"The Return of SailorMoon"- episode #41


(Japanese title: Revival of Moon! A mysterious monster appears- episode

#47) THE PLOT: With her memories of being a Sailor Scout erased after the battle with Beryl and her friends forgotten, Serena wakes up late for school(gee, what else is new). After a taunting Sammy flags her down for forgetting her bag, she runs into Ami at school- whom she finds strangely familiar but can't quite place.

Later that night, Serena is awakened by a loud crash and a light shining through her bedroom window. A mysterious meteor crashes into a grassy area; seconds later, a plantlike, glowing orb rises from the site of the crash, floats off above the city, and finally reaches the window of an empty apartment.

As spectators gather around the hole left by the crash, Serena runs into Ami and Lita; she vaguely remembers the latter as "that new student who's always getting into fights," a designation which Lita doesn't take kindly to. ^_^

Then she has the strange feeling of having known them before... and then manages to get hold of a flier for a sale at a candy store. A taunting onlooker(gee, I wonder who) informs her that if she eats too much candy, she's going to look like a "big fat meatball."

Finally, we see Alan and Ann sitting on the balcony of their new apartment, gloating over "their" new planet and all the energy on it. Conveniently for the viewers, they discuss their plan to disguise themselves as brother and sister so they can steal energy from the students at the nearby school- we then hear, for the first time, the strange haunting refrains of Alan's flute song.

The next day, Serena's teacher introduces two new students, "Alan and Ann Granger," a brother and sister in 10th and 9th grade, respectively. Serena and Molly drool over Alan, and Melvin gets jealous. Later on, in the classroom, Ann announces that she lived abroad for a long time; Serena asks her to say something in French. Ann responds with a strange babble that doesn't sound very French; sweatdrops abound.

Just then, Serena and Molly hear Alan's flute music wafting through the hallway, and start swooning again. Ann hears it too, but her reaction is much less, shall we say, approving. Serena and Molly start mobbing Alan(along with a dozen other girls), Melvin, envious, makes a very hideous attempt to play the flute himself.

Br>

Alan spots Serena, feels an instant attraction, and immediately offers to play for her. Seconds later, Ann, infuriated, shows up, and ends Alan's short-lived attempt at courtship. On the way home, Ann scolds him for his actions at school. "I can't believe you played our music in front of all those people!" Alan tells her to control her jealousy, reminding her that they're supposed to be brother and sister.

Ann informs him that she'll never fall for a human- then promptly spots Darien on the way home from school, goes ballistic, and starts chasing after him. Unfortunately, she runs out of energy and collapses on the sidewalk before she gets a chance to confess her feelings.

At the same time, Serena and Molly are walking home from school, and Luna has an ominous feeling... Back at Alan and Ann's apartment, Alan and a nearly comatose Ann are sitting underneath the Doom Tree. As Alan babbles to himself about the need to find energy, the tree begins to glow, sprouts a pod of some sorts, and revives Ann with a drop of some icky-looking glowing stuff. No sooner does Ann wake up than the new branch shrivels and dies. Panicked, Alan starts in again about the urgency of finding energy; Ann assures him that they'll be able to get as much as they need here, and that humans have the strongest life energy of all the Earth's creatures. She adds that young schoolgirls seem to have a lot of energy; Alan agrees, but Ann manages to persuade him not to target schoolboys as well. They then choose the first Cardian for their mission(it's the Amazing Monster That Knows Its Name).

The monster makes its first attack on a woman in an alley; Luna and Artemis, after witnessing it, agree on the need to revive Sailor Moon. The next victim is- gee, I wonder! It just CAN'T be- Molly, who was on the phone with Serena when the monster broke in. Serena quickly shows up at the door with Molly's mom, who faints instantly at the sight of the monster. Luna tells her to run away; Serena, amazed that her cat's talking, decides it's all a dream, and goes into her "I'll punish you!" pose, then does a double take. "Whoah! Where'd THAT come from?" Luna performs the Luna Mind-Meld on Serena, who instantly flashes back to the final battle with Queen Beryl and remembers her previous life. Disappointed and upset, but recognizing the urgency of the situation, Serena transforms into Sailor Moon. The monster ties her up and starts sucking out her energy, but a last-minute kitty attack saves Serena, who then proceeds to destroy the monster with her tiara.

Serena struggles to her feet and comes face-to-face with the apparition of Alan and Ann, who proceed to inform her that it's now "their" planet. "Get used to it, brats!" After the welcoming committee fades into thin air, Serena walks away dejectedly, bidding farewell to her dreams of being a normal girl.


CHANGED AND CUT SCENES:

As far as I can tell, no scenes were cut out of the episode. It was originally aired as a sort of "premiere" episode on Fox, and was one of the first to be dubbed, which is why Serena's voice is different. Artemis's voice also sounded funny in this episode; I'm not sure if it was a different actor or if Ron Rubin was still trying to find a good voice for the character.

In the beginning, when Luna and Artemis were sitting on the roof talking, Artemis suggested, "Why don't we get friendly like normal cats?" (Note: "friendly" in this context is the same sort of "friendly" as a giant unneutered dog who mistakes your leg for another dog.) Luna called him "disgusting."

Alan and Ann originally had different names at school(Ginga Seijuro and Ginga Natsumi).

Serena asked Ann to speak English in the original, not French. (But she didn't respond with real English either.)

Also, the "Luna Mind Meld" wasn't given any name.

When Alan and Ann are sitting on the balcony of the apartment, Alan mentions that he read a legend about the great hero Perseus fighting a monster to protect Andromeda, and tells Ann he'd like to do that as well. Also, Alan told Serena that the song he was going to play for her at school was called "Galaxy Illusion Instant Song- Miracle of Beautiful Andromeda."


COMMENTS: This one is a little shaky, especially compared to all the other Alan/Ann episodes, which are quite accurately translated. I think it's because it was dubbed as a "premiere." There's a lot of references to Queen Beryl and the Negaforce; this episode gives the impression that Alan, Ann, and the Doom Tree were actually _sent_ by the Negaverse, which is totally contradicted in later episodes. I consider these references to hold the same place in the Sailor Moon canon as "Star Trek V" does in the ST canon: it didn't happen. ^_^ Also, I think this episode is the last time Sailor Moon uses her tiara and it actually WORKS(except for in the R movie). In this episode, Alan plays a different tune for summoning the cardian, and it's completely different than the one he plays in subsequent episodes. (Actually, I don't know why they didn't keep this music. In the original, he _did_ use a different tune to summon the cardians.)

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