Friday, October 29, 2010

Villain Profile: Queen Beryl

Sailor Moon's iconic and best known main villain is Queen Beryl, she may be as iconic as Rita Repulsa. They have a lot in common as they are both witches that stand or sit around their palace waiting for their minions to do their bidding. Aya Sugimoto played Queen Beryl in Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon, who was slightly different from her Manga and Anime incarnations. In every version, Queen Beryl is a minion of Queen Metalia, who destroyed the peaceful Moon Kingdom many years ago. This caused Princess Serenity and her friends to be re-incarnated. Beryl came back, to collect energy for Meteria and seek revenge against Moon. In the 2003 live-action version, she had a past infatuation with Prince Endymion, who was reincarnated into Mamoru (Tuxedo Kamen).

In PGSM and the manga, she was a a lowly woman (in the manga, she was a beautiful woman) who secretly lusted over Endymion when she would ease drop on Serenity and Endymion. She plotted to make him hers. But then in 2003, Beryl made a off-shoot of herself, a teenage idol by the name of Mio. Mio did flirt a bit with Mamoru but didn't do as much as Beryl, she trapped him in a bedroom (yes, I know), under the watch of Mio. She did turn him evil for a brief period, like in the Anime and Manga before. Mio came back in Special Act sequel movie to get Mamory back but failed. In the Anime, she didn't have emotions for Mamoru but did make him evil to destroy Usagi.

Above picture is from Naoko Takeuchi's (creator) Materials Collection book. Queen Beryl in her wench form and her best known purple dress form. In the Anime, her boss Queen Metalia became Negaverse in the English dub. In the English dub, the Negaverse gave her power but she was still Queen Beryl but in the original Anime, Metalia took over her body and was named Super Beryl. In the Manga, Beryl killed Prince Endymion as he was trying to protect Princess Serenity, leading to the princess's own suicide. Sailor Venus killed Beryl with the Moon Sword. Beryl is "reborn" in the 20th century, but finds Queen Metalia sealed within the Earth while traveling in the Arctic. The inclusion of her (an evil character) in a line of girl dolls was described as a "radical idea" by Karen Klugman in her article "A Bad Hair Day for G.I. Joe" in 1999. The funny thing is that 'evil' dolls is not a strange thing, remember the Misfits in Jem back in 1985? Or the Trix in the Winx Club in 2004?

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