#pgsm act 13

[real-life-senshi]

Miyuu's doing PGSM viewing party for act 13 & 14 tonight (Jan 29 2am PST)!

Once again, would encourage PGSM fans come to support her! The more support she gets, the more likely she’ll continue the live streams of to cover the whole series! I imagine this may also be an emotionally challenging live stream she'd be doing, since these episodes heavily features Kubodera Akira. So the more love we can shower Miyuu during the stream, the better!

Reminder: This is how the viewing party typically happens in this format:

It typically takes 30 minutes into the viewing party for the actual episode watching to start.  Miyuu takes the first 30 minutes to recognize everyone who comments on the live chat to say hi to EVERYONE while she snacks/eats dinner. (Her love for sweets is very much Usagi-like! lol)

You need to prepare your own copy of the episodes and click play alongside Miyuu. 

Miyuu will count folks down on when to click start on watching each episode.

Miyuu will have her headphones when watching the episode, and you can see and listen to her live comments and reactions without pause (unless her cat Roku interrupts lol).

Because of this, you can even watch the episodes ahead and write down any comments or questions you want to share in Japanese (with help of translation tools as needed) ahead of time, and just post into the live chat for Miyuu when the time comes! :)

Miyuu reads English and she literally reads through all the messages on chat. If it's a simple answer, she will also respond in English to an English message. She even says hi to you even if you joined in the middle of the live stream!  She’s very sweet, hilarious, and awesome!

[real-life-senshi]

JFC Mamoru tsundere level is off the charts here!  Usagi’s so shocked when he gave her a warning to not be depressed because he’s concerned FOR her is just kinda painful to watch. She was so caught off guard. 

Also, Mamoru’s really risking saying too much about his personal background/condition here. Either he decided to say it because he believe Usagi’s too slow to realize he’s speaking from personal experience, or he’s already at a point where he knows he can trust Usagi/is already seeing her as a sort of confidant given their interaction as Sailor Moon and Tuxedo Kamen.  Still, it was risky. 

God we have to wait for another 19 episodes before things get better. THIS IS ROUGH.

The seaside’s definitely UsaMamo’s place for their love story; there’s just so many significant scenes of them being at the beach.  (possibly this very same beach?)

[real-life-senshi]

AHAHAHAHA So I guess Mamoru’s getting dragging into this because he wants to do damage control in case Usagi screws up. 

For someone that’s more of a klutz than graceful, Usagi sure tried to add some flair and sass to her facial expression and body language when she walked away from Mamoru and into the flower shop. It’s entertaining to realize how easily riled up she gets around Mamoru. 

He sounded so judgmental when he questioned Usagi “you’re just going to show that to him!?”, it ‘s so douchey and funny! 

Also. Bunny image transition! Bunny image transition! Bunny image transition! That’s so awesome!!!!!!

[real-life-senshi]

LMAO. While Rei can’t get mad at others for not showing up to help her, she can definitely be mad when her friend cause her MORE work to do.  At the last scene Rei’s barely holding it together and it’s glorious. I once again applaud Keiko for her superb acting!

Usagi looks so sheepish after Rei cut the line it’s hilarious, even more so when you consider that Usagi had decided that she was going to ASK REI FOR HELP. That’s why she called Rei in the first place!  She was going to ask Rei for help when she herself forgot that she was supposed to be at Rei’s RIGHT NOW to be HELPING REI out. 

Usagi might not always be the most helpful person when she’s trying to help, but it’s terrifying that she has such destructive powers in her when she’s not that.

But in all seriousness though, I really love this detail here.  It’s such a clever way to explain why Usagi WILL BE stuck with Mamoru in this episode, and justify why the girls are indisposed to be giving a hand.  It’s also so amazing to see that Usagi’s comfortable enough to ask Rei for help on this, likely something that’s she’s become much more comfortable with doing since Act 10 when Rei took her in for the few hours when Usagi ran away from home.  Previously as seen, Usagi would have asked Ami or Makoto for help first, but this time she called Rei first.

I LOVE this tiny detail so much, BECAUSE IT’S SO FUCKING IMPORTANT.  

[real-life-senshi]

We kick off second round of Act 13 liveblogging with an awesome scene that quickly establishes the main plot of this episode, and why this supposedly mysterious character that they randomly bump into because of Kamekichi has any business to be hogging screen time in a Sailor Moon show.  (lol I kid)

The amnesic piece is very quickly drawing connection point for Mamoru’s personal background, and Usagi’s also recalling Tux’s comment from the end of Act 9.

What’s interesting for me is, Shin disclosed that not only he has no memory of who he is, the fact that he claimed that he made up his own name, shows that interestingly he has failed to find anything that would inform him of his identity here in this large mansion that he’s living in it.   As I recall, we don’t get much detail about this mansion and frankly the backstory of Shin, just that we get into the fact that he’s actually Kunzite’s reincarnation.  But I’m really hoping to form some kind of fan theory about what’s going on in this place as the story unfolds in this episode.  

This actually also brings a side tangent for me that, if the story’s narrative aims to parallels Mamoru’s background to Shin’s, does that mean it alludes that possibly Chiba Mamoru was also a name Mamoru himself made up? Or named by his adoptive family? :O

Lastly, I’m finding the name Shin made for himself interesting, and I’m really trying to find some kinda symbolism here.

Shin’s kinda generic - it’s just scribed katakana, as shown in the memorial book. But I haven’t seen any actually scribing of the first name.  “Ichi” is probably (一) means “one” or “first”.  But how about “ou”? Is this the “ou” (王) from “Shitennou”　（四天王)?  That would translate to this being the “first king”, which makes sense given he’s supposed to be the leader of the Shitennou, even though he’s introducted last.  (As all villains do, the more powerful they are, the later they get introduced.)  Would that mean for any of the other Shitennou, if they have a civilian name, their first name could end up being the equavallent of “second king”, “third king” and “fourth king”? lol

[real-life-senshi]

AND we are at the end of this episode with Luna exclaiming that Moon’s gonna turn into a Youma! An ACTUAL cliff hanger! :DDDDDD

You know something’s definitely wrong when Moon rose up without gushing at Tux, and even more so when you realize she’s rising like a zombie with eyes closed. haha

We really haven’t had much of a cliff hanger in PGSM so far.  The end of Act 11 was more of giving off a vibe that more’s to come and the story isn’t actually over yet, but it didn’t end with something that likely causes audience to feel anxious about what happens in Act 12.  But THIS, in the limitation of what Sailor Moon can do as a tokusatsu production, this definitely counts as a cliff hanger!

Because of the cliff hanger, the cast and crew even filmed a preview only scene for the next episode at the end of Act 13!!! For this reason, I also decided to screenshot them here.  Usually I don’t bother with the episode preview. 

I’m definitely eager to start Act 14 liveblog soon, but can’t promise it will happen within next week. I’ll have to see what crap work will be throwing at me now that I’ve finished my vacation.  

[real-life-senshi]

Really hope this is the last of the flower imagery so I can stop posing to make gifs of flower. lol

Anyway, we finally actually have Kunzite reveal on screen to the audience, and Beryl looks like a proud mama-bear while she watch her flower blooms! lol

Even for first time viewers to PGSM, it’s so clear that Kunzite’s going to be play a much more significant role in PGSM than the other Shitennou, given the build up to his reveal. He basically had a full episode all to himself to be introduced, which typically means this is a significant villain, not just a “lackey” on screen. 

It is too bad though that PGSM ended with barely having any callback on Kunzite’s time as Shin after this episode.  I would appreciate if they could have done that.

Also, I do recall reading that some fans had been disappointed how drastically different the Shitennou’s design have changed. I do want to say that I LOVE PGSM’s approach to the Shitennou.  Not only are they more defined as characters, but the costumes made them more individual than be treated as a collective.  Honestly, I’ve always though the original design in the manga was quite dull.  All other non-big bad villains (Nemesis, Witches 5, etc) all had much more defined and vibrant design to their looks after the Dark Kingdom arc. Endymion’s guards deserve that too! 

I will say I’m slightly disappointed at the flower scene here though. It looks like it’s just a recycle of the shot earlier.  I wish they’d timed it better so it doesn’t look like the flower was “reblooming” again. :/

[real-life-senshi]

God, this scene could not be more obvious with the symbolism. 

Shin mentioned that he shouldn’t be leaving this mansion, likely because he knows that once he leaves, his actions won’t be his own making. Even as the white rose turn black, Beryl’s still poisoning it with her powers, suggesting that at this stage she still needs to actively make Kunzite take action.

Shin seems like a kind person, and yet as Kunzite’s attacking innocent school girls in the middle of the night and turning them evil, which is probably why he said “(he) shouldn’t leave.”

I wonder that’s why Beryl said she felt sorry she had to summon Kunzite?

 Because she’s aware the different person Kunzite’s reincarnated to is so drastically different to the person she needed to work for her? Why is she sorry though? Aren’t the Shitennou just a means to an end to her? 

How did Kunzite get these powers?  His power seems much more forceful and violent. (like dear god he chokes them first before putting them down, forcing them to do his bidding!) 

All the others Shitennou just summon Youma to do their bidding, but Kunzite can turn someone evil and even transform them into Youma or something else - hence Beryl mentioned she needs “greater evil”, but how and why can he do what he does? And how does Beryl know about that?  How long has Beryl know Kunzite’s whereabouts and what he can do? So many questionsssss!!!!