Bishojo Senshi Sailor Moon Act 39 Review

 

Act 39 is tied for the longest act in the Sailor Moon manga with Act 27 at 75 pages, both being the introduction to an arc. The Dream Arc commences. The arc begins with the Guardian Senshi watching the eclipse that Usagi, Mamoru, and Chibiusa were at the end of the last act. Makoto comments on how she wonders if Usagi is watching this too and Ami comments that the conditions for this eclipse only happens only once every few centuries. 

A young girl nearby is told that an eclipse is even rarer than a shooting star and is told to make a wish, wishing to become an actress. Hearing this Minako and then after a little giggle at Minako's childishness, the other Guardian Senshi playfully join in and make their own wishes. Minako wishes very similarly to be an idol singer. Makoto wishes to be a bride, and makes a second wish for a flower shop and a cake shop, causing Minako to humorously comment on Makoto's greediness in having so many wishes. Ami wishes to be a doctor, and Rei wishes to be the head priestess at the Hikawa Shrine.

This is building upon a part from the last act where they celebrated becoming High School students, and wanting to join clubs. It represents a theme of the arc, a maturation of the Senshi through their dreams. As you might be able to tell through the arc name, dreams are a theme of this arc.

The Senshi notice how much darker it's gotten and how it really seems to be taking its time. Cleverly Naoko cuts from that quickly, and if you know how this arc goes you know why that's clever. We cut to Mamoru who suddenly doubles over in pain. He tells the others there he just felt dizzy and wonders where that sudden pain came from. However, his wondering is cut short by the arrival of a flying ship, the occupants proclaiming themselves to be the Dead Moon Circus finally here in this bright city of beautiful dreams.

...as you do. 

This is one of the first things one notices about the Dead Moon Circus, starting on page 6 of the entire arc, that surreal things just happen this arc. It was part of what caused the initial dislike his arc had. While I'm not saying you have to like it, in fact it's not particularly my taste, it does serve a narrative purpose; it's meant both to make the arc feel more "dreamlike" for obvious reasons and because this is the arc centered around Chibiusa it's to make the arc feel more like it's coming from the perspective of a younger child. Depending on how out there vs grounded your tastes are you might enjoy this aspect of it. But yeah things like a flying circus tent of evil clowns can just show up and nobody questions it. 

That's also connected to the major difference with this villain group. So far we've had the urban fantasy villains, the sci-fi villains, the apocalyptic villains. This time we're evolving again into the surrealism-type evil. This stuff became very popular with the rise of the internet; stuff like creepy clown videos with them just showing up, liminal spaces where empty or degenerated places create creepy ambiance (for instance this vid of the SpongeBob outro playing in an abandoned mall), psychopathic children playing twisted versions of children's games. These are the type of horror that became popular with the rise of the internet and which the Dream Arc seems to be portraying. Though it comes from a period before this became popular, the idea of creepy clowns has certainly been around much longer (ala The Joker or Pennywise the Clown) but the idea came to mass prominence somewhat recently. This type of fear is characterized by the twisting of the fantastical things meant to delight children; clowns and dreams and fairy tales into more horrific forms, the contrast serving to accentuate the surreal fear of it. Fittingly the Dead Moon Circus characterize a lot of this type of villainous fear. They are much more in your face than any villain group by far, just showing in the middle of civilization yet are somehow the most invisible. They mix immaturity in their behavior with malevolence and violence and their monsters are stylized after monsters children might fear are under their beds or in their closets. The Dead Moon Circus play on this type of scares I would refer to as anti-innocence, the subversion of a seemingly innocent or childish element with a dark element or undertone. Their members are psychopathic children, creepy killer clowns, and circus performers, all led by a classic evil fairy tale witch-queen.

People seem quite surprised by the flying circus ship though view it as some kind of weird amusement rather than any threat, akin to a magic trick, save for our heroes who comedically do the same reason all in unison.

A joke, but also a little cartoonish and surreal. Once again, Naoko subtly building up the atmosphere, even when it's the least subtle of her atmospheres so far.

Usagi and Chibiusa, panicked, reiterate what they just saw, that a flying ship came out of the center of the eclipse, with Mamoru commenting that he guesses it wasn't just a daydream and that he has a bad feeling about this. Yeah thanks Mamoru, brilliant observation. 

We cut back to the Guardians who also saw the Dead Moon Circus and are wondering what's going on. Phobos and Deimos, Rei's crows, show up and warn her via tarot cards that it was a bad omen, that something bad is going on.

It's nice to see Phobos and Deimos again, and they help to build the atmosphere a little bit being a bit more classically mystical while still being kinda surrealist. Rei proclaims that she senses a new enemy.

We cut back to the Moon family where they decide to stick around the area for a bit longer, going to the shopping district to kill time. They don't seem especially concerned about what they just saw though I can't tell if that's deliberately there for atmosphere purposes or is just odd character writing.

They come to a big circus arrival sale where the Dead Moon Circus information is being circulated, that they are a world-touring circus from the Amazon rainforest while their music plays across the street...Naoko has done evil hypnotic music before, a lot if you include Sailor V, but this is the first time where it's subtle and not even clear if it is hypnotic in any way or if it's just giving the eerie vibe like that

Usagi and Chibiusa wander around the Dead Moon Circus street vendors looking at all the various things for sale The two excitedly stare at all the strange sights, coming across pretty kaleidoscopes, a toy using a series of mirrors with colored material to create a procession of images. In a sense, a kaleidoscope is actually a metaphor for the events of the arc; a series of colored individual items (The Sailor Senshi) trapped among mirrors whose interaction create a series of illusory images like dreams.

Usagi and Chibiusa ask Mamoru to buy them the kaleidoscopes which he does after giving them an amused smirk. Usagi is depicted as being similarly immature to Chibiusa in that she needs to ask someone else to pay for a toy for her, which will also be a theme in this arc and even in this act. There's a cute moment where Chibiusa shows Diana the inside of a kaleidoscope, amazing the kitten. Meanwhile, the Guardian Senshi find the Lunar family, happy that they seem alright, though still distrustful of the whole situation.

The 5:00 bell rings yet Usagi observes there's still a massive crowd of people in the streets like a festival. Once again, there's the subtle allusion to people being manipulated and acting unnatural, but unlike in previous arcs in a subtle way that could easily be dismissed. Things aren't unnatural, just surreal.

Usagi tells Chibiusa she should probably wait to leave until tomorrow since traveling at night can be dangerous... SHE'S TIME-TRAVELING! WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?! Mamoru tries to argue against that because Chibiusa said in her letter she'd go back home today. Once again, she's traveling to a later point in time, leaving later would just mean a shorter distance, she literally can't be late! 

Chibiusa says it's fine to Mamoru because her letter was dated April First, meaning her mother will think it's an April Fool's joke. Usagi and Mamoru don't really buy that logic but say Chibiusa can stay the night if she apologizes to her mother for her delay. After double bunny eyes pleading, Mamoru lets both girls stay at his place for the night, giving the relatively rare image of Usagi and Chibiusa with their hair down. Chibiusa is seen using Neptune's mirror from last act to brush her hair while Usagi gives bare-faced lies to her mother to explain her absence.

Usagi and Chibiusa absent-mindedly play with their kaleidoscopes when they are suddenly hit with a full frontal assault of pillows. For rabbits, it's quite brutal. Mamoru tells them they need to go to sleep as they need to get up at 5 tomorrow, much to the shock of both girls, though I imagine it's to go to the park when no one is around and stay disguised. Mamoru also tries, in a funny bit, to tell Usagi she can't stay around his place so much or it will "ruin his reputation", which is a funny reversal of it usually being the girl in the relationship who worries about sleeping over with her boyfriend in case people get a certain image of her.

Usagi and Chibiusa both complain at his protestations, once again depicting Usagi as being unusually immature. Mamoru comments that as a parent he plans to be a firm parent. Usagi comments that she wishes she was still a kid where she could be spoilt and treated like royalty though Mamoru annoyedly points out he never spoilt Chibiusa. Meanwhile Chibiusa argues that being a kid is much worse because you can't do anything you want on your own, and that despite technically being 903 she wants to be an adult as soon as possible so Mamoru will see her as a woman. Usagi points out that she's talking nonsense, she's his daughter. Mamoru is angry at all the commotion and just wants them to go to sleep.

Overall it's a pretty amusing bit that's meant to set up part of the themes of the arc. Usagi the young woman wants to be a kid, and Chibiusa the kid wants to be a young woman. Usagi wants to be carefree and Chibiusa wants agency. It's also very clearly trying to callback to the second arc, with is something that happens several time this arc with references to Chibiusa's little girl affection for her father or her really being over 900 years old. 

Chibiusa lies in bed, looking at over at Usagi's form in admiration. She thinks to herself what she really wants is to be like Usagi, with long slender legs, a full chest, long flowing hair. Chibiusa wishes she could be pretty like that. This is also in its own way calling back to the second arc where Chibiusa was scared she'd never be able to step out of her mother's shadow, born the daughter of the legendary savior Neo-Queen Serenity. Here to show the progression it's not that she thinks she won't reach Usagi's status, but she wishes to attain it soon. It's also meant to reflect the real beautiful parts of post-adolescent young women that young girls find admirable and enviable. 

Usagi and Mamoru notice Chibiusa is still awake and asks if she can't sleep. Chibiusa asks them to tell her a story, that at home mama would tell her stories to help her sleep. Mamoru asks her what type of stories she wants to hear and Chibiusa lists off stories about sunken civilizations, the pyramids, lost diamonds, and then amusingly adds stories about robots and stories about vampires....which are real things Chibiusa herself was therefore, robots are the droids from the second arc, and vampires are from the side story Chibiusa's Picture Diary 1 also taking place in the second arc.

Chibusa finishes the list with "stories about mirrors", which prompts Usagi's interest. Chibiusa explains that there's a legend about mirrors, that on the other side of mirrors is a dark parallel universe, and if you look into a mirror in a full moon night you'll be sealed away in the world of darkness forever. Mamoru being a sophisticated gentleman identifies it as an old European Legend.

I get that this is foreshadowing for the arc, very clear and obvious foreshadowing for what is to come, but that would be a horrible bedtime story. What little girl would wanna go to sleep after hearing THAT?

Usagi, frightened at the prospect, proclaims she's never looking at mirrors at nighttime again, hurrying under the covers. Chibiusa has already fallen into calm sleep causing Mamoru to comment to her sleeping form that he guesses she's the mature one here. Mamoru and Usagi both tuck Chibiusa in a bit more, and pat her head in parental displays of affection. Meanwhile the dark mirror in the room is emphasized to the reader.

We cut back to the Dead Moon Circus tent and to our villains this arc. An old seemingly non-human woman who names herself as Zirconia summons to her side her familiar, a flying eyeball called Zircon that can catch fire. She complains in stereotypical old person fashion that the light of day hurts her eyes and she's been waiting for the cover of night, but that unless their circus is a bit hit, she won't be able to sleep well either. Once again we see a surrealist contrast. This woman is complaining about mundane old person things, while holding a flying fiery eyeball. 

Zirconia addresses her minions, the Amazoness Quartet. Despite Zirconia calling herself their leader, they are noticeably disrespectful to her responding with "We heard ya, you old hag." The quartet explain that they're going to seal up all the entrances, so that no one can escape their big show or interfere, one of them using a magic orb to do so.

The Amazoness Quartet are a fairly popular villain group in the Sailor Moon fandom, partially because a lot of Naoko's villains are straightforward evil destroyers or conquerors. The Quartet aren't either and while technically affiliated and just a bunch of childish brats. The closest comparison would be Black Lady, but Black Lady was the spoilt brat archetype, the Quartet are the mean-spirited pranksters. They're also popular for another thing seen later.

We cut back to Mamoru's place where all through the house, not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse. Chibiusa sleeps soundly, when she hears someone calling for the "young maiden" in her dreams. The pegasus appears in Chibiusa's dreams calling her a young maiden before, to the delight of the young girls reading at home, taking her on a magical night flight through the city in her dreams.

This "whole new world" sequence is interrupted when Chibiusa notices a section of the city is unusually dark and asks the pegasus why that part of the city is so dark when the rest of the city is so bright. To Chibiusa's shock, the pegasus tells her that's the area they were just in, the Juuban shopping area.

The pegasus tells Chibiusa his name is Helios and gives her a bell to call him when she needs him. He tells her that he will need her strength soon to save "Elysion." Elysion is a reference to the Greek Mythological afterlife for Heroes.

Chibiusa sees Helios trapped in a cage and begin to fade away as the dream comes to an end, she also briefly sees her parents. Obviously including a dream sequence that also is meant to be the continuation of the plot is another example of creating a surreal atmosphere, it's almost the textbook example of it. Though Chibiusa initially thinks it was just a dream, she finds the bell Helios gave her confirming it was real.

Usagi and Mamoru awaken and realize that they both dreamed the same thing, dreamed of Chibiusa riding around on Helios, meaning that all three of them had the same dream. In the same way the third arc had a lot of emphasis on the Senshi having the same heart, the same motive, the fourth arc will make much of the Senshi having the same dream, the same goal, and this is the first narrative example, more literal than usual. 

Mamoru doubles over from a pain in his chest, though he attempts to dismiss Usagi's fears by saying that it's just a temporary pain coming from college drinking parties. Usagi looks unconvinced but is distracted by a note from Chibiusa saying she's gone to the future.

We cut to Chibiusa running to the park to time travel, a concerned Diana on her head. Chibiusa comments to herself that she doesn't really wanna go home and while getting out the time key, finds the bell. She wonders why she got on him so easily despite not knowing if he's friend or foe. She thinks of his serious pleading eyes calling for her help. Her thoughts shift first to her mother excited for the day she would become a true Sailor Senshi and return home. She looks in Neptune's mirror recalling what Neptune said to her wondering if she truly is an elegant Sailor Senshi, and whether it's time for her to leave. 

Her contemplations prove fruitless as when she tries to time travel, she runs across one of the seals the Quartet placed and is stopped

The attempt shocks Chibiusa, both physically and mentally. Usagi and Mamoru show up only to be alarmed by what happened. Chibiusa sees a vision of the pegasus again, asking for her power. This could metaphorically be her responsibility calling out to her and not leaving her conscience. Chibiusa tells Usagi and Mamoru that even though she couldn't travel through time, she's unharmed and that she thinks the pegasus needs her help. Meanwhile, one of the Amazoness Quartet, Palla Palla, senses that someone tried to break one of their seals, and another one of them, Ves Ves, uses her whip to call a circus tiger to her side.

We cut back to our heroes and after a page basically re-expositing what we already know, with the only new information being Usagi doesn't fully trust the pegasus, they notice a tiger is on the loose and causing havoc. You'd think this could be a problem for the police to solve, but I guess the police just got used to the Sailor Senshi dealing with everything for them. Mamoru gets bogged down by the pain in his chest while Usagi and Chibiusa go to stop the tiger.

In a... kinda bizarre sequence...Usagi and Chibiusa first find that they can't transform into their Sailor Senshi forms, only for the Holy Grails to appear. Usagi notes that they can't transform into their super forms because it required the unity of the Sailor Senshi and the Outer Senshi aren't there... only for Usagi and Chibiusa to almost instantly transform with a new power arising within them due to the "need to fight."

This might seem like the biggest deus ex machina in the entire series and...granted it might be. But there is KIND OF an explanation for it. Back when Chibiusa was first describing the Holy Grail the way she explained it was that in times of the greatest crisis, the Holy Grail would grant Sailor Moon a stronger power. The third arc sort of leads you to believe that the power Sailor Moon gets from the unity of the Sailor Senshis' hearts is that power, however, the fourth arc is basically saying that there are actually two separate power sources, both of which are strong enough to change the Senshi into their Super Forms; the "unity" power and the "crisis" power. 

But the bizarre-ness doesn't stop there. The Super Sailor Senshi round the corner to stop the tiger only to run into the Amazoness Quartet, Palla Palla summoning "lemures" to fight for her from the darkness. Lemures in Roman Mythology were the restless spirits of the dead, but in Sailor Moon, they're dark orbs with "scary" faces that are the representations of nightmares.

Though a lot of this is basically unexplained, it almost has to be in this case. Naoko doesn't explain a lot of elements of her world-building, but here it's very deliberately so because as the old idea goes, the scariest thing is the unknown, it's what your mind can imagine. The Lemure are deliberately devoid of details in both explanation and appearance, much like a lot of things about the Dead Moon Circus, so your brain will fill in the details in the worst possible way.

 The Lemure attack Super Moon and Super Chibi-Moon, and though they bat them away, they lack any weapons to actually hurt them. Chibi-Moon uses the bell to summon Helios, the pegasus to her side. Helios summons their kaleidoscopes from earlier which are imbued with the Super Senshis' powers to become magical weapons and also....gain.... consciousness? 

It amazes me that I never hear anyone talk about this part. Yeah, it's weird, obscure, and doesn't come back up but that just makes it seem more conversation-worthy in my eyes. Where did this come from? Is this just another way from Naoko of making things seem surreal? I can't think of any other reason for this plot point to just suddenly be there.

With their new weapons, Super Moon and Super Chibi-Moon use the new attack of the arc, Moon Gorgeous Meditation. One thing I will definitely give this arc is it has on average my favorite attacks for the Senshi of any arc. The Quartet teleport away in fear and... I guess the tiger is also teleported away? Mamoru finally catches up to them but collapses much to Moon and Chibi-Moon's worry. Helios briefly shows up and the nearly unconscious Mamoru comments that he sounds familiar...

Back with the villains, Zirconia comments in annoyance and fear that the great light they faced must mean the people of the Moon Kingdom have been reincarnated, She angrily yells at the Quartet to stop messing around with flashy tricks, that the queen, Nehelenia, is angry. 

Zirconia exposits to the Quartet about the White Moon Kingdom, implying she was around during the time of the kingdom but the Quartet were not. She explains that they have the infinite power of the holy stone (The Silver Crystal), and immortal bodies. Because of that, if they attack head-on, the Senshi will blow them away. As such, they must infiltrate slowly if they want to take the planet. This is a different dynamic than normal. Usually in this type of story, the villains are stronger, but here the villains outright acknowledge they are weaker and that they'll get crushed in a direct fight. 

Zirconia goes and begins speaking to a mirror, commenting she wants to know of the horse that came to the Senshi's aid. Meanwhile, the Quartet begin complaining to each other, with Jun-Jun complaining that the "old hag" said she could do whatever she wanted, but is now telling her what she can do. Cere-Cere says she agrees with the hag, they only just got there, they should take advantage and have a little fun. Palla-Palla agrees, saying she wants to find out what kind of town this is and what kind of people are here. Ves-Ves gets an idea from this and gets three of their circus animals; a hawk, a fish, and the previously seen tiger. Palla-Palla uses her magical orb on them, turning them into the miniboss squad known as the Amazon Trio.

I have to be honest, I think this was perhaps a bit of a mistake on Naoko's fault. She's already introduced enough villains for this arc and is clearly struggling to express different personalities for the quartet given how their previous discussion didn't clearly differentiate their personalities and now she's just throwing in three more disposable villains. Also just to clarify; Naoko has made it apparent that the Amazon Trio are all male in the manga, even if one is a crossdresser. While the anime potentially made Fisheye transgender, in the manga, there's no indication Fisheye is female so I use male pronouns for manga Fisheye.

Ves-Ves gives their new minions their mission; they're gonna bring their lemure across town so that they can do what nightmare clumps love to do; eat beautiful bright dreams. She explains this is for the purpose of filling the town with dark dreams instead... because of course that explains it. That's a natural goal to just accept. The Amazon Trio express their understanding in ways to give slight understanding to their personality, with Tiger's Eye mentioning wanting to be an artist, Hawk-Eye teasing Ves-Ves by calling her their "big sister" before clarifying she's not old, and Fish Eye giving a comedic yell at the end of his declaration he will work really hard.

The quartet gather together to look into the dreams of their enemies where Usagi and Chibiusa are expressing the opposite sentiment of what they explained earlier with Usagi stating she has to be strong and mature and Chibiusa in fear expressing she doesn't mind being a kid, that she needs more training. Palla-Palla comments that throughout history the words of people contradict what they desire and while Usagi and Chibiusa fret over Mamoru, Palla-Palla uses her magic orb to reverse their ages.

I think Naoko does a generally good job of using her first act of each arc to express what the arc is going to be like, with the sole exception really being the first arc. With that said I'm not especially fond of this act, not necessarily because of its content but how long it is, and broadly unnecessarily so. This act is the same length as the first act of the third arc but that act was a slow burn building up the atmosphere around the Outer Senshi and the daimon and didn't actually contain that many plot points. This act actually contains a LOT of plot points. It introduces Zirconia, all the Quartet, the Amazon Trio, basically reintroduces Helios and his plot thread, has an episodic fight, has exposition on the mirror universe, has exposition on the eclipse, has a whole bunch of character moments, introduced the conflict for next chapter with two scenes devoted to it, etc. If you compare the section where I go over Act 27 it's 3,373 words, compared to this act's at 4,305 and that's because there were so many more plot elements I had to describe. I feel like this could have been better if Naoko had divided it into two acts.

Going into the actual content of the act, Act 39 is a general set-up for the Dream Arc, the same way 15 and 27 were for the Black Moon and Mugen Arcs, introducing the major elements and atmosphere. It's a surreal act with really strange things happening all over; but not arbitrarily strange. Everything that happens are either elements common in children's stories specifically or a creepy subversion of the prior. This arc is about Chibiusa's struggle to become a full Sailor Senshi, and in the same way that the Mugen Arc was about the mature, cynical Outer Senshi causing the arc to be dark and maturely sophisticated, this causes the Dream Arc to adopt a lot childish imagery either to play it straight or to subvert it to reflect a child's development.

I'm not very much a fan of this act's content, by Sailor Moon standards at least, because it just feels less than the sum of its parts. The same way Act 1 was filled with symbolism, Act 15 was filled with life, and Act 27 was filled with intrigue, Act 39 is filled with ideas. And it's not even necessarily that the ideas don't come together, because they do all support the surrealist atmosphere Naoko is going for. Things do indeed feel-dream like. It's that the overall results feel like less than the sum of its parts. This act includes some really cool ideas; the eclipse, Helios taking Chibiusa through the dream world, the Quartet sealing up the entrances, Zirconia acknowledging they're outclassed in a straight fight, Lemure being nightmares incarnated, the Senshis' weapons coming to life, yet in spite of the large size of the act, none of these individual ideas are given much focus. As a result, you don't know what here is especially important, as it doesn't seem to focus on anything else. That's a broad way I would describe a lot of the arc; it's atmospheric and is full of ideas, but it lacks a clear narrative focus for much of it.

That's obviously not to say the act is without redeeming factors, just that it's not one of my favorite SM acts. This act introduces a lot of the relatively unique aspects of the Dream Act; villains like the Quartet without much paralleling, more playful powers that aren't just insta-win buttons, the simple but beautiful childish imageries of things like flying on a magical pegasus and more. There's also a lot of cute interactions between the Lunar family and I especially liked the moment where Palla-Palla proclaims that for all of history, people have said the opposite of what they wanted for being a very archetypal line. And of course, I like the sequence of Chibiusa flying on Helios through the dream world, it's a sequence that's in most versions of Sailor Moon that reach the Dream Arc, because it's such an iconic sequence that captures what the Dream Arc can do at it's best; iconic imagery that carries the potential beauty of childish simplicity, unmoored in unnecessary complication. 

Probably the best part of the act and the part that hits most in the mutual protective love between Usagi and Mamoru have for Chibiusa and her admiration of them, her parents. In the highly surrealist world made by this act, it's the most grounded relatable aspect. However, the worst aspect of the act is probably a sheer lack of narrative focus. Surrealism is not really my taste, but even beyond that I don't like the meandering feel of the act. In both aspects; this act is like a child; sweetly innocent, filled with infinite potential, but shifting in identity and concerns from moment to moment, hard to keep up with. How much you like it, I imagine depends on how much you value that childishness.