Moonlight Shines Eternal (The Sailor Moon Post: Part 2)

Previously- Part One: The Crybaby Who Saved The World

Part Two: The Crybaby Heals The Future

"Do you think I care for you so little that betraying me would make a difference?"

(If the above video is blocked because you're American or otherwise, here's an alternative for you. )

Somewhere between here and now, we basically lost my 2003 experience of watching the show. As I said, I watched from the tail end of the first season right up to the filler arc which opens up the second season, Sailor Moon R, here. There's nothing to comment on, as I remember it being an okay story at the time. The most notable thing about it is that it brings the Sailor Senshi and Tuxedo Mask out of retirement by giving them back their memories, restoring the status quo. Not only that, but Usagi and Mamoru actually become a couple! Isn't that sweet? Maybe I should have revisited the Doom Tree arc to see how it holds up, as it's not really held in high regard. Either way, it doesn't matter. We've finished in 2003, basically. (There will be one small exception in the next part.) I don't know why I stopped back then. It could just have been my summer job keeping me busy, and then college keeping me extremely busy. 2003 has waned now, and we're focused on what I felt and saw in 2018. This leads us to both an inspiration and a problem. The inspiration is our new force of change which literally falls out of the sky to crash into the status quo of Usagi and Mamoru enjoying a date: a mysterious pink-haired little girl also named Usagi, soon dubbed "Chibiusa" to avoid confusion with our heroine. Actually, it's not right to write about her in such a vague fashion. Chibiusa is an incredibly important part of the show whose actions influence the very heart and soul of the narrative. We're still going to be talking about her up until Part Five, believe it or not. She's nowhere near my favorite character, but she's still vital to how the show is going to progress. For the time being, though, she's just sort of a bratty character who hoodwinks her way into living under Usagi's roof as her cousin by hypnotizing her family. It sounds like I'm making this shit up, but I'm not.


That's the inspiration. We now have to deal with the problem. I want to preface this by saying that I adore this show, and I have thousands more words of positivity to share about it. Throughout the six months I went through it, the show only betrayed me twice. Sailor Moon R has the first of these betrayals, and it all has to do with the status quo of Usagi and Mamoru being together. To summarize, Mamoru begins having premonition nightmares with implications that the world will end if he and Usagi stay together, so he reluctantly breaks up with her and bravely shoulders his heartbreak for the sake of the world. Oh, and he doesn't breathe a word of these premonitions to Usagi when she begs and pleads to know why he wants to call it off. Oh, and he pulls bullshit schemes like being seen riding his motorcycle with a cute girl in order to make Usagi think he's found someone else so she'll stop pining for him. Oh, and none of her friends ever confront Mamoru once about this and demand to know what in the holy fuck he's playing at. This utterly infuriates me. Not only is it hackneyed and contrived, and hurtful to our protagonist... but the reveal of why Mamoru is having these premonitions in no way justifies any of this as a narrative necessity. That's an understatement, actually, as the real reason is fucking idiotic, but to explain that I need to get into all the concepts this season introduces.


We'll get to that in due time, but the thing that most pisses me off about this whole thing? This entire season's arc, as I'll soon get to, is all about healing... and not once does it attempt to have anyone heal the gaping wound that Usagi and Mamoru's breakup causes for the pair of them. In my head, of course, I can only dream. Minako Aino, warrior of love, confronting Mamoru and gently explaining how much he's hurting her friend. Letting him no in no uncertain terms that Usagi is at least owed an explanation, that his behavior to drive her away is only making things worse. Letting him know that, to put it shortly, they need to sit down and talk like actual human beings instead of playing this bullshit keep away game. I mean, I just picked Minako here because she's my fave... and, as proven by that hair salon business in Season One, she's the one who tries to cheer up Usagi while everyone else is focused solely on duty. You could have your favorite slot into this same scenario, because ostensibly they're supposed to be Usagi's friends, right? And wouldn't a friend try to help out another friend when she's feeling down? Though they do give her some encouraging words right after he pulls the initial breakup, it's not enough. Bluntly, Mamoru straight up needs to be called out on his toxic bullshit. It doesn't happen, and this is a major failing of Sailor Moon R. In my mind and in my dreams, they'd help. On the screen, they don't, not to the extent I'd want them to. This is but one of the two moments this show betrays its own ideals for cheap dramatic knife-twisting, and thank goodness that the other one isn't until the practical end of the show itself... but we're getting way ahead of ourselves. You'd better believe we're not done picking this bullshit apart, but let's stay positive for half a second. Let's go back to Sailor Moon R, and pick at that theme of healing a bit.

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Things are actually just a little more complex than that, though, as the theme of healing has its dark mirror in this season; a theme of corruption. I'm not just talking about all the aforementioned romance stuff, either. If that had a whiff of corruption and healing to it, it'd at least have an arc to it. I could respect it. Instead it... well, no, I'm still not ready to talk about it. In lieu of that, a discussion of this season's villains: the Black Moon Clan. They're a rather complex set of villains, each with their own goals and morals and Machiavellian machinations of backstabbing each other when it's most convenient. They're fascinating, but they are also literally the corrupted future. Exiles from the future utopia of Crystal Tokyo in the 30th century, who have been banished to the planet Nemesis, the tenth planet of the Solar System. Exiles whose goal is to capture "the Rabbit". At first you obviously think that they're after Usagi, but it's actually Chibiusa they want to get at. Chibiusa, you see, is also from the 30th century, sent after a calamity befell the future utopia to live in safe hiding in the past. That worked out well, as you can no doubt tell.


More to the point, the Black Moon Clan sees an opportunity and literally tries to corrupt the future; taking over key strategic spots of Crystal Tokyo in the 20th century and making them havens of dark energy to weaken the future. It's the first member of the Black Moon Clan we see which leads to some real interesting stuff. Crimson Rubeus is one of the top dogs of the Clan, and while he's not the leader he does have his own underlings; The Spectre Sisters. Four sisters who take orders from him, bicker with each other, and try and fail a bunch to get Chibiusa and corrupt the future. Eventually Rubeus gets fed up with all the failure, and they have one last chance each to get the job done. Each of them fail... but then something happens that we've never seen before. They don't die. Each sister gets their own episode of trying and failing with their last chance, and at the end of each one? Sailor Moon heals them of their corruption, making them human and allowing them to live normal lives. The Spectre Sisters don't get blasted into oblivion with the power of love. Actual effort's made to show them the light. Here, then, are the first glimmers of the utopian idealism which will define the series very soon. Sailor Moon sees four confused girls who feel they have no other choices beyond corrupting the future or dying, and she shows them a third option which is preferable to either. In some respects, it had to be this way. I mean, four sisters who work as a team and are evenly matched against our heroic Sailor Senshi? They're dark mirrors of our girls. Of course they had to be healed. Rubeus doesn't take kindly to this betrayal, and actually manages to capture everyone except Sailor Moon and Chibiusa. In this moment of desperation, we really see how much our heroine has grown:

The Usagi of now directly compares herself to the Usagi of Season 1, and finds a new groundswell of bravery and heroism within her. She waltzes on up to Rubeus's ship, ready to throw down... and, thanks to Chibiusa's help, she wins. Rubeus tries to blow everyone up, but oops. The Sailor Senshi have a teleport they can all do together. The next in line of the Black Moon Clan, Esmeraude, shows up just to taunt Rubeus and tell him what a fuckup he is before she warps away and lets him blow up with his ship. In that moment, it's Rubeus who is put in his place. Rubeus, the manipulator who only saw the sisters as fuckups, as a means to his ends, something to be used and then discarded without empathy when  they fail one too many times? He's put in that same position, and doesn't it sting? Could he have been redeemed? Who can say for sure? Either way, he's blasted into oblivion. The future's not quite here... yet. Still, if the future can't come to us right away... why don't we go to the future ourselves?


(This actually is an intrusion from the future, as I am adding this into the finished Sailor Moon R post after the fact upon realizing my colossal omission. It would be criminal of me not to mention the adorable episode in which everyone catches the flu and gets sick save for Minako, who then acts as a klutzy caregiver to all of her ill friends. It not only follows through on our healing theme using my favorite character, but has this beautiful moment between Usagi and Minako which absolutely opens the doors for shipping the pair of them together:

Just wanted to add that bit of positivity before I tear this show's corruptive excesses to shreds. What do I mean by that? On with the show...)

NO FUCKIN' SHIT I'M ANGRY WITH YOU!!!

This is where the fun begins. Our five Sailor Senshi, Tuxedo Mask, and Chibusa all literally travel to the future. Guarding the gateways of time is a mystery figure who Chibusa has been in contact with during her time in the present and now is when she reveals herself. Sailor Pluto, guardian of the gates of time. This is, in itself, the future stepping upon the past. Sailor Pluto isn't just the guardian of the gates of time to me; she'll become very important soon enough. Still, like a proper guardian, those gates must remain closed for now. In a short time, they will open. For now, we travel to Crystal Tokyo, a ruin in stasis thanks to the Black Moon Clan. They attacked when the Silver Crystal (you know, that thing Usagi blew up Queen Beryl with at the cost of her own life) vanished from this time and allowed them to run rampant. Everything was frozen, and now utopia is eerily silent. We're in a future in which the Black Moon Clan has won, in a sense... and right about now is when another gate opens. I'm not talking in the show, I'm talking about all that nasty corruption we've been fighting off. We staved it a bit by healing the sisters, but I'm afraid it's about to burst. A bit before we came to the future, Usagi and Mamoru actually had the goddamn conversation they should have had when he broke up with her, about the premonitions of the end of the world. Usagi, ever the idealist, is confident the world won't literally end if they're together. Okay. Here's the goddamn reveal. You ready for this? King Endymion, aka Mamoru's future self... he sent the premonitions back in time to his past self. Why? TO STRENGTHEN THEIR RELATIONSHIP SO THEY COULD DEFEAT THE BLACK MOON CLAN WITH RENEWED LOVE FOR EACH OTHER. I... I... NO! NO NO NO NO NO! BAD! BAD SHOW! BAD! I am at a loss for words on how upset this makes me, which is particularly impressive considering all the words I've spilled on this show already (and the words left yet unspilled). BUT BY GOD I'M GOING TO TRY ANYWAY.


The man fucked around with his past self, putting him and his future wife through the emotional wringer...  to make them love each other more? That is NOT healthy! This just makes Mamoru out to be the biggest dick in the universe; both in how he treats Usagi in the past by trying to make her break up with him, and how he treats her in the future by literally orchestrating fake premonitions to make himself break up with his future wife what in the holy fuck am I actually summarizing an actual plot here? I mean, wow. To put this kind of toxic bullshit in the show to begin with, LET ALONE in a season all about healing? That's a new low. Not only should Usagi be infuriated with Endymion for this, but so should Mamoru. His reactions to the premonitions and toxic behavior are indefensible, of course, but here and now he's basically learned that he was manipulated into feeling he needed to push Usagi away to save her and the world? I'd punch my future self out. Hell, let's go farther. What if this plan backfired? What if your stupid grand scheme to make yourself break up with your girlfriend so you love her HARDER to blow up the Black Moon Clan completely botches, and you don't get back together with her AND CREATE YOUR GODDAMNED UTOPIA? King Endymion literally risks a TIME PARADOX over this horseshit, and Sailor Pluto should have smacked him in the face with her staff the moment he tried it. The argument could be made that it's a predestination paradox, but I don't buy it because a later season will put Usagi and Mamoru's relationship in jeopardy and actually show Chibiusa fading out of existence, Back To The Future style, because time is literally being rewritten on the fly. (But then, that latter situation has its own twists and turns that are a good while away.) None of this makes any sense, but we can Occam's Razor this. Why did King Endymion do this? Because heartache and breakup and making Usagi feel like shit over not being able to be with her true love is easy conflict and drama. Fuck this. Fuck this entire subplot. As much as I love this show, as much as it has and will inspire me in the future... this is, as I said, one of the two moments where it betrayed me for the sake of cheap melodrama. No, I take that back. It didn't just betray me, or any other average viewer of the show invested in what it had to say. The worst crime is that, in a season of healing and redemption and fighting against corruption, it succumbed to its own corruptions. It betrayed itself.

It's the theme of the season.

It doesn't get any worse than that, but the floodgates have opened. Lesser evils and corruptions take hold now. Take, for instance, Prince Dimande of the Black Moon Clan. The leader. The head boss, so to speak. To make a long story short, he sees our Usagi in the future. She's a dead ringer for Neo Queen Serenity, leader of Crystal Tokyo. He, an exile, has a forbidden lust for Neo Queen Serenity. so, what's the logical thing to do? Oh, just kidnap and try to hypnotize a 14 year-old girl into being your bride because she looks a lot like a queen you want to bang. WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE HOLY FUCK NO! He doesn't succeed, but we do get a victory for the forces of corruption. See, there's this guy who's been hanging around since all the way back with Rubeus and the sisters. Wiseman. A spooky man shrouded in robes with a crystal ball and glowing hands. At first he seems more like a vizier, but gradually we see that he's playing the entire Black Moon Clan like a fiddle. He tricks Esmeraude into taking his power and fucks her up, and he's got grand plans of his own. To that end, he encounters Chibiusa alone in Crystal Tokyo, and makes his move. His corruption spreads. He preys on Chibiusa's negativity and conflicting emotions, he makes her think the people in her life are cruel and don't love her. Here and now, for the briefest of moments, the corruption wins. I haven't mentioned it yet, but it's obvious in hindsight. Chibiusa is the future daughter of Usagi and Mamoru. She's literally the future, the shining utopian idealism this show will one day hold up proudly... and here and now, she becomes corrupted. Chibiusa is transformed into a mature woman, an agent of the Black Moon Clan. Chibiusa is no more, and Black Lady stands proud, ready to unmake utopia. Things look utterly grim now, and we're at a new low point. The Black Moon Clan's power comes from a dark crystal, a mirror to the Silver Crystal which has defined the show so far. It has literally descended upon the past to unmake it, and Black Lady is right there along with it to bring about the end of the light. At this point we're at the lowest of the low. Hell, let's go all out with it.


You know what I was dealing with between the end of Sailor Moon Classic and the beginning of Sailor Moon R? Pure despair. My dad was scheduled for a risky bit of surgery not long after I finished Classic. About half a week before it was supposed to happen, our dog of 10 years up and died. I didn't start R until after the surgery was shown to be a success, but the point is that I wasn't in the best of moods when I was sitting down and watching this. Maybe that's part of why the breakup plot pissed me off so much, it was adding salt to my own wounds. Still, in this darkest of hours, there's always hope. The four healed Spectre Sisters do their best to help in this time of crisis, and our Sailor Senshi venture into the heart of the dark crystal to stop everything and save the day. Dimande tries his stupid goddamn hypnosis again but it doesn't work, and here we are. The end. Black Lady stands tall, utterly convinced she is unloved. Her master, Wiseman, is the Death Phantom who will bring calamity and unmake our shining utopia. What does our heroine do? Does she cry, trip, or run away? Of course not. She heals the future. She heals Black Lady, returning Chibiusa to us, and then does battle with the Death Phantom using the Silver Crystal. It's not enough. The past cannot unmake the dark future... but it doesn't have to do it alone. If King Endymion's toxic bullshit can reach back into the past and create conflict... then the idealism of the future can reach back into the past and create resolution. Chibiusa was corrupted over her own guilt; she'd wanted to see the Silver Crystal in her time, but it vanished when she touched it and that allowed the Black Moon Clan to attack. It hadn't vanished. It was lurking within her, all along. Was it waiting for this moment? Either way, it appears again. The Silver Crystal of the future, the utopian idealism that will one day enlighten us... it appears here and now to help the past. Sailor Moon and Chibiusa, mother and daughter, hold their crystals aloft and blast Death Phantom into oblivion. The day is saved, and the future allows itself to be born. With a tearful goodbye, Chibiusa departs back to her own time, a peaceful utopia where she can live happily ever after... for now.


I suppose that's all there is to say about Sailor Moon R. It's a very important season in a lot of ways, but you can see how it ended up hurting me. Here in the real world, beyond all our colorful symbolism, it has to be said up-front: the plot point this show pulled with its fake breakup was not okay, and manufactured drama of the worst kind with no satisfying payoff. If the bad dreams had been sent by the Black Moon Clan or something in an attempt to unmake the future, at least that would have fit with what else was going on... but no. No, that's not what they did. They did what they did, and I don't like it. still, let us consider this a test of sorts. One day, a day that will come very soon, this show will stand to the highest heights of utopian idealism. That show has reached back into its own past to test itself, and what has it found? Sailor Moon R is not without merit. For all it's done, consider how it's redeemed the sisters. How it's saved Chibiusa from her own negativity, how it's even made some members of the Black Moon Clan sympathetic villains. It has taken great strides forward, but it has a long way to go. Not only has it committed the first of its two major sins, but it has devolved into a climax not unlike the first season. As of this writing, I cleared a video game last week: Final Fantasy VI. It's a game I remember fondly from 2001, just before all of this Sailor Moon madness started for me. It's a game that, like Sailor Moon, is all about love and healing and finding purpose in the face of corruption. At the end of that video game, you stand before the nihilist force which has corrupted your world, stating everything you've found. Love. Purpose. Honor. Forgiveness. Awe-inspiring things that have brought you together to stand before the ultimate evil. You then blast the everloving shit out of it with magic and swords. That's not entirely unlike what happened at the end of Sailor Moon R. It healed the sisters, yes... but against the corruptive force of the universe, it didn't hesitate. It didn't even bother to ask if this was the only option before blowing it out of the sky. The future is coming, and it will look back on the past. It will look back at the blasted remains of Queen Beryl, of Wiseman, and it will utter six words before showing us our follies, showing us how to do conflict without destroying itself, showing us the highest heights it can reach.


"There should have been another way."


Next Time: The Crybaby's Idealism Vs. The Pair's Practicality