What's next for the Sailor Moon franchise?

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Ale6

Luna Crescens
Jan 10, 2018
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#81
If she's a good actor, she should have an easy time to play a role like Usagi. Good actors have a wide range. My personal favourite example is Walter Koenig: in Star Trek TOS, he was an extremely insecure Navigator that constantly made up stories. In Babylon 5, however, he was a psi cop with strong Schutz Staffel qualities.
Ok I said she's not a bad actress, but I never said I find her particularly good either. I was shocked when I found out she played the mother in Room, she honestly did a great job.
Despite that, I think she's too agenda driven. Given the progressive nature of a show like Sailor Moon, the last thing I want from a live action reboot is for the actress playing her telling me how strong and good Sailor Moon is, instead of showing me. I just hate that.
 
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#82
I think if Sailor Stars went as originally planned and directed by Ikuhara along with the Galaxia being Chaos in the manga and the anime, I really see TOEI approving either Toon Makers Sailor Moon or Team Angel.
 

Nadia

Aurorae Lunares
Jun 30, 2010
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#83
With the Sailor Moon reboot anime coming to a close soon (assuming they adapt Stars), what do you think is next for the franchise?

They've re-released the manga like 3 times, blu ray sets are now complete of the OG anime, Crystal was an adaption of the Manga...will Sailor Moon just fade from existence besides basic merchandise? Will they just continue to re-release the manga? Perhaps re-adapt the 3 OG movies? Wait 10 or so years to do another anime adaption of the Dark Kingdom?
I think Sailor Moon is going to simply slowly fade away aside from the merch and possibly a few limited time events, with COVID-19 providing a convenient excuse to blame for the disappointing end to the "20th" anniversary push.

Sailor Moon, like most franchises, has always been a means to sell toys and merchandise. As long as it does that successfully, it justifies a re-investment of the funds to lure in a new generation to buy more toys and merchandise. If the funds start to dwindle, then those in charge evaluate whether or not it is worth it to produce new material to bring in more eyes, or to simply retire it and move on.

Building a franchise is hard. Sustaining a franchise is even harder.

The 20th anniversary, unlike the 10th anniversary, was very much for long-time older nostalgia fans. While there were licensing deals and such, aside from the re-releases overseas, there wasn't that much new. Instead they wanted to pull a FMA: Brotherhood by having an anime that more closely followed the manga, and decided to reboot the musicals. If the new anime was successful in bringing new eyes, then maybe more effort would be spend on new material. Unfortunately, it does not seem to be the case.

Because of this, those in charge probably made the decision. Some franchises do have an expiration date and cant be successfully revived. With the lackluster response to Sailor Moon Crystal, one has to wonder if it would be even worth it to try to draw in younger eyes. To do that, a new series has to be developed, and that will take money. The recent Sailor Moon movie releases, at least from what I can tell, haven't done so well (if I'm wrong, please feel free to correct me). Thus it's going to be hard to justify the development of new material beyond something like a musical or something domestic to Japan.

Unless Naoko Takeuchi sells off the rights to Sailor Moon, it will be nothing but a cash cow of minimal effort, which is understandable because the series is nearly 30 years old at this point. I think it could be revived, but the only way to revive it would be to retool it and have new material, both of which would provide more of an expense than a licensing deal that would sell more merch with less effort.
 
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#84
I think the ending of the Sailor Moon manga gives a chance for a sequel or a spin-off, in the same vein as Saintia Sho(Saint Seiya) or Eikouden(Fushigi Yuugi).
 

Seira Hazuki

Solaris Luna
Jan 17, 2007
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#85
@Guardian Princess Nadia I understand a lot of your points, but less successful anime series have rebooted multiple times despite a string of flops, underperforming titles. Cutie Honey is a great example and has way less name recognition than Sailor Moon, especially internationally. But it’s considered a classic, so it’s had multiple anime and live action versions for several decades.

I’m not pointing at you, but I think some Sailor Moon fans like to fetishize doom and gloom when they try to argue Crysternal is going to kill off any future anime. It won’t. The series will 100% be rebooted in the next ten or twenty years.
 

Memento

Stella Nova
Mar 8, 2012
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#86
I also think fans like to look at the manga faithfulness of this era and say that's proof that Naoko's too controlling and hates creativity or something. But...no? We know she's always been a huge fan of the musicals, and the musicals have always taken lots of liberties. Even the Nelke musicals, for all their comparative faithfulness to the manga, have taken a lot of liberties. The producers have even stated Naoko gave them permission to do whatever they wanted! Like... I think Naoko and Toei just wanted to do a close adaptation of the manga this time around, and the musicals decided to take that same general direction, but the idea that Naoko has some sort of agenda against future adaptations having more unique spins to them is just...not rooted in reality. Similarly, fans love to claim there'll never be a continuation of the manga because Naoko would never approve of someone else doing Sailor Moon manga, but...she approved of someone else writing novelizations of the manga. And we all know that she adores doujinshi and even bootleg goods, so does it really make sense she would never let someone else continue the manga? Maybe Kodansha has just never approached her with that idea. Maybe the right manga-ka hasn't come around yet. We have no idea why a continuation hasn't happened yet or may never happen, but, again, the idea that it's ~all Naoko's fault~ isn't rooted in reality.
 

Seira Hazuki

Solaris Luna
Jan 17, 2007
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#87
I also think fans like to look at the manga faithfulness of this era and say that's proof that Naoko's too controlling and hates creativity or something. But...no? We know she's always been a huge fan of the musicals, and the musicals have always taken lots of liberties. Even the Nelke musicals, for all their comparative faithfulness to the manga, have taken a lot of liberties. The producers have even stated Naoko gave them permission to do whatever they wanted! Like... I think Naoko and Toei just wanted to do a close adaptation of the manga this time around, and the musicals decided to take that same general direction, but the idea that Naoko has some sort of agenda against future adaptations having more unique spins to them is just...not rooted in reality. Similarly, fans love to claim there'll never be a continuation of the manga because Naoko would never approve of someone else doing Sailor Moon manga, but...she approved of someone else writing novelizations of the manga. And we all know that she adores doujinshi and even bootleg goods, so does it really make sense she would never let someone else continue the manga? Maybe Kodansha has just never approached her with that idea. Maybe the right manga-ka hasn't come around yet. We have no idea why a continuation hasn't happened yet or may never happen, but, again, the idea that it's ~all Naoko's fault~ isn't rooted in reality.
I don't think it's a stretch at all to think Naoko is a big reason why every new adaptation has been so manga-focused because everything seems to point to that way. Just look at Eternal, Naoko had no official involvement in the past three seasons, and while they had high fidelity to the manga, there were still many scenes that weren't just a copy. With very few exceptions, that seems to no longer be the case with Eternal.

I think the only reason the musicals (especially the most recent ones) got away with taking creative liberties is because it's a harder to fit a whole manga arc in one musical, and they aren't high budget enough to fully adapt every plotline (especially when so much goes on in each chapter). That seems to be changing though with the Nogizaki46 musical essentially being such a faithful reproduction of the first arc, I wouldn't be surprised if the next wave musicals have higher fidelity to the manga that they're almost 1:1 to like Eternal.

That's not to say that I think Naoko will never change her mind, or that she won't loosen up as time goes on. I think ultimately once she gets her wish of a manga-faithful anime adaptation with Stars being adapted, she'll eventually greenlight projects that take more liberties with her work (I mean eventually she'll have to because there's clearly not that huge of an appetite for ANOTHER manga-focused anime project).
 

Memento

Stella Nova
Mar 8, 2012
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#88
That's what I was saying? Like, this *current* era is all about manga fidelity because, presumably, that's what Naoko/Toei/Kodansha wanted, but that doesn't translate into Naoko will never ever ever allow a non-faithful-to-the-manga adaptation of Sailor Moon to see the light of day. I think Naoko has always wanted to see her manga come to life as is, and she's getting her wish at the moment. But once Crysternal wraps up, we'll definitely get a far more liberal take for the next project.
 
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#90
I consider any changes in Cryseternal as partly liberties to make the story suitable to its target audience and partly things that Naoko wanted to add to the manga and anime then but was not able to execute back then, Senshi/Shitenou story was Naoko's but I think the issues of the Senshi/Shitenou part of Crystal is TOEI's problem, Since they added the Senshi/Shitenou story I think an anime adaptation of Sailor V is possible.
 
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#91
Since many of the "what could have been" in Sailor Moon Metaseries is in Utena, it makes Utena feel like a "Left Over Pie Dough" of Sailor Moon.
 
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#93
Perhaps they can make a series that focuses on Chibiusa, Quartet, Chaos and Cosmos.
 
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#95
I think they could greenlight a Seinen Scifi spin-off of Sailor Moon, CCS was able to do this with XXXHolic.
 
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#96
I think the manga needs two sidequels that can be compiled to one volume, one that details the fate of the cats, starlights, kakyuu and galaxia and a sidequel Sailor Cosmos narrating how the Senshi returned to the earth, I think Naoko can commission another artist to do that, I read the recent Sidequel and Sequel of the Utena Manga written by Chiho Saito After the Revolution, so I think Chiho Saito is perfect for that job.

Another is a Sailor Moon 30th anniversary anthology.

I think the mangaka that could do a sequel, sidequel or midquel to Sailor Moon are:

-Ken Akamatsu – a known fan of Sailor Moon

-Chiho Saito

-Miwa Ueda – she was an assistant of Naoko Takeuchi

-Tsubaki Nekoi of CLAMP – her artstyle is like Kazuko Tadano, Mokona the other artist of CLAMP is busy with Card Captor Sakura.

-Arina Tanemura – Her artstyle is similar to that of Akira Takahashi, she is another known fan of Sailor Moon.
 
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SILVER

Aurorae Lunares
Jan 7, 2014
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Dark Kingdom
#97
I think the manga needs two sidequels that can be compiled to one volume, one that details the fate of the cats, starlights, kakyuu and galaxia and a sidequel Sailor Cosmos narrating how the Senshi returned to the earth, I think Naoko can commission another artist to do that, I read the recent Sidequel and Sequel of the Utena Manga written by Chiho Saito After the Revolution, so I think Chiho Saito is perfect for that job.

Another is a Sailor Moon 30th anniversary anthology.

I think the mangaka that could do a sequel, sidequel or midquel to Sailor Moon are:

-Ken Akamatsu – a known fan of Sailor Moon

-Chiho Saito

-Miwa Ueda – she was an assistant of Naoko Takeuchi

-Tsubaki Nekoi of CLAMP – her artstyle is like Kazuko Tadano, Mokona the other artist of CLAMP is busy with Card Captor Sakura.

-Arina Tanemura – Her artstyle is similar to that of Akira Takahashi, she is another known fan of Sailor Moon.
I dont think Stars needs everything spelled out exactly, much less 2 sequels based on plot threads that can be covered in just 1.
 
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#98
I dont think Stars needs everything spelled out exactly, much less 2 sequels based on plot threads that can be covered in just 1.
She can have another artist doing short stories on the unresolved plot threads of Stars compiled on one book, I think Miwa Ueda or Chiho Saito are perfect for the job since their art style are similar to that of Takeuchi.
 
Likes: SILVER
Feb 8, 2021
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No offense if you like her, but I find her almost the opposite of Usagi
She's not a bad actress, but hot damn she's unlikable
She is perfect as Serena/Usagi if the live-action remake was done in the mid to late 2000s but not at this point.