Disclaimer: This review is based on thoughts and opinions of the lead writer! Please respect her thoughts on the content, voices, and story of this anime!

Hello Shiquers and welcome back to Nerdy Shique Universe! Never thought you would have two reviews in one day! Well, this time it’s an anime!

Title: Sailor Moon!

I bet you’re wondering, “Wait a minute! Why that one?” Welllllll! It is the re-dub of the anime! For those of you who don’t know that recently Viz Media got their hands on Sailor Moon Crystal which they gave it their cast of females and it was pretty good except for a few voices. I did like Crystal since I only read a tiny bit of the manga since this version did follow that and remembered sitting at Books A Million when it used to be open near me reading that during Pokemon Leagues. I know I was weird back then but I do call back to being a Sailor Moon fan even back in middle school. Anyways, the difference was that Crystal covered Queen Beryl and skipped to the Dark Moon Clan arc with Rini or shall I say ChibiUsa! Apparently the Mikai Tree aka the Doom Tree was a filler arc which I will touch that in a bit and I did like this since the story was good but wishing the Specter Sisters weren’t killed so quickly. I did like how Sailor Pluto had a bigger role in this one instead of just being the Time Space Guaridan throughout the entire thing, as in you get to see her fight against the Death Phantom. I am hoping they dub Season 3 which we get to see Uranus and Neptune and of course Pluto being back in it. I hope it does hit Hulu as well because that’s how I catch it.

Now onto the re-dub! Like with Crystal, Viz wanted to bring the newer cast into the original series as well and not only that they did bring episodes that weren’t shown on tv! Which means we get the entirety of the series and the plotholes that were wide eopen that we wonder where was the episode before another happened. One example was Usagi aka Serena’s family knowing about Luna which was an episode that eintroduced a creature called a Chanela and they were used to steal energy for Beryl’s plot. I did forget to mention, they do go back to the original names in this one which of course Usagi for Serena, Makoto for Lita, and oh yes, the actual Japanese pronunciation of Ami for this one! Yes, I thought back to the old names but I did like the call back to the original ones and it did help me know what they were before DIC Entertainment changed them all. I did know about Rini’s original name from the manga so it makes sense after knowing that she was named after Usagi since they are supposed to be mom and daughter.

Another thing is that they didn’t cut a lot as in if you guys seen the original like I did you noticed how the scene cuts were made with elements of tiaras and moons, right? Here! Nope! As in you get to watch the entirety of the story and how all the scenes make sense. To tell you the truth, this was way better because I felt like all the episodes in the original felt too fast and squeezed in since they had that “Sailor Moon Says” bit! What made it different was during the first part of the series you have intros to Usagi and as the girls were added she does talk about them and then you get the episode preview of what she will say as part of her catch phrase and then either a part of the episode before the title card or just the title card alone. I think this flowed a lot better due to not having everything so squeezed together and the episode flows naturally! Also, they did keep in the original music on top of that which includes the transformation music. I do not like the transformation music that the Japanese used even when Sailor Moon Super and Super S were dubbed they used the original transformation music, I wished they used the one from the original version because it was badass and it was unique! I did love Sailor Moon’s transformation music the best back in the original instead of the music just saying her name. I do love orchestra-like music but I wished the original transformation music was used. Now onto something that did feel weird…

Voices: I had to touch on this since it was changed for the re-dub. Let me touch on the weaker voices first! The rest of them seem to be the best but the weak voices are Luna, Rei, ChibiUsa’s. Why is that? ChibiUsa, first of all, seemed like she was a bit bored. I did like how they changed it for her Black Lady transformation (Yes, that is the original name for her dark side!) but she did the crying and whining on cue which I give props for but the rest I kind of felt she could’ve done a bit better. She does appear again in Super so hoping she sounds slightly better. The laugh also was cute in her Chibi form and she did sound more sinister as Black Lady, so that did give one more good point. Luna and Rei…where do I begin? They picked Michelle Ruff for Luna and Christina V. for Rei! Sorry to say they didn’t sound different as in there were times while watching episodes where I felt like I was hearing Luna and Rei at the same time which I felt that Christina was making herself sound more like Michelle as the series went on. They are both talented actresses don’t get me wrong but they should’ve had Michelle do a British accent to diiferentiate herself as Luna as a nice call bacl back to the original. Or would’ve been funny to hear Christina do her Nova voice from Tales of Xilia 2 for Rei. Sorry for the nitpicks but being honest, would help since I got them confused.

What about the others you may ask? To tell you the truth, I did like Stephanie Sheh as Sailor Moon. I know I did enjoy the original but what annoyed me the most was how they changed her voice with three different actresses or is it four because in the third movie it felt like she went higher! Well, during the first few episodes she sound very young due to her being thirteen or fourteen and then it dropped during the Nephrite arc and she did act more whiny than usual but more natural as the series progressed but when Super and Super S happened….it went silly sounding! What the heck Dic? At least Viz kept Sheh for the entirety because I admit she was a really good fit due to how she was Hinata Hyuga in Naruto and Orhime in Bleach which their nurturing sides are seen in Usagi and when she transforms she takes on badass Hinata from Shippuden and even when she had to take on the older tone for Neo Queen Serenity during the clips that shown ChibiUsa’s past she did perfect with that! I did kind of agree with Gondras and another friend that it was a weird switch for this but looking as episodes progressed I do like it and it’s not bad to like it. Now to the othersKate Higgins plays Ami aka Sailor Mercury which is not bad of a choice. Kate is known as Sakura Haruno in Naruto for the longest time which as you knoiw she does have a mean streak. I do like how she was able to play the shy nerd pretty well from what I heard. Trust me, watching Sailor Moon again with a blindness gives a newer perspective on watching it and I did tell Jason Fond during Ranger Stop that I watch Power Rangers through the grunts and watching this did bring me back to all the usual sound effects. Anyways, I think I prefer Kate over the original because the British accent kind of threw me off with her. I know it differinitiate her from the others but ever since I was a teen I wondered why her being the British one? This time I think it sounded better without it. Amanda C. Miller takes on the voice of Sailor Jupiter and to me it called back to the original actually! If you remembered how in the original she was very tomboyish and her voice was deep and Amanda did a very fine job and I felt like I was hearing the original again and of course Jupiter has been my fave Sailor Guardian for the longest time! I still want to cosplay as her someday! Cheramie Leigh is the new voice of Sailor Venus which I do like! Is it me or does Cheramie tend to get the blonde anime characters? For instance Lucy Heartfilia from Fiary Tail which I did make a joke of a Sailor Guardian uniform for her since I still want to do Pokemon Trainer Lucy. What did I think? I did hear a bit of Lucy but tad more tougher and harder since of course she is Sailor V in this universe and she does have to take on monsters, cardians, and droids and I wonder if she will call on Taurus or Cancer sometimes. Still, she was a pretty good pick in my book for her. Plus, in the last episode before Season 3, I think Ami made a good point that Venus and Moon do sound alike which I can see why Leigh and Sheh made a really good choice for both since when they do the twin talk thing they do sound alike and not bad.

What about some of the other characters? Did I like their voice changes? I do like Johnny as Artemis since he sounded natural and did take on the character Sapphir. There was one thing that I did like was when the Specter Sisters showing up was that they made their voices consistent! Well, if you didn’t know from the original, like Sailor Moon, Koan aka Katsy had the same voice change idea as in she did sound normal when she first appeared and then she had someone who had a frog in her throat when she had the battle against Mars and then it changed again when Sapphir appeared on their doorstep to be with Petz aka Prisma! In this dub, at least her voice didn’t go through that as in it stayed the same like everyone else. Another voice I had to give props for is the one playing Zoycite in this and that is Lucien Dodge which yes, they call back to the original Japanese by making Zoycite a dude in this one. I would say Dodge did a very good call back to the actress who did Zoycite in the Dic version of Sailor Moon with the dialogue and of course the laugh and the scream towards rats when he had to chase a big fat cat for a rainbow crystal. I did like Liam O’Brien as Nephrite since it did call back to the original actor as well since Nephrite had to sound over the top and did have the gentle side around Naru. Speaking of which, I am so glad they gave her a voice I can stand. Sorry guys, I can’t handle the New York accent they gave to Naru in the original, even though Gondras thought she didn’t sound right but I thought it fit in my mind and plus she is kinder in this one and does have the teasing tone that she has to take on in some episodes. She did have a better role as the friend to Usagi in this version since she shown up more. Also, you get to see the romance better between her and Umino, which you may remember him as Melvin, which they chose Ben Discan for! For those of you who have been fans of Kids Next Door, he was using a mature version of his Numba 2 voice! ::waits until everyone’s heads explode from this revelation::

I think I have went a lot into detail of what I thought about the voices in this, to me, if only they made Rei and Luna sound different and ChibiUsa a bit more better, everyone else sounded pretty well done. I don’t want to get more into detail with everyone else but to me with Viz doing this was not bad. I am hoping that the rest of Crystal and the other seasons of this do get dubbed, including Season 5 because that needs to be in English finally, because I want to hear how Saturn, Neptune,and Uranus sound like in this dub. If I were to pick an actress for Saturn, I would pick Luci Christian or Moinica Rial since they already have Cheramie show up from Funimation, why not get another leader from Funimation and Sentai Filmworks for this one? I would lean more towards Luci Christian because she can probably use her Risa Harada voice for Saturn. Or maybe Himeno from Pretear? Let’s see what happens!

Rating: 4 Star Pawprints Out of 5! If I would, I would’ve had someone turn the four in this rating in Jupiter’s Sailor Symbol since it is a 4. Anyways, despite some things in the casting, I do like how Viz casted some of the characters. I wished they did use the DIC Entertainment transformation music because it would call back to the original and of course it sounds better than the Japanese transformation music since that was used in the original Super and Super S when those were dubbed. I hope they dub the rest including Season 5 because knowing that everyone would want to see that in English despite some hesitance towards one bit in the second half of Sailor Stars. Still, Viz did a good job and even included the episodes that weren’t brought over for tv broadcast which we get to see some of the blocked out story which made it flow better. I hope to see more of this dub soon since it still brings me back to when I was a sighted teen watching this anime all over again but better.

That is it for this review. I know it may have been nitpicky but it is my honesty. I still enjoy it. Anyways, next up is of course my interview with Chris Rager and Josh Martin!