[Starscream Gaga]

Just finished watching Sailor Moon Crystal episode 2.

Ugh, the animation has taken a pretty steep dive from episode 1. Usagi's magical disappearing pen while chatting to Ami in the library was notable, as was super fat pen and super small bun nurse Usagi and Luna's gigantic mouth during Mercury's transformation. A little sad, because looking pretty seems to be the main point of the series.

As was the first episode it was the exact same as Chapter 2 of the manga almost word by word. So far I'm questioning why this series exists. Sailor Moon already got a fantastic adaptation in Anime form so why are they doing absolutely nothing to make this one special rather then put the manga straight on the screen? Seems incredibly pointless. Is it just a hugely expensive bit of fanwank/nostalgia bait? Ultimately episode was OK; its good having scenes, especially action scenes, done clearly so I can appreciate it for that. Mercury is still as useless as ever, but at least they slightly changed it so that she actually used an attack to create the mist. In the manga, it just appeared when she transformed. She literally just stood around doing nothing in her first manga transformation. Beryl's introduction was suprisingly dull and lifeless, which is a bit of a disappointment.

I really disliked Rei's introduction in the manga, with weird stalker bisexual Usagi who acted like an alien when it comes to other people and Jadeite being unceremoniously killed off without doing absolutely anything, so I'm hoping here is when they start to move away from the source material. I'm assuming its going to happen somewhere, considering its 26 episodes and the manga Dark Kingdom arc was only 11 or so chapters long. I haven't seen any evidence Crystal will go beyond the Dark Kingdom and 26 chapters lands them straight at the middle-point of S rather then have any conclusion.