Tag: Sailor Moon

1284: MIRAKURU ROMANSU

I’m a little further into Sailor Moon now. (That sounds a bit wrong. Never mind, let’s just run with it.) Still not a long way, but long enough for both Sailors Mercury and Mars to have shown up, which has thrown an interesting twist into things.

As I suspected, both Mercury and Mars are considerably more competent than poor old Usagi, who is still a clumsy crybaby even when transformed. That said, it’s interesting to see the different ways that Mercury and Mars come to “competence” — Mercury, in keeping with her “normal” incarnation as Ami, is quiet, intelligent and thinks things through; Mars, meanwhile, is aggressive, quick to anger and courageous. Mercury is by far the most “mature” of the bunch, despite Mars clearly being the oldest (I assume, anyway; I’m judging largely on the basis of their physical development and the fact that Mars has a job rather than attending school) [correction — the episode I watched the day after this post was written saw Mars turn up in a school uniform, so scratch that!] — the episode I watched today featured Usagi and Mars arguing throughout, with Mars in particular betraying the facade of maturity she clearly tries hard to keep up by getting sucked into Usagi’s ridiculous world. I’m spotting a bit of a tsundere streak in Mars, too (well, mostly tsuntsun at present) which, of course, means I find her tremendously attractive.

The show continues to be simplistic, entertaining fun at its current stage. I don’t know if it gets any more complex later on, but to be honest, I don’t mind at all if it continues in its present, rather formulaic fashion. You don’t have to think too hard about it or try to hunt for hidden meanings; you can just flop down in front of it and enjoy the silliness. It’s the Saturday morning cartoon formula — predictable villains who are always after the same thing (the curiously non-specific “energy” in Sailor Moon’s case), a predictable main cast who get to do one majorly awesome thing per episode that can be easily represented through the insertion of stock footage, and a comic sidekick character. (That said, Sailor Moon’s sidekick character Luna the cat is actually the most mature, sensible one out of all of them.)

What’s interesting about Sailor Moon at this early stage — and I could be wrong about this, since I’m only ten episodes into the whole run — is that it’s essentially a superhero show, focused almost exclusively on female superheroes, in which said female superheroes don’t appear to be there just to be “sexy”. Sure, they’re all in short skirts, Sailor Mars is wearing some distinctly impractical-looking high heels and there was a rather gratuitous pantsu shot (Sailor Mars again) in the last episode I watched, but for the most part when they’re in their Sailor Senshi forms, it’s all business, bubbles, fireballs and Moon Tiara Action. (Incidentally, I feel that Sailors Mercury and Moon drew the short straws when it came to their awesome powers — Sailor Mars can set things on fire, while Mercury can, err, make a lot of bubbles, and Moon can throw her tiara at things. Granted, getting hit by Sailor Moon’s tiara generally appears to make things turn into dust, but still. Sailor Mars can set things on fire.)

Anyway, yeah. Sailor Moon is awesome. I’m disappointed in myself I haven’t watched it sooner, but at least I can make up for lost time now.

1281: MIRACLE ROMANCE

SMoonI guess about now is a good time to admit that I’ve started watching Sailor Moon and, predictably, enjoying it a great deal.

In my defence, after watching Revolutionary Girl Utena and finding it enjoyable but immensely confusing, I felt obliged to check out Sailor Moon for further education in the ways of the magical girl. I have a sort of ulterior motive for educating myself on this particular aspect of anime — for starters, I’ve always been interested in it, but never got around to checking any of it out; secondly, I hear that Puella Magi Madoka Magica or whatever it’s called is very good, but is something of a deconstruction of the magical girl genre as a whole and consequently is best appreciated when you have more than a passing familiarity with its tropes.

So, Sailor Moon, then. In stark contrast to Revolutionary Girl Utena, Sailor Moon is charmingly unsubtle about everything it does. The lead character Usagi seems to do nothing but shout or cry all the time, and the show’s moral messages are only a couple of steps removed from He-Man’s posturing. While there’s no “Hey, Kids!” moment at the end of a Sailor Moon episode, the inherent “message” of each chapter is so startlingly obvious within about five seconds of it starting that it becomes more of a Columbo-style show, where you’re waiting to see how it reaches the conclusion you already know from the outset, rather than holding on tight for some narrative twists and turns.

That’s not to say it’s bad, though; simple is good sometimes, and God knows it’s appreciated after Utena. Sailor Moon’s characters are charming and endearing, even if they’re loud, and they’ve all grown and developed even in the space of the few episodes I’ve watched to date. I’m looking forward to seeing how Usagi — who, spoiler, is also Sailor Moon — develops over the course of the 300 bajillion episodes there are, because she is comically incompetent at present, despite ostensibly being the show’s heroine. Her “sidekicks” who are teased in the show’s opening titles haven’t shown up yet, but I assume it’s only a matter of time.

It’s clear even from this early stage that Sailor Moon was very influential, however. I’m seeing elements of its humour and characterisation in the latest Hyperdimension Neptunia game, for example, where Neptune takes on the Usagi role of “amusingly rubbish protagonist who’s aware she’s rubbish”, and her companions are actually far more capable than she is. There’s also the more obvious fact that Neptune and co are all themselves magical girls, able to transform into their “Hard Drive Divinity” forms to power up and become stronger — though there’s less “identity hiding” in the world of Neptunia than there is in the more “grounded in reality” world of Sailor Moon.

And that music. Amazing. While the copies of the episodes I’m watching aren’t brilliant quality — or perhaps they really were that poor quality when originally broadcast — the amazing background music still stands out, if only for the fact it sounds like it belongs in a 1960s TV series rather than the 1992 anime from which it actually hails. Huge string orchestras, wakka-wakka guitars, choirs of singers mewling “oooooooh, oooh-ooooooohh, Saiiiiloooor Mooooooon…” as Usagi transforms. Marvellous stuff.

Anyway. I’m going to watch a lot more of Sailor Moon, I predict. I have the whole series to hand, but it remains to be seen if I can manage all of it. I’m sure I can, and I’m sure I will feel suitably satisfied at its conclusion. I hope there’s a good ending. Please don’t tell me if the ending is rubbish!