Is there a double standard regarding Naoko as a mangaka?

A lot of Sailor Moon fans around the world would love to get a complete and faithful redub in their own language. Hell, some of us don't even have a subbed version. So the notion that the new dub shouldn't exist sounds absolutely bonkers to me.

The reason why people don't care about the Tokyopop version of the manga being out of print is two-fold.

1. Fans don't care as much for the manga in general.
2. Prices for the out of print books are at least for now...reasonable. (likely due to #1)

The fans who do want to read the manga are usually looking for a more an authentic experience and are self-selected to prefer authenticity. Generally, reading is a semi-active experience in that you actually have to actively look for what you want to read.

Likewise, people don't go on "tirades" about PGSM because PGSM was not for them. PGSM aired on TV in Japan in a format for a Japanese audience that would be impossible to localize as is. It was never presented to be for a Western audience.

By contrast...the old English-language anime was literally put in the faces of Canadian and American fans. In an era of streaming and serialized viewing this may be hard to remember, but once upon a time, watching TV was a very passive experience. Yes, there were schedules and such, but basically, you turned the TV on and something was automatically playing for you (it still works like that now). For most really old-school fans who were not anime junkies, we didn't go, "Sailor Moon sounds interesting, I'll check it out." No, for many of us, it just happened to be something that was on the TV that day, we saw it, we liked it, then it was on again and we liked it.

That means the Sailor Moon fans who generally preferred the old dub aren't fans who wanted to seek out new experiences but were fans who got hooked because that show was on TV and grew to like it out of sheer exposure. And the vast majority of those fans, once the episodes stopped coming on TV, stopped liking the show. That's perfectly fine.

But when you wait well over ten years between the end of the old dub and the start of a new one (and nearly 20 years after the dub first started airing), long enough for Sailor Moon to become a nostalgia project and for the TV watching landscape to change, people who do remember Sailor Moon from their childhoods want to see that version. They don't want to see a version that looks like the version they remembered but is different. It's like changing the recipe but calling the product the same thing in a revival campaign. Of course people will be less than happy because people's memories and experiences are being deliberately messed with, and with the old version only accessible through non-mainstream links, it will be not only forgotten but replaced with memories of the new version.



First of all, since Naoko Takeuchi has control of the franchise, ALL of our opinions are meaningless. Even if you were her best friend and knew everything about her, your singular opinion is meaningless. We're all equal in that regard.

Next, you don't have to personally know someone to make an informed opinion about them. Let's suppose you have a job at a major company with a CEO. Let's suppose the company is very profitable and strong, and the CEO is rewarded for his efforts. Let's suppose the CEO announces everyone in your department to take paycuts and work twice as hard for half the pay. Are you trying to say, "You don't know the CEO so you can't have an opinion on him?" Please. I don't care if he donates his salary to charity and volunteers his time to help the unfortunate, he's still an awful person to do that to employees. Even if as an employee you can "leave" it's still a scummy thing to do. And, yes, I would not like a CEO who did that to other people even if I didn't work under them.

But aside from that, even if our hate is based on a "strawman" that doesn't make it invalid. You later state that I'm denying the reality of her existence (and if she exists as a person, she's a valid target for hate), and in fact, I'm going to skip ahead because what I wrote above applied to your next two points.

But I don't have the anime I like as there is no fandom. Everything that surrounded that anime -- and that fandom which surrounds it is a part of it -- is gone because you and Takeuchi took it from us.



I disagree. If that apple pie recipe was a success and a cultural touchstone, it would be supremely arrogant to not acknowledge that the apple pie was enjoyed and then instead force those same people to eat a cherry pie when they were previously served an apple pie. If people eat an apple pie and like it, even if it's not intended, then you serve them the apple pie.


She should have respected the work of localizers in all regions, not just the US, as she has also interfered with the dubs of other countries. Otherwise she's suggesting that she's the center of the world, and she's not.



Because it was the first dub. Artistic integrity is irrelevant. It was released first and is what people saw and that should be respected.

When old video games are re-released as virtual ports and not remakes, everything typically remains the same as when it was first released. The same is generally true of movies to the point where it's controversial when edits are made to later editions. If someone is remaking a game or a movie, that's a different story. Again, localize Sailor Moon Crystal by 2010s standards since that's a remake (and likewise the 2010s manga was a new edition, so a new translation was appropriate) but they should have left the old anime stay dead.

Plus, Toei is the one who signed off on the censorship, and not in a passive way, either. Toei didn't just have to approve DiC's edits. Toei, as Cloverway, was the later license holder. The whole "cousins" thing may have been recorded by Optimum, but TOEI is the one that endorsed it. Note how the old manga translations, while having its own issues, was not censored the same way even when it used "dub names?" Because that was handled separately.

It's not Toei...it's PNP. Naoko.



Who are you to say someone is overly attached to anything, as if there's a single way to be a perfect fan?



I thought you said the hate wasn't based on reality. Now, you admit it is based on reality by acknowledging her existence instead of a strawman whose name appears as the creator of Sailor Moon. If we don't know her in reality, then I can project whatever I want on her. If she is a person, then I have a reason to hate her for her existence. Simple.



Now who's strawmanning? I want the material that was released in my market to be available in my market when re-released. I don't want new material put in place of the material I saw. It's not entitled to want what you had before. That's basic human experience. Giving people different things when they're expecting the same thing destabilizes and disorients people and purposely causes confusion to the point where they cannot even trust their own experiences.

I'm not backpedaling. My point is that if you just accept that Sailor Moon as a franchise isn't and never will be about the one version you like, and if you simply engage with things you like and disregard things you don't instead of demanding reality to bend to your liking, then you wouldn't be acting entitled anymore, and you'd be a lot happier to boot.


None of the fans of the original version did this when the dub was airing or even after it stopped airing/ And guess what? They did get reality to bend to their liking, so their "entitlement" paid off, The squeaky wheel gets oiled.




The redub is the only thing rewriting history. Sailor Moon was Serena in the English version and now people pretend Sailor Moon was not Serena.




No, it doesn't. It doesn't exist as "Sailor Moon" what people think of and see when they look up the television show, and people aren't directed to it when looking up Sailor Moon episode.

Funny, before there was a redub, people claimed that we "needed" a redub so the next generation could see what the show was all about. Never mind that people could look up the subtitled version of the show even when Sailor Moon was unlicensed. People wanted the anime licensed and dubbed. They weren't happy with the show being dead. So why should fans of the dub that was in existence just roll over when you stole what we had? You got the redub by "whining." Again, the squeaky wheel gets oiled.





Also, there is an important difference between never having something and losing what you had. Generally, the latter tends to hurt worse.

PGSM being broadcast internationally or not doesn't matter to me; it was used as an example for the fact that it exists at all. The point being made was people shouldn't consistently or actively engage with things they don't/won't like (my example was me not necessarily liking PGSM), especially if it's going to be such a source of an issue for them if it isn't already. Though I believe that's not to be confused with something like critiquing art and having an opinion for it or giving an opinion on a story if someone wants to share what they think (e.g.; again, I feel the animation for Seasons 1 & 2 of Crystal was poor enough to be just that distracting for me, whereas I preferred Season 3); but there's a difference in that compared to some of the derogatory posts I've seen that are derogatory simply for the sake of being derogatory (obvious jokes aside) and sometimes quite hateful. I know it's a Sailor Moon forum so of course it seems amplified in a bubble but some posts border on being so nasty to Naoko (if not outright) that it's almost laughable as much as it comes across as bizarre.

I think these are two plausible reasons, but they are not the two primary reasons. The two primary reasons, I feel, are:

1: The TokyoPop manga is a legitimately bad translation and the artwork is flipped. Yes, Western manga readers (in general, not just Sailor Moon fans) do regularly prefer authenticity, and these two aspects speak to that. Me personally, I think the TokyoPop manga is charming despite being a terribly flawed product, and I sometimes go back to enjoy it when the mood strikes me.

2: Scans and downloads are available online.

Going by this logic, you are not defined by the people around you. You are defined by your *reactions* to the people and situations around you. And you can always choose to react differently. [...]
Who cares? You can easily access it. Why does it matter what other people think? Enjoy the show, enjoy your memories, enjoy watching it again and again if you'd like.

A lot of Sailor Moon fans around the world would love to get a complete and faithful redub in their own language. Hell, some of us don't even have a subbed version. So the notion that the new dub shouldn't exist sounds absolutely bonkers to me.

Seems like 'Unhealthy' is the new cool word innit?

Seems like 'Unhealthy' is the new cool word innit?

Well it’s somewhat a progress because last week, criticizing Naoko and the way the franchise was handled was « HATEFUL »

They could have chosen to dub the Stars first then the other arcs later.

I think I understand the frustration because season 1 (classic) is my favorite season, the first anime I watched, and I would like to have the Portuguese dub… just like it was presented to me.

Toei stated that they could never recover it from the first licensor in Brazil. Basically, it's lost since the 90s.
What makes everything worse is that they literally left three of the four seasons whose dubbed audio they own (R, SuperS, Stars) ROT and they don't even bother at least subtitling the rest. They announced new dubs at least twice since 2017, and it never happened

Toei stated that they could never recover it from the first licensor in Brazil. Basically, it's lost since the 90s.
What makes everything worse is that they literally left three of the four seasons whose dubbed audio they own (R, SuperS, Stars) ROT and they don't even bother at least subtitling the rest. They announced new dubs at least twice since 2017, and it never happened

Should we use our unhealthy behaviour to find the person at fault?

The woman who voiced Serena/Usagi in the 90s had the perfect voice. It is truly a shame that the Portuguese dub from the 90s has been lost forever. I watched a few scenes of the S dub in Portuguese and I didn’t like it (personal opinion, of course). If I had to watch the 90’s anime, I would possibly choose the Spanish dub (it has some aspects that remind me of my original Sailor Moon experience, e.g. Zoisite being a woman) or the VIZ English dub.

You can watch it in a pretty good quality through Project Nostalgia. It's lost through official means, not between fans.


I also have a strong dislike for "Serena's" Brazilian replacement actress. She is basically our Linda Ballantyne, but with a voice that actually suits a teenager.

I have been reading this thread back and forth…

and my understanting is that fans of the DIC dub do not merely wish to keep their Sailor Moon experience to themselves… they wish to share their Sailor Moon experience with other fans.

If you are a millennial and you live in North America, then you probably caught Sailor Moon on TV and you fell in love with that particular experience. And it’s not only the dub or the magazine… boomers defined how Sailor Moon would be consumed in North America (they made decisions for you). For example, they didn’t like the Japanese dolls and decided to create their own.

To summarize, I think what she is saying is that in the past Sailor Moon was more commonly accepted as a localized American show: Serena went to an American school and Darien worked as a model to afford his tuition, but as time progressed that old Sailor Moon experience was replaced with a new one … and it became more and more difficult to share that old experience with other fans.

I think that is what she is saying. Of course, I apologize if my interpretation is wrong.

So, I don't want to get into this too deeply, but I really want to challenge some of what I'm seeing here.
Going by this logic, you are not defined by the people around you. You are defined by your *reactions* to the people and situations around you. And you can always choose to react differently.

I found them fairly easily (maybe because my search turned out to not be nearly as broad as "sailor moon episodes"), and while I would honestly love to direct anyone else interested to them, the forum has rules against what I'm sure are all and any forms of pirating and I doubt it'd be an exception for me to post any links here.