The Perfect Score: Sailor Moon

In this series I detail the few series I have given a 5/5 too and why.

What is it?

Long ago, the cosmos was at peace, the forces of primordial chaos kept at bay by the soldiers of the stars, the Sailor Senshi. At the apex of this was the Silver Millennium based on our Moon ruled by the wise and noble Queen Serenity who bore the child destined to be the messiah of the universe against Chaos. Then Chaos created it’s children, the dark stars, the chaos stars, who roamed across the universe and brought an end to the Silver Millennium.

Queen Serenity gave her life to protect her child and reincarnated her daughter and her planetary guardians on Earth far in the future where, as Usagi Tsukino she would go on to lead the Sailor Senshi of the Solar System and save the universe from Chaos

Why do I love it?

Confession time, if I was rating out of 10, all my other 5/5s would be 9/10s, and SM would be my only 10/10. That’s not because it’s a perfect series. It’s not, it relies on deus ex machina sometimes and it’s arcs could stand to be more connected….but what it does….

Sailor Moon is a series that is perfectly equidistant from all the other 5/5 series of mine. It’s like somebody combined the essenses of everything I liked into one. The Manga especially.

What I love so much about the Sailor Moon Manga is how much trust and faith it puts in the reader. It introduces dark, heavy, and intricate topics and it expects you to follow along and YOU CAN. It’s a series about a simple girl like me and why we matter to the world and it makes me like myself in a way nothing else ever has.

Sailor Moon has this magical quality about it that….you know most good things the more good they are, the worse other things look in comparison. Sailor Moon doesn't do that. Thinking about Sailor Moon and any other thing, and that thing somehow always seems better, it’s as if seeing the same archetypal struggle or pattern in SM makes me recognize it in the other series and makes it shine brighter.

I don’t know how it does this, I seriously don’t. Everytime I read Sailor Moon, everytime else seems so much better, entertainment seems better, people seem more beautiful and wise, the world seems friendlier and it never leaves.

It’s gotten to the point that I have considered making a longer retrospective for SM because I could never explain all the many many reasons I love it in a single blog but my god SM to me is unparalled in fiction. The best parts of most series is the average to Sailor Moon, and the best parts of Sailor Moon are like nothing else I have ever seen. They blow my mind, they make me feel with an intensity I couldn’t imagine and yet they are emotions I had never felt before, it makes my spirit rise.

5/5 Moments:

*Each of the Senshi Introductions in the manga

*Princess Serenity awakening in the manga

*Sailor V’s awakening to her past life in the prequel manga

*The Fall of the Silver Millenium in every canon

*The spirit of Queen Serenity blessing her daughter

*Sailor Moon awakening her full potential and realizing her unified self through time thanks to the love of Tuxedo Kamen

*Sailor Moon defeating Queen Metallia, her power making the Moon shine like the Silver Crystal restoring Mamoru’s sight and the whole Moon Kingdom restored from her pure energy

*Usagi and Mamoru consummating their love in the second arc

*Diana become the tiny guardian of space and time for Sailor Pluto

*Sailor Pluto’s sacrifice leading to Chibi-Moon’s awakening, the end of old life leading to new life

*Sailor Moon and Sailor Chibi-Moon, mother and daughter merging their power to destroy Death Phantom

*Chibi-Moon and Saturn’s relationship

*First Henshin into Super Sailor Moon in the Manga

*Hotaru as a soul protecting the souls of the senshi from Mistress 9

*The whole ending of the third arc with the messiahs of darkness and light Sailor Saturn and Sailor Moon working in unison to save the Earth

*The Senshi’s awakening to their Sailor Crystals in the fourth arc of the manga

*Tuxedo Kamen twice powering through his worst nightmare from his love for Sailor Moon

*The Union of the Silver and Golden Crystals bringing about the downfall of Nehelenia’s curse, sending a light through the universe, Usagi and Mamoru’s love so powerful that the whole universe is made aware of it

*Galaxia’s backstory

*Usagi and Galaxia’s battle which is the most hype battle I’ve ever seen

*Usagi confronting Chaos, absorbing the lambda power, the power of the whole cosmos, her acceptance and love for the whole universe allowing her to transcend even the primordial void

*Usagi and Mamoru’s wedding at the end of the manga

*Nephrite’s sacrifice in the anime

*All the Senshi’s sacrifices at the end of the first anime season

*Sailor Moon saving the brainwashed Prince Endymion in the anime

*Sailor Moon with the spirits of the other senshi stopping Super-Beryl at the end of the first season of the anime

*Sailor Moon going into Chibiusa’s dream to stop DEATH who was in her dreams, representing her trauma seeing her city bombed and gas-ed and seeing death everywhere. Death triumphing over everything but Sailor Moon pleads with Chibiusa to believe in her and when she does Sailor Moon defeats Death itself and saves her.

*Uranus and Neptune’s backstory in the third season of the anime

*The whole of the second Nehelenia Arc. Everything about it

*The whole 5-episode anime battle with Galaxia, by far the longest battle in the franchise history

*Saturn breaking from Nehelenia’s control in the musicals and her power along with Eternal Sailor Moon resetting the world of dreams

*In the musicals when Galaxia kills Endymion and Beryl who had merged with hatred itself attacks her one-shotting all of her minions at once yelling “YOU KILLED MY ENDYMION?!”

*The end of the first stage of musicals where Naoko Takeuchi comes and personally hugs and thanks the actress who played Usagi.

*In the Sailor Moon Another Story Game Queen Serenity getting to meet her time-traveling granddaughter Chibiusa, knowing that all she fought and sacrificed for was not in vain and that not only her daughter was safe and happy, but that she has gone on to continue her legacy and have a daughter all her own

*In PGSM the first time Usagi turns into Princess Sailor Moon and battles away the whole Dark Kingdom

*In PGSM when Beryl releases her mental hold over the Heavenly Kings when the Dark Kingdom is collapsing and Jadeite still refuses to leave her, remaining loyal to her until the end

*In PGSM, Rei finding out about Minako’s death is so turmoiled and enraged that she kills a youma that was defeating the whole Senshi team earlier

*So many more

Favorite Moment:

In the First Sailor Moon Movie: Promise of the Rose, the Alien Fiore possessed by the Xenian Blossom and enraged at the thought that the whole Earth abandoned him and Mamoru to be alone forever and that the people of Earth are all evil is torturing Sailor Moon asking what she could possibly know of being alone, of hating herself, of thinking the world would be better without them, and Sailor Moon is screaming with pain, the Guardian Senshi drained of energy look on and remember what it was like before Usagi, how their powers isolated them from others, how they were alone and beg him with what little strength they have not to take Usagi from them since without her they’d all have been alone.

Later Sailor Moon as Princess Serenity is trying to stop the asteroid Fiore sent hurtling towards Earth using what remains of her energy. The Guardian Senshi channel their energy to Sailor Moon remembering their interactions with her, how she had seen them not how others had seen them or even as they had presented themselves, but who they really were.

Sailor Moon thinks to herself that it’s incredible, that she always drew strength from the others but she never realized how she helped others before declaring that she would never leave alone alone again, something I always declare along with her!

In this scene I see who I am and who I want to be, it is a scene expressing the theme of Sailor Moon: Isolation, it is a scene that really shows why people like me are liked and wanted and needed and it’s a scene I could never have even conceived of. It’s a scene expressing the most basic tendency of people to be known to each other, to be together. This moment is the encapsulation of what I want to be to others, I want to be their moon shining through the endless night, who will never ever force them to be alone.