What the . . . then, I demand Utena sequel: the Post School Kakumei!  Or at least a Kakuemi Rebuild!  Damn it!  Why is the BEST of the top 3 90s series not getting resurrected in this day and age crap plot anime!?

I'm fucking excited, y'all.

The SM forum I'm on has basically lost their shit over this, and we're hoping that it's going to be the FMA: Brotherhood to the SM franchise. Kotono Mitsuishi is already on-board, too.

I dunno, I've developed so many theories and interpretations for those loose ends, and get a sense that some of those ends were intentionally left loose, that I'd probably not find myself all that satisfied if some of them were wrapped up in a canon manner. It would in a way perhaps, rob me of my self-created interpretation of what I think the story was trying to tell.

Mainly 5 and 7, actually. The sense of unknown there very much ticks my boxes, as a way of highlighting the point that adult life / moving on / change is unfamiliar, is unknown. In a way I suppose, what I like about SKU is that I don't have all the answers by any means, but I definitely have enough to speculate, and feel the series was directed in a way that was supposed to encourage my speculation and my own conclusions.

Kind of like OITL, I do feel very little was left unsaid (that was intended to be said, anyway). Point 1 and 2 are probably the few things, and offer some extra insight into the characters and add to their sense of character, but possibly won't answer much, series-wise.

Sailor Moon is iconic. So much so that you can find things in mainstream culture. Utena is not, and has never been, mainstream. It is a cult classic anime, if you get my drift. To expect a continuation of something that most people have never heard of is rather ... ludicrous. Let the Sailor Moon fans have their time without being bitter that Utena fans can't.

Thoughts and feelings on Ikuhara coming back to direct the Sailor Moon reboot?

Also, I now realize that's what all of this has been about: the 2003 reprinted manga being released, the sudden influx of SM merchandise at Hot Topic, the worldwide licensing (except the US) of the original anime. They were getting us ready for THIS.

gorgeousshutin wrote:

Raven Nightshade wrote:

Ikuhara coming back to direct the Sailor Moon reboot?

Wait . . .  has it been confirmed that Ikuhara will be involved this time around?

We don't know yet, but I kind of want to know what everyone's thoughts are before we find out who exactly is going to direct.

For all we know, they may asked Junichi Sato to come back, or whoever the hell did Stars. OR they may get someone new altogether.

Woohoo!

I remember last year I was working at Barnes & Noble, and remember them releasing the manga with better translating and packaging. I figured they'd probably touch up on the anime too.
I'm hoping for Ikuhara too, because the best season for me hands down is S. I did love the Stars season too, but that's mainly because it wasn't edited. Also, the ending was left pretty open for Sailor Moon as opposed to Utena.
As said, Sailor Moon is much more famous and accessible than Utena. Also, Sailor Moon is by far more marketable. I noticed the merchandise influx too, as Raven Nightshade pointed out.

I wish they did something for anime like they do for film with the Criterion Collection.

Last edited by Varla (07-06-2012 02:29:25 PM)

gorgeousshutin wrote:

Sailor Moon is by far more marketable

Oh, the show is designed to be marketable: the school girl sailor suits turned short and sexy (going further than Ohtori's girl uniforms, and definitely "hotter" than the unrevealing student council female uniform . . . Anthy looking like a bespectacled old maid through 3 quarters of the show did not help rein in the average male fans), the cutesy attack phases and poses that male otakus can easily sexualize (as opposed to the sexually charged yet subtle, thought-requiring pre-duel stock footages), Tuxedo Mask serving as the idealized Prince that all girl otakus want to believe exists (as opposed to SKU's disillusioning Akio too often found in real life (in less hot packagings)) . . . etc, etc.

That's... kind of a cynical view of Sailor Moon's marketability. The senshi wear those uniforms so that the young girls in the target audience can relate to them (since they wear the same kind of thing), and so they can feel empowered through them and want to buy cosplay items and whatnot. The creators were gearing far more towards that than the creepy fanboys drawing even creepier doujinshi.

Anyway, I like the news that this new series is set to have a worldwide simulcast. I'm guessing they'll do that through Crunchyroll or a similar streaming site? However they do it, I appreciate them making it accessible for as many fans as they can.

As for wanting a new SKU in light of this... as much as I'd personally like a "Rebuild of SKU" or something like that, I frankly can't see it ever happening - especially since Utena's seiyuu passed away last year.

MikoGalatea wrotie:

creepy fanboys drawing even creepier doujinshi

Oh, I'm not being cynical in my first statement.  Trust me when I tell you that creepy fanboys are the overwhelming majority in almost every top-money-making anime known to the west - especially the one that got a Rebuilt; too little sexpot fanservice to fanboys (or worse, having gaypot that scares away fanboys ala Akio/Touga) will hurt any anime's popularity, no matter how intelligent its plot.

young girls in the target audience can relate to them (since they wear the same kind of thing

It takes a brave real life anime watching young girl to wear anything remotely similar to the senshi skirt away from an anime convention, especially in a country where many nasty middle aged men will outright gawk at any skirt that's cut over  2 inches higher than the kneecap.

Of course there's also lot of female-directed-marketing to draw female fans in SM, like idealized romance, dreamy men with little dark sides, loyal girlhood friendships with little backstabbing and/or pettiness,  and so much more.  The show is a big success since its marketing appeals to both boys and girls.

as I'd personally like a "Rebuild of SKU" or something like that, I frankly can't see it ever happening - especially since Utena's seiyuu passed away last year. emot-frown

I love that seiyuu so much . . . but if the powers that be really want to do it, they'd still be able to find a capable replacement seiyuu.

Last edited by gorgeousshutin (07-06-2012 06:26:23 PM)

Anthy looking like a bespectacled old maid through 3 quarters of the show did not help rein in the average male fans

Is it weird that I always thought Anthy was beautiful?

gorgeousshutin wrote:

Saito Hoshikawa wrote:

There are some guys out there that actually enjoy the storyline of an anime before even thinking about how sexy a female character is.

But Saito-san, are those guys in the majority?

I know I'm in this aforementioned group; I'm annoyed by shows that use empty sex and/or unrealistic romance to draw audiences, and am willing to accept male/male scenes when it suits the story's plot.  Why else would I love SKU (which grosses out all my male acquaintances) to begin with?

But I know I'm in the minority as far as male anime fans go - that being in every public anime showing I go to, the guys all go whoo-hoo when the senshis transform, or ooohed the girls do those pop-idol gestures ala in the name of the name of the moon - and have since accepted it as how the majority of male fans react to the series.  Eventually, I ended up watching a lot of eps on my home computer.

The marketing people who put in the suits - while combining that with the cutesy idol gestures (that have little to do with combat effectivenesss) - knows that this will a) attract fanboys b) resonate with fangirls who wanna feel cute themselves, and uses these as part of SM's selling points.

Now of COURSE SM has a plot (I'm talking about the eng sub original japanese version here), especially by way of the later seasons.  But I wouldn't say plot alone is the reason behind its overwhelming success.

Regardless of being majority or not, the sexy factor of the outfit is not the main reason for popularity in male viewers. SM combines the concept of a magical girl series with that of the Super Sentai series; it combines a mostly feminine concept with a more masculine concept, so to speak, in order to appeal to both audiences with respective ideas seen in both concepts. And that it did; both boys and girls could sit down and enjoy watching SM without feeling left out because there wasn't enough fighting or romance or whatever. That's partially what made it so popular at the time. (The other part being the fact that the Internet came out around the time of the English dub's airing, so that there was a way to talk about the series and dub differences, increasing the amount of coverage overall that the series was getting.)

Now while more "open-minded" male fans are indeed in the minority, I'd think that initially, that wasn't the case. SM became such a pop-culture icon that you could pretty much talk to anyone that followed most TV trends in the 90s and find out that they knew something about the series. (Again, internet was a part in this, more than likely.) Her "In the name of the Moon" phrase and pose? Little girls loved to quote and mimic that shit for years. This eventually led to, in later years, the sexualization/fetishizing of the short-skirted sailor uniform that now attracts more than enough male fans than there are female fans.

The plot's also a drawing factor. Just as I said that the show's a combination of magical girl/Super Sentai concepts, the plot itself makes use of those concepts and blends them together into a balanced storyline. The Sailor Soldiers have to defend Earth from whatever comes their way, while managing a social and school life plus any romance that comes their way when they're not in battle. Granted, the dub does pull some logic drops and some things may not make sense (how two female cousins can be so damn close and not be romantically linked is beyond me), but at the same time, it manages to do just as the original did in terms of plot as a whole.

gorgeousshutin wrote:

Now while more "open-minded" male fans are indeed in the minority, I'd think that initially, that wasn't the case. SM became such a pop-culture icon that you could pretty much talk to anyone that followed most TV trends in the 90s and find out that they knew something about the series. (Again, internet was a part in this, more than likely.) Her "In the name of the Moon" phrase and pose? Little girls loved to quote and mimic that shit for years. This eventually led to, in later years, the sexualization/fetishizing of the short-skirted sailor uniform that now attracts more than enough male fans than there are female fans.

If you say so, Saito-san; I have the misfortune to be meet with leers whenever I tried talking to other males (online and in person) about SM, so I guess I just got sacked with the worst of the Asian male anime viewers back in the day; the way how short-skirted school uniform hostess bars (where bar girls dress as schoolgirls to frolic with patrons) were all the rage in Japan back in the mid-nineties did not help either.

Well, what do you expect? SM was mostly a shojo property, as was intended in the manga's case, so the idea of being met with leers from most other men for liking SM is not too farfetched.

At the same time, in terms of when the short-skirt uniform was essentially made sexual, there are somewhat differences between the West and East, as it seems you've pointed out. It wasn't until recently that such a uniform like a schoolgirl uniform reached that level of sexualization/attractiveness to men here in the States, yet as you've said, that kind of uniform was popular and already at something of an equal level in Japan, if I'm understanding correctly.

Either way, the view seems to be different depending on your location, as some countries have different outlooks on what is considered "sexy" or "attractive", in terms of what's in an anime.