Manga Review: Sailor Moon and Sailor V, volumes 1

Title: Sailor Moon, Sailor V Volumes 1

Author: Naoko Takeuchi

Publisher: Kodansha Comics

Release Date: 09/13/2011

ISBN: 1935429744

ISBN: 1935429779

If you're a manga fan like me, you've been eagerly awaiting these releases for years. Not days or months, but years. Ever since the now defunct Tokyopop lost their licence to Sailor Moon, this manga has been something that you could only find via eBay or scanned onto the internet. Sailor V never got an official release, so you could really only hope to find an untranslated copy or hope that a scanlated copy got released from someone. Now you don't have to wait anymore. Kodansha has released Takeuchi's most famous work to the English speaking audience.

Art-wise, these books are absolutely gorgeous. One look at the covers should show you that you're in for a treat. I don't have any scans of the new translations, but the artwork has been cleaned up for this reprint. It's been a while since I've seen the Tokyopop translation, so at some point I'm going to have to find a copy to compare it to. (Or look for pictures that people have posted on the net.)

Story-wise, the Sailor Moon volume was stronger than the Sailor V manga was. I'm sort of chalking this up to the Sailor V manga being more of a sporadic release than the Sailor Moon story was. One thing that's absolutely cool about reading the Sailor V manga was seeing how Takeuchi began to brainstorm characters and designs for Sailor Moon as well as to see the gradual change in how the series was presented. Over time the Sailor V manga started changing to show it as a prequel to Sailor Moon. (Sailor V started before Sailor Moon started being made, but continued to be sporadically released while Sailor Moon was running.) It's a glimpse into Takeuchi's thought processes and it's incredibly fun to see which designs made it into Sailor Moon and which ones didn't.

Translation-wise this is much more faithful than the Tokyopop/Mixx translations and fans who have poured over the TP releases will instantly notice a few translation differences. One thing that I couldn't help but notice was that while the translation was more faithful, it's just a little clunky. I loved that there were honorifics in here, but I'd be lying if I said that the honorifics occasionally hurt more than they helped. One such instance is the usage of "Princess-Sama", which just seemed a little redundant and clunky. I have to admit that I'd almost prefer that the honorifics were dropped entirely for flow reasons, although at times they do help to show some character interactions a little better.

This is something that I'd absolutely recommend for any Sailor Moon or Takeuchi fan as well as any fan of shoujo manga. It's worth looking at for the nostalgia value as well as to get a gander at the series that introduced a lot of the American and English speaking audience to anime and manga as a whole. (Sailor Moon was the first television series I watched where I knew that I was watching anime.)

4 out of 5 stars for both volumes

Kodansha's website is up!

I'm intruding on the CIO series to let my fellow manga fans know that the Kodansha website it up. I'm horribly late at remarking on this, but it's exciting to see what the website has to offer. It's also interesting to see that they aren't stopping at manga- there's another Kodansha website that has book offerings in many various fields!

Previously the Kodansha site only had a list of various manga they were going to be releasing, so this is really nice to look at. Still no sign of what the Sailor Moon covers will look like, but I've heard that they'll probably resemble the newer released volumes in Japan that collect multiple volumes in one binding. (The shinsōban editions.)


What's interesting is that the site has covers up for the manga that had previously been released in the US. It makes me think that perhaps Kodansha will continue to release the series in similar themed covers, which is pretty cool for those of us who love to have all of their manga matching one another. I'm pretty excited to see what their manga will look like- I've got a few of their manga on order through amazon, so I'll definitely let you guys know when it comes in!

Good news for manga: Kodansha opening a US branch

The other day I mentioned that TokyoPop was closing its US branch, something that I'm still pretty sad over. However, I've also heard something that I'm also pretty pleased to mention, something that's pretty old news as far as the manga industry goes. (My head's been stuck in books & I haven't been as news savvy as I usually am as far as manga goes.)

Kodansha is opening a branch here in the US, which means that there's a very good chance that any of the Kodansha titles that were translated by TokyoPop will see new life with this company. They've already announced plans for two titles that are incredibly popular here in the US, one of which is incredibly exciting for myself personally. Those two titles? Sailor Moon & Love Hina.




That's right, after being out of print for many years the series is now going to be reprinted in the US. This is good news for those of you who didn't have the money to plunk down for the Mixx versions of the manga. (However it also means that the value of the Mixx manga on eBay will plummet because now it'll only have value for collectors, but that's a downfall I'm willing to embrace.)

If that's not good enough then you'll also be happy to know that the Sailor V series will also be seeing an English translation. This is the manga series that started it all for Takeuchi & I'll admit that I'm really curious to read it. Hopefully this also means that we'll see some of Takeuchi's other work come to the US markets as well.

Fans of other series such as The Wallflower will be glad to know that Kodansha will continue to publish this series (starting with 25 & presumably going back to re-issue previous volumes) as well as other popular series that were published by other companies.

Here's a list of some of the manga you can expect to see: (but by no means the complete listing)

Until the Full Moon
Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney
Negima?!
Negima?! Neo
Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei
Shugo Chara!
I am Here!
Air Gear
Cage of Eden
Bloody Monday
And more!

What this means is that perhaps the future of English language manga isn't as dim as I was previously thinking it might be. It's not a clear future but it does give me some hope that it won't go back to the old days of 1-2 titles on the average bookstore shelf & special orders from the comic book stores. (Not that there's anything wrong with going to the comic book stores, but I'm spoiled by being able to go to work & see manga everywhere.)

Now if I could only get someone to pick up the manga Saint Marie then I'd be a happy camper!


Expect to see Sailor Moon & Sailor V on the shelves this September!