Okay, y'all. Let me rant about Sailor Moon and Sailor Moon Crystal for a sec.
Unfortunately, just like with many other beloved children's shows, I was unable to ever watch Sailor Moon until recently, leading me to even more recently finish it, and then start Sailor Moon Crystal to see what changes it made. Watching Sailor Moon Crystal turned out to be a fucking mistake.
I'm sorry for those of you who may prefer it over the original series, I definitely think it does some things better than the og, but I overall view it as worse, ESPECIALLY since it was made a lot more recently than the original Sailor Moon!
Starting with things I actually liked. I liked how much they expanded on the worldbuilding, more thoroughly explaining it and sometimes even changing it so that it made more sense. While it did sometimes feel like it was kind of exposition-dumpy, repetitive, and shoved-in, it still tickles the little place in my heart that ADORES learning all the little bits and pieces of a world. The same goes for the times they'd deep-dive into characters, Mamoru and Chibi-Usa being some of my favorite examples of this. On the topic of Mamoru, I 100% prefer his writing in this version, even as his future self! He feels so much more involved in the plot, and I actually like his romance with Usagi a lot more in this version. I also liked how they actually tried to tap into the background of the Four Kings. And then there's the obvious improvement of pacing.
Moving on to the things I'm... not so fond of. Starting with the art direction, it's just okay, but I can't help but feel it's so much less stylized than the original. The style feels like anything you'd see from any other anime, and that makes it feel less special to me. On top of that, the 3D models they use for the transformation sequences are just... ugly. I do like that they added more to Usagi's transformation, but that doesn't make up for how bad it all looks, Ami's probably being the worst, in my opinion. On top of that, there's the fact they reduced all characters who aren't Usagi, Mamoru, and whoever else is important for the storyline to just plot devices. The Sailor Scouts suffer from this the most, Rei being the example that comes to mind first, and it just makes it all feel souless. There were many scenes that felt like they should've meant more, ESPECIALLY in the first season, but they really didn't. I feel this is probably connected to the pacing issue I noticed in this. Crystal doesn't keep a consistent enough pace to justify most of the emotional arcs, or even off-screen development, that we get. I can't help but feel that it relies on you having watched the original series to do the heavy lifting for anything less plot-relevant, and that takes away from the appeal.
And then... there are the things I full-on hate from this series. I'll start with the one that enrages me the least: Mamoru being put under mind control towards the end of Season 2. The original Season 2 Chibi-Usa arc really isn't my favorite for numerous reasons, but the biggest thing I could respect about the season was how they didn't repeat the same storyline as last season and actually let him try to help out our heroines! Crystal decides, instead, not to do that, and instead opt for leaning into the incestuous undertones of Chibi-Usa and Mamoru's relationship, even having them kiss SEVERAL TIMES instead of just in Usagi's delusions because WHY THE HELL NOT!? And it hurts ESPECIALLY in Crystal's case because I actually like seeing Mamoru on-screen in Crystal!
My other issue is more encapsulated in Season 1, this one hitting a lot more personally for me, that being the erasure of Zoisite and Kunzite's relationship. Overall, there's a lot of erasure of the Four Kings' personalities, but making Zoisite and Kunzite not be in love with one another feels the most targeted and purposeful. What makes it worse is the god-awful romance shoe-horned in there with each of the Sailor Scouts, which was COMPLETELY ABSENT from the original material! I was willing to forgive them for not having Zoisite and Kunzite be a couple, at least, on screen, mainly due to how lacking screen time was for them in general. I was happy that the romance between Naru and Nephrite never happened, and was willing to give them the benefit of the doubt when they kept them alive til the end. I WAS EVEN WILLING TO ACCEPT THEM ALL HAVING A POORLY MADE AND ABSOLUTELY CLICHE ROMANCE WITH THE SAILOR SCOUTS IF MAYBE THE WRITERS WERE ACTUALLY CLEVER AND DECIDED TO USE THIS IN THE ICONIC SCENE WHERE USAGI REFUSES TO KISS MAMORU BECAUSE ALL OF HER FRIENDS DIED BEFORE THEY COULD DO THE SAME WITH THEIR OWN LOVES, BUT NO! A SCENE LIKE THAT NEVER HAPPENS! AND SO, THIS BEING WHAT BECAME OF KUNZITE AND ZOISITE? IT FEELS LIKE IT'S JUST HERE TO MAKE THEM NOT BE GAY.
Both the original series and Crystal are incredibly flawed, but in completely different ways. Sailor Moon has slow pacing, questionable age gaps, personally unappealing design choices, and borderline incestuous imagery at times. By Season 5, I was completely over Mamoru's romance with Usagi. That being said, at least Sailor Moon had heart and a time period where some lines were blurrier than they are today. Sailor Moon was made for kids, and so some of the pieces of writing are more simple so that the child audience will be able to understand. Crystal's issues are style, inconsistent pacing, overall poor writing, questionable changes from the original, and erasure of the heart of Sailor Moon. All of this had to be intentional and was made in an era where they MOST DEFINITELY realized SOME of the issues with the original. I'm not going to watch Season 3. I think I might rewatch Sailor Moon instead.
