Is Toei regretting Crystal's initial concept?

[Masquerade]

They tried to make an anime similar to the manga in art style and plot, but apparently it flopped. Crystal's impact on SM merch has been little to non-existant, with 90% of the collectibles being based on the old anime and home video sales for Crystal S3 doing poorly compared to S1/S2.
Now, they are bringing in the woman who did the character designs for the old anime back. Does this mean they want to drop part of the initial concept of faithfulness to the manga?

 

[Star Angel Haruki]

I hope not. As much as I love the 90s anime, it was it's own thing. The 90's are long gone..
There are some things I loved about Crystal, namely S1&2 treatment of battle styles and the bright look of the style, but them not being consistent and the lack of a "few" filler episodes makes the show kinda spotty, not terrible or anything.

I'm a big Mars fan, but Crystal version of her is a little boring compared to her anime version who had more redeeming qualities.

I think Crystal should be treated like its own series though, and not become SuperS all over again. I'm not to sure on how the movie designs will be but if the designs are that different, I think we have had three completely different styles for the same show now that look like they could all be from different anime. Lol

At the end of the day, our Toei folks just want what beings them more money.

I think this movie is going to be judged critically noe, so they better make sure they have their ducks in a row. The SuperS season was the prettiest season out of them all so they'd take care to make Dream an engaging reality for fans with polished animation what not.

We are only one season away from Stars and possibly a new SM season afterwards.

 

[SailorSugababe]

Now, they are bringing in the woman who did the character designs for the old anime back. Does this mean they want to drop part of the initial concept of faithfulness to the manga?

In the art department? Hard to say
Story wise? Definitelly not.
In fact the movie format might mean the story will be even more tight than any of the Crystal seasons (so very unlike 90s anime)

Also even though the art changed the story with each season was closer and more faithful to the manga.
The art is mystery at this point
Yukie Sakou style was close to Naoko's art but it wasnt really close to the manga content istelf which is very inconstent (in a good way) so pretty much all of Naoko's quirky and funny scenes were cut out in season 1.
Season 3 art was Akira Takahashi making it look more like his other show, Precure so it wasnt very close to Naoko's art but it captured some of Naoko's quirkier side and it worked a lot better when animated,
Its really hard to say what Kazuko Tadano, over 20 years after her SM days, will do.

To me the most important thing is the overall quality. Sakou's style worked when it was made properly (see first half of ep 21 for example), Takahashi's style also worked most of the time. As long as we're gonna get a good product im happy

 

[NJ_]

Season 3 art was Akira Takahashi making it look more like his other show, Precure

Actually his designs looked more like his Aikatsu episodes than his Precure seasons.

 

[SailorSugababe]

Actually they look more like his Aikatsu episodes than his Precure seasons.

Never really checeked Aikatsu but not checking on some of the pictures you're right

 

[Rika-Chicchi]

They don't regret on Crystal, because they just don't care about it.

 

[Clow]

People in general have been comparing Crystal to the 90's anime from day 1.

If TOEI wishes to redeem itself, the studio will deliver solidly written and directed movies with the aesthetics of the 90's anime.

Again... we have to take into consideration whether TOEI cares to redeem itself or not.

 

[SILVER]

People in general have been comparing Crystal to the 90's anime from day 1.

If TOEI wishes to redeem itself, the studio will deliver solidly written and directed movies with the aesthetics of the 90's anime.

Again... we have to take into consideration whether TOEI cares to redeem itself or not.

This is so laughable.
The reason why this anime also failed was by implementing straight up rip-offs from 90s in Season III.

 

[FloraKiraraHime]

People in general have been comparing Crystal to the 90's anime from day 1.

It's about right, Crystal was paced much faster than the 90's anime.

 

[Masquerade]

This is so laughable.
The reason why this anime also failed was by implementing straight up rip-offs from 90s in Season III.

Beeeeeep.
People watched S1/S2 and were not interested in further seasons because they didn't like what they saw. It's not like they were loving Crystal and dropped it because of attack stock footage.

 

[lansing]

Crystal was probably created to gain new and younger audiences, just like Dragon Ball Super. The art style doesn't have to be the reason for the failure, maybe it's simply because that the youngsters didn't like the story.

 

[Clow]

This is so laughable.
The reason why this anime also failed was by implementing straight up rip-offs from 90s in Season III.

I feel it is fair to say that nobody cared to watch season 3 when it aired.

Although season 3 is actually OK... the two early seasons proved to be a complete disaster.

People have been making memes and gifs ridiculing Crystal since the debut of Sailor Mercury (episode 2 of Crystal).

 

[Mitsukara]

I've only seen season 1 so far, but I thought I heard the story of season 3 stuck much closer to the manga? Season 1 had the changes to the Shitennou's deaths (and changed the Beryl fight a lot, and skipped all the extreme horror imagery like Usagi's nightmare about Mamoru with no skin), and I thought I heard season 2 changed things a little too, while Season 3 supposedly didn't alter the story much.

Art-style wise I don't feel like any of the seasons really matched the look of the manga.

I can't speak to the overall success or what the companies are thinking, but, I would find Crystal a lot more interesting if they'd tried to make it a "best of both worlds" continuity, grabbing unique ideas from both the manga and the '90s anime and blending them together. Like keep Zoisite and Kunzite's present day relationship but then include the past life romantic link with the Inner Senshi, or have the Naru and Nephrite story while also going into the backstory about them being Endymion's guardians and tie those threads together somehow, and then put some new spins on these combined ideas that weren't featured in either continuity. They could even grab some things from the live action continuity, which is it's own insane third path; basically, I think this would've been a good time to make a 'super continuity' that borrows from everything and ties it together. Sort of like Sailor Moon: Another Story was trying to do, but more developed.

 

[Seen2]

They grossly underestimated how much the 90s anime contributed to the series' popularity and misunderstood why people liked Sailor Moon in the first place (character interaction, humor, etc.)

 

[Anne_Rosebottom]

I saw the Sailor Moon Crystal season III and I liked it. It was very close to the Manga and there were no CGI animations. I liked the first outtro of the season with Haruka and Michiru and that they were very peaceful to Usagi and the other Senshis. In my opinion Season III is better than the other Crystal Seasons.

 

[Starlight]

I don't know about Toei, but I certainly am.

 

[Clow]

I would like a better score.

 

[Masquerade]

I would like a better score.

Yasuharu is sympathetic and even tries to answer moonies in English on Facebook, but i'm not fond of his work at all. Wish he was replaced. His transformation cues sound like morning mass music.

 

[NJ_]

It's funny because while we see new designers and ADs, they still keep the same hack of a composer recycling the same songs from other shows that nobody cares about (or used to care about in Naruto's case).

It could be worse (see the DBZ Kai plagiarist and the guy who has since replaced him) but yeah, keeping him around is not helping either.

 

[FloraKiraraHime]

Season 1 had the changes to the Shitennou's deaths (and changed the Beryl fight a lot, and skipped all the extreme horror imagery like Usagi's nightmare about Mamoru with no skin).

I remember them killed off by Metalia. It was not one of the best changes.

Art-style wise I don't feel like any of the seasons really matched the look of the manga.

Naoko's manga art is rather difficult to translate into an animated form.

I would find Crystal a lot more interesting if they'd tried to make it a "best of both worlds" continuity, grabbing unique ideas from both the manga and the '90s anime and blending them together.

I think this is a fantastic idea!