Previously, “Act 19: Time Warp - Sailor Pluto”

Photo Credit: qtpie caps on Tumblr

In this episode, King Endymion gives the present day Guardians a recap on everything that’s happened. After Usagi and Mamoru turned 22, their aging stopped, and so did everyone else’s on earth. They rule Crystal Tokyo as king and queen along with their daughter Chibi-Usa, and her guardian cat Diana - Luna and Artemis’ daughter. As with all time traveling paradoxes, being in such close proximity with themselves cause the present day Usagi and Mamoru to vanish, prompting King Endymion to send them away. Back in their own time, Usagi is still jealous of Mamoru’s treatment of Chibi-Usa, and runs off. The next day, Chibi-Usa returns to her time, but is captured by Esmeraude. The Guardians return to the future to try and protect her, but Sailor Moon’s attack fails again; apparently, she forgot when Chibi-Usa told her that her powers won’t work out of her own time. Thankfully, Tuxedo Mask and King Endymion both use the Tuxedo La Smoking Bomber attack to take out Esmeraude. This battle doesn’t go without consequences, though; Prince Demande kidnaps Sailor Moon and takes her to Nemesis for some nefarious deeds.

Here are my five standout moments of the episode:

Although the exposition was incredibly heavy this episode, I could understand why. I can only imagine what it would be like to realize that I would grow up to be the ruler of the entire world.
I love Mina in this episode; after finding a comfy place to rest - on top of her fellow Guardians, she spent an inordinate amount of time trying to apologize; even during a moment where things were about to become incredibly angsty, she kept it up.

Speaking of which, I’m about done with Usagi being jealous over the person who will become her daughter. Seriously…knock that shit off. It’s strained credulity to the point of exasperation.
Who trolls the trolls? Why Rubeus does, of course! He spent his scant few moments on screen trolling the hell out of Esmeraude, and I was here for it. Speaking of Esmeraude, her multiple arms trick was freaky as hell.
Prince Demande is a creep. That is all. No, not quite; he outcreeps Mamoru, and Mamoru is creepy as hell.

When Sailor Moon Crystal returned to air, everyone was happy that it would be slavish to the manga. That, in and of itself, is fine; the problem is when it becomes slavish to the manga to the point of absurdity. Like I said above, I don’t mind exposition for exposition’s sake; the problem comes in when it takes up half the episode. Also, and I made mention of this above as well, Usagi needs to grow up. The original anime gets one major thing right with this: it frontloads all of the perceived Electra Complex stuff so that the rest of the story can focus on the situation at hand. All of this unnecessary drama really detracts from the story they’re trying to tell, and it’s really quite aggravating. I know I’m harping on this a lot, but it’s literally half of the episode. If you want a story-driven episode, this is the one for you. If you want an action driven episode, your feelings are going to really get hurt. Despite it all, this is a necessary evil for telling the whole story.