Time for some Sailor Moon news!
What a week it’s been, huh? One of the greatest things about being a Sailor Moon fan nowadays is that, with the start of the 20th anniversary campaign, so much energy is being put into the franchise that there’s always some new announcement being made.
As sappy as it is to say — it’s a great time (for a Sailor Moon fan) to be alive.
In what I’m hoping will become a weekly feature, I hope you join me for this look back over the past week’s worth of news!
Sailor Moon and the Holy Grail
While I’m well aware that the majority of the audience who reads this blog probably watched/read Sailor Moon in translation, I think it’s sometimes informative to take a look at the more in-depth Japanese linguistics issues that, even though they don’t have a substantial impact on the series as a whole, they still would stand out and affect the interpretation of a native Japanese speaker.
And besides, I live for this geeky Japanese interpretation stuff.
I hope you join along for this trip through the bizarre world of the kanji wordplay! If we’re really lucky, maybe we’ll have even learned something at the end of this!
Where are Kakyuu and the Starlights from??
As a translator, one of the most difficult issues to deal with is that of trying to figure out what an ambiguous word means when you don’t have enough context. This issue becomes infinitely harder when you’re working within a fantasy setting and there quite simply isn’t any further information for you to look up.
The debate surrounding Kinmokusei is one such problem. In Japanese, it could just as easily be either a planet or star (but thankfully not both).1 But depending on which one it is, that kind of changes our perception of where the Starlights come from.
Today, we’re going to see if we can try to unravel this mystery. Get suited up, it’s gonna be a rocky flight!
Sailor Moon comes to Universal Studios Japan
If you’re anything like me, the moment you heard that there was going to be a real, live Sailor Moon attraction opening up at Universal Studios Japan (USJ), you were probably overcome with excitement. This is very likely the one and only time that we’ll ever be seeing the Sailor Soldiers in a theme park setting, so we’re going to need to make the most out of the experience.
Now that we’re only two months out from the unveiling of Sailor Moon: The Miracle 4-D, it’s about time that we take a look at what USJ has in store!
Correction: Lizards, Salamanders, Fish, AND RABBITS will be angry
While I typically avoid going down into the tiny nitty-gritty in individual episodes (that kind of analysis is saved for the Episode Reviews), there’s something about this line that I just found so nonsensical and confusing that I just had to look into it. And I’m glad I did.
For those of you who have no idea what I’m even talking about, today we’re going to take a look at the odd line in episode 5 of the original 90s anime, where Sailor Moon exclaims that three animals are “going to be mad” about Jadeite’s plan.
If you’re as confused as I was, stick around!
Technically not “twins”
If I’ve learned anything from researching every little detail about the world of Sailor Moon, its’s that every time you end up asking the question “how many…,” the answer is almost always much more than you’d imagine. Even something as seemingly obvious, like the sheer number of Sailor Soldiers, is mind-boggling!
Today we’re going to take a look at the series and see how many sets of twins appear across the five story arcs. If this is something you’ve ever wondered about (and, let’s be honest, this is a question probably no one has ever asked…), now’s your chance to find out!
Disclaimer: this is not a real photo
One thing that I’ve always loved about the world of Sailor Moon just how how much of the real world Ms. Takeuchi, and later the anime staff, included into the series. You can really feel tell that she really did live in Azabu-Juban before choosing it as the backdrop for her series in how detailed and alive the various locations are.
Today, we’re going to talk about something near and dear to my heart – real life locations that appear in the world of Sailor Moon! For the sake of simplicity, we’ll be talking about Sailor Moon Crystal today, but I do plan on sitting down to write an article about the old 90s series and manga once I get enough old pictures together.
Well, let’s get started!