When anime fans think of the Sailor Scouts, they typically don’t think about the scarier aspects of the series. Sailor Moon presented Usagi Tsukino and her cohorts with plenty of extraterrestrial beasts that threatened the world at large and put them in quite a few pickles throughout the decades of the shojo series. In a wild new reveal, one of the directors who helped bring the anime to life has revealed that their anime work was influenced by one of the most terrifying, and beautiful, horror movies of all time. While Sailor Moon has never been considered a horror series, this big reveal might have you looking at the series, and several other anime franchises, in a brand new light.
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Kunihiko Ikuhara has been a major player in the anime world for decades, first joining Toei Animation all the way back in 1986. Ever since, Ikuhara has been rising the anime ranks and is responsible for bringing to life series such as Sailor Moon, Revolutionary Girl Utena, Soul Eater, Gunbuster, and many more. For the anime Yurikuma Arashi, aka Love Bullet, Kunihiko recently revealed that this series was inspired by the 1977 horror film Suspiria. For those who haven’t seen this creepy live-action movie, Suspiria follows the story of a dance school wherein the dancers are losing their lives to witchcraft, depicted in such a colorful way that the film is often referred to as one of the best horror movies ever made.
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If you want to check out Yurikuma Arashi to see what horror elements were added to this comedic romance anime, we have good news for you. It is available to stream on Apple TV and the streaming service has a breakdown for the idiosyncratic series, “At some point, somewhere in outer space, the small planet Kumalia exploded. As the particles of what used to be Kumalia showered upon Earth as a meteor shower, for some reason all the bears on earth stood up to attack humanity! In due time, a great “Wall of Extinction” was built between humans and bears, and they could no longer show aggression towards one another… One morning, Kureha Tsubasa and Sumika Izumino were alone watching lily flowers blooming. Just then, a Bear Warning pierces loudly through the air! Mystery brings on more mysteries, a series of one raging blow after another!”
As for Suspiria, you can watch the original horror film on Amazon Prime Video, alongside the 2018 remake that is arguably just as terrifying. Here’s how the streaming service describes the spooky classic, “An American newcomer to a prestigious German ballet academy comes to realize that the school is a front for something sinister amid a series of grisly murders.”
Want to see how the worlds of horror and anime collide in the future? Follow along with Team Anime on ComicBook.com for the latest updates on all things anime and hit me up directly @EVComedy to talk all things comics and anime.
