Anime vs. Manga (1999.04.11.)

Just about every well informed or at least, well surfed, member of the Sailornet is gonna ask themselves this question at one point : Which is better ... the anime? Or the manga? Here's what this member thinks.

When it comes to plot, the anime and the manga are similar in some ways, and total opposites in others. Both can stand alone as seperate entities somtimes, the differences are so large. Like in the anime, in order to create the Ginzuishou, the Sailor Soldier and Dark Kingdom needed to find the seven Rainbow Crystals. In the manga, there's no such thing as Rainbow Crystals, heck, nobody even knows where the Ginzuishou even is. Another example is in the third season of the anime, and it's manga equivalent, the Infinity series, are similar in basic plot line only. Uranus and Neptune's mission is the same, find the three talisman, but in the manga, they already know of two ... the one's they carry. In the anime, they try to find people with pure hearts for the three talisman and never look to themselves. In the manga, there is no such thing as Heart Crystals like in the anime so the Death Busters in the manga look to capture strong souls, especially souls like that of the Sailor Soldier. In the anime, Hotaru had to be killed by Sailormoon in order to destroy Mistress 9. Hotaru was reborn and Saturn sealed away. In the manga, Sailorsaturn was awakened by the three talisman and destroyed Mistress 9 herself as well as Tokyo. Sailorsaturn disappeared with the closing of the space-time door and was reborn when Sailormoon used the Ginzuishou to restore Tokyo.

Both the art of the anime and the manga are beautiful in their own special way, but there's no competition, the manga is gorgeous! The anime art is fairly inconsistent, switching from artist to artist on a weekly basis so no two consecutive episodes look alike (just look at the two-part finale of the first season!) The art of the manga is done by Naoko Takeuchi and her assistants, Ms.Takeuchi drawing the characters herself. While her style does mature, as the art in the Stars books clearly show, it is still fairly consistent in the look and definitely in the feel. The characters are definitely drawn with more care and detail and the final product shows this. Naoko Takeuchi's version of the Sailor Senshi are far more beautiful then any of their anime equivalents. Special detail is payed in how eyes look (if you look closely, each character has a defining feature in his or her eye), how hair is drawn, and how clothes look. While the black and white is classic, the colour pictures are most certainly a beautiful part of the manga. I have no clue who inks these drawings, whether Naoko Takeuchi herself or one of her assistants, but the colour is gorgeous! Ranging from watered pastels, to vivid colour, the inking of these drawings is unlike anything you'll ever see. American comic book art isn't done this way, and the Sailormoon anime art certainly isn't done this way. The colour manga pictures are a class of their own.

Of course, that's just my opinion.