Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon!

Rewatching this series reminds me of a few things...
Well, first off...it reminds me that the Negima Live Action was very cheap in production, and rather rushed, and well...not that great compared to this. In fact, if I was not a fan of Negima at all and just by happenstance saw it on TV, I would be very put off by it. The only reason I really watched it was for its branding...it's called 'Negima'. So...therefore I would see characters I enjoy viewing on it, and despite whatever may happen that fact alone will drive me to watch it. That's really all it had, since many many characters were very different from their manga and/or anime counterparts, so it wasn't as enjoyable as I would have hoped. Fortunately they didn't change Sayo's character too much, so although many of my other favourite characters never really interested me, at least one did, and that was why I watched it.

Sailor Moon is a different thing.

This franchise, metaseries, manga, etc...was very influential to many girls when it aired long ago, maybe even a few guys. It's like Star Wars for someone who grew up in the 80s'. You grow up with something you enjoyed so much as a child, something that gave you a part of how you view of the world. Now the anime Sailor Moon is very idealistic, which fits for a children's show. Sailor Moon would do anything for a complete happy ending. There is no need for sacrifices, or to completely annihilate the enemy because they could be cured. Sailor Moon obviously would not believe in the death sentence, but instead complete rehabilitation. All you need to do is sprinkle pixie dust on a bad person and PA-CHAW! They're GOOD!

Sailor Moon would always find a way to come out of it at the best way possible in the end. No one will die, not even the bad guys. This viewpoint works very well for young girls watching the show all over the planet, and even if it wasn't the best view for an older person with more realistic thoughts on the world, the show still had its deep, memorable scenes which would be entertaining enough. The storyline and the mystical fantasy aura around the characters and settings, really drove through a point....

So years later, when child fans of Sailor Moon have all grown up, a live action series comes out! Would such a concept work with the whole theme of Sailor Moon? Would the main character only want the best, and nothing but the very best to happen, while all the other characters would comply? How would it work? Thinking about it now, to stress a need for idealism wouldn't work with living human beings, rather than animation. Everything is more real...therefore, the theme of Sailor Moon must be as well.

Likely the live action took on more from the manga, which as far as I'm concerned isn't as idealistic as the anime was known to be. All the villains, or at least most, were killed. No forgiveness or healing or any of the sappy warmth we were used to when watching the anime as young children, but just something a little more 'ompth'. I'm sure if all the bad guys were killed in the anime as opposed to being healed, we would be a little different in the present. Yet the Live Action seems to be driven for children to watch as well, and in Japan they have a different take on what is appropriate for children and what is not. As I watched this series, I think american mothers would be appalled if their daughter was watching it, simply appalled. Of course I wasn't a child, so I enjoyed it nonetheless, and didn't get completely traumatized as a child might.

One thing the Live Action did that the Anime NEVER managed to do for me was the characterization. I was never latched with any character in the anime. I mean everybody was great with their own unique personalities and all, but they never really jumped out at me. The fact that the Live Action touches more on realism really helps. It is sad to say that my favourite episode, or at least one of them, was mostly a humorous episode. There was nothing very deep in it, besides finding out identities. (And I hate it when they find out each other identities because there's always this huge surplus of tension popping up and they all glare at each other, mad because OMFG that girl was actually Sailor Moon zomfg I feel BETRAYED! It's...simply dumb.) My favourite character, Aino Minako, more or less takes after Sailor Moon in several ways, so basically the only reason she is up top and not Usagi is because of the humour she brings.

Yes, that is indeed sad.

The Live Action is different. It takes on the manga personalities, kind of. Rei for example, is much different and I actually enjoy her character much more this way than the anime. Minako, unfortunately, is completely different from both the anime and manga. She is actually what I would call the "Outers" representative of Sailor Moon, kind of like Luna representing Chibiusa. She's much more serious and emphasizes the need to complete the mission of the past life, no matter what. This really reminds me of Uranus and Neptune of the S season. I loved the S season, but characters with such attitude are disheartening, as I've said with my dislike of finding out Sailor Identities. I find myself skipping a lot of Minako episodes when rewatching as a result, but I watch a few because some are, amazingly enough, actually good. Particularly the later acts when Minako finally awakens and realizes that she must be Minako, not Venus. So I pretty much don't like episodes where she has the stubborn 'past life' attitude. Act 40 is one of my very favourites.

So obviously from what I have said, Minako is not my favourite character, unlike the Anime. Who is, then? Is it Rei? Well, I'm not a person who enjoys serious characters that much, and although Rei may be so, she isn't as far as Minako, so I can tolerate the miko. That leaves Usagi, Ami, and Makoto.

From what I have said before, I don't enjoy flat annoying serious characters, so obviously one of my least favourite characters ever would probably be Tuxedo Mask, also known as Mamoru. He is the worst character that ever existed in the anime. He has no personality. Tell me, if you took away Usagi...what would Mamoru be? He's just there to BE the spouse, king, husband and protector of Usagi. If he wasn't chasing after his past, WHAT THE HELL WOULD HE BE? He would be nothing. His character is a complete failure in the anime, and I rather have Seiya marry Usagi because he had more character than Mamoru and he was only in two-thirds of the last season! Besides, not having Chibiusa around is fine by me as well.

The Mamoru of the Live Action isn't as flat. He even promised some guy that he would marry their daughter. Mamoru actually has PROBLEMS outside of Usagi! It's a miracle! He even has the Shitennou, who improve his personality and life some more. That means he has friends outside of a bunch of middle-school girls! Although he is much more tolerable here he is still not a character I am fond of, but better than nothing. Mamoru is a massive improvement in the live action.

Moving on, basically I have stated that characters are mostly a large improvement over the anime. I've never really liked Makoto for some reason. I mean I don't hate her, but she's just 'there' for me. The thing is in the live action she didn't really have many episodes to herself, but she would also be a large improvement to her anime counterpart. First off in the first season of the anime, Makoto has a crush on Motoki, right? Well like Mamoru, the males in that anime fail. In episode 45, one of the most epic episodes in the entire metaseries, Makoto falls for a Motoki illusion. I can't feel her desperation or whatever she would be feeling at that point because the male characters are completely flat! Thankfully in the Live Action, Motoki is much different. He is obsessed with turtles and is an adorably cute nerd. The change on Motoki definitely improved Makoto's characterization as well, so I was overjoyed at the end of the special act when Motoki caught the bouquet. He is a very lovable character! Thank god for Motoki.

The main character is very important to the story obviously, if the story is not strong, the main character wouldn't be either. The same is for the opposite. Usagi comes off as a very friendly and kind character in the Live Action. She works hard, and seems to be quite the role model for any young girl. This contrasts with her anime counterpart, who is a crybaby with terrible grades. Not that Usagi has great grades in the drama either, but that point is stressed upon much less, and other characters do not chastise her as much for her poor results, which very much helps. Usagi is one of the few main characters I do not dislike. That's a huge compliment from someone like me.

Finally, there is Ami. The Ami with 300 IQ, who does nothing but study, study, and study! I remember an episode in the S season where Ami's pure heart was stolen. She was trying to find her identity. She thought all she was good for was academics, and she was nothing else. Apparently having races at the swimming pool with Michiru helped her cheer up and all was well in the end, but I, as a viewer, was not satisfied. It really felt like that all Ami was good for was academics...even after the conclusion of that episode. Even in her special, which was highly amusing, it stressed her need to be perfect in academics even more. She even thought of her perfect guy as someone looking like a young Einstein...needless to say Spotto was not impressed. (Well, it was amusing, but for her character it was not so)

The Live Action changed this all.

Yes, Ami is still the smartest person on the universe, but there is a reason for that. Her mother is a doctor, similar to the anime story, and so Ami wants to grow up to be a doctor too, also similar to the anime story. The difference? First, the Live Action seems to stress less on Ami being the smartest person in the universe, but instead develops a conflict within that. I cannot ever imagine some child obeying their parents for their ENTIRE lives, especially teenagehood, the age of rebellion. An act from the Live Action actually shows Ami rebelling! For the first time in her life, no doubt, and why did she do something like that? While her mother wanted the best for Ami, there was one thing more important than studying at that point, and it was her friends.

I don't seem to recall the anime ever pointing that out. There was that R episode where she was about to leave to some country and study abroad, but she came back because she wanted to be with her friends, but that episode was very poor. First, Ami was undecided about going, and then finally decided that she would go before changing her mind at the last moment (lol); however, live action Ami did not want to transfer schools at all. Her mind was set. She WANTED to be with her friends. I suppose the circumstances were different. After all going to some other country would benefit Ami's dream of becoming a doctor, but LA Ami actually DID that...AFTER they finished their senshi business. This is AFTER the secondary school days, where people do drift away from friends so they can focus on their future! That's why people go to university and colleges. LA Ami has more brains than the flat character that is anime Ami.

I never really like how the anime handled the relationship with Usagi. Apparently in that universe, Usagi's bestest best friend in the whole entire universe is Rei. In the manga, Rei's bestest best friend in the whole entire universe is actually Minako. See where I'm going? Remember how I hate relationships where two people hate each other but are actually good friends? I think those relationships CAN work, but for such a relationship to be at the TOP of someone's priority is not. Rivalry, maybe, but there is no rivalry between Usagi and Rei. If there was, it'd be for Mamoru, but he is destined to be with Usagi so the rivalry is just not there. Rei and Minako DO have a rivalry, at least in the Live Action. So, who is Usagi's bestest best friend in the whole entire universe in the Live Action?

That's right, AMI. Why? She's in the same class as her for one thing, which would help. I like to believe if you're around someone more your relationship is stronger. That's perfectly sensical logic. Also, this is kind of sad, but Usagi is Ami's first friend ever...so Ami would obviously be a little more attached to her than someone else. That's why I enjoyed so many Ami episodes. What were they about? Friendship. ALL FRIENDSHIP. Two or three of them were friendship with Usagi, no doubt. Act 5, Ami wants to be a better friend with Usagi, so she tries too hard not being herself, faints, and learns a lesson. Act 14, everybody else chooses their own way to stop Usagi from becoming a youma...Ami's way is to stay by Usagi's side at all times. Act 16, Ami is jealous of Naru because Usagi pays attention to her and not to Ami all the time. Act 21 and onwards, Ami feels they're drifting apart, so Kunzite takes this opportunity to steal Ami away from everybody and then Ami turns evil and is all badass, and then at Act 28 reunites with them all in harmony and friendship! Act 33/34, she chooses friends over studying...at least for now. Even in the last act, she's the one running towards Usagi despite her bitch-of-a princess alterego striking her all the time. She is the one who decides first she must fight Usagi because the real Usagi would not want to destroy the world. I believe I've provided more than enough evidence.

That's why her name is Ami, which means friend. In the anime, all I see in Ami is study, study, study! So once again another live action character is superior to their animated counterpart! I guess you can see that Ami is my favourite character in the Live Action. She even has wicked ice swords! And of course a hot evil persona...everything! Bonus points to Ami for also being humorous, especially in Act 31. (No character is good without a touch of huuumouur)

That just makes the plot of the Live Action so much better. With better characters, you can feel their sorrow and pain much more. They have interesting supporting characters as well, as opposed to the anime where all the supporting characters all faded away. (Ryo fails, Motoki fails, Mamoru fails, every male or minor character completely utterly failed) The Four Generals aren't a bunch of mindless cronies but also have their own personalities. Nephrite's anger, Zoicite's piano, Kunzite's superiority, and Jedite's loyalty.

There is also none of this idealism business. Queen Beryl does nothing but stare at Metalia in the entire Live Action, and the new character Mio I dislike, but the absolute storm of ingenious characterization and plot overcomes such minuses. Sailor Moon is not the perfect princess the anime makes her out to be, but actually quite a selfish bitch. Princess Sailor Moon is like: "If there is no Endymion then the world is not worth existing!" However Usagi is a very nice character and obviously doesn't want that to happen, so much so that she kills Mamoru just to try to save the world (a whole lot that helped, lol). It's more realistic for sometimes sacrifices must be made. Just like Minako's case. It is best to live our your own present life even to the end, and take the chance to get better, rather than hiding away your identity to save the earth. Even if you do make the right decision, in the end the result will not always be happy either. (She died btw, :P).

...now compare that with the Live Action of Negima.

Negima!! UTTERLY fails in that retrospect. It's not even worth comparison. That's like comparing the size of a star with the size of an ant running around your garden. No chance.

tl;dr?
No idealism, but realism! No flat characters, but round characters! Live Action = Yay, Anime = Nay! Ami = cool, Mamoru = tool! The End.

Hallo (OAD Two!)

I have immigrated here from a different blogging site, and hopefully I will have a much funner time blogging to myself here than there. :D

What to blog about today I wonder...Ah! But of course, the Negima OAD#2 is out! I watched it pretty early actually, before anybody on the usual forums noticed it was up. No need to brag about it really but I like watching it before other people, gives me some pathetic sense of pride, haha. It was quite good, but again like the first OAD had ups and downs in terms of animation. All of Anya's flaming attacks were very well animated, but there were parts where again they got lazy and animated the scene poorly. There was more in the first OAD so they improved somewhat on this point, but I still believe that there is no justice being served for my favourite character, Asakura. First they blow up her breasts to an enormous size and her other proportions in other scenes seem a little iffy too, and a few other characters too, but I probably noticed it more with her due to that promo picture, heh.

Besides animation, the voices were wonderful as usual. I actually like Kotaro's voice, and I don't understand how other people might not like it. It has that rough sound and that boyish sound...perfect for a rough boy like Kotaro, right? It's nice for them to add scenes with him since he didn't really have much dialogue in the actual episode. I want to hear moar Kotaro! I want the Magic World Arc to be animated to hear even moar Kotaro! Oh and but of course those adorable lolis. As for other notable voices, the 'roughness' of Yuuna's voice is back, since it was strangely absent in the first OAD, where she just sounded generically loud. Overall the voice-acting was superb, especially Anya (Chiwa Saito), though I feel a bit disappointed with Ayaka (Junko Minagawa)'s performance.

As for being faithful to the manga, it was about 95% faithful. There were a few changes here and there, maybe a deleted scene, extra lines, and an added scene or two, but nothing major. Any Negima fan would be fine with that, but there are some small things that would have been nice to see animated or even coloured which were cut, disappointing me slightly. I welcome any additions to the OAD unless it's competely ridiculous (for example, if SHAFT threw in a Motsu cameo...), but deleted parts don't sit as well with me. Of course maybe an exact adaptation of the manga is too linear for people. One thing I had really hoped for SHAFT to do was to have a close-shot of the Sayo doll when it first appeared, then panning out to the actual volleyball game. That way there would have been a fairly large quality image of the Sayo doll but instead they opted to follow the manga exactly at that point. Oh well, guess I'll have to wait until the third OAD. Also, either Ayaka has disturbingly flexible fingers or her index finger is broken.

I loved the soundtrack, particularly a certain song that played during the second beach scene, sounded too cute. I also thought the background music for the pillow fight fit very well, especially since the pillows being thrown around looked crisp in animation as well. (I noticed the freakin' pillows! That must have been some awesome animation!) Basically everything sounded excellent to my airs, so no complaints there! The OAD overall exceeded my expectations. It was better than the first OAD, so I'm going to have high hopes for the third OAD, which would have the much anticipated scene of the Sayo Doll, and of course...lots of Chisame. This was the best scene in the OAD, though I wanted to see how they would adapt the 'symbollic cussing' in the manga, and they answered that question with nothing at all, so that was also disappointing, but again overall was superb. 8.5/10!A nice start to my first post, no? One more thing, despite the oversized breasts, I did laugh at that spring scene too, mostly because of the amusing sound effects.