by Heroine of the Valley
Over the Rainbow
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
Promises, Flowers & Farewells
1 2 3 4 5
All Hearts Can Melt
1 2 3 4 5
Beautiful Dreams
1 2 3 4 5
PLOT: The adventures of diminutive Irish girl Lydia MacGreggor. Transforming into the soldier of rainbows and luck, Sailor Rainbow, Lydia uses her considerable power to fight along the sailor scouts for love and justice.
NEW CHARACTERS: Lydia MacGreggor aka Sailor Rainbow aka Princess Lydia; Madame Indigo; Lucky the Cat; Queen Azure; Sailor Shadow; Queen Vera, the Star of Truth; Blossom
LENGTH: 74424 words (Over the Rainbow); 19018 words (Promises); 25416 words (All Hearts); 16189 words (Beautiful Dreams)
RATING: PG for Over the Rainbow and Beautiful Dreams; PG-13 for Promises and All Hearts Can Melt
COMMENTS: Gotta love Irish stereotypes. They're apparently the luckiest people in the world despite the fact that they've undergone over 2,000 years of oppression, religious strife and countless renditions of "Danny Boy" by tone-deaf singers, they drink lots and lots of Guinness beer and sing about beating people up, play really good college football when they live in Indiana, and routinely find pots with loads of cash at the end of rainbows guarded by midgets in green who peddle kid's cereal. And they ride horses in emerald green fields. Lots and lots of horses, according to Nora Roberts, because all Irish people are naturally farmers.
Enter Lydia MacGreggor, a magically delicious midget who fills all those wonderful stereotypes (except she doesn't play for Notre Dame) and more. Not only is she the soldier of luck and the rainbow, not only does she speak in an Irish accent even when she speaks perfect Japanese (which she somehow knows despite growing up on a horse farm), not only does she have red hair, the prototypical Irish hair color, not only does she look for rainbow coins in random places and not only goes she beat people to a pulp and get drunk, but she is a raging Mary Sue to boot. In this epic, which spans the first season dub and the dubbed movies, it is clear that she is the star, wielding power in a swirl of rainbow ridiculousness and an overabundance of shamrocks.
The list of things she becomes reads like a laundry list of Mary Sueism. She lives on a rural farm and yet manages to have enough money to travel to Japan on a routine basis. She was friends with Darien and Serena in the previous life and a princess herself, and is also the only person Darien remembers when he's evil. She has a talking cat who fell in love with a human just like Luna does. She makes nice with all of the sailors and Darien within seven chapters. She's as smart as Amy, can use ESP like Raye, is stronger than Lita, and attracts more boys than Mina.
There's more, of course. She single-handedly turns both Malachite and Fiore good, the latter becoming her boyfriend and true love, as well as the father of a half-alien child. She even manages to get to her Eternal form after acquiring all seven Rainbow Crystals, and no monster or main boss can be beaten without her express help because her power is equal - if not stronger - than that of Sailor Moon. Combine this with the horrid Irish stereotypes, and you've got one of the most ridiculous avatars ever created.
Even more ridiculous is the author's apparent inability to venture further from the script of the episodes and movies her character is in - thus not only making this story a Sue story, but a plagarised story. Every single chapter is nearly word-for-word what was said in the actual dub. The only parts that stray at all involve when Sailor Rainbow is inserted, or when the story is changed so that only Sailor Rainbow, or Sailor Moon and Sailor Rainbow, saves the day and not any of the other sailors, or when it involves a Fiore/Lydia plotline that is as vapid and pointless as the story overall.
But suppose you really want to see an Irish sailor. Very well - go to Northern Ireland and and someone in the British Navy, or find anyone who works on a ship with an Irish accent, then insert them into the story. It doesn't matter who - just anyone, and dress them up in a sailor soldier suit, then write them into a random story. Because frankly, even if your story sucked, it would still be better than this soppy, sappy insert.
Sailor Moon and related characters are copyrighted ©1991-2006 Naoko Takeuchi.
