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How Sailor Moon’s Queer Characters Were Erased - Anime Club · Anime Club Podcast

0:23
Welcome to Anime Club this week. We're very excited.
0:28
So welcome to not only the anime club that we're welcoming to
0:32
this month, we're also welcome you to Queer History Month,
0:37
which I'm personally I'm quite excited about, if only because
0:40
we get to talk about the anime that started it all for me.
0:46
She is the one Sailor Moon and Chris, let me pick.
0:51
So that's what we're doing. We're doing pretty Sailor Scout.
0:55
Yeah. Guardian of Earth.
0:59
Yeah, it was fun to be honest. Yeah, like I honestly was
1:04
expecting more rebellion from Chris, but you have just like
1:07
you just went with it. You watched 3 episodes, we're
1:09
going to play a little bit of a game later.
1:13
Yeah. What did you think?
1:14
See, I've told you I've I'm open to anything new.
1:18
If I don't like it, then at least I know I'll not like it.
1:21
So. And you know, the things that I
1:23
won't watch. So yeah.
1:26
Yeah, yeah. Although there are moments that
1:29
border on I'm not in this and we'll get to that, Yeah, yeah.
1:38
But yeah. So welcome to Anime Club.
1:40
We're doing Sailor Moon specifically how?
1:44
Well actually, so Sailor Moon. The reason that we picked this
1:46
for LGBTQIA Plus month Alphabet Mafia Month is because Sailor
1:54
Moon has a very interesting history in terms of its
1:59
westernisation, and it raises some interesting questions
2:02
around queer representation and what should and shouldn't be
2:05
censored in anime, as well as being just a fun nostalgic
2:10
vapour wave time. But before we get before so much
2:15
vapour wave energy does does the fact that this was one of the
2:22
first anime I ever truly fell in love with this and Dragon Ball
2:25
ZI feel like explains so much about why like the colours I
2:29
wear, the way I live my life like it is, it's formative.
2:37
The so the first 3 episode we opted for classic Sailor Moon.
2:43
We didn't watch the original dub, we watched a dub version,
2:48
which is a later dub. And the reason you can tell is
2:51
that as along with many other changes, one of the main changes
2:54
that they made in the original dub was they changed Sailor
2:56
Moon's name to Serena from Usagi.
3:00
Usagi meaning rabbit. In fact, because of the and
3:04
that's part of the long pigtails looks like a rabbit.
3:08
I didn't get that. There we go.
3:10
Oh, there you go. But what did you get from the
3:13
first 3 episodes? What?
3:14
How would you, how would you describe what happens?
3:17
And this is a test just to see if you paid attention.
3:20
A little bit. So the main thing like the first
3:25
episode was Usagi finding a stray cat and it's busy gives
3:32
her powers. But the series as a whole from
3:35
what I've seen it the three episodes is a monster of the
3:39
week. In the first 3 episodes there
3:42
wasn't a lot of continuity in plot but I'm guessing there is
3:46
because there's like 200 odd episodes of it's at the minute
3:50
so it's got to be something holding it together.
3:53
There's something holding it together.
3:54
It's loose though, because this is the early 90s.
3:56
This is released in 1992 in Japan, so Monster of the week is
4:02
very much the vibe. You can tell that I mean not in
4:06
a bad way of a monster of the week where I could watch episode
4:11
1 or I could watch episodes 501 and I still get the same
4:15
enjoyment. I wouldn't be like, who's that?
4:17
What's he doing? Because some of the characters
4:20
are on for 10 seconds in episode anyway.
4:23
But yeah, so Sailor Moon or Usagi has been granted the power
4:30
of the moon. Yeah, correct.
4:32
As if I'm I'm wrong because this.
4:34
Keep going. And and she punishes evil doers
4:39
with by the power of the moon. And she's known as the is it the
4:43
good looking one? I'm looking at me notes and it's
4:46
not in there. I don't know why, but she she
4:49
keeps saying I'm the looker one or I'm the good looking 1.
4:53
So I'm assuming that there's going to be a a not good looking
4:56
one. No, they're all good looking.
5:00
All right. I didn't know.
5:01
That's the thing, I think that's just like her gassing herself up
5:05
to be honest. Right, she's.
5:08
Like, and you do get a hit of this.
5:11
She's oh, she does not want to be there.
5:13
Like, I think she's extremely relatable because really all she
5:16
wants to do is eat and sleep like a cat.
5:20
And there's a bit like a cat. There's a bit in the third
5:23
episode that we were talking about where she's her teacher
5:27
has been kind of like given a cursed flower that makes her
5:32
fall into us like a sleeping disease, like a like a constant
5:35
sleep and they can't wake her up.
5:38
And the whole class are like, oh, it's so bad.
5:41
Can you imagine how awful? And then she's sitting there
5:44
like Daydream and being like, oh, Can you imagine how nice it
5:46
would be to just sleep all day? And I've never felt so seen in
5:50
my life. It's on, it's on the news as
5:54
well. There's like there's people
5:56
like, oh, this mysterious sleeping disease, like in on the
5:59
telly where the dad listen to dad, terrible dad by the way,
6:02
and and and she's just saying, wouldn't that be nice?
6:07
Everyone's like no. So yeah, and she's very much in
6:13
that like happy go lucky. She's failed.
6:15
She's flunking all her classes. She's a bit bit dumb, like a bit
6:22
cowardly. I put.
6:24
This and supposed to be the savoury of earth.
6:28
I genuinely put this down to her being a 14 year old girl because
6:33
I'm like I was AI was a Dick when I was 14 year old.
6:37
I can't expect anyone else to be competent.
6:43
No, and that's kind of what I like about it.
6:45
And in and she's not very good at fighting the evil in the
6:49
beginning either. So like her, her power grows
6:53
throughout the series as Luna train Luna the talking cat
6:56
trains her. Yeah.
6:59
But yeah, she is basically just like, a, like a high schooler.
7:04
She's a teenage girl fighting monsters and an evil queen.
7:09
Beryl. Yeah.
7:12
And it is. It's an interesting series.
7:16
Like, how gay did you think it was a weird question to ask
7:20
someone in a podcast? Is this where we get cancelled?
7:24
No, I don't think so. I mean, we're allowed to talk
7:27
about gays. Yeah, culture I think anyway,
7:31
we'll find out. I think so and I didn't I didn't
7:35
get any from the first 3 episodes and nothing at all.
7:41
My impression first gone into it and after I get into two or
7:44
three episodes down was it is following a teenage girl into
7:49
having typical of the 90s stereotypical and 90s girls
7:56
problems. Like she's got crushes on
7:58
people, she's navigating life, she's failing school, struggling
8:02
to get up in the morning, that kind of thing.
8:04
None of that screams to me queer content.
8:08
Yeah, I mean, it's not relatable to me as a male, but.
8:17
What, you don't want to sleep and eat all day?
8:19
I can't. Got stuff to do?
8:24
No, but that doesn't mean you don't want to.
8:27
True, that's true. So what we did is because I knew
8:35
that this that would be a fit like the first 3 episodes, you
8:37
don't even meet all the sailor scouts.
8:39
In fact, you only get really a hint of one other Sailor Scout,
8:42
which is Sailor Venus, who is a manga film star at this point.
8:51
But there are many Sailor Scouts in Sailor Moon, and they all
8:55
have like, their own little kind of struggles.
8:57
And again, it's all very kind of teenage romancey.
9:01
Like, sometimes it's teenage romance.
9:03
Sometimes it's just about trying to like, deal with the stress of
9:06
performing well at school and feeling like you have to.
9:09
You don't want to disappoint your parents.
9:10
Like it's all kind of normal teenage girl stuff.
9:15
So I found some videos of some clips.
9:20
Now I've got some facts about the westernisation and I don't
9:25
know if it'd be helpful to do those first.
9:27
Should we do the videos first? Do you?
9:28
Think videos 1st and then it can add a bit of.
9:32
And then I can talk a bit about the the westernisation journey
9:36
and why I think this is quite an interesting thing to look at for
9:39
for a queer History Month. Yeah, yeah.
9:43
OK, 11 take it away. I'll just load up the video.
9:49
Magical girl transformation sequence.
9:54
Sorry I'm I'm watching the moon again.
9:58
I know you dazzled. I am.
10:01
I definitely did not forget to set up the third screen for this
10:04
video as well, so. That's fine, It's all good.
10:08
That's why we have the magical girl transformation sequence.
10:10
Take it away. Feel as useless as Tuxedo Mask.
10:17
What's this obsession you have with older men?
10:19
Because that's usually the way it is usual.
10:21
Hell. Usual as in usual.
10:23
I don't know any of these characters yet.
10:26
No, you won't admit any of them. That's Sailor Mars.
10:30
Handsome or not, I can't believe Mako would go chasing after
10:33
another woman. You're missing the.
10:35
Point you're 1, judge. Isn't this yours, Ray?
10:39
Get your puppy. Hands off my first edition,
10:43
sailor. Do that.
10:46
No, please don't. The other thing is the aspect
10:53
ratio. That's how you know you were in
10:54
the 90s, because TV's used to be, yeah.
10:59
I absolutely love the art style. You called.
11:04
I was not a happy child. That's the.
11:08
Reason. See.
11:09
OK, now it's getting a bit more. Openly lesbian.
11:14
Yeah. We'll work together, we'll find
11:17
a way by combining our powers, I'm sure we can remove her evil
11:21
and bring back the girl we love. You're right.
11:26
Thank you. Still, you have bags under your
11:29
eyes. Is that I do.
11:32
In the end, I'll find a rich, handsome machinery.
11:35
He'll be my Prince, and I'll be taken care of.
11:38
That's what women really want. Getting stuck with some muscule
11:42
shrine would be awful. I've heard enough.
11:44
It's time to leave. Boom.
11:45
Up this equipment here. Somebody could bump into it.
11:48
So put it away. Yes.
11:50
Ray is so efficient. She.
11:51
Is so lovely. I've just taken us this.
11:54
Year without her putting everything together.
11:58
You think this is how it goes. You think this is how girls talk
12:01
to each other all the time? All the time.
12:09
I thought that was a lovely song, thank you.
12:13
I never realized, but you're a really super hard worker, Soggy.
12:20
Why don't I teach you a thing or two about hard work?
12:24
Kiss, and then they kiss. This is where it gets
12:37
interested. Right.
12:44
Kiss me, Michael. That might be what are you.
12:49
Doing Oh, Elizabeth, come on, Michael, kiss me kiss.
12:56
That's just like a normal girl's sleepover, isn't?
12:58
It. Yeah, yeah.
13:00
Although normally we don't cover so much skin.
13:04
Let's pull up item. Yeah.
13:13
But earlier when you said is that a man that back character
13:16
there? Right.
13:18
With her looks like cousin. Right.
13:21
Oh yeah, guess it is. Let me help you.
13:27
And, I would argue, far more gallant and chivalrous and
13:32
dashing. Yeah.
13:35
And Tuxedo Mask ever is. To be fair, it with that
13:40
character design it could be a woman or it could be a normal
13:43
vampire chasing after another woman.
13:44
You're missing the point. Here, so true.
13:53
There we go, and we're back to the beginning.
13:56
So yeah, no, you're right. And actually, that's it.
13:58
That's an interesting point. So in So here's the story.
14:03
So pretty. That's like some of that seems
14:06
pretty explicit, right? Girls almost kissing.
14:10
Lots of bubbles and flowers. But talk to me about your
14:12
impressions. So when I was first watching it,
14:15
I did think, is this not just girls who are friends kind of
14:20
thing, but that as it goes on, you kind of like, well, yeah, I
14:23
can see how this is coded and people would get that message
14:28
and that kind of vibe from it. So yeah, yeah, you've kind of,
14:32
you've kind of swayed this round, but.
14:36
I made the argument. I didn't get any of this from
14:39
the first 3 episodes though, so I think that's nice.
14:42
Yeah, I would have to watch this to get get it.
14:45
Yeah, and to be fair, Sailor Mars, who was a big part of
14:48
this, isn't canonically gay, but I just have a bid for her being
14:53
a lesbian in some fan fiction that I've read once.
14:57
And I've read Slash wrote slash, pretended to be, And there's a
15:05
reason I wore red. That's her colour, but the.
15:12
So it hasn't so this is part of the thing, right and it's
15:15
interesting that you say it could be a lady, it could be a
15:19
noble vampire. Yeah, because there are some
15:22
very as well as like the kind of Butch character you saw there.
15:26
There are also some very femme presenting men.
15:29
And when Sailor Moon was first westernized and brought to
15:32
America in 1994, so two years after its release in Japan, they
15:39
changed genders of some of the characters.
15:42
So there are two bad guys who serve Queen Beryl who are called
15:51
Zoci and Kunzite. And they are in the Japanese
15:56
anime canonically in a relationship and both men.
16:00
And when they did the dub, they changed the more femme looking
16:04
man into a woman. There's also another villain
16:09
called Fisheye who is an effeminate cross dressing man
16:13
but and is romantically interested in men but appears to
16:17
be a woman and they just changed him into a woman as well.
16:22
So some of the way that they kind of suppressed the gay
16:25
representation in Sailor Moon was to actually change people's
16:28
gender. Another thing they did, which
16:32
you saw with that couple with the blonde woman and the girl
16:34
with the long kind of dark green hair.
16:37
So one of the things they did with them and it's and it's
16:39
Mamoru and oh, no, sorry, that's not it.
16:44
It's oh, what's her name? I forget their name.
16:51
I feel like I want to say it's Sailor Pluto and Sailor Neptune.
16:56
Anyway, with those two, they instead of instead of like
17:00
letting them be a couple, which they are in the Japanese
17:05
version, they changed them into being cousins.
17:08
But what they didn't do is change any of the other
17:11
dialogues. So what you end up with, This is
17:15
why we say they're cousins. It actually makes it more
17:18
problematic because basically what they're saying is we would
17:22
rather that these cousins have a secret, weird kissing gay
17:26
relationship as long as they're not openly referred to as a
17:29
lesbian couple, that somehow is more OK for a children's show
17:33
than if they were just two women in a healthy, happy
17:36
relationship. And I think it's interesting.
17:39
Is it some of these choices? But what?
17:42
Because I don't know what kind of relationship is presented in
17:45
this. So they are like, like, openly
17:49
romantically, and they refer to themselves as a couple.
17:53
They are a couple. So it's like open LGBTQ
17:57
characters. And we had a little conversation
17:59
in our Discord, Yeah. About like, what was the kind of
18:04
like, some of the first gay characters you saw in telly?
18:07
Because I do think this is a thing in Western media is I
18:11
certainly. And because I can't remember
18:13
what you said with your like, what was your earliest gay
18:15
character you remember seeing on telly?
18:18
It was because I was looking it up.
18:20
It was distinctly, remember a main character that is openly
18:26
gay and not kind of the butt of a joke was Will and Grace, which
18:30
was 1998. And obviously this, I've seen
18:35
characters that are horrible tropes or stereotypes that are
18:38
meant to be the butt of the joke.
18:39
So I didn't count them. But yeah, I would say Will and
18:43
Grace. That series is where it was kind
18:46
of normalized. Yeah, and and that was that was
18:50
a that was a series that I think it was for the West at least,
18:54
very revolutionary because not only have you got openly gay
18:57
characters, they are the main characters of the story.
19:00
So they're not just like the gay best friend.
19:03
They are the the the relationship like hinges on the
19:08
fact that of like Will's sexuality and Jack's sexuality.
19:13
That's part of the plot and part of the things that is discussed
19:16
in the telly. Some like Lee said that he can
19:20
remember John Inman as being gay in Are You being served.
19:24
So it's the very effeminate kind of gentleman's like dresser.
19:30
And he was a gay man in real life.
19:33
And he's makes a lot of quite what what now seemed like quite
19:39
obvious gay jokes. But at the time he was using
19:44
like a type of gay slang called Polari.
19:47
So he often makes jokes about sponges or stones.
19:51
And that's because you weren't allowed to make any kind of gay
19:54
references. It wasn't acceptable.
19:56
And it was actually illegal to make those kind of references on
19:59
telly because it's illegal to be gay at the time in the UK.
20:02
And in fact, I think it remains illegal up until like 1994 when?
20:07
Sailor Moon transitions over to the West, right?
20:09
It's either 94 or 98, but it's like much later than you would
20:12
hope it be. And so, so Polari was like this
20:18
kind of slang that was used in the gay community to be able to
20:23
kind of help you identify if someone was gay or not because
20:25
you'd recognise the same kind of slang.
20:27
It's almost like a secret language, a bit like cockney
20:30
rhyming slang. So a sponge would be a bottom, a
20:33
stone would be a top. So it would be a way of kind of
20:37
negotiating like a possible sexual encounter without ever
20:41
having to say that out loud in a way that someone could hear you.
20:43
So there are lots of, there are lots of characters like that in
20:47
I think in British media where they're not openly gay, but
20:50
everyone knows they're gay and they're allowed to make these
20:52
very flamboyant camp jokes. But what you can't ever do is
20:56
say they're gay out loud. Implied gay.
21:01
Implied gay? Absolutely fine.
21:03
Everyone's allowed a gay uncle at a party who can be a bit camp
21:07
and make some jokes. But what you can't have is a
21:09
main character who is like allowed to fall in love on telly
21:16
until you get shows like Will and Grace.
21:18
And they also do stuff in EastEnders as well in the kind
21:21
of like 19 in the early 90s where you start to have like
21:25
women kissing on the telly. But in Japan this was kind of
21:30
more normalised. So you so you do have these
21:34
characters appearing in queer shows and you do have this
21:37
lesbian couple being openly gay. And when it gets translated and
21:41
Westernised, that's one of the things that changes.
21:45
They also changed some other things, right?
21:48
That's part of as part of the westernisation.
21:51
And I want to see if you could guess what else do you think the
21:54
censors thought would be good to change.
21:58
So they've already. If you had to make a guess.
22:01
So they've already switched A and gender swaps of people and
22:06
put incest in favour of a homosexual relationship.
22:11
In favour of healthy homosexual consenting relationships, yes.
22:15
Yeah, that's correct. That's why I asked, because I
22:17
was like, oh, was there any other reason other than being in
22:22
a homosexual relationship? It was just that they'd rather
22:25
have intest. They just rather have incest
22:28
because they thought somehow being cousins would be fine and
22:31
it wouldn't look so gay. But it still looks gay because
22:33
they don't change any of the dialogue.
22:35
So they're still kind of gay. It's just that now they're
22:40
cousins as well. Yeah.
22:47
So what else would they have changed?
22:49
Is this in relation In relation to?
22:54
So this is broad, no, So this is just broadly across.
22:57
So they're like, so there's a process that a lot of anime goes
23:00
through and it happens in gaming a lot as well, is where you have
23:03
localisation teams work on dubbing and subbing things and
23:08
making it more like more palatable or kind of more in
23:13
keeping with wherever you're shipping your content abroad.
23:19
I'm guessing ages hopefully. Nope.
23:26
So good, good question. Because you would have hoped so
23:28
Because Sailor Moon does engage in a relationship with a fully
23:32
grown adult as a 14 year old girl.
23:34
But no, that stays as is in the western eyes.
23:37
That that fine lesbian couple. No, but it's fine for an
23:42
underage relationship with a fully grown mum.
23:45
Right, right. I'm, I'm trying to think where
23:49
the bar is at these centres. Yeah, it's great question.
23:54
So the they're OK with a massive age difference under race.
24:05
No. They haven't changed any race.
24:08
Haven't changed any race. I don't know then.
24:14
OK, so some of the things that they do is so one of the things
24:19
they do is they they change all the names.
24:21
So we talked about Serena and Usagi.
24:24
They also change Mamaru Chiba, who is Tuxedo Mask.
24:31
They change his name to Darian Shields.
24:36
Darian Shields, which I like. He actually really like.
24:42
I think that's really funny. But you know, as we have
24:46
discussed, Serena or Usagi, Sailor Moon is an underage high
24:53
school student involved with an adult.
24:54
Now, at the time, the age of consent in Japan, it was 13.
25:00
So in Japan, that's not that's not an underage relationship.
25:06
So it's interesting that when it was transported to the West,
25:10
where the age of consent was 16, that that didn't change.
25:16
So how old is Tuxedo Mask or Darian Shields?
25:20
Good question, I don't actually know but I I've always put him
25:23
around like 20 in his. He's in his early 20s.
25:26
Either way, he's too old. So I'm just thinking if here a
25:33
man, because that's what he would be in his early 20s, was
25:37
in a relationship with a legal 16 year old, it's legally OK,
25:43
but not morally. Yeah, we'd still have questions.
25:48
We'd still want to know. We'd still want to know.
25:51
What they had. We'd want to know what's going
25:54
on. Yeah.
25:55
What? What have you got in common?
25:57
Yeah. Yeah.
25:59
Do your parents know where you are?
26:01
Those sorts of questions. What is it that shot shot that
26:05
you asked for the bar for help? Do you want an Angel shot?
26:12
Yeah, yeah. You'd be checking people's hand
26:14
for like dots. That's another thing that.
26:16
Yeah, so, yeah. So the interestingly that ages
26:22
don't change, there is a couple of other changes they did make.
26:25
OK, do. You want to have one more guess
26:30
or are you? Are you done with the guessing?
26:32
It's weird how you looked at us with a weird look as you said.
26:35
Do you want another guess? Well, it's just, I think this,
26:38
yeah, I just think it's funny that what they actually did do.
26:40
So so the name genders name of the cat Luna?
26:51
No. No, that is.
26:53
No, Luna stays the same. Luna actually stays the same,
26:58
no? So what they do is that they
27:00
change. So they change the they change
27:02
the title and they change it from a romance ballad to an
27:07
anthem focused on Sailor Moon's like identity as the superhero.
27:13
So the original Japanese song is all about her relationship and
27:17
her romance with Tuxedo Mask. Basically they reverse the
27:24
traffic scenes so that people are driving on the right hand
27:27
side of the road. Why would they care?
27:30
About that what why would they care about that?
27:33
And but still cousins. Do you know what I mean?
27:36
Like it's just I just think this is This is why I find it kind.
27:38
There's there's an element of the westernisation that's almost
27:41
comical because it's the priority of things that we think
27:43
is worth investing money into changing.
27:45
Do you? Know what to be heard As soon as
27:47
you said that the attention to detail is just not in the right
27:51
place, it's. Really impressive, but it really
27:55
isn't. And so they change the traffic,
27:58
they change the they change the theme tune to make it more
28:01
superhero Y and less romancey, which actually not a bad choice.
28:05
Not a bad choice. They do remove some of the
28:08
violent scenes, but they lower the violence and they also
28:14
reduce the visible like visible nudity.
28:17
So there are some scenes in the original, like the
28:21
transformation sequences where you see like silhouettes of the
28:24
girls naked as they transform and they get like ribbons around
28:27
them as they get their sailor outfits on, and it's all quite
28:30
fun. So they lower some of that and
28:32
they lower some of the other, like background bits of nudity
28:34
that happen. I get that.
28:40
Yeah, I get that. That's fine.
28:42
And but if you're going to do that, you're going to, but
28:44
you're going to leave, Yeah. Yeah, great attention.
28:48
Not on the right please. Yeah, and the idea was just to
28:52
make it more culturally appropriate for an American
28:55
audience. Really.
28:55
That's the, that was the, the whole aim of the westernisation
28:58
of the, of, of Sailor Moon. But despite this, and despite
29:02
the fact that some of the representation is messed around
29:05
with, one of the reasons I love this show is, is hugely, hugely
29:10
culturally impactful, particularly for anime for
29:13
girls. So up until now, like a lot of
29:17
anime was being made for, but like it was very popular.
29:19
You had things like Dragon Ball Z, like very like focused on
29:27
like delivering anime for boys. That's exciting and actiony.
29:30
And you don't see a lot of women getting involved in the fun
29:32
action bits. And Sailor Moon, you get to see
29:35
women fighting and it's mostly about the girls.
29:37
And like you said, one of the things is it's a bit like in
29:42
JoJo where all of the women are useless and there's just loads
29:45
of men fighting each other. In Sailor Moon, it's reversed,
29:48
all of the men are useless and it's just loads of girls
29:50
fighting to save the earth. And I kind of love that.
29:53
I love it for that. And I love that it kind of it
29:56
invigorated a whole genre. So there are lots of animes that
29:59
come after this that where like it's action-packed and it's like
30:04
fighting anime for girls with a bit of boy craziness thrown in
30:08
there just to, you know, just to appeal.
30:12
So it kind of it has a huge cultural impact in terms of
30:15
anime. I think Sailor Moon, I don't
30:18
know. Also, it's just a.
30:19
Hasn't heard of it. Yeah, it's it's it is like,
30:24
yeah, it's a big one. It's also one of the other
30:27
reasons I love it is it has the same, so it is inspired by the
30:31
same source material as Power Rangers and, and you can
30:36
absolutely feel that in. So there's there's a
30:40
transformation sequence that happens.
30:42
Everyone has their own colour and the villains are so power
30:46
rangery villains. They're like these very
30:49
two-dimensional. You don't get a lot of motive
30:51
from them. They're just here to do the bad
30:53
things. Yeah, yeah.
30:57
And there's lots of like. The, the woman with the big
31:00
ball, she's like, constantly widget queen.
31:03
Beryl. Yeah.
31:05
Beryl yeah. You know when you were talking
31:09
about the name change before, when you're on about this being
31:13
the first kind of Would you say it was like one of the first
31:17
anime for girls? Yeah, I would say, well, it's
31:20
not one of the first. So they there are other animes
31:22
that come before this that are for girls then, but it but
31:26
there's like this huge dip in the market that happens in the
31:30
80s where none of them are very popular or very good.
31:34
Yeah. And then suddenly Sailor Moon
31:36
comes along and it's not the first magical girl anime, but it
31:39
is one of the best. So it just, it just like picks
31:44
up the genre and goes, hey girls, look at this.
31:46
You could have fights too. Yeah, because I'm just thinking
31:49
that that might be the reason why they changed all the names
31:53
and they tried so hard to localise it to Western values at
32:00
the time. I don't know.
32:01
I'm I'm trying to pick my words carefully, but like they're
32:05
trying to make it appeal to the West as much as possible because
32:08
it's it's still earlyish days and it 9095.
32:14
Yeah, yeah. And it's, and there is a thing,
32:17
there is an interesting thing that happens with censorship and
32:21
audiences. Different countries have
32:22
different qualifications for what age you can show shows to
32:29
and you see it in you see it now in like it.
32:34
It happens in reverse where we're exporting media into into
32:38
the east into like Chinese and Asian markets where some stuff
32:42
does get censored. Like a lot like like a lot of
32:45
physical. Like if you ever watch a Korean
32:48
K drama, which I don't know if you have watched a lot of, but I
32:52
have become obsessed with lately, you don't ever really
32:56
see a lot of like physical. It's not like Game of Thrones
32:59
where everyone's like sexy timesing and like sometimes
33:02
you're like, Oh my God, I hope my mum doesn't walk in right
33:04
now. Like a lot of the romance
33:07
happens through like looks and glances or, or kind of off
33:11
camera. There's like a different and I
33:14
think And so when you then get stuff exported over, and I only
33:18
know this because I've got a friend in China who I was
33:20
talking to about it, where he was watching something and he
33:22
was like, they've cut out all the sex scenes.
33:28
But they, you know, but that's what happens in order to keep
33:32
your audience age range, because if you're targeting something
33:35
for a very specific audience, you have to meet certain
33:38
censorship requirements. And it's the same with so Disney
33:44
when they exported Beast Beauty and the Beast.
33:46
The live action There's a gay kiss that happens at the end and
33:50
two men dancing on the dance floor together.
33:53
It's Gaston's little friend. Who's that the?
33:56
The candle and the. No, Gaston the bad guy, you
34:00
know, he's got like a chubby, chubby buddy.
34:03
Oh yeah. Yeah, so they've made him gay in
34:07
the live action. He has like a waltz at the end
34:09
with a fella and a kiss. And that get that gets cut out
34:13
in some countries because that's just not not it doesn't meet the
34:17
censorship requirements. Yeah, I mean, yeah, it's, it's
34:22
for the for the audience. It's even even the wrestling.
34:25
I mean, the women wrestlers have to wear full covers where
34:30
obviously if it's in the West, it's like, well, what you want
34:34
kind of within within certain reasons.
34:37
Yeah, but and wrestlers of both genders will wear very little.
34:42
Yeah. Yeah, yeah.
34:44
So I do think there is, there's something interesting.
34:46
There's also something for me about the history of
34:50
representation from the queer community and queer characters.
34:53
What stories are you allowed to be part of?
34:58
Which is also interesting. Yeah.
35:01
So that's why I that's my build for Sailor Moon.
35:05
How gay is it? Super gay.
35:06
And we should love that about it because I think it adds to it.
35:10
And also, if you would rather watch the Kissing Cousins
35:12
version, that's on you. So apparently I'll watch that
35:19
version. I've got a question for you, but
35:22
it's so this was your first weekly.
35:25
Do you think there's a there's a 2026 equivalent, or do you think
35:31
you need a 2036 equivalent? Do you know, I was thinking
35:35
about this so because one of the things that I was thinking about
35:38
is like gendered anime. So you have shown in and showed
35:44
you manga and shown in and showed you anime.
35:48
One's targeted towards girls, 1's targeted towards boys,
35:51
though that's still a thing that's still be like you still
35:55
get that kind of gender targeted anime being made.
36:02
And I think you don't get like, I'm trying to think of like
36:07
there are animes where you get like really cool bad ass women
36:11
liking Kaiju #8. Not that I want to keep going on
36:14
about it, but or even One Punch Man, you've got some like really
36:18
bad ass women in One Punch Man, My Hero Academia.
36:24
So you do get that kind of girls fighting, but those very much
36:27
are in the kind of the world of this is targeted for boys kind
36:31
of thing. So I think there is like, I
36:35
think it's different now, and I also think that it's more common
36:37
for girls to watch Shonen Jump anime than it maybe was in the
36:43
90s. Yeah, yeah, I get that.
36:46
See, how should you face? So I do think that's the thing
36:50
as well. But like like a modern
36:54
equivalent, I don't know. I don't think anything is going
36:56
to ever be equivalent to, say, the moon because it's it's its
36:59
own, but that phenomenon. That that's for you, though,
37:03
wouldn't it be that that would be your own for for you in
37:07
people your age range? Obviously I'm much younger than
37:10
you so but yeah, I'll just I'm. Much younger.
37:20
I'd like to give around you, yeah.
37:28
Yeah. I don't know if I'd say my son
37:31
who's 5, if he would have a have an equivalent.
37:33
I would like to think that he does, but I don't think it would
37:36
be on my radar personally. Yeah, well, you're watching One
37:41
Punch with him, aren't you? No, I'm not watching No punch.
37:46
Man no, he will ruin it. He likes, he likes totally
37:52
spies. Can you remember that?
37:55
I love Totally Spies. Yeah, and that is a great.
37:57
That's another Western version of this.
38:00
Yeah, because that's what I thought.
38:04
He he loves watching stuff like that.
38:06
And obviously Pokémon Concierge as well.
38:10
But I don't think, yeah, I don't think, I don't know if there has
38:14
much representation or specific representation.
38:18
It's just. No.
38:20
Well, it's funny you should say that.
38:21
So I looked up what other characters are there in So in
38:28
the 90s and well, in the 80s and 90s, what other kind of openly
38:34
gay characters did we have in cartoons and anime?
38:37
Oh, OK. And we've got so Arthur, do you
38:43
remember Arthur the Aardvark? Mr. Nigel Ratburn actually has a
38:47
gay marriage in an episode, right?
38:52
So openly gay character and they and the kids talk about it and
38:55
they work out what it means to be gay.
38:58
So that so I don't think I count not not his his marriage because
39:04
that was set in 2019. He may have been gay before, but
39:08
he wasn't openly. Gay then.
39:10
So he was. 1996 is when it first airs.
39:13
But you're right. The the marriage episode, the
39:15
marriage episode doesn't happen until 2019.
39:18
Yeah, yeah, we there's also another anime called Bubble Gum
39:23
Crisis. I've heard of.
39:26
That which which has a which is a girls with guns kind of action
39:33
anime. It's quite it has its moments.
39:36
Daily Wong. So this is in 1987.
39:39
Daily Wong is like a kind of sympathetically presented gay
39:43
character. You also have there's a
39:52
character in Card Captor Sakura who is often thought to be gay,
39:58
who's like a kind of warm, gentle character who's friends
40:00
with the brother, I think, or the love interest and he's like,
40:07
but he's in a room. So there's it's Yukito who's in
40:12
a relationship with Tuya. And on the website they say,
40:15
yes, he is officially gay even. And I think there's also some.
40:19
There's some westernisation that happens there as well where that
40:21
he gets referred to as the best friend, which feels very much
40:25
like when you're reading Old Victorian, like, oh, it was,
40:28
they were lifelong companions. Very good roommates.
40:33
Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's weird.
40:35
They've only there's only one room in the house, but they live
40:38
together. There's also there's also car
40:46
cap secure also has like an intersex character called UA.
40:52
You have general blue. So talking of Dragon Ball,
40:56
general blue is an A Nazi, but he's an economically gay Nazi.
41:05
He also makes an appearance in Dragon Ball GT.
41:07
And then you also have Otto Kazuki, who is in Dragon Ball Z,
41:12
who is what is described as a stereotypical gay.
41:17
Right. Who appears in the 28th World
41:21
Martial Arts tournament and he freaks Goten and Trunks out with
41:27
his flirtations, which means he's gay and hitting on kids.
41:32
Well, or. You have, you know, there are.
41:39
Oh, gargoyles. Do you remember gargoyles?
41:41
I love gargoyles. Yeah.
41:44
So do you remember Lexington? The little gargoyle.
41:47
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, so he is confirmed by the
41:51
creator, Greg Weissman, as being gay.
41:54
No way. He's a gay character.
41:56
Yeah. Yeah, he's never.
41:57
It's never really mentioned openly in the show, but Greg
42:01
Weissman has been on record to say, yeah, Lexington is gay.
42:05
There's also Hey Arnold. Do you?
42:08
Did you ever watch Hey Arnold? Hey, Arnold, that.
42:11
Is. There's a character called
42:12
Eugene Horowitz and I, this is do you remember Eugene?
42:19
So, and I kind of like this the creators, the show's creator,
42:22
Craig Bartlett, describes him as a proto gay, which I kind of
42:27
love because because this is a thing with kids, right?
42:29
So I think there's a thing that happens with kids where you have
42:32
like adultification, where we put adult mindsets onto children
42:38
before they're ready because we're looking at it through an
42:40
adult lens. So lots of people might say, oh,
42:43
Eugene's a gay character, but the the creator instead prefers
42:48
to refer to him as a proto gay, which is that he's, he's not gay
42:52
yet because his sexuality hasn't shown up yet, but he is someone
42:55
who will become gay. So he loves musical theatre and
43:00
he's just a wonderful guy. That's what that's what the
43:03
creator says about him. So it's like the idea of him,
43:05
like at the moment he hasn't got a sexuality.
43:09
He's a kid. Yeah, yeah.
43:11
And I kind of, that's like a level of sophistication to this,
43:14
which I kind of enjoy. But also in Hey Arnold you have
43:17
Mr. Robert Simmons, who is openly gay in the show.
43:25
I never, I never talked on that. I used to watch that quite a lot
43:27
as well. There's a show called Outlaw
43:32
Star that's another anime. They've got a character, Fred
43:35
Luo Kunzai, we've talked about with Zoci.
43:40
So that's where Zoci is changed into a woman so that their
43:46
relationship in the West becomes a heterosexual one.
43:50
But in the original, they're both men.
43:52
You have Fisheye who is the cross effeminate cross dresser
43:58
and you also have in the Sailor Moon R the movie, you have a
44:02
character called Fiore who is a distant friend of Tuxedo Mask
44:09
and decides to kidnap Tuxedo Mask for himself in fear that
44:15
Asagi will abandoned him at some point.
44:19
So there's a kind of like a, yeah, kind of right, slightly
44:24
weirdly possessive thing. Obviously you've got South Park
44:28
1997, Big Gayle, and we all remember Big Gayle and we all
44:34
remember his song. So yeah.
44:39
And actually, absolutely not. And there's actually South Park,
44:47
there's a whole load for South Park.
44:49
Satan and Saddam Hussein are both in a gay relationship.
44:54
And I think we can take this. This is one that really
44:56
surprised me, 1983, which I think it might be one of the
45:00
earliest gay, openly gay characters in a cartoon.
45:06
Super Ted. There's a character called
45:08
Skeleton who is one of Texas Pete's two hench men.
45:14
So he's he's a living, very cowardly skeleton who behaves in
45:18
a very effeminate manner. And again, the series creator
45:22
has confirmed, yes, that is a he's a, he's a gay skeleton.
45:26
Yeah. Is that is that an implied gay
45:30
until he's legal? That would be kind of job.
45:35
I think so there. And also you have the cartoon
45:40
The Ambiguously Gay Duo. And I don't know if you've ever
45:43
seen the Ambiguously Gay duo. It's quite funny.
45:46
They they basically solve ambiguously gay crimes and the
45:51
main characters are Ace and Gary.
45:54
What about Jesse and James from Pokémon?
45:59
So I've always thought James absolutely right, but yeah, and
46:09
also both both cross dressed. No, well actually that was a lot
46:14
censored out. The episode where.
46:18
So there was an episode where James had a pair of fake breasts
46:21
on and obviously he didn't have his.
46:25
And a fancy Victorian gown. Yeah, I remember that.
46:31
Yeah, it was, it was, it was banned, so.
46:36
So, yeah, so that's my list from the 90s and of And then you also
46:39
have characters like Waylon Smithers from The Simpsons,
46:42
Dewey Largo from The Simpsons. I was again, a lot of those
46:48
those. Oh sorry I I was thinking as
46:52
well. Button clay, one piece enclay.
46:58
Yes, I know his sexuality is not exploring what I've seen anyway,
47:04
but he is a cross dressing person that doesn't identify as
47:09
male or female. Yeah, and that would have been
47:14
one Piece came out 90 sevens, or at least the early 2000s.
47:20
Yeah, it is in the early, so he's in my list for for the
47:23
2000s character. Right.
47:28
Yeah, as well as do you remember Drawn Together?
47:34
That was hot. Like so funny, but so
47:38
inappropriate and horrible. The jokes are so, so awful.
47:42
Like you could not tell half of them now.
47:45
But they also have Zandir, yes, Zandir Whifflebottom, the M elf.
47:52
It was like a a send up the a send up of like Link from the
47:57
Legend of Zelda kind of character.
48:01
Yeah, I forgot about that. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
48:10
There's also, because I was researching like different gay,
48:13
like gay characters in animation and some of the name, some of
48:17
the names of these these anime, there's Queer Duck with the main
48:23
character, Adam Seymour Duckstein.
48:26
It's the main character. There's also Rick and Steve, the
48:29
happiest gay couple in all the world, which is actually quite a
48:32
cute series from what I remember.
48:34
And obviously Rick and Steve were in it.
48:37
So yeah, there are loads. There are absolutely loads.
48:41
It's out there, the representations out there,
48:43
whether or not you censor it for a Western audience.
48:49
Yeah, there we go. So in terms of Sailor Moon,
48:58
we've talked a bit about the kind of gay history of it.
49:00
We talked about the westernisation.
49:03
What was your overall impression of the anime?
49:08
So. Will you be watching past
49:10
episode 3? I don't think now that you know
49:14
how important it was for so many queer little girls.
49:17
Oh, don't say that because you already know me answer because
49:19
I've already told you so. I recognize it's important, but
49:27
I will not be watching past episode 3 mainly because it's
49:32
it's not my it's not my thing. It's not your target, or you're
49:37
not the target audience. I'm at the age where I do not
49:40
want to see 14 year old girls fight crime.
49:47
Fighting crime and lusting after boys.
49:50
And it's kind of, I don't know, it's kind of aged weirdly.
49:55
So this is my first time watching.
49:57
You have the benefit of those tinted glasses and nostalgia
50:01
eyes. I don't.
50:03
So I've kind of made my while watching it, I was actually
50:09
jotting down notes of what was happening and what me thoughts
50:12
were and. Read me some of your peak notes.
50:19
Which so Well, I've come up with titles because I can't remember
50:23
what the actual titles are. So episode 1 is Teamu jewelry.
50:28
Yeah, episode 2 is incel card and episode 3 is chloroform
50:35
flower trick. No, OK, yeah.
50:42
I mean I'll go through it and episode 1 Teamu jewelry.
50:46
Usagi gets gets to stop all the mums in the city under the
50:51
control of teamu jewelry. Tuxedo guy shows off for one
50:54
minute, tells her not to be a crybaby from a window, fucks off
50:59
and she punches the demon lady. Episode 1 Episode 2 is insell
51:05
cards. Usagi gets a fortune, boys.
51:10
And Oh yeah, and she kicks a shoe at the mass tuxedo.
51:16
I assume because it's the reoccurring character, the boy
51:20
guy. Oh, sorry man, that I found out.
51:23
And which I suppose I'll be pissed off if someone chose
51:26
Darren Shields, but yeah, hey, justified, he gets pissed off
51:31
and uminu the guy with the the glasses and gets hypnotized so
51:38
he can do whatever he wants without fear.
51:40
In brackets could go in silly and spoiler.
51:44
And he does. Usagi's dogged doesn't know his
51:48
daughter is out at the city at midnight.
51:51
Bad dad and the nerdy guy upskirts a teacher because she
51:56
said he couldn't come to school out of uniform.
51:59
All the boys turn into proper knobs.
52:01
Usagi returns to the House of Fortune moon prison power make
52:04
up lads lads Lads confront storyteller lady and army of
52:09
lads creep in. Asterix creepy army of lads
52:13
because they look lecherous. Tuxedo Mask nips in to say
52:17
believe in yourself then fox off a second later.
52:21
Lobbs Usagi lobster tiara at the future.
52:24
Teller and lads go back to Norma consequence free.
52:31
Love that. That's important, though, in a
52:33
monster of the week. Everything has to return to.
52:35
Like this is the fate, a feature of 90s stories.
52:38
Everything has to return to. Yeah.
52:42
Everything has to turn to net zero.
52:44
Yeah. I was just thinking, oh, how did
52:48
they come back from the weird upskirting thing?
52:49
And it's just like everyone's forgot.
52:51
Sorry. Next week.
52:52
In it, chlorophyll Pharaoh Usagi listens to a weird, weird radio
52:59
program that's not actually a radio program where a guy's
53:02
reading out love letters anonymously.
53:05
Find a letter from the teacher. Sleeping sickness is mentioned.
53:09
Miss Haruna is late and knackered.
53:12
She's got a massive flower brooch and masked tuxedo.
53:16
Guy in normal form is a Dick. These are notes, just not what
53:20
happens if Saggy tries to write a love letter for a future, Be
53:23
it boyfriend fails a 14 year old rocks up to a radio station at
53:29
midnight and gets turned away in brackets.
53:31
Surprise, Usagi's mate gets a flower, they all buff it and
53:36
fall asleep. We had tuxedo must dream bodies
53:40
are siphoning women's dreams of love or something.
53:44
Yeah, gives Usagi a pen to change your appearance, but you
53:48
have to yell moon power so it's pretty shit for stealth.
53:53
She disrupts the show Eddie Mary revealed and it was Jadeite and
53:59
the flower blossom Blass who I can't remember her name.
54:03
He's the guy collecting stuff. Usagi chins the last with a
54:07
brooch. Jadeite stops the tiara.
54:10
Usagi cries. Tuxedo masks chucks of rose at
54:14
him. They both run away over all the
54:17
boys in this lame teacher is back.
54:19
Everyone's awake at the end. That's the first 3.
54:21
Episodes. Nice.
54:24
That's pretty good summary, to be honest.
54:27
Yeah, Yeah. So I also, so I did watch this
54:32
with roast into glasses. And I would say that even with
54:35
Roast into Glasses, I got to Episode 4.
54:37
I watched the end of episode 4 and then was like, OK, I think
54:40
I'm done with the nostalgia now. So I think it doesn't really
54:46
hold up against modern anime in terms of story and stuff.
54:49
I mean, the monster of the week is always fun.
54:52
I do wish that we had, like, a good modern version of that.
54:58
But along with that comes a kind of like, like stringiness to
55:02
plot. Yeah.
55:05
I mean, yeah, it's 92. Yeah.
55:09
It. There's the same moral standards
55:13
won't won't stand up to today. I mean, it was what?
55:16
And they shouldn't. We should have, we should have
55:19
moved. We should have moved on in both
55:20
technology like appearance of animation and in the stories
55:25
that we are telling ideally, I mean, some, some stories will
55:29
forever remain appealing. But yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
55:37
That's great. So thank you for letting me
55:39
indulge in the B part of the LGBTQIA Plus community and do
55:46
Sailor Moon. Thanks for introducing us to us
55:50
and tell us facts because I wouldn't have known this, any of
55:54
this. That's fine.
55:56
And I just, I do. I do think it's funny.
55:58
I think, yeah, that like I like it doesn't make me angry the way
56:02
it would have done as a younger as a younger person.
56:06
Now I just find it interesting, like the the stuff that we, the
56:10
stuff that we choose to cut out, when to protect the young.
56:16
It's because that kind of thinking is such a disconnect
56:20
from reality now, yeah, that it shouldn't.
56:24
I mean I. Mean, I like to think we.
56:26
Get pissed off but. I think, yeah, I'd like, I mean,
56:30
obviously there there will always be a need to have
56:32
conscious dialogue and fight the good fight and there's still
56:35
work we've got to do. But I think when we look at
56:39
stories like this from the 90s, you realise that actually you
56:44
can be optimistic about the world, that some, you know, that
56:46
some, some narratives have moved on.
56:49
And that's a really beautiful thing.
56:52
And along with that, a vapour wave colour scheme will always
56:57
be appealing, along with a super, super catchy tune.
57:05
So what are we going to do next week, Chris?
57:07
What theme are we going to have? Really put you on the spot.
57:11
Yeah, because this has been recorded in advance and I don't
57:14
know. Yeah, but where will people be
57:18
able to find out? On our Instagram and Facebook,
57:20
definitely. So the.
57:22
Links will be down below. The links will be down below.
57:28
Keep an eye out on our socials to find out what what theme will
57:31
be doing next week and what Chris and I will do to fight for
57:35
the right to choose it. Will probably involve Lee.
57:40
Probably will involve me because I think what Chris and I have
57:43
realised is that neither of us are.
57:44
Well actually I think I am quite competitive, but I think I'm
57:50
just bad at thinking up games. And I don't think you are that
57:53
competitive, but you will cheat if left unsupervised.
58:01
Yeah. So we need, we need someone who
58:03
is good at thinking up games and a good adjudicator for fairness.
58:08
And that happens to be Lee, with his beautiful sense of internal
58:11
justice and. So yeah, very easily manipulated
58:16
by me because we want to be best friends, so I'm OK with this.
58:20
You say manipulated. You ask him for a favour and
58:22
he's like yeah and then yeah is amazing and ends up counting how
58:27
many Jelly beans at hand 1 by 1 into a jar?
58:32
Yep, 871 Jelly beans. Something like that, yeah.
58:38
Yeah, Thank you, Lee, for the favour that you don't know
58:41
you're going to do for us. Yeah, We'll catch you later next
58:44
week. Bye, everyone.
58:47
Bye. Bye.