Even before excising the manga’s original ending — which actually features the Sailor Scouts turning on Usagi, forcing her to kill all of them to protect the universe in an enormous, world-shaking betrayal that breaks Usagi’s heart — the 1992 version of “Sailor Moon” had already diverged from the original manga. Further English dubs and fan-created subs ended up creating other differences between it and “Sailor Moon Crystal” that are even more pronounced.
Infamously, the DiC dub of the anime, which aired in American syndication during the 1990s and on Toonami, censors the romance between Sailor Neptune and Sailor Uranus, turning them into cousins. It also turns Naru into Molly, who inexplicably has a heavy Brooklyn accent. The dub radically alters pieces of dialogue from the original manga and anime adaptations (No, “Go bleach your roots, creep!” was not a correct translation of the original source material), and it also completely alters the anime’s soundtrack. The end result is a show that’s quite different from the one Japanese audiences became familiar with. But while this goes to show that a little change in an adaptation can definitely change the intent and aim of any story, it’s also a dub that many anime fans are fond of, having been the one they grew up with.
