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.