Sailor Moon Appearances
Sailor Moon is the main character of the Japanese Manga Series Bishōjo Senshi Sērāmūn, literally 'Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon'. The manga was written & illustrated by Naoko Takeuchi, and was published from 1991 to 1997 in 18 volumes.
(Before I get into this, I want to apologize in advance if I got any of this wrong. I didn't grow up as a fan of this series so I tried to be extra thorough with my research on this one.)
(Before I get into this, I want to apologize in advance if I got any of this wrong. I didn't grow up as a fan of this series so I tried to be extra thorough with my research on this one.)
Sailor Moon was adapted into an anime by Toei animation that ran from 1992 to 1997, as well as three feature films, three short films, a television special, The series was licenced for English language release, and became one of the most popular anime of it's generation. a follow up series, Sailor Moon Crystal, was simulcast worldwide in 2013. There have been companion books, video games, board games... everything you'd expect from a worldwide phenomenon.
Toei actually produced a live action series in 2003 called Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon, starring Miyuu Sawai. While this is apparently a neat part of Sailor Moon as a live-action property, the real action was in the Sailor Moon stage musicals.
The first and longest-running production of the Sailor Moon stage musical ran from 1993 to 1998, starring Anza Ohyama. This show ran concurrently with the manga and anime series, following the same plot....
The second staging was the only fully original musical, running from 1998 to 2004. It had three different lead actresses, including Fumina Hara from 1998 to 1999...
... Minyuki Kanbe from 2000 to 2001...
... and Marina Kuroki from 2001 to 2004. Marina continued as the star of the third staging, which was a remake of a storyline already adapted in the second staging, which ran from 2004 to 2005.
The musical returned in 2013 for the 20th Anniversary staging, starring Satomi Ōkubo from 2013 to 2015...
... and Hotaru Nomoto from 2015 to 2017. (I don't know enough about this property for my opinion to matter for much, but I have to say that the two actresses from this production look the most like the character as I recognize her.)
The newest live musical opened in 2018, and has had no less than FIVE actresses play Sailor Moon. If there's any part of this I messed up, this is it. The actresses are:
Mizuki Yamashita...
...Sayuri Inoue...
...Kanae Yumemiya...
...Natsuki Koga...
& Tomomi Kasai.
I should add... I feel like I really missed out by not being a fan of this series. I always wrote it off as being a slightly creepy schoolgirl fetish fanservice, but having read about it I realize that there is a lot of very feminist, girl-power ideas in this anime, and the world can always use more of that.