Fanon / Sailor Moon

• The claim that Haruka is frequently mistaken for a man is mostly false, although due to Pronoun Trouble it is used as a introductory gag for some minor characters. Usagi, Minako, and Yuichiro (who all have loaded assumptions) do assume this during their first encounter with her, but the original reaction shot is of the other characters meeting Haruka but not connecting her with the "handsome guy" the two girls keep mentioning. The manga carries the charade of Haruka's gender a little longer as Usagi is the only one to meet her outside of battle for much of the Death Busters arc and she assumes Haruka is a man (especially when Haruka actually kisses her) and Haruka is even drawn significantly more masculine up until her identity as Sailor Uranus comes out. However, once Haruka's identity is discovered, she is shown as far more feminine, wears dresses from time to time, and even wears the female uniform when attending Juuban High in the last storyline (though apparently this is against her will). The anime significantly plays up her cross-dressing compared to the manga, to the point where Haruka is never seen in feminine clothes during the entire run of the show. Though this may have had a lot to do with the anime being directed at that time by Kunihiko Ikuhara, who ''loves'' characters like this.
• It is also a common mistake that Sailor Saturn uses an actual attack power to destroy the world, often cited as "Silence Glaive Surprise" for the anime and "Death Reborn Revolution" in the manga. She actually uses no attacks or incantations of any kind — she only has to put the tip of her weapon to the ground. "Silence Glaive Surprise" is explicitly shown to be only a distraction in the anime and nothing actually happens until after the attack has ended and Saturn starts forcing her glaive down in the one scene in which she is seen to use either. In the manga, she is shown using Death Reborn Revolution several times with the world perfectly intact. When she is shown to destroy the world, she is shown bringing down her weapon, while saying that she must bring down her weapon, while several of the Senshi all say that her bringing down her weapon is the end of the world.
  • Sailor Saturn has a lot of these — it doesn't help that she's such an enigmatic character. She is frequently attributed to have the powers of "death and rebirth" and that she can recreate the world after destroying it. This is more Fanon — Sailor Moon is explicitly the only person who can create life, and in fact, the one time in the manga that Saturn destroys the world, she tells Sailor Moon that it's her job to bring it back to life. The most appropriate description is that she causes destruction so as to pave the way for new life.
  • It also doesn't help that Saturn's powers are a little different across different adaptations; her healing ability can come off as an implication of greater creation powers even if she never actually says she does, and the video games (Another Story in particular) give her the standard named attacks, including Death Reborn Revolution (which is animated to look like ribbons).
• A single scene in the manga has led many to believe that Setsuna is in love with Mamoru. The scene itself specifically refers to King Endymion, Mamoru's future self, and is somewhat open on this, but it's never referred to again and Setsuna never pays any special attention to him after she comes to Earth. This never appears in the anime at all. This hasn't stopped numerous fanfics from declaring Setsuna's unending love for Mamoru, or even having him reciprocate it so Usagi can be shipped elsewhere. In fact, the fanon on this subject is so strong that one of the musicals actually incorporated a duet where Queen Beryl and Sailor Pluto lamented their hopeless love for Endymion.
  • Speaking of Queen Beryl, she is played up as suffering from unrequited love for Endymion or even blaming her evil nature on this. This is somewhat supported by one line in the manga, though Beryl repeatedly killing him seems to suggest she got over it. This was also mentioned once in Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon where she lists Endymion as something the Princess had that Beryl didn't. However, in the anime, she's already quite evil by the time she meets Endymion and her reaction towards him tends to be as a shiny bauble to play with or torment Sailor Moon over.
  • Yet another fanon example of "loves Mamoru/Endymion but can never have him" is Rei. This has a bit more basis than usual, since in the anime they dated for a while. However, aside from her comically explosive reaction to the revelation that Chibi-Usa is Usagi and Mamoru's future child, and episode 136 where Usagi's jealousy is played for laughs, it's never mentioned after the first season. Fanon ignores this so Rei can angst about the unfairness in life and how much she hates Usagi.
• Because Chibi-Usa doesn't have the same eye or hair color as Usagi and Mamoru, there are many fanfics where one of them isn't her biological parent. The strange part comes when said non-parent is Usagi and Chibi-Usa is having her hair colored/wearing eye contacts/is under a spell. No explanation is ever given to how Chibi-Usa can use the Silver Crystal and have the crescent moon mark of the Royal Moon family if she's not related to them, or how dying her hair pink and/or wearing red contacts makes her look more like the blonde and blue-eyed Usagi. Those that do keep her as Usagi and Mamoru's daughter often like saying her hair and eye color come from Mamoru's ancestors, or Queen Serenity's predecessors, or even Usagi's Earth mother Ikuko (who has been shown in the manga with different hair colors, including pink, before the 90s anime settled on blue. Presumably she dyes it blue). The most likely answer on why her hair's pink is it's a Shout-Out to the prototype version of Usagi, who had pink hair◊.
• The entire belief that people are being forced to obey Usagi because the alternative is to freeze to death or be sent into the far reaches of space. Not only are the only people stated to have been "exiled" there were criminals such as the mass murderer who eventually became Wiseman/Death Phantom but Usagi is flat-out stated to have been elected to her position in the future of Crystal Tokyo by the population of the world.
• The belief that being "purified" leads to mind control. Purification is an anime-only thing, and is even there is just expelling external forces. However purification works, what it isn't about enslaving people, something that the Senshi's enemies often did and what they fought against tooth and nail against. At worst, it takes the position that evil itself is an external influence, and people are fundamentally good.
  • A good example being how when Usagi purified Rei's lecher grandfather when he turned into one of the Seven Great Youma in the Dark Kingdom arc of the anime. If we use the Crystal Tokyo-Fanon definition of purification he should no longer be a lecher but afterward he still was as big as one as ever.
• The common belief that Senshi went out of their way to gain control of the planet either through mind control or as outright conquerors, or manipulating events so that Crystal Tokyo will come about. Heck, at the beginning of the series the girls are set on stopping the Dark Kingdom from destroying the Earth and by the end of the arc Usagi chooses not to recreate the Silver Millennium, wanting to live her life as a semi-normal school girl with her friends and family on Earth.
• The Black Moon family is not a group of freedom fighters. The ancestors of the people who ended up on Nemesis are flat-out stated to be religious nuts who thought that the infinite power of the Ginzuishou and its ability to give people eternal youth went against God's will. They ended up willingly fleeing to Nemesis after being told by Wiseman that if they went there they could gain unlimited power. It should also be noted that the first action that the people of Nemesis took when they returned to Earth was to kill countless innocent people without mercy by bombing the planet and using poison gases on civilians simply because they believed long life went against God. Both sides also state the Black Moon's goals were only about the people's life span and trying to take over Earth.
  • The Black Moon inhabitants (most of them) are considerably more sympathetic in the anime though, where their enmity to Crystal Tokyo is the result of manipulations by Wiseman, who played on their desire to find a better place for themselves to live than barren Nemesis, where they ended up due to the crimes their ancestors did. They still are unquestionable dicks, due to starting a massive war, instead of just asking Usagi politely if they can return to Earth, as well as abusing the destructive magical power of Black Crystal, which apparently had a subtler-than-usual This Is Your Brain on Evil effect. Demand does finally come to directly ask Moon to help his people... but only as he lays dying in her arms.
• The Utopian-Crystal Tokyo or mind controls Crystal Tokyo crap. There is still crime in Crystal Tokyo and people are still capable of being petty and selfish creatures. It's a better world but it isn't perfect. The few examples of people shown outside the Future-Senshi in Crystal Tokyo are the kids that bullied Chibi-Usa and some snobby politicians.
• Setsuna as some figure of absolute order and/or stasis. Not only is it complete and utter fanon but it also happens to be the complete antithesis of her nature as the "Soldier of Change and Revolution".
• The belief that Chaos in Sailor Moon represents a source of change and growth, like in Micheal Moorcock's novels and the D&D alignments, is utterly false. Chaos in Sailor Moon canon hearkens back to the Greek meaning, as the nothingness that was before creation. Hence why Usagi's future form is called Sailor Cosmos, which is its opposite, and why the Big Bad of each arc appears as negative space. In the anime Chaos is plainly and unequivocally stated to be the the manifestation of malice and hatred. If you pay attention to what Galaxia says while under Chaos' control, you'll notice, that the motives she gives for, well, killing everyone in the Galaxy change every episode, only the "killing everyone" part stays constant — that it is her only actual goal.
• The idea of Usagi representing "extreme order" or being a force of stasis. Usagi herself flat-out states the need for there to be change and growth in the universe, no matter how painful that it might be at times. That at times fighting was necessary for a better future. Of how the end of a war would lead to hope for the future and how it was all part of a balance. However Usagi can be considered the avatar of a type of order. The Order that exists in the universe now and allows a universe to have handy little things like, say, laws of nature that allow us, planets, stars, solar systems, galaxies, and so on and so forth to exist. If you consider the universe as a massive clock, then you might say that her job is make sure that the gears continue to spin and to keep anyone from attempting to stop or destroy said gears.
• The portraying of Usagi as some Valley Girl or crybaby post-series. She beat back several demonic invasions, saved the world several times and managed to redeem an enemy that had supposedly wiped out all life in the galaxy/universe depending on whether you're using the manga or anime. Not to mention several times in anime going to what was certain death for her but being willing to do so anyway. Hell, in the manga Usagi is shown through the series growing into a highly charismatic leader and skilled fighter. And even in the anime (where Usagi tends to be a paler reflection of her manga counterpart) she is shown growing at least some. And while she might have quite a bit of growing to do before she ever reaches the level of the manga version, she is slowly maturing. The dub on the other hand is without hope.
• The false belief that Senshi barely have enough power to destroy a house if that. Setting aside that Sailor Saturn's world-destroying power alone disproves that, Usagi during the first arc was shown able to use her healing abilities as a mass area effect to cover all of Tokyo and was also capable (with Mamoru's help) of resurrecting the entire world at the end of said arc as well. By the middle of the series Usagi easily had enough raw power to destroy the planet. And by the end of series Usagi's abilities have taken another large jump. And while the rest of the Sol-based Senshi are a fair bit behind her, they're still pretty damn powerful by the standards of a magical girl. This is somewhat created by the anime tending to show the Senshi as a whole as only rarely finishing off the Monsters, with Sailor Moon usually doing it, and much of the bigger events of the manga didn't make the anime.
• The idea that Chibi-Usa acted like a brat simply because she was a brat. Despite technically being nine hundred years old, her mind was that of a six-year-old kid, and like most six-year-olds not only is she often childish, but she doesn't always think things through or all that logically.
• The idea that Queen Nehellenia is Queen Serenity's sister. She is designed to look like a dark reflection of Serenity, but that's it. This might stem from a scene in the manga where Serenity asks where Nehellenia comes from (which wouldn't be so much of a mystery if they were sisters), and Nehellenia replies that the two of them share a common origin. This is a general thing about light and darkness coming from the same place (i.e. the Galaxy Cauldron introduced in the next arc)
• Mamoru breaks up with Usagi once in the anime because he had been having nightmares warning him that if they stayed together she would be in danger. This tends to be exaggerated by fans into him dumping or cheating on her all the time.
  • For that matter, he doesn't hate Seiya. They met only one time (in the anime, never in the manga), and it was amiable. While Seiya disliked Mamoru from afar for a while, it was because she was under the false impression he had dumped Usagi.
• In the manga, there is no canon answer about what celestial bodies the Sailor Starlights represent. In the anime, it's implied to be the three moons of Kinmoku - when Kinmoku is shown, it has three small moons that are the same colors as the Three Lights' roses.
• Kousagi^note the parallel universe second daughter of Usagi and her super identity: While fans give her the name of "Sailor Parallel Moon" or "Parallel Sailor Moon" (after the title of the story she appears in), she does not actually have an official Sailor name. In fact, seeing as the story depicts a universe with no Crystal Tokyo and Usagi and co. depicted as normal 20something housewives (with no apparent powers), she may in fact be just the first Sailor Moon- a parallel version. The other lookalike young daughters of Usagi's friends similarly have no official super identities, although fans tend to label them "Sailor Parallel Mercury"/"Parallel Sailor Mercury" and so on.
  • Those who attempt to place the Parallel Sailor Moon story into continuity try to rearrange the story to have Kousagi as the first daughter of Usagi, with Chibi-Usa being the second daughter from the distant future and simply visiting the past.
  • As Kousagi was never given an official color scheme except in one small picture (where she had pink hair and blue eyes), fans can go wild with her Sailor uniform. She's either depicted with a blue and red (or magenta) color scheme ala her mother's original suit, a pink and yellow suit, or even wearing purple. Some fans even opt to give her purple/lavender hair or darker pink hair as a way of differentiating her from Chibiusa.
• Nephrite is commonly portrayed as a heavy drinker in fanfics due to one scene in which he's seen drinking a beverage that may be whiskey in the original Japanese '90s anime.
• Queen Beryl having a personal vendetta against Kunzite and Zoisite's relationship due to her treatment of Zoisite in his final episodes (which was a two-way street given Zoisite expressly defied her orders for his own reasons). In canon, she seemed either oblivious to or did not give a second thought to them being together, only caring whether or not they did as they were told and later focusing all her attentions to Endymion.
• Fanfiction often shows Pluto standing vigilant after the fall of Silver Millennium, even arranging the events to come. There is no canon evidence for this. In fact, the canon Pluto comes from the future instead of the past. She is actually introduced in the Crystal Tokyo arc and likely born sometime in the future. When she later appears after her first death, she stated that she was reincarnated into the modern times by the power of Neo-Serenity. If anything, Pluto/Setsuna Meiou is actually junior to other Senshi.
• Sometimes, Minako is written as a close friend of Haruka and Michiru. This is probably due to the heavy amount of innuendo and suggestive comments that the couple say to each other during the last season of the 90s' anime, since a handful of Minako's wit and bad puns revolve around similar humor.
• A common element included in fanworks and meta-fiction is that before falling to Beryl/Metallia's influence, the Four Generals were kings of various regions of Earth (with Prince Endymion's family as rulers over all of them). This comes from the common transation of "Shitennou" as "Four Heavenly Kings" or "Four Kings of Heaven," combined with references to each of the four of them as commanders over specific regions (the Far East, North America, Europe, and the Middle East) in service of the Dark Kingdom. The manga only depicts them as bodyguards and advisers to Endymion, and the '90s anime adaptation removes that part of the backstory entirely; the term "shitennou," originally the name of the four Buddhist gods of the cardinal directions, is most likely used here in a figurative sense meaning "elite four."
• Ami's covert pervertedness is often exaggerated into her being a secret sex expert (despite never being clarified as dabbling/showing interest in porn, like Minako, in neither fanon nor canon).
• Usagi as bisexual. This is because of her heavily Ambiguously Bi moments mostly in the manga and Crystal, such as her relationship with Haruka and her fawning over Rei.
• Rei as bisexual or asexual. The latter is more common in the manga than in the 1990s anime, but the former appears in most adaptations.
• Shingo, Ikuko, and Kenji are assumed to have died by the 30th century in order to explain their absence. Some fans, however, believe they're conveniently off-screen and just aren't mentioned.
• Setsuna is part-Romani due to her Ambiguously Brown skin and her fitting the Magical Romani stereotype. Despite fans citing it as canon, God Never Said That.
• Mina and Usagi being cousins is commonly used to explain their reseblance. most commonly they are realted through a sister of Kenji who married and went abroad to explain why she is never mentioned. This might extent to Silver Milenium as well with the ruler of Venus being the brother, or sister, - in law of Queen serenety.
• Seiya (and to a much lesser extent Taiki and Yaten) being genderfluid or transmasculine is a popular headcanon, likely stemming from the rather odd choice in the anime adaptation of "Stars" to have the Sailor Starlights be physically male while in civillian form but gaining female bodies upon transformation. This is prelevant enough to pop up in fanworks that follow the manga's canon where all three Starlights are just androgyneous women disguised as men with no magical gender bending involved.