Sailor Moon Art Director motifs

[Talentless Fool]

I can't believe the girls totally ditched her for the whole afternoon! Friends!

Her expressions!

"Well, you see..."

"Did something happen?"

"Well, you won't believe ~"

"... I have no idea what happened!"
"Seriously?! What the heck you mean you don't know?!"
"Well, there was that, and that..."
"What's 'that'?"
"You know, THAT!"
"Be more specific!!!"

 

[Rika-Chicchi]

Now revisiting it, Stars doesn't look as bad as I thought.

 

[saintfighteraqua]

\ Seeds.

I like the little detail that the Animamates slip through Galaxia's pocket dimension to invade Earth.

And... Mamoru dies.

Something I think that's interesting is that Galaxia seems to send out 5 Animamates.
Of course, we know that one must have been her since that is who killed Mamo.
But the way this plays out early on is it feels more like she sent her minions.

Also, wasn't there a scene with four Animamates at one point in the shadows when Iron Mouse was talking? I could be remembering wrong, of course. But if there were originally 5 Animamates, I suppose it would have been because Naoko would have mentioned she was planning 5 including Heavy Metal Papillon. Given how much the anime improved the others, I would have liked to seen the characterization they gave her.
Perhaps she would have arrived by sliding down a stripper pole?

 

[Talentless Fool]

Something I think that's interesting is that Galaxia seems to send out 5 Animamates.
Of course, we know that one must have been her since that is who killed Mamo.
But the way this plays out early on is it feels more like she sent her minions.

Also, wasn't there a scene with four Animamates at one point in the shadows when Iron Mouse was talking? I could be remembering wrong, of course. But if there were originally 5 Animamates, I suppose it would have been because Naoko would have mentioned she was planning 5 including Heavy Metal Papillon. Given how much the anime improved the others, I would have liked to seen the characterization they gave her.
Perhaps she would have arrived by sliding down a stripper pole?

I think it was always supposed to be Galaxia who kills Mamoru.
Who knows perhaps she would have burst into the fight of Papillon and Mamoru and mercilessly strip him of his Star Seed.

This scene is eventually retconned as later we see Crow and Seiren in shadows (#180 & #182) coming from a faraway galaxy delivering new Star Seeds.
I suppose the idea was to have all the 5 Animamas debut at the same time akin to the Ayakashi Sisters and have them duel with their Senshi counterpart (considering it seems the Inners were going to be on the forefront again).
Which would give us:
Iron Mouse vs Venus
Aluminum Seiren vs Mercury
Lead Crow vs Mars
Tin Nyanko (?) vs Moon
Heavy Metal Papillon vs Jupiter (?)

But obviously since the Nehenelia arc failed to raise the ratings, the staff preferred to focus on the new characters, the Sailor Steallights.

Well, we might as well do Eternal Moon's attack.

The Starlight Theraphy Kiss of the Nehenelia arc version.

It's hard to count but there are seemingly 9 bursts of energies, one for each of the Solar Senshi.

 

[Talentless Fool]

Kagawa does a fantastic job here!

The expression in her eyes!

 

[Talentless Fool]

I'll forever be bitter that the Opening showed the Tenkei Kingdom being restored following this sequence yet we never see Kakyuu's world in the series.

 

[kasumigenx]

I'll forever be bitter that the Opening showed the Tenkei Kingdom being restored following this sequence yet we never see Kakyuu's world in the series.

We could have gotten this in Cosmos or Crystal S5 if Cosmos/Crystal 5 chose to adapt the discarded plans of the 90s anime but still followed the manga plot line like what happened in S1 of Crystal.

 

[saintfighteraqua]

I'll forever be bitter that the Opening showed the Tenkei Kingdom being restored following this sequence yet we never see Kakyuu's world in the series.

I've somehow never put this together or paid that much attention.
I just always assumed it was some generic place or the Moon Kingdom, but you're right, it looks very east or south-east Asian. The openings always have such epic stuff happening that we never see...but that's anime, for ya.

 

[Rika-Chicchi]

The openings always have such epic stuff happening that we never see...but that's anime, for ya.

That's where any new reboot should elaborate on, to fulfil all those visual promises in the OPs that haven't been realized in the actual show - as there're no disclaiming fine prints at the bottom in those OPs saying that what's shown may differ from the actual show, like those seen on food packages, the audience, as consumers of a product, are entitled to complain that the producer (Toei) is cheating & still owing them.

 

[Talentless Fool]

I've somehow never put this together or paid that much attention.
I just always assumed it was some generic place or the Moon Kingdom, but you're right, it looks very east or south-east Asian. The openings always have such epic stuff happening that we never see...but that's anime, for ya.

I pointed it out before but the Tenkei Kingdom (via it's Kovil/Pagoda-eaque towers) is likely inspired by the Prambanan Temple, a Hindu temple in Indonesia dedicated to the Trimurti - Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva whom the Starlights take inspiration from.
Notice the 3 main towers each representing one of the Starlights.

You have to remember the the Openings (and Endings as well) were always super spolilery:
- Classic already showed Venus a whole arc before she debuted as well as the Princess Serenity reveal.
- R explictly showed Usagi becoming Neo Queen Serenity before it was even confirmed.
- S showed the butterflies (Super Sailor Moon's symbol) from the very first version.
- S also depicted the girls praying in the garden of the Silver Millennium in the Opening and the group shot also showed them there, the Ending also showed all the girls during the time of the Silver Millennium - there were a couple of call backs to the Silver Millennium in the beginning of S, possibly diving into the lore and linking the Outers to their past lives but eventually dropped.
- SuperS predominantly showed Elysion in the Opening and Ending but we never see it in the show, it's only mentioned.
- Stars' Ending already showed angel-winged Usagi.
- Stars opening showed several events of the season, Mamoru taken away by an evil entity, Chaos corrupting Galaxia's Star Seed, Usagi spreading her light and releasing Star Seeds all over Tokyo, the Tenkei Kingdom being revived and Galaxia, as the Light of Hope, diving into the depths of the galaxy.

I suppose the writers intended to go the Classic season route and eventually introduce the 'Find the Princess' arc but it was eventually scrapped.
I really wished the girls had gone to the Tenkei Kingdom, who knows perhaps it is where the final battle was thought to take place in the very early beginnings.

Starlight Honeymoon Therapy Kiss

I love these coloring lights they used to do before!
Why don't they do it anymore?!?!?

Toy commercial!

 

[Talentless Fool]

I love the little twirls she does with her hands, it's a nice detail that gets easily missed

Notice how the movement of her hands are elegant and smooth!

Twirl! Twirl! Twirl like a Butterfly!

 

[Talentless Fool]

The anatomy! THE ANATOMY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Everything in this!
The feathers! The animation of the pigtails! The movements! The allure! The elegance! The class!

 

[Talentless Fool]

GO BABY! GO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It's super quick but notice the glittering powder burst on top of the rod before it spreads

The Theraphy Kiss is one of the most gorgeous looking Sailor Moon stocks ever, fight me!

 

[kasumigenx]

That's where any new reboot should elaborate on, to fulfil all those visual promises in the OPs that haven't been realized in the actual show - as there're no disclaiming fine prints at the bottom in those OPs saying that what's shown may differ from the actual show, like those seen on food packages, the audience, as consumers of a product, are entitled to complain that the producer (Toei) is cheating & still owing them.

That is the product of changing the plot of the show when the show is already airing.

 

[Rika-Chicchi]

The feathers! The animation of the pigtails! The movements! The allure! The elegance! The class!

It's so ridiculous that the feathers even appear there, as everyone knows that her wings are made of plastic.

 

[Hadibou]

Oooh I never noticed that they actually replicated the scepter several time on the same frame, I thought it was a quick motion effect with several swift frames !
It was never my favorite attack but there are a lot of very pretty frames with interesting poses, that can be easily missed if you don't check picture by picture.

What a difference with Crystal, were in-betweens are ugly and actually very noticeable

 

[Lady Pen]

I've somehow never put this together or paid that much attention.
I just always assumed it was some generic place or the Moon Kingdom, but you're right, it looks very east or south-east Asian. The openings always have such epic stuff happening that we never see...but that's anime, for ya.

I love all that extra information the openings and endings give you about the show. It's like "we can't tell you this in the episodes for reasons, enjoy it by watching the openings."

 

[kasumigenx]

I love all that extra information the openings and endings give you about the show. It's like "we can't tell you this in the episodes for reasons, enjoy it by watching the openings."

At least they never put the SenShi ships in the opening of the first season of the 90s anime.

 

[Rika-Chicchi]

At least they never put the SenShi ships in the opening of the first season of the 90s anime.

Talking about the OP of the 1st season, there're also some interesting visuals not seen in the actual show, tho I don't think they represent any missing/dropped plot elements - they're merely for the aesthetics. lol

 

[Talentless Fool]

Silver Moon Crystal Power Kiss

Beautiful!
The amount of work that when into this =

Look at the wavy movement of her left arm and hand!
She didn't need to be this elegant and good but my girl served!
The movement of the pigtails contrast and balance that of her body =

What a difference with Crystal, were in-betweens are ugly and actually very noticeable

For a moment, I was like, 'hey, perhaps I could do the Eternal version as well, it was cool!', then I went and rewatched them and NO.

The Eternal Moon transformation of the Dream movie has nice Yoshiyama style effects but art or animation-wise it's nothing special honestly.
They were forced to include that horrible panel for the manga in the sequence breaking it's momentum and they only thing good is the little slow down/bow she does before posing.

The OG 90s version completely wins over it.

As for the attack, there are some genuinely nice shots when she grabs and twirls around it.
But as for the 'attack' itself that fans label as 'epic', she just leaps forward - that's it.

And the Cosmos versions are utterly underwhelming.

They clearly didn't have the budget nor the talent to give justice to the 90s stocks so it would have been better for them to do their own thing rather than copy them.