If you were to look up rankings of the worst Sailor Moon episodes, this one is definitely down there. As far as I know it's due to a change in the English dub rather than the flaws in the episode itself, but as I'm watching the original Japanese version I don't have that problem. Notably, it's ranked worse than most of SuperS which is obviously wrong.
The episode starts with a cold opening straight to the inners exclaiming "Prepare to die, Sailor Moon!" which is a REALLY solid opening. What's going on? We need to get to the bottom of this! Who's that watching it that we see just before the title? What's happening in the Dark Kingdom? This is a great start to an episode and it really makes you wonder what is happening. Queen Beryl sends Kunzite to look into it and find out just what the hell is going on. The first thing I notice is that this episode is animated very... unusually. At first my Ando alarm was going off but the key animator chart shows that this is a Katsumi Tamegai episode. The monster-of-the-week shows up to steal some jewelry from Naru's mother's shop, and Usagi shows up to stop it - but then the other Senshis show up to stop Usagi and act like a total bitch to her! We cut to a suspicious shot of Luna and Artemis watching... something isn't right here!
The monster of the week has disguised herself as a "journalist" for the japanese version of The Sun, a shithole tabloid rag that makes up content and sensationalises stuff to get an emotional rise out of the audience. We get another fight scene between the Senshis and Usagi and it's plainly revealed that this is a ruse to try and fool the Dark Kingdom for... some reason. I can see why people might not like this episode as Rei's bitchiness comes through again to ruin her character some more, outright attacking Usagi deliberately despite trying to train as a ruse and calling her names for no reason. This is an annoying departure from her softer side just a few episodes ago and I really don't like it still.
Usagi strikes a deal with the Dark Kingdom; in exchange for the Silver Crystal, she can see Mamoru (who is currently incapacitated). Unfortunately, the rest of the Senshis are too stupid to hide themselves properly, and the Dark Kingdom realises that it's a trap, attacking Usagi before she can go through the portal. It turns out that Rei is holding the Moon Stick for Usagi so that the Dark Kingdom can't get hold of it instead. A fight happens, etc, etc. The emotional tone here really doesn't land at all honestly so I don't really care about the rest of the episode.
I don't see how this is the worst episode of Classic like it's rated online; sure, the characters are annoying, the plot is contrived, and the episode is otherwise uninteresting for the final episode before the ending kicks off, but there are far worse episodes in the show! Half of SuperS is worse than this! It doesn't deserve to be the 10th lowest rated episode in the entire show. Out of everything I give it a 2.5/5 for just sort of existing.
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