Friday, April 22, 2016

FIF#9-Sailor Moon Crystal Season 3


Usagi Tsukino’s life couldn’t be better.  Despite bickering with her daughter from the future, Chibi Usa, she enjoys her romantic life with Mamoru and she still has her four best friends, the Sailor Senshi.  But peace rarely lasts long.  A new threat has emerged, one whose energy surrounds a famous academy.  More than that, two mysterious new Senshi have appeared as well.  As Sailor Moon and her friends return to battle, many questions arise.  Who are the Death Busters?  Are these new Senshi friends or foes and why is an old ally siding with them?  And what about this mysterious, sickly girl Chibi Usa is befriending?  The world needs Sailor Moon more than ever.  But if it is to really survive, it’s going to need more than five guardians…it will need an entire galaxy of Senshi.

We’re three episodes into this new season of Sailor Moon Crystal and I have to say, I’m loving this more than I ever did during the whole of the first two seasons.  When Sailor Moon Crystal debuted a couple of years ago, there was a lot of understandable hype behind it.  Sailor Moon was finding new life with new animation for a new generation of Anime fans much like it’s beloved brother Dragon Ball Z.  However, the series was too serious, too CG in the transformation sequences, and lacking much of what made Sailor Moon great.  I still watched it all, it took a while, but even I had to admit something was out of place and I couldn’t figure out what.

Enter Season 3, where mistakes are rectified within minutes.  To see blown up and funny reactions on Usagi’s face again made me nod and go, “Yes.”  To see her bickering with Chibi Usa about Mamoru, “Yes.”  To see the Senshi actually hold their own just fine and even finish a monster off without Sailor Moon’s help, “YES!!!”  The studio has clearly heard all of the criticism surrounding the first two seasons and is working to make things better.  The Senshi all have personality and screen time again rather than everything being mostly Usagi centered.  The animation lacks any bit of CG.  The changes might seem minor, but you can tell it’s a far cry from the previous episodes in a very good way.

One major reason to make sure this season is amended is because we’re finally getting to two beloved characters.  Yes, Sailor Uranus and Neptune make their debuts in season three.  And no they are not kissing cousins this time (not that they ever were in the Japanese dub, that was just dumb American dubbing bs).  At this point, they haven’t done too much or joined any battles (which Im ok with cause we get to see the Senshi hold their own in battle).  Haruka and Michuru are enjoying being cryptic with their warnings to the Senshi.  Haruka in particular is having fun toying with Usagi.  I don’t think it’s any secret that Sailor Pluto will be arriving soon and I cant wait to see these two fan favorites come out of the shadows and get in on the action. 

The story is slow building (as I said, Uranus and Neptune haven’t done much besides hide in the shadows and smirk).  And, ugh, im a fan of the transformations…but really they take up three minutes of run time when you do full group transformations and then the episode is suddenly over…im not ok with that.  Otherwise, Season Three is off to a good start.  The most recent episode even had Sailor Mars and Jupiter at the forefront of things (and any attempt to give my Waifu, Mars, more center screentime is always ok with me).  This season is going to be all about going back to the roots of Sailor Moon and recapturing the love of the fans properly.  It’s almost enough to make a fan wish that the studio would just redo Season One and Two in this same fashion.  The Pretty Guardians in Sailor Suits are back…and they have never been better. 

Hell yes, I’m gonna keep watching.

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