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!

Last night, we got wind of a couple blog articles that were quoting Toei Animation Inc.’s Latin American Licensing Representative Eduardo Lucio, as saying that Sailor Moon will return in 2011.

First, we’ll feature a translation of the last paragraph posted in this post by ANMTVLA.

The news is very encouraging regarding Latin America. Exclusive to us, Eduardo Lucio, Toei Animation’s representative in Latin America has confirmed that Sailor Moon will return to our region next year, possibly with the original dub and uncensored . This adds to the confirmation by Capital 8 that they will be selling the entire series, but this is still not ruling out the chance of a redub for a new remastered version like Evangelion. Therefore, one of the fans’ biggest requests is becoming a reality with the launch of the new decade.

JBOX.com.BR also posted an article that only said that a release was going to come to Brazil in 2011, but did not quote anyone from Toei Animation.

We were unsure if this was a rumor or not considering that there was no press release linked, quoted, or mentioned in this article, and sought to confirm this as soon as we could. We have since learned that Toei Animation does not have any official Sailor Moon licensing news for Latin America to share with the press at this moment.

Fans, we know that this is a VERY exciting time with the series’ resurrection in Europe and Japan but please don’t count your chickens before they hatch. We have to always wait for a press release, or legitimate word from an actual person involved with these companies. Toei Animation Europe and Backstage Licensing have done a very good job at keeping fans up to date with whatever they can through their press releases, and we know that Toei Animation Inc. in Los Angeles will follow much of the same procedures when the time is right to make their announcements. Right now, it is a waiting game to see what will happen with the series. Thanks for your understanding, cooperation, and your patience! We know you are all excited but we need to be careful, ok?

And to the bloggers at ANMTVLA and JBOX.com.BR, please fix your posts. You aren’t doing the fandom or Sailor Moon any good by posting exclusives like this without verifying your facts.

Not too much to report now, but we thought we’d still report these since these actors were all featured in huge roles during Sera Myu!

Kenji Urai is a Prince!

Fresh off his win at the 44th Kinokuniya Theater Awards, Kenji Urai (Tuxedo Mask from 2001-2002) will be making an appearance in a stage musical, and he wil get to play a prince! Bara to Samurai: Goemon Rock Overdrive (Rose to Samurai: Goemon Rock Overdrive) began on March 18th in Tokyo, and will travel through to Osaka in April and May. The play takes place in the 17th century, about two pirates named Goemon and Ann. Lured by a reward, another pirate tries to kidnap Goemon, but captures Ann instead. Everyone finds out later that Annu is the long-lost daughter of the recently deceased King, and is set to rule over his kingdom. At her first party, Annu meets a prince named Charles from another country who falls in love with her, but Goemon isn’t ready to give her up easily. Kenji is playing Prince Charles, and has received some rave reviews from fans already over his performance! At a promotional event held earlier this month, the two leading cast members playing Ann and Goemon (Yuki Amami and Arata Furata) were excited for the chance to cosplay as pirates on stage!

Tae Kimura Presents at 33rd Japanese Academy Awards After Winning Year!

2009 was a great year for Tae Kimura (Fisheye in Sailor Moon SuperS musicals). She won two awards for her role in the critically acclaimed film All Around Us (including a Japanese Academy Award), and became well known around Japan. A few weeks ago, she appeared to present an award at the Japanese Academy Awards, and was also nominated for a Best Supporting Actress award for her role in the Japanese film Zero Focus. This movie was about a mysterious disappearance of a woman’s husband. We have a photo of her at the awards featured here (in the brown dress). Unfortunately, she didn’t win, but we are still proud of everything she has achieved! Zero Focus will be released to DVD and BD this June. Fans can check out more information about the film in English here.

Maki Aizawa Goes Shopping and Has a Beauty Blog

Maki Aizawa (Loof Merrow in 2004) went for a little shopping trip with her friend, Yuko Ogura (another idol) before they had to go to work. This for some strange reason was covered by the tabloids (*sigh*). They went to one of the most trendiest stores in Tokyo called ISBIT DAIKANYAMA which is very popular among idols for the eclectic selection of clothing it carries. They tried on a few items and took some photos of themselves without makeup and went on their merry way (which included posts on both Yuko and Maki’s blogs). Maki is the girl on the right side of the photo we have posted here. Maki also started a beauty blog a few months ago which is slowly gaining some steam with her fans. She reviews beauty products that she uses.

Tabe Mikako in New Lipstick Commercial!

Tabe Mikako (Yaten Kou/Sailor Star Healer) is currently being featured in a new lipstick commercial in Japan for Orbis Rouge Crystal. This lipstick has special shine enhancers in it to make your lips sparkle. Orbis has two commercials for this product, the first one features Tabe putting the lipstick on and talking about how it makes her lips sparkle. The second one, features Japanese pianist Alice Sara Ott playing a Chopin waltz off of her brand new album. Both aim to show that this lipstick will make you sparkle and shine at just the right moment! Fans can check out videos of both commercials here!

Anza Oyama a Matter of Weeks Away From South America!

Anza Oyama (Sailor Moon from 1993-1998) is the lead singer of Japanese metal band Head Phones President, and they are heading out for the first time to South America a month from now! They will be playing four shows in Brazil, and 3 of them are at anime conventions: the concert on April 24th will happen at Anime Hero!, then they will head off to Anime Osasco the next day, and then to Porto Allegre’s J-Party Ballads on the 30th. On May 2nd, they will finish their tour playing in Rio de Janeiro. We know our friends at SOS Brazil are very excited about this and we can’t wait to hear what they have to report! The band sings in English, and their style of music is definitely a departure from the cutesy songs fans know Anza best for singing in Sera Myu. Fans who want to give their music a listen can check out their MySpace! We wish Head Phones President the best of luck on their tour and we hope to see them perform in other places as well.

Yesterday one of our twitter followers Ultimo_Spalpeen tweeted this to us, and we were a little hesitant to post it to the site until we actually knew it was true. Roughly, this is what the Sailor Moon section of this article translates to:

Sailor Moon:

One of the most anticipated series in recent years, returns to Mexico and Latin America after many years, by DVD-release, or in this case, the DVD could not be censored but still contain the original dubbed track from Intertrack Mexico. In 2010, this is confirmed with a total DVD release.

We noticed that Capital 8 does have an image of Sailor Moon on their website, however it was missing the various copyrights or trademarks on it (on any of the Italian websites, there is always some mention of any combination of Toei, Naoko Takeuchi, and PNP). It is very difficult to find any official image like this on an official site without any sort of trademark/copyright information. And, there was no release anywhere on their site announcing that they had the rights to Sailor Moon. Moments ago, we just got the e-mail we were waiting for from our contact at Toei, and simply got the response back:

This is false information.

At this time, we wish to thank this representative for getting back to us so quickly today.

We understand that you are probably heartbroken with this bombshell, but please, do not give up hope Moonies in Mexico and Latin America! Perhaps Toei is waiting to see what kind of response the show will get in Europe before bringing it across the ocean.

EDIT: Toei has given another site some different information. The Latin America Sales Manager of Toei Animation Inc. Eduardo Lucio (who we can only guess works just feet away from our contact), has told SOS Brazil that Toei is waiting to see how the show does in Italy first, and then they hope to bring it back to Brazil in 2011. This is something that we had thought all along, and at least we know now that we are on the right track (although we thought we might have heard something by the Fall of 2010 considering how things have been progressing in Europe).