The Lost Dolls Of Sailor Moon

Between 1995 and 2001, Bandai North America and Irwin Toys had made a number of Sailor Moon items. While most were sold in Canada, as not too many US stores would sell Sailor Moon related merchandise until late in it's initial run, there were several dolls and the like promised to us, but never sold. Some were prototypes for dolls still in development, others where characters we flat out never got. Let's explore these lost dolls and see what we can learn.

The first first wave?

So if you've been a fan of Moon Sisters for a while, you may remember the Sailor Moon as Chibi Moon hybrid prototype seen above. She has pink boots like Sailor Chibi Moon, a pink bow and Sailor Chibi Moon's wand. This doll was first seen on Bandai America's ads in 1995, and again on Irwin's boxes in late 1995, usually alongside Venus with a blue bow, pastel Mercury, Jupiter, Mars with a magenta bow and as seen above, a passed out Queen Beryl.

But she was not alone! The six inch Moon-Chibi Moon hybrid was also accompanied by an 11 ½ inch version with an extra long torso, this time with a sunburst or star brooch and the Moon Stick, sorry, Crescent Moon Wand originally meant for the 6 inch dolls, but also used for some of the 11 ½ inch variants. This doll had a slightly darker, more bubble gum pink hue with a darker skirt and the moon tiara we wouldn't see until Sailor Moon S.

When the first wave of dolls debuted in 1995 for the US and Canada, fans were angry to find that Mars, Jupiter and Venus all were wearing the same style boots as Mercury and Moon, when in the anime and manga, they wear different shoes. This carried over to Irwin, and would not be fixed until almost a whole year later with a new line of dolls with corrected shoes for both the 11 ½ inch and 6 inch sets.

But did you know there was another set of Sailor Moon dolls?

At 6 ½ almost 7 inches tall, five mystery Bandai/Irwin dolls have shown up for each of the Inner Sailor Guardians, or in this case, Sailor Scouts. Not only are they taller than their more common adventure counterparts, they also have bent arms, slightly angrier faces and no real way to hold the wands, which are actually the same wands used for the usual variety as well.

The bodies are also much more curvy with a slightly larger bust. The backs of their heads are either blank, or they have T.K. Toei carved into them, and very few have an Irwin stamp. A variant of Tuxedo Mask with a larger head (seen above) has also been found.

Speaking of Tuxedo Mask, a variant from Bandai North America was teased with the Moon Cycle and in some print ads. This 6-6 ½ inch doll would have had a rose with him, lighter hair (brown maybe?) and seemingly no mask or hat. It was rumored that this doll was just moved to the Irwin line, but the Irwin Tuxedo Mask dolls have short, black hair, drilled in glasses, a hat and no rose.

Also planned for release was a black, 12 inch talking and non talking Luna with black eyes. This design would later be used in Japan as a prototype for the PGSM live action series related Luna plushies.

The original 17?

You've likely seen the two sets of 17 inch dolls from Irwin. One set as a baby doll head, the other matches the later "baby face/pretty face" dolls. But did you know about all of the variants? Pictured above are the prototypes for the very first set. Moon has blue gloves, Venus has a blue choker and all of the girls have gold buttons for brooches and the same sort of boots.

Even more curious is that Sailor Moon's tiara has a gold moon with a smaller circle in the center.

It seems this first wave had some of the other girls with gold gems as well.

But even more curious, on the back of these boxes is an ad featuring prototypes of the 11 ½ inch Bandai Asia Sailor Moon/Sailor Moon R dolls, but with incorrect boots! The rumor is that these were the dolls originally supposed to be slated for release here, but not too many details seem to have survived.




Speaking of, many of the prototypes for the Japanese and other Asian Sailor Moon dolls shows them with bendable arms, and yet none of these dolls can actually bend their arms as shown.

An alternate set with corrected brooches for the Inners and corrected tiaras for Mercury, Mars, Venus, Jupiter and half of the Sailor Moon dolls (see below) was quickly and quietly released without any explanation. These first two sets of 17 inch dolls would be the first to feature the gold trim seen on the final re-issue 11 ½ inch and 6 inch dolls in 1997.

As for Sailor Moon, half of the dolls kept the incorrect blue gloves but got a corrected tiara. The other half kept the wrong tiara but got the corrected gloves. A final set with corrected tiara and gloves came out in late 1997, again, quietly.

The Second Wave

With Sailor Moon slowly moving off of syndicated stations, WB and Fox in the United States and onto Cartoon Network's Toonami block, and with the show gaining more popularity in Canada, Irwin decided to refresh the toy lineup by re-issuing the Sailor Moon dolls, but with metallic costumes. Sailor Moon was seen with both red and incorrect blue gloves in the 11 ½ inch line, and while later dolls would get a larger Crescent Moon Wand to cart around, her prototypes were still using Chibi Moon's wand. Surprisingly, shiny costumes were also used on a short lived line of Jupiter, Mars and Venus dolls with incorrect boots, before the correct versions came to replace them.

A Neo Queen Serenity doll was planned, but was never produced. Curiously, King Endymion (incorrectly called Prince Darien) and Princess Serenity did get their own dolls around this time.

Plushies were released with both smooth, plastic brooches and with gems, but this olive haired Sailor Pluto with a rust colored bow and navy fuku is missing, replaced with one with slightly darker hair and a darker uniform. It's also rumored that a Chibi Tuxedo Mask was also produced/planned, but nothing seems to be coming up as of yet.

But starting here, we get two more prototype dolls that never saw store shelves. One is Tuxedo Mask with white trim for his coat in both the 11 ½ inch and 6/7 inch sets, and then came a teenage Sailor Chibi Moon, now known as just Rini.

Sometimes as seen below, she would even be advertised with her own Crescent Moon Wand.

Teased endlessly, this adult/teenage version of Sailor Chibi Moon was never actually released.

Instead, we got a version of Rini with her kid hair length in 10 ½ inches and in 5 inch formats with deep pink, nearly red boots, similar to her mother, Sailor Moon.

In another bit of false advertising, Sailor Moon is shown with knees more bendable than the actual 11 ½ inch dolls.

Officially, Tuxedo Mask, Rini, Moon, Mercury, Mars, Venus, Jupiter and Pluto all had variants with bonus outfits in Canada. But missing from the line up were Uranus and Neptune in their school uniforms and Hotaru, which leads me to the next chapter.

The lost dolls of Saturn

Rumors of prototypes for Sailor Saturn popped up as soon as Irwin had confirmed a line of Sailor Moon R and Sailor Moon S dolls for this 1997 line, two years ahead of when S would actually be dubbed, censored and sent to YTV and Cartoon Network for air. A few SuperS toys from Japan were even re-released at the same time for the North American market!

What we do know is that there exists dolls that are 6 inches, 11 ½ and 10 ½ inches tall. All of them feature purple or black hair, purple eyes and bright pink lips. The boots are a repaint of Jupiter's boots and the uniforms are in varying shades of pink and purple with brown bows.

Another scrapped Saturn would come in 2001, as the prototype for Saturn appeared with a correct costume, thick eyelashes and a transformation pen that would have matched the Inner Sailor Scouts' first pens instead of her planet power one! Irwin would go on to release a more accurate Saturn that year, albeit only in specialty stores and online.

Even in Japan, there exists a prototype of Saturn with boots like Sailor Moon but in purple. This doll would later be replaced by one with correct boots for the Sailor Moon World line.

The Lost Pretty Soldiers

1999-2001 saw the peak of Irwin's Sailor Moon line, but right away, we have some odd ideas being scrapped without warning. For starters, they originally (as seen above) thought about re-issuing the same dolls in yellow boxes. The yellow boxes wouldn't pop up until late 2000, being replaces by light blue boxes with yellow and then pink inserts. New dolls would replace the old, and if you look at the bottom of the above graphic, an alternate Luna-P/Luna Sphere/Luna Ball was planned with an older, more cat like face.

A new line of regular clothed dolls was planned, but only Serena was released, albeit with Rini, who was now Sailor Mini Moon.

Two different Sailor Mini Moon dolls appear! One set is a re-issue of the Wicked Lady "ugly face" doll with a Mini Moon with short hair, a new face and her 1997 doll costume, and then a second Sailor Mini Moon appears with a metallic brooch, deep pink boots and bright eyes.

And then, before the specialty Super Sailor Moon came out, we had three prototypes. One was for a Super Sailor Moon/Sailor Cosmos hybrid with a white costume with lace-ish sleeves but in Sailor Saturn's pattern, one was a Super Sailor Moon/Eternal Sailor Moon hybrid with the Eternal Tiare and painted on lockets, and then the third is Eternal Sailor Moon! This one even made it into the Toys R Us catalogs, but was never actually sold. Around this time, Cartoon Network had made the decision not to renew Sailor Moon, not wanting to tackle StarS, which is likely why the doll was scrapped so late into the year. Which leads me to another tragedy.

The Lost Dolls of SuperS and StarS

Irwin had planned on an entire set of SuperS dolls and action figures, but sadly, they ran into financial issues and lost the license, going belly up just before production could even start.

Had things not gone horribly wrong, 2002 would have seen the launch of a Queen Nehellenia doll, Super Sailor Mini Moon and a Diana figure, likely to compliment the 2 inch Luna and Artemis figures. It is speculated that either a Pegasus plush or Pegasus and Helios dolls were planned, but the only images found are actually scans of the Japan only Pegasus plush and the Italian Pegasus dolls.


Action figures of The Amazoness Quartet were also planned. Each figure would have matched the regular doll line in height, and the prototypes even had their original names instead of their Cloverway names.


Though no prototypes have shown up, Sailor Chibi Chibi Moon and Princess Kakyuu, now Princess Fireball, were also planned to have their own dolls. Irwin even had their bios on their official website for a short time in 2001. It is rumored that the Starlights were planned to have their own dolls, but no prototypes have surfaced as of yet.

Things that are not actually lost.

Once thought to be a prototype, Rini with a tiara was released as both a figurine and as a keychain in Canada.

Incorrectly thought to be an unreleased set of prototypes, the Mini Crescent Wand Lip Gloss and Secret Scents Sailor Locket were released in Canada, and in the US, they were sold at Jamesway/Ames and at Bradlees.

Variants of some of the 2 inch figures also exist with alternating paint color. The first wave were also redone in 1 inch versions, but the 1 inch versions are for the Japanese market only.

Molly, Rini and the Outer Sailor Scouts all had their own 2 inch figures in North America with keychain variants, but they were sold in smaller quantities and discontinued early.

Some of these things were dropped because of rights issues. Some due to time constraints and cash issues. We may never have all of the answers as to why we never got some of these interesting dolls and toys. All we can do is hope that one day, we will be treated to just a little more of the story, and maybe a new nostalgia line of goods. Until then, we must continue to support Sailor Moon by buying new merchandise as it comes up, so we can show the powers that own the series how much it still means to us after all these decades.