Hey Moonies! Yes, we all know there have been a lack of updates going on this site in the last few weeks. There really hasn’t been anything going on. There was a story from Japan recently about a TV Meteorologist who was inspired to be in her field because of Sailor Moon, and Sailor Moon Channel has new horoscopes posted.

And we couldn’t let this actor update go unnoticed at all – Keiko Han (Luna in both the anime and PGSM, Queen Beryl in the anime) and her daughter Megumi are keeping it in the family! Both are currently appearing in Madhouse’s retelling of Yoshihiro Togashi’s (Naoko Takeuchi’s husband) Hunter X Hunter! Megumi is in the leading role as Gon Freecss, and Keiko Han plays Mito Freecss, Gon’s adopted mother. Megumi was challenged on the first day of recording; while she was working alongside her mother, she still felt some of the pressure from her! She also said that her mother was surprised that she chose to follow in her footsteps, and initially didn’t consider voice acting a career until after she had started university. Oricon conducted an interview with the two of them which can be read here!

Junichi Sato (Director for Sailor Moon and Sailor Moon R seasons) will be making his first American convention appearance! He will appear at Ushicon 2012 in Austinn, Texas, from February 3-5th. For more information, check out the con’s official webpage here!

Hot Topic just recently introduced a new purple Sailor Moon T-shirt featuring Sailor Moon, Chibi-Usa, and Luna-P (or Rini and Luna Ball for you dubbies). Sailordees’ one sentence review: like the design, appeals to the younger fan in me, wish yet again this wasn’t so see through. The Sailor Moon Raglan is also back in stock. Oh, and Hot Topic now has a Sailor Moon Hoodie! Keep your eyes on the site though, the product has just launched and will probably be in stock very soon (fans do not worry, you didn’t miss this). This is a site we have on our daily radar that we check every morning and evening, and the hoodie was not listed this week.

While Hot Topic was the exclusive launch licensee for the T-shirts, FYE is now testing the sales of the T-shirts in their stores now. We contacted a representative of Hybrid Apparel yesterday, and learned that the two will always have different designs for t-shirts. But, if this test is successful then there could be potential to have Sailor Moon shirts at other retailers in the spring. Fans can check out images of the shirts posted at Sailor Moon Fans on Livejournal.

We are not sure that FYE was a wise decision. FYE has only 440 stores nationwide, of which the vast majority of them are concentrated in Eastern states. Hot Topic has 634 stores that are balanced a little more evenly throughout the US. FYE also doesn’t sell their shirts online, and we all know what the demand for these shirts are. It is hard to know if FYE’s success will match that of Hot Topic’s.

For those of you who read Anime News Network and didn’t read the posting on our Facebook page yesterday, here’s our correction reposted here.

“For those of you who have read this week’s ANN Answerman, there’s a major inaccuracy posted. “Dumbing it down even further, it’s a tangled, messy legal nightmare.” The “legal nightmare” is OVER – why else are we seeing anime-related merchandise?! There are only a few hands responsible for working the agreements for each territory, and they have come into fruition one at a time. It took a long time for these hands to reach North America. It will happen soon, major strides began in September. Once again, we invite ANN to stop talking about the rights to Sailor Moon in such a negative light, because you’re not doing the series any good with your words.”

And while we are still talking Sailor Moon politics: Italy isn’t getting the Artbooks. We don’t know any more details about this, but we do have a lot of questions. Did GP publishing ever have the rights, and did they say that they would publish them ahead of any contracts being signed? Were they pulled suddenly by Naoko Takeuchi/PNP? Did they disappear for the same reason that there will be no new toys there this holiday season? On the North America side, we can tell you that the companies are aware of fans’ demand for the artbooks. Until we hear a definite no, we will keep trying. And as far as the Mexico DVDs go? We haven’t been able to keep up with this – but please do your part to support Sailor Moon. Mexican Moonies, let us know if sales are still dwindling (Hey Cycyn, could you be so kind to send us an email to tell us what is going on? We miss you xoxo).

On the bright side, Sailor Moon’s trip to North America should have the absolute and complete go ahead to purchase her plane ticket very close to Christmas.  There should be news in 2012!

Edit: Here are some better pictures of the T-shirt designs being sold at FYE. Photos provided by Hybrid Apparel.

Mexican Sailor Moon fans are about to get a lot more Sailor Moon merchandise their way! Toei Animation Inc. announced some new Latin American deals for several of their properties. While there are no toys listed at this moment for Sailor Moon, there has been a licensing deal made with Doobalo S.a.de C.v. to make Sailor Moon socks. Does anyone else in North America feel like importing these and squeezing their feet into them to relive their childhoods? Also, thanks to facebook fan Jose Juan Hernandez for pointing us to this Sailor Moon teaser on Towers Entertainment’s website! The caption reads: “Coming Soon Special Edition on DVD Sailor Moon” Gotta love that brand new logo for the international revival. Speaking of new logos, Toei Animation Europe finally announced the return of Sailor Moon to Germany on their site, and posted one of our new favorite promotional images in the article which we have reposted above.

Toei Animation Inc. of Los Angeles launched three new series on Crunchyroll last week – Digimon Tamers, Interlude and Gaiking: Legend Of Daiku-Maryu. Free users will be able to watch 5 consecutive episodes of Digimon Tamers, and Gaiking: Legend of Daiku Maryu as they are posted each week, and one episode of Interlude per week until they are completed. All episodes are subtitled in English. It’s a little sad that the dub of Interlude is not up as it featured many stars of the English dub of Sailor Moon (and it was well done because Optimum Productions was not involved). Toei Animation has also launched the well-loved Toriko on Funimation.com and Hulu.

And on a sad note (but who didn’t see this one coming), Tokyopop announced last week that it was ending all publishing operations in North America. Though their translation and release of Sailor Moon was sub-par, we fans will always remember them for introducing us to the manga for the very first time. It is sad to see them go, but at the same time this day might not have come if they’d have improved their release quality.

We want to start this article by first of all congratulating SOS Brazil for all their hard work. We understand your struggles completely because we have been there (and still are). But please don’t view this as a fight you lost! You should be proud of everything you were able to do with your surveys – besides, the other parts of your survey will probably be a help when it comes to other aspects of the revival. We are proud of what you were able to accomplish, and we are sending you big Moonie hugs and lots of love from North America.

Save our Sailors Brazil reported the sad news yesterday that after a long and lengthy crusade to get a redub of Sailor Moon, it was not meant to be. A statement posted to their site from Márcio S. Reginnette, a representative of Brazil’s CD & DVD Factory, states that a redub of Sailor Moon S is not authorized because Naoko Takeuchi has not approved of any redubbing in any language. The same request was made in Italy as well, and was also denied. The statement also makes mention that Toei Animation does not have any exclusivity over the franchise, and prior approval has to be obtained by Naoko Takeuchi. There is also an excellent response to these developments posted over at Papo de Budega.

From what we know, the anime and manga are a sort of “co-agreement” between Naoko Takeuchi and the companies involved. Fans probably also notice that Naoko Takeuchi’s name is on every piece of Sailor Moon merchandise coming out their way these days. With the manga, Kodansha has the rights to publish it, but only after obtaining Naoko Takeuchi’s permission. But at the same time, she cannot hold it back. The same deal goes with the anime and Toei Animation as well. We do not know how many years that this current co-agreement is going to last, but that if matters regarding Sailor Moon do not go smoothly, they could be pulled away at any time.

While we understand fans’ anger, sadness, and frustration over this turn of events, please don’t be mad at Naoko Takeuchi. For all we know, the time frame for Sailor Moon’s return could be really short, and she may not like the idea of a redub keeping the series away from fans in an already shortened timeframe. Or, perhaps she likes everything the way it is and doesn’t want to change things too much. We are disgruntled too, as this leaves the fate of an English release of Sailor Stars up in the air, but at the same time we are thankful to have the Sailor Moon manga back (and hopefully soon, the anime).

Once again, huge hugs from Moon Chase to Save Our Sailors Brazil and everything they have worked so hard for. Keep up the strength, although your release has had it’s turmoils (starting with Season 3), you have done a lot for the fandom and we are sure every one of your readers thanks you for that!

For fans who want a little more detail on the ins and outs of the Brazilian revival, check out this interview in January with CD + DVD Factory’s Márcio S. Reginnette.

Hey Moonies! The Sailor Moon Licensing News train is showing no signs of slowing down! A new press release confirms new Latin American licensing deals from Toei Animation Inc. of Los Angeles. Brazil’s “little known” CD & DVD Factory as well as Mexico’s Towers Entertainment are both set to release the series on DVD. As of this writing, there are no merchandise deals being announced, however if you are a fan of DragonBall and Saint Seiya, we recommend reading the rest of the release here if you would like to learn of DVD and merchandise releases in Latin America. Toei is also predicted to have a much higher annual dividend this year than originally forecast. Enhorabuena a Mexico y Brasil! Viva la Sailormoon!

This past weekend marked Lima, Peru’s biggest anime convention, Otakufest. Fans of Sailor Moon were treated to not one, but three voice actors from the Mexican/Latin American dub of Sailor Moon! Patricia Acevedo (Sailor Moon), Cristina Hernandez (Sailor ChibiMoon) and Rossy Aguirre (Sailor Mercury). For the first time ever, the three of them were together at a special panel on October 31st. Fans may also be surprised that within these three lies an even bigger connection from Sailor Moon to The Simpsons other than that famous opening from just a few years ago . Patricia played Lisa Simpson from 1990-2005, but was fired from the series due to the dubbing studio’s policy on union actors at the end of the 15th season. Patricia did dub that particular episode, and this also makes her the only actress to have been in both Sailor Moon and that episode of The Simpsons parodying our hero! If any of our readers were able to attend Otakufest, please share with us what happened!