A Review of the Nostalgia Critic's Review of Sailor Moon

So people seem to have wanted this review to a years old review from me so..........uh............hear I am?

I'm a big fan of Sailor Moon. I have seen the entirety of the 200 episodes Sailor Moon Classic multiple times. I have seen Sailor Moon Crystal multiple times. I have read the 60 act manga, MANY times. I have seen all the SM specials and have watched the 3 SM movies. I have watched all of PGSM, the live-action series including the Special Acts. I have played most of the Sailor Moon video games. I have not only seen the original English dub in it's entirety, I have read novelizations of the original English Dub. I have seen all the Stage Musicals both original form and the Kaiteban, yes ALL the stages. I have read many interviews with the creator Naoko Takeuchi and alongside the manga own all of her artbooks (both original collection and material collection) giving all the precious art and details of the series. I have actually played the Sailor Moon Card Game based on the English Dub. What I'm getting at is I know this series pretty well.

I don't have anything against Doug as a person. I am not a regular viewer of his but I don't think he's a bad person or anything. This will be strictly a criticism and occasional defense of his Review of Sailor Moon. You want to support him, here is link to the original video.

I am going to be going over the vid bit by bit with some final thoughts at the end.

Let me actually defend something to start however. I've seen people saying he should have watched the entire series.

Guys let's be realistic here for a second. The original Sailor Moon Anime is 200 episodes long. 200 EPISODES LONG! I am a huge SM fanatic and it still took me like 2 weeks to marathon that last time I tried. Even if you just took the 159 episodes that were dubbed into English, including the final Season Sailor Stars being cut entirely, he has nowhere near the amount of time needed to watch all that even if he had that inclination. Not with also having to write, rewrite, produce, and edit the episode. A lot of the problems come from him simply not knowing much about SM, but you can't expect him to see the entirety of it. That is unreasonable as a time demand.

Is there something he could have done that would have been better? Yes actually. The first Sailor Moon Movie: Promise of the Rose is 1 hour long. Promise of the Rose has amazing reception from the SM fanbase, often considered the best movie and has been legit called the "Platonic Ideal" of SM. It is the perfect thing to watch to understand SM. It's also my favorite movie ever but shhhh.

You know what comes with Promise of the Rose? There's a 15 minute short called "Make-Up! Sailor Senshi" which is a funny skit entirely devoted to catching people up to speed on the SM characters, their personalities and the basic worldbuilding for the movie. It was literally the purpose of this short to be played in theaters before the movie so people who didn't know SM could be brought up to speed.

1 Hour, 15 Minutes. You get introduced to the characters and the world in a funny skit and then you get one of the best SM stories ever. Given how short it is relative to some things he reviewed in similar timeframe, he could theoretically watch it in both English and Japanese. It was also dubbed by DiC, the company that made the first English Dub, aka the "Nostalgic" one. Really simple, really easy. If he brought in a SM fan like Linkara for instance, it would have worked even better. It would basically be like his Digimon: The Movie review but he would get some introduction to the world better then that one did.

While I know he did get some help from Moonies on this, it's hard to tell how much. However watching the first few episodes of the series and then attempting to extrapolate what the "formula" of this series is very clearly a flawed way of getting the information you are trying to extrapolate. The best thing he could have done with this in my view is ask people who really like the series for help and directions. But maybe that's asking too much. I try and judge things for what they ARE, rather then what they COULD BE. So let's get into his actual review now. Warning: Gonna be a lot of nitpicks.



0:30- We are quickly introduced to the opening skit where "Dr. Hack, the master of formulas" who is trying to derive the formula for a show to be repeated over and over to make NC money beyond his wildest dreams.
1:37- Dr. Hack describes the formula that NC would go on to describe as being Sailor Moon's. What is Sailor Moon's Supposed formula?

"14-year old girl acts stupid, uses magical powers to look slutty and stupid, talking cat tells her how to fight crime because she's so stupid, surrounds herself with smarter girls that make her look even more stupid"

Off to a great start aren't we? This is how my favorite series is being described. Sigh. Various parts of this will come up later but let me talk about SM's "formula" for a second.

The original SM Manga has no formula because it was absolutely awesome. Sailor Moon Classic was a very formulaic anime though his description is not only insulting, more problematic it is vague and doesn't really describe any actual plot information or what happens. If I was to imagine a show based purely on this and you did as well we could imagine things that have no resemblance. So what IS the Sailor Moon "Formula"

The Average Episode of Sailor Moon Classic went as follows:

1: Important Mundane Event is going on in the lives of the Sailor Senshi
2: Location/Victim of the Week is introduced related to this
3: Secondary Big Bad of this Arc threatens or otherwise commands current Miniboss
4:  Miniboss releases monster of the week which happens to threaten the event, location, or victim mentioned in the first 2 points
5: Senshi Transform and Usagi does her "in the name of the Moon!" speech
6: Fight with the Monster where the Senshi get in someway entangled or otherwise incapacited only to be saved by mysterious protector of whatever the arc is (Tuxedo Kamen/Moonlight Knight...then Tuxedo Kamen again/The Outer Senshi/Pegasus/Sailor Starlights)
7: Usagi uses finishing move of the arc
8: Miniboss gets angry that their plan failed
9: Resolution to the event happening in point 1

This episodes tend to be mostly lighthearted comedy in the anime. This continues until the Miniboss is told to stop the Senshi or die at which point the Miniboss does some kind of unpredictable final confrontation with the Senshi and dies. Somewhere between 4 and 7 minibosses later we get to the end of the season where the secondary big bad releases the REAL big bad, which is some kind of horrific monstrosity that does a whole bunch of horrible cosmic sh*t before Usagi defeats the enemy with the power of friendship/family/compassion/dreams/love depending on the season in a magical rainbow sparkly lightshow. The end of each miniboss arc makes it closer to the manga, and the end of each season is actually really close to what the manga is like, and it's honestly these parts I like most about Sailor Moon Classic. The Manga is best canon imo. The Manga is fast-paced, intense, philosophical and sometimes freaking metal the entire time. 

I give all this information for an important reason. I want you to see that SM DOES have a formula...but the formula is one that allows for so much more variety then the formula explained in the review does. 

1:57- "Do they have a villain that keeps attacking the same town?" "Yesssss"

Will get to this later, but there is a stated reason they attack Azabu-Juuban (the part of Tokyo SM takes place in) in each season.

2:02- "Do they have a tedious relationship with a magical boyfriend"

Oh don't get me started! I really don't like what the Classic did to the relationship between Usagi and Mamoru. This is part of what Naoko-sama meant when she said that the anime had a "slight male perspective". They did not know how to write Mamoru at all.

2:04- "Do they repeat the same animation?" "Worse then Hanna-Barbara!"

Yep, I completely agree here that is a problem with Sailor Moon Classic, and one of the reasons I was so happy that Crystal had attacks that weren't stock footage. Anime, especially in the 90s was made cheaply, so yeah SM Classic reused stock footage of attacks and character intros A LOT.

2:07- "And it was successful?" "It's one of the most popular animes of all time!"

MFW he actually uses "animes" with an s to indicate plural. lol, not really a big deal just funny. And yeah Sailor Moon is one of the most popular anime of all time. I'd argue it's the third most popular after DBZ and Pokemon. It was the gateway anime so I understand for a lot of girls in the west and it shaped the magical girl genre as we know today to the point that there are maybe 2 magical girl anime with as much impact on the current scene as it (Cardcaptor Sakura and Puella Magi Madoka Magicka)

2:43- "I remember when it first aired in America. It was an export from Japan, which I think was originally called "Magical Girl Squad Robo Dance Yes"

very slight cringe I want to be on your side and say this review isn't as insulting as people make it out to be but some of these jokes really seem like they are trying to be insulting.

3:14- Starts talking about the opening

...I can't help it.

FIGHTING EVIL BY MOONLIGHT!
WINNING LOVE BY DAYLIGHT!
NEVER RUNNING FROM A REAL FIGHT!
SHE IS THE ONE NAMED SAILOR MOON!

4:00- *Jokes about how Girls who like Sailor Moon wouldn't like Star Wars*

Hey I like Star Wars! Well the OT. I didn't see the prequels because I heard they were bad. I saw episode 7 and it just wasn't for me so I stopped. 

Although the idea of Usagi (oh sorry "Serena", this dub name thing is gonna get annoying isn't it?) replacing Darth Vader is pretty humorous.

There are similarities between SM and SW. Both have space themes, and both talk about mystical unifying forces that bind all things, The Cosmos and The Force. Eh.
'
5:03- Starts talking about the weird way English Dub Episode 1 starts

I have no idea why the old English Dub does this. It takes clips from Episode 44 of the original, the fall of the Moon Kingdom, one of the most important scenes of the series as Usagi is shown the tragic fall of the legacy that was passed down unto her, what she must avenge and restore, and put it awkwardly at the start of episode.

I guess they didn't have faith little girls could follow the story ok which....it so against the idea of SM and what it stands for.

5:10- "At first, it seems like it's gonna be a big… space battle between cosmic planet...people...folk."

MFW this is actually what the series is.

5:38- "Yeah... Look, show, even if you pretend you have a story that matters beyond people who see a high-class meal as a flaming Hot Pocket…"

....ok....let me remind you of something you said earlier in this video:

"It's one of the most popular animes of all time!"

Considering it's popularity, why do you think only people that stupid or shallow would like it? Do you just think the majority of people are idiots?

I try not to be insulted but it's stuff like this that makes it seem very personal.

5:45- "...you still have to follow up that supposed "epicness" with this:"
*clip of the actual start of episode 1 with Usagi rushing downstairs being late to school*

Critic when you are watching a Spider-Man Movie, do you just get bored when you see Peter Parker's troubles with his job, or him in class thinking about his crush? It's our superheroines normal life. What's the problem?

6:22-“She's just your everyday gigantic-eye blond Japanese girl...”

Ok so anime characters generally have different hair and eye colors just to be visually distinct from each other, it's not meant to actually represent their real colors. But I guess the confusion is warranted from someone who doesn't watch anime.

6:33- “You don't understand! I'm Japanese! To me, failure is everything!”

...This is getting slightly uncomfortable to talk about. The fact that the characters are Japanese doesn't really mean much, especially in episode 1. In fact the very idea of Usagi is how relatable she is. That she's just a normal schoolgirl, who likes sweets and crushes on cute boys, and doesn't like hard tests. She's deliberately meant to be someone we can relate to. But so far this review has uncomfortably fixated on the "Japanese" thing. Maybe I'm too sensitive but lines like this don't help the picture.

6:41- "Being pretty as sin and dumb as cheese, she, of course, is very popular in school, obtaining all sorts of friends. Like an over-the-top accent with a human attached to it... ...and the awkward years of Dr. Insano's puberty."

Funny points about Naru (Molly) and Umino (Melvin) though I don't recall the anime, original or dub ever stating Usagi was popular at school.

This is the part of the episode where I think it should slip in that Usagi is meant to be an audience avatar, which is really important to understanding things later. But....I'm not sure if he wanted to give it that much thought.

He goes on a bit about how "stupid" she is....freak I know the Dub exaggerated Usagi/Serena's bookdumb nature but....this seems really exaggerated. I watched the DiC Dub of episode 1 for this, and "Serena" doesn't seem that dumb. 

7:42- “Uh-huh. And how tediously long do they drag that out… Oh, Jesus! Just mail me the comedic banter to my office shredder!”

This does make me wonder how if he actually knows how long it takes for them to get together. In the manga it was the end of arc 1, and it saved the universe because Usagi's love for him for reasons that are hard to explain here allowed her to access the power of the Silver Crystal. In the anime, they drag it out to like midway through season 2. That's because the anime didn't know how to write romance arcs because it was written by a lot of men. Bleh.

That said, I think he may be exaggerated this as well. Season 2 out of 5 for a relationship to get together doesn't seem that extreme.

7:57- “By the way, here's a confusing scene. We see her walk by a poster of a young girl dressed exactly how she is dressed. Like it's from a movie or a show or something…So...what? A movie or a TV industry got wind of this idea that coincidentally is exactly the same as what's going on right now?"

...mightttttttttt have wanted to do a little bit of research here. "Sailor V" is Sailor Venus. She is doing stuff while Sailor Moon is doing stuff. Specifically she is pretending to be the moon princess so the Dark Kingdom doesn't think it's Sailor Moon, hence why she goes by Sailor V and not Sailor Venus. 

Yes, foreshadowing. Things happening in the background. It's almost as if this being "one of the most popular animes of all time" means it's not actually stupid, means that it might actually be worth intellectual analysis. 

Sailor Venus joins the others in episode 33 of the original "Enter Venus, the Last Sailor Guardian". In the dub it's episode 29 "Sailor V makes the scene". This is first season stuff you could learn quite literally by looking at the episode titles. 

8:55- "And, of course, this gives way to the famous transformation scene."

Oh God.

9:00- "The tiara, the boots, the nail polish...later covered by gloves so that was pointless, and, of course, the miniskirt. The mini-mini-mini-mini-MINI-mini-mini-mini-miniskirt. Yup, the costume choice that in no way enables her to fight better but sure does force her to squat a lot. Okay, so take out the fact that it's obviously in no way battle armor. Take out the fact that it's obviously fanservice."

Ok I need to make something REALLY REALLY clear right now because it is important to understanding why a lot of Moonies get upset at this.

The Sailor Moon Transformation Sequences and Senshi Fuku....are not sexual. They are not sexual fanservice. The fact that you PERSONALLY found it sexual, honestly says more about you then it does about this show.

What are the Senshi wearing. First of all, the underside of their uniforms are not panties. The Senshi Fuku is comprised of a torso section that covers the entire torso like a figure skater outfit. It then has a miniskirt and several pieces added on top of that. You want to know why I know this isn't sexual.

The Sailor Fuku is just a colorful form of an actual school uniform. This is a Sailor Fuku Uniform common in Japan. Why is it designed this way? 

It's because Sailor Moon is on some level part escapism. It's about imaging your school uniform is actually a magical outfit of a cosmic guardian. It's the same reason kids use towels or sheets as superhero capes. 

The fact that you call it an "obviously sexualized transformation" makes this really awkward because I have to tell you it's not intended to be sexual. This is a show for young girls. It's meant to look cool and pretty. That's it. It's meant to be elegant like ballet dances while also powerful like a magical superhero.

He also mentions it takes a full minute in each episode and yeah complaining about Magical Girl Transformation sequences times to a Magical Girl Fan is like complaining about how Shonen transformations take forever to a Shonen Fan, or like saying Cartoons teach violence to a Cartoon Fan, or that Kaiju movies are made with cheap special effects like stomping through a poorly constructed replica city to a Kaiju Fan. It's such a cliche complaint and the actual source material makes fun of. Sailor Moon has scenes mocking transformation sequences.

Why does Sailor Moon and Magical Girls series have henshin scenes. Here's the reason, they are the most hype thing ever when you are a little girl. It's the scene where the protagonist becomes the Hero. It's like the Power Rangers morphing or Superman revealing his outfit saying "This looks like a job...for Superman!" It's the part that hypes the viewer up for the upcoming cool thing.

9:49- “Yeah. Forgot that for a second, didn't ya? The girls in this show are and always have been 14 years old. 14 years old.”

....uhhhhh....this is incorrect. They start the series at 14 but at the season 5 they are 16, entering high school and they are also over 900 in Crystal Tokyo because the Crystal gave them immortaliy. 


NC then goes on to really fixiate on this point. I could go into why we have a lower age of consent technically speaking then the United States but there is a more important point

THIS DOESN'T HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH SAILOR MOON!

Like,  why would you spend so much of your SM Review time talking about age of consent laws in Japan. Especially when you have a skit of your 14-year old self perving on them to make this all seem so much more creepy.

Also....aren't you legit sexualizing a 14-year old character depicting your younger self in a state of sexual interest? In a way that is way more explicit that what you claim SM is doing?...

This part of the vid doesn't have anything to do with SM.

11:25- “My personal problem is, like media in most cultures, it doesn't try to help younger people understand sexuality, (images of Bratz dolls, Britney Spears, and Megan Fox) but rather exploits it. Rather than educate young people about sex, it's honestly just easier if we can make money off of it.”

Even ignoring the fact that SM does not exploit sexuality, SM DOES teach about sexual interest. Even ignoring the manga which is...just amazing at depicting it mind you...there are plenty of examples in SM of sexual jokes and episodic subplots like when Usagi casually mentioned wanting to sleep with Rei under the context of working at the shrine (coded), or when Minako offered to strip to make money to help the victim of the week causing the other girls to get all horrified, or when Minako tried to take her crush of the week to an XXX movie..........

A lot of these involve Minako-chan honestly. 

But seriously, from what I can tell you have seen a few episodes, most likely less then 10 since you think "Jedite" is relevant at all and he gets beaten in ep 10 of the Dub, so how on Earth would you think it makes sense to comment on how this show deals with sexuality?

14:33- “and every villain she's fighting will quietly wait for her to finish before actually attacking. It’s the Japanese way”

Ok I have NEVER gotten this complaint. The Sailor Senshi don't transform in front of the monsters of the week. Not once in the entire 200 episode run do they do that. It doesn't even make sense they would do that because they transform to have secret identities. This is like asking why don't people attack Spider-Man when he's changing into his Spider-Man costume.

15-32:- “But once Luna reminds Serena to use her brain, she goes through her pedo-licious transformation and is ready to kick ass. Or...cowers in the corner like a fucking scaredy-cat.”

Yes Usagi/Serena cowered and cried a lot earlier in the series. That's...that's the point. She's a coward and a crybaby to reflect our insecurities about ourselves so that we can see her rise to become a hero. She was such a breakthrough in the Magical Girl genre specifically because she wasn't some perfect stalwart graceful heroine or some clever trickster but just a normal scared girl who doesn't like fighting and wants everything to be peaceful.

NEVER RUNNING FROM A REAL FIGHT

16:03- “THAT'S EXACTLY WHAT SHE'S DOING!!! SHE'S RUNNING FROM A REAL FIGHT!!!!”

LOL. Ok that is a pretty funny thing a lot of Moonies like to point out. Although there is a legit explanation. On the official English Soundtrack for SM, "One Named Sailor Moon" is supposedly sung by Mina and Rini (Venus and Mini-Moon). In all versions of SM Chibiusa/Rini looks up to Sailor Moon as an unstoppable hero and the Dub made Mina admire her the most of the Guardian Senshi. So they are idolizing her in the theme song.

16:28- “If she even raises her knee a centimeter to kick, she exposes her goodies to the world. Which, in many parts of Japan, of course is no big problem anyway.”

UGHHHHH

17:36- “The magic tiara isn't her only enchanted device, though. She also has a pen that can change her into anything. Wait, WHAT?! … Well, then, what the fuck is she using that tiara for!? I mean, they didn't give any limitations or anything. They said she can change into fucking anything she wants!”

Yeah this is a dub error, originally it only disguises her into whatever she wants but it clearly does not give the capacities as it humorously shows when she tries and disguises as a business woman and then immediately trips over her own heels.

17:56- “Series over! Six seasons spared!”

Six? SM is 5 arcs long or less in every version.....oh you think Crystal is a sixth arc and not a reboot like it actually is. Whoops.

18:24- “So maybe Jadeite should try his evil plans in another part of town. I mean, it's not like the Power Rangers that can beam anywhere.”

Season 1: They are looking for the Moon Princess they know is in that area
Makaiju Arc: No reason, cause that arc doesn't make any sense
Season 2 Proper: The bad guys are trying to find Chibiusa who went back to Tokyo in the past to find Sailor Moon and are trying to disrupt the crystal points where Crystal Tokyo will be in the future
Season 3: Sailor Saturn incarnated with the other Senshi in the same area and the Death-Busters emerged around her since Mistress 9 was feeding on her energy
Season 4: Helios was hiding in Chibiusa's dreams and the Dead Moon Circus was chasing him around looking through peoples' dreams to find him
Season 5: Galaxia sent her Senshi down to fight the Senshi of Earth because she likes to see Senshi fight for her amusement

 Also they do have the Sailor Teleport. They used it at the end of season 1 to get to the North Pole.

18:55- "Their personalities are about as on par as, oh, let's say... the Spice Girls. No, no, that's too demeaning. Um, let's say Hanson."

???

Ok I could understand if you said their personalities were stereotypes, especially given that this is the Original English Dub of the anime, but they very clearly do have personalities. Ami/Amy is the Shy Nerd Girl, Rei/Raye, is the Hot-Headed Goth-y (in the anime at least...in the manga she's the spiritual perfectionist one), Makoto/Lita is really girly on the inside but people falsely mistake as being a tomboy and Minako/Mina is the fun light-hearted comedic one. Saying they don't have personalities is like saying the original Power Rangers don't have personalities. You can say they are 2-dimensional but they are pretty clear.

19:08- "Ooh, except Pluto. Um, you're not a planet anymore, so, um... Yeah."

Ok this was another complaint I never got. Now I could point how there are Senshi for Asteroids, for Galaxies for the Universe, for the Void, and for basically everything. But that would be going way to obscure for this. 

You know what was never a planet?

THE MOON!

The Series is named SAILOR MOON! Where do people get the idea you need to be named after a planet to be a Sailor when the series stars a Senshi named after the Moon?

He then goes on to talk about how Uranus and Neptune's lesbian relationship was censored out of the show by the Cloverway Dub, and nothing I can see wrong here, it's pretty on-point, though this does give more questions as to the whole not teaching anything about sexuality given how CLEARLY Haruka and Michiru were banging in the series.

21:50- “Serena acts like a selfish idiot; supportive friends pick up her slack; Beryl rubs crystal ball like a boob and sends Jadeite out to create monster and/or device to obtain energy, using a marketing tool targeted toward vain suburbanites; one of the Scouts discovers the plan or falls for it herself; transformation takes place via reused, sexually-confusing animation; Scout or Scouts are trapped; prat in the hat seems to get them out and do nothing else; Serena never figures out who he is, uses her magic tiara that she should've used earlier instead of reusing more dialogue footage, destroys villain, and goes back to being an idiot again.”

This is his final analysis of the "SM Formula". You can compare my formula from above. I like how he thinks Jadeite lets any particular amount of time in this series. It was probably the Nephrite and Zoisite stuff that got SM popular in the West if we're being honest.

Finally he gives his analysis of why people liked SM and honestly this is the part that got me angry. THIS is the part, believe it or not. This is what he says

“Perhaps like a lot of other formulas, it knew what to keep familiar and what to keep changing up. It knew it was going to have a villain, but it changed up what kind of villain. It knew it had to involve an interest or product that girls wanted to be involved with, so it had a different one each episode. There was always peril that the girls had to get out of so that you'd feel great by the end when they finally do, keeping the formula exactly the same but changing up just the right elements that needed to be changed.”

You know why this angers me, because it seems frankly like very shallow surface level analysis, it seems like he didn't see the series as "worth" serious analysis. 

Why was Sailor Moon popular. Moonies have personal reasons but how about I tell you the biggest reason right now. 

It's not something you need to be Japanese to understand.

It's not something you need to be a girl to understand.

It's not something you need to be a teen to understand.

Sailor Moon got so popular for the same reason that Spider-Man, or Neo, or Arthur Dent or Harry Potter or any of those kind of characters got popular. I was filled with insecurities. I thought I was nothing but a coward and a crybaby. I thought the world would be better off without me. Sailor Moon told me that even if I was all the things Usagi was, that I could become a hero. It told me that no matter how bad I thought of myself that I always could Henshin into this graceful strong heroine.

This is not something hidden in the series, this is the most direct message of the series. It is the cornerstone of the First Movie. It is present since the first chapter and the first episode when Usagi says "Luna, I don't know what's going but I need to save Naru!" her want to protect her friend overcoming his cowardice. And it continues to the end where she saves the universe from Chaos because of her love. Sailor Moon is a series that shows us the best side of ourselves, that even a normal girl like Usagi can be the light of the entire universe.