Would Sailor Moon be better off without Naoko?

[Tsundereshipper]

This was a statement Ikuhara apparently said a long time ago, he thought that the main issue was Naoko and Sailor Moon as a franchise would’ve been much stronger without her? Do you agree with him?

Personally for me, I feel the main problem for the IP is Toei & Bandai, I think Naoko is great at concepts and Sailor Moon would’ve been worse off without her intricate ideas, I think a main “team” consisting of her, Osabu, Ikuhara, Junichi Sato and whoever’s responsible for the Myus and PGSM all working together in tandem without any corporate interference would’ve been fine actually.

 

[Rika-Chicchi]

W/o Takeuchi, Sailor Moon would be neither better nor worse off, as there wouldn't be Sailor Moon at all. lol

 

[unknowncheater01]

Alternative story:What if Naoko Takeuchi kicked her Editor, Fumio Osano out of her staffs?
On topic Naoko want to kill off characters like Gen Urobuchi (maybe what exactly Ikuhara like according to RGU) so it's may quite wrong here, maybe he thinked like that because she's being controlled by her own editor. About Ikuhara I just know a statement that Evangelion's Kaworu is based on him and he threw fire on it.

 

[Rika-Chicchi]

Alternative story:What if Naoko Takeuchi kicked her Editor, Fumio Osano out of her staffs?
On topic Naoko want to kill off characters like Gen Urobuchi (maybe what exactly Ikuhara like according to RGU) so it's may quite wrong here, maybe he thinked like that because she's being controlled by her own editor.

For some reason your description of Osa-P makes him feel like Wiseman to me - maybe he could be the editor of Urobuchi too & there'd be a different Madoka?

 

[Starlight]

Can we get a link to this alleged statement by Ikuhara? It's the first I'm hearing of this.

 

[Memelord_Yoshi]

Did Sailor Moon Director Kunihiko Ikuhara Hate Naoko Takeuchi?

On and on this cycle goes, until you have what was once an off-the-cuff “quote” someone mis-remembered showing up as definitive answers across the internet. Which is where we find ourselves with the infamous quote by Director Ikuhara regarding what he thought of Ms. Takeuchi’s contribution to Sailor Moon:

セーラームーンは武内直子の原作なんて無くても良かった。
Sailor Moon would have been better without Naoko Takeuchi’s original manga.​

Say what you will about Director Ikuhara’s rather… unique personality, but I was pretty surprised to see such a big name in the anime world go out and openly speak ill of the creator — the mother, if you will — of a franchise he dedicated years of his life on.

There's also a counter argument to this in the 2nd to the last paragraph.

However, at the end of this long journey, the only evidence I’ve come up with is actually to the contrary — in every interview I’ve read with him, Director Ikuhara always praises Ms. Takeuchi’s work, even going so far as to say that he originally “didn’t get” the story the manga was trying to tell until the series became a hit around Sailor Moon R, and he tried to keep in mind that the series was supposed to be much more than a plain-old drama.

 

[Lady Pen]

This was a statement Ikuhara apparently said a long time ago, he thought that the main issue was Naoko and Sailor Moon as a franchise would’ve been much stronger without her? Do you agree with him?

Personally for me, I feel the main problem for the IP is Toei & Bandai, I think Naoko is great at concepts and Sailor Moon would’ve been worse off without her intricate ideas, I think a main “team” consisting of her, Osabu, Ikuhara, Junichi Sato and whoever’s responsible for the Myus and PGSM all working together in tandem without any corporate interference would’ve been fine actually.

Everyone was important, even Bandai.

Naoko and Osano brought great ideas to the table. Osano suggested the sailor fuku, Naoko established the main basis with Sailor V that Toei would followed afterwards.

But it didn't end with Naoko and Osano's contributions:

- Iriya Azuma, producer, put the money along with TV Asahi which knew how a product like Sailor Moon would work on TV.
- Junichi Sato made a popular mahou-shoujo manga (because it was different back then in 1991/1992) into a phenomenon.
- Kunihiko Ikuhara kept the phenomenon and even raised it to a new level.
- Tetsuya Komoro created the anthem of the franchise, Moonlight Densetsu. Still popular.
- Takuya Hiramitsu was who set up the current structure and different components of Sera Myu. He was back for the 20th anniversary from La Reconquista to Le Mouvement Finale. Good songs and a mix between the manga and 90's anime events and characters.
- Bandai, with the exception of the first Usagi's brooch and tiaras, made the iconic remaining brooches, rods, transformation pens, etc that were used in the animation and the manga.

Let's not forget Naoko's Assistants: They helped her with screentones, inking in, completing Naoko's drawings and panels, making backgrounds (Azabu Juuban buildings, castles, cathedrals, special effects in battles, explosions, vectors, art nouveau ornaments, etc) and with illustrations, adding colour (of course, under Naoko's supervision), everything that makes the manga a pretty piece of the mahou shoujo genre.

All of them made Sailor Moon an icon ingrained in popular culture.

 

[MsImagination]

W/o Takeuchi, Sailor Moon would be neither better nor worse off, as there wouldn't be Sailor Moon at all. lol

Pretty much this without her.They would not been sailor moon.It could been another anime that would have praise, but it would not be sailor moon.

 

[Star Angel Haruki]

Everyone was important, even Bandai.

Naoko and Osano brought great ideas to the table. Osano suggested the sailor fuku, Naoko established the main basis with Sailor V that Toei would followed afterwards.

But it didn't end with Naoko and Osano's contributions:

- Iriya Azuma, producer, put the money along with TV Asahi which knew how a product like Sailor Moon would work on TV.
- Junichi Sato made a popular mahou-shoujo manga (because it was different back then in 1991/1992) into a phenomenon.
- Kunihiko Ikuhara kept the phenomenon and even raised it to a new level.
- Tetsuya Komoro created the anthem of the franchise, Moonlight Densetsu. Still popular.
- Takuya Hiramitsu was who set up the current structure and different components of Sera Myu. He was back for the 20th anniversary from La Reconquista to Le Mouvement Finale. Good songs and a mix between the manga and 90's anime events and characters.
- Bandai, with the exception of the first Usagi's brooch and tiaras, made the iconic remaining brooches, rods, transformation pens, etc that were used in the animation and the manga.

Let's not forget Naoko's Assistants: They helped her with screentones, inking in, completing Naoko's drawings and panels, making backgrounds (Azabu Juuban buildings, castles, cathedrals, special effects in battles, explosions, vectors, art nouveau ornaments, etc) and with illustrations, adding colour (of course, under Naoko's supervision), everything that makes the manga a pretty piece of the mahou shoujo genre.

All of them made Sailor Moon an icon ingrained in popular culture.

This is probably the most cohesive answer. Everyone planned their part into making Sailor Moon a legend.

 

[sapphire91]

Well we have Pretty Cure, my guess is this is what it would have been without Naoko. Another example is SuperS - characters aside there is not much Naoko in it and a lot of Ikuhara. And we know how universally loved and cherished SuperS is

 

[kasumigenx]

This was a statement Ikuhara apparently said a long time ago, he thought that the main issue was Naoko and Sailor Moon as a franchise would’ve been much stronger without her? Do you agree with him?

Personally for me, I feel the main problem for the IP is Toei & Bandai, I think Naoko is great at concepts and Sailor Moon would’ve been worse off without her intricate ideas, I think a main “team” consisting of her, Osabu, Ikuhara, Junichi Sato and whoever’s responsible for the Myus and PGSM all working together in tandem without any corporate interference would’ve been fine actually.

Takeuchi left the production of Stars anime and the result was not exactly good.

Ikuhara changed his mind about Naoko when he realized that Chiho Saito is worse than Naoko, if you just check his own posts in the Rose Garden forums.

 

[Princess Sugar Lily]

No offense, but this is kind of a ridiculous argument. For all of Naoko's flaws, she still created the damn work. I could see what people mean if they said that Naoko should've just drawn and created the concept of the characters and plots and left the rest to somebody else, but even then she'd have to create those concepts in the first place. Obviously, we all like Sailor Moon, which makes this argument even more weird. The way I see it, the only way one could possibly think Sailor Moon would be better off without Naoko Takeuchi is if they didn't like the anime and didn't want it to exist at all.

 

[sapphire91]

No offense, but this is kind of a ridiculous argument. For all of Naoko's flaws, she still created the damn work. I could see what people mean if they said that Naoko should've just drawn and created the concept of the characters and plots and left the rest to somebody else, but even then she'd have to create those concepts in the first place. Obviously, we all like Sailor Moon, which makes this argument even more weird. The way I see it, the only way one could possibly think Sailor Moon would be better off without Naoko Takeuchi is if they didn't like the anime and didn't want it to exist at all.

I agree completely. Actually if I have to make a similar statement it would be Sailor Moon would have been better without Ikuhara , because although we all love S most stuff we love come from the fact it is based on a solid story arc in the manga, and nobody, at least almost nobody loves SuperS. S was ok because they still followed the manga somehow, but a lot of the criticized stuff in both these seasons were Ikuhara's ideas, and they are present in one shape or another in every of his work so it is clear. S is superb but some monsters and episodes were quite weird even by Sailor Moon standards - Ikuhara's touch. In SuperS he tried to do his own thing and it almost killed the franchise, so...

 

[ChampionOfNuggets]

I - Ikuhara's touch. In SuperS he tried to do his own thing and it almost killed the franchise, so...

He left after SuperS because of a lack of creative control so this statement doesn’t check out.

 

[sapphire91]

He left after SuperS because of a lack of creative control so this statement doesn’t check out.

He is all over it, just watch his other stuff. Probably he wanted full control over turning them into penguins or something.

 

[ChampionOfNuggets]

He is all over it, just watch his other stuff. Probably he wanted full control over turning them into penguins or something.

You know what? That made me laugh out loud like an idiot so I can’t even argue.

 

[FloraKiraraHime]

He is all over it, just watch his other stuff. Probably he wanted full control over turning them into penguins or something.

Turning into penguins? Like Mawaru Penguin Drum?

 

[sapphire91]

Turning into penguins? Like Mawaru Penguin Drum?

Or bears, or cows...

 

[SILVER]

Uh... no?

I feel like this is actually kind of rude to say, haha

 

[FloraKiraraHime]

Or bears, or cows...

Or snakes.