17 - Usagi's a Model: The Flash of the Monster Camera

It's time for Usagi's favorite class - lunch. But while she's eating, the trio consisting of Naru, sort-of-chubby nameless girl and unremarkable nameless girl, last seen in episode four, has reassembled. They're admiring some photographs of trees and houses and so on. Remember when you were fourteen and you and all your friends were really into landscape photography? Of course you do! It turns out that the photographs are by Kijin Shinokawa, a young prodigy and the a student at a neighboring middle school. Now Usagi's interested, realizing there's a celebrity in their midst. She tries to rope Ami into finding the boy and getting his autograph, but Ami is studying, and altogether less inclined to fling herself into the latest passing fad.

Later, we see Kijin outside his school, getting pestered by reporters. Kijin's hair is... interesting.

That's not a lighting effect, by the way. His hair is actually two colors. I don't know why. Maybe because he's an artist, and you know what those artists are like, right? Eccentric. Anyway, being bugged by the press doesn't generally bode well for people in this show, but first he has to contend with autograph hunters. Usagi, Naru and sort-of-chubby girl come around the corner, hoping to meet their new celebrity idol, but their path is blocked by... Rei? Rei tells Usagi to stop being such a fangirl: she had no interest in photography up until now and can hardly claim to understand Kijin's work. A fight then breaks out between the two of them that Kijin himself has to intervene in.

That evening, Kijin is on a cliff edge, taking photographs of the bay. He slips and almost goes skidding down the rock face, but he's rescued by... Masato Sanjoin, millionaire playboy and rock climber! Sanjoin wishes Kijin good luck with his photography career, but not before making sure to implant a Youma essence in his camera. We then see Nephrite in his creepy cathedral of solitude, where the stars have chosen Kijin as the next target. Apparently he will be overcome with the urge to photograph girls! A fourteen year old boy with a sudden interest in looking at girls? Now I know something weird and creepy is going on.

Sure enough, Kijin goes all crazy and possessed, and decides what he really wants to do is photograph girls. A few days later, Usagi reads that Kijin is looking for models to photograph, and decides she should try out. Luna comes over with a new item for her.

It's ready? Up until now, Luna's just used the item creation dance every time the plot has required a new object. But this implies that this item took some time. Yes, I am imagining Luna in a miniature electronics lab with a tiny soldering iron, painstakingly manufacturing lunar technology. Don't judge me. It's a far nicer image than the other fan theory, that the cats poop out items when needed.

Anyway, the communicators. I forgot about these. While I think Mercury's little supercomputer still looks like it could be a stylish piece of technology today, the communicators... well, they have all the aesthetic appeal of a cheap knock-off Tiger Electronics LCD game from the eighties. They admittedly have full color graphics, albeit on a ridiculously tiny screen. Usagi uses hers to call Ami about her new-found ambition to become a model, but Ami tells her the communicators should be used for emergencies only. She considers calling Rei instead, but... well, if even Ami told her off, Rei's response doesn't bear thinking about. So instead, Usagi turns to the love and support of her family.

Only joking! Shingo mocks her ambitions and says she'd be rejected straight away. Usagi calls upon her mom for backup, which as usual turns out to be a mistake.

What is wrong with this family? Fortunately there's one person guaranteed to be nice to Usagi, and that's Motoki. He tells her that taking on new challenges is important. Mamoru is there too, however, to be the fly in the ointment, but he does at least have more to say on the matter than just insults. He thinks aiming to be a model is a fool's errand, as it's a kind heart and a desire to do what's right that make a girl beautiful. Which is, I have to admit, a genuinely good attitude, albeit one he must have acquired at some point after the time he ridiculed Usagi over her weight. Yeah, I haven't forgotten that, jerk.

After insinuating that Usagi lacks guts, Mamoru goes on to say that Kijin's sudden desire to photograph as many girls as possible suggests that he probably sucks as a photographer. Usagi leaves in a huff, and Motoki tells Mamoru he should stop treating her like a child. Mamoru says that whenever they meet he just can't resist the urge to argue.

Or maybe you're just a jerk?

Usagi certainly is up bright and early this fine morning. As Shingo correctly surmises, she's waiting for the mail. Once again, Shingo tells her she doesn't have a hope, but then the mailman comes, and Shingo has to eat his words, because Usagi got selected! Cue Usagi practicing her enunciation, balance, singing, and, er, hopping around her room like a rabbit. Models have been known to hop. She then remembers she has to bring a swimsuit, and fortunately she has one right... er...

Well, crap.

On the day of the shoot, a large number of girls have been invited, and Kijin is extra-crazy, barking orders at the girls and warning them not to look in on the other shoots. Because that would mess up his creative process or something, obviously. Not because anything evil will be happening. Usagi's here too, and Luna thinks something weird is happening... because Kijin's behavior has changed so drastically, and also because there's no way Usagi would be selected as a model. That's our Luna, supportive as ever. It does seem that Naru and Haruna have been selected as well, and well, maybe Usagi's teacher being selected as a model really is evidence that Kijin's criteria are a bit weird. In the dressing room, Naru wants to see Usagi's swimsuit. Yeah, how did that problem end up getting resolved, anyway?

Oh, Usagi, you... can be kind of a genius when the situation calls for it. Luna, meanwhile, has got bored and goes to check out the photo shoot, only to discover that Kijin's evil isn't just making him crazy: his camera now causes the models he photographs to disappear.

Luna returns to the dressing room and tells Usagi what she saw. Usagi, preparing for her modeling debut, really doesn't want to know, but she's persuaded to call Ami when Luna threatens to reveal the terrible secret of her swimsuit. In the meantime, she still has her photo shoot, but when she goes to follow Naru and Haruna, Luna grabs one of the emergency ribbons from her swimsuit and runs off with it, forcing her to give chase.

Usagi finally chases Luna to the photo shoot, where Haruna and Naru are posing along with some other girls. Sure enough, when Kijin photographs them, they disappear. By the way, this episode uses some really nice visual effects: when the models disappear there are momentary black and white spots and lines, like distortions in old film. It just works so well.

Usagi confronts Kijin, borrowing Mamoru's earlier criticism that this new-found obsession makes him a third-rate photographer, in contrast to the prodigy he used to be. Kijin pushes her away, and so she transforms. Sailor Moon tells Kijin - or rather, the Youma controlling him - that a girl's true beauty is in her bravery and desire to do the right thing. This doesn't deter him, and he starts trying to photograph her, forcing her to dodge the beams fired by his camera. She succeeds in kicking the camera away into the pool, but Kijin collapses, his energy level having reached its peak. Then, from the pool, the Youma emerges.

This is another wonderfully creepy Youma. She has a third eye embedded in the palm of her hand; you can't beat that. The subs call her Kyameran, which is an accurate transliteration of her name, though it's intended to be a pun on "camera". Anyway, it seems she retains the powers of Kijin's camera, and anything photographed by her hand-camera-eye-thing disappears and is trapped inside a polaroid. She first uses this power on Kijin, and when Sailor Moon tries to dodge her shots, Luna gets caught too. Sailor Moon's cornered, but Mars and Mercury arrive as backup.

Mercury casts Bubble Spray, and Mars tries to seal the Youma's powers with her ofuda, but Kyameran just deflects them, before trapping both Mars and Mercury in photographs. Sailor Moon's in a tough spot, but finding herself up against a mirror, she wonders what would happen if Kyameran took her own photograph. Let's find out!

Gaaaaaaah!

And then she starts to melt. Next time this show starts to seem juvenile, remember the time Sailor Moon took someone's eye out. Sailor Moon throws the tiara at Kyameran, and wow, I actually feel a bit sorry for this Youma. She burns up in blue flames, and the people trapped by the both her and the camera pop back into existence.

Nephrite's been hanging out in the cathedral of solitude a lot recently, and that means there's been nobody to ridicule him when he fails. Zoisite seeks to remedy that, appearing via hologram and mocking his rival, though Nephrite counters that Zoisite should focus on his own duties, and besides, there are plenty of other people on Earth with energy to take.

That night, while Usagi sleeps, the rest of their family watch a report about Kijin, who has decided to take a sabbatical. He says a wonderful young woman taught him that a kind heart and a desire to do what's right are what make a woman beautiful. Naturally, Usagi's family say how they wish Usagi could be like that woman and not such an idiot, because they're assholes determined to spoil the ending of this episode.

Monster of the day: Kyameran, you're so cool. But you just had to die/melt/catch fire/lose an eye.

Most valuable person: Usagi tackles this one pretty much solo, and demonstrates some real initiative, both in battle and emergency swimsuit repairs.

Least valuable person: While Shingo is the bigger jerk, this award actually goes to Usagi's mom for just merrily going along with whatever insult Shingo hurls her way. It's natural for siblings to be jerks to each other sometimes. It's also generally expected that parents will step in when things go to far. At this point I'm wondering if there's anything Shingo could say that would provoke some kind of rebuke from his mother.

For the most part, this episode is very good. A cool monster with interesting powers, a strong solo Usagi story where she's being carefree but not completely stupid, and even a few stabs at the misogyny of the modeling industry. Kazuko Tadano, the character designer for the anime, was the art director for this one, and as a result the characters are very expressive, with the great visual effects I mentioned earlier. Really, the only major criticism is that Usagi's family are way too mean to her. This episode gets four out of five stars, and an invitation to my next evil photo shoot.

Bonus feature! This episode's monster was pretty horrifying, but remember how scary episode 11's monster was when transforming? My good friend Crayola would like you to have nightmares, and so has provided me with the entire sequence in gif form. I've updated the review with the animations.

14 - A New Enemy Appears: Nephrite's Evil Crest

It's the famous tennis episode! Tennis puns! Navratilova reference! Tennis Youma who traps her enemies in giant tennis balls! This is an episode I've been looking forward to.

Sailor Mercury and Sailor Mars have finally been added to the opening exposition, as this is the beginning of a new arc. But before we meet them: Dark Kingdom politics!

Nephrite cements his place as Jadeite's replacement by explaining to Queen Beryl what a loser Jadeite was, with his loser plans to collect energy indiscriminately. Instead, Nephrite will base his energy-harvesting plans on the proven science of astrology (which... I mean, okay, this show was created by an astrology fan, so it might as well be a science in this universe). He will use the stars to target individuals whose energy is predicted to peak. The Powerpoint presentation is all going very well until a heckler appears. It's Zoisite, another one of Beryl's generals. He's amused by Nephrite's overconfidence, and predicts he'll come crawling back in disgrace.

Can I just take a moment to mention how much I love Zoisite? He doesn't even really do much in this episode apart from needling Nephrite, but he's so much fun. I suppose I'll get to talk about exactly why he's such a great character in later episodes, but for now, his mocking "Oh, you're scaring me" is enough to signal what an interesting addition to the cast he'll be. He's played by Keiichi Nanba, who also plays Umino, and really, what a versatile actor to be able to play both the subtlety-free comic relief nerd and a cunning, powerful, effeminate villain.

Veteran fans may recall that Zoisite was made into a woman for the original North American dub, because... well, look, it was the nineties, okay? Zoisite's one of the characters I'm most interested to hear in the new dub, partly because so much of his character is in the voice.

Anyway, sorry, I got sidetracked talking about Zoisite when this is Nephrite's big debut. Having mocked Nephrite, Zoisite disappears in a cloud of rose petals and scorn, and Beryl tells Nephrite to put his plan into action.

Back in Juban, a girl is being mobbed by reporters and cameramen. While she tries to evade them, a... thing happens. A huge forest appears in the distance, and in the forest is a creepy old... church, I guess, which is now Nephrite's base of operations. Nephrite does his astrology thing, calling on the power of the stars to aid him. The target he chooses is a young tennis player called Rui Saionji.

Rui (who is also the girl the reporters were bothering earlier) is playing a match, and Usagi and Naru are watching. Naru calls Rui "sis", which leads to some confusion, but as it turns out, Naru and Rui aren't related, but grew up together, with Rui acting as an older sister figure.

Nephrite... is clearly showing off now.

Not only does he have his own private evil forest for astrology and brooding, he's crafted a human identity as a super-rich playboy with a sports car. He somersaults over the fence and onto the tennis court and proceeds to bark advice at Rui, before returning her serve with supernatural power. He introduces himself as Masato Sanjoin, and returns her racket, but not before implanting the essence of a Youma inside it. He again advises her to put more of her weight into her serve, but as soon as Rui takes the racket back, her eyes glaze over. A fanboy comes over to act as her next opponent, and she's suddenly able to serve with such force that the boy is knocked flying, and the ball ends up embedded in the ground. Rui goes to thank the mysterious stranger, but he's gone. So she works her way through one opponent after the other, beating them all easily. Usagi is impressed, but Naru thinks something's wrong.

Hey, remember Luna's contact that she can communicate with through the Sailor V game at the arcade? Well, she speaks with them again, and they have new information... at least, new from the perspective of our characters. She's told that the enemy they face is called the Dark Kingdom, and they're collecting human energy for some reason. Nothing revolutionary there, I guess, but it's a start.

Luna passes this information on to the girls. Rei's plan is to rush in and kick all of their asses, but Ami points out they're not at a level where they'd be able to do that yet. Usagi wants to train by playing tennis, because of this hot new guy who's apparently a tennis coach. Rei and Luna express exasperation with Usagi, Rei going so far as to say that Usagi being a Sailor Guardian might be some sort of mistake. Ami sticks up for Usagi, a bit, but passes on the offer of tennis as well.

But you know, maybe they're right to avoid tennis right now, because back at the tennis court, Rui has gone full-on evil, crushing her terrified opponents with glee.

Naru calls Usagi over to her place and explains how weird and hyper-competitive Rui has become, to the point of rejecting Naru when she expressed concern. Usagi offers to help figure out what's wrong with Rui, and the two go to the tennis school where she practices in the evenings. Usagi privately wonders if a Youma could be responsible for this, and then realizes that dealing with it by herself would show Rei and Luna how valuable she is. She stays in this fantasy for a bit too long...

...before she's brought back to reality by the cry of another one of Rui's opponents/victims. Now even the local tennis pros are terrified of her. Usagi and Naru intervene, allowing the guys to flee, but Rui reacts with fury, sending a blast of energy from her tennis racket that sends both girls flying. Nephrite, hidden somewhere, feels Rui's energy peaking, and the Youma implanted in her racket drains her energy, taking on humanoid form in the process. This Youma's name is Tesuni, and she looks downright bizarre.

Since Naru was conveniently knocked out, Usagi takes the opportunity to transform. She confronts Tesuni, chastising her for using tennis for evil ends. And then there's this.

That's Martina Navratilova, winner of 18 Grand Slams, LGBT icon, and famously anti-turning-people-into-psychopaths-then-draining-their-life-energy. Navratilova must have had quite a following in the nineties in Japan; Slayers even had a character named after her. I mean, they genuinely had a major character called Martina Navratilova.

Well, Tesuni responds by summoning a tennis racket made of fire and evil, and hits Sailor Moon with a weird ball of energy that envelops her and, uh, causes this to happen.

That's... almost certainly somebody's fetish. But not Sailor Moon's, as Tesuni proceeds to telekinetically bounce her around, which just looks... so... painful.

Ouch. This goes on for some time, until the Youma is - you guessed it - distracted by a rose. Tuxedo Mask confronts her, and she aims an energy ball at him, but the rules dictate that Tuxedo Mask must remain dashing at all times, so he dodges it. We haven't seen much in the way of real combat from Tuxedo Mask so far, but that changes here, as it turns out his cane can extend a really, really long way. He knocks Tesuni over, and the giant ball trapping Sailor Moon disappears. Sailor Moon is delighted to be fighting alongside Tuxedo Mask, but Tesuni ruins the mood by firing huge fireballs from her racket. Sailor Moon is almost hit, but Tuxedo Mask scoops her away in time, and she has a nice little moment of being close to him.

Tuxedo Mask hurls another rose, which hits the Youma in the face. He tells Sailor Moon to finish her off, but is suddenly stricken with some kind of seizure. Sailor Moon runs to help him, but he tells her again to attack the Youma. She does, hitting her with the tiara, and Sailor Mars, Sailor Mercury and Luna arrive just in time to see Tesuni turning into a cloud of dust. In the meantime, Tuxedo Mask has vanished.

Rui recovers, but can't remember anything that happened over the past few days. She and Naru go off to play a friendly match, and Usagi enjoys the pleasant mood until Naru hits her in a face with a ball. The end.

Monster of the Day: Tesuni is another one of those iconic Youma that a lot of people remember. While we've had a few "themed" Youma before, she's the first one to be tied to something very specific, which would pretty much become the norm for monsters in the future.

Most valuable person: This is an episode where Usagi pretty much solves the case by herself... though she does get a longer-than-usual assist from Tuxedo Mask. I'm still giving it to Usagi because nobody deserves to land face-first that many times without a break.

Least valuable person: Both Luna and Rei didn't do much in this episode besides pick on Usagi. I'm giving the award to Luna, because we also discover that after thirteen episodes she still needs someone else to tell her that the bad guys are collecting energy, despite this actually being stated in our heroes' presence more than once.

This is a memorable episode, and fun too. Since it's the beginning of a new arc, there's a lot going on. It's the start of the Dark Kingdom actually becoming interesting adversaries, as opposed to the "Jadeite tells stock footage of Queen Beryl what this week's plan is, then leaves" act we've had so far. I'm admittedly not a big fan of Nephrite, but Zoisite gets all the love.

In terms of the protagonists, this actually feels a bit like one of the really early episodes, as Ami and Rei barely show up and don't participate in the battle. Tuxedo Mask's strange seizure at the end of the battle is the first time he's seemed anything other than invincible (even when he was supposedly dead last episode, we only had Jadeite's word for it). It's an interesting signal of things to come. This episode gets four stars out of five: Navratilova would be pleased (probably).

12 - I Want a Boyfriend: The Luxury Cruise Ship Trap

This episode's title doth protest too much. Naturally, the most lesbian-subtext-laden episode so far is the one with "I Want a Boyfriend" in the name. More on that later.

We open with Jadeite watching a replay of one of his defeats and looking frustrated. A woman appears from a sudden burst of water, and starts flirting with him. She's a Youma called... well, fandom has forever been split over whether her name should be Thetis or Tethys, and Viz gives us... Tetiz. Eh, fair enough. Anyway, Tetris here is a Youma who works directly under Queen Beryl, and her aim is to get into Jadeite's pants. Jadeite isn't interested... and, you know, maybe he has a point. I mean, she's in her human-like form now, but in their true forms, most of the Youma we've seen so far have been giant lizards or walking corpses or evil mechanical dolls. Hell, one of the more attractive Youma we've seen so far was a green bat woman with chest fur. It makes sense that Jadeite isn't looking to form romantic relationships with women whose main purpose is to scare the crap out of viewers, but this Youma has a proposition to make. She has an awesome plan to collect human energy that's guaranteed to get Jadeite back in Beryl's good books, or at the very least out of her "marked for death" books. She calls it... Operation Romantic Cruise.

Oh, there's just a little thing here that I find unintentionally hilarious. After Tetiz says the name of the operation, her eyes get all glowy and her powers flare up, then we hear a ship's horn. It's actually a transition to the next scene, where we see the ship making the noise, but for a split-second it's just Tetiz on screen, powering up, and the sound of a horn, and it's like... is she generating that sound somehow? Is she going to turn into a ship? Is that her true form? Anyway...

Usagi sees a romantic cruise in Tokyo Bay advertised on TV, and wants to go on it. At school, she and Naru look at a print ad for the cruise. Umino comes over and reads some copy from the ad, including that the ship can carry 666 passengers (which is in no way suspicious). Though he has a little fantasy of himself and Usagi on the cruise, it turns out he did actually have tickets... but he gave them away because, well, it's past his bedtime. He says that the local lottery is giving away tickets as prizes, though, and on hearing this, Usagi makes her way calmly to the exit.

Unfortunately, the problem with lotteries is that they suck. Usagi tries and tries, but all she has to show for her efforts is an increasingly large collection of tissues given as consolation prizes. Dejected, she sees Rei passing by and complains about her bad luck. Rei says they don't have the time to waste on things like this... then immediately walks up and tries the lottery herself. Then she proceeds to cheat with her psychic powers. By the way, the background characters in this episode look bizarre.

Rei wins the grand prize - two tickets for the cruise - because as unfair as lotteries are, they're not psychic-proof. Usagi, once she's recovered from hypocrisy-whiplash, proposes that Rei should take her along with her spare ticket. Rei says you're supposed to take a boyfriend... but, well, it's not like either of them have one of those. Then Ami shows up, and Rei quickly takes her aside.

Rei asks Ami to go on the cruise with her. I mean, practically begs her. Rei is so much fun in this episode, saying one thing and immediately doing the exact opposite. She says that she intends to find a boyfriend while on the cruise, sure, but don't recalibrate your yuri detectors just yet. Rei has tickets for a romantic cruise, and the plot hinges on which of her female friends she wants to take with her. You can take the talk of finding boyfriends at face value if you want, but this episode is just swimming in lesbian subtext. Even though the show introduces openly lesbian characters later on, this is the episode that a lot of people - including Erica Friedman, benevolent overlord of western yuri fandom - point to as the one where they first picked up on all that subtext.

So, back to the episode. Usagi overhears Rei and Ami agreeing to go on the cruise together, and resolves to get on that cruise no matter what. And how will she manage this without a ticket? Well, for times like this, she has the Disguise Pen! Over Luna's objections, she disguises herself as a photographer. Usagi with short hair is adorable.

Usagi stuffs Luna into her camera case and gets on the ship. Of course, Jadeite is disguised as the captain. Apparently he can change his hair and skin color, which does raise the question of why he never bothered in previous episodes and instead just wore a pair of sunglasses or something. Anyway, the ship is actually a rusted wreck that Tetiz transformed with her magic, and she tells Jadeite that that's not all her magic can do. Wink wink. If you know what I mean. Jadeite ignores her and instead looks forward to stealing the energy of all of the couples on board.

Speaking of couples, Rei and Ami notice they're the only girls who came without guys. Since everyone else here is part of a couple, it doesn't look like they'll be finding any single dudes here.

Usagi's having better luck, though. While poking around the suspiciously-quiet engine room, she meets a nice, single man: the captain! She says she got separated from her crew, and she's sure a hot guy like him would be able to help her out, right?

Luna immediately senses something evil about the captain, but she's in the box and can't communicate with Usagi. The contrast between Usagi and Jadeite's reactions in this scene is really telling.

Now, you could interpret this as a joke about Usagi's obliviousness in the face of evil, but the important thing here, I think, is Jadeite's reaction. Back when he first encountered Sailor Moon in episode three, he seemed so much more powerful than she was. Now, just being close to her freaks him out, while he isn't even a blip on her radar. One of the people in this scene is way more threatening than the other. Meanwhile, Rei wonders if she and Ami might be able to find guys if they just wait for some of the couples on the ship to fight and break up. Guys who'll hook up with you moments after being dumped by someone else are always top-tier, right?

Usagi is still hanging off Jadeite's arm and scaring the crap out of him for reasons he can't comprehend. He finally gets away from her when Tetiz shows up and needs him for important evil business. Luna finally gets the chance to tell Usagi that the ship is full of evil energy. They spy on Jadeite and Tetiz, who are discussing their plan, but can't hear what they're saying. Usagi has doubts that someone so attractive could be their enemy, but when Jadeite and Tetiz both disappear, she resolves to investigate.

In the dining room, Rei is channeling all of her frustrations into eating as much food as possible, embarrassing Ami. Who'd have thought that out of all our characters, Rei would be the most embarrassing date?

Then Tetiz makes an announcement about a show in the reception hall, and Ami is only too glad to get away. Rei and Ami join the crowds waiting for the show, and Jadeite and Tetiz appear on the stage. Tetiz welcomes them to the most romantic show in the world, and reveals her true form.

You know what, Jadeite? Maybe you should give her a chance. If you reject every woman you meet just because she's covered in blades or doesn't have a face, you'll be single forever.

Tetiz starts to drain the energy from the couples using the mirror ball on the ceiling: based on this and episode seven, I'm just going to assume those things are evil from now on. Everyone collapses except for Rei and Ami, because they didn't bring guys, and I guess the mirror ball was calibrated to hetero couples only?

How rude! Tetiz sends the crew - actually water monsters - after Rei and Ami, and though they fight some of them off, they can't transform in public view. Tetiz points out that these girls aside, they've succeeded in taking a large amount of human energy, and Queen Beryl is bound to be pleased, just as long as nobody comes in and ruins everything in the last few minutes. Outside the reception hall, Usagi transforms into Sailor Moon.

Sailor Moon bursts in and tells off Jadeite and Tetiz for being so inconsiderate as to not steal energy from everyone: what about those girls over there without boyfriends? Tetiz charges Sailor Moon and they end up on the deck of the ship, where Tetiz summons and controls torrents of seawater, aiming them at Sailor Moon. Inside, now that they've had a chance to transform, Sailor Mars and Sailor Mercury deal with the water monsters, and prepare for some sweet revenge.

I've seen the "Damn right!" mentioned in a few places, and yeah, it's not a direct translation, but it really captures the mood, which has been a persistent feature of these subs.

Mars and Mercury come to assist Sailor Moon, and together they're able to wipe out Tetiz. Jadeite confronts them, observing that they're much stronger than they used to be, and they prepare to battle. Jadeite summons a ball of dark energy and... is abruptly teleported away.

Oh boy, Queen Beryl is pissed. On top of his previous failures, Jadeite just let one of her Youma get killed. It's not looking good for him right now.

With Tetiz gone, her magic fades. The passengers wake up to find themselves adrift in Tokyo Bay in a rusty derelict, with rescue ships surrounding them. And then... well, once again, the ending is a bit weak, with all of the characters reverting to their archetypes: Usagi and Rei squabble, Luna gets exasperated and Ami talks about studying. But since Usagi doesn't cry or fall over, it's forgivable.

Monster of the day: Tetiz gets more development than any other monster I can think of, really. She's strong, smart, and really her only flaw is the persistent desire to bone Jadeite that ends up getting her killed.

Most valuable person: Everyone was on fine form, and it's hard to pick a winner. Let's give it to Usagi for freaking out Jadeite so badly, even when posing as a regular person.

Least valuable person: Again, tricky. Nobody really annoyed me here. Jadeite gets it by default for being a bit pathetic and acting kind of dickish towards Tetiz, while proving to be a lot less competent than her in everything other than not-getting-killed.

I like this episode a lot. The characters are funny, the plot is interesting, and we even get a monster of the day with some depth. The lesbian subtext has plenty of "but we really want boyfriends" plausible deniability, but it's there. It's all kind of Class S - an older genre of Japanese fiction where girls crush on girls as a rite of passage before getting on with the important business of being attracted to men. These days, some elements of Class S can seem pretty iffy, as it carries the implication that lesbian attractions are a phase to be grown out of, but in its day it was pretty subversive, as it served as a means to acknowledge and celebrate same-sex attraction without falling foul of censors (though the genre was banned by the Japanese government in the 1930s). Maria-sama ga Miteru is an example of a modern Class S series, and in keeping with more modern attitudes, it has at least one canon lesbian among the many schoolgirl crushes. Sailor Moon would go on to be groundbreaking in its portrayal of lesbian characters, and this feels like a first, nervous step in that direction.

All in all, this episode ranks amongst the most memorable of early Sailor Moon, and earns itself a solid four stars out of five.

Oh, and I don't usually comment on the next episode trailers, but thank you, Viz for doing a better job translating the next episode's title than ADV did.

11 - Usagi vs. Rei: Nightmare in Dream Land

Last week's episodes weren't so great, eh? Never mind, because things start to improve for a bit starting with this latest episode.

The team are at Rei's shrine, where Luna is trying to conduct a meeting, but Usagi and Ami are more preoccupied with going through Rei's stuff. Ami's reading her encyclopedias while Usagi's reading her manga. By the way, this episode subtly kicks off the running theme that Rei is a bit of a closet nerd. It's never a huge thing, but it's always there, just another little element of her character.

Luna gets frustrated that nobody's listening to her lecture about how they need to find the moon princess. But as Usagi and Rei point out, they don't know how to find her, and Luna hasn't exactly been forthcoming with a description. Ami helps Luna save face by changing the subject and suggesting they focus on their other mission: dealing with these monsters that have been showing up recently. She points out a recent incident at the nearby amusement park, Dream Land, where fifty visitors apparently disappeared. Fortunately for us, there was no mention of flying buses in the vicinity.

This is the first episode with Masahiro Ando as art director. He has the infamous round-faced style, and a lot of fans aren't keen. For me, it really depends on the episode. The style is jarring in more serious episodes, but frankly, it sort of works in more whimsical episodes like this one.

But it's not all fun and games: in the Dark Kingdom, Jadeite is getting a right old bollocking for having screwed up another plan, and letting yet another Sailor Guardian show up. Beryl is now openly threatening him, and he nervously insists that he has another energy-gathering plan in place; a really, really good one this time.

The gang visit Dream Land, where Jadeite is posing as the park's PR guy and taking questions from reporters. Well, kind of: he insists the park has nothing to do with the disappearances, then ejects the press from the building. Literally ejects them.

Jadeite might have his failings as an evil general, but he's definitely someone you'd want on your side at a press conference.

Ami and Rei debate what could have happened to the visitors who disappeared, then realize they've lost Usagi somewhere. Usagi, of course, is trying out the rides. One scolding from Luna later, I'm reminded why I sometimes like Ando's art style: you get priceless scenes like this.

It's the combination of Rei's pose and Ami's expression that makes it perfect, I think. And it's quickly followed by this...

Which is Usagi's response to a friggin' lion showing up in front of them. Well, it turns out that the lion is animatronic, and is one of many animatronic animals operated by the park's mascot, Princess Dream. Because what amusement park experience isn't enhanced by realistic apex predators wandering the grounds? Princess Dream demonstrates how she can control the park's animals using a weird apple she carries around with her. Man, I knew those Disney princesses had to have a secret. I'm onto you, Snow White.

Rei is thoroughly creeped out by Princess Dream, and thinks something's up. Usagi is unconvinced. Come on, Usagi, listen to the psychic girl. Princess Dream further ingratiates herself with Usagi by inviting her to a show at the House of Sweets. The House of Sweets? That's like Usagi's heaven. The only way it could be better is if it was called the House of Sweets, Hot Guys and No Homework.

We get a closeup of the House of Sweets, but... hey, isn't that the Dark Kingdom music playing? Yep, Jadeite is inside, surrounded by unconscious bodies, talking about how he intends to lure the Sailor Guardians inside. Which does at least show that the Dark Kingdom have finally started gathering intel on their enemies. Their data for Sailor Moon probably consists of "likes sweets".

Our heroes search the park for suspicious activity, but aren't finding anything, so Luna decides they'll split up. She'll go with Ami, who's the least likely to call her out on having no idea what she's doing, which means Usagi and Rei are stuck with each other. They investigate Princess Dream again. Rei is still suspicious of her, and unnerved by the crowd of children forming around her and her fake animals. She tries to get a small boy away from her, but Usagi insists that it's fine, and this dispute can only escalate into one thing...

Childhood trauma. One day years from now this kid will be telling a therapist about the time two amazingly strong women tried to pull his legs off.

Usagi and Rei switch to patrolling the park... on a tiny train driven by a panda. The train stops suddenly, and Usagi collides with the guy in front, who is... Mamoru! Mamoru tells Usagi off as usual, and Rei, who's spent the last few hours being massively irritated by Usagi, hits it off with him. Well, after so many episodes being on the receiving end of Mamoru's inexplicable ire, Usagi tells him off, pointing out that a grown man riding the kiddie train isn't in a position to be judging others.

It's really great to see Usagi giving as good as she gets. This is probably my favorite scene in the episode. Rei thinks Mamoru looks like Tuxedo Mask, while Usagi is unimpressed with the comparison.

Usagi and Rei meet up with Luna outside the House of Sweets. Rei senses evil, and Ami has already gone in. Inside, Princess Dream shows up and breathes a strange hypnotic gas on the crowd, causing them to fall into a dream-like state. She then uses her apple to start absorbing their energy. Ami is aware of what's happening, but also starts to succumb to the energy draining.

Outside, Rei senses that something really bad has happened. The doors are locked, and Usagi starts to freak out that Ami's trapped. There's a little bit between her and Rei where Rei insists that just because she's acting calm, it doesn't mean she isn't concerned. They both transform, and Sailor Mars blows the doors off with Fire Soul. Jadeite senses them as they enter: he intended to lure them in here.

Sailor Moon, Sailor Mars and Luna encounter Princess Dream, who starts working her illusion magic on them. She hands Sailor Moon a garland of flowers, and as Sailor Mars tries to knock it away, it turns into a snake. Mars gets bitten and her arm starts turning to stone. Again, Mars doesn't freak out, but uses an ofuda to expel the evil influence, freeing her. Then she demands Princess Dream show her true form.

Rei, why did you have to ask her that?

Oh god oh god oh god

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagh!

Thanks to my friend Crayola for providing these gifs; still images just don't do this scene justice. The spinning and the mechanical sound effects and the creepy, creepy music box music just makes this an amazingly scary sequence. Evil dolls are pretty much guaranteed to be scary, but they really nailed this scene. Brrrr.

So, the Youma's name is Moorido. That's a slightly different translation than I'd been expecting, but no matter. In Japanese, her name is an anagram of "dream", but that kind of thing just can't be reproduced in English. You'll be pleased to know that in addition to her freaky appearance, Moorido also speaks in a weird, faux-childlike falsetto.

She sprays more of the hallucinogenic gas their way. Sailor Moon resolves not to fall for another illusion, but the illusion this time is Tuxedo Mask. And both Sailor Moon and Sailor Mars fall for it. Completely.

In their defense, who wouldn't want a man with his own horse? While I'd usually be inclined to criticize the episode for having the characters act like idiots, I think this slightly balances out the running theme of Sailor Mars being way more competent than Sailor Moon: sometimes, Mars can be a huge dork too.

Fortunately, the real Tuxedo Mask shows up just long enough to knock Moorido's apple out of her grasp, disrupting the illusion. Sailor Moon and Sailor Mars look kind of embarrassed, then run for it when the Youma prepares to work the same magic on them again. They meet up with Ami, who's fared better than the room full of unconscious visitors, but is still weakened. She tells them that the source of the Youma's energy-draining power is the apple, and then transforms into Sailor Mercury.

Mercury casts Bubble Spray, leaving the Youma unable to see her surroundings. Mars descends on her with a frankly unnecessary panty shot, and attaches an ofuda to her head, freezing her in place. Then Sailor Moon and Sailor Mars deliver a combined Moon Tiara Action/Fire Soul, turning the Youma to dust. Jadeite watches his plan evaporate and swears revenge, but he's sweating a lot more now that he used to. And... did the whole building just turn to dust? Hmm.

I guess the rest of the park is non-evil, though, because the girls are walking through it afterwards and it looks fine. Then I guess nobody could think of an ending for this episode, because after squabbling with Rei a bit, Usagi falls over. Oh well.

Monster of the day: Moorido. Evil appearance, evil voice, evil transformation. She has some kind of dream-inducing illusion magic. She makes snakes that turn people to stone. She's bad news.

Most valuable person: As the title says, it's Usagi versus Rei! Rei wins, showing she's really on top of things, even if she was a bit mean to Usagi and capable of screwing up herself on occasion.

Least valuable person: It's tempting to go with Usagi, as the episode ramped up her stupidity and childishness, though not nearly as much as the last episode did. I'm going with Mamoru instead, though, because while did get called out on it, his sole purpose this episode was to do his usual being-a-jerk routine.

This episode is a mixed bag, though a bag containing mostly good things. A lot of the interplay between Usagi and Rei is fun, there's some good comedy, and the Youma is scary as balls. On the other hand... Usagi plays it a bit too dumb at times, and I really hate that lazy, lazy ending. This episode is a pretty solid three stars out of five: not amazing, but certainly entertaining.

9 - Usagi's Disaster: Beware of the Clock of Confusion

"I'll bet even the cuckoo in the cuckoo clock is angry!" Sailor Moon has the best fighting talk of anyone ever. What did those cuckoos ever do to you, Dark Kingdom?

Queen Beryl isn't impressed that there's now a second Sailor Guardian running around and ruining their energy-harvesting schemes. That's like the opposite of progress. Jadeite pacifies her with talk of a plan to make people panicked and impatient, then taking that heightened energy. Beryl likes it so much, she does her Captain Picard impression.

Jadeite had better hope he's Will Riker and not Tasha Yar.

By the way, the art in this episode is... not that great. Sailor Moon had a lot of different art directors over the years, and some of them were less good at keeping characters on model than others. Two in particular are notable for having a style that deviated quite a bit from the standard: Masahiro Ando, and Taichi Nakamura (credited during the first season as Akira Nakamura), who was responsible for this episode. Ando's style is probably the most recognizable; his characters are chubby-looking with rounder faces, and he probably gets the most flak from fans. Personally, I think Nakamura is worse: his characters have large chins and look extremely flat, and his attempts at perspective resulted in some of the worst art in the entire series. Art isn't something that's going to impact review scores much, but it is something worth pointing out.

We catch up with Usagi and Ami, our temporarily oddly-drawn protagonists, on a shopping trip. Ami's lived a very sheltered life... to the extent that she's never been shopping before? Well, not in a consumerist utopia like this, anyway. What follows is a shopping montage, and... well, even though I just decided not to dwell on the art too much, the fact that they decided not to fully animate this section, combined with the dodgy art, makes it... kind of... sucky.

Okay, no more complaining about the art, I promise. Usagi and Ami notice a clock store having a huge sale. The saleswoman is creepy, and we all know what that means, but Usagi and Ami don't notice. Usagi sees a clock that looks a bit like Luna, and goes to buy it in the hopes of one day getting to school on time, but can't because she's broke. I do like how irritated saleswoman-who-is-blatantly-a-Youma looks during this part.

Ami cheers Usagi up by promising to call for her on her way to school. But when Usagi returns home, it turns out her mom also visited the store and bought some clocks. She got the Luna-like clock for Usagi, though Luna is kind of offended that they see a resemblance.

Personally I see this as justified retribution for that offensive caricature Luna drew of Usagi in episode four. Who's giving who body image issues now?

Anyway, Luna's misgivings that the clock looks sinister are vindicated when it starts emitting a weird light in the middle of the night, along with other clocks in the house. In the morning, Ami arrives to pick Usagi up, but is surprised to hear that she already left for school. Shingo left even earlier, dad sprints past, and mom quickly excuses herself because she has so much to do.

At school, it's chaos. Usagi, Naru, Umino and a few other students have shown up early, as has Haruna, who's getting impatient waiting for the rest. Usagi's already eaten her lunch (though that could just be Usagi being Usagi). Naru wants to find the other students and drag them to class herself. Everyone's going crazy, though Haruna has at least found a way to benefit from the situation.

Haruna leaves for an early morning date, and her students leave too. Ami heads to school, confused by the chaos around her, but there's an even more confusing sight in store for her...

What the... Why... Okay, I get that Luna, being a cat, might not be dextrous enough to carry the clock, and I guess the plot demanded she get it to Ami somehow. But you know what's a lot harder for a cat than carrying a small clock? Securely tying a small clock to its own body. Just look at this picture. It's ridiculous and lazy. Yeah, how would Luna transport something she couldn't pick up? I don't know, it's a challenge for a writer. Be creative! Come up with something... better than this. Better than a cat with a clock strapped to its torso. She looks like a cat suicide bomber.

Luna wants Ami to analyze the clock, and once it's been removed she's able to do the item-summoning dance. She gives Ami a supercomputer to help with the analysis, saying it would be too much for Usagi. Um... the computer clearly isn't meant for Usagi, seeing as it has the symbol of Mercury all over it, so it comes off as Luna just taking another opportunity to call Usagi dumb.

On a positive note, though, I really like the supercomputer. It's a sci-fi-ish computer in a show from over twenty years ago, and it doesn't seem dated. In an era when actual supercomputers took up entire rooms and even cellphones were big enough to club someone to death with, they came up with this powerful palm-sized computer that seems like it would be a cool thing to own even today.

It turns out Ami doesn't really need the supercomputer to analyze the clock, though. She opens it up and a pulse of energy shoots out, but otherwise the clock is empty, with no mechanism. Luna theorizes that the clock store is to blame, and everyone who owns one of their clocks is being affected.

Meanwhile, the mass impatience is causing people to ignore traffic lights, leading to a huge pile-up, though apparently we're to believe that the worst injury was some guy cutting his finger. Also, this guy decides he's going to be late for his flight.

Okay, that's pretty funny. Jadeite oversees the harvesting of energy from the frenzied population. The energy is apparently being collected by a giant clock in the clock store. We also get to see the Youma's true form. What is it with characters from this show looking like musicians from the eighties? Meanwhile, with Usagi...

Things aren't going so well. Ami and Luna haven't been able to contact her and wonder if they should try dealing with this themselves, but Usagi soon emerges unscathed from a nearby bus crash. I swear, the damage caused in this one episode has to be greater than all of the previous episodes combined. Ami and Luna tell Usagi what's going on, and Usagi is keen to help... but is still being affected by the impatience-magic and so decides the best tactic is just to storm into the clock store from the front. At least she takes the time to transform first, and I do like that they recorded a different, faster version of her transformation phrase for this episode.

Sailor Moon and Sailor Mercury head through a smoking hole in the storefront left by Moon Tiara Action, but the hole seals itself up before Luna can get inside. They confront the Youma, and pose like they're a Conan the Barbarian cover.

 

Only with more clothes and fewer corpses. The Youma activates the giant clock, which creates a weird energy field that she escapes into. Sailor Moon and Sailor Mercury follow her in. By the way, when the clock starts up, it's... upside down. At first I wondered if it was like that deliberately, but nope, in all of the other shots, it's a regular clock. It's just an animation error. That's another thing that bugs me about Nakamura's art: a lack of attention to detail. Yeah, I lied when I said I wasn't going to complain about the art anymore. Most of the art screw-ups of this nature that I can think of are in his episodes.

Our heroes emerge in Salvador Dali's Persistence of Memory Experience, a weird dimension filled with clocks, because... time. The unseen Youma taunts them, Sailor Moon rushes off to find her, and Mercury switches on her visor and follows. They don't really explain it at this point but the visor comes with the supercomputer, and it's pretty cool. So they end up in another room made of screentone, and Mercury advises Sailor Moon to wait until she's analyzed her surroundings. She takes out her computer, so now she's looking at a screen through another screen, which might sound like overkill to you, but this is Mercury. Also, there are some Robocop references in the on-screen text. So while Mercury is investigating, Sailor Moon wanders off and gets de-aged, until Mercury pulls her back, reversing the process, and warns her than wandering around in a dimension created by a time monster isn't a good idea. Then we get to see Usagi's daydream of what else the dimension could do to her...

Which is disturbing, sure, but I'll still take it over the manga's obsession with showing people melting away into skeletons repeatedly.

Meanwhile! Tuxedo mask enters an empty building, and seems confused. Then it's back to our protagonists, and after an even more blatant Robocop reference, Sailor Mercury figures out where they need to go. They head off in that direction and do indeed find the Youma there, but there's a problem. Sailor Moon's still under the influence of her clock, and is suddenly weakened as her energy is drained away. The Youma then stops time around Sailor Mercury, except not really, because she's still aware and can move a bit, so it's more like she just paralyzed her. Like most of the 'time' effects in this episode, it doesn't actually make sense if you stop to think about it.

Tuxedo Mask is in the clock store, standing in front of the giant clock. Then he seems to notice something, and throws a rose at the giant clock, cracking its face (which is upside down for a second time, gah). This part just seems to come completely out of nowhere. How did he know what to do? What was he suddenly noticing? Having seen the whole show before, I'm pretty sure I know what they were intending with this scene, but the first time I saw it, it confused me. And not in a "they've set up a cool mystery here" way, but in a "huh?" way.

But however Tuxedo Mask knew what to do, it worked, as the stored energy is now released. Sailor Mercury can move again, and casts Bubble Spray. Sailor Moon, her energy now restored, aims her tiara at the gleaming Youma eyes visible through the mist, and kills the Youma. The entire store just disappears around them, leaving them standing in the street.

So, er, that's that, really. There's a tacked-on final scene where Naru runs up and tells Usagi that some cake store is having a competition for the fastest eater. Usagi runs after her and falls over, because the episode is just that lazy. I swear, Usagi falling over is this show's equivalent of "character makes a weak joke, everyone laughs, fade out." If you can't think of an ending for your episode, have Usagi fall over.

Monster of the day: Ramua. Her weapon is a spear shaped like a clock hand, she looks like an eighties pop star crossed with a member of a Kiss tribute band, and she has power over time... sort of.

Most valuable person: Ami again, who takes charge and assists Usagi (who was being affected by the clock and thus not at her most rational) through the maze.

Least valuable person: Luna is back to her unnecessarily bitchy ways. Knock it off, Luna.

This episode isn't terrible, but there's just such a lack of imagination when it comes to the evil plot. A Youma that can manipulate time? That should be terrifyingly powerful. There's all kinds of cool stuff you could do with it. Instead we get a nondescript pocket dimension decorated with clocks and a few tricks that don't even really count as time manipulation. Time wasn't actually running backwards for Sailor Moon when she de-aged, and time didn't stop for Sailor Mercury. Even the main scheme, collecting energy from impatient people, didn't rely on time manipulation so much as manipulating people's perception of time. Add in all of the other things that seem to have been done out of sheer laziness - tying the clock to Luna, the tuxedo ex machina resolution to the fight, and that ending, and this is an episode that just doesn't even want to try. There are a few good bits - a lot of the chaos resulting from the clocks is entertaining, and Ami is written well - but overall this episode gets a disappointing two stars out of five.