Sailor Moon Returns!

[Hogi Bear]

This third episode was good too. Rei's transformation was cool and it's like, take that, there's no messing with me!

Another two weeks to go. Seems criminal to me.

[Disney Duster]

Yea it really does feel like it takes forever for the next episode. I loved the last one, I loved the one before that too, how some attack and "Moon Power" animation is not stock animation but all new for the episode! The "change me into a princess" transformation was beautiful! I never liked how in the original manga Sailor Moon had a mask and got new tiaras (well, for the Moon Prism version, I'm okay with new tiaras for each different version). I didn't like that her tiara got burnt in the fire. It just makes sense to me that a magical object like that could come back, unless some really powerful magic destroyed it, and even then, I would think a new one exactly like it would appear. I wish that her Moon Tiara Boomerang just didn't destroy the evil and she got the new power of reflecting the moonlight using her same old tiara.

[Disney Duster]

Makoto is awesome! But why did her transformation get Sailor Mercury's transformation's music while Sailor Mars' transformation got its own unique music?! That's unfair and lazy!

[Disney Duster]

Moon Healing Escalation was amazing! I also liked how Usagi had to find faith and confidence to become the leader of the Sailor Guardians. But they got something wrong. Tuxedo Mask says he doesn't have special abilities like the Sailor Guardians. But in the manga he does, Tuxedo La Smoking Bomber, Pink Sugar Tuxedo Attack, and psychic powers. Naoko Takeuchi even said he takes the place of Sailor Earth, and he has the Golden Crystal. Maybe he just didn't know he had powers yet, but I thought he did, and could transform and stuff, by some point before the story begins.

[Disney Duster]

What a sweet, touching episode! I guess Usagi left Mamoru because she was too fearful to stay and start making moves? lol What she did was so brave, to come out as Sailor Moon and fight the people. A big step for her. But something I feared would look so ordinary and just repeat the same old animation, Sailor Venus's transformation, will have a lot of new animation and looks like it will be the coolest, best one, next to Sailor Moon's!

[Disney Duster]

I loved this episode! I love Sailor Venus and Minako even more now! And her transformation was sooooo cool! So beautiful! Amazing! The only thing is she didn't say "Venus Power Make-Up" and I'm pretty sure the Sailor Guardians need to say their transformation words to transform! I know they thought they couldn't say it because it would reveal she was Sailor Venus...but even people who don't know the show or the mangas should be able to tell she is Sailor Venus! Oh well. Usagi was so great in this episode, too! And the romance, ah, how wonderful! I wish they didn't do the tiara transforming of Sailor Moon though. She keeps her original tiara in the end, so hers changing all the time just doesn't make sense to me.

[Disney Duster]

I can't believe it! They're going to continue the series into at least the Dark Moon arc! You know, with Chibi-Usa, Sailor Moon's daughter? I thought they would only do the first arc! But no, we got "Moon Crystal Power Make-Up" and the rest!

This series really is beautiful. Sometimes it's animated way better than other times, but oh well. The final battle was epic and animated very cool and beautifully!

So, I wonder when and where I can buy this series? Don't know if I should wait for the inevitable complete series boxset or not...

[Disney Duster]

Okay, so the last episode had a not very well animated last battle, but that's ok to me because...

WE'RE GETTING A NEW SEASON OF SAILOR MOON CRYSTAL!!!!!

Yes, it will cover the third arc of the manga, the Infinity Arc! The outer guardians, the hearts, the Super Sailor Moon! The end of the world! It will all come according to news like this!:

Sailor Moon Crystal Renewed
On Monday September 28th at 11:30pm JST at the end of the TV broadcasting in Japan, Toei announced that the 3rd phase of Sailor Moon Crystal which will encompass the third arc of the manga Infinity so far. Season 2 of Sailor Moon Crystal is currently in early production.

I am so excited! Ah, but Summer just finished! We have to wait almost a whole year! But there is one possible good thing about it: maybe we'll get better animation and production values! Because the animation ranged from good to bad throughout the first season... But I'm optimistic!

[Disney's Divinity]

Finally pictures of the Funko Pop have been shown. I think the only one missing still is Chibi-moon, who'll hopefully have Diana with her.

I'll definitely be getting all of these. I do wish that Mars, Mercury, etc. had been holding their transformation pens. I still like what they went with though--Mercury holding a bubble and Mars with her index fingers together like in her fire-shooting pose.

[Disney Duster]

Ok, so the new images for Sailor Moon Crystal's third season, have arrived! And a new trailer!

The new characters designs look just about as good as the old ones, maybe even better, and the animation looks a lot better, at least from the trailer. It seems they are putting more effort into it because enough people watched the first series, and it made enough money, and it seems they learned to make the character designs to better animate.

The only misgiving I have is I haven't read any news this will be shown on Hulu. But there shouldn't be any reason it's not, right?

Anyway here are the images, trailers, and news:
http://moviepilot.com/posts/3817709

And the season will be called "Sailor Moon Crystal: Death Busters", which also may mean it will take time to really develop the season well and make it better. Also, it will air in April, we don't have to wait till Summer! Unless it doesn't come to Hulu, like I said...

[Disney Duster]

A little new info and special sneak peak!

First, this season will not cram every act into one episode each. It seems they will at least stretch every or most acts over two episodes each. The first episode only covered half of the first act. This is a good thing, for it means they can spend more time on the story and characters.

Also, even though I haven't heard any official news, some people on Youtube said this will be shown on the anime-watching site crunchyroll. So those who don't live in Japan and can't watch it on TV can watch it online!

Finally, the transformations, which used to be all in CGI, will now be all hand-drawn! It sounds like they listened to fan's complaints about not only the animation in general but in the CGI transformations that many fans didn't like. I was ok with them, but the new hand-drawn one for Sailor Moon does look even better!

Here is the trailer for the new season that I provided a link to before:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eHvs04SxlMU[/youtube]

I'm in love with what they are doing with Moon Spiral Heart Attack!

And this video has some little snippets of Sailor Moon's new hand-drawn transormation!:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Zzqt4jqSe0[/youtube]

[kiseki]

The new characters designs look just about as good as the old ones, maybe even better, and the animation looks a lot better, at least from the trailer. It seems they are putting more effort into it because enough people watched the first series, and it made enough money, and it seems they learned to make the character designs to better animate.

The previous character designer was actually despised to the point where she was harassed off Twitter, so that's part of the reason why that had to change. The current character designer is not that great of an animator (the same can be said for his animation studio), but he's known for keeping the art on model.

Shida Naotoshi animated the new Sailor Moon transformation if anyone wants to see more of his work: https://sakuga.yshi.org/post?page=1&tags=naotoshi_shida

[Disney Duster]

I didn't know any of that! I can't believe she was harassed off Twitter! All because of her work on Sailor Moon Crystal? And I am really sad to learn the new animation studio is not known for great animation. But I saw a sneak peek of the opening, ending, Moon Cosmic Power transformation and all the inner Guardians' attacks, and it was all great, some even stunning! So...that was all animated by different studios? I didn't know different studios/people were heads of different parts of the show!

[kiseki]

The Japanese animation industry is pretty interconnected! With certain exceptions that keep the majority of their work in-house (KyoAni, Ghibli, ufotable kiiiiinda), every animation studio will have work outsourced to other companies. The first season of SMC was heavily outsourced, and the studio Takahashi (the current character designer) is in charge of had a few episodes under their belt. I know a different subcontracting studio listed animating SMC episode 5 back in January, and apparently that was an outsource of an outsource...? Anyway, Toei is still the main animation studio for Crystal. I'm preeeeetty sure that's where all the good animators that normally work on Precure have been assigned.

[Disney Duster]

Oh. Thank you for the info. I thought Toei was the ones doing all the animation though...unless you mean Toei is a main company that outsources to other studios? And Precure people work at some of those studios?

Precure is known for good animation, isn't it?

I would have thought that for Sailor Moon, what I assume is the biggest, most famous magical girl anime ever, would get the best quality animation. The only way I can think it would get bad animation like it sometimes has is that it's so popular they figure people will buy stuff from it no matter what they do.

[kiseki]

That's normally the case. The main studio will be doing most of the (key) animation along with the freelancers, with some episodes outsourced. (Toei is being hilarious with Digimon tri. by slapping their name on something they're barely animating themselves.) Studio Dub (Takahashi's studio) animated the contents of episode 1 sans the stock footage/OP/ED, and apparently the rest of the key animator list had only two Toei animators (the aforementioned Shida being one of them, too lazy to check who the other is). It did have plenty of freelance animators that typically work on Toei stuff, and at least one former Toei employee that sometimes works on Toei stuff though?

It depends. Everyone was bullying the Dragon Ball fans with Precure scenes last year...not so much this year. The 2015 Precure series had impressive action animation that exhausted the staff working on it, so the 2016 series is both behind schedule AND lacking in good animators. There was one pair of transformation+attack stock was animated by 15 different people altogether when they're usually assigned to just one outstanding animator. I'm blaming Sailor Moon for Shida's absence here lol.

That's what everyone thought. :c Not sure what went on behind the scenes of the first Sailor Moon Crystal series that had it result in such disastrous results.

The only way I can think it would get bad animation like it sometimes has is that it's so popular they figure people will buy stuff from it no matter what they do.

Definitely. Sailor Moon merchandise sales had increased after Crystal started, so it was printing cash regardless of the anime's quality.

[Disney Duster]

Thanks for all the info again! Yea that Precure scene was great. It's seems Takahashi is actually a good animator to have, because episode 1 of Sailor Moon Crystal was animated well and the newest one was. But you just didn't answer one question for me - that woman character designer who was harassed off twitter, was it because of her work on Sailor Moon Crystal?

I watched the new Sailor Moon Crystal episode the day it came out and it was great! The chaarcter development was great and the animation was great! The only thing was, on hulu, where I usually watch it, the episode wasn't subtitled! And they usually were! Was it not subbed because I'm not a member, and now you have to be a member to see the subtitles? I had to watch it on crunchyroll which had a smaller screen, so I didn't like that.

Oh, I wanted to say, I also have one bad thing to say about the new season - I hate the opening theme song. They should have stuck with Moon Pride.

[kiseki]

Forgive me here, I always enjoy linking to Precure videos so this post (going on tangents) is just an excuse to do so in excess. ^q^

Takahashi is a good animation director. He's fast (he's still doing work for Aikatsu when he has his chief animation director duties for SMC wtf) and his episodes are always on model, but I was given the impression that his studio's animation work was so-so. It's not something I've bothered making sure of myself, perhaps that just referred to weak action animators since it was in the context of the action-heavy Precure.
...Maybe it's because his animation is weaker in comparison to others.
Shida's Flora: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eOL7ZDy9EW0
Takahashi's Mermaid: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KMsL5wN9AYQ
Itaoka's Twinkle: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_jEE5cVnvg
Ohta's Scarlet: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y8IRag7qZWs

Sakou Yukie was indeed harassed off Twitter because of her work on SMC. And the previous director left Toei (he wasn't removed) thanks to SMC. :c

I know that a lot of people subscribe to Crunchyroll only do so to support the industry. They still torrent since CR's player sucks.

I love Yakushimaru Etsuko but have to agree that the SMC OP is meh. She'd be better for an ED.
The OP itself felt like a discount Ikuhara OP (also Yakushimaru Etsuko) imo but then it turns out that it's just a generic Kon OP.

[Disney Duster]

Wow, thanks for all he info yet again! Precure has really good henshins. It ssems Shida's Flora was the best animated one to me.

[Disney's Divinity]

Finally pictures of the Funko Pop have been shown. I think the only one missing still is Chibi-moon, who'll hopefully have Diana with her.

These will be sold through Amazon around June 10th, which is the reason I haven't bought them yet (the pre-orders are overpriced right now, but I'm sure they'll come down).

Anyway, just wanted to say I did get the Hot Topic exclusive of Moon (same as regular except now she's holding her moon stick and Luna has the band-aid that covered the moon on her forehead at the beginning of the story). I couldn't justify buying the same item with minimal difference, but someone I know asked me to help them move furniture and I said I would if they bought me the exclusive.

Who knows if Chibiusa is still coming, or if they'd delayed her for a second wave. Which would make sense--release her with the Outers. There's no way these don't sell well enough to get multiple waves. I hope eventually they do Usagi/Mamoru as Queen/King, Nehelenia, Wicked Lady, Luna (Human), and Super Sailor Moon. I wouldn't mind if they released the characters with their various items (Moon's scepter/chalice, Mercury's Harp, Neptune's mirror, Mars' bow and arrow, etc.) or in their regular clothes (particularly Chibiusa with her umbrella and Luna P).