Sailor Moon Sailor Stars, The Complete Fifth season, is coming to Blu-ray May 28th

Sailor Moon Sailor Stars The Complete Fifth Season

It looks like won’t need to wait much longer for the next season set of the original Sailor Moon anime. Last week in a since deleted Tweet Viz announced that Sailor Moon Sailor Stars The Complete Fifth Season would be coming to Blu-ray on May 28th. Why was the Tweet deleted? Who knows! Is May 28th still the official release date? Probably. The set is not listed with any online retailers yet, but should be showing up soon. Along with the announcement we also get our first look at the cover art for this release which features Eternal Sailor Moon.

With the release of the fifth and final season this will complete the rerelease of the series on Blu-ray. While the first few sets included significantly improved video quality the difference becomes less noticeable for the later series which already looked quite good in the sets released a few years ago.

The set will include English audio as well as the original Japanese audio with English subtitles. Will you be picking it up?

Sailor Moon SuperS The Complete Fourth Season is now available on Blu-ray

Sailor Moon SuperS Complete Fourth Season

The fourth complete season set of the original Sailor Moon anime is now out on Blu-ray! Sailor Moon SuperS The Complete Fourth Season was released on January 30th in stores and online. You can buy the set from Amazon to support the site. Previously the season had been split up into two instalments but we now have it all together as one set. These newer releases have generally been of better quality than the older sets. That said as the seasons went on the quality of the original sets improved, so the difference between this release and the earlier one is likely to be less noticeable than other seasons.

If you’ve been following The Discourse these sets also have a pinkish hue which you may never have noticed until people started to make a deal about it. It’s something that’s visible with side by side screenshots but nothing I ever made much notice of while watching the series.

Sailor Moon SuperS mainly focuses on Chibiusa as she befriends Pegasus and the girls face off against the Dead Moon Circus. This is an adaptation of the Dream arc of the Sailor Moon manga. It isn’t the strongest or most popular season but it does have some solid episodes and redeeming qualities such as the humourous monster designs. I’m looking forward to rewatching these episodes.

Did you pick up this set? What do you think of it?

The Sailor Moon Cosmos films are coming to Blu-ray and DVD in Japan on December 20th

Sailor Moon Cosmos DVD and Blu-ray announcement

Good news for those who like to spend a lot of money to import movies they don’t understand! The official Sailor Moon site has announced that Sailor Moon Cosmos Parts 1 and 2 will be release on regular and limited edition DVD and Blu-ray sets on December 20th 2023! As with other Japanese Sailor Moon releases this will only include Japanese audio with no English subtitles. Japanese Blu-ray discs are region A so they will play in a North American Blu-ray player however their DVDs are Region 2 which won’t play on a North American player. You can watch the short trailer for the Blu-ray release below.

There are two version of each of the Blu-ray and DVD release and they aren’t cheap! The single disc Blu-ray or DVD, which somehow costs the same in 2023, has an MSRP of 10,000 yen, about $69 US. The four disc sets also costs the same on DVD and Blu-ray with an MSRP of 16,000 yen or $110 US. What’s the difference? The four disc set has a second DVD or Blu-ray with special features including an anime music video, likely the one we got with the soundtrack, creditless openings for the films as well as two CDs with music from the films.

There are also vendor exclusive special incentives from a number of retailers. There are acrylic figures with different characters being included with the films from different retailers. Those are even more expensive than the regular four disc set though price varies slightly between retailers.

So when do we get to see the movies here? We still don’t have any news about a release of the Sailor Moon Cosmos films outside of Japan but that doesn’t stop people from speculating! As the Sailor Moon Eternal films were released on Netflix less than a month prior to the Japanese Blu-ray release of those movies many are thinking that we will be seeing these movies either in theatres or on Netflix, before December 20th. I’m not totally convinced of this timeline as it seems odd to time a North American release with a Japanese home video release, or to do the opposite, but it seems that usually Japanese Blu-rays are released after movies are released here.

The original timeline which I speculated about back when Sailor Moon Cosmos Part 1 was released in theatres predicted that if we heard about and got a release of Sailor Moon Cosmos with a similar delay that we did for Sailor Moon Eternal then the Netflix announcement would be in September, next month, and the streaming premiere would be in November. There’s still time for this to happen!

All that said I am reluctantly looking forward to importing these movies for their absurdly high price. If a North American release isn’t out by then I will watch the Japanese version and surely follow along well enough as the story is pretty close to the manga. It’s also likely, in the event that a North American release is still not announced prior to December 20th, that someone will fansub the films. This sometimes happens as quickly as a few days after a show airs or is available on video. Perhaps these fansubbing groups will not be working hard on the days before Christmas and we can expect it a bit later.

Will you be picking either of these sets up? If so which one?

Sailor Moon S Complete 3rd Season is now available on Blu-ray!

Sailor Moon S: The Complete Third Season Blu-Ray

Today is the day that fans have been anticipating for … well a few months I suppose. Sailor Moon S Complete 3rd Season releases today online and in stores. This set, like the two others which came before it, has updated video quality better than the sets released many years ago. Is it worth upgrading? I can’t tell you what to do but I’ve been happy to pick up these sets and am enjoying rewatching the series for the first time in a bit. We all need something to do while we wait for Sailor Moon Cosmos after all. You can support the site by buying the set using the Amazon link below.

This set, like others released by Viz, includes the new English dub, Japanese audio with English subtitles and many special features. Are you picking this set up? What’s your favourite part of the Sailor Moon S season?

Sailor Moon R Complete Second Season will be released on Blu-ray February 28th

Sailor Moon R Complete Season Blu-Ray - Cover

A full eight months after the first season of the original Sailor Moon anime was released on Blu-ray we are finally getting Sailor Moon R released as well! This single release containing the entire second season of Sailor Moon is coming February 28th 2023 with an MSRP of $49.99. Like with the season 1 release this is likely a new and improved version of the Blu-ray with better video quality than what was released in 2015. This release will have the original Japanese audio, Viz’s new English dub and optional subtitles. I was very happy with the first season release and look forward to getting this!

Sailor Moon R Complete Season Blu-Ray - Contents

The set is currently available to pre-order from RightStuf for $44.99. It’s also listed on Amazon however no price is currently indicated and there is no option to purchase the set yet.

Sailor Moon Laserdisc vol. 4

Does the box art look familiar? It should! This art was originally used for a Laserdisc cover for the first season release of the original Sailor Moon anime. This image of Sailor Moon appeared on volume 4. This was reused for the first VHS and DVD cover of the dub only release by ADV, the first DVD cover of the original Japanese DVD release and the inside cover of the first Japanese Blu-ray. It’s also similar to a pose that Sailor Moon makes in the intro to the Sailor Moon R Movie. Seeing it used as a Sailor Moon R cover is a bit odd but it does seem that they updated Sailor Moon’s broach to the season appropriate Crystal Star.

Sailor Moon Japanese Blu-Ray Vol. 1 - Comparison between dub only DVD, Japanese DVD and new Blu-Ray

By looking at the back of the box we don’t get much of an indication of anything new. As with the first season it seems likely we will get the same features as were included in the 2015 DVD and Blu-ray release. Since the first season set had a new interview included it is possible that some new content is in this set, but we don’t see it listed at this time.

Sailor Moon R Complete Season Blu-Ray - Back

Will you be picking up this set? Is it worth double dipping for you? I bought the first season again and am very happy with the set!

A box set with six recent musicals is coming to DVD and Blu-ray on November 17th

Sailor Moon La Reconquista Musical DVD - Queen Serenity, Sailor Venus, Jupiter, Mars and Moon

Good news for fans of the Sailor Moon musicals but perhaps not for those living outside of Japan. A set with six of the recent musicals is coming on November 17th though at this time it is only mentioned to be available from the official Sailor Moon fan club as well as the King Records e-SHOP which only ships within Japan. It will also be sold at the Sailor Moon 30th Anniversary Musical festival which is also in Japan. It isn’t clear if it will be available to members of the International Sailor Moon Fan Club or sold at other retailers. It is not currently listed on either Amazon Japan or CD Japan which I’ve used to buy such products from in the past.

Which musicals are included? This set will feature the 2013 musical La Reconquista, the 2014 musical Petite Étrangère, the 2015 musical Un Nouveau Voyage, the 2016 musical Amour Eternal, the 2017 musical Le Mouvement Final and the 2021 musical Princess Kaguya’s Lover. Noteably absent are the Super Live musical which has never been released on home video and the Nogizaka46 x Sailor Moon musical which already has two Blu-ray releases.

Why is this something anyone would care about? Aren’t these already on video? They are but unfortunately five of these six musicals were only released on low quality standard definition DVDs. The Princess Kaguya’s Lover musical was already released on Blu-ray. It’s also worth noting that the price is fairly good, by Japanese standards. The MSRP is 17,600 yen which is about $127. This is about double the usual prince of a single musical on Blu-ray. When I first heard of the news I dreaded seeing the price tag expecting something close to the $300 to $500 range. The price seems appealing, assuming people outside of Japan can manage to get a hold of it somehow.

The recent musicals, despite only being released on low quality DVDs, do appear to have been recorded on some higher quality video. The DVDs were widescreen suggesting they weren’t shot with NTSC video cameras but rather converted from a high definition source. There have also been streaming and downloadable versions of the musicals available exclusively in Japan which were in high definition.

These sets have one disc for each musical with a seventh bonus disc. Since most of the DVD and Blu-ray sets for the recent musicals included a second disc for bonus features it seems unlikely all of those features will be included with this set. The musicals are all fairly long and so, unless video quality is sacrificed, it’s not likely that many hours of special features will be included on the same disc alongside the video of the musical performances themselves.

Japanese DVDs are region 2 so be sure your DVD player can handle this is you’re looking to buy the DVD set. Japanese Blu-rays are region A which is the same region as North America. I’ve had no problem watching Japanese Blu-rays on my Canadian purchased PlayStation 3, 4 and 5 machines.

There will be an online event held on August 20th at 7pm, Japan Standard Time, which those who pre-order this set will have access to view.

Will you be picking up this set, assuming you are able to? I would certainly be happy to revisit these great musicals in high definition!

The Sailor Moon Complete First Season Blu-ray set is now available for purchase

Sailor Moon Complete First Season Blu-ray

The new release of the first season of Sailor Moon is out on Blu-ray today, June 14th. We have learned from fans that have received the set that these Blu-rays discs have new and improved video quality as well as features not on the releases from 2014. I got my copy today but have not have a chance to watch any of it yet. I did get myself a new Blu-ray drive and plan on doing a proper review as time permits. The release should be available in stores that sell this kind of thing as well as through online retailers. You can support the site by buying it through the link below.

This is a North American English language release by Viz which includes the original Japanese audio with optional English subtitles as well as the new English dub which was done by Viz using the same voice cast that appears in Sailor Moon Crystal.

Have you gotten your set yet? What do you think?

The upcoming release of Sailor Moon: The Complete First Season on Blu-ray will include improved video quality and a new interview not in the 2014 version

Sailor Moon Complete First Season Blu-ray

Sailor Moon: The Complete First Season is coming to Blu-ray … again. As the first season was originally release on Blu-ray in two parts in 2014 and 2015 many fans had been wondering if it was worth it to buy this again. When I posted about this in March I predicted these would just be the same discs bundled in new packaging. I was wrong! With fans starting to get their hands on the release we can now see that this is a new updated Blu-ray with superior video quality to the originals as well as some new special features. Considering getting it? You can support the site by using the link below to buy it.

The original Sailor Moon Season 1 Blu-Ray releases were, simply put, not good. The video quality was bad. It’s an old show. Viz obviously had some pretty low quality standard definition sources to work with. This show is not HD. The original film source was never scanned in high definition. What we got in 2014 and 2015 were pretty low quality releases with obvious video artifacts. At the time these looked much worse than the DVD releases in Japan as well as others which had come out in other countries prior to this. You can have a look at what that release looked like in my review of the Japanese Blu-ray release which looked better.

Sailor Moon Season 1 Part 1 Blu-ray (2014) - Episode 6 screenshot

Original 2014 Blu-ray

Sailor Moon The Complete First Season Blu-ray (2022) - Episode 6 screenshot

New 2022 Blu-ray

So what does this new version look like? Check out this Twitter thread by Fred Francis where he goes through his set and examines the menus and video quality with side by side comparisons of screenshots. I won’t repeat all of his comparisons here on the site but as you can see from the images above the difference really is night and day. The 2014 release is obviously worse looking than the much nicer looking 2022 release. It’s still not HD. It’s still a standard definition master which has been upscaled to 1080p using software. It just looks much better. The standard definition master was likely superior. More recent software algorithms may also been a contributor. Even as the Sailor Moon series went on the quality of releases by Viz improved dramatically to the point where Sailor Stars doesn’t have the same issues that the first couple of seasons did.

An interview with Katsuyuki Sumisawa

In addition to improved video quality the disc menus and even some features are new. This set has an interview with Sailor Moon writer Katsuyuki Sumisawa which had not been released in the earlier set.

Katsuyuki Sumisawa

Whether or not you consider this set worth purchasing is of course your own decision to make. For me it seems worth the upgrade at the reduced price. The full season costs less than what a half season cost eight years ago.

Will you be picking this set up?

Source: @fredjfrancis on Twitter

A new cheaper Blu-Ray set for Sailor Moon season 1 is coming from Viz in June

Sailor Moon Complete First Season Blu-ray

Good news for fans of the original Sailor Moon anime who for some reason didn’t actually buy the Blu-Ray sets that came out eight years ago. Viz has a cheap season 1 set which collects all 46 episodes in Japanese and in English on six discs coming June 14th 2022. Previously Viz had released half season sets for the entire Sailor Moon series. This meant five seasons across ten sets. This new set has a more affordable price tag of $49.99, less than even half a season used to cost! Amazon has the set listed for that full MSRP while Right Stuf has it for $44.99. You can support this site by pre-ordering the set from Amazon using the links in this post.

Viz’s Blu-Ray sets aren’t the best but they’re the best we’ve got. All Sailor Moon TV series Blu-Ray discs released anywhere in the world are basically upconverted to high definition from a standard definition source using software. This means the show will never look like something which is actually an HD remaster from the film source, as many anime series have done. Viz’s release, mostly in the early seasons, didn’t look that good. I compared Viz’s Blu-Ray release to the Japanese Blu-Rays and DVDs in my review of the first Japanese Blu-Ray set. The Japanese set isn’t perfect either, but it’s nicer than Viz’s set. As the years went on the quality of Viz’s Blu-Ray sets got marginally better until the Stars set which was actually pretty good. This was probably due to a number of factors including the quality of the video masters they had available and the techniques they used in order to clear up the video. This of course raises the question of what, exactly, this set will look like.

Sailor Moon Complete First Season Blu-ray

My prediction is that this set will just be exact copies of the Blu-Ray discs which were including in Viz’s first season Part 1 and Part 2 sets. Same menus. Same special features. Same marginal video quality. If that’s the case it’s a decent deal if you don’t have these already. It’s evidently a great series and this is your best way to watch it in English or in Japanese with English subtitles. When I watch my Star Trek The Next Generation or Deep Space Nine full series sets whenever I pop in the first disc of a season I get ads for the previous season set, which was included with the set I already bought. This happens because they didn’t author new Blu-Ray discs. They just reproduced more of the discs they had already authored and put them in a bigger box. We don’t know for sure that this is the approach that will be taken here, but that would be my guess. That’s common for rereleased movies and series. There is one bit of evidence which suggests that we may actually be getting reauthored discs. The Right Stuf listing mentions an interview with Katsuyuki Sumisawa as a special feature. As this wasn’t on the original release this would mean at least one disc, potentially all of them, is potentially going to be new.

Sailor Moon Complete First Season Blu-ray

It’s possible that Viz will go back to their source material and redo the video in better quality. It’s also possible that they’ll use other masters like the higher quality Japanese Blu-Ray releases or some of the other Blu-Ray releases which have been coming out around the world since 2014. They might also take some high quality masters and use newer technology like AstroRes to get the best possible HD version software algorithms can give! This is possible. I think it’s somewhat unlikely. If this were the case then there would be good reason for a fan to want to repurchase these sets in better quality. Personally I’ll be waiting until confirmation of what these sets are like before I decide whether or not to purchase the series again. Getting the same discs in different boxes isn’t enough of an incentive to me, if that’s what this set is. Getting new discs with similar video quality would also not be a terribly enticing release.

Sailor Moon Complete First Season Blu-ray

Here are some details about this release from the Right Stuf web site:

About Sailor Moon Season 1 Blu-Ray
Sailor Moon Season 1 contains episodes 1-46 of the anime directed by Junichi Sato and Kunihiko Ikuhara.

Usagi Tsukino is a cheerful schoolgirl who often finds herself in unwanted trouble. One day, she saves a talking cat named Luna who gives Usagi a brooch that transforms her into Sailor Moon, guardian of love and justice!

Special Features: Clean Opening and Ending, Trailers, Art Gallery, Announcement Panel & Fan Reactions, Dub Recording Behind the Scenes, Official Announcement, Trailer Moonlight Memories Pt. 1, AX Sailor Moon Panel, Official Cosplay Team Interview, Sailor Moon Day Highlights, An Interview with Katsuyuki Sumisawa

See More
Details
Publisher: VIZ
Media: Blu-ray
Spoken Language: English, Japanese
Subtitle Language: English
Genre: Fantasy, Romance
Themes: Battles, Magical Girl
Age Rating: 14+
Run Time: 1060
Year Created: 1992
Release Date: 6/14/2022
Dimensional Weight: 1
Region Code: A

The special features listed are more consistent with what we got in the older sets except for the Katsuyuki Sumisawa interview.

Will you be picking up this set?

Princess Kaguya’s Lover musical news: DVD and Blu-ray details, international streaming announced and music track previews

Musical Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon - Princess Kaguya's Lover Poster

The Princess Kaguya’s Lover musical begins performances in Japan on Friday September 3rd. This musical has been delayed due to the pandemic but is finally being held with audiences at 50% capacity. There’s been a lot of news about the musical recently so I’ll put the most important stuff in this post.

It was announced that the musical will be streamed not only in Japan but internationally as well! This is great news as the musicals have only started to become accessible outside of Japan recently. The Japanese streams will start along with the first showings as early as September 3rd for a hefty price of 3700 yen, about $34 US. There will be a 20% discount for those who attend the show. In contrast the Nogizaka46 x Sailor Moon musical which was streaming this past week only cost $15 US to stream! We don’t have details about the international streaming option at this time. It seems unlikely this will be available on September 3rd along with the Japanese stream. We only know that the distribution will be done through Globe Coding. Note that this is the same service which was used for the Nogizaka46 x Sailor Moon 2019 musical stream. I purchased a ticket for that and watched it and did not have any issues! I’m expecting that since the musical is streaming outside of Japan that it will have subtitles for fans to watch along with.

We’ve also gotten details about the home video release of the musical. It will be released on both DVD and Blu-ray on January 19th 2022. Preorders will start on September 3rd, along with the first showing of the musical. It won’t be cheap! The DVD will sell for 8,500 yen, about $77 UD, while the Blu-ray will cost 9,500 yen, about $87 US. This will include a disc with the musical itself and a second disc with bonus features. This is only the second musical we get on Blu-ray after the Nogizaka46 x Sailor Moon musical. After years of really low quality DVDs for the recent musicals I’m happy that these are finally coming out on Blu-ray, even if the price tag is a bit higher!

Finally we’ve gotten previews of some of the songs from the musical. This includes a very short version on YouTube as well as longer tracks on a number of streaming services. A collection of those links can be found on linkfire. The two tracks are You’re My Universe and this musical’s version of Moonlight Legend, the original theme song for the Sailor Moon anime. Both songs are performed by the actresses playing the Sailor Team in the musical. You can watch the shorter versions of these songs on YouTube below.

The Princess Kaguya’s Lover musical is based on the manga chapter story which was the inspiration for Sailor Moon S: The Movie. The musical will focus heavily on Luna who falls in love with Kakeru and ultimately turns into human Luna. Are any of you expecting to see this one live or do you plan on streaming it or importing the home video release?