The Great Otaku Gathering

Hello and welcome to Don't Look Back... Again; a blog where I think I have run out of things witty to say at the start. Today's entry came to mind while I was away for the weekend as I had attended Anime Boston, so for everyone's enjoyment I am gonna share my convention memories over the years. Shall we begin?

Since I had gotten into anime it was always a dream of mine to go to an anime con and for awhile it was always talked about between me and my best friend, sadly though the friendship fell through and we were unable to achieve that goal. My first con I ever went to was with my boyfriend and was fairly local (only an hr or so away) called Kamecon. Kamecon was a one day only convention that was held at a high school; I honestly didn't know what to expect really when I had gone. I knew about cosplay and that they would have merchandise, but that would be the extent of my knowledge of it. This convention was rather entertaining, if only because of the people I had gone with. My boyfriend, myself and a few others went as volunteers for another friend who was running a business table, so we got into the con for free. When I first set out to go, like I do with every con now, I tend to think of what I want to look for and at this convention it was volume 4 of Card Captor Sakura: Masters of the Clow, since my boyfriend bought me all the volumes except for that one (because they were sold out). After setting up the table I went into the Dealer's Room and I was so excited; I found the book rather quickly. After that my BF and a friend went to the gaming area. I watched them play Marvel vs Capcom 2 for a bit then wondered back into the Dealer's Room. Apparently when I had done that my BF had asked our friend where I had gone to and I had come back with something else in my hand that I had bought. I did that about 3 or 4 times through out the day lol. It may have been small, but it was still fun.

The 2nd con I had ever gone to was Bakuretsu Con in Vermont with my friend Patrick. We had only gone for one day (it was a weekend con). We saw some anime DVDs and browsed the Dealer's Room of course. This time around my goal was to find a figure of Riku from Kingdom Hearts; sadly though I didn't find one. They had the KH figures, but not Riku's. That con was okay, but nothing really stood out for me; probably because I didn't sleep at all before I had gone to it.

At this point the person who was my best friend and I had started talking again and we actually were able to go to a con together; Anime Boston 2008 aka LineCon. Why LineCon? Because something went screwy and the line for pre-reg was ridiculous. And for being my first big convention it wasn't the best of memories. So to get this out of the way, here's the bad for me from that year; I didn't get my badge till 10pm the first night of the convention, I had a nasty fall on the sidewalk due to tripping over an uplifted brick and banged myself up pretty good and then 2 of the friends I had gone with snapped at me pretty much back to back. But the line thing aside, the con itself was fun. For me that year, I was looking for something from Disgaea. I didn't care what, I just wanted something from it since at the time it was my obsession. I lucked out and found two pictures in Artist Alley as well as 2 sealed figurines and one of them turned out to be my favorite character, Flonne. It was that con that made me understand why people paid for fan art and I am grateful for that.

I wouldn't go to another Anime Boston until 2010. This time around it was just me and one friend going, but we had an entertaining time. That year was a fantastic year for guests as the legendary Nobuo Uematsu was there and we got to see him jam with VGO (Video Game Orchestra). The Dealer's Room didn't fail me either as my goal was the DVD set for Slayers Revolution, but I got quite a nice surprise as I found a few things of Sailor Moon as well. The reason that's surprising is because most things Sailor Moon are very rare now due to it being an old series, even with the world revival. It was also the year that I discovered how entertaining cosplay chess was as my friend and I stumbled upon it while wondering the convention hall.

And then this year the same friend and I went along with another friend of ours; which was entertaining to watch cause it was his first con. The Dealer's Room once again made me grin from ear to ear as I wanted something of Kamen Rider and I found a model kit for Kamen Rider W, Fang Joker form. We hit the AMV contest, the Masquerade, and the cosplay chess as normal, but this year I actually made it to a panel. I had actually never gone to a full one before and I have to say, the one we went to was kind of a let down. It was a Final Fantasy panel, basically talking about the history of the series; but it really fell flat as it seemed like the guy didn't do any research until 2hrs before the panel. (that's how it felt, don't know if it's true or not) The panel was only an hour long, but I felt it could have been so much more. We also saw the end of the STEREOPONY concert, that was a lot of fun.

I know it doesn't sound like much, but that's just a quick overview. If you look at the con schedule (I am mainly referring to Anime Boston) you'll notice most of it consists of panels. And yes, that is mostly what the convention is; a place where the otaku can gather together and talk about a number of subjects. Think of it like lectures. And where as I do enjoy discussing my opinions on series or topics pertaining to it (this blog is case in point lol), the panels really aren't my thing. There was one panel this year called "Chu-Chu Died for Our Sins" which was to discuss the themes in all of the Xeno games, but I was unable to go since it started during the seating for the Masquerade. It's the scheduling conflicts that make me not want to hit panels as I would feel really lost going in part way through (whether I knew the series/topic or not). So for me conventions are a big shopping trip lol. I love the Dealer's Room and Artist Alley, but that's not to say I don't love the event as a whole either.

When I was around 16 or 17 my best friend and I started watching AMVs (Anime Music Videos) and we absolutely loved them. I even got to the point of wanting to make some myself, which I did. So going to AB the first year and participating in the contest (the voting) was a real treat. But seeing these videos really makes me want to get better at making the videos so I can hopefully one day maybe compete and possibly win. Here are two of the videos from this year's contest;

Best Romance:


Best in Show:


I didn't have this feeling the first year going to AB, but the end of last year's convention I really wanted to cosplay. So when my friend said he was going to AB this year, I put the idea and everything in motion to try and make a cosplay costume of Sailor Venus from Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon (the live action series) and with it I was going to have a closet cosplay of her civilian form, Minako. I was really fired up to learn how to sew to make these costumes, but unfortunately it wasn't in my favor this time around as many things came up and none of it got finished. But that didn't mean I wasn't gonna attempt to get into the spirit of things and cosplay somewhat; even if no one knew I was lol. I have cosplayed in the past, but never at a convention. One day I will have a costume to show off and have people stopping me in the halls to take my picture lol.

As I mentioned before; it was my first year at Anime Boston that made me appreciate and understand why people would pay for fan art. There really are only some things only a fan can do. The original artwork can only go so far, but a fan can take it to beyond it's limits. A lot of official artwork is just the run of the mill bust shot or standard pose for the most part; especially for video games. But with fan art anything is possible and because of this realization I had commissioned a few artists on Deviantart to create some images for me, using my FFXI character and her Adventuring Fellow. Without fan art, I would not be able to look at these images and say; "These are my characters" Where as before it would be "oh it's that hume model and elvaan model." And to make something special even more special, I had the first commission I have had done made into a wall scroll.



Watching the Masquerades and cosplay chess matches makes me want to participate in them one day. I don't think I ever will, but it's fun to imagine. I'm sure my friends and I could make an entertaining/epic skit to do, even though it would most likely be a cross-over disaster lol. But, some cross-over skits can be lol-epic-win. This is a skit from AB 2010 entitled; Don't Get Mad, Get Glad-os.



As for the cosplay chess it would be fun I think, but I really don't remember how to play chess and even if it is just me following the directions of "move so many spaces to the right or left" chances are I will move the wrong way as I have no sense of direction lol.

Other than these things that I realized within my years of attending anime conventions, the thing that really amazed me were the people. I never expected people to be so nice, ever. For some reason the great gathering of otaku makes us less bitchy (somewhat) and we all get along rather well. Save for one nitpicker that yelled at a friend of mine cause his costume wasn't 100% accurate, but I don't fault my friend for not wearing his sandals that day as it was raining.

Overall I love anime conventions and I hope I continue to get to go to more of them, even if it is only Anime Boston once a year. And with that I leave you with this; Ode to Final Fantasy from Anime Boston 2010.



See you all next time. ^^/

Doh, You Looked Back, Didn't You Part3

Hello and welcome to Don't Look Back... Again; a blog where I seem to confuse and keep people in suspense as to what I am talking about. Well it's that time, the time where you all finally find out what those three RPGs and Sailor Moon have to do with one another. And here it is, my very first massive writing project; Ultimate Sailor Senshi.

Okay, for starters I know the name wasn't too original, but it worked for a project name. This first all started when I was in the 7th grade, just starting to get into Sailor Moon and had recently played all the way through FF7, and of course continued to play Chrono Trigger over and over again. In my English class we were learning about random myths, folk tails and legends; and my teacher gives us the assignment to write our own creation myth. Anything would go, so long it was school appropriate of course. So for me my mind was swimming with ideas on how I could possibly, maybe combine all of my favorite games and what was becoming my favorite show together. I decided when I started writing I would base the female lead on myself, but using a different name at the time and that I was the sister of Princess Serenity and that this was taking place on the moon within the Moon Kingdom. The other senshi played their normal roles as Serenity's protectors, but also had more of a royal representation of their respective planets as well, thus me making their sisters too. Yes, by bloodline we too were royalty, but we were trained as warriors. Crono and Cloud came into play as they were my advisers and more or less bodyguards; in addition to that Crono and Cloud were also brothers. That idea actually came from my brother as he was working on a story he entitled “Knights of Power”; an original concept, but the main cast were named after his favorite characters from RPGs as a homage to them. For whatever reason, I liked that idea so I ran with it as well, but of course using the actual characters from the games. It was an interesting little story as the attack on the Moon Kingdom happened by the Sinistrals from Lufia 2, but it was the beginning of me starting to think what I could do.

From that moment and moving into the summer, I had made up my mind on what part of that creation story I was going to keep and what I was going to change. In the myth I had only mentioned my character by her senshi name, which was Ultima. And where as I mentioned the other Ultimate Senshi, I never gave them their names. Seeing as I had used a spell for my character I decided that that would be the theme for them, at least for the Inner Senshi. I ran through the RPGs I had played through at that time and picked four other spells I felt would make good names that could either be used solo or sounded good with the word “Sailor” in front of it; Valor, Meteor, Dragon and Missile were what I had chosen. In my opinion, looking at it now, Missile doesn't sound quite right, but the other method to my madness in choosing those was that at the end of their transformation sequence you'd see the spell go off. I wanted to use a spell from Breath of Fire II and Missile fit the bill in what I was looking for.

As for other characters that would be involved; Crono and Cloud were still around and remained brothers; using mainly Cloud's backstory from FF7 and having them grow up in Nibelheim, but before I get too far into the supporting cast, why don't we take a look at our heroines.
***Note: In the original works that we had written, our characters' names were actually our own, but myself and my best friend later came up with names for our two characters so for this entry I will be referring to them as those character names when civilian names are given.***

Lyera/Lina aka Sailor Ultima:


In the past life Ultima was also known as Princess Lina, the sister of Serenity. The name Lina came from the last part of my first name as when we first started it we used my whole first name instead of my nickname. Their mother raised Serenity to be more of the proper princess of the Moon Kingdom where as their father trained Lina as a warrior. Everything that happened in the Moon Kingdom's destruction happened just as it had within Sailor Moon, but with a little more of a heavy heart for my character as she came too late for the battle because she had sneaked off to see her beloved, which in her father's eyes was pretty taboo for a warrior, and she and her love soon died as well and were reborn with the power of the Silver Crystal on earth many years later.

Lina was reborn as Lyera and from an early age everyone who had come in any sort of contact with her knew she wasn't quite the normal little girl. When she was only five years old, her mother had taken her with her to see a friend of hers in Nibelheim, who happened to be Crono and Cloud's mother, and on that day a monster had escaped from the reactor on Mount Nibel and began to attack the town. For whatever reason, showing no fear; Lyrea grabbed two large kitchen knives and engaged the monster in battle. With little effort the battle was won and the Shinra surely took notice. President Shinra had approached Lyera's mother and informed her that he could provide special services for her daughter and give her the help she needed to live a normal life. With that being her main goal; her mother agreed and handed her over into the Shinra's custody.

Lyera would spend 3 years with the Shinra and even attaining the rank of First Class in SOLDIER, making her the youngest in the history of the company. At first the young girl was rather shy and bewildered as to why her mother would send her to such a place, but she soon made fast friends with another young girl, Sara, and a rookie Turk, Reno. For reasons unexplained, Reno felt very protective of her and it was questionable if it was on a romantic level or that of a big brother, but never the less he was there for her no matter what.

Her years with the company were filled with happy times as well as sad. She was not allowed to contact her family at all, even on the most special of days. Reno and Sara made sure that when her birthday rolled around that she would have the time of her life; along with another SOLDIER First Class; Zack Fair. But with the happy and say also comes the bad; Hojo taking a high interest in Lyera's fighting ability decided to conduct more experiments on her and to carry them through he, along with President Shinra, took her to the city whom they had the major alliance with; Solaris.

Her training became more painful and intense while she was in the city that looked above the world; but Hojo was more than pleased at the results he was getting, as Lyera had been the only one to not get ill to high exposure to Mako, but also maintained her sanity through the Ether experiments that Krelian implemented. Lyera had slowly become withdrawn as she hadn't seen her friends in sometime, but there was one person she had met within Solaris that could melt the cold exterior she had started to form; the son of one of the elements. Unfortunately, that happiness soon faded away as the boy and his family mysteriously vanished.

On her 8th birthday Reno had given her a necklace; a magentia materia with a crescent moon on it, along with it a promise. He had promised her that he was going to return her to her home. The decision was not just made by him alone as Rufus and Zack too saw what the company was doing to the poor girl. She was happy to return to her family, but as always things wouldn't stay normal for long.

She had problems fitting in at school, to the point where none of the other kids would talk to her unless it was making fun of her. Then one day, at age 12, out of no where, monsters appeared on the playgroud. Teachers and students ran for their lives, screaming, but not Lyera. She stood her ground and fought, like she always had. But these creatures had somehow managed to overpower her and when she thought she was done for a voice from her past shouted to her; instructing her invoke the power from her necklace by saying "Lunar Materia Power, Make Up!". Evading what would have been a death blow she looked to see Crono giving her the instructions and she followed them head on; thus giving birth once again to Sailor Ultima.

After that Crono, as the King of Guardia, gave Lyera the Hero's Medal and the title of The Hero of Guardia. It was then that Crono revealed the truth about her Senshi powers and her past life. He informed her that he doesn't know what has become of the other Ultimate Senshi, but they would have to seek them out. He also highered her full time to act as a knight for the kingdom and she would maintain her title as Hero.

Samantha aka Sailor Valor:


Valor was my best friend's character. Sadly though, because the backgrounds were written solo, I can only go off of what I am remember so these won't be as long Ultima's.

Valor was actually reborn in another dimension that was parallel to ours. She was travel back and forth between worlds with her Subtle Knife, that was attached to the bottom of her transformation pen/key. Unlike Ultima, where her advisor character is played by Crono, Valor took the que from Sailor Moon and had a feline companion; a white tiger named Hyzenthlay (pronounced Henzivay). Also where Ultima's version of Tuxedo Mask wouldn't appear for a little while, Valor had a male companion as well who later became her love interest named Inle.

One night, when she had crossed the dimensions; she sees a monster attacking Ultima and in the shadows of the night saves her from it, unfortunetly it makes a hastey retreat as does Valor, so Ultima is unable to identify her. When reporting the battle to Crono, the King can only conclude that she was indeed one of the missing Ultimate Senshi and he could only hope they could find her again. As luck would have it the monster attacked again, but this time targeting Valor to start. Repaying the favor Ultima saves her, but once again both the monster and Valor take off. One final round would be had with the creature as Ultima and Valor final team up to defeat it. Knowing her past already as it was told by Hyzenthlay, she agrees to stay in our world and assist Ultima in protecting the kingdom.

When I had originally outlined the Senshi, I wanted someone with medical knowledge and high healing ability. So it was only fitting that it would be Mercury's counter part to have this as Mercury was studying to be a doctor; thus giving her the name Valor suited her as well as it was the highest level healing spell within Lufia 2: Rise of the Sinistrals.

Sara aka Sailor Meteor:

The character my other friend had chosen. She had decided to playoff of Ultima a little bit as she too had joined up with the Shinra, however on her upper right shoulder she was branded by the number VII tattoo. She was very much like Ultima in that she had been recruited by the Shinra company at a very young age, though she never disclosed what she had done to catch their interest.

She had become fast friends with Lyera and was determined to always make her happy. For reasons unknown when Lyera made her escape Sara didn't follow and seemingly just stayed behind. Lyera had always wondered what became of her old friend and it wasn't long after she had met Valor that Sara would come waltzing into Guardia Castle.

There was no question in Crono's mind that this was Sailor Meteor and that it had been fate that had broght the two girls together many years before. Sara was more than happy to oblige to the request to assist in protecting Guardia.

Sara's character overall was that more of comic relief as she had the tendency to play jokes or call Inle names such as "Fish Boy", though I actually can't recall why she called him that. As well as scare the poor man with fire as he had a giant phobia of it. Perhaps that was her trying to capture her childhood, but I honestly can't say for sure.

Fiona aka Sailor Dragon and Chole aka Sailor Missile:


To fill out the rest of the team, to make the 5 inner Senshi, we had made our Sailor Jupiter and Venus in Fiona and Chole. Their characters unfortunately were very under developed to the point where I remember pretty much nothing about them except for what the look like. I do remember Fiona was a tomboy and Chole was pretty much a girly-girl, but that's pretty much the extent.

Crono and Cloud Strife:

As I had said the two remained brothers; with Cloud being the older of the two, and the adventures that took place in their games still happened. Just as Cloud had entered the Shinra, Lyera had already escaped and Crono had married Marle after their adventures. Working with these two characters was interesting as Crono never talked in game, save for one ending, and Cloud was an emo mess for most of FF7.

Crono I think we did really well with as he proved to be a good adviser and leader to the girls. The one quirk I do remember giving him though was that he had a sever knee injury, which was why he very rarely entered combat himself. As for Cloud, for some reason we decided to make him into an idiot. No, I'm not kidding and I can't for the life of me remember why we did that. The Mako poisoning taking it's toll perhaps?

So that was the beginning of everything. When discussed, mainly between myself and Valor, the topic of my "Tuxedo Mask"; it was noted quite a few times by her that once it was decided I couldn't change it. And even now, I wouldn't want to as I chose my favorite video game character; Billy Lee Black from Xenogears.

The Fateful Encouter:

As the story went, the 3 girls were sent to the Aquavy region to investigate an unnatural occurrence. Taking the Epoch they flew over, only to get shot down by the Captain of the Thames; crash landing onto the island where Billy's orphanage was. The 16 year old Etone rushed to the crash site and discorvered that only two of the three of the girls were conscious. Billy took Lyera into his arms and escorted them to his home where he and Samantha tended to Lyera's wounds.

When the two of them saw each other for the first time, they felt some sort of connection, though they could not place it. But like any soldier on a mission, Lyera side stepped those thoughts and informed the priest of their assignment from the King of Guardia. The only conclusion that Billy could think of was that the Wels/Repears were involved. With permission from Bishop Stone, Lyera was allowed to assist Billy in his work.

Meteor and Valor made sure to keep in contact with Crono over the radio until someone could come and repair the Epoch. But for the three of them it wasn't all work, as these two had started to see something different within their leader. Of course, when asked or confronted about it she denied it at first. The kids in the orphanage noticed the change in Billy as well and one night they all decided to spy on the two. Billy and Lyera sat out on the sandy shore watching the moonlight on the ocean; they were quite open with each other on their upbringings and they had grown closer together to the point where they had just gave in to the moment and kissed; resulting in a “Wooooo” a la Saved by the Bell.

It actually wasn't until Lyera had seen Billy's father for the very first time did she really realize who he was. Even with his face scared, Lyera could tell that he was the man from the Elements who had taken away her only friend inside Solaris. Jessie had confronted his son and demanded that he stay away from her, but of course Billy would never listen to Jessiah Black. After that fight, Billy had recalled the girl he used to play with and could now place the Mako filled eyes that he dreamed of.

Billy's plot arch from Xenogears remains in tact, except of course the three Senshi are there along side him. During this piece of story there was a confrontation between Jessie and Lyera on how she couldn't be trusted and that if she really was falling for his son she would tell him the truth about the Ethos. As much as she hated to admit it, he was right, but in her heart she just couldn't bare shattering someone's faith like that. After the fight the Stein, Billy did question her on her knowledge of the Ethos and to Jessie's surprise, his son was thankful and grateful that she hadn't said anything; only for the fact that it proved to him how much his father did care about his family.

Cloud had been brought to the Aquavy area along with Lucca to fix the Epoch and upon doing so he had a slight grin on his face as he watched Lyera and Billy together. He informed his brother of the pairing and Crono too, knew that this was the priest she had fallen in love with in the past.

Also at that time, Lyera had informed Cloud of the plan to invade Solaris and she insisted that they stay and help out. For the most part things were quite smooth on the Yggdrasil until Billy had suddenly fallen ill. Samantha, Citan and the rest of the medical went through a thorough examination, but could only determine that he had been poisoned. Where as it should have been an easy thing to deal with, no amount of medicine on the ship or magic could lift his ailments.

The crew on the ship had later discovered that a Solarian soldier had sneaked on board and poisoned the young priest's food and the only antidote was in Krelian's possession in Solaris. Krelian's price was Lyrea in exchange for the antidote. There was no hesitation as Ultima agreed to go to save Billy's life; even after the warnings from her friends that it was a trap. Lyera knew there was more than to just the simple exchange, but even the slightest chance that Billy's life could be saved she was going to take it.

Cloud had once again contacted his brother, this time with devastating news. He could almost feel his brother's heart stop at the end of his news and it wasn't the shock that she had “surrendered”, it was who she had surrendered to as Crono then recalled the name; Krelian was Princess Lina's father.

Up in Solaris, Krelian wasn't making it easy for Lyera as he threw another ultimatum at her; in order for him to hand over the antidote he wanted to see her in the blaze of battle against her friends. Reluctantly, she agreed and went back to the Yggdrasil's deck. Cloud, Meteor and Inle stood before her and if they had looked close enough they would have seen a syringe in her shaking hands; taking a breath she injected herself with the drug known as DRIVE and began her assault. With ease, she had taken down her friends and returned to Solaris; but once again she had been played as Krelian withheld the cure from her.

A few days had gone by and seeing that she had nothing else to lose, Lyera had inquired to an old friend from the Shinra who had been stationed in Solaris about the antidote. To her dismay, she had discovered that the vial that Krelian held was nothing more than a simple vial of a run of the mil vaccine. Knowing that Billy's time was running out, she had gone back down to the lower region; in the dead of night in hopes to see him one more time. She sneaked onto the Yggdrasil and as she went from room to room in the med bay she had apologized to the injured. But when she had reached Inle she stopped and held back her tears. He was bandaged up from head to toe and the sound of the monitors beeping were like stabs to her heart. She was then caught by Valor, who of course was more than upset at seeing her after what she had done. Lyera pleaded with her to let her see Billy one last time. Inle then awoke and said to Samantha to grant her her wish and that he forgave Lyera for what she had done. Following Inle's words she brought Lyera to Billy, who lay in a bed slowly dying. She left the two of them alone and right there next to the bed, she took his hand in hers and broke down in tears.

Knowing she couldn't stay with him, she had gone back to Solaris to have her final one on one with Krelian.

This arch; simple labeled as 'Billy Poisoned' was actually the most thought out and detailed piece of the entire project, even though it was unfinished. During the fight with Krelian he had revealed himself to be her father from the past and taking another cue from Sailor Moon, this would have been her emotions would have empowered her further and made her Super Sailor Ultima. Also fitting with the Sailor Moon moments, it was Lyera's tears that were the cure for the poison.

Other stories too were in the works, but like everything else they were only half done. Random 'episodes' would take place while they had gone to school for simple fluff pieces. Since we were basing this loosely on what Sailor Moon we had seen; i.e; the dub, we only had up to Sailor Moon R to really go by. It was then that we decided to bring in our version of Chibi-Usa.

Melissa Raquel Black aka Sailor Vera:


Vera is Lyera and Billy's daughter and like Chibi-Usa, we first meet her as she came from the future; though I cannot recall what crisis would have made her flee to the past. However unlike in Sailor Moon, Melissa knew who her parents were at the start.

The timeline in of itself for the stories did advance enough where Lyera did give birth to her and they had watched her grow up into a teenager. Though much like Chole and Fiona, the character development was pretty non-existent and if I had to guess the reason why was because we jumped around a lot in the timeline when writing, which is also more than likely why nothing got 100% completed.

There were other characters too who made an appearance; our friend Jole made a character named Tray, taking inspiration from Tray of Triphoria from Power Rangers Zeo and another friend who had a character named Rico. Rico... didn't last long as a character for us as when we were to face off with him he was overpowered and there was no way for the Ultimate Senshi to win. And for a story that is about the Ultimate Senshi, we couldn't have an all out defeat with no resolution.

We also made our Outer Senshi as well and keeping with the theme of spells, I had used summons from the Final Fantasy series;

Sailor Pluto = Sailor Starlet
Sailor Uranus = Sailor Maduin
Sailor Neptune = Sailor Siren
Sailor Saturn = Sailor Phoenix

Phoenix was actually the only one to have some kind of personality when we did use her since she was based on my cousin, Ronni. Valor also decided that she wanted her character and Inle to have a child as well. I thought that was a good idea since Sailor Moon didn't go that route and we made Valor's daughter the last of the Ultimate Senshi; taking Sailor Chibi-Chibi's place as Sailor Angel.

Meteor actually wasn't fond of this character and I never really understood why. While we were watching/recoding Power Rangers Lost Galaxy, Meteor got really inspired by it as it was the episode where Kendrix sacrificed herself to save Cassie. She took that same idea and applied it to Vera and Angel. Needless to say, Valor was unhappy.

There was a lot of needless drama for something that should have been fun. The example above was one instance and another was mainly because Meteor had quit the project once before. My best friend and I got sucked into CLAMP's Magic Knight Rayearth and decided we wanted to be the Magic Knights, so we crossed-over our Ultimate Senshi into it and started going through that story in our own way; however instead of the 3 original senshi going it was Ultima, Valor and Dragon who were chosen. When Meteor decided to do the project again she was very unhappy that she wasn't chosen.

Upon the final quitting of Meteor; my best friend and I had to decide on how to rework the entire story, but outright removing a senshi didn't work. We were talking about this one day in front of another friend and she had mentioned that the story sounded like fun and that she wouldn't mind taking her place.

Amara aka Sailor Meteor:


The storyline we came up with for this was kind of complex as it some happened that our memories had been altered by Krelian to replace Meteor's image with that of a clone that was made by Hojo at Krelian's request.

Ultimately though we had stopped working on this mainly due to that too many things began to crossover. We already had; Sailor Moon, FF7, Chrono Trigger and Xenogears. But then we threw in; Magic Knight Rayearth, Digimon and Gundam Wing. When it snowballed out of control it was a good time to stop.

Other things made somewhat of a cameo more or less as the weapons the Ultimate Senshi used were from other RPGs; such as Ultima wielding Dual Blade from Lufia 2. Ultima, Valor and Meteor also possessed the Ra-Saru from Legend of Legaia. The creature that had escaped from the reactor was actually the Nue from Breath of Fire III. And taking the idea of Wicked Lady from Sailor Moon R, we had made Almang; an evil form of Ultima that was a cross between Althena from LUNAR and Miang from Xenogears.

Looking back it may seem like a silly, massive, crossover fan fic, but I have really fond memories of it. This was what started me writing a lot and drawing. And even if nothing got 100% complete, what had been thought up or written was quite impressive, in my opinion, of something that meshed these things together.

See you all next time! ^^/

Doh, You Looked Back, Didn't You? Part2

Hello, and welcome to Don't Look Back... Again; a blog where I continue to do what the title tells me not to. Today as you can see is the part 2 entry from the previous "Doh" so let's dive right into my favorite video game genre; RPGs.

I had been playing video games on and off for a number of years; I started playing things on the NES like Mario Bros. and Rescue Rangers, then moved on to the SNES when that came out and mainly played like three games; Mario World, Power Rangers and Donkey Kong Country. Sure there were some other games in the mix, but those were the ones I really remembered playing a lot. I was 12, going into the 6th grade when I got my first taste of an RPG.

My brother and one of his friends had rented two different games; Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy VI. I hadn't paid too much attention to it and then randomly one day I became rather involved with watching my brother play one of these. I began to ask a lot of questions like; "why are you doing that thing that makes the screen all yellow?"(him casting a spell) "what's the deal with the big box at the bottom of the screen?"(the battle menu) and my favorite one; "what's the point of this game?" Finally, I grew tired of asking questions and had to try for myself and my first RPG was not only memorable for me, but it became a classic;



That's right, Chrono Trigger was my very first RPG. We had rented it from one of our video stores so the game had already been beaten and unlocked the New Game + on it. Honestly, I think that was a nice perk for someone who never really played on RPG before; you got all your best gear and levels, plus all your normal items from the previous play through so just learning and playing through to see what an RPG was all about, was nice to not have to worry about building and such.

My brother was to walk me through the game, but something came on the TV in my parents' room that he wanted to see, so he told me he'd be right back and had me enter the Millennial Fair and get Marle, but not go to the Middle Ages yet. I waited for over 30 minutes and he was still watching whatever was on so I went ahead. I managed to get all the way through the Middle Ages without him and when he came back Crono was on trial.

As I went farther through the game he felt there were certain spots I would have trouble with and decided to do them for me; The Sunken Desert and Death Peak to name a few. When it was time to do all the "side" stuff he told me to skip the Black Omen and either use thee bucket at The End of Time or ram Epoch into Lavos. Even though he "held my hand" I rather enjoyed the game and was determined to play all the through the whole thing on my own. Little did I know, that determination would become somewhat of an obsession.

The more I played the more I actually did on my own till I could do everything; it got to the point where I knew the entire game like the back of my hand and could play it with my eyes closed. Almost every week with my allowance I would rent it and to a point wrack up late fees. So my mom talked with the manager at our Blockbuster (she knew her from her job at the laundromat) and she was allowed to buy the game from them.

I started getting the alternate endings and at the time had found all but one of them. When 6th grade started we had this thing called Advisery, where our Home Room would split in half. One group stayed with our normal teacher and the other would go with another teacher. I thankfully had my normal HR teacher. He asked us, as a part of "get to know each other time" to bring in a hobby of ours or something we were interested in. I asked if I could bring in the SNES and play my favorite game for everyone and he said okay. Since there were 3 files on the game, all of which were at different points I gave my group the choice of what they wanted to see me do; continue where I was on my current file (Magus' Castle), Frog vs Magus ending, Frog returning to normal ending or the actual ending. The guy vote won out as they wanted to see Frog vs Magus. As I went through the fight of Lavos my classmates wanted to see all the different tech attacks and because of that time was running out and the teacher wanted to turn off the game so he could ask me questions (like my birthday, favorite color and stuff like that) the guys all went "nooo" I laughed and said I could talk and play at the same time, but I needed to use the more powerful tech to win in our time frame. The guys nodded and eagerly watched the ending as it played. Afterwards they asked me what the hell happened and who won lol.

As time went on I did play through without the New Game + when it was released for thee Playstation as a part of Final Fantasy Chronicles. I was so happy to be able to see the anime cutscenes they had added in addition to the newer/remixed versions of the characters' themes. And of course I was thrilled when it was released for the Nintendo DS with another ending added in. My only complaint with the DS version is that it updated the translation and where that really isn't a bad thing over all, I just liked the original we had. Especially for my favorite scene in where Frog opens the sealed cave to get to Magus' Castle;

Frog: "Handth over the Masamune."
Crono: *sticks the Masamune into the ground*
Frog: "Mine name is Glenn, Cyrus' hopes and dreams and now the Masamune. Forth with I shall slay Magus and restore honor" *grips the hilt of the sword with both hands*
A serge for energy emits from the sword and he cuts an opening to the cave.
Frog: *in a kick ass pose*

Him just proclaiming that he will slay Magus really touches me, the new translation didn't really have the same impact in my opinion. Overall the game is just fantastic; the graphics were top notch for its time making it a pleasure to play through every time I did. The music fit for every scene you were in and helped the epic story flow and the characters were all unique and even if Crono was the "silent protagonist" he still showed a lot of personality. I am really happy that this was my first RPG and I could easily recommend it to anyone looking to start out.

After Chrono Trigger it was hard to really find another game I would love as much to play it through that many times. I had played through Breath of Fire II, Lufia 2: Rise of the Sinitrals, and Final Fantasy VI; and where as they were all good games, I didn't have that same love as I did for Chrono Trigger. That was, until the Playstion;



The commercials really did a great job grabbing my attention for this game. At the time, it really looked like you were watching a movie trailer as it said; "A war that seemed endless" and then flipped to Cloud putting Aerith in the water; "And a love that could never be..." Way to spoil the game advertising people, right? But actually it was the "love that could never be" that perked my interest in the game.

We didn't have a Playstation when it was originally released, but a friend of mine and my brother's would bring his over and play through the game at our house so we could see it. He hit the point where we all know Aerith was gonna die and he refused to play farther for awhile cause he didn't want to see her killed. I can't quite remember how far we actually saw him play before we got our own copy.

Final Fantasy VII was like a whole new creature to me as the system for the materia was rather complex compared to what I had been used to. And I love it honestly, being able to customize your characters to whatever job/role you wanted or needed was a great idea. The 3D characters were great to look at, though I will admit when Cloud answers the PHS and holds it up to his hair with his block-like hand I laugh. Every time, I laugh.

The music is the one thing in every Final Fantasy game that I can say I really enjoy. And this was no exception; the transition of Aeith's death with her theme playing was heartbreaking and to go from that emotional scene to a boss battle with J-E-N-O-V-A and have that song continuing to play was extremely memorable. There wasn't a single person in my group of friends who didn't like the songs in this game.

The characters were interesting and had some depth to them, though now as I look back on this, I wish they had more. Especially Aerith since she died so early on. This is where it's interesting to look back; FF7 was the fan favorite for many years and I was one big fangirl of it. I loved everything about it and had little complaints about the game. I could rattle off my favorite character at the snap of a finger, my favorite scene and even my favorite limit break. Now though, I can see the game has its flaws. I bring it down to mostly a translation problem as the Reunion and the Sephiroth clones were explained rather poorly. And the commercial portraying Aerith and Cloud as a couple was sort of misleading since they never actually were a couple; they just had the one date and that was if you didn't treat her badly. Character development did get slightly more involved as they released Advent Children, Dirge of Cerberus and Crisis Core. But for the time and what was there; I loved it.

But it wouldn't be till the following year that I was exposed to what has become my favorite game ever;



My brother was once again the first to pick up this title. At first it was the demo that was with Brave Fencer Musashi and I admit, it was entertaining but not enough for me to really want to try it. That didn't stop my brother though, he rented it fairly quickly after it was released and I watched him play as I often do.

The story was very captivating as it pulled me in almost right away; there were so many twists and turns right at the beginning that you never could tell where the story was going to lead you. He made it to the part where you get Billy and stopped; not sure why he stopped but he did. Now, yes girl moment, I became more interested in the story when Billy was introduced because I thought he was cute and because my brother wouldn't continue I felt I should, so I copied his file to my memory card and played on. Honestly it was Billy's story that truly made me love this game; his character was so complex I was amazed. All of the characters were, actually. I felt that you could really feel some sort of connection with them as you played.

Of course much like all RPGs, Xenogears excelled at the music as well as each song was very fitting. And for a game where most of it is story with an intermission of game play it really needed it. The combat system was extremely unique as I had never seen one like it and it was honestly one of the better ones who tried something different.

The downside to Xenogears? Well, it was rushed for starters. Xenogears is episode 5 in what was supposed to be a 6 part series. I am fairly certain that episode 4 at least would have explained some more of Fei and Elly's past lives or some back story on Citan, Sigurd, and Jesse as some of the events for those characters are briefly mentioned, but never explained. Disc 1 was so full of story and Disc 2 felt very lackluster and because of it there are still things left unanswered and it kind of ticks me off. However, I was lucky enough to find this; a website that translated the time line that was in the Xenogears Perfect Works artbook. It explains the a formed mentioned Citan and Jesse as well as somethings on Miang, Billy's mother and more. Any fan of Xenogears should give it a glance.

Between all these games I really wanted to tell a story just as epically good and complex. It was the start of me really wanting to write. And as such I will show my appreciation to these classic games by listing my favorite character, scene and song for each game;

Chrono Trigger:

Favorite Character: Frog/Glenn
Favorite Scene: Frog opening the sealed cave
Favorite Song: Frog's Theme

Final Fantasy VII:

Favorite Character: Reno
Favorite Scene: Aerith and Cloud's date at the Gold Saucer
Favorite Song: Cid's Theme

Xenogears:

Favorite Character: Billy Lee Black 
Favorite Scene: The fight with Stein
Favorite Song: Small Two of Pieces

Still wondering why I did these in parts? Well you'll just have to wait and find out won't you, see you all next time! ^^/

Doh, You Looked Back Didn't You? Part1

Hello, and welcome to Don't Look Back... Again; a blog where I wonder how I get into some of these things in the first place. As you can see it's time for another "Doh" moment, but it's titled as Part 1. Why is this done in parts, well if I lumped it all together it would get fairly long since this is going to be done in 3 parts. And just to confuse you all I will tell you that they technically have nothing to do with one another. So with that said, why don't dive into what has become one of my favorite series of all time; Bishojo Senshi Sailor Moon.


Sailor Moon first aired in North America back in 1995, I was 11 years old and actually had never heard of the series. In an odd twist to that statement I never really knew what anime was back then either. I was actually a pretty big fan of the Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers and one morning my brother and I went to watch it and discovered it wasn't on, instead it was the first episode of Sailor Moon.

I admit, I wasn't impressed. I mean it wasn't bad per say at the time, but the only good thing I liked back then for this series was Luna since she was a talking cat. The following week it was again Sailor Moon instead of Power Rangers and I still wasn't liking it. It wouldn't be until 3 years later where I actually wanted more...

I was 14 and in the 7th grade and much like every teenager I hated school. My stress from school life was pretty bad as when I get overly stressed out I tend to get migraines and this was such a day where it was the aftermath of one. The night before I had a really bad migraine to the point where I actually hadn't gone to sleep till almost 2 or 3am, my parents both had to work the next morning however they called me in sick so I could get the sleep I needed. It's every kids' dream to be left home alone on a school day and where as it was cool, I did have that uneasy feeling since I wasn't used to being alone, so to fill the silence I turned on the TV. Back then USA used to run something called "The Action Extreme Team" which was a 2-3 hour block of cartoons every weekday morning and this was when Sailor Moon had reentered my life.


I recognized the theme song right away and was almost loathing leaving the TV on this channel, but since it was just for background noise I left it alone and as I listened to the episode I found myself becoming more invested in it to the point where I wanted to see more. Unlike when I had first seen the series where it was only Sailor Moon and Luna, this episode had Mercury, Mars and Jupiter and honestly the more characters made all the difference. I was now becoming a fan and I had my mom record the episodes that were to air while I was at school. Sadly though, by the time I found Sailor Moon, USA was about to stop running it. I had yet to see all the episodes that had been dubbed, but thankfully a friend of my brother's had recorded most of them and let me barrow his videos. Even though we never finished Sailor Moon R, I was still a fan and the Internet provided me with a plethora of images to feed the desire for the series.

The next year I had found out that the manga had been brought over as I stumbled upon issue one in our local comic store, though issue one didn't start at the beginning; instead it started with the introduction to Sailor Venus. Be as it may, I was happy to have the series back in some form and I was hit with more good news as Cartoon Network was getting the last of Sailor Moon R and by this time I had gotten my two best friends into the series so I was elated that I had someone I could share these moments with and from there CN would also get Sailor Moon S and Super S, but that would be as far as the anime would get stateside.

Sailor Moon was really the start for me becoming an anime fan; it was the first anime I saw that I knew was labeled as anime. Why does that look funny? Because I found out some of the series I used to watch when I was really young; Transformers, Voltron, Rainbow Brite and Strawberry Shortcake were also anime. So by that logic I had been into anime since I was two lol. But it was Sailor Moon that made me interested in seeing what over series were out there, it also made me want to be more creative. I started to draw a lot more, even if it was only one free handed drawings of images that already existed. Some of my projects in school even included Sailor Moon; I made a poster for a "pop art" project that featured Sailor Moon in her traditional pose as she declares; "In the name of the moon", our vocab crossword puzzles we had to do in our science notebooks had Sailor Moon and Sailor Venus behind two of them (our teacher told us we had to do some sort of imagery behind it, even if it was color), we had to write our own creation myth in English class and I used Sailor Moon for a base for the story and the list goes on and on. Even today I still continue to make things for Sailor Moon and I am sure that that trend will go on for years to come.

Now where as I have many, many fond memories with Sailor Moon I have often had to wonder "Is it has good as I really remember?" In truth, I do look at it and go "I got into this how?" as some of the moments were rather goofy and made little to no sense, but I think it was that goofiness that made it worth while. It was fun and I felt it was worth my time. Sailor Moon continues to be one of the strongest series of all time as it is now making a revival around the world. Earlier this week Kodansha Comics USA announced they are bringing the Sailor Moon manga back to the states after being out of print for six years in addition to the prequel manga; Codename: Sailor V, in its first US release. In Japan this phenomenon as not only had the manga and anime, but also stage musicals and a live action adaptation entitled Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon, which was the title of the manga in its release in Japan as opposed to Pretty Soldier (Bishojo Senshi) Sailor Moon.

So do I prefer the English dub or the original Japanese? Well I have to say I have become more of a fan of the Japanese version over the years, that's not to say I didn't like the dub in it's own way. To change the names of the characters didn't bother me too much, in fact back then it really made sense to do so, so the audience could possibly relate and understand the characters more since the show was being shown inside a country that wasn't Japan, but on the same hand the show does take place in Japan so having the Japanese names remain would have made sense too. But on that note, it was actually what some of the names changed to that made me have to wonder where they came up with them;

Usagi/Sailor Moon:

In the dub she is known as Serena. I really don't have a problem with that name, in fact I think it's rather pretty for her. The confusing, yet not part is when they refer to her has the princess. For the Moon Kingdom and in the future Crystal Tokyo she is known as Princess/Queen Serenity, but the dub would call her Princess Serena. The reason for doing this was to not cause confusion among the viewers, so it's partly understandable, really, if you're following the series I doubt there would have been any confusion. However, interestingly enough they would use the name Serenity for her future self in Crystal Tokyo as Neo Queen Serenity.

Ami/Sailor Mercury:

The dub actually didn't change her name much at all going from Ami to Amy, but in the first chunk of dubbed episodes her last name was changed from Mizuno to Anderson and then later changed back to Mizuno.

Rei/Sailor Mars:


Another one like Mercury, her name actually didn't change save for the spelling, going from Rei to Raye. Her last name, Hino, remained intact.

Makoto/Sailor Jupiter:

I'm actually not really sure how they come up with the names as they want to change them. With Sailor Moon if I had to guess they took it from the soundings from Serenity, but with Jupiter I would have no idea where to begin as we dubbed name is Lita. Again like Serena, I don't mind this given name, I think it fits her.

Minako/Sailor Venus:

Very akin also to Ami and Rei, they were pretty close to leaving her name as it was giving her the dubbed name Mina.

Chibi-Usa/Chibi-Moon:

This was the first of the name changes that was reasonably so as Chibi-Usa is basically "Little Rabbit", playing off of Usagi's name. Thus with changing Sailor Moon's name to Serena they would need to change Chibi-Usa as well, deciding to use a nickname often associated with Serena; Rini. I really didn't mind that change as it made sense and in the manga they wanted to keep the association with the dub when they brought it over so they were using the dub names, which looked rather silly since they translated Usagi to Bunny and put Chibi-Usa as Rini. Which just brings up another thing; since they translate everything out Chibi-Moon became Mini Moon in the dub, but the manga left it as Chibi-Moon (thankfully).

Setsuna/Sailor Pluto:

Pluto first appears in Sailor Moon R inside the little Luna sphere that Chibi-Usa carried around. In the Japanese version Chibi-Usa refered to her as Puu where in our dub she called her Luna P. Later when she was introduced to fight along side the other Sailor Senshi she was given the name Trista for our dub. I actually looked this up and the name makes sense for as both her Japanese and English dub name mean sad or sadness.

Michiru/Sailor Neptune:

When Sailor Moon S was slated to be released my brother and I started to take guesses as to what the dubbed names would be for the Outer Senshi and I have to pat myself on the back for guessing correctly for Neptune as they named her Michelle. Only reason I could think of for this was because the sounds of her Japanese name was very close to her dubbed one.

Haruka/Sailor Uranus:

This one... is actually kinda funny. As you can see some of these kind of have no rime or reason to why the names are chosen and for me I pick Uranus for being the most out there one, not for the fact that her dubbed name is bad, but because I didn't expect her to have the name of one of my friends; Amara. When Sailor Moon S first aired my brother, my best friend and one of our other friends sat in our living room awaiting to here her dubbed name for the first time. The show cuts to commercial and the 4 of us are sitting there going, in a shocked/dead pan kind of tone; "They named her Amara..." Phone rings and it's our friend Jole who says in the same tone; "They named her Amara..." Another one of my friends calls right after that and in that tone says; "They named her Amara..." Another call comes through and all happy and excited on the other end was indeed my friend Amara saying; "They named her Amara!" Ah memories...

Mamoru/Tuxedo Kamen:

Even the male lead can't escape the name change as he is given the dubbed name Darien. Much like his love Sailor Moon, he too went under the stick with the one dubbed name for your past and future lives as they dubbed him Prince/King Darien instead of using the name Endymion. Also like with Chibi-Moon for the anime, they translated out his name making him Tuxedo Mask.

The changes in terms of names weren't that bad, but since I was looking into the series a lot more online I was rather saddened that they had to edit so much to the point I wish they never aired the dub on TV at all. For starters it kind goes off on a double standard; Sailor Moon is a story that mainly focuses on love and the primary characters that it revolves around are Sailor Moon and Tuxedo Mask.  For an American audience I am amazed this got past the FCC since Sailor Moon is a 14 year old girl and Tuxedo Mask is at least an 18 year old college student. Yes, it is only a 4 year difference, but she is still underage by US standards. (where as in Japan 14 is of legal age btw) But when Sailor Moon S and Super S were brought over they edited and CHANGED Uranus and Neptune's relationship; taking them from being lovers to making the cousins. COUSINS! This was horribly done too as there are countless scenes that could not be cut due to story importance that there is still flirtation within their body language.

Episodes themselves were also cut completely due to some content not being suitable to air on American television. In fact, because Sailor Moon was primarily targeted towards children here in the states, the final episode of the first season was edited and cut so much taking it from a two episode finale to one. And honestly I don't know why, especially with the way they cut it. In the episode the Sailor Senshi and Tuxedo Mask all die and get reborn at the end. Because death isn't suitable for a kids' show they had cut out the scenes where they were killed one by one and said they were captured. A nice attempt for a cover up, but anyone with half a brain could figure out they were killed. The end has one of those "it makes no sense" moments that I mentioned before as they have no memories at the end and for them to have been captured this part makes no sense. The memory loss is of course is due to them going through the rebirth.

But as I got older and looked at more of the Japanese version, including watching a fansub of Sailor Stars, I could really see the difference in the show. Take a look at these two scenes; one from the Japanese version and the other from the English dub.


I do apologize for the raw Japanese, I couldn't find the clip with subs that was under 10 minutes. But you can get the sense of tone. Usagi goes looking for Chibi-Usa and finds out that her parents were attacked in the future. The enemies from the Black Moon locate her and go in their attempts to kill her only to be interrupted by Sailor Moon and the other Sailor Senshi. Rubeus then goes for the kill himself but Sailor Moon protects Chibi-Usa as she slowly starts to realize there is something about her that draws her to her and the desire to protect her. Tuxedo Mask appears as he always does and tells Sailor Moon that she is really the only one who can protect the girl. Now here's the scene again (it's really the scene with Rubeus that I am pointing out) in the English dub;


I really do love the voice cast for the early Sailor Moon R, the voice for Sailor Moon was just perfect. The song in the background was really unique too as they tended to use original stuff for the English adaptation and it really fit for the scene in my opinion. But it's the dialog that seems to make the scene fall apart. Rubeus saying he doesn't want to hurt Sailor Moon is total BS. Tuxedo Mask's entrance is about the same in both basically be raiding Rubeus for targeting a helpless child. I do like the dub line of "Cape Boy" for some reason, it's like he's making fun of him for wearing a cape lol. But it's when Tuxedo Mask tells Sailor Moon to take him out basically that I have to scratch my head a little. As I said for the Japanese version he tells her that she is the only one who can protect the girl; where the line in the dub is corny (as were most of his lines in the dub) and really didn't fit for the emotion the scene was supposed to have. I remember finding this scene a year ago and was like; "wow... did he REALLY just say that?"

Over all though I still love the series and could easily recommend it to people. See you all next time for my Part 2. ^^/

o.o Gimmie!

Hello and welcome to Don't Look Back... Again; a blog where I look back on things from my past and realize I may have wasted money. So today at work I had an interesting conversation with my boyfriend about toys. Yes, toys; mainly for series that were once Japanese and then translated/brought over to the states. And as I looked back I realized that some times.... you have to wonder who thought some of this was a good idea. So for this I am going to be using 3 examples from my childhood, though one is technically just a current thing, but you'll get the idea. So first lets take a look at one of my favorite series of all time; Sailor Moon.

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! ^^/

It's FanGirl Time!

Welcome to Don't Look Back... Again; a blog where I am free to release my inner fangirl! Well let's see what I have rambled on about so far; moments that made me cry, thus proving I am a total sap on many levels. Favorite game tunes in both Final Fantasy and non Final Fantasy games. Kingdom Hearts and songs that get stuck in my head way too easily. Okay, those who actually know me probably are going "why wasn't her favorite genre her first entry?" And honestly that's kind of a good question and I don't really know why I waited to mention this. So let's dive right into my favorite genre; Yaoi.

Okay, let me first say; yes, I do know there is a difference between yaoi and shounen-ai. The question is; do you? If not, it's quite simple. Shounen-ai literally translates to "Boys Love" and those stories are cute love stories that rarely have anything sexual to them. Where yaoi on the other hand is basically gay porn with plot... and sometimes just porn. Now I am a true sap to the point where I was nick-named the Queen of Sap during my fanfic days because everything I wrote would get quite sappy with dialog or overall plot. So just to cover I am more of a fan of the Shounen-ai stuff, but I do like my yaoi as well.

So what got me into it? Well oddly enough it was the fandom in which I took part in and that was Mobile Suit Gundam Wing.

Gundam Wing was I believe the 4th Gundam series to make it to the states and for me was the first I had seen. For whatever reason I really latched onto it, but if I had to think of one it probably would have been that I thought the pilots were cute. Anyway it was around I think episode 25, where the Vayeate blew up and Trowa was presumed dead, that I wrote my first fanfic. I really can't explain why I wanted to do such a thing, but it was a start of something much bigger for me. It was my 4th fic I wrote where I took a stab at writing the shounen-ai relationship with Trowa and Quatre (the second couple pictured). Was there any mention of them being a couple in the show? No, there was no official mention of them being together in a romantic way, but as a fan I chose to read certain actions in such away. The same would later go for Heero and Duo (the first couple pictured). The show never had a theme of romance, but there was an underline tone with some characters showing interests in others; Zechs and Noin, Treize and Lady Une, Relena and Heero, Duo and Hildie to name a few.

So why would I change something that seemed like it was cannon for couples? Behold the power of fandom. Heero and Duo as a couple seemed to really fit in my head because quite frankly I am not a fan of Relena and there were times Hildie came off as more of a sister to Duo than a girlfriend. There was also a sense of balance in placing the two together; Heero was very serious with a heart of ice and Duo was a gentle carefree soul. Trowa and Quatre were pretty much the same way as well, but with more implications here and there scattered through the show.

As I went on to write more GW fics, the more absorbed I got by the fandom; wanting to find pictures of the couples as well as reading other people's works. And for awhile GW was really the only thing shounen-ai/yaoi related that I would acknowledge. Sure, I had seen or read things within other interests of mine that paired two male characters together, but it was nothing compared to GW.

At the time, I am unsure if any shounen-ai series had reached the states (I'm sure there were a couple of yaoi ones since a lot of Hentai gets dubbed), so I really wasn't aware of it being a real genre instead of just a fan made one; until my best friend at the time showed me a fan subbed version of what would become one of my favorites series; Gravitation.

This story I found rather touching as truly showed the concept of you can't change what love is nor who you fall in love with. Shuichi is the lead singer of a band called Bad Luck and one day he meets Yuki, a romance novelist, who reads some lyrics Shuichi had written and point blankly tells the singer that he sucks. This was the start of Shuichi's obsession and soon to become love. This is actually the one shounen-ai series I can recommend to non fans of the genre as it has more to offer than the shounen-ai plot. Now I never wrote fanfiction for this series, but it did inspire me to write an original story where the main character was a gay singer.

Now actually knowing that there were shounen-ai manga and some anime were being released I took a lot more of an interest the genre. I never actually wrote more fanfics after I stopped writing for GW, but instead I wrote more original work and some of those characters I still work with today.

So the difference between the genre and fandom? The fandom can get out of hand and out of hand fast. As I mentioned with GW, there were no implications for the relationships aside from the few for Trowa and Quatre; fans would pair whoever they wanted together so long as it worked in their heads and this would go for any series, even those like Gravitation. Now don't get me wrong, I do like some fan pairings, but there are things that I don't think should ever be touched. (say Transformers, yes it exists.) So, I am gonna take the time to list my favorite fan shounen-ai couples (haha 2 for 1 deal entry!);

#5: Tsuzuki and Hisoka- Yami no Matsuei

This is a hand in hand kind of relationship as it comes across that they need each other to move forward and I really like those kinds of stories. It can also be viewed as a "teacher, student" kind of thing too as Hisoka is new to being a shinigami and Tsuzuki is their to guide him through it as his partner. Either way the emotion that these two characters bring is just eminence.

#4: Bart and Billy- Xenogears

Yeah, one of the only times I can say I had a crush on a character and loved the yaoi pairing involving them. But this was one of those pairings where you could almost picture them not really wanting to say how they really felt, thus their actions coming off childish. So cute, but to my surprise this pairing is rarely ever used in the Xenogears Yaoi Fandom.

#3: Tohma and Yuki- Gravitation

This pairing isn't exactly cute, but I love the strength it has and that's what makes it good. Tohma is more of a big brother in the sense that he wants to protect Yuki. Even in the manga he can be quoted countless times saying that Yuki is his. Because of a childhood trauma of Yuki's that Tohma had witnessed the aftermath of, he feels he is the only who can and will every understand his pain. And truly, with that strength it brings up the question; "how far would you go for the one you love?" And Tohma Seguchi would go very far, even to the point of murder.

#2: Riku and Sora- Kingdom Hearts

You may have heard some people who are anti-yaoi fans say that "Friendship isn't shounen-ai/yaoi", well it can be. It's no different than two friends who are male and female getting together. So the friendship CAN turn into something more and that is my all time favorite kind of story. And yes my fangirl-ness went into overload in KH2 when Sora broke down crying when he finally managed to see Riku again.

#1: Trowa and Quatre- Gundam Wing

Yep the pairing that started my obsession. The two of them are just so cute and rather perfect for one another. Fanfic notions aside, in the final episode where Quatre is dueling with Dorothy and the scene switches to Trowa inside Heavyarms saying; "I'm coming Quatre" was just so baffling and romantic to me. Baffling because Trowa had no way of knowing that Quatre was in danger (really, it's never brought up how he knew to go to his aid) and romantic because it came off as the "my heart knows" kind of thing, and let's be honest; when you're in love there's a good chance your heart knows when the one you care for is in trouble or hurting. And its those moments that can make for some great story telling.

There will always be lovers and haters of the genre and to the lovers; please don't egg on the haters, it just brings a bad name to the fandom. And haters; not every fan is obsessive enough to make anything and everything into a yaoi pairing. I can grasp the fact that it isn't your cup of tea, but others do like it and we have a right to our opinions so please, let us do so.

I owe a lot to this fandom and genre as it got me to write and be more creative. For that I am very thankful and grateful to be apart of it. See you all next time! ^^/

Inside My Head

Hello, and welcome to Don't Look Back... Again; a blog where I just ramble on and on. Well yesterday I sat pondering what other lists I could make, yes I do enjoy my lists alot, I think they're fun. And where as I came up with a few ideas and will do those ones later, I for some reason latched onto this one. Everyone and I do mean everyone, will at some point or another get songs stuck in their head. But for me, usually, it ends up being the same five songs (hence why it was perfect for my list, see what I did there?) and my brain just likes to set it to random. So welcome to My Head: The Musical;

#5: Donuts, Go Nuts!- Splosionman

This song was fairly recent to getting stuck in my head, but I can't help it. It's just so light hearted and funny that you just can't help but smile when you hear it. And it really is one of the only songs I have heard that can make any feeling of anger wash away just for its randomness. Though there is a side effect; it usually does make you want to eat donuts.

#4: Everlasting Love- We Love Katamari

Admittedly I never played Katamari, but my brother used to play this daily and when he did this was the song he would ALWAYS choose, same with another friend of mine. It got to the point I heard it so much that I started humming it everywhere I went. It's just so upbeat and cute.

#3: This is Halloween- Kingdom Hearts version

As I said in my previous entry the KH soundtrack was fantastic with the new renditions of classic Disney music for their respective worlds and naturally the one chosen for "The Nightmare Before Christmas" was this song. I love and loath this song, where its an awesome version of it, every time I played through KH I was start humming/singing this tune. It's probably the song I heard the most as Halloween Town was my stomping grounds for building levels for a long time. But as annoying as it can be to have it in your head, it's still a fun song.

#2: Climax Jump- Kamen Rider Den-O

A new obsession of mine. I have only recently started watching Kamen Rider, but the music is so awesome that I am hooked. My favorite opening is actually "W-B-X ~Double Boiled Xtreme" from Kamen Rider W, but this opening is way too damn catchy for it's own good. And the worst part about this getting stuck in my head it's really only one line that is and goes on a loop and thats where it says "In your hand~"

#1: Duck Tales

Who doesn't remember this show? I'm not even sure what made me think of it one day, but sure enough when I did all I could think was this song and now it remains lodged into my brain forever. I even made a comment to some friends that I didn't know what was worse; having the song in my head to begin with (because it was the 3rd or 4th day in a row it had been there) or having it in my head with a headache. But no matter what, this song is nostalgic and fun and I wouldn't have it any other way.

So there you have it, the 5 songs that plague my mind and distract me from things. May they now penetrate your brain. See you all next time. ^^/