Sailor Moon R Episode 01 - Moon Revived! The Mysterious Aliens Appear

Well, I suppose this was inevitable at some point. I update the blog three days a week, and two of those days are already filled up with other shows. My choices for the open one right now are Sailor Moon and That Which Shall Not Be Named. So the choice was obvious here because f**k that other show.

On the other hand though, I've managed to go more than a week without having to even think about this show, so let's see what adding the letter R onto the end of a series tends to do for us.

So... they managed to keep the exact same theme music. The exact. Same. Song. Not that it was bad but, you'd think after FORTY-SIX EPISODES they might have retired it. Instead, they just decided to update the visuals, while hardly changing the intro all that much. In fact, this is the kind of intro that just says, "Hey, if we wanted to totally re-do the intro to the show, how would we do it again?" BY PRETTY MUCH DOING THE EXACT SAME THING AS LAST TIME.

Except now they're going with some trippy background plates.

The hell is this, Full House?

You know what also hasn't changed? THIS SHIT.

Did you even bother to change ANYTHING?!

Quite literally, it's the same everything. Same music. Same goddamn intro voiceover. It's even a goddamn carbon copy of the intro plate from the LAST SERIES. Including telling you what is going to happen in the episode before you even get a chance to see it. Hey, do you know what happens in this episode? Usagi gets attacked by a giant flower gorilla in her best friend's bedroom. No, seriously, a giant flower gorilla.

Maybe I should start coming up with my own monsters.

So today's episode opens up with the laziest goddamn thing they could possibly come up with. The exact same way the last series both opened AND ENDED. With the same static plates, the same Usagi running out of the house with toast in her mouth because she's late and everything. Except this time she forgets her bag and trips on a crack in the sidewalk. But still, that's just plain freaking lazy. The only thing different is that two cats are sitting on the roof watching over her, and letting us know it's been two months since the last series ended. Not much of a vacation if you ask me.

Everything is so peaceful in Tokyo now, with birds just kind of flying in front of a static image using only four frames of animation. These guys are true masters of their craft in terms of sheer goddamned laziness. Normally when you open a series, you try to do it strongly - in fact, several shows tend to blow a good portion of their budget on the first episode in order to make a good impression. See the first episode of Nanoha, for example, with its visually distinct Studio Mad House shading during the pilot - you never see it again, but it is really visually striking, and helps set a good tone for the rest of the show.

Ah, but there I go on about other shows, so let's just keep things moving along.

Not like that you damned horncat.

Now we're back to an all-too familiar scene at the junior high, where someone is busy standing in the hallway with a bucket of water on her head. While being reintroduced to her first combat buddy ever - that whiz kid over in Class 5. Y'know, the one with unusually blue hair.

Listen to the teacher, she knows what's up.

Of course, Usagi winds up dumping the entire bucket of water on the teacher's head, in front of the rest of the class, and her life as she knows it is basically over. Later that night, she's sleeping with a Luna on her back, and then a UFO shines its lights through her bedroom window! Aliens approach! Or something. I doubt we'll be so lucky as to have her be abducted anytime soon. This causes the young girl to wake up in the middle of the night, thinking morning has already arrived. Not the case.

There is, however, a giant explosion not too far away as something falls from the sky and crashes into the city. Yay for meteorites!

Beware the evil alien pickle.

So an alien pickle sort of falls to the Earth, flies off, and finds itself an empty apartment to crash in or something. It flashes some kind of light in through the windows, and then there's a ring of people looking at the crater left behind. Which isn't surprising really - but it took out an entire parking lot, which is just wow.

The cats look over it all, and realize all of the girls seem to have found their way to the same place. Why, three of them have even bumped into one another again: Ami, Usagi, and Makoto. Which gives our heroine a very funny feeling.

When you say it with a rapeface like that, it's hard
to take anything you say seriously.

Of course two seconds later she is distracted by a flyer that says all snack foods are 80% off, so all is well with the world again.

You know who also shows up again?

This guy. Still stalking girls, even after a memory wipe.

Literally he shows up out of nowhere, calls her fat, and is basically back to his old creeper ways. Seriously, if you remove everything they had together in the last series, what do you have? ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. I know this will make the girls all swoon and go "oh but that means their love is true and it's so lovey dovey". IGNORE THE FACT THAT THIS MAN IS IN COLLEGE, CHASING AFTER A GIRL WHO IS STILL IN JUNIOR HIGH, EVEN THOUGH THEY NO LONGER KNOW WHO THE OTHER IS. We tend to have words for people like this. Lots of them. None of which are good.

Oh. My. God. Did you really just... Oh. My. God.

Now he's being open about wanting to put his penis in her, it seems. That? That is just horrifying. But of course, nobody is going to recognize this, because it's a thing that he's always sort of said right? Except that they don't have any of their memories together so what is up with that. Why does he care about how she looks? He honestly shouldn't. You might call it love. Me? I call it being a creepy goddamn stalker chasing after girls way too young for his age.

Then there's some aliens talking in their new pad about how this planet has awesome energy or something. Then they make the first insinuation of incest.

Or should I say, twincest?

By the way. Their names? Are Ali and En. Just. Process that for two seconds. Their names. Are Ali. And En.

Barely six minutes in and I want this show to be over already. Oh my god. You just know some guy thought he was being clever when he came up with these names.

I don't think I'm ever going to get over this.

Twincest confirmed mere seconds later.

Y'know, these guys remind me of someone else... oh right, the Neutrinos from Teenaged Mutant Ninja Turtles.

Image courtesy of TheTechnodrome.com

Now here's a few fun facts. The first appearance of these three was in 1987. Long before even the first Sailor Moon series had aired. You have two characters who are, in fact, brother and sister (the one on the left and the one in the middle), and they have pointy ears. More than that, they also have very similar eye structure as well. But the thing that kills me the most? One of them has almost the exact same freaking hair color. While the other one? Could've been a borrowed variation from the other.

Now, I don't know about you, but this seems a bit suspect to me. So I decided to do just a little bit of research. According to wikipedia, the first 13 episodes of this series (referred to as the Doom Tree arc) were essentially filler episodes, because the manga was ongoing at the time of production (since the artist didn't think her work would be good enough to warrant a second series). In order to buy time, they had to come up with some filler material, because that's what you always do in the anime industry.

So, you tell me - do you really think it is that far-fetched that someone would have copied from a popular series from the US? Let's not forget the interesting relationship that the creators of TMNT had with Japan and its many influences. Personally, I wouldn't be a damn bit surprised, giving the veritable mountain of evidence here, and if I really wanted to dig further, I could probably come up with some conclusive links. Suffice it to say: THEY ARE BEING LAZY ASSHOLES.

Anyways, Ali goes on to talk some more after hitting on his sister and hold on wait.

YOU ARE AN ALIEN HOW DO YOU KNOW THIS?

Then he plays a flute after talking about Greek mythology, and.... oh for the love of-

Only in Japan. Seriously, only in Japan.

So, somehow, they already know how to fully integrate into our society, despite having been around for less than 24 hours. Not bad for having been borne from a giant evil space pickle, right? Also, somehow, Japan is the only country in the world that probably has tick boxes on their school application forms which include the following choices: Alien, Robot, Clone, Genetic Experiment, or Soldier. Because those always seem to transfer into schools, despite having ZERO PRIOR CLASS HISTORY.

Also, am I the only one concerned by the fact that they have literally just come out of a giant evil space pickle, and yet already know everything there is about human history? Like the local language. Or Greek mythology. I mean, that's just pretty damn weird.

So these are the Ginga kids now. Seijuro and Natsumi. I'm sure there's probably a joke in there somewhere but I am too lazy to look it up.

Oh Umino. Always there to get my back.

The girls think Seijuro is hot, and the boys are all over Natsumi. Story goes that they've just come back from another country. Right. So of course, they ask her to say something in another language.

I don't even have words for this.

After that, some douche starts playing his flute, drawing everyone's attention away, and the sister gets all evil eyes because her brother is busy playing the Pied Piper of Getting Hot Chicks. Not wanting to be outdone, Umino tries to play the recorder to compete, somehow managing a slightly better rendition than Osaka. Except when Osaka did it, it was kind of charming. And kind of became an internet thing. Somehow, I don't see this one catching on. Neither does Naru, since she snags the thing from him and clocks him over the head with it. Everybody's a critic.

Then Ali stops playing his flute, claiming to have found the "Andromeda of my heart". Naturally, Naru thinks he means her, but in reality, he means the blonde standing next to him. You know. The main character of this show. And he wants to play her a very special song. One that describes his 'feelings' for her.

What in the hell are we even watching at this point?

If the song is impromptu, how do you have a name for it? That isn't how that works!

Of course, before he gets a chance to play, his sister gives him the evilest look and chases him off. Then when they walk home, they start having a lover's quarrel. About how in public they are 'just brother and sister' and they shouldn't interfere with one another's lives very much. Sounds to me like someone wants a chance to get with someone he isn't related to if you ask me, and the sister is too much of a bitch to let that slide.

That is, until she sees Mamoru walking by, and then suddenly everything is different.

You hypocritical little twat.

Her brother starts going on about how much he loves his sister, but she's already walking after another man, totally ignoring him. Oh, and then she starts having an acid trip or something.

"How do we ramp up the dramatic tension in this scene?"
"Run it through a color inversion filter. That'll work."

Then she collapses, needing some serious energy, and we cut to Usagi talking to her friend on the phone about how pretty she is. Luna has to sit there and listen to it all, and she has to wonder why she feels so darn uneasy about everything.

Meanwhile, someone's been busy decking out their new pad.

That's a lotta books...

And making a few simple additions.

Nobody will miss a few floors, I'm sure.

So Ali is playing the flute while his sister lies on the tree, which feeds her energy or something, I dunno. This is where the really disturbing imagery begins, because this flower-like thing comes out, and from that a green tendril, from which a smaller white one emerges.

This is the stuff of nightmares.

But it gets worse. Because it then secretes some sort of strange glowing liquid, which drops onto En, causing her entire body to glow like crazy. Then she wakes up feeling totally rejuvenated, and we get our new commercial break slide. Which I kind of like, won't lie.

I'm a sucker for chibi stuff.

Interestingly enough, the return from break slide is even more interesting and dynamic. It's just a shame the rest of the show isn't. When we return, En feels a lot better, but the tree is looking a lot worse for wear, and begins to wither up some. They're running out of life energy, but this planet is full of it, so maybe they should take some of that.

You just gotta love these images.

So they look at a bunch of images of wildlife. Fields of flowers, bears looking at deer, wild horses running, flocks of seagulls, crowds of people, so on and so forth. This place is a veritable paradise for them. Which means they should start harvesting the energy as soon as possible. Using Cardians.

Cardians. Yes. The monsters of the day are called Cardians.

They are literally cards.

At this point, it is revealed that En is some sort of psychic, being better than anyone else in the universe at making predictions. Well then. Given the bar set for psychics in this show so far, that can't possibly be very hard at all. So she picks one, and guess what today's theme is?

Really shitty tarot-esque designs, I guess.

En says that the energy of flowers is shitty. But the energy of women in love is pretty awesome, so they should start harvesting there. Ali is all "can't we take it from men?" but hey, no arguing with the lady I guess. So he summons his Cardian monster. Vampire.

No, that is its actual name. Vampire. I am trying not to slam my head into my desk as hard as I can right now because that is just a terrible, terrible idea. You named your flower monster Vampire.

That's some flower alright.

I've seen a lot of fillers in my time. Now, let's just keep in mind, this isn't exactly the worst offender I've ever seen, but it's certainly a far cry from the best I've seen. I can best describe Vampire as being an amazonian gorilla woman with a flower for a right hand. Yeah. Can't imagine going wrong with that design.

Then the cats witness Vampire stealing energy from a random woman, and they wonder what to do. Should they revive the sailor scouts? No, they can't do that, they just got back to normal lives again, that would be mean. Then more screaming more energy being stolen, and Naru is on the phone with her friend when she gets attacked by the monster, causing Usagi to get very worried about her friend. But then the cats appear on the scene.

At least you recognize how ridiculous this situation is.

Sadly, cats are no match for the giant monster, but before they can lament not being able to call Usagi, she shows up anyways, having woken Naru's mother up from a rather nice sleep I guess, who really wants to know what's going on.

Mom! I told you to knock! God!

Oh, but they're met with yet another monster in Naru's room. This isn't the first time this has happened, and I'm sure Naru's mother is probably going to require some serious counseling after this because that's like, the third or fourth monster she's had to deal with in the last year? If I were her, I'd just sell off the store, skip town, and start my life over somewhere else, because Tokyo is just getting too rough for her poor fragile heart to handle.

Then the mom passes out, and Usagi's cat begins to talk to her, telling her to just run away. Like that ever worked before. But hey, she must be having a dream, and since this is a dream, she must be super powerful, right? So she goes off on a spiel to the monster, and somehow manages her trademark thingy.

But what if it wants to be punished?

Oddly, this sounds very familiar to her, but since this isn't a dream, she just gets some tentacles wrapped around her and her energy is drained. But before it's fully done, Artemis scratches its face, and causes the monster to chase after him. So Luna makes the only obvious decision she can, and asks her master to become Sailor Moon again. Through magical cat telepathy or something.

Artist's rendition of an actual cat power, mind you.

Then she gets the crescent moon on her head again, and all the memories come flooding back of the last final fight with Beryl and everything else that happened, including everybody dying all over again. Because that wasn't traumatic at all. Then she cries in her mind about wanting to be normal again, and sits there like a dead fish, having remembered everything all over again. She seems pretty sad about this whole thing, but she understands that she actually has a duty of sorts, so they do the transformation sequence. Which is exactly the same as last season. *sigh*

Outside, Artemis is getting the crap beat out of him by a monster that just keeps saying its name like some sort of demented Pokemon. But then Sailor Moon arrives on the scene, angry about being forced out of retirement, and planning on taking it out on the monster in front of her.

Though, it still manages to wrap its tentacles around her leg, and saps her energy away, but before it can eat her all up with her flower-arm, Luna bites the monster on the arm, which gives Usagi the time to prepare her tiara for its just-back-on-the-beat run. Welcome to more footage you've seen at least thirty times before as the tiara soars through the sky, blasting it into sparkly bits as it cries, "Cleansing!"

... well, they have a theme, so I guess they need to stick with it. Vampire becomes a card again, which turns black and emits some weird smoke. Oh, then the aliens talk to Sailor Moon via holographic projection.

How could you? YOU JUST GOT HERE.

They call themselves members of the wandering nobility of the universe. They're also nice enough to let her know this is just the start of things, and vanish from the sky, leaving her to stand there crying about how she can't be normal again. Welcome to the next ending credits! Which are incredibly boring. It's pretty much just Usagi repeating the same walk cycle over and over as the background passes in front of her. But it's not even the full thing. They wanted to animate as little as possible.

Way to only use a third of the available space.

Oh, then halfway through she starts to walk a little bit faster. They went all out with this show, especially once she starts running. Yeah.

Now, in English, they also had these little segments called Sailor Moon Says. Thank god that didn't exist in the Japanese version. Because then I'd have to decode the supposed moral messages the dubbers wanted to impose on America's children.

I am not impressed at all. If anything, the show has taken a solid step backwards in many regards, but I suppose in all respects, it could have been a lot worse. Though, it also could have been a lot better.

Ali and En. They seriously aren't even trying now.