Hey guys! Was just answering a Moonie Mailbag question about Sailor Moon ripoffs (see my answer here) and was thinking while I think I listed all the big ones I’m sure I’m missing a few (or even heaps) of others.
So I put this to you: What do you think are the biggest Sailor Moon ripoffs?
Comment on this post. Let’s start a discussion! What do you think about Sailor Moon ripoffs? Do you like any?














Mermaid melody! is a sailor moon ripoff but with the senshi recast as mermaids! However I love it especially the italian version which composed all new songs some of which are superior to the japanese ones! If you don't beieve me just go to youtube and search for Hanon dolce melodia
Mermaid Melody is a massive musically themed ripoff of of sailor moon I mean just look at the main character she is a mermaid sailor moon but with chibiusa's colors! HOWEVER It is still a fun watch with some great songs and remains my personal favorite guilty pleasure! (especially the Italian version!)
I agree with Pretty Cure and Mermaid Melody.
I always felt like Winx was a wicked ripoff too. Oh, also Wedding Peach. Doesn't make any of them totally unwatchable, but I'll always think Sailor Moon is the best.
But I Love Yes! Pretty Cure 5…
Anyway, Imma vote for Tokyo Mew Mew. It's Sailor Moon with cat ears.
To be honest, Pretty Cure is evolving more like Power Rangers instead, with a completely new cast with every season that comes out (Save for the second season, which was a direct sequel of the first.)
Futari wa Pretty Cure is the first story line.
Pretty Cure Max Heart is the direct sequel
Pretty Cure Splash Star is a completely new storyline with no relation to the first two
Yes! Pretty Cure 5 is also a completely new storyline and also features a sentai team like Power Rangers (Sailor Moon also yoinked the idea from Power Rangers too)
Yes! Pretty Cure 5 Go Go is the direct Sequel.
Fresh Pretty Cure is a completely new storyline.
The major difference between Sailor Moon and Pretty Cure is that Sailor Moon eventually gathers a huge group of Sailor Senshi. The Pretty Cure girls never actually meet the others outside of their respective seasons.
isn't anyone going to mention Tokyo mew mew! biggest rip off ever, even the transformations scenes are ridiculously similar
I want to say Wedding Peach but it has a few of it's own unique points too.
Actually, Mermaid Melody reminds me more of Ojamajo Doremi instead of Sailor Moon… ^^;
As for Pretty Cure, even though they are never joined into one big team like the Sailor Senshi, they did make a crossover movie, Pretty Cure All Stars DX. Cure Peach is unbelievably so much like Sailor Moon, however. The blonde hair, those hair jewels, being the leader, etc.
However, Wedding Peach for me is the biggest ripoff. It has nothing do to with the clothes. Instead, it is the plot: three love agnels (ai tenshi, in Japanese) who try to protect the angel world by spreading love. There is some similarities via the characters (ex., in the first episode, Momoko talks to a goddess named Aphrodite; Jama-P helps the angels much like Luna-P helped out Chibiusa; the fact that the boy crushes called the main girls nicknames, etc.)
I forgot about Mermaid Melody! DEFINITELY a ripoff!!!
It's sad that there are so many unoriginal anime series in Japan. 5% seem to be original and the other 95% seems to be imitating that 5%.
Here's a short list of Sailormoon ripoffs I've seen:
1. Cardcaptor Sakura
2. Magic Knight Rayearth (Though I forgot which eyar it came out.)
3. Magical Do Re Mi
4. Winx
5. W.I.T.C.H.
6. Mermaid Melody
7. Pretty Cure
8. Wedding Peach
9. Princess Tutu
10. Pretear though there's only one girl, but the boys are SO unmanly they can pass for Sailor Senshi.
There are also several Angel titles that take from the Sailormoon look.
As for storyline? Well nobody can outdo Sailormoon. ^_^
Whoa, just whoa.
If you guys think that transformation sequences and group battles are all that make these series rip offs, I suggest you don't turn on the sentai programs which established team battles long before Sailor Moon was even thought of, or any classic mahou shoujo series like Hime-chan no Ribon or Minky Momo that aired before Sailor Moon. If it's the mascot characters you're hung up on, you sure as heck don't want to check out Mahoutsukai Sally.
Sailor Moon was revolutionary in many ways, but calling these series–a lot that were very original in their own respects save for their reuse of standards long-established in sentai and other shoujo series–unoriginal is just ignorant.
By your standards, Sailor Moon stole many of the things that you think make it "unique" from other series before it.
OP, I suggest you actually watch the series you post about in their entirety before you pass judgement, because a lot of the information you posted was blatantly incorrect.
Lucky, whoever knew that having blonde hair, having a leader, and having magical jewelry would make you a ripoff of Sailor Moon? Especially when hair accessories (almost every magical girl series before Sailor Moon featured a character with hair accessories) and having a leader (nearly every sentai series in existence had a leader) and blonde hair (lol wat) were around long before Sailor Moon was even thought of.
Also, I'm amazed that "having a nickname" makes a series a ripoff of Sailor Moon. I'd better let the guys who like me know that they're just ripping off Sailor Moon when they call me by a nickname, because THAT'S NEVER BEEN DONE BEFORE SAILOR MOON, EVER.
I love Sailor Moon as much as the next person, and while the series established a lot of the commonly-used tropes in the mahou shoujo genre today, it is not the ~*~UNIQUE~*~ and ~*~SPECIAL~*~ butterfly you guys think it is.
We're not saying they're ripping off Sailor Moon because they're just a group or because they just have a leader.
But if the leader has the same colour hair as Sailor Moon in a very similar style, makes similar speeches similar attacks, and even powers up to have white wings I think you'll agree it's a bit of a ripoff.
Sure Sailor Moon has a team like in those Sentai shows (i.e. Power Rangers) but having a cast of major characters instead of just one doesn't mean they're ripping them off. The Sailor Scouts aren't dressed in coloured spandex and last I checked they didn't ride giant robots.
I don't think we're being too general in our observations.
I actually just watched the Pretty Cure DX crossover movie and while I thought it was pretty cool, it was SCARY how much it was like watching Sailor Moon. You seriously could place certain parts of the movie in separate Sailor Moon anime episodes or movies.
Brad-
Have you watched any magical girl series that came out before Sailor Moon? A lot of the things you're complaining about were established in the genre long before Sailor Moon came into existence.
You only think they're ripping off Sailor Moon because you haven't seen any of the series that established these standards for the genre before Sailor Moon did.
So you're telling me there's another girl superhero team in short skirts who has a leader with blonde pig tails that came out before Sailor Moon?
btw, I don't think anyone here is complaining or ranting, we're just saying is all.
Let me also say this: Are you saying none of these series mentioned were influenced by Sailor Moon at all? Not even a LITTLE? :/
Just so there is no misunderstanding, when I said that "Cure Peach is unbelievably so much like Sailor Moon", I meant compared to the rest of the Precure. In other words, having the most influence from Sailor Moon. (Although my first impression was that they were bringing back Shiny Luminous from Max Heart).
I did see a few pre- Sailor Moon shows (so long as I could watch them online ^^), including Sally the Witch, Majokko Megu-chan and Magical Princess Minky Momo (Chibiusa actually reminds me of Momo….) I am very aware that Sailor Moon is not completely unique, but I am not saying every current show is a clone. It is just that there are not-so-subtle references, IMO.
I don't care too much, though. It proves Sailor Moon is still popular after its run.
theres a show called cutie honey, it came BEFORE saior moon, when you look at the transfromaitons you will find that sailor moon riped that off.
now hearts are a big things to us all, so if a show wants to become poupler they will use it.
mermaid melody in my eyes is about %20 rip off sailor moon where mew mew power is about a %80
Brad, what I believe Trudy is saying (correct me if I'm wrong, Trudy!) is that suggesting titles "rip-off" Sailor Moon when they merely adhere to tropes established decades before Takeuchi's work is a little unfair. These titles should be judged on their own merits, not lumped together as nothing more than a group of pale "wannabes". The magical girl subgenre is far more diverse than this implies.
For example, Lucky cites one of the reasons Wedding Peach should be considered a rip-off as "Jama-P helps the angels much like Luna-P helped out Chibiusa". One could just as easily cite the influence of titles like Creamy Mami (with Nega and Posi) or Mahoutsukai Sally (with Kabu) in the use of assistant or familiar mascots in Sailor Moon. The richness of the magical girl world today owes a lot to many different series that have come and gone in the past, even series we might not usually associate with the modern concept of a magical girl (like Samantha from Bewitched or the original Kisaragi Honey from Cutie Honey).
Neither Trudy nor myself are trying to detract from the invigoration of the magical girl subgenre that came in the nineties with the advent of Sailor Moon. Combining elements of sentai with the familiar trappings of a magical coming-of-age story was an ingenious move on Takeuchi's part and certainly a creative direction that has left an impact. We're definitely not disagreeing there!
As so much of magical girl programming is dictated by what brings profits for the toy companies involved, it makes sense that the majority of magical girl series produced after Sailor Moon have capitalised on the "team of lovely warriors" motif so prominent in Takeuchi's work. A team of five or more magical girls means you can produce five or more related transformation item sets or similar. This is not so much copying the core concept behind Sailor Moon in so much as it is trying to enjoy similar market success by utilising now established genre norms. This spread of influence was seen in a similar context after Creamy Mami popularised the media mix concept. Suddenly everyone wanted in on the idea of promoting a new idol singer through magical girl programming. Does this mean all magical idols made after Creamy Mami ripped off Pierrot's biggest media mix anime? Not necessarily. Creamy Mami itself borrows from Minky Momo which in turn borrows from Cutie Honey and so on and so forth.
This constant building on "what came before" is what helps make the magical girl genre so diverse and grand. Nobody is trying to deny the influence of Sailor Moon on the titles that came after it, but by the same token one can't deny that Sailor Moon itself has been heavily influenced by its predecessors too.
Are all of the magical girl titles produced in the past decade as good as Sailor Moon? No, of course not. Neither were all the series that came before it. Instead of citing similarities in different texts and calling them out as rip-offs we should be exploring and enjoying the richness found in the world of magical girls.
Sailor Moon itself has been heavily inspired by texts produced before it. Are some of magical girl series
Ooops, some of my comment got screwed up at the end there. Sorry, just ignore that!
missdeep… that was the best post EVER!!!!!
Thank you, Brad. I really admire the work you do for the Sailor Moon community (though as my clumsy reply probably suggests, I'm not used to commenting). ^^;
says:
No problem at all. I love having discussions like this. Almost always educational for everyone involved.
i stumbled on here looking for a show i saw years ago with my ex,
she’d borrowed it from her brother and neither of them seem to have any recollection of it at all…
from what i can remember it was SailorMoon remade directly from leftovers from PowerRangers, and only one Heroine
lots of huge explosions, lots of absurd monsters, sometimes shot in the close/far big/small angle,
think there were lots of scenes on aircraft carrier/giant barges, bridges, water areas
mostly japanese/asian cast, all acting exactly the same style of cheese as power rangers
i’ve googled most of the above series and no dice
PLOX HALP?!?
says:
Maybe it was the live action Sailor Moon series, Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon? I have info on it in the EPISODE GUIDES link above.