Usagi Tsukino is a perfectly ordinary 14-year-old girl living in the Juuban District of Tokyo, Japan. She gets less-than-average grades, enjoys napping, eating + crying, and lives a largely peaceful life with her parents and younger brother. Then of course there's the fact that one day, the mysterious talking cat Luna appears and tells her that she's the pretty Sailor-suited Soldier of Love and Justice, Sailor Moon! At first the leader of the Soldiers destined to protect The Princess, it was revealed that she was the princess. And on top of that, she held the Maboroshi no Ginzuishou ('Illusionary Silver Crystal'), the strongest artifact in the Universe. It's always in the last person you look!
Being the reincarnation of the Moon Princess, with the ability to wield the Ginzuishou, Sailor Moon is one of the most powerful beings in the Universe. In the Super Series it is also revealed that she has the purest heart; a heart so pure it dwarfs even the Holy Grail, a legendary chalice of immense power (which then becomes one of her tools).
She will always fight to the end to protect her friends, even if it means her death, to the extent that she'd rather lie down and let the enemy win than see her friends die. She tries to save everyone; fortunately, she's so head-strong that her hairbrained strategies usually end up working.

In the past, Usagi was Princess Serenity, the beautiful and delicate heir to the Silver Millenium and secret girlfriend of the hansome and loyal Prince Endymion. Then she got dead. Oh snap! Reincarnated approximately a thousand years later and forced to fight the reawakened evil as the Sailor Moon we know and love. Fast-forward another 1000 years to the future, she is NeoQueen Serenity, the wise and powerful ruler of Crystal Tokyo (the future capital of the world). She reigns justly with her husband King Endymion and their daughter, Small Lady Serenity. And yet, she has the linguistic skills of a primary school student. Who'd a' thunk it?

Usagi has quite a few romantic interests that aren't a thousand years in either direction, however. In the R Season Fillers she was courted constantly by the very good-looking Seijuurou Ginga, who was also the temporary villain Ali (an alien from outer space who sought to take over the Earth with his lover, En. Yeah, she wasn't too happy about his obsession with Usagi). And then all the way into the fifth series, Stars, she is wooed by the charismatic but ultimately female Kou Seiya. Despite her many efforts, poor Seiya never manages to win her over, and eventually accepts that her feelings are one-sided.

But of course, her biggest squeeze is the sharp-dressing, bud-tossing, bike-riding Mamoru Chiba, the reincarnated soul of Prince Endymion who also got dead about the same time as his ill-fated lover. Together they've suffered through intense dislike, brainwashing, death, amnesia, intense dislike again, Arabian knights, recollection + reunion, sham breakups, Prince Demando, future children with Electra complexes, future children with bestiality tendencies, Fiore, Nehellenia, and the whole period where Usagi thinks Mamoru's ditched her when he went to America when in reality he just died again. Isn't that sweet?

• Usagi's 14 when the Manga starts, not 13.
• Usagi is in love with Mamoru and only Mamoru. She isn't in love with Seiya; she doesn't even realise that he has a crush on her.
• Her nickname is 'Odango Atama', which means 'Dumpling Head'. 'Odango Atama' is not a dessert, and an 'Odango' is not a savoury dish. It's a sweet dumpling.

• In the Manga, Princess Serenity stabbed herself through with Endymion's sword when she found his prone corpse. Ouch. However in the Anime, both were killed at the same time by the Dark Kingdom.
• How she rose to the throne as NeoQueen Serenity is left ambiguous in the Manga. However in the Anime, it's explained that the world goes through a second Ice Age and Sailor Moon ascends to the throne after she's healed everyone.
• In the Anime, she graduates into Highschool in the Stars season. However in the Manga, she was already in Highschool in the Dream Arc (SuperS Season).
• The last scene of Usagi + Mamoru in the Anime is them kissing under a (huge) full moon. At the end of the Manga, Usagi + Mamoru are getting married, and the other Soldiers are her bridesmaids.
• Usagi + Mamoru seem to have a much more 'innocent' relationship in the Anime. In the Manga, it's heavily implied they've slept together on more than one occasion.
• In the Anime, NeoQueen Serenity has never seen her younger self. Usagi had only seen her through the quartz she was encased in. In the Manga, however, they actually met face-to-face because they were so curious, despite Luna's warnings because it could cause a total melt-down of the space-time continuum. Hey, I said curious, not rational.

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Mythology

Princess Serenity is named after both Selene, the Titan Goddess of the Moon, and 'Mare Serenitatis', or 'Sea of Serenity', a large area on the moon. This doesn't mean her name can be written as 'Selenity', however.

Selene embodied the full moon with her pale face and beauty. She rode a charriot drawn by two white horses, and would trail it across the sky every night and sink into the ocean when she was done. Her brother Helios was the sun and her sister Eos was the dawn.

Interestingly the goddess Selene always wore a crescent moon on top of her head. Interesting not only because she was the Goddess of the full moon, but because the Serenity lineage of the Sailor Moon anime all had crescent moons on their forehead.

Selene was in love with Endymion, a beautiful hunter/sheperd/King mortal from Earth (specifically Asia Minor). Selene was so smitten with him that he begged Zeus to grant him eternal sleep. Endymion was given the option and he took it, staying alive and never aging. He would never wake but at least he could stay by her side. Every night, Serenity would go and visit Endymion at Mount Latmus.

Endymion gave Selene 50 daughters.
Fifty.
Good lord.
Oh, and a good deal of those were conceived after he nodded off, mind you. :V

Selene is sometimes referred to as Artemis, another goddess of the moon. In the Endymion myth she is also sometimes substituted with Hera.

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Technical

Sailor Moon's Voice Actress in the Japanese Anime is Kotono Mitsuishi. She's a very famous voice actress and plays several other well-known characters in popular Animes, such as Misato Katsuragi from Neon Genesis Evangelion, Kagura Sohma from Fruits Basket and Excel from Excel Saga. She's also made small appearances in Cardcaptor Sakura, Fullmetal Alchemist, Great Teacher Onizuka, Doraemon, Anpanman and Pokémon. She's also provided voices for Video Game characters like Christie from Dead or Alive 3 + 4.
She was sick for a couple of Episodes and so Kae Araki did her voice, who later went on to play Chibi-Usa.

For the North American dub, her Voice Actresses are (in order of appearance) Tracey Moore, Terri Hawkes and Linda Ballantyne. All three have done minor work in various Care Bears shows (but not together).

The Sailor Moon Musicals - Sera Myu - are split up into 4 stages depending on which actress is playing Sailor Moon. From left to right:

First Stage: Anza Ooyama
Second Stage: Fumina Hara
Third Stage: Miyuki Kanbe
Fourth Stage: Marina Kuroki

Anza Ooyama is now in a heavy metal band called Head Phones President. Miyuki found work in a couple of popular Animes, singing the two opening songs to Mermaid Melody Pichi Pichi Pitch, but she's also in hospital for an eating disorder, poor girl. Fumina is apparently the most successful now, having appeared in 12 different movies + is due to appear in her 13th this coming July. Marina's got her whole career ahead of her since she debuted as Sailor Moon at 12.
You heard me.

In the Live Action Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon she is played by Miyuu Sawai (image on the right). Miyuu remained a fairly succesful idol after the show's completion, and as well as numerous photo shoots has acted in a couple of movies; she had a large part in a Japanese horror movie Chain 2, and she was the voice actress of Noah the Gypsie in the Fullmetal Alchemist: Conquerer of Shamalla Movie.

Sailor Moon's Image Songs are 'Ai Kotoba ha Moon Prism Power Make-Up!' ('The Password is Moon Prism Power Make-Up!'), 'Yumemiru Dake ja Dame' ('Just Dreaming is No Good'), 'I am Sailormoon', 'Ai ha Energy' ('Love is Energy') and 'Ai wo Shinjiteru' ('Believe in Love'). She also shares the love Ballad 'You Are Just My Love' as Princess Serenity with Prince Endymion. Her Image Songs in PGSM are 'Over Rainbow Tour' and 'Here We Go'. In the North American Dub, her Image Songs are 'Carry On', 'The Power of Love' and 'It's a New Day'. As Princess 'Serena' she also has the Image Song 'My Only Love'. She also shares a duet Image Song with 'Raye' called 'Who Do You Think You Are?'. Interestingly (if you find this sort of stuff interesting) she has the additional Image Song 'I Wanna Hold Your Hand', which is a weird teeny-bopper cover of the Beatles song of the same name with the lyrics tweaked so it's a girl singing to a boy instead of vice-versa. Lovely. All of Serena's Image Songs are sung by Jennifer Cihi.

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