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alt title(s): Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon; Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon 
Moon Prism Power, Make-UP!
Sailor Moon is the story of Tsukino Usagi ("Serena Tsukino" in the North American dub) — a clumsy, lazy, underachieving 14-year-old crybaby whose life is completely changed when she meets a talking cat. The cat, Luna, tells her that she is a predestined magical warrior who must find the reincarnated princess of a lost kingdom of magic while at the same time defending against the forces of the extradimensional evil responsible for the fall of that kingdom. In the course of a year, Usagi gathers to herself other reincarnated warriors, learns how to be a leader, and discovers a secret power within herself that puts the combined force of the Sailor Senshi to shame. Finally, she must confront the evil behind the Dark Kingdom, sacrificing everything in her attempt to destroy it forever.
Subsequent seasons go through a similar pattern with the strength of each set of foes escalating, and even non-combative elements of the show had a strong case of So Last Season; obscure allies and Ascended Extras popular with fandom are sometimes ignored.
Known in Japan as Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon (and given the non-literal English title of Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon), this groundbreaking manga and anime fused the Sentai and Magical Girl genres, forever redefining the latter. It has become known as the archetypical Magical Girl show and has been widely imitated and parodied. Created by pharmacist-turned-manga-author Naoko Takeuchi, Sailor Moon lasted through five seasons and several motion pictures, and has become something of a cottage industry. Toei Animation's work on the most popular current Magical Girl series Futari Wa Pretty Cure is largely seen as attempting to replicate its success.
The North American dub of Sailor Moon is infamous for the amount of censorship and "rewriting" imposed on it by DiC, the company which licensed the show. Few English dubs of anime this side of Carl Macek's "free adaptations" (see Robotech) and the Nausicaa dub Warriors of the Wind have been more despised by fans when it comes to butchery in the name of making a show "acceptable" to an American audience. Whole episodes were thrown out, plot lines excised root and stem, and entire segments rewritten from scratch to shoehorn it into DiC's intended audience; additionally, An Aesop was conjured up out of each episode and stitched on at the end in order to comply with FCC regulations for "educational content" in children's television (although this was only done to the Classic and R series). Uncensored versions of the series were offered first for S and SuperS as they aired on Cartoon Network by Geneon (then Pioneer), and for a brief period in 2003-2004, the first two series were offered uncensored by ADV Films before going out of print again. Toei has quietly pulled the license to the franchise worldwide and non-bootlegged DVDs now go for a great deal of money online.
As bad as the DiC dub was, however, its was downright faithful compared to what a small company known as Toon Makers wanted to do with it. Watch the sheer horror here!
Also, a live-action version appeared on Japanese television between October 2003 and October 2004. Forty-nine episodes were broadcast of Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon, which established itself as a completely separate continuity unrelated to either the manga or the anime.
The show's influence created the stereotypical image in the West of a Magical Girl being a Magic Warrior rather than a Cute Witch; in Japan the latter is still the more prominent variety. It also probably has — or had — the most fanon of any televised anime, making it a sort of stepsister show to Ranma 1/2. Fan Fic crossovers between Sailor Moon and Ranma 1/2 are unusually common, to the point that they've developed their own sub-genre: the Fuku Fic.
The core characters are:
Aiding them are:
- Chiba Mamoru, Tuxedo Mask (or Tuxedo Kamen)
- Luna and Artemis, the team's mentors and talking cats
Later additions to the team include:
The manga has a prequel (of sorts; timing makes it both a prequel and a sequel to Sailor Moon) — Codename Sailor V.
This show provides examples of:
- The Abridged Series (Sailor Moon Abridged)
- Adaptation Decay (through each successive version but it's not always a bad thing...)
- Agony Beam : Various baddies have them, a notable use (though without an actual beam) is during R when Rubeus increases his ship's artificial gravity to 10 and more G's to torture Sailor Moon. She stands up.
- Aliens And Monsters:throughout the series' entire run
- Allergic To Love: Ami in one of the side stories
- Aloof Ally: Sailors Neptune and Uranus. The aloof allies.
- Alternate Continuity: The animé and the Manga. Not to mention the live-action series Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon
- Amazon Brigade: The Sailor Senshi
- And Knowing Is Half The Battle: "Sailor Says", North America only
- Annoying Younger Sibling: Usagi's younger brother Shingo. Later Chibiusa.
- The Anti Christ: Mistress 9
- Apocalypse Maiden :Sailor Saturn
- Ascended Extra :Many villains
- Battle Aura : Everyone
- Battle Royale With Cheese
- Badass Bookworm : Ami, Taiki
- Because Destiny Says So: Crystal Tokyo. 'nuff said.
- Berserk Button: It was established in the 13th episode that anyone who makes sexist remarks in the hearing of a sailor senshi is in for a world of hurt, as Jedite learned the hard way when the then-Power Trio of sailor senshi used Plane Fu on him for that offense.
- Bicep Polishing Gesture
- Bifauxnen: Haruka
- Surely the Starlights as well, at least in the manga.
- Big Bad : One each season: Queen Metaria, Death Phantom, Master Pharoah 90, Queen Nehellenia, and Sailor Galaxia/Chaos. The latter of which is also the entire series Big Bad in the manga.
- Big Budget Beef Up
- Big Eater: Usagi
- Bishonen Prince Diamond, Sapphire, Mamoru Chiba, Ali, etc.
- Bishoujo Usagi, Rei, etc.
- Brother Chuck: Season one had a fairly large supporting cast, including Usagi's parents and little brother, Rei's grandpa and his assistant, and various folks from their school. Almost all of them had vanished completely by season three, though a couple made a token appearance or two in later seasons, and the writers were nice enough to awkwardly pair off Usagi's main two school chums before they vanished.
- Brother Sister Incest: Eiru and An in the second season have hints of this because they were created from the same being, á la Adam and Eve; surprisingly, this wasn't removed from the American version.
- Bunny Ears Lawyer: Professor Tomoe, a Mad Scientist who goes on rants about delicious coffee
- By The Power Of Greyskull: "[Planet] [Something] Power, Make-up!" The dub usually just took off the "Make-up!", but sometimes you got things like "Moon Cosmic Dream Action!"
- Cake Eater: Hawk's Eye of the Amazon Trio
- Calling Your Attacks: All the Sailor Senshi. It's unclear if they can attack without doing it.
- Car Fu: Episode 13 features an instance of Plane Fu.
- Cast Speciation
- Chained Heat: Moon and Uranus in a Sailor Moon S episode
- Character Exaggeration:
- Circus Of Fear: "Dead Moon Circus" in SuperS
- Clothes Make The Legend: The Sailor's Fuku
- Coat Hat Mask: Tuxedo Mask. Who does not, in fact, wear a tuxedo.
- Commander Contrarian: Rei was Flanderized into this in the DiC dub.
- Crash Into Hello: Subverted in one episode where Rei trys to deliberately engineer this to meet Mamoru. She ends up falling flat on her face and he walks past her.
- Dark Magical Girl: Hotaru, somewhat; the Shadow Galactica.
- Don't forget the Dark/Wicked Lady, who Chibiusa became when the enemy brainwashed her.
- Dead Lesbian Syndrome: Haruka and Michiru both seem to suffer from this, as they've been mowed down twice in the anime. Subverted both times as they got better within the next couple of episodes.
- Death Is Cheap: One of Sailor Moon's powers is explicitly resurrection, so expect main characters to die at least once per storyline.
- Demonic Invaders: All the bad guys.
- Die For Our Ship: Oh, Mamoru.
- Did Not Do The Research: Despite his name, Tuxedo Kamen wears full evening dress, not a (semi-formal) dinner jacket.
- Dirty Old Man: Rei's grandfather, but only in the anime
- Dont You Dare Pity Me
- Dragon :Every. Single. Season. Including one who eventually becomes a literal dragon.
- Dream Mirror: Trope Namer, each season had at least one new item.
- Dub Induced Plot Hole: On top of just plain Inconsistent Dubbing, some incredibly unique plot inconsistencies popped up in the dubbing.
- Dub Text: Sailors Uranus and Neptune.
- Ducks In A Row
- Elemental Rock Paper Scissors: sometimes, as in the S movie where Ami's ice-based attacks do nothing to the ice-powered villain; sometimes not.
- Eleventh Hour Superpower: Princess Serenity typically appeared during final battles.
- Ensemble Darkhorse :The creators were hugely surprised when Ami was the most popular Sailor Senshi, worldwide.
- The End Of The World As We Know It: Every. Damn. Season. Finale. The last season involved the end of the universe.
- Evil Costume Switch: Endymion, Galaxia, and especially Black Lady
- Expressive Hair: Usagi. Just, Usagi.
- Extra Strength Masquerade
- Facial Markings
- Fake Boss
- Fake Defector: Uranus and Neptune in the final episodes
- Famous Last Words: If you're a sailor senshi, expect to get some.
- Fan Fic — loads of it, of course. Special mention though should be given to the Doom Tree series within the show itself, a short arc where the girls rediscover their powers, fight the strange aliens, and each gets a relevant Power Up. Said powerups were promptly forgotten when Chibi-Usa showed up. It was really an elaborate Fan Fic written so that the manga creator could restart what was originally intended to be a complete story and get ahead of the animators.
- Festival Episode
- Figure It Out Yourself
- Filler
- Five Man Band: The Sailors, as explained above.
- Flanderization :Minako in the anime goes from being more mature and experienced despite her occasional ditzyness, to being worse than Usagi.
- Foreshadowing: In both the manga and anime, Chibi-Usa wants to make a grail she once saw in her mother's room out of clay as a school project. In the manga she's actually called out on this and asked if it was something Sailor Moon used for an attack, but Chibi-usa doesn't know. What she ends up creating eventually turns out to be a replica of the Holy Grail, the object Sailor Moon uses to become Super Sailor Moon.
- Four Is Death
- Frills Of Justice :Contributes the image. Eternal Sailor Moon takes this trope to RIDICULOUS levels. At least Super Sailor Moon looked nice...
- Full Moon Silhouette
- Gender Bender: Starlights, anime only
- Genius Ditz: Usagi, Minako
- Germans Love David Hasselhoff: the original US airing flopped while the original Canadian airing was a hit, because Canada got it on a nationwide network in better time slots
- Ghibli Hills
- Girlish Pigtails: Usagi and Chibiusa.
- Glam Of Shazam: Early on, Usagi had a pen that let her age up and take on a disguise, such as a reporter, like older, traditional Magical Girls like Creamy Mami and Minky Momo. This was all but forgotten once other girls joined her, except it was used once in the R season.
- Gotterdammerung
- Grand Finale
- Gratuitous English: most of the By The Power Of Greyskull and Calling Your Attacks
- Green Lantern Corps: It turns out there are Senshi all over the galaxy! Heck, there's even a Sailor Galaxia! (Think "Galaxy")
- Hair Colors: Ami has blue hair. Sailor Pluto and Neptune have different shades of green and Chibiusa's is pink.
- Heavy Sleeper: Usagi
- Heroic Sacrifice: Many of them.
- Hero Secret Service
- Hide Your Lesbians :Haruka and Michiru, who were actually quite groundbreaking for their time in playing with this idea
- Hostage For Mc Guffin
- Huge Schoolgirl: Makoto
- Human Aliens
- Hypnotize The Princess :quite a few times
- Hypocritical Humor: Many Sailor Says segments, when you consider that Serena's the one doing them.
- I Have The High Ground (mostly Tuxedo Mask, Uranus and Neptune)
- I Just Want To Be Normal (Usagi)
- Idiosyncratic Wipes: The DiC-produced episodes added CGI scene wipes. Cloverway was too cheap to be bothered.
- Ill Girl :Hotaru
- Image Song
- In A Single Bound : Tuxedo Kamen is fond of this
- In The Name Of The Moon : The Trope Namer
- Ineffectual Loner : Tuxie, sort of.
- Invisible To Normals: Nobody notices that Usagi looks exactly like Sailor Moon.
- Is That Cute Kid Yours :Chibi-Usa, who is Usagi's kid, and Chibi-Chibi, who isn't.
- James Bondage :Poor, poor Tuxedo Kamen.
- Joshikousei
- Kansai Regional Accent
- Karmic Death : Most of the Dark Kingdom's bad guys.
- Keep Circulating the Tapes (the series was out on DVD, but briefly, and Toei refuses to license it any more; also the final Sailor Stars series and episode 67 never made it to America).
- Kid From The Future: Chibi-Usa
- Knight Templar :the Outer Senshi, especially Uranus.
- Kotono Mitsuishi: Usagi
- Large Ham: The characters particularly shine when they make their In The Name Of The Moon speeches.
- Late For School : Usagi. Always.
- Leotard Of Power
- Local Hangout: Game Center Crown, Fruits Parlor Crown
- Luminescent Blush : Sailor Moon and Tuxedo Mask, upon finding out that they'll have a kid in the future.
- The Last Temptation
- The Little Shop That Wasnt There Yesterday
- Macekre : Lots of changes were made to the DiC and Cloverway dubs of Sailor Moon to make it more palatable for American audiences, including:
- The Sailor Senshi's names changed from Japanese to American (in the U.S. and Latin American dubs, the main heroine is "Serena Tsukino"; oddly enough, Sailor Saturn escaped this treatment, though she didn't get much screen time anyway),
- Quirky Miniboss Squad member Zoisite being changed from a flamboyant homosexual male into a full-blown woman.
- Sailors Uranus and Neptune being portrayed as "cousins" instead of "more than just friends." Famously, this change didn't work.
- The entire ending of the first series being cut down into one episode, "Day of Destiny," so nobody would be shown dying, including the villains themselves.
- And the characters developed an inability to distinguish rice balls from donuts.
- It's nigh-on impossible to list everything here because the changes were so numerous and oftentimes completely unexplainable. However, what DiC did pales in comparison to what Toon Makers was planning to do if they got the rights. They were going to make their own American version with original animation and live-action segments. There exists footage of a promo being displayed by someone who worked on it.
- Mad Scientist:Soichiro Tomoe, in the "Death Busters" arc
- Mad Scientists Beautiful Daughter:Hotaru Tomoe, in the "Death Busters" arc; slightly subverted as she's only 12 or so.
- Magical Girl: Well, duh.
- Magic Warrior
- Malaproper :Minako
- Making A Splash : Ami
- The Man Behind The Man
- Martyr Without A Cause :Haruka and Michiru, who outdo even Usagi in their self sacrificing zeal.
- Mask Power: Tuxedo Mask, at least before his extreme case of Bad Ass Decay.
- The Messiah: Usagi
- Messianic Archetype : Usagi
- Mid Season Upgrade :Usagi gaining the Silver Crystal, which powered up her Moon Healing Escalation in R, and gaining the Holy Grail which gave her a Super Mode, powering up her Spiral Moon Heart Attack into the Rainbow Moon Heart Ache in S.
- Mind Control Eyes:Seen in any brainwashed character, particularly Mamoru. Those who had their Pure Hearts stolen or were trapped by the Dead Moon Circus also had them until rescued.
- Mind Rape: Dead Moon Circus did this to their victims in Super S. It's also how Chibi Usa became Black Lady in R).
- Missing Episode: Several, North American adaptation only.
- Monogender Monsters: Always seem to be female.
- Monster Of The Aesop: Some really, really bizarre youma came about depending on the episode's theme, including such things as an elephant vacuum cleaner, "Cinderella", race cars, and even a syringe... Though the most bizarre example would have to be the Stars season's Sailor Guts, a football player transformed into a beefy, pink-skinned guy in a sailor suit about three sizes too small for him. Ew.
- Of special mention is Professor Tomoe, who engineered his Aesop-monsters on purpose after awhile.
- Monster Of The Week: Every episode.
- Moral Dissonance: Usagi loves everyone equally. Especially Tuxedo Mask.
- My Significance Sense Is Tingling
- Mysterious Protector: Tuxedo Mask, Moonlight Knight in the Makaiju arc of SMR
- Myth Arc
- Name That Tune
- Nerd Glasses: Umino/"Melvin", Princess D
- Never Say Die: the dub, instead said captured by the Negaverse
- New Transfer Student: Ami, the guy she crushes on. The starlights.
- Nightmare Fuel: You'd be surprised how much this show has, case in point Death Phantom and Zirconia.
- The Nineties
- No Export For You: Hi there, Sailor Stars.
- Jetix UK's inablity to air the third and forth season of Sailor Moon should have probably have been a warning sign in regards to Naruto...
- We might as well count all of the anime now that Toei has pulled the license on it.
- Non Serial Movie
- The Nose Bleed: A rare female example with Minako.
- Not A Date: Rei with a one-shot female character
- Nurse With Good Intentions : Minako only makes everything worse.
- Odango
- Official Couple: Haruka & Michiru, Usagi & Mamoru.
- Omniscient Morality License (Pluto)
- The One Guy: Mamoru/ Tuxedo Kamen
- The One True Sequence
- Only Six Faces
- Oracular Urchin
- Ordinary High School Student : The Senshi.
- Out Of Clothes Experience: Pops up often, even remaining in the dub. Like in the transformation sequences, however, nothing explicit is observable. It is particularly relevant at the very end of the final episode of Stars, Sailor Moon spends the last episode completely naked and with wings on her back.
- And you wonder why that season was never dubbed. . .
- Overtook The Manga : The Maikuju arc is a product of this.
- Paper Thin Disguise: No-one can tell that the senshi and their normal selves are the same people because they are wearing tiaras. The world must just be one huge Idiot Ball.
- Fanon holds that the Senshi have a some sort of magical glamour.
- Subverted in the R movie by Fiore.
- Parental Abandonment :Ami, Rei, the Outers
- Peril Rollover :against Sailor Galaxia
- Pimped Out Dress :the Moon Princess dress, and the dresses in the "Wedding Day Blues"/"Dream of a White Dress" episode
- Pinky Swear
- Playing With Fire :Rei/Sailor Mars
- Plot Relevant Age Up :Hotaru, and this was after she had an age down.
- Power Gives You Wings: Eternal Sailor Moon
- The Power Of Friendship
- The Power Of Love :If you couldn't tell by the heart shaped compact, the heart shaped rod, which attacks by hitting enemies with a giant heart, this is what causes her upgrade in S.
- Pretty In Mink: One of the outfits Minako tries on at the beginning of one of the movies.
- Prime Directive :Pluto had three of them, although this never was an important plot point
- Prophetic Names :Tsukino Usagi, literally translates as Rabbit of the Moon.
- The Psycho Rangers :the Ayakashi Sisters, four of the Witches 5, and the Amazoness Quartet.
- Puppy Dog Eyes :Usagi again
- Put On A Bus :Haruka and Michiru in Super S; Chibiusa and Mamoru in Stars. Mamoru was put on a plane to be exact. And then killed until the season finale. Lucky for him Death Is Cheap.
- Quirky Miniboss Squad
- Quite a lot, aren't there?
- Really Seven Hundred Years Old :Chibi-Usa, manga only.
- Redemption Equals Death Anime only: Nephrite, Saphir, Demando, the Amazon Trio, half of Sailor Tin Nyanko
- Redemption Earns Life (The Amazon quartet, Alan and Ann, Professor Tomoe)
- Red String Of Fate :in one episode of SMR Makaiju arc; also mentioned in episode 69
- Reed Richards Is Useless :Massively averted: in the future, Usagi resurrects the advanced civilization of her previous incarnation & changes the world forever.
- Reincarnation : Everyone in the main cast.
- Reincarnation Romance: Usagi and Mamoru.
- Reliable Traitor :Kunzite
- Requisite Royal Regalia :Moon's first attack is throwing her tiara.
- Reset Button :used as a plot element at the end of some season-long arcs
- Roofhopping
- Sailor Earth : Fan Fic is crawling with these. Indirect Trope Namer.
- Satellite Character
- Scary Shiny Glasses :Professor Tomoe
- Schoolgirl Lesbians :Haruka, Michiru
- Schrodingers Cat
- Sculpted Physique :The monster's aesthetics
- Sealed Evil In A Can :multiple examples
- Sentai
- Shojo
- Shoo Out The Clowns :both straight and inverted.
- Shoot Your Mate
- Short Run In Peru :the last 17 R episodes aired in Canada long before they aired in the USA
- Shout Out :Quite a few, including numerous references to Kingyo Chuihou
- Shy Blue Haired Girl : Ami/Mercury. Appears as the picture for that page.
- Sixth Ranger :Initially, Venus though she's less distant than the usual examples. Then the Outers, later the Starlights
- So Last Season :Sailor Moon, without fail, will be defeated and get a locket upgrade within the first few episodes. The other scouts usually just get a casual Mid Season Powerup instead.
- Sorting Algorithm Of Evil: Every new Big Bad
- Spell My Name With An S :Numerous thanks to the Theme Naming.
- Spirit Bomb :"Sailor Teleport", "Sailor Planet Attack"
- Stab The Sky :With scepters, not swords, but still fits this trope
- Stealth Hi Bye: The Outers have a habit of doing this.
- Step Three Profit: Many of Jadeite's plans involved creating successful businesses out of nowhere. This theme was revisited occasionally throughout the series.
- Stock Footage : The transfomation sequences.
- Story Arc
- Stupid Sexy Flanders :vis-a-vis Haruka
- Superhero
- Surprise Santa Encounter :in the S movie
- Talking Is A Free Action
- Tall Dark And Bishoujo: Setsuna and Rei
- Team Spirit
- Temporary Love Interest: One-shot characters. Many.
- Theme Music Power Up
- Theme Naming: several places, including most villains being named after gems; creator Naoko Takeuchi's hometown Kofu, Yamanashi is famous for its gem industry. Also, the Inner Senshi's last names relate to their powers: Mizuno Ami translates to "Ami of water," Hino Rei translates to "Rei/Soul of Fire," Kino Makoto translates to "Makoto of trees," and Aino Minako translates to "Minako of love." Tsukino Usagi actually translates to "rabbit of the moon," in reference to a Japanese folk tale. The other senshi have this on occasion; for example, the Outer Senshi's first names correspond to their personalities: Hotaru's first name means "firefly," Haruka's means "distant," and Michiru's means "mature," and Setsuna's (Sailor Pluto) means "juncture."
- The Scrappy :Chibi Usa often takes the brunt of criticism for the fourth series because she's more prominent there.
- More prominent? The entire season is centred around her.
- Third Person Person: Palla-Palla in the anime.
- Tokyo Is The Center Of The Universe: All the bad guys come to Tokyo. It never seems to occur to them to collect energy somewhere they won't be defeated by teenage girls in mini-skirts.
- At least they have a reason in R (they want to kill Chibi-Usa, who came looking for Usagi, and change the current Tokyo emough that the "Chrystal Tokyo" of the future will never come to be) but the rest of the time.... It's made even more ridiculous in that whenever the Senshi leave Tokyo, the villains come along.
- Transformation Is A Free Action: Every damn time the girls change into their costumes! (Mocked mercilessly by The Abridged Series.)
- Translation Correction: the Robocop joke in Sailor Mercury's visor had a misspelling of "innocent" and the wrong name (Mash_ instead of J. Smith; this was fixed in the North American dub.
- Two Timer Date :Minako in SuperS
- Transfer Student Uniforms :Makoto
- Transformation Sequence : All the main cast. TK once did a very impressive transformation while riding a motorcycle.
- Unusual Euphemism :In one episode, the Senshi are debating who should have the lead role in a play. Makoto says she should have it because she has the largest breasts. The dub changes to "the most talent." So fans sometimes jokingly refer to breasts as "talent."
- Victim Of The Week: The Rainbow Crystal carriers. And Naru.
- Victorias Secret Compartment
- Villain Exit Stage Left
- Visible Sigh
- We Are Team Cannon Fodder
- Weasel Mascot :the Moon cats
- Weirdness Magnet: Naru Osaka, the Official Energy Source of the Negaverse
- What Do You Mean Its Not Symbolic :why hello there, third season!
- What Kind Of Lame Power Is Heart Anyway
- Winged Humanoid
- Winter Royal Lady :the Big Bad in one of the movies
- Word Of God
- The World Is Always Doomed
- Xanatos Gambit :Galaxia awakening Nehellenia
- Yaoi Guys :Zoicite and Kunzite, anime only
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