The Sailor Moon Anime's Rainbow Crystal Arc Discussion

 Hey everyone, how's it going? I'm doing pretty well. I don't have a comic book review for you today as I didn't have a chance to read Dark Forces: Rebel Agent as I crashed with Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie on VHS last night. But I do have a topic that I wanna talk about today that is related to Manga and Anime. As you can see from the title, I'll be talking about the Rainbow Crystal arc from the 1992/1995 Anime adaptation of Sailor Moon. I'll mostly be focusing on the DIC Dub because that's what I know and that's what I've seen, though I will talk about the original version, including the Viz Media Dub, a little bit. So let's get into it.

The reason I wanted to write about this topic is because I did think it was weird that the Shadow Warriors were nowhere to be seen and not mentioned in episode 39, "The Past Returns", despite them being part of Queen Beryl's attack on the Moon Kingdom in earlier episodes. I knew it wasn't an oversight on the part of the writers of the DIC Dub, because none of the '90s Anime was reanimated for the North American version, just scenes cut down or removed entirely from said episode. Plus they were mentioned by Luna and Artemis in epsode 31, "A Reluctant Princess", while they weren't in the original Japanese or Viz Dub versions of that episode. So then I began to realize that it was simply an oversight on the part of the Japanese writers when the '90s Anime was getting made in 1992.

Because the Rainbow Crystals and the Shadow Warriors are unique to the '90s Anime, it's easy to assume that the writers of the '90s Anime weren't quite sure how they would integrate those elements into the story established in the Manga because they hadn't gotten there yet when they did the Rainbow Crystal arc. And because in those earlier episodes, Luna is only able to tell the Scouts what she knows, which isn't a whole lot since she doesn't remember who the Moon Princess is or who the fifth Scout is, or anything like that. And Queen Beryl being Queen Beryl, she also isn't aware of the Princess's identity even though she wasn't stripped of her memories being that she remembers the war between the Negaverse and the Moon Kingdom. At least in the DIC Dub. I don't know how much she remembers in the original Japanese version or the Viz Dub as I've only seen a few episodes from the Viz Dub (I have them on iTunes), and one or two episodes of the Japanese version. Regardless, because Luna is the mentor character and her memories are incomplete, she can only tell the Scouts what she knows and what Central Control tells her.

Adapting stories from one medium to another is never easy. And adapting comic books, be it American comic books or Manga, is even harder. Especially back in the '90s when the material wasn't taken as seriously by studio executives, and the visual effects were just starting to become what they are today. While the first volume of the original Sailor Moon Manga is five to six chapters long, depending on the release, and the Dark Kingdom arc, which was adapted into the first season of the '90s Anime, was wrapped up in about two and a half volumes, which was only 14 chapters, most Anime were between 40 and 60 episodes back in the '90s. Which means the people adapting the Manga into the Anime had to add alot into the storyline in order to fill the 46 episodes that the first season had. As a result it wasn't easy for them to integrate the new elements into the existing story while trying to keep it as close to the Manga as possible. 

What is even more crazy to me is how the writers at DIC were able to adapt Sailor Moon even further for the first two seasons of the original English dub, given they had to take alot of stuff out and alter many of the characters in order to fit the restrictions that North American Television had on children's programming at the time Sailor Moon was brought over here in 1995. 

I don't know if it's this way in the original Japanese version, but in episode 21, "Jupiter Comes Thundering In", Queen Beryl says that Queen Serenity locked the Shadow Warriors in the Silver Crystal, and Luna tells the Scouts the same thing in the very next episode. So, at least in the original English dub, the writers intended it to be Queen Serenity who defeated the seven Shadow Warriors, tying the Shadow Warriors and the Rainbow Crystals, into the main final battle between the Negaverse and the Moon Kingdom more closely than they were in the other two versions of the '90s Anime.

Like I said at the beginning of this post, I just found it weird that the writers of the DIC Dub would be so inconsistent, given they added Artemis's line about Queen Serenity defeating Beryl's strongest warriors and locking them away in the Silver Crystal in "A Reluctant Princess", but that part being ignored in "The Past Returns". Even though I knew that all of the flashback sequences in "The Past Returns" were taken from the Japanese version of that episode, it still felt weird to me as Artemis had that line while he and Luna were telling the Sailor Scouts about their past. But hey, that's what you get when you're trying to adapt a story from one medium to another, and from one language and culture to another.

That's going to be it for me for today. I'm not sure when my next blog post will be or what it'll be on. I'll try to have my review of Star Wars: Dark Forces: Rebel Agent out before next Wednesday as Ahsoka starts that day, and I'll be covering the two episode premiere. We'll see what happens though as I have an appointment on Monday. So until then have a great evening and I'll talk to you later. Take care.