What Sailor Moon can learn from the MMPR live action movie's failure

  • This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this site, you are agreeing to our use of cookies. Learn more.

Slowpokeking

Aurorae Lunares
Apr 1, 2020
1,421
1,065
1,665
41
#1
Since both of them are inspired by Sentai series. I think Sailor Moon could look at its failure if they want to make a live action movie

1. Don't rewrite the characters too much.

The movie turned everyone from cool teens with minor flaw into troubled kids, which distanced the characters from themselves. I see that as a problem because they don't feel like themselves anymore.
I don't want race swap as well.



2. Action needs to fill the movie.

The MMPR movie was way too boring because there was lack of action, the villain's doing was boring and even the last fight was far from satisfying. This must be avoided in any blockbuster movies. The anime's fighting was fine at that time. It would be good to see more melee combat then magic.


3. Don't try too hard on the "development"

You need to show their good shiny lovely side first, then add some flaws. The MMPR movie went too far to make them struggling without let us see what they are good at.
Even Kimberly and Jason, the most ordinary ones went too far from the TV ones. Billy was entirely unrecognizable while he did receive some development.

Same for Sailor Moon, sure the characters have their sad side, but I don't think it should be too focused upon losing their good and funny side. Especially Usagi, don't make her overly unlikeable by showing her flaws too much. Even the anime mostly showed it in a comedic way.


4. The villains has to be serious/menacing enough.

Rita being the old green ranger was a good concept, but her doing was boring, collect gold, burn a shop and then form some ugly monster which doesn't resemble the old Goldar at all. None of that was interesting.

We need the villain to actually show that they are a huge threat to the world. That might need some work, I think they should target mass amount of ppl to drain energy, then show some tough fight.

5. Bring the old music, bring up the old amazing design/costume.

That MMPR song only showed up for a few seconds. Same for the zoids, I don't think the senshi should stay too long on their civilian form, let them MAKE UP.
 

Lady Pen

Aurorae Lunares
Mar 12, 2021
1,223
3,837
1,665
#2
Well, the magic of MMPR is that the show didn't take itself seriously. I'm still trying to understand why everyone's obsessed with a dark and grim MMPR after seeing that it doesn't work. The show had colourful characters (good and evil), energy, old school martial arts, silly humour, the enemies were fun, and the mythology was appealing to the eye (dinosaurs, celestials beasts, ninjas, shoguns and japanese folklore). Turning all this into boring and serious villains, generic teenagers with sad personal history, robots and costumes without personality, tragedy, drama only for the sake of being dark and adult will always fail. And Sailor Moon isn't that different in that respect.
 
Last edited:
Likes: kasumigenx

Slowpokeking

Aurorae Lunares
Apr 1, 2020
1,421
1,065
1,665
41
#3
Well, the magic of MMPR is that the show didn't take itself seriously. I'm still trying to understand why everyone's obsessed with a dark and grim MMPR after seeing that it doesn't work. The show had colourful characters (good and evil), energy, old school martial arts, silly humour, the enemies were fun, and the mythology was appealing to the eye (dinosaurs, celestials beasts, ninjas, shoguns and japanese folklore). Turning all this into boring and serious villains, generic teenagers with sad personal history, robots and costumes without personality, tragedy, drama only for the sake of being dark and adult will always fail. And Sailor Moon isn't that different in that respect.
It's not even dark and grim, they got some family issue sure, but the real villain conflict was too chessy.
 
Sep 6, 2014
3,326
3,548
1,665
#4
Since both of them are inspired by Sentai series
Only Sailor Moon is “inspired by” Sentai. ’Power Rangers is an American reversioning of Super Sentai

The movie turned everyone from cool teens with minor flaw into troubled kids, which distanced the characters from themselves
They literally had no flaws in the tv show. The movie may have went too far in the other direction but it needed to do something

. I see that as a problem because they don't feel like themselves anymore.
Only two of the original 5 had anything resembling personalities in the original series. So something had to be done.

I don't want race swap as well.
If you’re wanting an all Japanese cast for Sailor Moon I’m cool with that. But in Power Rangers they had a black guy in the black suit and the yellow ranger in the yellow suit. Race swapping was a painfully obvious decision to make.



The MMPR movie was way too boring because there was lack of action, the villain's doing was boring and even the last fight was far from satisfying. This must be avoided in any blockbuster movies.
It has like two A-list stars, came out in March, and was made on a budget of $105. Hardly a “blockbuster”


3. Don't try too hard on the "development"

Even Kimberly and Jason, the most ordinary ones went too far from the TV ones.
I despised Kimberly in the movie because we’re suppose to side with her for being ostracized by her friends but what she did was repugnant and she deserved losing her friends. Kimberly in the tv show was kind of a generic valley girl stereotype that was trendy in the 90s but pretty dated in 2017. The movie did need to change her character they just did it in an awful way that made her despicable.
Jason was pretty much a blank slate most of the time in the show with the occasional display of hotheadedness and the movie tried a more well rounded take on him

. Billy was entirely unrecognizable while he did receive some development.
Billy was obnoxious in the original show because the writers were idiots and thought the best way to show a character is “smart” is by having him talk like he swallowed a thesaurus. The movie just making him out and out autistic was a good move. Not only because autism is rarely displayed in a positive light (and let’s be honest, most of Power Rangers adult fandom is usually somewhere on the spectrum) but its rare to show a person of color with autism. The movie just took the character’s inability to follow social cues to it’s logical and realistic conclusion.



.
Rita being the old green ranger was a good concept, but her doing was boring, collect gold, burn a shop and then form some ugly monster which doesn't resemble the old Goldar at all. None of that was interesting.
Rita wasn’t menacing in the original show. Elizabeth Banks performance was the best part of the movie. She knows that’s she’s in a stupid stupid movie based on an even stupider franchise and she’s having the time of her life.
Goldar being a golem made of literal gold was lame and uninspired though.
 

Slowpokeking

Aurorae Lunares
Apr 1, 2020
1,421
1,065
1,665
41
#5
They literally had no flaws in the tv show. The movie may have went too far in the other direction but it needed to do something
They do, they even got development, you can see Kimberly changed from a valley girl into a strong woman. Billy also got away from his nerdy part to be the backbone.

Only two of the original 5 had anything resembling personalities in the original series. So something had to be done.
Other than Trini was a bit bland, the others all got personality.

If you’re wanting an all Japanese cast for Sailor Moon I’m cool with that. But in Power Rangers they had a black guy in the black suit and the yellow ranger in the yellow suit. Race swapping was a painfully obvious decision to make.
I do like the PGSM cast, it's cool to have full Asian cast as long as they resemble the characters.



It has like two A-list stars, came out in March, and was made on a budget of $105. Hardly a “blockbuster”
It is still a blockbuster, just not a huge one.


I despised Kimberly in the movie because we’re suppose to side with her for being ostracized by her friends but what she did was repugnant and she deserved losing her friends. Kimberly in the tv show was kind of a generic valley girl stereotype that was trendy in the 90s but pretty dated in 2017. The movie did need to change her character they just did it in an awful way that made her despicable.
Jason was pretty much a blank slate most of the time in the show with the occasional display of hotheadedness and the movie tried a more well rounded take on him

Not really, Kimberly in the show got the most development among them, she was likeable all the way without being too perfect.

The movie Kimberly did such a mean thing to her friend for little reason. It's like they forced it to give her some flaw. And they totally missed out the chance to set up Kat's future plot by making that girl Kat.

Billy was obnoxious in the original show because the writers were idiots and thought the best way to show a character is “smart” is by having him talk like he swallowed a thesaurus. The movie just making him out and out autistic was a good move. Not only because autism is rarely displayed in a positive light (and let’s be honest, most of Power Rangers adult fandom is usually somewhere on the spectrum) but its rare to show a person of color with autism. The movie just took the character’s inability to follow social cues to it’s logical and realistic conclusion.
Billy was not obnoxious, he got his silly side at first like to girls, but later he grew up to be the strongest side for the team and take care for the others.

You don't need obvious "problematic" side to be a good character.

The only one that got reasonable and sympathetic part was Zack in the movie, but he got too little screentime.


Rita wasn’t menacing in the original show. Elizabeth Banks performance was the best part of the movie. She knows that’s she’s in a stupid stupid movie based on an even stupider franchise and she’s having the time of her life.
Goldar being a golem made of literal gold was lame and uninspired though.
Rita acted cheesy, but she did make many menacing moves and cause a lot of threat. Such as using Tommy to put the team into desperate situation. Using Kat to hurt Kimberly. She also caused world level threat quite a few times.

Elizabeth Banks' performance indeed was great and made her look menacing, having her as the former green ranger was a good move. But the script let her doing all the silly things instead of causing real world level trouble. That shop scene was just dumb and the whole Godlar fight was meh. So that kinda made the conflict very weak.
 

Slowpokeking

Aurorae Lunares
Apr 1, 2020
1,421
1,065
1,665
41
#7
Well..... the original are all Japanese and when made for American audiences they we're all changed race. I don't understand why people have such a huge issue with race change for a character for a new re-telling of a story.
Because Saban Moon looks terrible.
 

Slowpokeking

Aurorae Lunares
Apr 1, 2020
1,421
1,065
1,665
41
#9
But you like Power Rangers which Americanized a Japanese show just in a completely different manner than Toonmaker Moon was going to.
Different shows, and PGSM proved that a full Japanese/Asian cast could work beside special effect/costume issue.

Race Swap could work, but in modern day I doubt they would do it well, so nah.
 

Slowpokeking

Aurorae Lunares
Apr 1, 2020
1,421
1,065
1,665
41
#10
Sure most of the Sailor senshi isn't that Japense(other than Rei and probably Ami), some of them might look better as white. the villains would probably work better as white.

But it's not worthy to go that path, it would mostly turn out to be "have diversity for the sake of diversity" or even insert unnecessary change instead of "carefully transfer it into western to make it better". None of them is "too western" to be played by Asian.

Even Michiru could be totally fine, I mean Rika Izumi is the perfect choice to play her now.
 

MariaTenebre

Systema Solare
Jul 22, 2009
5,778
1,225
1,665
#12
They shouldn't let any American company get Sailor Moon. To be honest I would be thrilled if all of our Entertainment was handed over to our Japanese Masters in the land of the Sun Goddess and Empress of Heaven instead of the wokeflix nonsense we have now. In fact I did a thread saying how I think the wokeies would do Sailor Moon if they could and it would be awful. I just thank The Gods Above and Below that Naoko Takeuchi has more control over her franchise then say the people who made She-Ra, Marvel, DC etc.
 
Likes: Slowpokeking

Boro

Solaris Luna
May 19, 2012
2,772
83
65
31
Mount Grimrock Level 4
#13
They shouldn't let any American company get Sailor Moon.
To be fair nobody should let americans get their works. They'll just disrespectfully butcher it for their audiences and then use their film-industrial monopoly to spread it around the world till it becomes the "default" in people's minds.
 
May 4, 2021
46
44
15
www.fanfiction.net
#15
Since both of them are inspired by Sentai series. I think Sailor Moon could look at its failure if they want to make a live action movie
I always appreciate these kind of posts that take their time and consider all the points, even if I differ in opinion. I feel I was probably as surprised as anyone to find that I quite liked the Power Rangers 2017 movie, save for the messy CGI business at the end. Possibly part of this is because I have little nostalgia for the source material and was only tangentially aware of Power Rangers when younger.

I think that an attempt to apply the dynamics of this movie to Sailor Moon would be... interesting. I can't say that a live action, international adaptation is top of my wish list, but I also wouldn't begrudge it if it did exist. I've long felt that every iteration of a story is probably someone's favourite, and I guess I'm kind of testament to that with the PR 2017 movie. If a Sailor Moon live action production were to debut with an international cast, I feel I would be content for it to be its own thing, because, after all, it wouldn't diminish my connexion with the comics, or the cartoon, or the Toei show, or the musicals, so even if it didn't reach the original audience, as seems to have been the case with the PR movie, I am sure it would find an audience, and the idea of getting to ramble to even more people about these characters regardless of the medium makes me quietly happy.
 
Likes: NJ_

Slowpokeking

Aurorae Lunares
Apr 1, 2020
1,421
1,065
1,665
41
#16
I always appreciate these kind of posts that take their time and consider all the points, even if I differ in opinion. I feel I was probably as surprised as anyone to find that I quite liked the Power Rangers 2017 movie, save for the messy CGI business at the end. Possibly part of this is because I have little nostalgia for the source material and was only tangentially aware of Power Rangers when younger.

I think that an attempt to apply the dynamics of this movie to Sailor Moon would be... interesting. I can't say that a live action, international adaptation is top of my wish list, but I also wouldn't begrudge it if it did exist. I've long felt that every iteration of a story is probably someone's favourite, and I guess I'm kind of testament to that with the PR 2017 movie. If a Sailor Moon live action production were to debut with an international cast, I feel I would be content for it to be its own thing, because, after all, it wouldn't diminish my connexion with the comics, or the cartoon, or the Toei show, or the musicals, so even if it didn't reach the original audience, as seems to have been the case with the PR movie, I am sure it would find an audience, and the idea of getting to ramble to even more people about these characters regardless of the medium makes me quietly happy.
If they want to find dynamics, the live action PGSM was a much better example. Save for a few character's handling.
 
May 4, 2021
46
44
15
www.fanfiction.net
#17
If they want to find dynamics, the live action PGSM was a much better example. Save for a few character's handling.
I also like the Toei live action show a lot, so I don't disagree that there's a lot of great dynamics, but again, every iteration of a story is bound to be someone's favourite, so even if an adaptation hit closer to the dynamics that seem to have displeased you about the PR 2017 movie, I still don't think it would be the end of the world. Again, I'm not a Power Rangers fan, but I quite enjoyed the 2017 movie, so I'd at least watch a Sailor Moon adaptation after this style, even if it wasn't really my thing—its existence wouldn't diminish my enjoyment of the original.
 

Slowpokeking

Aurorae Lunares
Apr 1, 2020
1,421
1,065
1,665
41
#18
I also like the Toei live action show a lot, so I don't disagree that there's a lot of great dynamics, but again, every iteration of a story is bound to be someone's favourite, so even if an adaptation hit closer to the dynamics that seem to have displeased you about the PR 2017 movie, I still don't think it would be the end of the world. Again, I'm not a Power Rangers fan, but I quite enjoyed the 2017 movie, so I'd at least watch a Sailor Moon adaptation after this style, even if it wasn't really my thing—its existence wouldn't diminish my enjoyment of the original.
I'm ok with further characterization. But seriously, if it was a movie, there would be little room to have too many character's development.

I don't hate the 2017 movie other than a few characters' handling(Billy and Jason) plus stupid villain plot. I just think it's not going to work as a blockbuster. As a PR fan I couldn't find the same fun I've got other than the last scene where Amy Jo Johnson and JDF showed up in cameo.

It would be ok to set one or two character that miserable and troubled, but not all of them. Make Jason and Kimberly more ordinary would have been better.