Question about Japanese anime airdates.

Ni-ban Neko · Post by **Ni-ban Neko** » Mon Mar 22, 2004 10:28 pm

I know this is odd, but we got our R boxset today, and while looking through the packaging, I started wondering about the airdates of Classic and R. I know the Doom Tree arc was filler, while the manga caught up to the anime - was there any break at all between Classic and R? I know here in the US there is a break between seasons of TV series, so I'm curious about whether there is any sort of similar break.

As far as I know, the Nehelenia arc of Stars was a similar situation. . . but if someone more familiar with the manga can correct me on that, please do so.

Jumbled Thoughts · Post by **MarioKnight** » Mon Mar 22, 2004 11:35 pm

There was no break at all between seasons. All episodes were aired once a week where during the week the next episode would be worked on. Sometimes things happened causing a delay in the schedule which is why some episodes have two weeks between them instead of the just one, but there was never any extra break between the seasons when they aired in Japan.

Cardcaptor Takato · Post by **Cardcaptor Takato** » Tue Mar 23, 2004 12:19 am

o.O How could Toei create such an excellent episodes for Sailor Moon all in the course of one week? I knew that they aired one new episode per week, but I always thought they produced seasons a year before they were actually aired or something. I find this to be a bit surprising.

Jumbled Thoughts · Post by **MarioKnight** » Tue Mar 23, 2004 12:29 am

It's actually common practice in anime, not just Toei. I don't know too much about details but I have read about this practice in various ways and forms, the one I can remember right now is in the music director's notes (or someone else's) in my Princess Nine OSTs where something like that was mentioned breifly.

Akarui Kibuno · Post by **Akarui Kibuno** » Tue Mar 23, 2004 7:50 am

But to answer the "how can they make this in one week" my guess would be they didn't make the eps in one week, but made some eps, started airing them and then continued the making while showing already done eps, and so on.

Would have been quite difficult otherwise... and if they DID make them week by week, congrats @_@;;

DurgaRea · Post by **DurgaRea** » Tue Mar 23, 2004 5:06 pm

I can imagine this would have been possible, more or less, since a good portion of the time of the episodes were taken up by the transformation and attack sequences, which I am sure they made once and just copied and used again and again in each episode.

But yes, you are right! Doom Tree was not part of the manga. So were the manga and the anime published and aired at the same time?

ANd oy! No breaks between seasons? Toei just kept those animation staffers going and going and going??? OMG THere is NO WAY they would have been able to get away with that in the U.S. Oh wait, what am I saying most businesses here give people jack shit for vacation anyway.

Hope they had a lovely holiday when the series ended.

Cardcaptor Takato · Post by **Cardcaptor Takato** » Tue Mar 23, 2004 6:25 pm

From what I've read, Toei wanted to continue the Sailor Moon anime after completing the first season, but Ms. Naoko Takeuchi wanted to take a break from working on her manga, so Toei decided to create their own storyline for the anime until Ms. Naoko Takeuchi went back to working on the manga.

Ni-ban Neko · Post by **Ni-ban Neko** » Wed Mar 24, 2004 8:24 pm

I think there had to have been more than one team of animators. You can see differences in the way characters are drawn between episodes.

Neo Dead Moon · Post by **Neo Dead Moon** » Wed Mar 24, 2004 10:45 pm

Ni-ban Neko wrote:I think there had to have been more than one team of animators. You can see differences in the way characters are drawn between episodes.

Yes, there are several animation teams on Sailor Moon. One of the most well-known is the "mop head" animation team, which got its nickname from making Ami-chan's hair look like a mop. Examples of this team's usage include episode 11 ("Usagi & Rei Face Off - A Nightmare in Dreamland"), episode 27 ("Love for Ami-chan? The Boy Who Sees the Future"), episode 49 ("Who's the White Rose For? The Shadow Knight Appears!"), episode 78 (Venus Minako's Nurse Mayhem"), episode 90 ("The premonition of the world's destruction? Enter the mysterious new soldiers"), episode 114 ( "I love Idols! Mimet's Worries"), episode 144 ( "Sparkling Summer Days! Ami, the Girl with the Sea Breeze"), episode 153 ("Dentist of Terror? Para-para's House"), episode 160 ( "Dream to Become an Adult! Bewilderment of the Amazoness"), and episode 164 ("The Golden Crystal Comes Out! Neherenia's Spell"), among many others. BTW, the episode names come from SMUncensored, so I should give credit where credit is due. Thanks! ^_^

Perosnally, my favorite animation team was the one in the very first few episodes. It was so cute~! ^_^

Aya Reiko · Post by **Aya Reiko** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 12:51 am

MarioKnight wrote:It's actually common practice in anime, not just Toei. I don't know too much about details but I have read about this practice in various ways and forms, the one I can remember right now is in the music director's notes (or someone else's) in my Princess Nine OSTs where something like that was mentioned breifly.

And for more info on the amount of stress the animation department goes through (but with a comical twist), I refer you to Animation Runner Kuromi 1 & 2. (2 in particular)

OVA 1 is available domestically, and OVA 2 available in Japan but does come with English subtitles and is Region 0.

crazydiamond · Post by **crazydiamond** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 2:18 pm

Yes, there are several animation teams on Sailor Moon. One of the most well-known is the "mop head" animation team, which got its nickname from making Ami-chan's hair look like a mop

A little off-topic, I know, but if they're the one's that do episode 170 (I think? The one where Mercury and Uranus face the Mirror Parerodies...), I really dislike that animation team. There is so little depth to the characters when they animate them. I think they also do the ep. where Usagi and everyone go into Chibi-Usa's dream in R. My favorite team would have to be the one(s?) that worked on the movies and on the last few episodes of Stars.

Neo Dead Moon · Post by **Neo Dead Moon** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 5:18 pm

crazydiamond wrote:
Yes, there are several animation teams on Sailor Moon. One of the most well-known is the "mop head" animation team, which got its nickname from making Ami-chan's hair look like a mop
A little off-topic, I know, but if they're the one's that do episode 170 (I think? The one where Mercury and Uranus face the Mirror Parerodies...), I really dislike that animation team. There is so little depth to the characters when they animate them. I think they also do the ep. where Usagi and everyone go into Chibi-Usa's dream in R. My favorite team would have to be the one(s?) that worked on the movies and on the last few episodes of Stars.

Yep, they did both of those episodes as well. They also did the episode in Stars Uranus and Neptune die in. What a sad way for them to go...with such a bad animation team.

Tempest · Post by **Tempest** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 6:49 pm

I like that chubby, round looking style. I think it's cute ^.^ The type of animations tyle I didn't care for was the style that was shown in (I can't remember the Japanese title) but it was the epsiode after Usagi discovered she was the Princess in classic Sailormoon. Another epside comes to mind is in the "S" season where Sailormoon and Uranus her handcuffed together by Kaorinite. That stiff looking animation style. I'd much rather see something partially detailed but flowing than something patially-detailed and stiff.

Post by **Tiff** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 10:36 pm

Tempest wrote:I like that chubby, round looking style. I think it's cute ^.^

Yeah, Derek likes that style, too. I think it's cute, but sometimes it looks really, really bad...I like the Stars episodes..the animation in some of those is really gorgeous, especially the facial expressions. I don't care for how skinny they began tod raw the senshi, though...especially Usagi x_x;

Sakuya · Post by **Sakuya** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 10:41 pm

Don't you just love the animation in the last few episodes of S?! It was sad though how they switched to the bad art for the last two episodes (the Neptune/Uranus VS Moon and the Chibi-Usa leaving episodes).