Ilsevet of the Moon Garden who
helped contribute in the writing of this article wrote to me,
"I
can't imagine why people would want to put Seiya and Usagi
together - not when Usagi's so obviously meant for Mamoru. I mean,
Seiya's a nice person, romantic and beautiful and powerful... but she and
Usagi don't match the way Mamoru and Usagi do. Besides, how can Seiya
ever devote her heart to Usagi? She has to be loyal to her own princess
first; that's her duty as a Kinmokusei senshi. Mamoru's heart and soul
have only one person to protect: his Usako-hime."
Indeed, it is hard to understand how one could wish Usagi to be with
anyone else but Mamoru but in the character Kou Seiya, we find several
reasons. Ilsevet has provided below information on the manga about Seiya
and I have wrote an article based on it.
For starters, the anime and the manga Sailor Moon are very different. The
manga is the original and it portrayed Mamoru as loving, sensitive, and
tender. In the manga, he shows his love for Usagi repeatedly and he never
ever broke up with her. His breaking up with Usagi in the anime was
something the animators made up and was never part of the original story
line.
The anime then made Mamoru into a cold, rude jerk in the 1st season and most of the 2nd, and because of how he
was portrayed in the anime, some fans felt Usagi should be with Seiya. They seem to forget all the times in both
1st, 2nd (R season) and S and SuperS seasons where Mamoru was very sweet and loving to Usagi. Please see The Eternal Love Story for evidence of all the times Mamoru stood up for his love for Usagi.
This article is here to show you just WHY Seiya would not be a good match
for Usagi. We begin with the manga.
Manga Volume 16: Mamoru has just asked Usagi to marry him, and gives her a
ring. Usagi cries tears of joy and both kiss pasionately. Suddenly, out of
no where, comes this woman, Sailor Galaxia, the main villain of the Stars
series. This villain takes Mamoru's Golden Crystal - his star seed/what is
his very essence - and in doing so, kills him. Usagi watches with horror
as her beloved disappears, his last word being 'Usako'. Usagi faints and
who catches her? A beautiful stranger named Kou Seiya.
Seiya is a woman from the Kinmokusei Solar System who came with her fellow
Kinmokusei Senshi, Kou Taiki, and Kou Yaten to find their Princess Kakyuu.
This Princess had fled her galaxy to run away from Sailor Galaxia who was
out to steal all the universes' Sailor Senshi Crystals. Seiya now has
witnessed Mamoru's death and takes an unconscious Usagi home.
Seiya, from that moment on, notices similarities between Usagi and his
Princess Kakyuu, and begins to fall in love with her. Seiya disguises
herself as a man on Earth - she is still a female under her clothes (in
the anime her body changes into that of a man on Earth) - and befriends
Usagi who has blocked out Mamoru's tragic death from her memory. Instead,
she thinks that Mamoru got onto his plane safely and arrived in America
where he was to study at Harvard. She is very alone and feels sad
wondering why Mamoru does not write to her as he promised he would. She
really cannot remember that he died right before her eyes.
Seiya feels things for Usagi at first because Seiya was actually in love
with Princess Kakyuu - she sings a song for Princess Kakyuu (in both anime
and manga) in which she speaks of a love she has for this person - and
this is before Seiya really falls for Usagi.
The similarity between Usagi and Princess Kakyuu is the smell of olives
which Usagi has gotten from an incense lamp in her room. Princess Kakyuu
is from a planet of olives and always smells like that. It turns out,
Princess Kakyuu is IN the incense lamp and that Chibi Chibi is the one who
placed the incense lamp in Usagi's room so Usagi would rescue Princess
Kakyuu. This smell of olives is what helped Seiya into viewing Usagi as
the Princess Kakyuu she loved.
Seiya realizes though, in both anime and manga, that he/she is not the one
for Usagi - that her heart has belonged to Mamoru from the very beginning
of her existence, and always shall. In Act 46: as she watches Usagi walk
away, Seiya thinks to herself: "We are of different stations in the
universe. This might be an unrequited love." And unrequited love it is.
Usagi never loves Seiya back in that way and is always loyal to her
Mamochan. She sees Seiya as only a friend, and nothing more.
Besides Seiya's own realization, and the fact that Usagi would love and
choose Mamoru always, there are other reasons why a matching between the
Fighter and the Moon would not work out.
For one thing, there's the matter of the long-distance relationship.
Seiya lives very far away; if Usagi finds it hard to part with Mamoru when
he goes to America, how would she feel when Seiya must return to Kinmoku
Star? And don't tell me that Seiya will stay on Earth because of
her love. Seiya will never stay with Usagi. They are both loyal, dutiful
senshi; Usagi will remain with the Moon, and Seiya will go back to
Kinmokusei and serve her princess.
That's another point - Seiya already has a princess to protect and defend,
and it's not Usagi. As a Kinmokusei senshi, Seiya must devote herself to
protecting Kakyuu-hime, just as Mamoru and the senshi of our solar system
devote their very lives to protect Usagi.
Mamoru, on the other hand, has no other calls on his loyalty. He has only
one person he must protect: his Usako. He has sacrificed his life for
hers several times before, throughout the centuries; he will not hesitate
to do so again. At one point, he even cries out that Usagi is what keeps
him alive. How can Seiya, a senshi with another princess and a duty far
away, ever match that kind of loyalty?
And if you want to get technical, there is no match for a princess but a
prince of equal rank. Mamoru-kun's Golden Crystal is the only perfect
match for Usagi's powerful Silver Crystal. Seiya's Kinmokusei sailor
crystal isn't even in the running.
Lastly, the most important thing to remember about Seiya is that he/she
and Mamoru had NO ill-feelings towards each other. In both anime and
manga, both only had respect for the other. The way they interacted in the
final episode 200 of the anime shows a Mamoru who appreciates all that
Seiya did and shows a Seiya who knows Usagi will be loved and safe always
in the arms of her Prince.
It is easy for Usagi and Mamoru fans to get angry with Seiya and Usagi
fans but what we must remember is that Usagi chose her man. She chose
Mamoru. She was face to face with Seiya, was kissed by him, was shown
Seiya's affections and yet Usagi was never won over - she never returned Seiya's feelings or ever thought about Seiya in that way. To her,
Seiya was always a friend, and Mamoru was always her one true love.
Usagi and Mamoru, who have faced challenges from other potential lovers,
to enemies, to evils and death have overcome it all. They have remained
true to each other to their very deaths and even beyond death. No matter
how much some fans may believe Seiya should be with Usagi, the fact of the
matter is, Seiya - noble and worthy candidate as she was - did not win the
heart of our Usagi.