Me liking Sailor Moon will probably become an entry later on, but lets take a look at what there was in the way of toys. Honestly, here in the states there wasn't much. We had some small collector type things along with keys of course, but the one thing I remember were the "Adventure Dolls";
Oh god... I think I am going to have nightmares... Yes, these "Barbie" dolls are the Sailor Moon Adventure dolls. Now where do I begin other than saying "what the hell?!" I should mention up front that these dolls were made by the same company in Japan; Bandai, just keep that in mind for a second. So what's wrong with these you ask? Well first off their faces are HORRIBLE; to the point where they look like blowup dolls, Sailor Moon is missing the "meatballs" in her hair with the red orbs (odango for the people who know Sailor Moon), they are holding the SAME weapon/key and their boost, even though different colors are the same. Any fan of Sailor Moon knows what these characters wear and what they wield. Who really thought this was a good idea when Japan got something like these;
Though the clothing is much bulkier, these dolls show much more character. Sailor Moon is holding her weapon from the Super S season and the other senshi are holding their transformation keys/pens, Sailor Moon's hair actually looks like they took care into making it like the anime and book rather than just sticking it into pigtails and their shoes are what they are supposed to be and not just different colored copy of Moon/Mercury's boots.
But really, when I was a kid I really liked playing in action with friends and really wanted to be one of the Sailor Senshi (and for me it was Sailor Moon herself) and thankfully it was made possible by some items;
A nice addition to the "lets pretend" kind of games. Honestly these really weren't all that bad, but to nitpick; the gem/crystal is pink. Why does that matter? Cause the crystal is described as the SILVER crystal, but as I said, it's a nitpick. Out of the two I really licked the locket because in Sailor Moon R when she transforms she brushes her hand over the crystal and when you do that on the toy (pushing the crystal in slightly) it makes the transformation sounds. Other weapons were released as well such as; Sailor Moon's weapon from Sailor Moon R and Chibi Moon's weapon from S. But wait, the other senshi have their keys/pens to trasnform, didn't they make those? For some reason, no they didn't. Not over here at least;
Yep, Japan wins again. Not only did they get the key/pen for the other senshi, but a lot of other items were released as well. We see in the second picture; Sailor Moon's weapon for Super S and Stars (Stars was never brought stateside other than the manga), the Luna pen, the star locket, Chibi Moon's transformation broach and the communicators. Also the pair of gloves; I am not sure if these are Sailor Moon's or Chibi Moon's, but the point is Japan actually had Dress Up kits and they could have been easily done in the states giving the; tiara, gloves, clip on earrings and a choker necklace. And they probably would have made a lot of money when you think about it...
Now as a collector of things in anime, I love plushies and I was thrilled to see that they actually brought over the concept;
These were such a fantastic idea, not only are they cute, but they could also add to the let's pretend aspect as well since they released both Luna and Artemis as well as the Sailor Senshi and Tuxedo Mask. Really, I have nothing bad to say about these. Japan technically has the upper hand again, but only because there are more variety.
This is for a comparison; since the series started and going through various anniversaries, you can see the difference in make and quality.
The states did have some other items, such as Luna P (which if I recall was a jewelry box that made sounds) and something I would like to forget and not men-
Curse you Internet! Yes, they actually made this for the adventure dolls. And before anyone says anything about the picture of the doll having the red orbs; yes I see them, but the stay look like god damn pigtails. And why did they make this eyesore of a toy? I really have no idea other than they wanted to waste plastic in hopes for more money. I mean even Japan had their items that didn't quite make sense; like a washing machine and cash register. But at least those made more sense than this thing.
Sadly that was really all we got for something that was sweeping the nation aside from trading cards, a very confusing TCG and three soundtracks. The CDs were actually pretty good, the first placing tracks from the first and second season. The second album, Luna Rock, had fewer tracks from the end of R going through S in addition to the Japanese opening and another Japanese song titled Ai no Senshi. And the 3rd ablum; Full Moon Collection, had all the English tracks from the first two, plus a new lyrical track that played no where in the show and all of the American made BGMs. Japan though, of course still had much to offer;
As you can see figurines were released and they were released for every season, statues/model kits in various poses were also made. A lot of sound tracks were released, not just for the anime series, but for the 3 movies, all of the musicals, the live action TV series and video games. Yes, there are Sailor Moon games; some side scrollers, some fighters, and one RPG. And even with the Musicals and the live action series other toys got spun out of those too.
And that actually leads me to a big part of my childhood; Power Rangers. The Power Rangers was my first taste of a live action Japanese series, all be it just dubbed over fight scenes, but it was enough for me. As far as toys go, everyone remembers the Zords and honestly I don't find the Zords horrible at all, well in the old days anyway. They did just what you expected them to do; be separate pieces and combine into the Megazord. But for me it was the action figures of the rangers I felt were kind of hit or miss;
In fairness to these figures they all look bulky because they are the morphing rangers that had the heads flip around when you pressed the morpher on the belt down while the civilian head was up. But all ranger figures till the movie action figures didn't really have different shapes to them; they all looked like males. Even in the video games (at least on the SNES) the sprites took after the Red Ranger. But these toys are very basic and standard as you can't really pose them well, their hands are always in the same position making it hard to get their weapons in their hands. And to be honest, they aren't very well detailed at all. And why do they have their dinosaurs on their chests? They never did in the show. Keep all this in mind as I am doing this part a little differently than the Sailor Moon section, okay?
And I don't know what it was about doing something like this, but they actually made "Barbie" Dollish dolls for Power Rangers as well;
As the box at the top indicates these were "for girls", but I really have to wonder why they didn't make any of the male rangers. After all Barbie had Ken, why didn't Kimberly have Tommy? And there were also no monsters, except for the early, early Power Ranger toys, that would be tall enough for them to fight. So... why bother playing with them if you couldn't really be Power Rangers? Or that's at least how I felt with mine. They also released a doll of Aisha when she replaced Trini as the Yellow Ranger. And take a look at the artwork on the box; the Yellow Ranger I can almost get doing this since in the Super Sentai Mighty Morphin' is based on was a male, but the Pink Ranger was always female, yet the picture doesn't have the skirt (and neither does the doll) and there is no indication of a chest. If this was for girls, how about making them look like girls.
Power Rangers was another genre/series I had the "lets pretend" fad for. I would play Trini and my best friend back then was Kimberly. Now I do give our toys some credit for this as they made gloves for each ranger that you could wear, they made 2 different sounds; the button between the thumb and index finder made a "swooshing" sound like you were doing karate and when you crossed your wrists (the glove with the button on top of course) it would sing "Go go Power Rangers". They released the power morpher which came with the 5 original power coins and the Blade Blaster; both of which made sounds. They made the Dragon Dagger and it played the 2 songs that would summon and command the Dragon Zord and they had made Saba which did talk. Now hearing that sounds good right? Imagine the excitement and disappointment when we saw this;
The Power Blaster. We were excited for this because it was the weapons we desired to be the Power Rangers, but look at the size. I know that when this was made I was technically "too old" to be into or even be playing Power Rangers, but even for a kid, they can't really feel like the Rangers could they? The axe barely has a grip on it, the lance is waaaay to short (even for a toy), and in fact they all just seem to be too small for the average fan of the series. Would it have been so bad to make these the size of NERF weapons and had them combine?
And that brings to the Japanese side of things. As I said before I was doing this differently and here's why; I couldn't find much in the way of these toys in Japan because the Sentai it's based on is older than Mighty Morphin' is in the states, so I am going to use Kamen Rider for the examples.
The figures in Japan are so intricate, it makes me wonder what goes through people's heads here;
This is a figure of Kamen Rider W (Double) Cyclone/Joker form. As you can see just by these few images there is a huge difference in detail. They are fully pose-able with different sets of hands so you can get poses and gestures prefect from the show. The belt shown here is amazing as you can see he has the Cyclone and Joker memories placed inside of it. Even just the lines on the suit are in sync with the television series. Now wouldn't you feel a little more like your hero if you looked and moved like them?
In addition to the "let's pretend" I have to examples; one from Kamen Rider W and the other from Kamen Rider Den-O. As I mentioned the morpher wasn't bad, but it did have it's flaws and where as it may be minor, it's kind of not at the same time; there was no clip to attach it to a belt. So after you said; "It's morphing time! 'insert what ranger you wanted to be here'." it felt like that was it, you'd set it down and start fighting the invisible putties and monster. These on the other hand, would make you feel like you are Kamen Rider W or Den-O.
The greatest thing about these toys is that when they come out with new things as the show introduced them, you didn't have to go out and buy an entirely new belt. It was already compatible with the one you have.
I am by no means saying that our toys were absolute crap, after all I did pay money for the and played with them, but stop and think; don't you think they could have been better? See you all next time! ^^/
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