Princess Snow Kaguya (プリンセス スノー カグヤ, Purinsesu Sunō Kaguya) is the main villain of the manga side story The Lover of Princess Kaguya and its anime adaptation. The story was later adapted into the Kaguya Hime’s Beloved musical.
Etymology[]
Kaguya-hime is the main character of a tale from Japanese folklore; namely The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter which is also known as The Tale of Princess Kaguya. Kakeru Ohzora explicitly names her comet after that story.
Comets are cold and melt as they approach the sun which is what produces their characteristic tail. This is why she is "Snow" Kaguya.
Appearance[]
In the manga, Princess Snow Kaguya is all white apart from the bottom of her skirt which gradients to yellow. In the movie, she has blue skin with a white headdress and skirt. Kaguya wears no top, has a long flowing skirt, a transparent shawl and an intricate headpiece. The crystal on her skirt is similar to her comet shard.
Information[]
Anime[]
Princess Snow Kaguya is a powerful alien being of unknown origin. She travels by comet to different planets, freezing them and making them part of her "collection". Earth has always been her most sought after prize. Long ago in ancient times, she tried to cover the Earth in ice, but failed when the Silver Crystal melted the ice and saved the planet. As a result, Princess Snow Kaguya was forced away and has since frozen countless other planets but her desire for Earth never went away.
Eons later in modern times, she has once again made her way to Earth to try again. A piece of her comet has been lost and she cannot proceed without it. She sends her minions, the Snow Dancers, to search for the missing shard.
A young astronomer named Kakeru Ohzora finds the shard and keeps it in his observatory. It attaches itself to his life force, and begins slowly stealing his energy, causing him to become very ill. Princess Snow Kaguya appears before him at his observatory to retrieve her comet shard, and he becomes entranced by her, believing that she is the mystical Princess Kaguya. She takes the shard, but because it is linked to his life force, he is brought even closer to death when it is taken.
She throws the shard into the ocean and creates an enormous ice crystal that will continue to draw away Kakeru's vital life energy until he dies. She and her Snow Dancers then begin to freeze the Earth. The Senshi attempt to stop her, but none of their attacks seem to work. All of the nine Sailor Soldiers' combine their powers to activate the Silver Crystal's full abilities, which obliterates Princess Snow Kaguya, her Snow Dancers, the ice crystal in the sea, and her comet.
It is interesting to note that Snow Kaguya seems to think her efforts are for peace; she believed that she would spare people from the pain of loneliness and suffering and create a peaceful and perfect world. Also of note, during her backstory, she mentions that a light "bounced her off the Earth", describing it as Silver Crystal Power.
Powers[]
She has power over ice and snow, and as a result she can create frost, sleet, hail, frostbite, flurries and cold. She can command massive snowstorms and blizzards to form on Earth, and commands Snow Dancers as her servants. she can also emit two circular bursts of snowy energy from her cold hands at her target. Her ultimate attack is a massive blast of energy she fires from her torso.
The crystal she desires greatly amplifies her frigid abilities as well as its own.
Trivia[]
- Kakeru gave her the name Princess Snow Kaguya. Her real name, if she even had one beforehand, is never revealed.
- Princess Snow Kaguya may be the oldest character in the Sailor Moon franchise. She says she was banished from Earth 4.5 Billion years ago in the manga and musical.
- Other "old" characters with confirmed ages, such as Zirconia, are only tens-of-thousands of years old and others, like Guardian Cosmos or Sailor Cosmos, are only said or implied to be extremely old but do not have values given.
- The manga and musical strongly imply it was the Silver Crystal that banished her implying its carriers have been protecting the Earth since the planet's birth.
- Sayaka Okamura reprised her role as Princess Snow Kaguya in the 30th Anniversary Musical Festival -Chronicle-.
- As she is made up entirely of solid ice and desires to freeze the whole world in ice and snow, she was most likely inspired by the Snow Queen; the titular character and main antagonist of The Snow Queen fairytale by Hans Christian Anderson.
- Duplicates of Princess Snow Kaguya appeared in Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon: Another Story as enemies in random battles at the Dark Castle near the end of the game.
- In the liner notes of the manga, Naoko Takeuchi indicates that she based the design of Princess Snow Kaguya off an art deco glass statue she saw. The statue, called "Salome", was designed for the Societe Anonyme Edmond Etling company, and was depicted in their 1930 catalogue. There were subsequent reproductions with a smaller base. The designer is unknown, but thought to be Lucille Sevin, a 1920s-born French artist who died in the 1940s.
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