Hi everyone, I'm here with my very first PG proposal, since I have been added to the Whitelist recently. Because this is my first proposal, I may falter in some aspects, but I will do my best to make a good proposal. Having said that, let's talk about Ami Mizuno, better known as Sailor Mercury.
What is the Work?
Sailor Moon is a manga series written by Naoko Takeuchi that later got an anime adaptation in the 90's and a remake in more recent years. The story is about Usagi Tsukino, a normal high school student that one day meets Luna, a mysterious talking cat, who reveals that she is a warrior of the Moon that must fight for peace and justice named Sailor Moon. Usagi, now as Sailor Moon, must fight against monsters that threaten the peace of Earth while she finds the other Sailor Guardians and their princess. While the series progresses, Usagi and Luna find the other Sailor Guardians and it is revealed that she was the princess of the Moon in her past life. Each time, stronger enemies invade Earth and the Sailor Guardians face new challenges to protect their new home.
Who is Sailor Mercury? What has she done?
In her past life, Sailor Mercury was one of the Solar System Sailor Guardians who must dedicate their lives to protect the heiress of the Moon throne, Princess Serenity. She specifically was the ruler and guardian of the Planet Mercury, under the name of Princess Mercury, and lived in the Mariner Castle that orbited the planet. She protected the Moon Kingdom while she also lived happily with Princess Serenity and the other Sailor Guardians. One day, the Moon Kingdom was attacked by the Dark Kingdom, controlled by Queen Metalia. The Sailor Guardians did their best to defend the kingdom but the enemy was stronger and died in battle along Princess Serenity, his lover Prince Endymion and all the civilian inhabitants. However, Queen Serenity sacrificed herself to use the full power of the Legendary Silver Crystal to make everyone reincarnated on Earth.
Sailor Mercury was reincarnated into a human girl named Ami Mizuno. Her mother is a doctor and when Ami was a child, she witnessed the divorce of her parents. Her father doesn't live with them anymore but he sends her a postcard on her birthdays, something that means a lot for her. Ami decided to follow her mother's steps and to become a doctor. By the time she is in high school, she has the better grades in her school, with her classmates being surprised about her intelligence and believing that she has a superhuman IQ. However, Ami was always alone, since she wasn't good at making friends and this made everyone in the school believe that she has an arrogant nature due to her grades, while in reality Ami feels alone. One day she meets Usagi and Luna and they begin to get along with each other. Luna feels her special energy and tells Usagi to follow her, since she thinks that Ami could be a Youma of the Dark Kingdom. Meanwhile, the real Youma got infiltrated as a teacher in the seminar that Ami assists and makes all the students to be controlled with her power after they use her program in her floppy disc, but Ami is saved since she refused to use a program to study. When Sailor Moon and the Youma begin fighting, Luna realizes that Ami is the second warrior and gives her a pen transformation to turn into Sailor Mercury. Then she helps Sailor Moon to defeat the Youma.
The next day, Luna gives to Ami a small computer that she can use to analyze the paranormal activity and powers of their enemies. Something that makes her a key member of the team, being the one that finds out information of their enemies that she and the girls can use to defeat them. Over time, Ami meets the other Sailor Guardians, being happy to have new friends and, despite being distant sometimes, she always respects them and supports them both in their normal lives and in battle. Sailor Mercury recovered her memories of her past life little by little and this made her understand her mission to protect Earth better. Although in combat she doesn't stand out so much as her partners. Mercury saved them in several occasions and she contributed to save countless lives when she an the other guardians gave their energy to Sailor Moon to defeat Queen Beryl, when they formed a barrier in Mugen Academy to prevent Pharaoh 90 from destroying the planet, of when she gives the energy of her Mercury Crystal to defeat Queen Nehelenia in the manga. It is shown that in the XXX century, after Usagi became Queen Serenity, the ruler and protector of the Earth, Sailor Mercury and her friends are now adult guardians with more experience that retains their task of protecting the World.
Admirable Standards
As I have mentioned, Sailor Mercury doesn't stand out in fights with enemies in comparison to the other Sailor Guardians, since her attacks serve more to retain their enemies than to kill them, but she is still very close to Sailor Mars, Jupiter and Venus. Since she still contributed in almost every battle, saving her teammates, and their teamwork saved the lives of probably all the people on Earth in the occasions previously mentioned. Also, Mercury stands out in different things: Since she is the smartest member of the Inner Sailor Guardians, her intelligence had a key role when knowing the resources and powers of their enemies. Also, despite having the weakest attacks at the beginning of the series, Mercury knew to use them well. So there is plenty of saying that without Sailor Mercury there would have been more victims of the series villains, although this also applies to any other Sailor Guardian.
In terms of personality, I believe that Ami has no corrupting qualities. Although at the beginning several of her classmates believed that she was arrogant, later it is revealed that she is actually kind, polite and respectful towards others. She and Makoto (who is actually Pure Good), are the only members of the group who were never jerkish with her friends or anyone else. When Usagi, Rei and Mina are discussing, Ami tries to calm down there in good ways. In episode 96, when Makoto feels attracted to Haruka, Usagi, Rei and Minako were disappointed since both are girls, but Ami didn't show any disappointment to this and at the end she seems to try to understand her. In episode 147, when the girls are in a dance party, Makoto is the only one that doesn't have a dance partner and Ami is the only one who asks her to dance together. This examples shows that on occasions Ami is the only one who pays attention to her friends and tries to make them feel better. When Ami feels bad in a difficult situation, she pretends to handle the problem well and when she is alone she vents. Although her friends want to know her problems to help her, Ami doesn't want to worry her friends.
One of her most admirable traits is the influence that she got on Ryo Urawa, this character is the reincarnation of one of the Seven Great Youma of the Dark Kingdom, after reborning as a human, he retained precognitive skills, which allowed him to be aware about his original self and that the Dark Kingdom will turn him into a Youma again. Ryo asks Ami to kill him to not be an evil Youma again, but Ami refuses, saying that he must appreciate his human life. In episode 41, Ryo warns Ami that Prince Endymion (brainwashed by the Dark Kingdom) is recapturing the Seven Great Youma, so they can project Rei's grandfather. Although Ryo does not want to be protected, Ami, with the help of Makoto, goes to find him. After Ryo is captured by Prince Endymion, Mercury manages to release him after avoiding a fight with Endymion.
These are some of her most notable moments:
- In episode 62, Ami has to choose to study medicine in Germany or to retain baing a Sailor Guardian, at the end she notices how much her friends appreciate her and decides to prioritize her mission as a Sailor Guardian with her friends over her desires.
- In episode 122, Ami reveals that she believes that scientists must use their heart in their work, she also tries to convince Viluy about that. After Viluy’s death, she mentions that she probably received what she deserved for believing in a heartless science but she still feels bad for her.
- In episode 144, when Tiger's Eye makes Shingo fall in the ocean, Ami goes to rescue him without thinking twice, she later applies mouth-to-mouth on him to save his life.She also explains to Tiger's Eye that she does it because Shingo is her friend.At the end of the episode, she thanks Shingo for trying to protect her.
- In episode 177, Ami prevents Sailor Star Maker from harming Professor Amanogawa and teaches her that people needs to have dreams and romances to move forward in life.
- In the manga and Eternal versions, Fish Eye makes Ami fall into an illusion where nobody cares about her and then he tries to use this insecurity to corrupt her, but Ami doesn't get carried away and discovers the illusion, managing to escape and to confront Fish Eye.
We must note that, similar to what happened to Usagi and the other protagonists, Ami originally was insecure about her ability as a Sailor Guardian, but as the series progressed, she became more confident and capable. I also mention that the only time that she and the other Sailor Guardians did evil things was when Sailor Galaxia brainwashed them to kill Sailor Moon. It is not clear if they retain memories of their brainwashes after being revived by Sailor Moon, but she is still seen at the end apologizing for not being capable of helping her and thanking her for saving them.
Mitigating Factors
Although Ami is usually cautious, on rare occasions she is reckless: In the classic anime, when she notices that Mr. Sanjouin is Nephrite in disguise, she follows him and then decides to fight him alone, then, Nephrite defeats her easily due his superior strength. Also, when she informs the rest of the team, Luna scolds her for this. The other time was in the manga and Crystal, Ami decides to go to the Mugen Academy, that is the base of the Death Busters, there she investigates carelessly and causes her, along with Haruka and Michiru (who had been infiltrated in the academy for a long time), to be discovered. So, more than discovering more things about their enemies, Ami ruined Haruka and Michiru's plans. This will be reproached by them later.
Also, she has a moment that at first can question her morals. This happens in the manga short story and anime special “Ami's First Love”. In this story, a monster named Bonnon uses Ami's love feelings towards her new rival Mercurius to make her catch a fever that slowly ends her life. Ami notices her and transforms to fight, but since she is delirious due the high fever, she believes that the monster is Mercurius who wants to defeat her with this trick, so she angrily kills Bonnon. While at first she seems to be lethal and vengeful, Ami in reality was angry because the monster tried to kill her and just mentions her rivalry with Mercurius as something secondary, she also retains her friendly and polite nature with Bonnon and of course she killed her because, being Mercurius or not, she was a dangerous evil monster who uses people's love feelings to kill them. So she is still a righteous killer. Also, at the end she is surprised to see that Mercurius is alive and she is just annoyed because their situation hasn't changed but she didn't show any hate towards him.
Final Verdict
I will give a yes. Do you guys agree with me?