The Sailor Moon Anime began after the Manga had begin. The Anime
however had a more lighter fill to it and out right changed some ot the
story and characters from the manga. The core concepts were still
there however. The anime was also not under the full control of Naoko,
resulting
in things not neccesarrly following her true vision. The anime
lasted
for five seasons in Japan.
Orginally
the anime
was only supposed to last for one season. Which is probably why the
soldiers lose their memories at the end of the first season's finalie.
The Doom Tree arch that began the second season was not present in the
manga. And was manly there to allow the manga to get ahead of the
anime. The anime lasted 200 episodes and spawning three animated movies.
The
first season was
known
as Pretty Little Soldier Sailor Moon. The follwoing season were, Sialor
Moon R, Sailor Moon S, Sailor Moon SuperS, Sailor Stars. Movies
were made for tjhe R, S, amd Super S seasons. Although it is seems
hard to place them into the continunity of their particular seasons.
Sailor
Moon
was
later syndicated to various countries accross the globe. DIC was
givien the liscence to dub the show for the North American audience.
They bought 65 episodes of the show ( skipping a few episodes in
ebtween and combining the two part finaile of the Beryl arch).
The DIC episodes featured different background music than the Japenese
version and changes the character names to english. DIC cut out
most of the child unfriendly scenes. Dub critics noticed
countless rewrites in the dub and felt that it hacked the orginal too
much. Still it was North America's first exposure to Sailor
Moon. The Dub was syndicated for a year but was not continued
afterwards. Leaving American fans hanging on a cliff hanger.
USA
later got
the
rights to air Sailor Moon reruns on their weekday morning
children's block. Sailor Moon did not last long on the station
however. A short time later ,Cartoon Network added the reruns to
their afternoon toonami block. The dub had far more success on this
cable network. Sailor Moon soon became one of the top rated programs on
Toonami.
Eventually
severall
parties got together to dub the final 17 episodes of the R Season (
where the dub orginally ended in the middle of). Most of the orginal
voice cast was
reunited for the roles. Only Raye and Darien's VA"s were
replaced. Later Pioneer gained the rights to subtitle and dub the
sailor moon movies respectivally. They released uncut subbed and dubbed
versions on vhs (and DVD). They also released an edited dubbed
version for the
childred. The edited dubs of the movies woukld eventually air on
Cartoon Network as well. Raye's old VA would return for the
movies. The subbed movies would retain the orginal Japenese Music
cues while the dubs would use the DIC cues.
Another
company
named
Cloverway would gain the rights to dub the S and SuperS seasons. Most
of the orginal VA cast once again returned. However Serena's , Rini';s
, Trista's, , Michelle's, and Omara's VA's were replaced. The DIC
english cues were not used and instead the japenese music cues
remained. Both seasons aired in their entirity on Cartoon Network. They
were also released on DVD ( with some subbed and uncut versions).
The orginal 82 episodes were also destributed but by a different
company. Ironically, Cartoon Network would lose the rights to air the
orginal 82 and was only able to show S and Super S hench forth.
Sailor Stars was
never
dubbed for the North American audience. Some beleive due to its
controversal nature and for lack of interest by any company. Currently
no company has the rights to the DIC Dub or Cloverway dub.
With the live acton Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon's creation, Toei
stopped exporting the show and had no inrerest in renewing the Notrth
American rights with anyone. With Pretty Guardain no longer on the ai,r
it remains to be seen if Toei will ever change this policy. But
Sailor Moon is not currently airing in the US nor is any new
merchandise being sold.
