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Sailor Moon - The Secret of the Sailor Scouts (Vol. 4)
ADV Films // G // June 11, 2002
List Price: $14.98 [Buy now and save at Amazon]
The Movie
I will again admit I am not a huge follower of Sailor Moon. I know many people who are religious followers of this series and I think even they would agree with me that Sailor Moon Vol. 4: The Secret of the Sailor Scouts is more continued crap from the disc I previously reviewed. There will be some repeats from my Vol. 3 review coming up.
What is presented on this disc are episodes 19-24 of the Sailor Moon TV series. DIC productions have owned what I believe to be the first couple to few seasons of the SM franchise, Pioneer Entertainment owns the rest of the series. ADV bought the rights from DIC for these and we are presented here with basically what has been shown on our television stations, including Cartoon Network before the Pioneer-owned episodes, when we were younger. And what is presented here is crap. The video looks like it came off of a VHS tape, the English voices (the only choice you have) are horrendous and the series itself has seen many a writing revision. This excludes such things as lesbian tendencies and overtly sexual shots of both the Sailor Scouts and the situations they get into. In fact, these episodes of Sailor Moon have a preview of the episode in the very beginning so you know exactly what is going to happen in that episode before you even see it. To add more to the travesty there is even a little "Sailor Says" moment at the end where Sailor Moon gives you some words of wisdom such as, "Don't talk to strangers unless you know them". G.I. Joe did this when it was on TV, but making a travesty out of the SM franchise is something totally different.
This release is mostly centered on the introduction of Sailor Jupiter, but also is a continuation of the last disc. The man who dressed as the fake Tuxedo Max now has Molly in love with him. She dreams of being married to Maxfield Stanton, but the Scouts know he is bad news and try their hardest to tell Molly about him without giving away that they are the Scouts. Much like I said in the last review, keeping their identities secret is worse than Clark Kent. It is obvious to anyone who the Scouts really are. We also are introduced to more of Queen Beryl's plan for the Scouts and her want of the Sailor crystals. I have no clue if this follows the actual original plot or was just made up by DIC so long ago.
Sadly, I can only recommend this release to people that must have all of Sailor Moon on DVD. I know the purists absolutely hate the fact that these are still in English only and cannot be translated until DIC gets its hands off of the license. It is sad that a better presentation was not shown here though. ADV should be ashamed of what they have done, this should not happen to such a respectable company. If you have a child, I would recommend this as I remember liking this show as a child and it presents an easy story to get attached to. Problem is that it does not show the actual full story.
The episodes here are: "Molly's Folly", "A Friend in Wolf's Clothing", "Jupiter Thundering In", "The Power of Friendship", "Mercury's Mental Match" and "An Artful Attack".
The DVD
Video: This seems to have been taken from VHS masters or has been converted from an already poor master of this series. The video is very grainy and was just hard to watch at many instances. This is most likely not ADV's fault and the blame can be put on DIC directly. This is a television presentation, so standard full-frame. I got this disc slightly scratched it looks like and I had a few problems getting through some episodes, but I persevered.
Sound: Presented in Dolby Digital 2.0 and in English only. In this case, having English only is a bad thing considering the dub is so bad. This show needs to be set free from DIC so a correct version can be created. The sound was very tinny, which would go along with the horrible video
Menus: Static with the six episode names and one extra.
Extras:
ADV Previews: Dirty Pair Flash, Monster Rancher, Medabots, Sakura Wars, Reboot, Princess Nine
Final Thoughts: If you have not figured it out yet, Sailor Moon Vol. 4: The Secret of the Sailor Scouts is a horrible release unless you must own all of the Sailor Moon episodes. There are no extras outside of some previews, so this is not even a good bang for your buck, even for $14.98. Easily forgettable unless you have a child that might like this series as much as we might have when we were young. Now we are older and know exactly what a farce this section of Sailor Moon is. Sometimes it is sad to have to grow up.
I will again admit I am not a huge follower of Sailor Moon. I know many people who are religious followers of this series and I think even they would agree with me that Sailor Moon Vol. 4: The Secret of the Sailor Scouts is more continued crap from the disc I previously reviewed. There will be some repeats from my Vol. 3 review coming up.
What is presented on this disc are episodes 19-24 of the Sailor Moon TV series. DIC productions have owned what I believe to be the first couple to few seasons of the SM franchise, Pioneer Entertainment owns the rest of the series. ADV bought the rights from DIC for these and we are presented here with basically what has been shown on our television stations, including Cartoon Network before the Pioneer-owned episodes, when we were younger. And what is presented here is crap. The video looks like it came off of a VHS tape, the English voices (the only choice you have) are horrendous and the series itself has seen many a writing revision. This excludes such things as lesbian tendencies and overtly sexual shots of both the Sailor Scouts and the situations they get into. In fact, these episodes of Sailor Moon have a preview of the episode in the very beginning so you know exactly what is going to happen in that episode before you even see it. To add more to the travesty there is even a little "Sailor Says" moment at the end where Sailor Moon gives you some words of wisdom such as, "Don't talk to strangers unless you know them". G.I. Joe did this when it was on TV, but making a travesty out of the SM franchise is something totally different.
This release is mostly centered on the introduction of Sailor Jupiter, but also is a continuation of the last disc. The man who dressed as the fake Tuxedo Max now has Molly in love with him. She dreams of being married to Maxfield Stanton, but the Scouts know he is bad news and try their hardest to tell Molly about him without giving away that they are the Scouts. Much like I said in the last review, keeping their identities secret is worse than Clark Kent. It is obvious to anyone who the Scouts really are. We also are introduced to more of Queen Beryl's plan for the Scouts and her want of the Sailor crystals. I have no clue if this follows the actual original plot or was just made up by DIC so long ago.
Sadly, I can only recommend this release to people that must have all of Sailor Moon on DVD. I know the purists absolutely hate the fact that these are still in English only and cannot be translated until DIC gets its hands off of the license. It is sad that a better presentation was not shown here though. ADV should be ashamed of what they have done, this should not happen to such a respectable company. If you have a child, I would recommend this as I remember liking this show as a child and it presents an easy story to get attached to. Problem is that it does not show the actual full story.
The episodes here are: "Molly's Folly", "A Friend in Wolf's Clothing", "Jupiter Thundering In", "The Power of Friendship", "Mercury's Mental Match" and "An Artful Attack".
The DVD
Video: This seems to have been taken from VHS masters or has been converted from an already poor master of this series. The video is very grainy and was just hard to watch at many instances. This is most likely not ADV's fault and the blame can be put on DIC directly. This is a television presentation, so standard full-frame. I got this disc slightly scratched it looks like and I had a few problems getting through some episodes, but I persevered.
Sound: Presented in Dolby Digital 2.0 and in English only. In this case, having English only is a bad thing considering the dub is so bad. This show needs to be set free from DIC so a correct version can be created. The sound was very tinny, which would go along with the horrible video
Menus: Static with the six episode names and one extra.
Extras:
ADV Previews: Dirty Pair Flash, Monster Rancher, Medabots, Sakura Wars, Reboot, Princess Nine
Final Thoughts: If you have not figured it out yet, Sailor Moon Vol. 4: The Secret of the Sailor Scouts is a horrible release unless you must own all of the Sailor Moon episodes. There are no extras outside of some previews, so this is not even a good bang for your buck, even for $14.98. Easily forgettable unless you have a child that might like this series as much as we might have when we were young. Now we are older and know exactly what a farce this section of Sailor Moon is. Sometimes it is sad to have to grow up.
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