User:Sjones23/Sailor Moon

Sailor Moon, known in Japan as Pretty Soldier Sailormoon or Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon (美少女戦士セーラームーン), is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Naoko Takeuchi. It was originally serialized in Nakayoshi from 1992 to 1997, with the 52 chapters published into 18 and later 12 tankōbon volumes by Kodansha. The series follows the adventures of protagonist Usagi Tsukino as she transforms into the titular magical guardian to defend Earth. On her adventure, Usagi makes several friends and battles a wide variety of villains, most of whom seek Earth's complete destruction.

The tankōbon volumes were adapted into an anime series produced by Toei Animation, which was broadcast from 1992 to 1997. Additionally, Toei has developed three feature films, three television specials, three short films and a tokusatsu television series. A second anime series, titled Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon Crystal, is scheduled to be broadcast in July 2014. Several companies have developed various types of merchandising based on the series leading to a large media franchise that includes novels, collectible trading card games, numerous action figures, stage musicals, along with several collections of soundtracks and a large number of video games.

The manga series were licensed for an English-language release in North America by TokyoPop before Kodansha Comics USA acquired the rights to release it in 2011. The entire anime series has been licensed for an English-language anime release by Viz Media in North America, although the series was previously licensed and distributed by DIC Entertainment and Cloverway Inc.

Manga
Written and illustrated by Naoko Takeuchi, Sailor Moon was serialized in Kodansha's monthly manga magazine Nakayoshi from the February 1992 issue to the March 1997 issue; the side-stories appeared simultaneously in another of Kodansha's manga magazines, RunRun. Kodansha has published all the chapters and side-stories in book form. The first collected edition of the manga was published from 1992 through 1997 and consisted of 18 volumes with all the chapters and side stories in the order in which they had been released. By the end of 1995, the thirteen Sailor Moon volumes then available had sold about one million copies each, and Japan had exported the manga to over 23 countries, including China, Mexico, Australia, most of Europe and North America.

The second collected edition, called the shinsōban or "renewal" edition, began in 2003 during the run of the live-action series. Kodansha redistributed the individual chapters so that there were more per book, and some corrections and updates were made to the dialogue and drawings. New art was featured as well, including completely new cover art and character sketches (including characters unique to the live action series). The second edition consisted of 12 main volumes and two separate short story volumes.

The third collected edition, called the kanzenban or "complete" edition, began in November 2013 to commemorate the manga's 20th anniversary, with the plan to release two volumes per month. The interior artwork has been digitally remastered while brand new artwork has been created for the covers and all color pages that were printed in the original serialization have been included in this edition. The books themselves have been enlarged from the typical Japanese manga size to A5. The short stories will be republished in two volumes, with the order of the stories reshuffled, while Codename: Sailor V will also be included within the third edition.

Anime
Toei Animation produced an anime television series based on the manga. The series, also titled Sailor Moon, began airing in Japan on March 7, 1992 and ended on February 8, 1997. The series spans 200 episodes, and is one of the longest-running magical girl anime series. Sailor Moon sparked a highly successful merchandising campaign of over 5,000 items, which contributed to demand all over the world and translation into numerous languages. Sailor Moon has since become one of the most famous anime properties in the world. Due to its resurgence of popularity in Japan, the series was rebroadcast on September 1, 2009.

Sailor Moon consists of five separate arcs. The titles of the series are Sailor Moon, Sailor Moon R, Sailor Moon S, Sailor Moon SuperS and Sailor Moon Sailor Stars. Each series roughly corresponds to one of the five major story arcs of the manga, following the same general storyline and including most of the same characters. There were also five special animated shorts, as well as three theatrically released films: Sailor Moon R: The Movie, Sailor Moon S: The Movie, and Sailor Moon SuperS: The Movie.

In 1995, after a bidding-war between Toon Makers, who wanted to produce a live-action/animated hybrid, DIC Entertainment acquired the rights to the first two seasons of Sailor Moon for an English-language broadcast. This dub had mandated cuts to content and length, and also added "educational" segments at the end of each episode. In 1997, Cloverway Inc. acquired the rights to the next two seasons, Sailor Moon S and Sailor Moon SuperS. These series had less editing as opposed to the first two seasons and was released uncut on DVD and VHS. However, Toei froze the international rights to the series in 2004. On February 4, 2010, Toei began negotiations to re-license the series for an international release. In March 2010, a newly remastered Sailor Moon began broadcasting in Italy. The success prompted an international revival of the series.

At a July 6, 2012 press conference celebrating the 20th anniversary of the series, Naoko Takeuchi, Kodansha and idol group Momoiro Clover Z announced that a new anime adaptation was in production and scheduled to premiere in Summer 2013 for a simultaneous worldwide release, with Momoiro Clover Z performing both the opening and ending theme music. However in April 2013, it was announced that the new anime had been delayed.

It was later confirmed on August 4, 2013 that the new anime will be streamed in the Winter. On January 9, 2014, it was announced that the new anime will premiere in July. On March 13, 2014, the official website for the new anime was updated to reveal a countdown (beginning on March 14), regarding a special announcement that will be revealed on March 21, 2014. That same day, an image displaying the key visual art, synopsis and staff for the new anime were announced on Toei's website, revealing the name for the anime,. The series is animated by Toei Animation and directed by Munehisa Sakai. At the 20th Anniversary Project Special Stage on April 27, 2014, the cast and premiere date were announced; the anime will premiere on July 5, 2014, with episodes premiering on the first and third Saturdays of each month.

While Kotono Mitsuishi reprises her role as the main protagonist Sailor Moon from the previous series, a new cast of voice actresses were chosen for the four Sailor Senshi. Sailor Mercury's voice actress is Hisako Kanemoto, Sailor Mars is voiced by Rina Satō, Sailor Jupiter by Ami Koshimizu, and Sailor Venus is voiced by Shizuka Itō. It was revealed on April 30 that the series will run for 26 episodes, streaming via Niconico, on the first and third Saturday of each month for a whole year from July 5 onwards.

Art books
Kodansha released special art books for each of the five-story arcs, collectively called the Original Picture Collection. The books contain cover art, promotional material, and other work done by Takeuchi. Many of the drawings appear accompanied by comments on how she developed her ideas, how she created each picture, whether or not she likes it, and commentary on the anime interpretation of her story.

Another picture collection, Volume Infinity, appeared in a strictly limited edition after the end of the series in 1997. This self-published artbook includes drawings by Takeuchi as well as by her friends, her staff, and many of the voice-actors who worked on the anime. In 1999, Kodansha published the Materials Collection; this contained development sketches and notes for nearly every character in the manga, as well as for some characters who never appeared. Each drawing is surrounded with notes by Takeuchi about the specifics of various costume pieces, the mentality of the characters, and her particular feelings about them. It also includes timelines for the story arcs and for the real-life release of products and materials relating to the anime and manga. At the end, the Parallel Sailor Moon short story is featured, celebrating the year of the rabbit.

Stage musicals
The musical stage shows, usually referred to collectively as SeraMyu, were a series of live theatre productions that played over 800 performances in some 29 musicals between 1993 and 2005. The stories of the shows include anime-inspired plotlines as well as a large amount of original material. Music from the series has been released on about 20 "memorial" albums. The popularity of the musicals has been cited as a reason behind the production of the live action Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon TV series.

Musicals ran twice a year, in the winter and in the summer. In the summer, the musicals showed only in the Sunshine Theatre in the Ikebukuro area of Tokyo; however, in the winter they went on tour to the other large cities in Japan, including Osaka, Fukuoka, Nagoya, Shizuoka, Kanazawa, Sendai, Saga, Oita, Yamagata and Fukushima.

The final incarnation of the series, The New Legend of Kaguya Island (Revised Edition) (新・かぐや島伝説 <改訂版>), went on stage in January 2005. Following that show, Bandai officially put the series on a hiatus.

On June 2, 2013, it was announced that the Sailor Moon musicals would begin again in September 2013.

Trading figures
Megahouse will release a set of Sailor Moon trading figures for release in early 2014, consisting of twelve figurines, two for each Senshi and two for Tuxedo Mask.

Live-action series
The Tokyo Broadcasting System and Chubu-Nippon Broadcasting screened a tokusatsu version of Sailor Moon from October 4, 2003 through September 25, 2004. The series, titled Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon (often shortened to "PGSM"), used an entirely English-language title for the first time in the Sailor Moon franchise. It lasted a total of 49 episodes.

The series' storyline more closely follows the original manga than the anime at first, but in later episodes it proceeds into a significantly different storyline from either, with original characters and new plot developments.

In addition to the main episodes, two direct-to-video releases appeared after the show ended its television broadcast. These were the "Special Act", which is set four years after the main storyline ends and which shows the wedding of the two main characters, and "Act Zero", a prequel which shows the origins of Sailor V and Tuxedo Mask.

Video games
More than 20 Sailor Moon console and arcade games have appeared in Japan, all based on the anime series. Bandai and a Japanese game company called Angel (unrelated to the American-based Angel Studios, known as Rockstar San Diego) made most of them, with some produced by Banpresto. The early games were side-scrolling fighters, whereas the later ones were unique puzzle games, or versus fighting games. Another Story was a turn-based role-playing video game.

The only Sailor Moon game produced outside of Japan, 3VR New Media's The 3D Adventures of Sailor Moon, went on sale in North America in 1997.

A video game was released in Spring 2011 for the Nintendo DS, called Sailor Moon: La Luna Splende (Sailor Moon: The Shining Moon).

English adaptations
The English adaptations of both the manga and anime series became the first successful shōjo title in the United States. The anime adaptation of Sailor Moon attempted to capitalize on the success of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. The English adaptations of Sailor Moon S and Sailor Moon Super S, produced by Optimum Productions and Cloverway, stayed relatively accurate to the original Japanese versions, without skipping or merging any episodes. Some controversial changes were made, however, such as the depiction of Sailors Uranus and Neptune as cousins rather than lesbian lovers. The English adaptations of Sailor Moon S and Sailor Moon Super S, produced by Optimum Productions and Cloverway, stayed relatively accurate to the original Japanese versions, without skipping or merging any episodes. Some controversial changes were made, however, such as the depiction of Sailors Uranus and Neptune as cousins rather than lesbian lovers.

Toei has never licensed the fifth and final series, Sailor Stars, for adaptation into English. In 2004, the rest of the media franchise in English-speaking countries expired.

The manga publisher Mixx (later Tokyopop) translated the Sailor Moon manga into English in 1997. The manga initially appeared as a serial in MixxZine but was later pulled out of that magazine and made into a separate monthly comic to finish the first through third arcs. At the same time, the fourth and fifth arcs began printing in a secondary magazine called Smile. The series was later reprinted into three parts—Sailor Moon, Sailor Moon SuperS, and Sailor Moon: StarS—spanning eighteen volumes which were published from December 1, 1998, to September 18, 2001. Tokyopop's translation officially went out of print on May 2, 2005, after the license expired,

In 2011, Kodansha Comics USA announced that it would publish the Sailor Moon manga in English, along with the lead in series Codename: Sailor V, both were released on September 13, 2011. The manga continues to be released bimonthly with the next Sailor Moon and Codename: Sailor V volumes being released on November 15, 2011. Kodansha Comics USA published the main series in twelve volumes simultaneously with the two-volume edition of Codename Sailor V, from September 2011 to July 2013. The first volume of the two related short stories was published on September 10, 2013, with the other published on November 26.

In 2009, Funimation Entertainment announced that it was considering an entire re-dub of the Sailor Moon series and asked people to take part in a survey on what their next project should be. The re-dub of the Sailor Moon series was included. The results of the survey have not been released to the public.

On May 16, 2014, North American manga and anime distributor Viz Media announced that they have acquired all 200 episodes of the Sailor Moon anime, as well as the three movies and specials. They began streaming the series on Neon Alley and Hulu on May 19, 2014, and will re-release the series on Blu-ray and DVD in Fall 2014, with uncut, remastered video, an uncut English dub as well as the Japanese audio track with English subtitles. In addition, Viz has also licensed the Sailor Moon Crystal anime for simulcast streaming for July 2014. This distribution is so far exclusive to the United States; a plan for distribution in Canada has not yet been announced. Viz aims to release the franchise digitally with English subtitles beginning in Summer 2014, followed by the English dub starting in late 2014. They are also scheduled to release DVD and Blu-ray/DVD combo releases in half-season sets in Fall 2014.

Reception
The anime series was sold as twenty volumes in Japan. By the end of 1995, each volume had sold approximately 300,000 copies.