D. G. D. is a science fiction writer and archaeologist. He blogs on occasion at www.deusexmagicalgirl.com.
My first review is up over at my new blog, and we're still on track to begin serializing a novel real soon, but mostly I'm popping in here to share the above image I found while searching for something appropriate with which to celebrate National Unicorn Day, because, well ... damn.
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Unicorn Day? Okay.
I lost interest in Crystal in more quickly. Yeah, it wasn't funny. Though, the original animated series was made by the same staff as Goldfish Warning, so they knew cartoon humor.
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I stuck with Crystal because, well, it's Sailor Moon. Also, I keep hoping it will improve. It has, somewhat, but no, they haven't learned how to tell a snappy joke.
3859348 At least they got rid the bad CGI transformation sequences. The transitionally animated ones are far and away better. It's also odd to listen to the same arrangement from Smile Precure in Sailor Moon.
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Woah, is it really the same, or is it just similar?
3861147 It's similar, but incredibly so. Especially the use of the angelic choir. I haven't looked it up, but I suspect that the same music composer worked on both series.
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Probably more appropriate than the bongos in the original Sailor Moon, at least.
Where have you found the other PreCure series? I've only ever come across the original.
3861418 Less than legal means I must admit (release official subs on the web at least, Bandai). Though, Smile was dubbed by Saban as "Glitter Force" and is currently on Netflix. I don't recommend it the dub. It's...bad.
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Netflix needs more anime.
It's unfortunate that anime releases tend to be so short-lived. Snatch up the DVD while it's available, or it will be gone. There are several series I'd happily purchase legally if I could. I want Studio Pierot's old magical girls series. And I want all the PreCures. And I want Saint Tail.
Because releases are so short-lived, I get the impression that anime fandom has a short memory, such as how Puella Magi Madoka Magica was praised for being the first of its kind when everything it did (though it did it very well) had been done already in places like Sailor Moon's fifth arc, and Phantom Thief Jeanne, and Revolutionary Girl Utena.
3864423 I think it's because what those series did with whisper Magica did through screaming at the top of its lungs through a massive bullhorn. One the facade was dropped like a bad habit in Episode 3, it was a Katie bat the door.
I still think the first series of Fushigiboshi no Futagohime was a better deconstruction of the Magical Girl genre for repeated viewings because it used humor and roll playing game mechanics to clever effect for their powers. Even though I found Fine and Rein to be much like the trainer avatar in Pokemon, the least interesting part of their world (which was one of the many reasons the second series pissed me off as it further collapsed its scope in on them and made them even more irritating).
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Well, I think Revolutionary Girl Utena is a really brilliant take on Sailor Moon's central conceit. The director, I think, "got it" when he concluded that the popularity of Sailor Moon and subsequent magical girl warriors was due to their depiction of violence as catharsis. His take on that concept is very original.
Still, the ending of Utena cheesed me off like nothing else. The basic idea was good, but the underlying Gnostic parable was a mistake. It simply didn't fit what the series ultimately grew into.
I suppose I should watch Fushigiboshi no Futagohime. I'm still not familiar with that one.
3867010 Sadly Futagohime is not available officially in the States. Which is shame.
The basic idea is there is a planetoid about 1,000 to 2,000 kilometers across that's been hollowed out into a miniature Dyson's Shell with an artificial sun and other environmental controls. The sun is dying and the twin princesses of the Sunny Kingdom are given a power to save it...eventually. It's an exploration story as they travel from kingdom to kingdom helping people with their problems by using this power which does basically whatever it wants and leaves them to figure it out.
As I said, it uses a combination of comedy and RPG mechanics to deconstruct the magical girl genre. Twins are the "Most unprincess-like princesses in the history of the world" as they're clumsy and immature being a couple of 8 year olds. Their power, called the Prominence, works on a leveling system. They start at level -1 (at least according to their mascot, Poomo) which is called "Pitiful Princesses" and they have to gain experience (by solving people's problems and making them happy) in order to level up which makes their magic more powerful. They also only have a finite amount of power, so they have to recharge and did run into cases where they had used up all their power and couldn't do anything (their reserves also increased as they gained levels). They also had some key items like a magical feather thing that could make everyone in range dance, and even had to collect a bunch of magic McGuffins to complete their powers.
The world itself was also rich and vibrant. The seven kingdoms all had a royal family who were fleshed out to varying degrees as well their own look and culture.
However, that was all tossed for the second series because Junichi Sato was finally allowed to follow his vision of making it a painfully genre school show. The Wonder Planet was left behind for a generic boarding school (and if I hear a another comparison to Hogwarts I'm going to scream) on a generic planet populated by generic people. We find out there are other world that are flat stereotypes. The magical girl elements are so paint by numbers you would think they were developed in a mad lib. Fine and Rein go from clumsy and immature to needing a second brain in their butt just to walk straight and braindead (they had an episode where the villain monkey pawed them over and over because they were too stupid to catch on). The school's faculty are morons, and how you advance in this place is asinine. It seems to be more popular with the doujinchi and otaku crowd because it gave more fan service, but I found it boring, stupid, and a waste of such a great concept.