How Was Sailor Moon Affected by the 1995 Hanshin Earthquake?

Sailor Sting & the Police

Sailor Sting & the Police

Though we often talk about how Sailor Moon has had a lasting impact on the real world, it’s important to remember that the series did not exist in a vacuum. Throughout the five years that it was front and center in society’s consciousness, the world continued to change around it — and not always for the better.

As many of you already know, prior to the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and subsequent tsunami, the Great Hanshin Earthquake that struck on January 17, 19951 was the largest-scale natural disaster Japan had faced in recent history.

What many of you probably don’t know, however, is that Anza and the other members of the Sailor Moon Musical — Seramyu — cast were in Osaka for their final performance of the season when the earthquake occurred.

Today we’re going to talk about the lasting impact the Great Hanshin Earthquake had on Sailor Moon and even on the story’s canon! There’s some interesting trivia here, so you may want to stick around!2

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Why Did Naoko Takeuchi Nearly Call Off Her Own Wedding?

Romantic, huh?

Romantic, huh?

Naoko Takeuchi is something of an interesting character, even by Japanese manga artist standards. As you follow her career, she seems to waffle between two extremes — sometimes she’s intensely private, and other times she’ll write about deeply personal stories and publish them in comics with massive, nationwide circulation.

And for that, I’m immensely thankful. How often do we have a chance to get such a close look “behind the curtain,” so to speak, of our favorite creators?

Today, I’d like to take a closer look at Ms. Takeuchi’s relationship with the equally-famous manga artist Yoshihiro Togashi. Or, more accurately, how she very nearly called the marriage off. It’s a pretty epic tale, as told by our favorite eccentric artist herself, so you might wanna stick around!

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What Does Naoko Takeuchi Credit for Sailor Moon’s Success?

Got a few questions here for Naoko...

Got a few questions here for Naoko…

As the writer of a Sailor Moon blog, invariably the day would come where I’d sit down and put pen to paper fingers to keyboard and weigh in on the “secret to Sailor Moon‘s popularity.” I thought that today would be that day.

But then I started to have second thoughts. Why should I write this?

Why don’t we just go straight to the source, and see what Ms. Takeuchi has to say for herself? With all the dozens (hundreds?) of interviews that she’s done over the years, she must have already answered this question, right?

And, as a matter of fact, she did!

Join me, dear readers, as we follow Ms. Takeuchi’s logic behind just what made Sailor Moon the raging success that we know it to be today!

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5 Often Misreported Sailor Moon “Facts”

That's not true, I tell you!!!

That’s not true, I tell you!!!

When you dedicate a large portion of your free time to crawling through 25+ years of Sailor Moon sources, you eventually just learn to accept that running across inaccurate information is simply a fact of life.

However, thanks to the recent releases of Kodansha and Viz’s manga and anime translations along with the rise of curated (… okay, not really) wikis, the general quality of information you’re going to run into nowadays is worlds better than what I started with as a fan in the late 90s.

That being said, today I’d like to tackle five of the more common myths I often run across in my research and see if I can set them straight. Who knows, maybe some piece of Sailor Moon trivia you’ve “known” about for years could be on this list!

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5 Lessons Learned From Sailor Moon

Sailor Moon Says...!

Sailor Moon Says…!

I’m sure it sounds really contrived to say this, but Sailor Moon left a large impression on me growing up. In addition to being a fun show/manga about magical school girls who triumph over the forces of evil, but it was full of all sorts of lessons that ultimately would have a direct impact on my life well into adulthood.

What makes this topic all the more fascinating, at least to me, is there there is no “right” or “wrong” answer to what fans can take away from the series. Depending on one’s culture, values, and life circumstances, the lessons that any given fan walks away with will be completely different from other fans.

Today I’d like to take a look at some of those lessons I took away from Sailor Moon and about the impact the series had on my life. And, while I’m at it, I’d like to invite you to share your stories about the effect the series has had on yours.

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How Old Would the Sailor Senshi Be Today?

This was literally decades ago

This was literally decades ago

While I’m painfully aware that the world and characters of Sailor Moon are not actually real, the time and effort that Ms. Takeuchi went through in order to help you suspend your disbelief is truly impressive. From setting her story smack dab in the middle of Tokyo’s Azabu-Juban to making liberal use of real world history and mythology, there’s just enough there that you almost feel as if just maybe you could exist in the same world.

And when confronted with a story so heavily based on the real world, it’s only natural that you start asking questions about how the characters’ lives would have really played out — whether it be about how much money they make, what jobs they’d grow up to do, or even how old they would be today.

Today we’re going to take a closer look at the characters’ ages, what years they were (… or should have been) born in, and how old they would be today. Like all things in Sailor Moon, nothing is quite as easy as it seems, so you might want to keep a calculator handy!

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How Rich is Ami Mizuno?

"But can we really afford to buy another jet, mommy?"

“But can we really afford to buy another jet, mommy?”

I totally understand that talking about salaries, people’s standards or living, and how much money someone throws around isn’t something we typically do in polite conversation. But when Sailor Moon depicts so many characters living the high life – all the while claiming to be totally normal – it’s hard to not address the topic.

Today I’d like to take a closer look at our favorite underage genius and doctor to be, Ami Mizuno. I hope you stick around for this look into her ritzy, if lonely, home life!

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