Sailor Moon Crystal Act 25, Showdown – Death Phantom, Review

Posted on July 5, 2015 by Adam

The latest episode of Sailor Moon Crystal, Act 25, Showdown – Death Phantom, premiered this weekend on July 4th. It is available to stream on Crunchyroll, Hulu and Niconico. As of now it is currently the second last episode of Sailor Moon Crystal, as there are none planned beyond episode 26. This week Chibiusa becomes Sailor Chibi Moon but this happens just moments too late, as tragedy has struck Sailor Pluto!

As we left off last time Prince Demande was about to stick two versions of the Silver Crystal together which is a bad idea and likely to destroy the whole world. Sailor Pluto, who sees this as being likely to cause certain death to herself and everyone she cares about, decides to stop time to avoid this catastrophe. Too bad stopping time is the ultimate taboo! Even though Sailor Pluto is totally capable of doing it, she totally never should and that means that she will have to die as a result. The physics of this are a bit odd. Everything is still with nothing moving, but clearly there is still air flowing enough to allow the show’s main characters to breathe. The distinction between who and what are not frozen in time seems to be completely decided by Sailor Pluto, though how this is done is not clear. So Sailor Pluto had 3 taboos not to break and she sort of broke all of them, but everyone would have died otherwise so no fault can really be given in this.

Sailor Pluto thanks Diana for protecting the Space-Time Door. So does this mean no one is guarding it anyone? I mean, Sailor Pluto spent a life of solitude simply so that she could endlessly protect the door but now that no one is around to do it… maybe let’s just get an alarm system set up?

Black Lady is saddened by seeing Sailor Pluto dying. She is reminded in this that she is not really alone and so Chibiusa is finally able to break free of Nemesis’s control and, thanks to the power of the Silver Crystal from the future, is able to transform into Sailor Chibi Moon. The name Sailor Chibi Moon is not said in this episode, but that is who she becomes. King Endymion mentions that this is the Sailor Guardian who will succeed Sailor Moon. Indeed this is Chibiusa’s destiny, to become the Sailor Guardian to protect to the world once Sailor Moon is retired though we have a younger unretired version of Sailor Moon from the past to do that right now. This wasn’t a huge surprise, as art showing Sailor Chibi Moon surfaced through official sources before we even got a look at Chibiusa, and of course Sailor Chibi Moon has appeared in other continuities for over 20 years.

A transformation sequence accompanies this change. It wasn’t really clear if this would happen at this point. In the original Sailor Moon anime Chibiusa does not transform into Sailor Chibi Moon during Sailor Moon R. She does so only during Sailor Moon S and even then she has no transformation sequence until Sailor Moon SuperS. It is nice to see her actually have one animated, though at this point this may be the final time we see it, as there may not be a next season of Sailor Moon Crystal.

It is unfortunately that the catalyst for Chibiusa’s change was Sailor Pluto’s death, although her changing prior to this may have been enough to have Sailor Pluto avoid that fate. She is naturally heartbroken at the death of her good friend, and just wanted Pluto to see her make her long awaited transformation.

Oh wait we still have to fight with Nemesis! Mamoru is now unbrainwashed and apologizes to Sailor Moon, supposedly for making out with their daughter and attacking her, and she says it’s okay as if he was apologizing for leaving his dirty laundry on the floor or something. A funny exchange though in seriousness he had no control over his actions, and this is really why Sailor Moon is so easy to forgive him.

Prince Demande tries to attack Nemesis. This doesn’t work and he dies. So everyone tries to attack him and this doesn’t really work. We then go into Nemesis and learn that the true identity of Nemesis who was Death Phantom was Wise Man is actually Death Phantom, so we’re back to calling him that for now. This can get a little confusing. He is indeed the criminal that was kicked out of Crystal Tokyo for killing a bunch of people. He slowly made Nemesis full of evil energy and acquired the power he has today. He’ll probably be getting what he deserves… next time.

Next, on July 17th, is Act 26, Replay – Neverending. This final Black Moon story will wrap up anything related to Crystal Tokyo, the Black Moon Clan, Nemesis and Chibiusa, though Chibiusa continues to be present in the Infinity story arc which follows. This will, as far as we know, be the final episode of Sailor Moon Crystal. There have been no episodes confirmed as following Act 26. This past weekend at Anime Expo at Viz’s official Sailor Moon panel it was stated that Act 26 was the final episode of Sailor Moon Crystal. If there are any plans for additional episodes, not even Viz who is releasing the show domestically has any knowledge of such plans.

Keep reading for more screenshots from this episode and the next episode preview for Act 26.

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Watch Sailor Moon Crystal Act 25, Showdown – Death Phantom, July 4th at 6am Eastern Time

Posted on July 2, 2015 by Adam

The next episode of Sailor Moon Crystal, Act 25, Showdown – Death Phantom, will be available this coming Saturday, July 4th, at 7pm Japan Standard Time which is 6am Eastern Time, 3am Pacific Time. Since that’s nice and early you’ll have more than enough time to watch it before your mandatory yearly viewing of the hit film Independence Day. As always the episode will be available to stream on Crunchyroll, Hulu and Niconico. This week we say goodbye to a Sailor Guardian and hello to a new one as everything changes.

Where the last episode left off Prince Demande was just about to put the two Silver Crystals together, which is meant to be a disastrous suggestion of the scope of crossing the streams. Sailor Pluto has three rules and she’s broken two so why not just break the third now? Judging from the next episode preview a lot of the episode will show Chibiusa struggling to free herself from Black Lady, though this internal struggle is not something we see a lot of in the Manga. It’s finally time for Chibiusa to come into the role she was born to play, but will she be just a moment too late?

Sailor Moon S episode 116 and 117 are now available on Hulu

Posted on June 23, 2015 by Adam

The two latest episodes of Sailor Moon S were added to Hulu and Neon Alley yesterday. This week we got episodes 116 and 117 which once again focus mainly on Hotaru as her friendship with Chibiusa deepens.

Episode 116, Sunny Skies After a Storm: A Friendship Dedicated to Hotaru, is all about a fun picnic. It’s fitting that we just got an episode of Sailor Moon Crystal this past weekend which shows how Usagi understands why Black Lady is possessive of Mamoru and recalls the fault in herself for feeling the same way but here in the anime no such revalation has taken place. Usagi is completely jealous of Chibiusa and Mamoru, as always. The whole gang, Usagi, Mamoru, Chibiusa and Hotaru, go to a lovely garden for a picnic. The random dude that works there is the target of the Daimon. What a coincidence that this was the exact place Sailor Moon was! Fighting ensues and Hotaru has a total freakout moment where she gets all glowy eyed and attacks the monster. If I didn’t know any better I’d say there is certainly something up with this girl!

Episode 117, Higher and Stronger: A Cheer from Usagi, is a pretty silly one. An early scene has Mimete and some yet unshown members of the Witches 5 playing Twister. It isn’t really Twister though, as a real Twister board has a 4×6 pattern of coloured circles with all of the same colour in a row. This board has randomly dispersed coloured circles with numbers, but still has the player putting a hand or foot on some specified dot. The target for this episode is a runner named Shun Hayase who Hotaru is infatuated with. He was sick when younger and was able to overcome it, and Hotaru hopes to be able to do the same. In the original dub of this episode the runner’s English name is Sean Hayes. This is meant to be the closest English approximation to the name Shun Hayase, which I think fits. This seemed ridiculous to me as I watched the episode as Sean Hayes is a prominent American actor best known for playing Jack in the TV series Will and Grace. This seems like a total coincidence however as Shun Hayase’s appearance in the original Japanese version of this show predates Will and Grace by a number of years. Inspiration is impossible, barring time travel, and if the creative talents behind Sailor Moon had time machines Sailor Moon R would have made more sense. The dub would have been recorded once the series was airing and popular, so there may have been a bit of a joke intended with the name adaptation which sounded close enough. Hatoru gets to meet her idol while Chibiusa does an adorable cheer, but he gets his Pure Heart ripped out by Mimete’s monster.

Support the site by buying Viz’s dubbed and subbed episodes of Sailor Moon on DVD or Blu-Ray using the links below:

Sailor Moon S episode 114 and 115 are now available on Hulu

Posted on June 15, 2015 by Adam

The two latest episodes of Sailor Moon S have been added to Hulu and Neon Alley. This week we focus a lot on boy crazy Mimete and her crazy antics, as well as getting a good look at Hotaru and her mysterious past.

Episode 114, I Love Idols: Mimete’s Dilemma, has Mimete and Minako facing off against each other in a contest to find the lead in an idol’s next movie. Jinta Araki is a heartthrob that both Minako and Mimete are infatuated with. Minako has long had a dream of being an idol, and this fits right in with that. As with many other times in the series, this creates a situation where one of our heroes befriends one of the enemies without realising what is really going on. The contest goes well for Minako, who is quite surprised by her success. She passes the swimsuit part of the contest, which will please a certain reader who is a big fan of episodes with swimsuits. She makes it to the final five before being cut, though she will do much better in a later episode. Mimete loses and, as always, freaks out and attacks the target who she was previously infatuated with. Mimete is like Kirk from the original Star Trek series who would frequently kiss a girl and then hit her all in the same episode.

Episode 115, Shadow of Silence: The Pale Glimmer of a Firefly, is all about Hotaru. The title is a pun in Japanese, as the word “Hotaru” means firefly. The episode starts out with a nice conversation between Setsuna and Chibiusa. Even though they were BFFs in the future, they don’t get to interact much in the present time. There’s little question at this point as to whether or not Hotaru is the Messiah of Silence who her father, Professor Tomoe, is talking to. When she has pain during their conversation we immediately cut to Hotaru in pain on her bed. When Chibiusa visits Hotaru she is turned away, but Hotaru pursues and reveals the full extent of her health problems when she falls ill and needs to be hospitalised. In some flashback scenes we see a lot of what has been going on with this girl. She has some sort of dangerous ability which first manifested itself when she was a child and killed a fish. Later we see her in school when she unknowingly hurt a boy in her class. Her school uniform in this scene is from the Mugen Academy, which Haruka and Michiru also attend.

Support the site by buying Viz’s dubbed and subbed episodes of Sailor Moon on DVD or Blu-Ray using the links below:

The Sailor Moon Crystal English dub will premier at Anime Expo on July 3rd in Los Angeles

Posted on June 13, 2015 by Adam

The first two episodes of the English dub of Sailor Moon Crystal will be premiered at the Anime Expo convention in Los Angeles on Friday July 3rd at 6pm, as part of Sailor Moon Day. The anime convention’s schedule is now online, where the event was listed. This will be Act 1, Usagi – Sailor Moon, and Act 2, Ami – Sailor Mercury. The English dub, by Viz Media, will keep the same cast that their new English dub of the original anime used. Some of those actors will be present at the convention. Since this convention takes place in California all times will be in Pacific Time.

Anime Expo will take place the weekend of July 2nd to the 5th in Los Angeles California. The convention will feature many guests from the English dub of the original Sailor Moon Anime and Sailor Moon Crystal. In attendance will be Stephanie Sheh, the voice of Sailor Moon, Cristina Vee, the voice of Sailor Mars, Amanda Miller, the voice of Sailor Jupiter, Cherami Leigh, the voice of Sailor Venus, Robbie Daymond, the voice of Tuxedo Mask and Sandy Fox, the voice of Chibiusa and Black Lady. Kyle Hebert, who played the Priest who turned into the monster Boxy in the new dub, will also be at the convention though he may not be involved in the dub of Sailor Moon Crystal or the Sailor Moon themed events.

Also at the convention will be Momoiro Clover Z, the band which performs the Sailor Moon Crystal opening theme, Moon Pride, and ending theme, Gekkou or Moonbow. Momoiro Clover Z will be performing on Thursday July 2nd with KISS members Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons. The two bands recently collaborated on a single released as Momoiro Clover Z vs. KISS. Watch the video below.

Friday is Sailor Moon Day at Anime Expo. This starts with the Official Sailor Moon Panel by Viz Media and the cast of Sailor Moon from 10am to noon. Following this from 1pm to 2:30pm will be a screening of Sailor Moon’s best episodes, though we don’t know what those will be at this time. From 4:30pm to 5:30pm will be a Sailor Moon Cosplay gathering. Then from 6pm to 7:30pm is the English dub premiere of Act 1 and 2 of Sailor Moon Crystal. Other events listed in their schedule that will likely be relevant to Sailor Moon fans are the Viz Media panel on Thursday July 2nd at 1:15pm and the Viz Animation Panel featuring Neon Alley on Saturday July 4th at 4pm.

Source: Anime Expo schedule via Moonkitty.net

Sailor Moon S episode 112 and 113 are now available on Hulu

Posted on June 8, 2015 by Adam

The two latest episodes of Sailor Moon S were added to Hulu and Neon Alley this morning. This week we get episodes 112 and 113 which focus on a new character, Hotaru Tomoe, and her mysterious family.

Episode 112, Who Is the True Messiah? Chaos of Light and Darkness, doesn’t really deal with who the true Messiash is. The new villain, who we saw last week, is Mimete of the Witches 5. We also get a look at her in the Death Busters’ HQ with Cyprine in the background. Mimete is kind of insane. She killed Eudial in the last episode and is all over the map this week, first falling in love with an actor and then attacking him and ripping out his Pure Heart. The main thing which occurs in this episode is the first appearance of Hotaru. We saw her briefly in the last episode but we get a proper look at her here. Chibiusa loses her hat and Hotaru helps her retrieve in. The two are instant friends. This is the special encounter that Neo Queen Serenity told Chibiusa she would be making in the 20th century. We’ll be learning much more about her as the season goes on.

Episode 113, A House Filled With Evil Presence: The Beautiful Hotaru’s Secret, does not actually explain much about Hotaru’s secret. This episode features a very exposition filled interaction between the Sailor Guardians of the outer solar system and Tuxedo Mask. Everyone transforms for the sake of transforming without a villain in sight, which is a bit of a waste. We learn that Sailor Uranus, Neptune and Pluto protect the solar system from outside invaders while the Sailor Guardians that appeared previously protect against things from inside the solar system, like we had in the first two seasons. They aren’t too fond of Sailor Moon. Chibiusa and Usagi pay Hotaru a visit at her home. There they run into Kaolinite, who is somehow not dead. Usagi is shocked by this, as she encountered her in battle many times. Chibiusa arrived after Kaolinite’s supposed death so she doesn’t see this as odd. Somehow Kaolinite does not recognize Usagi, who she encountered in civilian form on her birthday, and Usagi just shrugs the whole thing off thinking it’s just a similarity. We see Professor Tomoe, Hotaru’s father, and here it is revealed who he is. Not much sense hiding it as we know his last name already. We also see him talking to a weird zonked out Hotaru who seems to be the Messiah of Silence. Will Hotaru destroy the world? She seems like a nice innocent girl, but when she comes face to face with Usagi’s broach, which contains the Silver Crystal, she sort of freaks out and seems to want to eat it. Surely this is not the last we’ll see of Hotaru as there is more going on with this girl and her creepy family who are clearly associated with the season’s villains.

Support the site by buying Viz’s dubbed and subbed episodes of Sailor Moon on DVD or Blu-Ray using the links below:

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 23, Covert Maneuvers – Wiseman, Review

Posted on June 7, 2015 by Adam

The latest episode of Sailor Moon Crystal, Act 23, Covert Maneuvers – Wiseman, is now available on Crunchyroll, Hulu and Niconico. This week we are finally introduced to Black Lady, who is Chibiusa aged and made somewhat evil by Wise Man. Black Lady is all about being evil and making out with her younger father from the past, Tuxedo Mask.

The episode starts out with Sailor Pluto warning the Sailor Guardians about not wandering around in the limbo and getting lost in the storm in the Space Time Corridor. Sailor Moon wants to go anyway, and Sailor Pluto caves. Then they find Luna-p and nothing really changed about the severity of the situation, but Sailor Pluto tells them they can’t go on and since Sailor Moon passes out, they give up.

We get a better look at Nemesis this week. Previously I postulated about the state of the surface of Nemesis, which is never very clearly described. Here we see that there are a large number of volcanic eruptions on the surface, so it does at least have a solid rock like surface. Most of the time there seems to be spent somewhere underground. Traveling deep into its core there is a kind of alternate dimension. Black Lady talks about this Castle of Darkness at the bottom, but it’s really just a slab of rock. Supposedly someone would build a castle here but there’s really nothing going on. Nemesis is kind of lame, all things considered. No wonder they want to conquer Earth!

This episode marks the first real introduction of Black Lady. Seems like this was a long time coming. Chibiusa is taken away by Wise Man during Act 21. We see Black Lady a number of times throughout Act 22 be we never get a clear look at her. Finally seeing her it doesn’t feel like a huge surprise, especially since she’s been shown in the anime and manga for some 20 years. As always her appearance here matches that of the manga more than the original anime were she had very little exposition. Physically she seems about the same, though I can’t help but notice she has disproportionately large breasts. Compared to the rest of the Sailor Guardians the proportions seems a bit off. This establishes a contrast between Black Lady and child Chibiusa, though it seems innapropriate to sexualize such a character.

Black Lady’s first order of business is to capture and brainwash Tuxedo Mask in order to seduce him. Naturally this a bit odd as she is his daughter. While a lot of her bad behaviour is motivated by Wise Man’s corruption, there’s no indication that this is. This incestuous relationship will not help Wise Man achieve his goals. Chibiusa is a young girl who is infatuated with her father. This in itself is not that odd for a child. She gets thrown into an adult’s body and she deals with her conflicting feelings as it makes sense to her, by trying to hook up with her father. Let’s remember of course that Chibiusa is over 900 years old while Mamoru is about 19 years old at this point. It may seem creepy for such a young girl to be with such an old guy, but she’s much older than the teenagers he’s usually hanging around with, she just lacks the maturity which comes with a regular transition through adolescence and adulthood. This relationship is a result of a young girl’s emotions expressing themselves through the actions of someone who seems to be in adult, but in many ways is not.

We first see Chibiusa kissing Tuxedo Mask while he is in his full Tuxedo. In the scene immediately afterwards Mamoru is seen only wearing his white shirt. These are the shirts usually reserved for the girls that sleep over at his place. Are we to believe something happened between this original kiss and the time where Mamoru is somewhat dressed down?

The gang travels back to the present day. Why do we keep doing this? Naturally this stay does not last very long but while there we learn that they used Luna-P to erase Usagi’s mother’s memories. This seems a bit drastic. I realize Chibiusa put some of those memories there but she’s been gone for what, a day? Maybe a few hours? Oh well the time storm thingy was too much let’s forget about ever getting Mamoru and Chibiusa back. Should we also go around brainwashing Motoki, Asanuma and anyone else Mamoru knows to avoid any hard questions about his disappearance? We didn’t do so last arc when he died or in this arc when the other girls were kidnapped for much longer times! Usagi mentions that she’s happy to be home but then is sad because her boyfriend and future daughter are lost to time. She feels guilty for being upset about this and everyone finds her impossible to please. In the grand scheme of problems this seems like a pretty huge one and regardless of the relative comfort of sleeping in one’s own bed this kind of problem seems like a legitimate reason to be a bit bummed. All considered, Usagi takes it quite well!

Back in the future King Endymion has a chat with Diana the kitten. He then pets her. Wait a minute! How is this possible? We don’t know much about King Endymion’s ghost like maybe a hologram maybe a sort of astral projection type representation but we do know that he does not have an actual physical form. Chibiusa walks right through him in Act 20 but now that a kitten needs petting he’s able to muster some sort of ability to be solid which he was not able to do to hug his own daughter who’s been traveling through time to save him and his family. No wonder this girl has daddy issues.

Finally Black Lady confronts her actual father in the Crystal Palace. She seems to want to make out with him too but since she’s not a kitten that doesn’t seem possible. She gets kicked out of the Crystal Palace by Neo Queen Serenity. I know she’s being kind of evil here and kicking her out makes some sense but still this is being done by her own mother. It was probably the making out with Tuxedo Mask part that set her off.

Next time, on June 20th is Act 24, Attack – Black Lady. The battle continues as everyone sees more of Black Lady and she introduces everyone to her new boyfriend, Endymion, which naturally turns some heads. We’ll get to see Endymion wielding the Cutie Moon Rod.

With Act 24 coming in a couple of weeks there has still not been any confirmation of any episodes past Act 26. The first episode of the third story arc, should such a thing be announced, should be playing the first Saturday of August but for now we have had no official confirmation that this will happen. As always if we learn any news about the new series and new episodes we’ll post it to the site right away.

Keep reading for more screenshots from Act 23 and the next episode preview for Act 24.

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Sailor Moon Crystal Deluxe Limited Edition Blu-Ray vol. 8 review

Posted on May 21, 2015 by Adam

The latest release of Sailor Moon Crystal on Blu-Ray was released on May 13th. Volume 8 collects acts 15 and 16. It’s packaging showcases Chibiusa. You can buy this volume on Amazon Japan and CD Japan. It only has Japanese audio with no English subtitles, though it will play in North American Blu-Ray players.

The charm included this time is Sailor Mercury’s Star Power Stick. Her original transformation item was released with volume 2 when Sailor Mercury first appeared on the cover. It’s a safe bet that the next 3 releases will have Sailor Mars, Jupiter and Venus’s Star Power Sticks as charms.

The 20 page special booklet included this time has the same breakdown as others, included episode summaries, screenshots, character art and a special page by Fumio Osano, Osabu. The interviews included in this release are with Yu Kaminoki, producer for the series and Misato Fukuen, the voice actress who plays Chibiusa. The character art included mostly focuses on Chibiusa but also has Koan and Berthier of the Ayakashi Sisters. There’s a heavy amount of focus on Chibiusa with her gun. Can any gun nuts identify exactly what model of gun this is and whether or not it can be equipped with an optional flower clip?

The episodes included are Act 15, Infiltration – Sailor Mars, in which Sailor Mars faces off again Koan, and Act 16, Abduction – Sailor Mercury, in which Sailor Mercury faces off again Berthier. Chibiusa showed up at the end of the last release so now we begin focusing on the battle with the Black Moon Clan. Both episodes on this disk have minor changes to their animation that’s been done for the Blu-Ray release. I didn’t note anything terribly significant as far as changes go. You can check out the differences in Act 15 and Act 16 on Crystal Comparisons, which details the changes between the streaming version and home video versions of the show.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 17 - Chibiusa in her incorrect coloured uniform with Luna-P

Chibiusa in her incorrectly coloured uniform from the next episode preview for Act 17

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 17 - Chibiusa with a white top

Chibiusa in her correctly coloured uniform in Act 17

More shocking here is the lack of change! The next episode preview for Act 17 shows Chibiusa with a short sleeved but dark blue uniform. As we’ve covered in our review of Act 17, this was an incorrect colour which was actually corrected for the episode proper. The animators change things like this up until the last minute and update all kinds of things for the Blu-Ray but no one is bothering to fix up the next episode previews so that they don’t include these errors! Shameful!

As always as I don’t speak Japanese I can’t comment much on the audio commentary. There are three people appearing on these commentaries. You can hear Rina Sato, the voice of Sailor Mars, Hisako Kanemoto, the voice of Sailor Mercury and Munehisa Sakai, the series director for Sailor Moon Crystal.

As with other releases it’s hard to justify buying a fairly expensive release for just two episodes. I don’t imagine I’ll change anyone’s mind on buying these at this point. Either you’ve bought the other releases and will buy this too, or you won’t be buying any. With free viewing options available for Sailor Moon Crystal and an English version inevitably happening in the future, this isn’t something many English speaking fans will find much value in.

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

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Sailor Moon S episodes 106 and 107 are now available on Hulu

Posted on May 18, 2015 by Adam

The two latest episodes of Sailor Moon S are now available on Hulu and Neon Alley. This week with episodes 106 and 107 we get two stories of people who fell in love with Michiru! First is a flashback to the time when Haruka first became Sailor Uranus and then Chibiusa is in love with a classmate and they make a clay grail which looks just like a future transformation item.

Episode 106, The Bond of Destiny: Uranus’s Distant Past, partially takes place in flashbacks, which is the only part of the story we really care about. As a runner who Haruka is friends with is targeted we get a look back at when Haruka and Michiru first met. Michiru had, at the time, already transformed into Sailor Neptune and Haruka was having visions of the upcoming apocalypse. Haruka was not interested in becoming a Sailor Guardian and Michiru supported this decision. When she saw how much Sailor Neptune needs help, Haruka had a change of heart and became Sailor Uranus and so a great romance was born.

Episode 107, Art Is an Explosion of Love: Chibi-Usa’s First Love, is one of the many first loves Chibiusa has. Let’s see… first there’s obviously Mamoru who she was so in love with that she turned evil and old to get him, but the status of first love is also given to the likes of Helios and Peruru later in the series. Chibiusa has made a pie for a boy she has a crush on, but the Sailor Guardians all eat it. In this scene we get a look at Usagi’s book shelf and can see that she has a bunch of Sailor Moon books in her library. The boy Chibiusa is in love with is Masanori Tsuzuki, but unfortunately he does not return her affections instead being interested in Michiru. Naturally Chibiusa is upset with this, but they still manage to be good friends. In an art class Chibiusa, with the help of Masanori, makes a clay statue of the Holy Grail, a transformation item which will appear later in the season. This is really odd as it doesn’t really come back. This is lifted from the manga in a later chapter which has Chibiusa making the grail which ties in a bit better to the actual Holy Grail which Chibiusa has some memory of due to time travel and such. In the original anime the early appearance of the grail is a bit random. Chibiusa saves Masanori from the monster of the week and while it seems like their relationship is about to blossom he is never seen again. Chibiusa’s important encounter which she was sent to the past to make, is still yet to come.

Support the site by buying Viz’s dubbed and subbed episodes of Sailor Moon on DVD or Blu-Ray using the links below:

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 22, Hidden Agenda – Nemesis, Review

Posted on May 18, 2015 by Adam

The latest episode of Sailor Moon Crystal, Act 22, Hidden Agenda – Nemesis, is now available to stream on Crunchyroll, Hulu and Niconico. This week we get teased a bit more with Black Lady but we still don’t get a really good look at her. Instead we focus on more exposition and freeing Sailor Moon, Mercury, Mars and Jupiter who are trapped on Nemesis.

Why does it take us so long to finally get around to showing Black Lady? The flow of the past few episodes seems a bit weird but this is partly due to the fact that the manga was originally broken up differently. This was changed when the manga was reprinted around the time the live action Sailor Moon series was out. Originally the last episode, Act 21, and this episode were part of one manga chapter, Act 20 Complication – Nemesis. This happened once in the first arc and will happen once again with the final Act of the Black Moon story arc. All in all we will have 26 episodes of Sailor Moon Crystal for what was originally 23 chapters of the manga. The original story that covered these two episodes was very long, almost 100 pages, so it makes sense to break it up into two episodes but the pacing seems a bit odd as it takes us forever to tease out the appearance of Black Lady. Sailor Moon Crystal is a 23 minute show but a manga chapter had no such restriction which is why there were some very long stories some months.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 22 - Chibiusa takes Wiseman's hand

Next episode preview at the end of Act 21

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 22 - Chibiusa wearing the correct top, with symbol of the Black Moon Clan on her head

Intro for Act 22

Shirt gate continues! This show can’t seem to make up it’s mind on this thing. I know I’ve mentioned this time and time again but as long as they keep screwing it up I will keep harping on them for it. As you can see above, the next episode preview that played at the end of Act 21 showed Chibiusa with her long sleeved blue uniform which she should absolutely not be wearing at this point. This is the uniform she wore when she came from the future which she traded for a short sleeve white uniform when she started going to school. She wore this on her trip back to the future and did not bring a change of clothes. The animators consistently mess up the colour of Chibiusa’s shirt in next episode previews, fixing it before the next one comes out. We can clearly see in this how last minute this show is prepared. Another change that can be seen is that Chibiusa, pre transformation, is seen with the symbol of the Black Moon Clan on her forehead. This is new to Sailor Moon Crystal. In the manga and anime Chibiusa doesn’t get this symbol until she transforms into Black Lady.

A new location featured this week is the library which houses many books. Funny when you actually get a nice look at them it looks like there are just a bunch of copies of the same book. So many volume 19s of some kind of book all over these shelves! The original Sailor Moon manga was collected in 18 volumes. Perhaps the most precious thing collected in this library is more Sailor Moon manga! These books are so important that Venus is tasked with just watching them. Tuxedo Mask runs off to find Chibusa and she is stuck there to protect a bunch of books!

If you’ve ever wondered what Sailor Moon characters look like with lips we now have an answer! With another funny face frame this week we get to see Sailor Venus with lips and she looks a bit like a frog!

We get another look at the Death Phantom, the Earth criminal who became Wise Man. It’s mentioned that he has Beast Hand and Evil Eye, though there is no indication of what that is. He seems to have used some sort of supernatural power to kill a bunch of people, but he is said to be a human. Indeed Sailor Moon is full of these kinds of magical people but there really isn’t much in the way of detail about Death Phantom. It seems this could be a whole side story on it’s own which never really gets investigated.

Nemesis is such an odd planet. When we see it from space it’s surface seems volatile. It does not appear to have a solid surface but perhaps one of molten lava or some sort of gas or energy. It’s mentioned that the reactor is the only place which opens to the outside, yet we clearly see buildings with the reactor’s energy coming out of it. What exactly is going on here? Is this a building on the surface of Nemesis? Is this an underground cavern with buildings in it? This doesn’t seem all that efficient when a cavern isn’t really exposed to the elements. Perhaps this is the surface but above them is a thick cloud or energy layer that can’t be penetrated? This brings up a ton of questions. Who are the labourers of the Black Moon Clan who make these buildings? What is the size of their population? Where do they get their food? The manga never shows actual structures so some of this doesn’t really come up but an anime series like this needs to have proper backgrounds and a level of detail that isn’t shown in a manga series.

Finally Sailor Moon is able to transform. This isn’t really explained but the key is that the reactor connects to the outside. As another suggestion that they are underground, Sailor Moon’s powers are blocked where she is. Being close to the reactor allows her to get her power and in turn transfer that to her friends. How gross is the room Sailor Mercury, Mars and Jupiter are in? It’s just full of dead bodies.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 22 - The Sailor Guardians return

Next episode preview at the end of Act 21

Act 22

As another change from the next episode preview once the Sailor Guardians show up the reactor’s energy is shown in the background more prominently and shining through a bit. This is a fairly minor change but yet another reminder that these episodes are tweaked right up to the last minute.

Next episode preview at the end of Act 21

Act 22

Yet another change is this shot of Black Lady’s eyes. Originally all we see are Black Lady’s eyes in the next episode preview but here in the episode proper they are using the sort of blurring effect to hide her identity instead. It seems that the method of obscuring Black Lady’s identity was still being worked out after a couple of weeks ago’s airing.

Black Lady is seen but not really seen throughout. In the manga she appears as a sort of ghostly whisp but here she’s just sort of blurry. Perhaps she has that same problem Bigfoot has where you can’t take a clear picture of him. We can see her clothes in Sailor Moon Crystal which is a first, this is something that normally wouldn’t show up until the next episode. She doesn’t do a ton but does manage to kill Rubeus which tells us she isn’t really on board with the Black Moon Clan but instead has some other agenda.

Wise Man has the most ridiculous eyes in this episode. Every time Black Lady does something amusing he gets these emoticon type eyes which look like something out of those letters that scroll across a Niconico feed. OMG! #kawaii ^_^; @_@;

Next in 3 weeks on June 6th is Act 23, Covert Maneuvers – Wiseman. This time we’ll get a proper look at Black Lady without any blurriness.

Keep reading to see more screenshots from Act 22 and the next episode preview for Act 23.

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Sailor Moon News

Bringing you the latest news about the new anime series Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon Crystal and all things Sailor Moon.

Tag Archives: Chibiusa

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