them “Moon Pride” and the ending theme “Gekkou”. Check out this ad for the new theme which includes a lot of footage of the group and of the trailer:

The opening theme, “Moon Pride” is composed by Revo of Sound Horizon while the ending theme, “Gekkou” is composed by Akiko Kosaka who composed many Sailor Moon songs from the original anime including Moon Revenge, from the Sailor Moon R Movie, Tuxedo Mirage, the ending theme for Sailor Moon S and many songs from the Sailor Moon musicals.

You can preorder the single on CD by either getting the CD version which will include a bonus track of a Momoiro Clover Z cover of Moon Revenge, including karaoke versions of all 3 tracks (CD Japan, Amazon Japan) or the CD and Blu-Ray combo pack which will have just the opening and ending themes in standard and karaoke versions plus a music video of Moon Pride on Blu-Ray (CD Japan, Amazon Japan)