The further adventures of I AM THE MOST RIDICULOUS PERSON...!
► GENERAL:
→ Oh, Madoka Magica fandom, you're just about all grown up now, aren't you? I'm not surprised the first kerfluffle was over the anime episodes potentially not airing at all (meaning, we'd have to wait until September or so when the dvds come out), it was bound to get some people wound up, and it's not like I'm not anxious for the episodes, too. But honestly, jeez.
→ re: One Piece: Whoa, Ace's tattoo has even more meaning than I originally gave it credit for! I always thought it was a lolarious mistake on Ace's part, but apparently it was deliberate! AAAAAAACE! I LOVE YOU FOREVER, AAAAAACE!! Seriously, that kind of blew my mind.
► TUMBLR:
→ re: Dragonball: More posts that made me laugh! Piccolo was always so great with kids.
→ No, it's possible.
► FARMVILLE:
→ Level 92! My goal of ~93-95 is within sight!
→
WAHAHAHA, THAT IS AN OLD ENGLISH HEN (to the right of the gold chickens, above the black chicken) and I don't even care that it's kind of ugly as all get out! I HAVE IT AND IT IS IN MY COOP NOW. And it better lay some fucking English Eggs already.
→
This is my sheep pen so far! It's surprisingly cute for not having nearly as many color varieties as I'd like. I have a few multi-colored sheep, but... to be honest, I think it looks kind of terrible if you get two non-complementary colors. I've been focusing a lot on the reds, but I fear I might be wasting my time. I've bred probably 10 of them now and they're not getting much redder. orz
→
This is a work in progress, as you can see, but! I had the idea that, well. I had all these greenhouse seeds for flowers just sitting around and I'm tired of trying to find different types of grasses that will hide the feet of my horses, so let's try some flowers. And I think it's working really well so far! The best part is that I only have to replace them every two weeks, which won't be hard to take time to do, and it'll give me a reason to come back. I'm really sort of pleased with this so far!
► ANIME:
→ I finished Shikabane Hime awhile ago, but never got around to blogging about it because... because... uh... tumblr distracted me? I'm pretty sure that's my answer for everything lately. SPOILERS for the whole series, of course.
I think the finale suffered from two things. One, it wasn't actually an ending! I don't know if it was because the manga wasn't finished so they didn't want to make up their own or they were hoping for a third season or what (and I do want to give them the benefit of the doubt) so they left it open-ended. And, two, after the Ouri background episode, it was really hard for anything to follow up after that. Between those two things, I think the ending felt like a real let down.
Not that there weren't moments of awesome. I enjoyed the Shikabane Hime creating their own En and I thought the Breakers storyline was about what it needed to be (it was obvious that something tragic would happen to the Shikabane Hime, given Akasha's need for revenge) and I definitely felt for Akasha's story. But without any real resolution to the storyline, with Akasha's death gone in the blink of an eye, it wound up feeling like it couldn't quite live up to the promise of the earlier episodes. Even the awesome moments (like the Shikabane Hime creating their own En) felt rather duex ex machina.
Though, I did love the "Our will cannot be negated by anyone!" line, it was so fantastic.
And the realization that Breakers (a Shikabane Hime who had reached the 108 kill limit) couldn't be killed, that they were just stuck that way, was brutally heartbreaking and yet... part of me kept thinking... why doesn't the Kougon-shuu just say that they'll ascend to heaven after 100 kills and then have Akira and Sadahiro take them out? Why run so close to the limit?
It was sort of the same with Ouri's background episode. As absolutely horrific as that was to watch, as stunningly heartbreaking and beautifully done as the scenes were, a part of me just kept muttering about the logic behind it. A newborn baby cannot feed itself. A three-year-old? Sure. A week-old baby? No! No, it cannot feed itself! Not if the mother was rejecting it! So, the way the show asked me to suspend my disbelief (since Ouri was supposed to be human, I think?) made it really hard to enjoy that episode. Even if the reveal about the cat being the souls of the other kids was pretty awesome. But, for every awesome reveal like that, there was one that came out of nowhere, like one of the other Shichisei being one of those kids that Ouri's mother took.
I did enjoy that Keisei's presence was still strongly felt in the entire second season, since I was wary that the series was going to go the route of Makina needing to forget him because of Ouri and I was especially wary that the show was going to try to ship them. I think the possibility is there, at least from Ouri's side, but the show also never forgets that Makina is dead, that Ouri treats her like a human being because she has human feelings still, but it remembers that she's still very much dead.
It's not that I think the series was bad! It got nearly all the beats down that it needed to get in place, all the explanations and backgrounds were put down, all the issues that needed to up come did, etc. And I can agree with Star Crossed Anime Blog's review that we didn't really need to see the ending because it was a typical shounen/seinen-style fight and the series wasn't really about that, but... I don't know. It still felt like it needed another episode of wrap-up to really have come to a satisfying conclusion. I mean, we never even got an answer to what they're going to do about the Shikabane Hime, if things will just continue on as they were (if so, there needed to be a scene where the characters were obviously conflicted about it, but at least acknowledge it) or if things were going to change. The show was so good about answering other questions (like why only girls of a certain age were able to become Shikabane Hime, why the Shichisei were so obsessed with Makina), it felt like the ending was half-assed.
Overall, I'm really glad I watched it. I'm glad inkstone found it and wore people down into watching it, it was a fantastic series with a collection of characters that I really liked, and more of my favorite thing: women with badass weapons! Doing actual fighting! And I have to say, Ouri's background was certainly one of the more intense flashback scenes I've seen in awhile and the series was worth it just for that, holy crap.
→ I've been thinking about that Sailor Moon tumblr post about Serenity's father and the crystals because I'm apparently just that nerdy. Basically, the theory talks about how Queen Serenity (Serenity's mother) looks pretty much exactly like Princess Serenity and their use of the crystal is identical to each other (ie, it's silver for both of them), but Chibi-Usa looks slightly different to her mother and her crystal usage is pink instead. And I think my theory on that is... well, even if Usagi was reborn on Earth, she's still considered a descendant of the Moon Kingdom (or at least Princess Serenity was) while Chibi-Usa is only half from the Moon Kingdom and half from the Earth Kingdom, because of Mamoru. So of course it would be different, because she's not just purely one or the other type. Wikimoon also mentions that, in the manga, Chibi-Usa's Pink Moon Crystal was a more evolved form of it, so of course it would be different. (But, then, why didn't it evolve from Queen Serenity to Princess Serenity? Which goes back to how I think that, one, Queen Serenity never had to go through the power-ups that Usagi and Chibi-Usa did and, two, because they were both pure Lunarians, while Chibi-Usa was only half-Lunarian.)
But then I was on Wikipedia and it mentioned the possible theory that, because the Silver Crystal is revealed to be Usagi's Star Seed in the anime (and in the musicals as well, but I get the impression they followed the anime a lot?), so the theory is that Queen Serenity using the Silver Crystal wasn't about posessing it herself, but using her daughter's Star Seed and thus not being able to use it to its full potential. And everyone has their own Star Seed, so maybe they're using different crystals? Idk, there's a lot that's not really direcly addressed and the differences between the anime and the manga make it hard to really pinpoint anything down. (Not like that would stop me from obsessing over it, however!)
→ Okay, I finished Sailor Moon Super, so there will be SPOILERS all the way to the end of the season!
Episode 117:
» This episode was kind of hilarious just for Professor Tomoe perv!staring at Mimette while she played Twister in a suggestive position. Like... what's even the point of that? Just to bring us lolz? Because, between that and him playing after she's sent out on her mission, it certainly did its job.
»
I STILL LAUGHED LIKE A MANIAC.
Episode 118:
» Sometimes it's the little things that I love. Earlier in the episode, Haruka said that it would be better if the rest of the Inner Senshi had all stayed in the other dimension (and thus kept out of their way), but when they made it back just fine, Setsuna says that it's too bad, Haruka-san. Michiru smiles softly and totally rats Haruka out with, "Setsuna-san, Haruka believes in Sailor Moon more than either of us."
Sometimes it's the little touches of knowing your partner that well (and then using it to rat them out) that really make me fall in love with a ship.
Episode 119:
» It was nice to see the girls discussing why Haruka-san and the others were keeping an eye on Hotaru. Like, maybe she has a special pure heart? Sometimes, I get so used to the anime completely forgoing logic, that it surprises me to see it being brought up again.
» It was the same for Haruka and the others. They think Hotaru might be Sailor Saturn (they don't say it, but they show Saturn's symbol and a picture of the planet), which is the Planet of Destruction. I wasn't used to all this picking up on the signs stuff!
» Haruka and Michiru recognize Mimette even in disguse! Seriously, I'm not used to all this logic in the Sailor Moon anime!
» Setsuna says the Messiah of Silence is the final Senshi who should not be awakened. Which really started to make me wonder, because Setsuna comes from the future, so... shouldn't she already know that Hotaru would be awakened? It's not like they forget that she's from the future, like the way she calls Mamoru "Endymion-sama" and all.
» Tomoe says, "'The stars know all...' Someone once said that..." I can't help thinking that was a reference to Nephrite?
» OH WAIT. It occurs to me that Small Lady is from the future as well, yet she doesn't seem to know Sailor Saturn either. Nor Neptune and Uranus, for that matter. And she wouldn't have the same reasons for keeping mum that Setsuna would have, so... either Hotaru, Haruka, and Michiru aren't in Crystal Tokyo in the future... or they're changing the timeline? There's another moment in 123 that really made me think on this, too.
Episode 120:
» Sometimes it's the little things, again. When Setsuna brings a soaked Chibi-Usa home after Hotaru's disappearance, Usagi gently scolds her and tries to clean her up, but Mamoru takes one look at Chibi-Usa's wound up little face and interrupts. A father knowing his daughter, my heart. (I always look for these moments because Usagi and Chibi-Usa's relationship is so incredibly important and such a central theme of the show that I don't have to look hard for it. And I really love it when both parents bond with their kids. ♥)
» Mamoru pulling up the blanket over a sleeping Chibi-Usa and him thinking of her impassioned outburst about not killing Hotaru! Gah, you can just feel how much he loves his little girl in moments like this.
» I always find Tomoe's posession backstory so sad. Dads and their baby girls!! My weakness!
Episode 121:
» I know she's evil and all, but Kaolinite massaging the Professor's shoulders and her smoking hot design makde me kinda ship it. >_> And he revived her, but not Eudial or Mimette? Also, her black outfit (which is more like her manga design, I think?) is smoking hot, homg.
Episode 122:
» If they keep playing the twinkly version of that song while Chibi-Usa stares at Hotaru's empty house and saying things like, "I don't care if it's even for just a moment, I want to see Hotaru-chan." I'm going to keep giving the show the side-eye for cribbing off Classic again. (I know they devoted basically all of Super S to Helios/Chibi-Usa, but sometimes I think the anime really wanted to play up the f/f ships.)
» Haruka thanking Ami's idealism for saving them = ♥ ♥ ♥
Episode 123:
» Michiru and Haruka's dramatic talk about the planet cowering at the hands of the unknown makes me think of their job to protect the Solar System from outside threats and how this is supposedly a huge enemy but feels a lot like Metallia and Beryl to me. Which got me to thinking, Metallia was already nested into the planet, so I get why the Outers didn't stop her, but... what about Ail and Ann? Or were they not awaked at that point? They looked fairly old in their flashbacks, so maybe they just weren't around to protect the planet from that.
However, there's also the Black Moon family, so where were Uranus and Neptune during that? I'm really never sure what to think about the whole timeline shenanigans, if the anime just wants us to not apply logic to these things or if they're saying that Uranus and Neptune and Saturn aren't going to be around in the future (and, if they don't spend a lot of time around Usagi and her Silver Crystal, they wouldn't be immortal, either?) or are they saying that they're changing the timeline? While I don't rule out the idea that Haruka, Michiru, and Hotaru just aren't around in the future (because I can see them taking off, just sort of drifting with the wind/the currents, rather than sticking down roots in one place and Hotaru going back to her father), I suspect that they're changing the timeline. Setsuna seems surprised by too much for me to think otherwise.
» I love Usagi tripping into the bath, which starts a water fight between her and Chibi-Usa, which takes her mind off Hotaru. ♥
» When Cyprin lures all the Mugen Gakuen students to the school and their heart crystals fly out, it's not explained how she does any of this and THIS IS WHY I GET SURPRISED WHEN LOGIC COMES UP IN THE SHOW.
» They linked Chibi-Usa and Mamoru's bodies so he could heal her (after her heart crystal was stolen to be fed to Mistress 9), which is sort of an implication of his manga powers, maybe? But the implication could also be that anyone could have done it if linked to her, because they don't really say how it happened and it sort of seems like the cats did it? Yet, you never see this happening anywhere else, even when people are dying, and you think they would have if other people were capable of it?
» With this powerful enemy, why don't they bring Serenity or Endymion back in time to help? It makes me wonder if they know how it's all going to turn out, which makes me wonder if this is all part of the original timeline again. And I know I should just relax and enjoy the show. orz
» Mistress 9 does sort of feel like the show cribbing off Black Lady a bit. >_> Even if Mistress 9 is a completely separate entity from Hotaru, where Black Lady was Chibi-Usa brain-washed.
Episode 124:
» Setsuna gets an odd look on her face when she thinks of Usagi's words of how she won't let anyone be sacrificed and this is right after Haruka says that there was no Messiah after all, that they had to do it themselves, no matter the sacrifice. It's a logical connection between what Usagi said and Haruka's words (the idea of someone having to be sacrificed) but it still made me wonder how much Setsuna knows about Usagi and the Messiah.
Episode 125-126:
» I have noticed in these episodes that Mugen Gakuen was visibly destroyed and there are implications of the public being made aware of supernatural stuff, even if the anime is really inconsistent about these things.
» Tomoe's flashback to kiddie Hotaru! Her little mad face!! SO CUTE!!
» Interesting that Chibi-Usa's heart crystal seems normal-sized.
» Hotaru fighting off Mistress 9 because she has dear people now! I love moments like that so much. ♥ It really was one of the better, more epic parts of the finale. But that's sort of where my problem with Super comes in, because I felt like the finale was weak compared to what I'm used to from SM finales. Maybe I went in with expectations that I shouldn't have (even if both Classic and R had really excellent, epic endings) or maybe I'm just being too picky, but I feel like the best part of any season ending is when Usagi transforms into Serenity and stands up, refusing to go down. I wouldn't even have minded that we didn't get Serenity in this finale because Super Sailor Moon was pretty epic!
But... we didn't even get to see the fight with Pharaoh 90! I realize that they were probably hampered by not having an actual human-like form to have Usagi (and Hotaru) fighting against, but it really felt like a huge let down to see Saturn jump into the large gathering of black energy, then see Usagi jumping into it... and a few seconds later, she jumps back out, with baby Hotaru in her arms. And that's it. We don't even get to see the final fight!
This also goes together with the fight between Usagi and Haruka/Michiru. There's a lot I loved about that situation, but it was also resolved very quickly and wound up feeling almost pointless. I get what they were going for, but if it was going to be that easy, why bother with it at all? I feel like the whole season was all this build-up and none of the payoff that I'd been hoping for.
» However! One of the things I really loved about the Usagi vs Haruka/Michiru fight was when Usagi agreed to it, the Inners want to rush to help her, but Mamoru stops them with a rose. I love that he understood the situation and supported Usagi's decision to do that on her own. ♥
Episode 127:
» There's a moment between Usagi and Mamoru here that always gets me thinking about what the anime was trying to do. Usagi says she's cold, so Mamoru goes to get her cocoa and she's murmuring that she wants him to warm her up and he completely misses her cues and HER FACE. Given that, in the episode right before this one, he understood Usagi and her situation perfectly even when the other Senshi hadn't caught on yet (among the many other times the anime has shown that he gets what's going on pretty well), I refuse to believe that Mamoru doesn't understand her/isn't picking up on the signals she's giving him.
I think Mamoru has firmly decided that Usagi is only 15 right now, so HANDS OFF until she's a little less jailbait. He's still desperately in love with her, but he's (mostly) waiting a bit longer.
» Not much later after that moment, Mamoru asks the other girls to leave Usagi and Chibi-Usa alone when they start to chase after the two of them, because he knows that they need time alone together. Again, he gets Usagi (and Chibi-Usa), so you can't tell me that he's not picking up on her PLZ KISS ME NAO vibes.
Overall:
» I have to say, Classic is still the reigning champ for my favorite. I think Super did a lot of things better, like the build-up and the focus on plot more than monster of the week, but it failed to deliver an epic ending and it felt a lot like it was cribbing off previous seasons. (Like Hotaru being kidnapped/forced to transform into another person, with the search for the Messiah vs the search for the Princess, even a little the way Haruka and Mamoru are rather similar in a lot of ways, the allies-who-aren't-quite-allies thing, etc.) I can see why it's a favorite of a lot of people, but I don't think it'll ever be mine.
» However, it did have the best humorous episodes. The running gag with Chibi-Usa's Pink Sugar Heart Attack was ALWAYS FUNNY. And I love love love Chibi-Usa in this season! I'm super curious to see how the manga originally did this storyline, because I've been finding the comparisons really interesting with Classic so far!
→ Oh, Madoka Magica fandom, you're just about all grown up now, aren't you? I'm not surprised the first kerfluffle was over the anime episodes potentially not airing at all (meaning, we'd have to wait until September or so when the dvds come out), it was bound to get some people wound up, and it's not like I'm not anxious for the episodes, too. But honestly, jeez.
→ re: One Piece: Whoa, Ace's tattoo has even more meaning than I originally gave it credit for! I always thought it was a lolarious mistake on Ace's part, but apparently it was deliberate! AAAAAAACE! I LOVE YOU FOREVER, AAAAAACE!! Seriously, that kind of blew my mind.
► TUMBLR:
→ re: Dragonball: More posts that made me laugh! Piccolo was always so great with kids.
→ No, it's possible.
► FARMVILLE:
→ Level 92! My goal of ~93-95 is within sight!
→
WAHAHAHA, THAT IS AN OLD ENGLISH HEN (to the right of the gold chickens, above the black chicken) and I don't even care that it's kind of ugly as all get out! I HAVE IT AND IT IS IN MY COOP NOW. And it better lay some fucking English Eggs already.
→
This is my sheep pen so far! It's surprisingly cute for not having nearly as many color varieties as I'd like. I have a few multi-colored sheep, but... to be honest, I think it looks kind of terrible if you get two non-complementary colors. I've been focusing a lot on the reds, but I fear I might be wasting my time. I've bred probably 10 of them now and they're not getting much redder. orz
→
This is a work in progress, as you can see, but! I had the idea that, well. I had all these greenhouse seeds for flowers just sitting around and I'm tired of trying to find different types of grasses that will hide the feet of my horses, so let's try some flowers. And I think it's working really well so far! The best part is that I only have to replace them every two weeks, which won't be hard to take time to do, and it'll give me a reason to come back. I'm really sort of pleased with this so far!
► ANIME:
→ I finished Shikabane Hime awhile ago, but never got around to blogging about it because... because... uh... tumblr distracted me? I'm pretty sure that's my answer for everything lately. SPOILERS for the whole series, of course.
I think the finale suffered from two things. One, it wasn't actually an ending! I don't know if it was because the manga wasn't finished so they didn't want to make up their own or they were hoping for a third season or what (and I do want to give them the benefit of the doubt) so they left it open-ended. And, two, after the Ouri background episode, it was really hard for anything to follow up after that. Between those two things, I think the ending felt like a real let down.
Not that there weren't moments of awesome. I enjoyed the Shikabane Hime creating their own En and I thought the Breakers storyline was about what it needed to be (it was obvious that something tragic would happen to the Shikabane Hime, given Akasha's need for revenge) and I definitely felt for Akasha's story. But without any real resolution to the storyline, with Akasha's death gone in the blink of an eye, it wound up feeling like it couldn't quite live up to the promise of the earlier episodes. Even the awesome moments (like the Shikabane Hime creating their own En) felt rather duex ex machina.
Though, I did love the "Our will cannot be negated by anyone!" line, it was so fantastic.
And the realization that Breakers (a Shikabane Hime who had reached the 108 kill limit) couldn't be killed, that they were just stuck that way, was brutally heartbreaking and yet... part of me kept thinking... why doesn't the Kougon-shuu just say that they'll ascend to heaven after 100 kills and then have Akira and Sadahiro take them out? Why run so close to the limit?
It was sort of the same with Ouri's background episode. As absolutely horrific as that was to watch, as stunningly heartbreaking and beautifully done as the scenes were, a part of me just kept muttering about the logic behind it. A newborn baby cannot feed itself. A three-year-old? Sure. A week-old baby? No! No, it cannot feed itself! Not if the mother was rejecting it! So, the way the show asked me to suspend my disbelief (since Ouri was supposed to be human, I think?) made it really hard to enjoy that episode. Even if the reveal about the cat being the souls of the other kids was pretty awesome. But, for every awesome reveal like that, there was one that came out of nowhere, like one of the other Shichisei being one of those kids that Ouri's mother took.
I did enjoy that Keisei's presence was still strongly felt in the entire second season, since I was wary that the series was going to go the route of Makina needing to forget him because of Ouri and I was especially wary that the show was going to try to ship them. I think the possibility is there, at least from Ouri's side, but the show also never forgets that Makina is dead, that Ouri treats her like a human being because she has human feelings still, but it remembers that she's still very much dead.
It's not that I think the series was bad! It got nearly all the beats down that it needed to get in place, all the explanations and backgrounds were put down, all the issues that needed to up come did, etc. And I can agree with Star Crossed Anime Blog's review that we didn't really need to see the ending because it was a typical shounen/seinen-style fight and the series wasn't really about that, but... I don't know. It still felt like it needed another episode of wrap-up to really have come to a satisfying conclusion. I mean, we never even got an answer to what they're going to do about the Shikabane Hime, if things will just continue on as they were (if so, there needed to be a scene where the characters were obviously conflicted about it, but at least acknowledge it) or if things were going to change. The show was so good about answering other questions (like why only girls of a certain age were able to become Shikabane Hime, why the Shichisei were so obsessed with Makina), it felt like the ending was half-assed.
Overall, I'm really glad I watched it. I'm glad inkstone found it and wore people down into watching it, it was a fantastic series with a collection of characters that I really liked, and more of my favorite thing: women with badass weapons! Doing actual fighting! And I have to say, Ouri's background was certainly one of the more intense flashback scenes I've seen in awhile and the series was worth it just for that, holy crap.
→ I've been thinking about that Sailor Moon tumblr post about Serenity's father and the crystals because I'm apparently just that nerdy. Basically, the theory talks about how Queen Serenity (Serenity's mother) looks pretty much exactly like Princess Serenity and their use of the crystal is identical to each other (ie, it's silver for both of them), but Chibi-Usa looks slightly different to her mother and her crystal usage is pink instead. And I think my theory on that is... well, even if Usagi was reborn on Earth, she's still considered a descendant of the Moon Kingdom (or at least Princess Serenity was) while Chibi-Usa is only half from the Moon Kingdom and half from the Earth Kingdom, because of Mamoru. So of course it would be different, because she's not just purely one or the other type. Wikimoon also mentions that, in the manga, Chibi-Usa's Pink Moon Crystal was a more evolved form of it, so of course it would be different. (But, then, why didn't it evolve from Queen Serenity to Princess Serenity? Which goes back to how I think that, one, Queen Serenity never had to go through the power-ups that Usagi and Chibi-Usa did and, two, because they were both pure Lunarians, while Chibi-Usa was only half-Lunarian.)
But then I was on Wikipedia and it mentioned the possible theory that, because the Silver Crystal is revealed to be Usagi's Star Seed in the anime (and in the musicals as well, but I get the impression they followed the anime a lot?), so the theory is that Queen Serenity using the Silver Crystal wasn't about posessing it herself, but using her daughter's Star Seed and thus not being able to use it to its full potential. And everyone has their own Star Seed, so maybe they're using different crystals? Idk, there's a lot that's not really direcly addressed and the differences between the anime and the manga make it hard to really pinpoint anything down. (Not like that would stop me from obsessing over it, however!)
→ Okay, I finished Sailor Moon Super, so there will be SPOILERS all the way to the end of the season!
Episode 117:
» This episode was kind of hilarious just for Professor Tomoe perv!staring at Mimette while she played Twister in a suggestive position. Like... what's even the point of that? Just to bring us lolz? Because, between that and him playing after she's sent out on her mission, it certainly did its job.
»
I STILL LAUGHED LIKE A MANIAC.
Episode 118:
» Sometimes it's the little things that I love. Earlier in the episode, Haruka said that it would be better if the rest of the Inner Senshi had all stayed in the other dimension (and thus kept out of their way), but when they made it back just fine, Setsuna says that it's too bad, Haruka-san. Michiru smiles softly and totally rats Haruka out with, "Setsuna-san, Haruka believes in Sailor Moon more than either of us."
Sometimes it's the little touches of knowing your partner that well (and then using it to rat them out) that really make me fall in love with a ship.
Episode 119:
» It was nice to see the girls discussing why Haruka-san and the others were keeping an eye on Hotaru. Like, maybe she has a special pure heart? Sometimes, I get so used to the anime completely forgoing logic, that it surprises me to see it being brought up again.
» It was the same for Haruka and the others. They think Hotaru might be Sailor Saturn (they don't say it, but they show Saturn's symbol and a picture of the planet), which is the Planet of Destruction. I wasn't used to all this picking up on the signs stuff!
» Haruka and Michiru recognize Mimette even in disguse! Seriously, I'm not used to all this logic in the Sailor Moon anime!
» Setsuna says the Messiah of Silence is the final Senshi who should not be awakened. Which really started to make me wonder, because Setsuna comes from the future, so... shouldn't she already know that Hotaru would be awakened? It's not like they forget that she's from the future, like the way she calls Mamoru "Endymion-sama" and all.
» Tomoe says, "'The stars know all...' Someone once said that..." I can't help thinking that was a reference to Nephrite?
» OH WAIT. It occurs to me that Small Lady is from the future as well, yet she doesn't seem to know Sailor Saturn either. Nor Neptune and Uranus, for that matter. And she wouldn't have the same reasons for keeping mum that Setsuna would have, so... either Hotaru, Haruka, and Michiru aren't in Crystal Tokyo in the future... or they're changing the timeline? There's another moment in 123 that really made me think on this, too.
Episode 120:
» Sometimes it's the little things, again. When Setsuna brings a soaked Chibi-Usa home after Hotaru's disappearance, Usagi gently scolds her and tries to clean her up, but Mamoru takes one look at Chibi-Usa's wound up little face and interrupts. A father knowing his daughter, my heart. (I always look for these moments because Usagi and Chibi-Usa's relationship is so incredibly important and such a central theme of the show that I don't have to look hard for it. And I really love it when both parents bond with their kids. ♥)
» Mamoru pulling up the blanket over a sleeping Chibi-Usa and him thinking of her impassioned outburst about not killing Hotaru! Gah, you can just feel how much he loves his little girl in moments like this.
» I always find Tomoe's posession backstory so sad. Dads and their baby girls!! My weakness!
Episode 121:
» I know she's evil and all, but Kaolinite massaging the Professor's shoulders and her smoking hot design makde me kinda ship it. >_> And he revived her, but not Eudial or Mimette? Also, her black outfit (which is more like her manga design, I think?) is smoking hot, homg.
Episode 122:
» If they keep playing the twinkly version of that song while Chibi-Usa stares at Hotaru's empty house and saying things like, "I don't care if it's even for just a moment, I want to see Hotaru-chan." I'm going to keep giving the show the side-eye for cribbing off Classic again. (I know they devoted basically all of Super S to Helios/Chibi-Usa, but sometimes I think the anime really wanted to play up the f/f ships.)
» Haruka thanking Ami's idealism for saving them = ♥ ♥ ♥
Episode 123:
» Michiru and Haruka's dramatic talk about the planet cowering at the hands of the unknown makes me think of their job to protect the Solar System from outside threats and how this is supposedly a huge enemy but feels a lot like Metallia and Beryl to me. Which got me to thinking, Metallia was already nested into the planet, so I get why the Outers didn't stop her, but... what about Ail and Ann? Or were they not awaked at that point? They looked fairly old in their flashbacks, so maybe they just weren't around to protect the planet from that.
However, there's also the Black Moon family, so where were Uranus and Neptune during that? I'm really never sure what to think about the whole timeline shenanigans, if the anime just wants us to not apply logic to these things or if they're saying that Uranus and Neptune and Saturn aren't going to be around in the future (and, if they don't spend a lot of time around Usagi and her Silver Crystal, they wouldn't be immortal, either?) or are they saying that they're changing the timeline? While I don't rule out the idea that Haruka, Michiru, and Hotaru just aren't around in the future (because I can see them taking off, just sort of drifting with the wind/the currents, rather than sticking down roots in one place and Hotaru going back to her father), I suspect that they're changing the timeline. Setsuna seems surprised by too much for me to think otherwise.
» I love Usagi tripping into the bath, which starts a water fight between her and Chibi-Usa, which takes her mind off Hotaru. ♥
» When Cyprin lures all the Mugen Gakuen students to the school and their heart crystals fly out, it's not explained how she does any of this and THIS IS WHY I GET SURPRISED WHEN LOGIC COMES UP IN THE SHOW.
» They linked Chibi-Usa and Mamoru's bodies so he could heal her (after her heart crystal was stolen to be fed to Mistress 9), which is sort of an implication of his manga powers, maybe? But the implication could also be that anyone could have done it if linked to her, because they don't really say how it happened and it sort of seems like the cats did it? Yet, you never see this happening anywhere else, even when people are dying, and you think they would have if other people were capable of it?
» With this powerful enemy, why don't they bring Serenity or Endymion back in time to help? It makes me wonder if they know how it's all going to turn out, which makes me wonder if this is all part of the original timeline again. And I know I should just relax and enjoy the show. orz
» Mistress 9 does sort of feel like the show cribbing off Black Lady a bit. >_> Even if Mistress 9 is a completely separate entity from Hotaru, where Black Lady was Chibi-Usa brain-washed.
Episode 124:
» Setsuna gets an odd look on her face when she thinks of Usagi's words of how she won't let anyone be sacrificed and this is right after Haruka says that there was no Messiah after all, that they had to do it themselves, no matter the sacrifice. It's a logical connection between what Usagi said and Haruka's words (the idea of someone having to be sacrificed) but it still made me wonder how much Setsuna knows about Usagi and the Messiah.
Episode 125-126:
» I have noticed in these episodes that Mugen Gakuen was visibly destroyed and there are implications of the public being made aware of supernatural stuff, even if the anime is really inconsistent about these things.
» Tomoe's flashback to kiddie Hotaru! Her little mad face!! SO CUTE!!
» Interesting that Chibi-Usa's heart crystal seems normal-sized.
» Hotaru fighting off Mistress 9 because she has dear people now! I love moments like that so much. ♥ It really was one of the better, more epic parts of the finale. But that's sort of where my problem with Super comes in, because I felt like the finale was weak compared to what I'm used to from SM finales. Maybe I went in with expectations that I shouldn't have (even if both Classic and R had really excellent, epic endings) or maybe I'm just being too picky, but I feel like the best part of any season ending is when Usagi transforms into Serenity and stands up, refusing to go down. I wouldn't even have minded that we didn't get Serenity in this finale because Super Sailor Moon was pretty epic!
But... we didn't even get to see the fight with Pharaoh 90! I realize that they were probably hampered by not having an actual human-like form to have Usagi (and Hotaru) fighting against, but it really felt like a huge let down to see Saturn jump into the large gathering of black energy, then see Usagi jumping into it... and a few seconds later, she jumps back out, with baby Hotaru in her arms. And that's it. We don't even get to see the final fight!
This also goes together with the fight between Usagi and Haruka/Michiru. There's a lot I loved about that situation, but it was also resolved very quickly and wound up feeling almost pointless. I get what they were going for, but if it was going to be that easy, why bother with it at all? I feel like the whole season was all this build-up and none of the payoff that I'd been hoping for.
» However! One of the things I really loved about the Usagi vs Haruka/Michiru fight was when Usagi agreed to it, the Inners want to rush to help her, but Mamoru stops them with a rose. I love that he understood the situation and supported Usagi's decision to do that on her own. ♥
Episode 127:
» There's a moment between Usagi and Mamoru here that always gets me thinking about what the anime was trying to do. Usagi says she's cold, so Mamoru goes to get her cocoa and she's murmuring that she wants him to warm her up and he completely misses her cues and HER FACE. Given that, in the episode right before this one, he understood Usagi and her situation perfectly even when the other Senshi hadn't caught on yet (among the many other times the anime has shown that he gets what's going on pretty well), I refuse to believe that Mamoru doesn't understand her/isn't picking up on the signals she's giving him.
I think Mamoru has firmly decided that Usagi is only 15 right now, so HANDS OFF until she's a little less jailbait. He's still desperately in love with her, but he's (mostly) waiting a bit longer.
» Not much later after that moment, Mamoru asks the other girls to leave Usagi and Chibi-Usa alone when they start to chase after the two of them, because he knows that they need time alone together. Again, he gets Usagi (and Chibi-Usa), so you can't tell me that he's not picking up on her PLZ KISS ME NAO vibes.
Overall:
» I have to say, Classic is still the reigning champ for my favorite. I think Super did a lot of things better, like the build-up and the focus on plot more than monster of the week, but it failed to deliver an epic ending and it felt a lot like it was cribbing off previous seasons. (Like Hotaru being kidnapped/forced to transform into another person, with the search for the Messiah vs the search for the Princess, even a little the way Haruka and Mamoru are rather similar in a lot of ways, the allies-who-aren't-quite-allies thing, etc.) I can see why it's a favorite of a lot of people, but I don't think it'll ever be mine.
» However, it did have the best humorous episodes. The running gag with Chibi-Usa's Pink Sugar Heart Attack was ALWAYS FUNNY. And I love love love Chibi-Usa in this season! I'm super curious to see how the manga originally did this storyline, because I've been finding the comparisons really interesting with Classic so far!