Sailor Moon Monopoly game review

Sailor Moon Monopoly - Board

The Sailor Moon Monopoly game is now out in stores and online. I got my copy from an EB Games store in Ottawa (the Canadian equivalent to GameStop) a while back and it seems like many fans have done the same. With the game in hand we can get a good look at exactly what’s going on with the various pieces! As we’d discussed earlier this seems to be Sailor Moon S the game for reasons which I can’t really fathom. The various characters are mostly all from Sailor Moon S, mainly the villains being the Witches 5, Professor Tomoe and Mistress 9 as well as the inclusion of all Sailor Guardians including Sailor Moon S’s new additional Sailor Uranus, Neptune and Saturn. With the Viz video releases now having reached the end of Sailor Moon SuperS this seems an odd way to do it. Perhaps the game was simply in development for too long or this may have been an intentional choice as many of the Sailor Guardians introduced in this season would not appear in Sailor Moon SuperS and a Sailor Moon Sailor Stars Monopoly game would not be as recognisable to fans. For whatever the reasons, it’s Sailor Moon S Monopoly!

As with many other versions of Monopoly this really is the same old game we’ve seen time and time again with a different esthetic. This was immediately obvious to me as I’ve played countless hours of the game in my youth and I even spent quite some time programming a Monopoly computer game in Turbo Pascal when I was a child (the game mostly worked well but lacked houses, hotels, Chance and Community Chest cards). This is good for purists who want to have the same game experience as normal Monopoly. One thing which I think is fairly odd however is the completely random grouping of characters for most of the properties. Allow me to rant a bit about each one.

Sailor Moon Monopoly - Mortgaged Properties

First we have Luna and Artemis, as a single property, bundled with Mimette of the Witches 5. Wouldn’t it have been easier to just use this, one of the only two pairs of properties, as Luna and Artemis? Mimette does not fit with Luna and Artemis at all. The characters don’t ever actually interact.

Next we have Eudial, Viluy and Tellu. This actually works! They are 3 of the Witches 5 and since there are no sets of five properties (most are groups of three) this sort of works!

Then there’s Cyprene/Ptilol with Kaolinite and … Sailor Chibi Moon! Kaolinite does have a brief interaction with Chibiusa at some point and the two characters do show up together in succession in the later versions of the Sailor Moon S credits. Cyprene and Ptilol fit only with Kaolinite. It would have made more sense to have put Mimette with her fellow Witches and then put Chibiusa with either her parents or maybe with Sailor Saturn!

Next is Sailor Mercury, Mars and Jupiter. There are all Sailor Guardians so this works decently. Aside from Sailor Moon they do spend some time together before Sailor Venus joins the show so I’ll say this is one of the three less terrible one.

Sailor Moon Sailor Stars episode 167 - Professor Tomoe and Hotaru

Next is Sailor Venus, Professor Tomoe and Sailor Pluto. None of these characters have much to do with each other, except perhaps for a brief interaction between Sailor Venus and Pluto in one episode of Sailor Stars. Sailor Venus belongs with the Sailor Guardians from the first season while Sailor Pluto fits in better with Sailor Uranus and Neptune or even with Sailor Chibi Moon. I would personally have put her with King Endymion but that’s because I like trolling people. Professor Tomoe is a villain and if he’s going to be paired with anyone but his fellow villains from the season it should probably be his daughter, and not the Sailor Guardians who steals his baby from him in Sailor Stars.

Next is Sailor Uranus and Neptune with … Tuxedo Mask! Naturally Sailor Pluto would have worked better here. There’s nothing these two lesbians love more than the show’s male love interest! At least Sailor Uranus and Neptune are together where they belong.

Sailor Moon Monopoly - Board

On the last side we have Sailor Moon with Sailor Saturn and Mistress 9. This sort of works since Sailor Moon fights Mistress 9 and sort of saves Sailor Saturn but these characters would fit so much better elsewhere. Saturn should be with her father or her friend Chibiusa and Mistress 9 could easily fit with the villains! It does of course work that two versions of Hotaru be grouped together.

Finally we have the only grouping that works well, and that is Neo Queen Serenity and King Endymion. The only issue here is that they don’t really appear in Sailor Moon S so they don’t fit with the game at all.

Live Action Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon Act 9 - Makoto the cop

Other groupings make some sense! The railroads are all items, either Talismans or Sailor Saturn’s Silence Glaive. The utilities are replaced by Sailor Moon’s items, that being her broach and rod. Jail and Free Parking are unchanged. It seems like there’s an opportunity here to use something a bit more Sailor Moon themed for these. Maybe Pharaon 90 sends you to the Tau Star System or something like that. A missed opportunity which leaves art which ultimately clashes with the rest of the game.

Sailor Moon Monopoly - Tokens

When it comes to the game pieces they are nice! These are the three Talismans, Sailor Moon’s Cosmic Heart Compact and Spiral Heart Moon Rod, and the Holy Grail. They’re all things and not characters but then aside from the dog most Monopoly game pieces are just things anyway.

Sailor Moon Monopoly - Money

The money is a bit odd. The colours and values are more or less kept from real Monopoly with different characters appearing on each bill. The money is all shown with an M with a slash through it. Moon dollars or something of the sort. It’s not like Sailor Moon takes place in a universe they don’t use normal currency. We frequently see prices and money in the series being yen. Is there some rule that a themed Monopoly came have some weird non existent currency?

Sailor Moon Monopoly - Love Cards

Finally we have the Love and Friendship Cards. These seem to basically be Chance and Community Chest cards with the flavour language changed and the same dollar amounts and consequences. The descriptions of what is occurring are just random events occurring during Sailor Moon S.

Sailor Moon Monopoly - Friendship Cards

Should you buy this game? If you wanted to I imagine you already would have! It’s just one of a very, very, very long series of Monopoly games with images based on many franchises. The specific decisions made in adapting this game seem to be pretty poor as someone with a minor amount of effort would likely have been able to put together property groupings and other aspects of the game which work much better. It seems like someone with next to no knowledge of the franchise was given a list of characters, art and perhaps episode summaries of Sailor Moon S and that they threw together a version of Monopoly that superficially seemed to have made sense. For my money the Sailor Moon games by Dyskami Publishing are a much better way to play a Sailor Moon game.

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Check out the board and pieces for the upcoming Sailor Moon Monopoly game

Sailor Moon Monopoly - Board

A Sailor Moon Monopoly game is coming! A listing for this game has been up with many retailers for a while now but we can now see, from the GameStop listing for the product, what the game’s board will look like! The game will retail for $39.99 US and will be released November 9th according to GameStop’s site. With the release of this version of Monopoly there will be as many different types of Monopoly games as there are Funko Pop toys at GameStop! The box and board feature all characters from the Sailor Moon S season including all 10 Sailor Guardians as well as other villains from that season such as Professor Tomoe, the Witches 5 and Mistress 9. Neo Queen Serenity and King Endymion are also on the game though those characters don’t make a proper appearance in the S season. As a long time Monopoly player it seems obvious that the values on most of the board match what people would be used to only all spaces are replaced with Sailor Moon themed characters and items. Properties are all characters with other characters and items making up others squares. I’ve listed a breakdown of what characters are replacing for every original Monopoly space:

Mediteranian Avenue – Luna and Artemis
Baltic Avenue – Mimete

Oriental Avenue – Eudial
Vermont Avenue – Viluy
Connecticut Avenue – Tellu

St. Charles Place – Cyprine/Ptilol
States Avenue – Sailor Chibi Moon
Virginia Avenue – Kaolinite

St. James Place – Sailor Mercury
Tennessee Avenue – Sailor Mars
New York Avenue – Sailor Jupiter

Kentucky Avenue – Sailor Venus
Indiana Avenue – Professor Tomoe
Illinois Avenue – Sailor Pluto

Atlantic Avenue – Tuxedo Mask
Ventor Avenue – Sailor Neptune
Marvin Gardens – Sailor Uranus

Pacific Avenue – Mistress 9
North Carolina Avenue – Sailor Saturn
Pennsylvania Avenue – Sailor Moon

Park Place – King Endymion
Boardwalk – Neo Queen Serenity

Reading Railroad – Garnet Rod
Pennsylvania Railroad – Deep Aqua Mirror
B. & O. Railroad – Space Sword
Short Line – Silence Glaive

Electric Company – Cosmic Heart Compact
Water Works – Spiral Moon Heart Rod

Community Chest – Love
Chance – Friendship

Income Tax and Luxury Tax – Something with the Witches 5?

The following spaces are unchanged:
Go
In Jail/Just Visiting
Free Parking
Go To Jail

In addition we can get a bit of a look at the “Sailor Moon Money” in this image and we see the following denominations on bills:

$1 – Sailor Moon
$5 – Sailor Chibi Moon
$10 – Sailor Mercury
$20 – Sailor Mars
$50 – Sailor Jupiter
$100 – Sailor Venus
$500 – Sailor Moon

Why Sailor Moon is on both the $1 and $500 isn’t clear! I may be mistaken as it’s hard to see exactly what it says on the $1 bill but it seems to have a crescent moon and the “Sailor” part is clear and the second 4 letter word appears to be Moon from the top of the letters we see. I’m not sure the $ is the appropriate symbol to be using in this case as there seems to be an M symbol to reference Sailor Moon Money when dollars are mentioned but it is a bit hard to make out. Sailor Moon Money has no basis in canon. Throughout most of the series the character live in Tokyo and would use Japanese Yen as currency. I don’t know what currency would be used in Crystal Tokyo but it seems unlikely that it would be called Sailor Moon Money as Sailor Moon is no longer an active superhero at the time, what with being the Queen of that city.

Sailor Moon Monopoly - Box

We also see what the tokens for the game will be. These are also listed on the GameStop site. These are the Cosmic Heart Compact, Moon Chalice, Spiral Heart Moon Rod, Garnet Orb, Deep Aqua Mirror and Space Sword. These are again all items appearing in Sailor Moon S.

Why Sailor Moon S? Why now? Sailor Moon SuperS has now been released in its entirety in North America on home video. Sailor Moon Sailor Stars is out subtitled on streaming services. When it comes to Sailor Moon Crystal we’ve only gotten up to the Infinity Arc, telling the equivalent of the Sailor Moon S story, but these are clearly original Sailor Moon anime based designs and not Sailor Moon Crystal designs like we’ve seen with the Sailor Moon Crystal Dice Challenge game. Surely there is the convenience of having all of the Sailor Guardians appearing in Sailor Moon S allowing for more properties with those characters in it. If we had a first season based game we might be seeing Queen Beryl and the Shitennou alongside Naru and Umino instead. There are certainly reasons for which Sailor Moon S makes sense for the game’s setting, but it still seems odd and a bit arbitrary to me.

Do you plan on picking this game up? How many versions of Monopoly do you own?

Susan Aceron, the voice of Sailor Pluto, has died of cancer at age 44

Susan Aceron, the voice of Sailor Pluto

I am sad to report that Susan Aceron Gray, who voiced Sailor Pluto during the Cloverway dub of the Sailor Moon anime, passed away earlier this week after a long battle with cancer. She was 44. She played many other characters through the series including the Kisenian Flower from the Sailor Moon R movie, Byruit (Viluy), Cyprine and Petirol of the Witches 5, Mistress 9 and Elizabeth (Unazuki).

I was lucky enough to meet Susan Aceron over 10 years ago at Anime North in Toronto. She was very kind and quite happy to meet her fans. Her work was cherished by Sailor Moon fans around the world. She will be missed.

Source: Moon Chase!, Obituary

A Mistress 9 Pullip Doll is coming in September

Mistress 9 Pullip Doll

A Mistress 9 Pullip Doll has been announced on the Official Sailor Moon Site. This seem like an odd choice for a doll but after getting Human Luna it seems like we could get almost anything. This is the second villain we get as a Pullip Doll, after Black Lady. The doll will be released in September with the Bandai Premium Edition coming out in October. It will be priced at 22000 yen, about $210 US.

Mistress 9 Pullip Doll

We previously reported on a Sailor Saturn Pullip Doll which was actually a DAL Doll, which is a younger version of the doll modeled after Pullip’s younger sister. This more adult version of Hotaru is shown as a Pullip Doll. This is similar to how Sailor Chibi Moon had a DAL Doll but her older version, Black Lady, was a Pullip Doll.

Mistress 9 Pullip Doll

Pullip Dolls are expensive high quality collectible dolls with disproportionally large heads and eyes. Do you plan on picking this one up? With all of the main Sailor Guardians already released in the Sailor Moon line of dolls I wonder what will come out next.




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Sailor Moon Crystal Act 38, Infinity 12 – Infinite – Journey, review

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 38 - The 10 Sailor Guardians

The entire Infinity arc of Sailor Moon Crystal is now available to view online. The final episode we’ll see for a while, Act 38, Infinity 12 – Infinite – Journey aired on Japanese television on Monday June 27th at 11pm Japan Standard Time. Immediately afterwards it was available to view on Crunchyroll, Neon Alley and Hulu, starting at 10:30am Eastern Time. This week is a bit of a mixed bag as we wrap up the story of Sailor Uranus, Neptune, Pluto and Saturn and then move on for a teaser of the upcoming Dream arc. We still have no official confirmation that this new arc will be adapted. This episode is just doing exactly what the equivalent manga chapter did. While it seems likely at this point that we will be seeing more episodes this would certainly not be the first show to have a really awesome cliffhanger final episode which we never saw a follow up to.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 38 - Title Screen with Sailor Saturn

As always we start with an unreasonably long flashback! This week’s spans 3 minutes and 13 seconds which covers half of the last episode! At least we see a lot of Sailor Saturn. The opening theme, In Love With the New Moon, is the first version sung by Etsuko Yakushimaru. The full length version of this song is also heard in the episode itself. This is my favourite version of the opening so it was nice to hear. The ending theme used is Eternal Eternity sung by the voices of Sailor Uranus, Junko Minagawa and Sailor Neptune, Sayaka Ohara.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 38 - Super Sailor Venus

Sailor Moon blasts out of the Pharaoh 90/Mistress 9 monster juice thing and in doing so causes some damage. She gives everyone super transformations! Well almost everyone. How come Tuxedo Mask doesn’t get an upgrade? He’d look great in some transparent shoulder pads! Poor guy. At least he has his male privilege to fall back on.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 38 - Sailor Saturn smiles Sailor Moon Crystal Act 37 - Super Sailor Moon going to her death

Sailor Saturn, who was supposed to be destroying the world at the end of the last episode, decides to attack Pharaoh 90 and go to her death. She turns and smiles to her friends just like Sailor Moon had last week. This was a nice touch, as both seem willing to sacrifice themselves to save others.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 38 - Three Women and a Baby

Unfortunately Sailor Saturn has to die. Sailor Pluto is the one to do this. She’s upset about it, although this was kind of the plan all along. Sailor Uranus, Neptune and Pluto were ready to kill Hotaru in order to save the world. The solution now is to lock her, Pharaoh 90 and the Tau Star System away forever. Sailor Pluto does this with the Dark Dome Close attack. Her penance for killing Sailor Saturn? Her and her friends have to raise the reincarnated baby version of her! There’s some sort of odd justice here. This will be a tough conversation when she gets a bit older and asks why she has three moms! This is basically a genderbend version of Three Men and a Baby, a mediocre 80s comedy movie by Leonard Nimoy. “Well you see we helped killed your Dad and then killed you, so you’re adopted. Sorry not sorry.”

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 38 - The Messiah

Sailor Moon becomes Neo Queen Serenity. OMG she was the one we saw in the visions. This isn’t the future version of Neo Queen Serenity possessing Sailor Moon in some way. This is Usagi in full control of her faculties. There’s no other consciousness in there. So I wonder why she doesn’t seem to remember what happens. Sailor Moon asks where this baby came from, and Sailor Uranus basically says it’s “From precious you”, which no doubt is a terrible translation, but basically she believes that Neo Queen Serenity caused Sailor Saturn to reincarnate as baby Hotaru. Sure. The original Queen Serenity is the one that sent everyone to reincarnate in the present time after they were all killed. Future Neo Queen Serenity is the one who sent Sailor Pluto back in time to reincarnate as Setsuna. It stands to reason that Sailor Moon, the present version, is the one that did this. There’s no other consciousness which is doing stuff here. It’s not insinuated that old lady uploaded consciousness computer simulated Queen Serenity on the Moon has any real power here. Why doesn’t Sailor Moon have full memory of doing this? It doesn’t really add up to me.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 38 - Super Sailor Chibi Moon

Sailor Uranus, Neptune, Pluto and Saturn leave and then we have a commercial break. There’s meant to be a massive passage of time here but I don’t feel that this is well conveyed at all. In the original manga the Infinity arc concludes here which is the end of a chapter. Following this we get The Lover of Princess Kaguya side story which is a full manga book which is the equivalent of the Sailor Moon S movie, which then has a side story about Rei. There are a bunch of other side stories published later which are understood to take place during this break which is basically the time when the girls are preparing for their high school entrance exams. Ami’s First Love, which was adapted in an anime special, falls into this period as well. The first three story arcs all follow one another directly, but the Dream arc was never meant to do so. When the manga was rereleased in 2003 the chapters were broken up differently so they ended up breaking this particular Act up very poorly so that this passage of time isn’t properly demonstrated and happens between pages of the same story. I think Sailor Moon Crystal had a good chance to pace things out a bit differently and have the season end here, but they didn’t do that and instead, it’s time to go to high school.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 38 - High school girls

This episode is kind of like the first episode of Sailor Stars from the original Sailor Moon anime. Those first 6 episodes of Sailor Stars basically fix the problems that the SuperS season skipped, including some characters which will be returning later in the Dream arc. The girls are supposed to be in high school before meeting Pegasus as we see here. Most of the girls have Juban High School Uniforms. Rei does not, as she goes to her own school which does not use high school entrance exams. We don’t really have an equivalent to these in the West. I suppose maybe the SATs are something similar but as a Canadian this is also something I only know of through TV and movies. I’ve never had a test so important in my schooling that it required me getting addicted to caffeine pills like Jessie Spano. So much to say Japanese high school entrance exams are a big deal and the source of a lot of stress, and the girls are meant to have been preparing for this during the long period covered by the commercial break which we don’t even get in the streaming version.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 38 - Solar Eclipse

Chibiusa says she’s going to leave on April 1st, at the time of a Solar Eclipse. The next Solar eclipse that will occur on April 1st is in 2098 and there certainly wasn’t one in the 90s when the manga was written, but this is pretty nitpicky even for me. She mentions in her letter to her mother “Please come to pick me up”. How exactly does this work? Is Neo Queen Serenity from the future going to travel to the 30th century to come pick up Chibiusa? Who’s guardian the Space-Time Door with future Sailor Pluto dead and Diana in the past?

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 38 - Artemis and Luna cry for Diana

Speaking of Diana! Usagi says to Luna, who isn’t present when this is said, that she will see Diana “very soon”. What does this mean? From the frame of reference of Diana then she would see her parents soon, in the future. From Luna and Artemis’s point of view they won’t see her soon at all. Diana is a kitten. Chibiusa, who is born in less than a decade, is 900 years old in the 30th century. Is Diana a permakitten born in the 20th or 21st century and never aging? Permakittens would revolutionize the pet industry! Kittens are most of the reason people have adult cats!

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 38 - Usagi and Chibiusa see Pegasus

So the gang are watching the eclipse and they hear a bell. They turn around to see… Pegasus! Well we don’t see Pegasus but in the manga version of Act 38, the final image has Usagi and Chibiusa seeing Pegasus. There’s no preview for another episode, but we will likely at some point be seeing Act 39, Dream 1 – Eclipse Dream. This will be part of the 4th story arc which, if current trends continue, will likely be referred to as Season 4 or Season IV in Japan. I’ve still been calling them arcs or phases but I may start using the term season if that becomes well established. We have no specifics on if and when we might get new episodes but perhaps we will learn something tomorrow at the live event to celebrate Usagi’s birthday.

Keep reading for more screenshots from this episode.

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Sailor Moon Crystal Act 37, Infinity 11 – Infinite – Judge, review

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 37 - Sailor Saturn attacks

We’re almost done with the Infinity arc of Sailor Moon Crystal. The latest episode aired on Japanese TV on Monday June 20th at 11pm Japan Standard Time and was available to stream immediately afterwards starting at 10:30am Eastern Time on Crunchyroll, Neon Alley and Hulu. Act 37, Infinity 11 – Infinite – Judge, is all about the appearance of Sailor Saturn! This was a long time coming. More on that later in the review!

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 37 - Rainbow Double Moon Heart Ache

The episode starts out with a ton of repeated footage. This happens occasionally as the first scene repeats the last few seconds of the last episode but it was for two and a half minutes this week! This is a build up to a new attack, the Rainbow Double Moon Heart Ache, performed simultaneously by Super Sailor Moon and Super Sailor Chibi Moon. Another new attack! Too bad it doesn’t do much but feed Mistress 9!

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 37 - Tuxedo La Smoking Bomber

Mistress 9 merges with Pharaoh 90 which is kinky and sort of terrible. It’s not really clear what this does instead of just making the gang fight Pharaoh 90 now. We didn’t really see what he was capable of before this. The two grow and grow with power the more they get attacked. It absorbs power so we need to really give it a lot more power to kill it! I guess that makes some kind of sense. Sailor Moon doesn’t often distinguish between energy helping and nourishing something and destroying it. A source of electricity can power a building but if you stick your tongue on it you might end up electrocuted! So everyone joins in and attacks. We even get Tuxedo La Smoking Bomber which is always fun.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 37 - Super Sailor Moon going to her death

This isn’t working, and Sailor Moon decides she needs to take the Holy Grail right into the belly of the beast and release it. She smiles to her friends and dives in. There’s something so inspiring and tragic about this look she gives. She knows what she has to do and doesn’t hesitate. As far as we can tell she dies in there.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 37 - Sailor Saturn

Sailor Saturn. At long last. I don’t hide that Sailor Mars has always been my favourite but I also have a fondness for Sailor Saturn. Unfortunately we see so little of her in the original anime that we are always left wanting to see more of her! No transformation sequence, very few attacks. Now is the time for that to change! Finally Sailor Saturn in Sailor Moon Crystal! We don’t really get a transformation sequence, but what we see is like the tail end of one. This was more than I expected so I’m happy to see it! Sailor Saturn looks so bad ass and I love her attitude. She’s come to destroy the world and doesn’t seem to be concerned with the mild inconvenience this may cause for everyone around!

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 37 - Sailor Saturn

Sailor Saturn makes an interesting comment. She says that history is twisted. She insinuates that Hotaru should have died during her accident, but was allowed to survive as a cyborg which somehow seems to have been a fundamental change to the timeline. What is that about? Did something happen here that went against the causal fabric of the universe? I’m a determinist so as far as I see it things are playing out the way they always would have and always will. The one thing which could interfere with this of course is time travel, as we had last season, but that does not apply here. What order of events led to the lab accident which would have lead to Hotaru’s death but did not lead to Professor Tomoe resurrecting his daughter as a cyborg? These two events are linked. The Death Busters showed up afterwards. Is that some sort of unaccounted for outside influence? Saturn states that Professor Tomoe attracted the Death Busters. Why does Professor Tomoe go against the causal fabric of the universe? Does he and only he have free will, while the rest of the inhabitants of the Earth do not?

Tokyo in the 21st Century vs. 30th Century Crystal Tokyo

Sailor Saturn mentions that what drew the Death Busters to this area was also that it was the chosen land. This area would be where the Crystal Palace would be in the future. During the Black Moon story arc I mentioned how it was interesting that images of Tokyo Bay seemed to show the palace on reclaimed land that seemed to be a new island in the bay. Since Mugen Academy and the surrounding area was built on reclaimed land in Tokyo Bay, this seems to add up! This specific placement of the Crystal Palace was not originally included in the manga version of Crystal Tokyo but it actually aligned itself well with what was mentioned here, a tie which I did not think of until rereading this chapter recently.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 37 - Sailor Saturn

Another new attack with a questionable name! Sailor Saturn uses Death Reborn Revolution but it is referred to as Death Ribbon Revolution. The two names sound so alike that one can easily see how they might get confused. Additionally this attack uses a bunch of ribbons to destroy the world! A SuperS fighting game has an attack Death Ribbon Revolution. Is this meant to be the same attack or something different with an almost identical name? I tend to think this all has to do with inconsistent interpretations of this move and how it should be spelled in Japanese kana and then translated back into English. That said I do believe that the correct name should be Death Reborn Revolution.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 37 - Death Reborn Revolution

And so Sailor Saturn destroys the world. What a great way to end the episode! Sailor Moon is lost, probably dead, and Sailor Saturn just used her attack which destroys the planet. Fade to white, just like Total Recall. Series finale! Thanks for watching! If you enjoyed this program you should watch 48 and a half episodes of the live action series now!

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 38 Preview - Sailor Saturn

I kid of course. Next week is Act 38, Infinity 12 – Infinite – Journey. How to survive an attack which really should destroy the world without destroying the world! Next week’s episode will be the last for a while but hopefully not the last ever!

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 38 Preview - Sailor Chibi Moon

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Sailor Moon Crystal Act 36, Infinity 10 – Infinite – Upper Atmosphere, review

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 36 - Hotaru dies

The latest episode of Sailor Moon Crystal aired Japanese TV Monday June 13th 11pm. Immediately afterwards, starting at 10:30am Eastern Time, the show became available to stream first on Crunchyroll and then on Neon Alley and Hulu. Act 36 is the first of a three part finale for the Infinity arc, as this was once a single long chapter of the manga. The episode is all about Hotaru freeing herself from Mistress 9 and the consequences of that as well as a power up for Sailor Chibi Moon.

Phanto from Super Mario Bros. 2 Sailor Moon Crystal Act 36 - Pharaoh 90 happy face

We get an idea of the Death Busters’ end game here. Pharaoh 90 wants to vesselize the planet. How odd! Up until now we’ve only seen the vesselization of living being but he wants to do it to the planet. What will this look like? Literally a comical smiley face on planet earth. No this isn’t a bad photoshop but rather a screenshot from the episode! Looks like Phanto from Super Mario Bros. 2/Doki Doki Panic to me! They seek to make the Earth a second Tau Star System with this. Wait a minute how do you make a planet a star system which is shown as a galaxy? I don’t really understand the scope of the astronomical references of this arc.

Sailor Moon Manga Act 36 - Mistress 9 with elf ears Sailor Moon Crystal Act 36 - Mistress 9 has elf ears

Mistress 9 is some weird looking in this episode. What’s with the elf ears? This could be a reflection of the monster inside. She does have a more monstrous looking face as time goes on in the manga. I think, however, that those ears are inspired but a misinterpretation of some art in the manga. Only one panel shows Mistress 9 with pointy ears and I don’t think it was meant to be elf ears at all. She has all sorts of things sticking out of her in this one image and the sharp things near her ears just happen to look like pointy ears. She has normal small round ears in all other panels in the manga. She’s also got bulging Total Recall dying on the surface of Mars eyes.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 36 - Hotaru protects the Sailor Guardians' souls

Mistress 9 is chowing down on hostes or souls. She eats Sailor Mercury, Mars, Jupiter and Venus’s but this doesn’t last long. Hotaru protects them, along with Chibiusa’s soul and Crystal, and decides it’s time to GTFO. She leaves Mistress 9’s body, which is actually her body, and is able to take those souls with her. Great news? Actually it means she’s going to have to die.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 36 - Hotaru and Chibiusa

Hotaru uses her last bit of life to bring Chibiusa’s soul back to her, along with her Crystal. What follows is a tearful and heart wrenching farewell. She mentions that she feels like her encounter with Chibiusa was destiny, pointing out that this seems odd because they’re both girls. The obvious interpretation of this is that destiny is usually something that would connect lovers. In Japan there is an idea, shared amongst other Asian cultures, that a red thread connects lovers together through fate or destiny. Why does Hotaru think this is odd? Because they aren’t lovers, or because their relationship is not heterosexual and therefore not fitting with her expectation? This story arc, and the show as a whole, has precedent dealing with same sex relationships. Ultimately the romantic aspects of Hotaru and Chibiusa’s relationship are subject to interpretation. There’s nothing overt about this relationship, but this is one of the many insinuations that it has romantic undertones. In case you were wondering, of course I’m shipping these two!

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 36 - Sailor Chibi Moon flies

Mamoru encourages Chibiusa to go out in fight. You can see this is hard for him, but he pushes her for it anyway. Chibiusa is totally bad ass here. She digs deep and finds the will to fight to save the world. A lot of fans may not have liked her portrayal in the original anime but it’s hard not to like Chibiusa now. She seems to have immediately increased in power and she jumps out the window and flies to where she’s going. We previously saw that Chibiusa appeared to be the only member of the team that was not able to fly.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 36 - Tuxedo Mask transforms

I was really hoping that this episode would have an amazing transformation sequence for Tuxedo Mask. In the manga we see him transform and get a look at his nakedness. Sadly this doesn’t occur here. I was hoping for a full on elaborate stock footage calibre transformation for Tuxedo Mask. Instead we see him glow and quickly transform behind his cape. I blame the patriarchy.

Ryuk from Death Note Sailor Moon Crystal Act 36 - Mistress 9's Daimon

When Hotaru left Mistress 9’s body, it meant that Mistress 9 was also no longer bound to that body. The Daimon inside escaped, destroying the body, which killed Hotaru. This Daimon kind of looks like Ryuk from Death Note. I don’t know much about this series, and only ever saw the terrible live action movie adaptation, but this guy from that show immediately came to mind when I saw it.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 36 - Super Sailor Moon and Super Sailor Chibi Moon

What’s the gang to do? Sailor Chibi Moon does an effective Pink Sugar Heart Attack for a change but that isn’t enough. We need Super Sailor Moon … but wait! Chibiusa gets a grail too and she becomes Super Sailor Chibi Moon. Unfortunately we don’t get a full transformation sequence for Super Sailor Chibi Moon. Oh well.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 37 Preview - Sailor Saturn

Next time is Act 37, Infinity 11 – Infinite – Judge. Sailor Saturn. That’s all. Who cares what else happens in this episode because it’s Sailor Saturn! We’ve been waiting for this for like… ever! Finally we will start seeing a proper representation of Sailor Saturn in an animated series after she got totally shafted in the original Sailor Moon anime. I can’t wait!

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 37 Preview - Sailor Saturn

Keep reading for more screenshots from this episode and the preview for Act 37.

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Watch Sailor Moon Crystal Act 36, Infinity 10 – Infinite – Upper Atmosphere, Monday June 13th at 10:30am Eastern Time

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 36 Preview - Hotaru

The next episode of Sailor Moon Crystal will air on Japanese TV tomorrow, June 13th, at 11pm Japan Standard Time. Afterwards, starting at 10:30am Eastern Time, the episode will be available to stream on Crunchyroll, Neon Alley and Hulu. . Act 36, Infinity 10 – Infinite – Upper Atmosphere, is the first of a three part conclusion to the Infinity arc. These next three episodes were originally one massive chapter of the original Sailor Moon manga. Because of this the pacing may seem a bit off.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 36 Preview - Sailor Moon cries

Hotaru is a big deal this week, trying to free herself from the evil Mistress 9 who’s ingesting human souls like they were candy. One major thing we just might see in this episode is a Tuxedo Mask transformation sequence. The equivalent manga chapter, which we expect should be faithfully adapted as all others before it have, shows Mamoru transforming into Tuxedo Mask. We never got an elaborate stock footage transformation for Tuxedo Mask in the original Sailor Moon anime. This happened a few times but these were quick and nothing like what the other Sailor Guardians did, and by that I mean we didn’t see a glowing naked version of him. Fingers crossed!

Sailor Moon Manga Act 36 - Tuxedo Mask transforms

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 35, Infinity 9 – Infinite Labyrinth 2, review

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 35 - Hotaru in thorns

The latest episode of Sailor Moon Crystal premiered on Japanese TV on Monday June 6th at 11pm Japan Standard Time. Shortly afterwards, starting at around 10:30am, it was available to stream first on Crunchyroll and later on Neon Alley and Hulu. Act 35, Infinity 9 – Infinite Labyrinth, mostly takes place inside of Mistress 9 and in an elevator.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 35 - Chibiusa and her Crystal

Mistress 9 ate the Silver Crystal of the future. This is the one Chibiusa stole from her mother in the 30th century and has been using to fight as Sailor Chibi Moon. More importantly, Chibiusa’s soul is now fundamentally tied to this Crystal which causes all sort of problems, mainly that she’ll die if it’s apart from her body and consumed by an evil entity. How exactly does this work? Sailor Moon’s Silver Crystal of the present is similarly tied to her soul. It’s her Star Seed and all that fun stuff. What’s Neo Queen Serenity doing in the future? In the last story arc Neo Queen Serenity still seems bound to the Silver Crystal of the future so what happened to her when her daughter went gallivanting around time with it? Sure she was dormant for most of the last season but now that her daughter is gone on her training is Crystal Tokyo defenseless? Did Neo Queen Serenity need to somehow disassociate herself from the Crystal? If I take a powerful Crystal and keep it in my pocket for too long will my soul get tied to it like Golum being bound to the one ring?

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 35 - Hotaru and Chibiusa

My favourite part of this episode takes place within Mistress 9. Chibiusa, bound to her Crystal, is lost inside of Mistress 9 who basically ate her. Hotaru goes out of her way to protect her and her Crystal. These are two sort of ghosts or spirits stuck inside of this body which has been controlled by this evil entity. Hotaru hasn’t known Chibiusa that long, but she has strong feelings for her and is protecting her with everything she has. It seems like Mistress 9 won’t be getting full access to that Crystal just yet, which is unfortunate since she immediately destroys the Taioron Crystal once she gets something better. This is kind of like getting a new phone, deciding you don’t need your older out of date phone, and destroying it only to realise there’s some software problem with the new one and you can’t use it but oops I obliterated the iPhone 4s. Too bad so sad.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 35 - A terrible directory

A lot of this episode takes place in an elevator which somehow leads to a bunch of weird mistakes. Let’s see what we know. The gang starts on the 56th floor, obvious from the sign we see and what is mentioned, and Sailor Venus decides to take one group and go down floor by floor while Sailor Moon and the people who want to kill Hotaru are going to take the elevator to the basement. Look at this chart. How terrible is this thing? It has a column with floor numbers, a column with descriptions, a second column with floor numbers and … that’s it. There are no descriptions for the second column! What’s on floors 31 to 60? The manga equivalent pages show an extra column there with descriptions of what’s on those floors, but there’s nothing here. Minor nitpick but that’s how it is.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 35 - Elevator

Sailor Moon gets in an elevator with Sailor Uranus, Neptune and Pluto and in doing so they go down. All indications from shots in the elevator shaft seem to indicate that it is going down at incredible speeds. A line in the manga, omitted from this version, speaks about the effect of the acceleration that Sailor Moon is feeling. Watching the floor numbers we seem to go from 50 to 40 in a number of seconds. Then we go from 30 to 20 in nearly a minute. It’s a few minutes more until we get to 6. Following this things get weird, we go into this weird other dimension, and then we arrive at floor zero. Or is it? There is clearly space for two digits on the display however when we are in single digit floors, like 6, we don’t have a preceding zero. It’s “6” not “06”. Also the numbers take up the full height of the display while the display on the final floor takes up half. The manga chapter has the gang travel down to floor negative infinity. With the infinity symbol, ∞, being like a horizontal 8. The manga has them mostly travel through basement floors to get there though. Here the floor indicator, which looks like “oo” could be taken to mean infinity. There is no negative floor indicator on the display. The reason for which those two os aren’t touching could be an artifact of the display. The show have easily avoided ambiguity by just putting another row of dots between the two numbers and having oo display as ∞. Also notable is that there are 60 buttons shown and 60 floors in the directory, so any basement floors don’t seem to be listed. If there really are on the minus infinity floor what does this even mean? If they go down infinity floors they would go through the earth, outside of our solar system and galaxy and beyond the reaches of the known universe.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 35 - Floor infinity and Professor Tomoe

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 35 - Hotaru has a messed up face

There is a flashback to when the Death Busters arrived. We see the accident once again and Hotaru’s face is real messed up in one shot! Koalinite is called Kaori, as she appears to have been a normal human woman working for Professor Tomoe before this incident. She was infected by an egg and then Professor Tomoe decided to infect himself with one. We also learn that Mistress 9, who was placed inside of Hotaru, was once Pharaoh 90’s partner. This seems to be new to Sailor Moon Crystal. The other Witches 5 however were created artificially.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 35 - Sailor Uranus on Uranus

For the second time we see Sailor Uranus, Neptune and Pluto on their home planets. Uranus seems tiny. We can actually see the curvature of the planet. Uranus has a diameter of about 4 times that of the Earth. That means its surface is much flatter than the Earth’s surface. Do you ever find yourself gazing out at the horizon and actually noticing the curvature of the Earth? Probably not. Based on the curve we see here Uranus should be roughly the size of The Little Prince’s asteroid. Just imagine tracing out a circle from that thumbnail image and it wouldn’t even be larger than your computer screen. Alternatively if Uranus is the right size Sailor Uranus could be huge. She’d probably be about the size of the Earth’s Moon for this to work. Sailor Pluto appears to actually be on Pluto. Previously we saw her guarding the Space-Time Door but it wasn’t clear exactly where it was. What’s the deal with this thing? In Crystal Tokyo when there was this door at the end of a long hall which led to the Space-Time Corridor, were people traveling to Pluto as an intermediate before going back in time? Did the door itself move at some point? Who’s even protecting this door in the 30th century now that Sailor Pluto is dead, Diana went back in time and Neo Queen Serenity has no Crystal? Maybe it’s that pink haired kid who isn’t Chibiusa. How rare would children be in a world where humans live 1000 years? Pretty rare.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 35 - Princess and Queen Serenity

We learn that when they were bored and alone Sailor Uranus, Neptune and Pluto would look at Queen Serenity and Princess Serenity. For some reason Princess Serenity is pointing to her bracelet in this image. It must have been new at the time.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 35 - Professor Tomoe

Bad news for Professor Tomoe, who turns into this big monster thing. Sailor Moon hesitates to kill him because he was Hotaru’s father a few minutes earlier. Realistically he hasn’t been Hotaru’s father for some time, though I wonder if Kaolinite and Professor Tomoe have little spirits of themselves wrapped up in thorns inside their minds somewhere. Oh well. He gets killed.

Sailor Mercury, Mars, Jupiter and Venus are attacked and Super Sailor Moon transforms back into normal Sailor Moon. She seems to think this is because something happened to her friends. Not a great omen.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 36 Preview - Hotaru

Next week is Act 36, Infinity 10 – Infinite – Upper Atmosphere. There’s more of Hotaru’s ghost resisting Mistress 9 and being all bad ass. With only three more episodes the story arc will be done soon. These next three episodes were originally one massive manga chapter!

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 36 Preview - Hotaru

Keep reading for more screenshots from this episode and the next episode preview for Act 36.

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Watch Sailor Moon Crystal Act 35, Infinity 9 – Infinite Labyrinth 2, Monday June 6th starting at 10:30am Eastern Time

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 35 Preview - Usagi

The next episode of Sailor Moon Crystal will air on Japanese TV on Monday June 6th at 11pm Japan Standard Time. Immediately afterwards it will start to be available to stream on Crunchyroll, Neon Alley and Hulu. In Act 35, Infinity 9 – Infinite Labyrinth 2, the gang continue to fight against the Death Busters and work their way down Infinity floors under Mugen Academy which should take them out of the other side of the earth, outside of our galaxy and beyond the end of the known universe.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 35 Preview - Hotaru protecting Chibiusa

Mistress 9 has eaten the Silver Crystal which contains Chibiusa’s soul. Inside of Mistress 9 she’ll meet Hotaru’s soul and they’ll get up to all sorts of fun.

Sailor Moon Crystal Act 35 Preview - Mistress 9