I thought that as I am writing a fiction about Sailor Moon and a site with lots of Sailor Moon elements, I should explain a bit about the series behind it all. The information will not exactly be ground-breaking, any fan of the show will certainly know it all, I'm not trying to teach or tell anything new, but just give a little bit of background. Being stranded in the rainy ol UK (she says on a swelteringly warm day) we're a bit behind the rest of the world. You can now buy the SuperS series on dvd, but FoxKids I don't think will show the S season and I myself am only on the S season and constrained by money and time mainly. However, I have (thanks to the net) read a lot about all the five seasons and know quite a bit about the senshi.
Sailor Moon, in my experience, tends to be a really divisory series. People either like it alot, or they cannot stand it. Based solely on my experience mind you. The dubs made it very popular but also popular as a far more 'young' show than the original was set to be - not that the original didn't have a young target audience already, the dubbed seemed to lower that by a couple of age bands. Some people, I've heard and read, decide it is contrived stupidity for little kids about impossible young girls and overlong with poor animation. Other people the series just grabs hold of. I'm in the latter (obviously). I can't explain why, the series is oddly comforting as it was one of my first animes, but there is just something about the characters and plot setup that just attracts me. I think I tend to be quite a shoujo and mahou shoujo fan anyway, and I like the cutesy series'. Whatever, Sailor Moon has remained one of my favourite series since I began to find more out about and get into anime. So onto a bit actually about the series:
Sailor Moon was created by the very talented manga-ka, Takeuchi Naoko and begun as a manga series. Of the designs for the series, personally I love the manga designs best, Takeuchi-san has such a beautiful style and in some respects I do prefer it to some works by CLAMP. Not that I can actually translate the Japanese - I'm working on transliterating - but I still take one of my three manga volumes on holiday as a sort of comfort book, just to flick through the illustrations. Don't know about other people but i adore her drawing of the Black Lady on her introduction page for Act 22 in volume 6 of the manga.
There are 18 volumes of the manga, followed by the anime in 1992. Both follow the story of a young Japanese schoolgirl, Tsukino Usagi (name meaning: Bunny of the Moon) who discovers she had a past life as the Imperial Princess of the Moon but midway through her life the peaceful existence known as the Silver Millennium was shattered by the Negaverse led by Queen Metallia and Queen Beryl. The Moon Kingdom was close to collapse and the Princess' guardians, the four Sailor Soldiers of Mercury, Mars, Jupiter and Venus were losing their battles. Queen Serenity uses the Imperial Silver Crystal to send her daughter, Prince Endymion of Earth and the Sailor Soldiers 1000 years in the future, while at the same time shattering this crystal to trap and seal away Beryl's seven Shadow Warriors. In the Present day, the Princess has been reborn and discovered by feline guardian Luna to be a clutzy 14 year old schoolgirl. With the Negaverse renewing its attacks, Luna gives the Princess instructions on how to become a superheroine, Sailor Moon to fight the evil. Along the way the scouts are rediscovered and new evils are fought with each new season. In total the series spanned 5 seasons and 200 episodes; Classic, R, Super, SuperS and Stars with a total of 11 sailor senshi, countless villains and a whole universe created perfect for fanfics and of course otaku senshi.
Many consider either the 3rd season, Super, which introduces the Outer Senshi of Uranus, Neptune and Saturn while giving Pluto a firmer role, or the final season, Stars as the strongest seasons in terms of plot and character. Maybe also because these two seasons use all the senshi, Stars also adds in the Three StarLights, characters searching for their own Princess Kakuyuu. And Sailor Moon becomes Eternal Sailor Moon. I can't give a personal opinion without seeing it, needless to say its high on a wish list, I just need to find out how....
A usual of any information page, a little bit on the characters:
As I love the manga so much, a mini-manga gallery
