Bishojo Senshi Sailor Moon Act 16 Review

 

Act 16 begins immediately after Mars' abduction. The Senshi discover Chibiusa watching the events and Usagi, hysterical from Rei's kidnapping, accuses Chibiusa of being with the people that kidnapped Rei. A not ridiculous accusation, but clearly wrong to just suddenly accuse a little girl of. I do like how Usagi's emotions will be built up over the early second arc, though once again I feel it would have been more impactful if people had a more reasonable reaction to Usagi's concerns last act. 

Luna jumps down protectively in front of Chibiusa and Chibiusa, upset at Usagi's hysterical accusation runs off. As Chibiusa runs off, Usagi briefly sees the object on Chibiusa's neck looks identical to the Silver Crystal

This will end up being up a minor plot hole later. Meanwhile Luna tries to reason with Usagi, that if she comes on so harshly, she won't get any information from Chibiusa and Usagi herself runs off. Quite the similarity between them. Privately Usagi feels terrible at how she acted towards Chibiusa. It begins to rain.

Meanwhile Luna goes over to Mamoru, taking him to Chibiusa. I find it interesting that Luna chose to go to Mamoru over any of the other Senshi to take care of Chibiusa. Most likely it's because she saw how well Chibiusa responded to Mamoru earlier, or because Mamoru is the oldest of their friend group. 

Chibiusa is sitting alone in the rain looking dejected, and Mamoru takes her back to his place, putting her to sleep in his bed. Luna and Mamoru talk about how Usagi is really emotional and will come around, but that it might be best for Chibiusa to stay there tonight.

In Chibiusa's dream, she dreams of that city of crystal Mamoru saw earlier, and of the voices of her parents speaking of what to do if danger should arise, telling her that the legendary Sailor Moon is invincible. 

However then the manga's TRUE hero finally appears

TUXEDO PUPPET!

More seriously it's a really cute sweet scene. Chibiusa awakens tearfully but Mamoru cheers her up with his little puppet friend. Mamoru explains how he's using ventriloquism to make it seem like the puppet is talking and Chibiusa adorably, like a child, protests that she can make things talk too, drawing their attention to her toy cat head.

Chibiusa reveals the toy's name is "Luna-P", getting a strange look from Luna, and it robotically refers to Chibiusa as "small lady." A brief touch of Luna-P gives Mamoru a brief sense of images. In the commotion, Mamoru sees the key and crystal around Chibiusa's neck and asks Chibiusa of the key. Chibiusa says it's the key to her home, and that she can't go home without it. Mamoru asks Chibiusa where her home is and Chibiusa responds cryptically saying she doesn't know where it is, that it's far and it's near. While the "twist" is easy for an adult to guess, I do have to say that is actually a really poetic way of referring to where Chibiusa is from and a good mysterious answer. 

Then comes one of the cutest scenes in the whole manga. Chibiusa asks Mamoru if Sailor Moon really is strong, and Mamoru responds just as Chibiusa's father does in her dream; Sailor Moon is invincible. Chibiusa comments maybe Sailor Moon will be able to save mama, and goes to sleep huggling Tuxedo Puppet

Mamoru's unwavering faith in Usagi and his concern for Chibiusa are both very sweet and Chibiusa is cute as well. 

The next day, Chibiusa returns to Usagi's home much to Ikuko's relief. Mamoru shares he too saw the objects around Chibiusa's neck. Usagi shares her concerns with Mamoru, and once again he reciprocates his concerns in a way that is empathetic for his Usako, yet rational. Mamoru suggest they watch her a little longer and reassures Usagi

I love them together so much. Mamoru is constantly helping Usagi through her emotional strains, being reassuring yet rational, and the two of them are constantly drawn in physical contact with each other, as though they can't bear any distance between them. 

After that follows another pretty cute scene. Motoki comments on how they were keeping all these secrets this giant command center in his basement and how he nearly died back during the Beryl fight causing the Senshi to look all embarrassedly apologetic, though he encourages them anyway.

There is then a chess metaphor which is going to be a motif for the rest of the act. The metaphor is...pretty on the nose. Ami comments that chess is a game in which "you move the different pieces around to corner the enemy's king." This is a pretty barebones explanation of chess and also a pretty blunt metaphor. I feel like Naoko could have done more, as this arc in particular both sides are trying to protect royalty, but I imagine that would require more page space to explore. This sort of half-hearted implementation doesn't really serve the story much in my opinion.

The Senshi go investigating at Rei's school where the police haven't figured out what happened there. The Senshi meet up with Asanuma and Kotono who are also there and just bluntly explain to the Senshi everything that happened with Rei the Senshi weren't there for last act. They overhear people talking about UFOs, wondering if this was truly an abduction by aliens.

I think Naoko does a fairly good job at evoking the sense of science-fiction mystery around UFOs, urban legends and the like. I do think the scene however is kind of exposition-heavy and is just re-explaining to the characters what we the audience already knows in a not particular interesting way.

Asanuma sees Mamoru with the Senshi and comments to himself that he thinks there's something strange about them going into a flashback where he first met Mamoru and Mamoru encouraged him, giving him some strange power to succeed, and then later healed himself quickly

This is an interesting part that sort of shows what the Senshi and Mamoru seem like to normal people. They have these powers but are plausibly deniable enough that people only see them as strange and rumored rather than having to investigate, similar with Ami's intelligence, Rei's sixth sense, Makoto's strength. I do kinda wonder what the purpose of the scene is. My intuition is that it's setting up Mamoru's psychometry, but that will be fully explained next chapter. it's building up Asanuma as a character who has this interaction with Mamoru but Asanuma isn't important to the story past the next act. Possibly it's meant to just build a vibe, a tone, showing the heroes are also strange urban legend type things similar to the villains in a general urban fantasy type way. I could buy that, but I feel like Naoko is the type to never waste a scene re-establishing something without building up to something else. My best guess is given how the scene ends with Asanuma wondering if Mamoru is from space, that it is meant to parallel the heroes and the villains as being other-worldly influences on Earth, which will become relevant later.

We cut to the enemies. Demande speaks to Saphir, who confirms he's using the energy of the malefic Black Crystal to create droids, the robot minions of this arc and to send them to "that planet." Demande commends Saphir for his ability to use alchemy to breath life to the droids. However Saphir questions the wisdom of Demande's aggressive plans, causing Demande to instantly turn against him and threaten him, the mystic third eye appearing on his forehead. Rubeus, Saphir's archetypal opposite appears swearing loyalty to Demande.

This is a really good villain introduction. Demande's personality is conveyed strongly to the audience by the sheer impulsiveness and coldness with which he switches from praising his brother to threatening his life, Saphir is built up as the rationalist woobie type, forced by his cruel brother to serve his impulsive whims while Rubeus, the fiery warrior opposite Saphir and his devotion to Demande are shown. 

Rubeus says that Mars is being kept captive in the "room of darkness." Wiseman and the second Ayakashi, Berthier, further report to Demande, with Berthier once again making a chess reference claiming she will take their pieces from the board and capture the "rabbit." Wouldn't this be the perfect time to actually use the chess metaphor and have Berthier say "capture the king" or would that be too confusing with the actual royalty in the series?

We cut back to Ami playing chess where the crowd talks up her incredible chess abilities. Suddenly a faucet bursts and Ami demonstrates her ability to feel the water, sensing where the disruption. People are amazed but Berthier shows up and comments that dowsing without a pendulum is repugnant. 

 

This brings up a pretty obvious problem to me. Berthier knows who Ami is here so.....why isn't she attacking and capturing her now? Ami is alone and in her civilian state, this is as as opportune time as she could want save I suppose the existence of civilians but I doubt Berthier is the type to fret about collateral damage. I can tell Naoko wants to set up Ami and Berther as being in a rivalry, same way as she wants all the Ayakashi to parallel the Guardian Senshi, but Ami being an incredible chess prodigy was literally introduced this chapter. I get chess = example of an smart person thing, but given Ami's desire to be a doctor like her mother wouldn't a enemy who focused on infecting people make more sense, kinda like next chapter.

Anyway it cuts to Ami swimming, thinking about Rei's capture. Onlookers identify Ami as "the artist's daughter" skilled in chess and swimming. Usagi and Naru show up, and Ami gives her backstory; her parents are divorced and her father is a Japanese-style painter who taught her chess and swimming as the things he used to relax. Ami's familial situation will come up later in an amazing chapter, but the character development is put on temporary hold as Berthier appears on television explaining how she uses dowsing to find hidden things, having her pendulum swing to find the correct placement. The interviewer proclaims that Berthier is the third ranked chess player internationally but Berthier says it's because she uses dowsing to find the correct place to move her pieces, and then she publicly challenges Ami on tv. 

A few questions:

1: If she's using easily viewable, easily falsifiable magic, how is this not considered cheating?

2: If she's using magic that literally tells the right move to do, how is she only the third best player internationally?

3: Can chess players literally just challenge each other on live TV like that? Particularly someone who'd be considered Grandmaster rank challenging a person who probably has a reputation as a local prodigy, but has no rank and is still in school?

4: Why is Berthier doing this? Thus is the opposite of a stealthy infiltration mission. She is literally publicly challenging her enemy on live TV.  

This plot was very clearly Naoko trying to do something dramatic and "big-brain" for Ami's chapter, but Berthier isn't even a genius type character, she just cheats with her magic.

At the actual chess match Ami asks Berthier if she can use her dowsing to help find someone, but Berthier says for someone that can control water like her, dowsing should be simple

Berthier reveals herself as an enemy and attacks to capture "the rabbit", referencing Usagi and Chibiusa's name. It's a clever codework given that rabbits are often targets in hunting and it's who they want to capture. The Senshi transform and Jupiter makes Berthier flee from her attack.

However as they attempt to pursue her through the streets, the "normal civilians" arround, reveal themselves to be droids in disguise. That gets much darker when you realize what the droids did with the originals of all these people.

Fortunately to distract from the dark implications, Sailor Venus shows up and dusts the droids attacking Mercury freeing her to fight back. They catch up to Berthier who traps Mercury in some kind of water trap, Mercury declares she can't breath....despite having gone to space last arc. 

Sailor Moon uses her new attack to killer Berthier but just like last time it doesn't trap the water bubble Mercury is trapped in and Rubeus comes down and abducts her.

That ends Act 16. Act 16 is like the opposite of Act 15, and a lot of Sailor Moon acts early in each arc. While Act 15 started out slower and got more exciting as they went on, Act 16 is best early on, then slowly starts making less and less sense.

The start of Act 16 has some really cute things. It has Mamoru and Usagi relationship development, it has Mamoru and Chibiusa relationship development and the introduction of Tuxedo Puppet, it has Usagi character development. Later on there's the cute scene with Motoki and the introduction of the villain personalities of Demande and Saphir, and to a lesser extent Rubeus. All that is good character set-up. You also have Ami setting up her backstory for later

With that said, the plot with Berthier is semi-incoherent. Sailor Moon plans have been goofy before. The second act of arc 1 was "evil backwards messages on the floppy disks." But I don't even get what Berthier was trying to do here in challenging Ami. At best she was luring her into a trap with the droids which isn't really said. Even if that was the plan, it did nothing. You also have stuff like Berthier somehow drowning when Ami can breath in space, or walls of exposition mid-chapter. Rei being captured was a good surprise, it made things exciting. Ami being captured like Rei was also a surprise, but it's not a good surprise, it's a surprise of "Oh I guess they're capturing all the Guardian Senshi one by one."

Overall this Act feels like a set up act. It's good to have it for the overall health of the arc but by itself it's one of the lesser acts of the series and could really have done with a more interesting main plot going on. I like parts of it a bunch so it's certainly not without some merit but I would think the logical thing to do would be to have Berthier be a fellow superhuman intellect that uses a genetically engineered disease to mirror Ami's desire to be a doctor. Failing that if you wanna focus on more occult stuff and have the Dowsing element being prominent, have Berthier be hot on the tail of Chibiusa using her pendulum and then work the chess metaphor around Ami trying to protect her while trying to find where Rei is being kidnapped so both are looking for each others' kings. These are just some ideas but as it stands nothing about this really seems like an Ami chapter or give this chapter any personal identity (outside Tuxedo Puppet of course), it just feels like a chapter to set up stuff for later. 

It's certainly not a bad act, I like every act in the Sailor Moon manga in the Sailor Moon manga. While I did feel the main plot could have been significantly more on-point for Ami, I do like the character sets up it gives for Ami's parental situation, Demande and Saphir's characters, and I do like the cute scenes at the start of the act.