Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon S: Kaguya-hime no Koibito

This movie is very beautiful and interesting: amazing smooth animation, cool villain (pun intended), pretty art-style, well written characters and a great script that goes beyond just magical girl anime. It's about the beauty of love, friendship and life. We also get to know Luna (Usagi's kitten) better and with more depth, following her through her very first love and how she deals with it emotionally. I recommend this movie because it is suitable for people of all ages, otakus or not! Bonus points for Luna's love interest being an absolute sweetheart: curious and kind. If you take your time to watch it, enjoy!

The Sailor Moon S Movie has come a long way from the Sailor Moon R Movie. While that movie was also amazing in its own right, the Sailor Moon S Movie gives its own take on a brand new story that cuts ties with Sailor Moon S (the season) completely, rather than the R Movie's somewhat reliance on the premise of Ail and An to work. This is a good thing, as the star of this movie is actually Luna, who gets really great development.

Off the bat, I'd like to say the idea of giving Luna character development is really interesting. While she was never ... by any means a one-dimensional character, nor can I ever say she's been neglected during the series, her (and Artemis') screentime has been slowly dwindling and chipping away from relevance after the first season, as there wasn't much left in the plot for them to do. And it's fitting that in the way that Usagi's childlike and naive nature allowed her to find love in the first season, so too is it that Luna would fall in love with something equally taboo to Usagi's. While for Usagi, this was the case of an older man (though the actual degree of how "taboo" this was at least at the time is questionable), for Luna this tended to be the case for a human. Even though it does seem like a case of a missed opportunity to pair her with Artemis right off the bat, I think pairing Luna with a human actually works better for the movie's premise. Primarily, just like the human characters themselves, Luna seems to greatly care for the lives of people, perhaps moreso than the Sailor Senshi even, and she's obviously connected to the stars and astrology very heavily, which makes the premise a lot more appealing. Furthermore, the movie heavily discusses Luna's desire to be a human in a longing sense, which adds a really deep emotional value to the entire premise, as she wants to do so for selfless reasons.

Even though Luna is the star of the movie, she eventually turns out to fight with NASA copilot Himeko, a character who I am unfortunately not a fan of, not even as Kakeru's love interest. In my perspective, throughout the film, Himeko comes across as rather one-dimensional, and only serves to exist as a counterpart and "foil" to Kakeru; the more grounding presence to the man lost in his daydreams and fantasies (of meeting Princess Kaguya.) Frankly, Himeko isn't all that interesting as a character either, which is unfortunate, as this is one of the movie's big selling points (that Kakeru loves Himeko truly, not Luna). Other than that, the use of Princess "Snow" Kaguya was really well thought-out, and I like her backstory a lot. Everyone also has a lot of beautiful designs and artwork in the movie, which clearly had much better production than the main series.

One of the other unfortunate aspects is that Hotaru wasn't added to the plot; it does somewhat cheapen the finale to have only nine Sailor Senshi present, which is depressing. After all, as all three Outer Senshi are present, and Chibiusa was around even before this point, there's no real reason Hotaru should be missing. It's also not like they haven't taken liberties before, as Chibiusa had no real reason to be in the Sailor Moon R movie (at a point where she could also somehow fit into the main series, without taking some massive liberties), so it's incredibly disappointing that the "star" of the S SEASON was missing from her own season's movie.

Overall, the Sailor Moon S Movie is really beautiful, and has a lot of the magic, mystery and awe that likely captivated fan's hearts as soon as they watched the series proper for the first time, and focuses on some really touching and caring scenes for characters that have gone less and less appreciated throughout the series. I wholeheartedly recommend this romantic movie.

Out of the three movies in the first anime adaptation of Sailor Moon, Sailor Moon S: The Movie is the only one that is based on a side story from the Sailor Moon manga known as The Lover of Princess Kaguya. That alone isn't the reason I like this movie the most. I find this side story to be very engaging and I daresay it gives the biggest spotlight for Luna, bigger than any filler episode in the main seasons.

Taking place somewhere in the middle of the Infinity arc, an ice creature seeks to turn the Earth into a frozen paradise. It is shown early ... on that she intended to do this a long time ago, but a mysterious silver light from the moon prevented her from doing so. Since that silver light is nowhere to be seen, she now has a chance to take over the Earth. She travels to the planet via a comet that's said to be a part of her. On her way, a piece of the comet fell off and dropped onto the Earth's surface and she is unable to proceed with her plans until she recovers it. The comet piece is picked up by an astronomer named Kakeru who has an overactive imagination that there's a princess living on the moon. He isn't wrong if he was born in a much earlier time if you know what I mean.

Next, we get to see what the main characters are up to. Usagi and her friends are doing some shopping. It's not too long until it's shown that Luna isn't feeling well, and she decides to go home alone, even though everyone suggested that Artemis should tag along with her so she can get there safely since her sickness has her barely able to stand up. She should've heeded their warning since she couldn't cross a street in time and collapsed on the middle of the road by the time the traffic light switches. Fortunately, Luna is saved by Kakeru and she is taken under his care until she recovers from her illness. During her stay at Kakeru's place, Luna developes romantic feelings for Kakeru. She wants to help him in return as little did they know, the comet piece he picked up is draining his energy. However, there is so much a cat can do for a human. Plus, Kakeru already has a love interest named Himeko, though their relationship is sort of awkward since Himeko hardly takes Kakeru's theories seriously. Meanwhile, the ice creature creates minions called Snow Dancers to attack people and search for the missing comet piece.

You might've noticed I haven't said the antagonist's name this whole time. That's because Princess Snow Kaguya isn't her real name. It's the name Kakeru called her comet when he discovered it. When she heard him say it, she happily accepted the name. Either way, it's up to the Sailor Soldiers to save the Earth from Princess Snow Kaguya's invasion while Luna wishes to have a human form, so she can help Kakeru. Not only would she help him recover, she would also fulfill his dream of meeting a princess from the moon.

I will say that this is by far the best movie of the entire Sailor Moon franchise. Yes, I think it's even better than the second anime adaptation of the Dream and Stars arcs. What's even more interesting is that there are two other side stories from the manga that haven't been given an anime adaptation. Well, it makes sense for the one called Parallel Sailor Moon, which is a non-canon alternate universe where Usagi and Mamoru don't become monarchs and establish Crystal Tokyo. However, I do hope that Toei Animation will one day make an adaptation for Casablanca Memory. They really did an excellent job adapting The Lover of Princess Kaguya into a 1990s anime movie, even with differences made from its manga counterpart. Since I don't see any negatives, I believe it deserves a perfect 10/10.