Kind of makes me wish I’d gotten the kanzenban version after all. More Kanji should make it easier to read since there’s furigana anyway.
Also the covers are pretty.
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Seems like roughly 30 pages for act 2, so it’s less pages than act 1. Will start reading act 2 today and add vocab to the sheet again while doing so.
I’m so excited to go on reading! I loved Sailor Moon back when it started getting popular in Germany (just like almost every girl my age at that time actually haha), so it feels really nostalgic but great to read it now (and on top of that in Japanese!).
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Uhm what kind of test is a 摸試? It is mentioned on page 55 (Kanzenban). Full sentence: ねえねえ摸試の結果見た？
Is it maybe a short form of 模擬試験 (which I found on jisho)?
And is 五組 = class five?
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Yes on both accounts. ^^
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Just noticed that 模擬試験 is also written on the result notice on the same page 
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Me again!
On page 66 (Kanzenban) a lady hands out flyers and says さあ今から入会金タダ！
ただ has several meanings (see jisho) and I guess here it means free of charge? Edit: But could also mean “only; just; simply” (only the admission fee has to be paid now instead of… other additional fees…?)… 
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Yeah, in that case it means ‘free of charge’. Japan is big on admission/entry/starting fees, and from time to time places will have these offers. I hate admission fees. 
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I am a grown-ass woman and I relate so hard to this.
S.2.52 first panel
What does 気 mean in this context?
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First Manga I’m diving into, and I was on vacation so I’m already behind. Forgive me if I ask a question twice.
I made it to like page 12 today. Overall, I’m finding the katakana hard (especially the sound effects and stuff in the background) and when things leave regular font into handwriting difficult I’m having a hard time deciphering what the characters are. The vocab isn’t too bad (especially with the vocab list), but I’m not that far in. It’s fairly slow going, but I understand what’s happening. I like going back and rereading the page after my brain has sort of settled what all the words are.
ACT 1 QUESTION:
On page 9 (kanzenban) - Luna says : こんなことしてる場合じゃない。I know the words, but I don’t understand I grammatically what is happening here. [edit: I realized this was USagi speaking and it makes more sense I’m reading it as a this [situation] can’t be happening? Is that close?)
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That is how I read it, but I also don’t read with full comprehension in mind, so I don’t check my assumptions if they seem to fit the situation. So wait for someone else more knowledgeable to answer to be sure. 
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気 when used after a verb has the meaning of “intention”.
「うちに
“Is your intention to stay in my house and conduct surveillance?”
(Note that the subject is not stated in this sentence, but context makes it clear Luna is the subject of the sentence, so I’ll filled in the pronoun “you”.)
Thanks for asking about this, @Chellykins. Like MissDagger, I’m not being too picky on perfectly understanding every little thing, so long as I have a strong understanding of what’s being said and going on. I do try to look up at least a few bits of grammar I don’t know each week, but this 気 completely escaped me as something I didn’t know, and I should have looked it up to learn it. Now that I know its meaning, that’s changed my sense of Usagi’s question a bit.
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Means “it’s not the time for this”
(More literally “it’s not the situation to be doing this thing)
She is late for school and doesn’t have time to play with cats.
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It took me so much searching to figure this one (lmao) out but it’s the して(い)る場合じゃない part that means “this isn’t the time” or something like that, right? I haven’t come across it anywhere else but I say this phrase in English a lot so maybe I should keep a mental note of it 
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Despite reading Vol. 1 ahead of time, I missed out on replying to the thread earlier due to a stressful/busy start to January. Hopefully it’s okay to just chime in on both chapters so far now:
Chapter 1
I was absolutely floored by how good this was. I don’t know if I’ve ever thought this before, but I’m convinced Sailor Moon might have a perfect first chapter. It sets up its exposition deftly, its art is show-offy in the best possible way, it moves at a breakneck pace, it’s funny, and most importantly for series like this for me–there’s the intangible element that Takeuchi just seems like she’s genuinely having a great time drawing it.
I’m glad I went with the kanzenban release for this, because the opening color illustrations are gorgeous. The newspaper (newspaper!) shadow behind Usagi on the title page is a small element that establishes everything about the first chapter’s show-offy, goofy vibe. In general, I really enjoy the way Takeuchi plays with design and texture elements in her panels, even when she doesn’t need to.
Usagi’s narration boxes and her little rabbit icon are a joy, and I don’t know if it’s because of the language or an actual difference in approach, but of my hazy memories of the English dub of the TV series, and what I saw of the first season of Crystal a few years back, this is the first time I have ever actually bought into Usagi as a 14-year-old.
I don’t know that I have that much else to say. It’s cute, funny, show-offy, briskly and efficiently paced, and has absolute madwoman energy. The only thing I can knock the first chapter for is establishing impossibly high standards for the rest of the run.
Chapter 2
I left myself comparatively fewer notes for this one. A trend is established for the surpisingly Western superhero-comic-esque trope of Usagi beginning new chapters with expository monologue boxes to bring new readers up to speed, though at this point they still contain more goofy characterization than they will just a few chapters down the line. (「正義の戦士になちゃったの☆ もう～っっ 信じられないっ」closing out the one on page 52 in the kanzenban, for example.) Other small reactions:
- Ami’s introductory panel with the screen-tone flower background and ornate lower border is great. More show-offiness from Takeuchi. Ami herself is maybe a biiiit too hyperbolically genius, but at this point it fits the goofy whiplash nature of the series.
- Devil-tail Usagi scheming over her chance to have a genius-friend up her study ability on page 58 is a great panel.
- The trend, starting here, of Usagi using her wand to change into costumes more for her own goofy theatrics than any practical need, and Luna’s light frustration at it, is also great.
- Another great panel: Usagi noting wistfully that Tuxedo Mask has vanished after defeating the villain.
- Sailor Mercury (as Sailor Mercury) sure doesn’t do a whole lot in her introductory chapter.
- Everyone’s element+野 name trend is a quiet absurdity of the series, but in a typically superhero-comic fashion, so you roll with it, including Usagi’s name being the ultimate coincidental moon-double-up that no one ever comments on.
Sorry that I’m not really engaging with any of the language conversation and am more just gushing over the panels. On my one negative craft note (which extends through the rest of the volume but which I think I first really noted here; it’ll get a bit worse), Takeuchi engages in my pet-peeve of having arbitrarily tail-less dialogue bubbles here and there. There’s a reason the convention is to reserve them for off-panel speakers. I don’t think it hinders reading anywhere in this chapter, but there are points down the line where it starts to warrant a double-take, especially as group scenes pick up.
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Today I was reading ACT 1 PAGE 12 (kanzenban) and Usagi (maybe Umino? these speech bubbles aren’t super clear to me!) uses the phrase: 世紀末ね？
My assumption is like it means once in a century- or like a super rare event.
I found this page SO much harder than the ones before it-- I knew very little of the vocab and I spent alot of time slogging through it.
Randomly, though not very useful - I did find a youtube video of a (non-native) reading ACT 1 in Japanese and English. It’s not a fantastic video by any means, but it’s nice to hear somebody read it, and her pronunciation is okay enough for what I was looking for. I’m not sharing it directly because the quality isn’t worth sharing as an actual recourse.
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It actually means exactly what it looks like–the end of a century. It would have been used more prominently in the '90s (nearing the literal end of a century), to semi-ironically invoke the idea of societal collapse or change. “End times,” “These are the times,” etc.
See also: The second Dragon Ball Z intro.
these speech bubbles aren’t super clear to me!)
Right?! Takeuuuuchi, use taiiiils. (Usually you can parse who’s talking by their speech pattern or vocabulary, but I don’t feel like a comic should ever leave you with even a momentary question as to the speaker, since it pulls you out. A small blemish on an otherwise pretty fantastically crafted series.)
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New Question (Kanzenken Act 1. page 13) Usagi says なるちゃんちでっかい宝石店だようね？
What is chi doing in that sentence?
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It means household/family. Naru’s family owns a huge jewelry business/shop.
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To add to @Naphthalene’s answer, the full wording would be:
「なるちゃんのうち 」
The のうち commonly gets reduced to んち in speech, especially when following the ん sound, such as in 「(name)ちゃんのうち」 or 「(name)さんのうち」. However, you can also encounter usage such as 「 私んち」 (私のうち, my house) and 友達んち (友達のうち, friend’s house).
I’ve encountered this usage for のうち in many different manga I’ve read this past year (GochiUsa, Yotsubato, possibly Mitsuboshi Colors as well, and I’m sure more). So, expect to encounter it again in something you read/watch.
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