Listen to a clip of “Moon Color Chainon”, the Sailor Moon Eternal theme song by Momoiro Clover Z

Momoiro Clover Z - Moon Color Chainon

A preview of the theme song for the upcoming Sailor Moon Eternal films has been posted to the official Sailor Moon site! The song, by Momoiro Clover Z, is “Gesshoku Chainon” which roughly translates to “Moon Color Chainon”. What’s a chainon? Chaînon is a french word meaning a link in a chain. I suppose this is a reference to the Sailor Guardians all being individual links in the chain that is the Sailor Team. You can check out the short clip of the song which features the members of Momoiro Clover Z below. It includes a few seconds of new footage from the upcoming films.

Two different CD and Blu-Ray sets for this song will be released on January 13th 2021. They will each include a different version of the song. The Momoiro Clover Z Edition includes the song performed only by the group Momoiro Clover Z. The Sailor Moon Eternal Edition includes a different version of the song which is performed by not only Momoiro Clover Z but also voice actors from the Sailor Moon Eternal film. The voice actors who will be providing vocals on this version of the song are Kotono Mitsuishi as Sailor Moon, Hisako Kanemoto as Sailor Mercury, Rina Sato as Sailor Mars, Ami Koshimizu as Sailor Jupiter and Shizuka Ito as Sailor Venus. There does not appear to be any version which includes both songs, so fans looking to get both will need to buy both versions.

Sailor Moon Eternal - Moon Color Chainon Video - The Sailor Guardians

Exclusive cards are available for those who order from specific retailers with each different retailer including a different card. The Momoiro Clover Z version (Amazon Japan exclusive, regular edition) is 2500 yen which is about $24 US while the Sailor Moon Eternal version (Amazon Japan exclusive, regular edition) is 2200 yen which is about $21 US.

Sailor Moon Eternal - Moon Color Chainon Video - Momoiro Clover Z singing

The band Momoiro Clover Z has contributed a lot of music to Sailor Moon Crystal going back to the very beginning. They performed Moon Pride, the original opening theme for the series. Fans may notice that Momoiro Clover Z used to have five members but that this video only includes four. Momoka Ariyasu left the group at the beginning of 2018 and is not featured in this song.

Sailor Moon Eternal - Moon Color Chainon Video - Sailor Moon

Sailor Moon Eternal Part 1 will be in theatres in Japan starting January 8th 2021. It will be followed shortly afterwards by Sailor Moon Eternal Part 2 which will hit theatres on February 11th. The movies are an adaptation of the Dream arc of the Sailor Moon manga which was also adapted as Sailor Moon SuperS in the original 90s anime.

Sailor Moon Eternal - Moon Color Chainon Video - Sailor Mercury

What do you think of the song? Keep reading to see more screenshots from this video.

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We get our first look at Sailor Uranus, Neptune, Pluto and Saturn from the Sailor Moon Eternal films in ads for Bufferin pain killers

Bufferin x Sailor Moon Eternal - Our first look at Sailor Uranus, Pluto, Neptune and Saturn

In a collaboration which would have surprised me a decade ago but doesn’t phase me in the least these days pain killer brand Bufferin has teamed up with Sailor Moon Eternal for their latest campaign. Art from this features our first look at the designs for Sailor Uranus, Neptune, Pluto and Saturn from the upcoming Sailor Moon Eternal films. What do you think of their new look? This seems to be a lazy placement of the characters with Sailor Neptune’s hand clearly positioned to be holding Sailor Uranus’s but the two’s hands never quite seem to overlap.

Bufferin x Sailor Moon Eternal - Our first look at Sailor Uranus, Neptune, Pluto and Saturn

Bufferin is a brand of aspirin, acetylsalicylic acid, which used to be available here in Canada but which isn’t sold here anymore. The brand still seems fairly common in the US and in Japan. I don’t take aspirin due to some conflicting health issues I have, so be sure to consult your doctor or pharmacist if you aren’t sure what pain killers might be appropriate for you. The campaign will feature Sailor Moon characters on product packages. Thanks to commenter nonameq9 who shared one of these images in the comments.

Bufferin x Sailor Moon Eternal - Our first look at Sailor Saturn

The Bufferin site has now been updated with a Sailor Moon section which shows the updated art as well as ads featuring Kotono Mitsuishi, the voice of Sailor Moon. There’s also a quiz which fans can complete for a chance to win either a Luna cushion or Super Sailor Moon Room Wear. Certain screens on that quiz can give a higher resolution view of some of the characters which I’ve included in this post.

Bufferin x Sailor Moon Eternal - Our first look at Sailor Uranus

The first of the Sailor Moon Eternal films will be in theatres on January 8th and will tell the first half of the Dream story arc from the Sailor Moon manga. We previously saw the civilian forms of Haruka, Michiru, Setsuna and Hotaru in an ad for Ichiban Kuji. There is some other art of them in their civilian forms in a recent ad campaign for J!NS glasses.

Sailor Moon Eternal x J!NS

It isn’t clear how much involvement these character would have in the first film as they are mostly absent from the early half of this story arc of the manga. My own expectation is that the film will end with a short appearance of Michiru Mama, Haruka Papa, Setsuna Mama and the younger version of Hotaru who was a baby when we last saw her at the end of the Infinity arc. What do you think?

Keep reading for more images from the campaign.

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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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Here’s the latest news on the Sailor Moon Eternal films from the Sailor Moon Fan Club newsletter

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 15 - Usagi conspicuously talking to Luna in front of her family

The Sailor Moon Eternal films are coming to theatres in Japan on September 11th 2020. We don’t have a ton of information about these films but a recent mock interview shared with Japanese members of the Official Sailor Moon Fan Club gives us some morsels of information about the films. We could have inferred most of this information already, but it’s nice to get some confirmation about some of these things.

I am not currently a member of the Sailor Moon Fan Club so I did not receive this newsletter however I read about it on the Tuxedo Unmasked web site. If you don’t already follow that site I suggest you do as there’s a ton of research that goes into those articles which I always enjoy reading. If you can read Japanese you can check out this scanned version of the Sailor Moon Official Fan Club Members Only Special Issue volume 13. I do not, so I will be referencing Tuxedo Unmasked’s translation.

Sailor Moon Fan Club Newsletter volume 11 - Page 3

The interview isn’t with an actual person who exists in the real world. Instead it’s a fake conversation between Luna and Usagi in which they destroy the fourth wall and talk somewhat in character about the upcoming films. This reminds me a bit of the Sailor Moon Memorial laserdiscs which are season recaps hosted by Usagi and Luna. So what does the interview tell us?

Tokyo 2020 Summer Olympic Paralympic games

First there’s a reminder that the movies will come out “After the Olympics” which is a bit vague. The 2020 Summer Olympics, which will take place in Tokyo, will run from July 24th to August 9th. The film has already been announced to be released on September 11th so this bit of dialogue is less precise than what we already know. The actual release date appears on the page and later in the interview.

Then Usagi asks Luna what actually happened in Act 4 of the manga. We already knew that these two films will cover the Dream arc of the Sailor Moon manga which is the story which was adapted as the Sailor Moon SuperS season of the original Sailor Moon anime. This means it will include the Dark Moon Circus, Pegasus, the Amazon Trio, the Amazoness Quartet, Zirconia and Queen Nehelenia. Despite the similar characters the actual stories of the manga and anime differ quite a bit though, so Sailor Moon Eternal will be new to fans of the original Sailor Moon anime!

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 38 - Viewing the eclipse

We learn that the new movie will be about the Dead Moon Circus who break free of a mirror during an eclipse. That eclipse was is seen at the end of the final episode of Sailor Moon Crystal’s third season many, many eclipses ago. We will see Usagi and Chibiusa switch bodies, which is something that also happened in the original Sailor Moon anime though this was a minor story contained to one episode. It is also mentioned that this is a very Chibiusa intensive story! This arc is basically a romance between Chibiusa and Pegasus/Helios so there’s no ignoring that she will feature heavily.

Sailor Moon SuperS episode 158 - Old Sailor Chibi Moon and Young Sailor Moon

More importantly they ask where the visuals for Sailor Uranus, Neptune and the other Sailor Guardians representing the outer planets are. Luna muses that this must mean that Hotaru’s awakening will be in the second film. This fits with what I had been assuming about the films. These characters only appear in the second half of the manga’s arc and it seems like a good split of the films would be to include them only in Sailor Moon Eternal Part 2, or whatever it is we will be calling it. This would start with us seeing what Haruka, Michiru, Setsuna and Hotaru have been up to for the past while and having them join the rest of the team. In the original Sailor Moon anime this never happens during Sailor Moon SuperS and the short six episode arc which starts off Sailor Moon Sailor Stars does its own quick version of these events. If this information is to be trusted it seems unlikely we’ll be seeing any designs for these characters for the first film, though I still think it may be possible they will appear briefly as an end of movie teaser.

Sailor Moon Sailor Stars episode 168 - Sailor Saturn gives Hotaru her memories

Following this exchange we get some quotes from Chiaki Kon, the film’s director, Kazuyuki Fudeyasu, the film’s writer, Kazuko Tadano, the animation director, Kotono Mitsuishi, the voice of Sailor Moon and Misato Fukuen, the voice of Chibiusa. These are some nice little comments but they don’t really tell us anything new about the films. Misato Fukuen comments that she will finally get to see “an important character” who we can only assume is Pegasus. It seems they’re all being very careful not to tell us anything!

Sailor Moon SuperS episode 158 - Chibiusa kissing Pegasus

This all makes me wonder if the person that wrote this fictional exchange actually knows anything we don’t or if they instead are just inferring all of this from what we already know? I can’t say for sure. For now we are all anxiously waiting until September and wondering just when we’ll be getting the movies outside of Japan! I’m hopeful for some sort of limited North American theatrical run around the same time as the film will be released in Japan but that may be too optimistic of me! We may instead only get the film some while later, possibly not until 2021, and it’s not really guaranteed that it will be out theatrically here at all. I’ll be sure to share anything conclusive as that information becomes available!

Source: Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon Official Fan Club Mailer Vol. 13 translated by Tuxedo Unmasked

Keep reading for the full interview translation.

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Meet Kotono Mitsuishi, the voice of Sailor Moon, Keiko Han, the voice of Luna, and Katsuji Mori, the voice of Nephrite, at the Animazement convention in Raleigh, North Carolina May 24th to the 26th

Kotono Mitsuishi, the voice of Sailor Moon

Great news for Sailor Moon fans in North Carolina! They will have a chance to meet the Japanese voices of Sailor Moon, Luna and Nephrite at the upcoming Animazement convention in Raleigh May 24th to the 26th! This includes Kotono Mitsuishi, the original voice of Sailor Moon as well as her voice in Sailor Moon Crystal! She has also done a number of other roles in other popular anime series such as Misato in Evangelion. Returning to Animazement is Keiko Han, the voice of Luna from the original Sailor Moon anime as well as the plush and CG Luna from the fantastic live action Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon series. Finally there is also Katsuji Mori, who voiced Nephrite in the original Sailor Moon anime. When not drinking chocolate parfaits Katsuji Mori is an anime voice acting veteran and the main star of many classic series having played Ken the Eagle in Gatchaman (Battle of the Planets), Tekkaman in the original Tekkaman series and Go Mifune (Speed Racer) in Mach GoGoGo.

Keiko Han, the voice of Luna in Sailor Moon

A specific schedule doesn’t seem to be available quite yet but it stands to reason that they would be available for autographs and potentially some panels. Be sure to check out the full schedule when the event approaches. Are any of you in the area and planning to attend this convention? Let us know in the comments!

Katsuji Mori, the voice of Nephrite

Check out a preview of all tracks on the Sailor Moon The 25th Anniversary Tribute album

Sailor Moon The 25th Anniversary Memorial Tribute Album cover art

The Sailor Moon The 25th Anniversary Tribute Album will be released later this week, on April 4th, but you can now see a video previewing of all tracks on the Sailor Moon official site. I had previously posted a translation of all tracks on this album. We have now also learned of two bonus tracks which will be included. These are Moonlight Densetsu (Moonlight Legend), the original Sailor Moon anime opening theme, as well as Tuxedo Mirage, the ending theme to Sailor Moon S. Both of these tracks will be performed by the cast of Sailor Moon Crystal. That being Kotono Mitsuishi, Sailor Moon, Hisako Kanemoto, Sailor Mercury, Rina Sato, Sailor Mars, Ami Koshimizu, Sailor Jupiter, and Shizuka Ito, Sailor Venus. It sure is nice to see that they still have the contact information of the Sailor Moon Crystal cast, what with it having been so long since they’ve recorded any episodes of the show.

The cast of Sailor Moon Crystal reading the Sailor Moon manga at Usagi's birthday celebration

Check out the video below.

What do you think? I’ve got a few thoughts already! I don’t like Moon Revenge at all. I’m all for doing a cover in a different style but this fast pace just doesn’t fit the song to me. I’m pretty disappointed with Otome No Policy being so similar to the original version. Why get the original artist back to sing the same song in the exact same way especially after we just got a fairly similar version from the Classic Concert? Hearing Moonlight Densetsu with the new cast is pretty neat, though this song is generally done to death. We had originally gotten a “Pretty Cast” version of this song from the original anime. Pretty Cast was a name for a group composed of the five voice actors voicing the original Sailor Guardians. As they were also the original voices for Moon Revenge I would have preferred to see them do the vocals for this song as a bonus and perhaps give something more fitting to BiSH.

Any favourite tracks out of these? Are you picking up this album this week?

Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon Classic Concert CD review

Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon Classic Concert CD - Booklet

The Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon Classic Concert CD was released in Japan on December 6th. This sells for 3500 yen which is about $31 US. Media in Japan is usually more expensive than in North America so this price is actually pretty reasonable. This CD includes the entire performance of the Sailor Moon Classic Concert which was performed by the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra in Japan this past August. Now that I’ve given the CD a few listens I felt like sharing some thoughts on it. You can pick up the CD from Japanese retailers such as Amazon Japan and CD Japan.

Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon Classic Concert CD - Back

All around the album is great. It’s a real mixed back of very classical sounding renditions while others have a more modern feel. It’s not simply the case that all songs are performed in the same style as we’ve seen with the Sailor Moon SuperS Orgel Fantasia album which makes everything sound like it’s played by a music box. The selection of music is also quite varied. While it is mostly renditions of popular opening and ending themes from the original Sailor Moon anime there is also a bit of background music as well as music from musicals and Sailor Moon Crystal. Sadly nothing from the live action Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon series has made the cut!

Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon Classic Concert CD - Booklet 1 - Makoto Yoshida and the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra

The CD comes with your standard sort of insert booklet that’s only a handful of pages. It includes a full track listing and information on the many people who worked on the music and this concert in particular.

Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon Classic Concert CD - Track listing

I’ll give a few thoughts on each of the tracks. This won’t be anything thorough! I’m not really a music buff and I know even less about actual concert music. I took the trumpet in school for 3 years pretty much because it was part of the curriculum and after the end of the 3rd when some of my classmates who had started that same year had surpassed me in skill it was evident that it wasn’t happening for me so I concentrated on drawing and messing around with computers. One of those paid off. The set comes in two discs with a total of 21 tracks.

Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon Classic Concert CD - Disc 1

Disc 1 track 1 is background music from the introduction to episodes.

Track 2 is Moonlight Densetsu (Moonlight Legend), the iconic Sailor Moon opening theme! This has been done in a variety of styles over the years and here is yet another! A fairly faithful adaptation.

Track 3 is Ai No Senshi (Guardian of Love), a song which was featured in Sailor Moon R and Sailor Moon S and that has been redone a few times. This is one of my favourite songs from Sailor Moon and it’s very well done on this CD. It has an epic quality that fits it quite well.

Track 4 is Heart Moving, the first ending theme for the first season. This is a decent instrumental version of the song but not the greatest. While I don’t have any strong feeling about this song as an ending theme there are a number of instrumental versions which feature in important and emotional scenes in the first season including when Sailor Moon is discouraged after the death of her friends and finds the motivation to continue fighting. This version doesn’t evoke the same emotional reaction in me than that particular version does.

Track 5 is Princess Moon, the second ending theme for the first season. This track reminds me of something out of ballet which I think suits it. It starts to show the range that this concert can offer.

Track 6 is Watashi-tachi ni Naritakute (Wanting to Be Together With You) which is the first ending theme for Sailor Moon SuperS. Why do we jump ahead so far instead of staying somewhat chronological? No clue. This is similar to the TV version and is a good track.

Track 7 is Otome No Policy (Maiden’s Policy) which is the Sailor Moon R ending theme. This is a punched up version which isn’t really classic as many of the tracks leading up to this have been. It includes vocals by Yoko Ishida who originally performed the song back in the 90s. I prefer the version on the 20th Anniversary Memorial Tribute Album personally.

Track 8 is “Rashiku” Ikimasho (I’ll go with my looks) which is the second ending theme for the Sailor Moon SuperS season. It has a sort of big bang feel and includes vocals once again from Yoko Ishida though she did not perform this song in the original anime.

Track 9 is background music for Sailor Uranus and Neptune. This is a variety of music used in the anime mostly when the characters are introduced or transform. It features a lot of violin as the music in the original Sailor Moon anime did, with Michiru being a violinist. This is quite a good track for fans of those characters! They always did have great theme music.

Track 10 switches gears and gives us a song from Sailor Moon Crystal. Eternal Eternity is the first ending theme for the 3rd season, which is also all about Sailor Uranus and Neptune. All versions of this song just remind me of the Utena opening theme.

Track 11 is short and just gives us the music for the commercial break bumper for the first season. It sounds so much like the original version that I was expecting the weird “chirp” sound which can be heard on the laserdiscs of the first season.

I guess there was an intermission at this point? On to disc 2…

Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon Classic Concert CD - Disc 2

Track 1 has Kotono Mitsuishi, the voice of Sailor Moon, speaking over some background music and then transforming to Sailor Moon’s first season transformation music. A fairly faithful version of this music.

Track 2 is Moon Revenge, the theme song from Sailor Moon R The Movie. This is one of the better songs from the original anime. This version is great as well. It’s a more classical rendition lacking the more upbeat tone of the original song but it works quite well. Some portions remind me of the instrumental version featured in the film.

Track 3 is Tuxedo Mirage, the ending theme for Sailor Moon S. The version here is very similar to what we heard on TV, without the vocals. A good track but it just doesn’t give us anything new.

Track 4 is La Soldier which is a song which was used in a number of the early Sailor Moon musicals as well as the final episode of Sailor Moon R (Let’s pretend episode 89 doesn’t exist because I hate it!). This is a good rendition but not as good as the original and nothing could top the Tommy heavenly6 version from the Tribute Album for me.

Track 5 is a Three Light Medley which merges two songs which the Three Lights performed during Sailor Moon Sailor Stars, Todokanu Omoi -My Friend’s Love- (Unreachable Feelings: My Friend’s Love) and Nagareboshi he (To the Shooting Stars). When this one started I was a bit worried because the Three Lights are a pop group and their music doesn’t translate to classical music. Still the orchestra manages to give these songs a disco kind of 70s pop sound which I think works really well. The track lacks vocals I think because the concert hall didn’t have enough place to include Taiki’s forehead.

Track 6 takes a song from the recent Sailor Moon musicals with Ai No Starshine (Starshine of Love) from the Sailor Moon Amour Eternal Musical. Again we go with a somewhat modern sound almost fitting to an 80s TV drama theme song if that makes any sense. I appreciate the unique take on the song and that an orchestra can have such an atypical sound.

Track 7 is Moon Pride, the first Sailor Moon Crystal opening theme. It’s performed with a big band sort of sound. Enjoyable.

Track 8 is Gekkou (Moonbow), the first Sailor Moon Crystal ending theme. Again this track is quite similar to the original version which had a very orchestral sound. Decent but nothing new here.

Track 9 is New Moon ni Koishite (In Love With the New Moon), the Sailor Moon Crystal Season 3 opening theme. It has what I believe is a lot of saxophone and other brass instruments. A fun track.

The final track is an encore which is the Sailor Stars Song, the opening theme for the Sailor Stars season of the original anime. Yoko Ishida performs the vocals for this version, though again she was not the one to contribute the original vocals. She does a decent job. She attempt to rouse the crowd and get them to sing along which doesn’t seem to work all that well. I’m not sure if this is because the crowd isn’t participating much or simply because they didn’t bother to put a mic in the crowd to properly pick up the audio. I don’t know how popular the Sailor Stars Song is in Japan but I wonder if this was really the best track to try to get people to sing along to. If they’d done this with Moonlight Densetsu, the iconic opening theme used for the first four seasons, no doubt a ton of people would know the words. Does the average Japanese casual fan know the words to the intro of the final season which had significantly poorer ratings?

All considered I quite enjoyed this CD and recommend fans import it if they’re interested.

Keep reading for more pictures of this CD including photos of all remaining pages of the booklet.

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The Dream story arc of Sailor Moon Crystal will be two theatrical films directed by Chiaki Kon

Sailor Moon 25th Anniversary Usagi's birthday live event

Yesterday there was a special live event to celebrate Usagi’s birthday, June 30th. The main news pertaining to new Sailor Moon Crystal, which is what everyone has been waiting for, was that the upcoming 4th story arc or 4th season will not be presented as episodes but as two theatrical films. These will be played in theatres in Japan but it isn’t clear at this time what that means for international fans. Will we get the films in theatres ourselves? Will it be streamed online at a later date, perhaps split into individual episodes? A free simulcast seems a bit unlikely as there wouldn’t be much of an incentive to get people into theatres if the movies were available online on the first day. We will have to wait and see for more details as we still don’t have any timeline of when this might happen. After the event this information was posted to the official site.

Chiaki Kon - Director of Sailor Moon Crystal phase 3

We’ve also learned that these two movies will be directed by Chiaki Kon, who was the director for the Infinity Arc of Sailor Moon Crystal. I really dug the animation style of the latest season so I’m happy to see her return, but it doesn’t look like all fans share that sentiment.

Sailor Moon 25th Anniversary Usagi's birthday live event - Happy Birthday

The rest of the live event wasn’t all that compelling. Since it was Usagi’s birthday there was a cake and Happy Birthday to You was sung, which it seems is now public domain and not subject to copyright.

Sailor Moon Le Mouvement Final musical trailer - The Starlights and Princess Kakyuu

There was also a new trailer shown for the upcoming Sailor Moon Le Mouvement Final. This included another look at the new characters from this musical. This trailer can be seen embedded below.

Sailor Moon 25th Anniversary Usagi's birthday live event - Reading a letter from Naoko Takeuchi

There was also a message from Naoko Takeuchi which was read by Sailor Moon’s voice actor Kotono Mitsuishi. No new information was included but it was about looking back at her time with the manga and thanking fans. This letter was also shared on the official site. This letter mentions that in 1992 she was 26 years old. This doesn’t match with many sources stating that she was born on March 15th 1967. If she was indeed 26 in 1992 this would put her year of birth at 1966. According to the Naoko Takeuchi Wikipedia talk page there are sources which indicate that she was born in 1966. It would seem plausible that this is in fact the case. This would mean that my most viral Tweet where I wished Naoko Takeuchi a happy 50th birthday in March of this year was in fact wrong as she would have turned 51 this year. Without confirmation of her year of birth we can’t be sure one way or another.

Sailor Moon 25th Anniversary Usagi's birthday live event - Sailor Moon Crystal season 3 intro

The most annoying part of the event was when they screened the intro and ending themes from the last story arc. This would have been a great time to see something new instead of something we’ve seen well over a year ago!

For now we must continue to wait for more details about these two movies and what they mean for North American fans or the possibility of a Stars story arc. Sailor Moon fans have certainly learned to be patient with Sailor Moon Crystal!

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No, Kotono Mitsuishi, the voice of Sailor Moon, is not the voice of Wonder Woman in the Japanese dub of the film

Kotono Mitsuishi is not the Japanese voice of Wonder Woman

This past weekend Wonder Woman was released in North America and in many cities worldwide. This film has been a tremendous success. Over the past few days I’ve seen the follow bit of trivia more than once on Social Media:

For the Japanese dub of the film, Wonder Woman is voiced by Kotono Mitsuishi, best known as the voice of Sailor Moon. Like Wonder Woman, Sailor Moon is a princess heroine of divine heritage and based on Greco-Roman mythology.

The source of this information is the IMDB trivia page for the Wonder Woman film. I’m pretty sure this isn’t true! Kotono Mitsuishi did the voice over narration for the Japanese Wonder Woman trailer, which many news sources including this site reported on back in March. It seems likely that this information was mistakenly used as evidence that Kotono Mitsuishi, the voice of Usagi in Sailor Moon and Sailor Moon Crystal, would actually voice Wonder Woman in the Japanese language dubbed version of the film. The narration in the trailer is not the actual voice of Wonder Woman who’s English voice can be heard in the trailer. I can find no indication by doing searches of various sites in English and Japanese that Kotono Mitsuishi will be the voice of Wonder Woman.

It seems quite unlikely that Kotono Mitsuishi would voice this role as she was not the one to do the Japanese dubbed voice for Wonder Woman in Batman V Superman. We can see from the Japanese Wikipedia page for Batman V Superman that this was actually done by voice actress Yūko Kaida who may be known to readers for some of her anime roles. It seems likely that she will be the one to voice the character for the Wonder Woman film. Actors will often dub the voices of the same actors in multiple films especially when there are part of a series where the actors appears in more than one film.

Wonder Woman in Batman V Superman

While it is certainly possible that independent of her doing the narration for the trailer Kotono Mitsuishi will also be included with the Japanese dubbed version of the film which isn’t set to be released until the 25th of August we don’t actually have any good evidence beyond this bit of IMDB trivia which indicates that this might be the case. Keep reading for more exploration of the specific research which led me to this conclusion.

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Kotono Mitsuishi, the voice of Sailor Moon, narrates the Japanese Wonder Woman trailer

Japanese Wonder Woman poster

Do you like female super heroes? The Japanese Wonder Woman trailer is out and it is narrated by none other than Kotono Mitsuishi, the Japanese voice of Sailor Moon in the original Sailor Moon anime and Sailor Moon Crystal! Watch the trailer below!

For years I’ve tried to argue that Sailor Moon is the most iconic female comic super hero! This was certainly true in the 90s when Sailor Moon was a worldwide phenomenon. Wonder Woman is the other obvious answer people give when asked who the most popular female comic book character is. I have no interest in detracting from her importance as a character but having been featured in one TV series 40 years ago and only in 2017 having her first theatrical film she has some catching up to do! Still when most people in the English speaking world hear “comic book super hero” they think of Superman, Batman, capes and tights, which brings Wonder Woman to mind.

Kotono Mitsuishi, the voice of Sailor Moon

The Wonder Woman film will be released on June 2nd in North America and August 25th in Japan. It stars Gal Gadot who will be reprising her role from the Batman v Superman movie from last year. I think she did a great job in the last film and am looking forward to seeing this film. It’s always great to see a film like this promoting women as being strong, independent and kicking ass.

Sailor Moon/Wonder Woman crossover by Andriu

If you’re a fan of Sailor Moon and Wonder Woman crossovers check out TeePublic to get a cool looking shirt for $14. It will also be on sale at Ript Apparel on Sunday March 26th for just $13. Don’t miss it!

Japanese Wonder Woman book