Sailor Papillion

Sailor Heavy Metal Papillon was the fifth and last Animamate to appear in Sailor Moon. She appeared very briefly in Stars 7, and also appeared in a couple of the musicals.

Sailor Heavy Metal Papillon was known as the Soul Hunter. Like the other Animamates, she sought out Star Seeds, but she also buried them in her graveyard. Whatever essences escaped them then transformed into butterflies, fluttering off into oblivion.

Sailor Moon, Princess Kakyuu, and Sailor Chibi Chibi encountered her just after the deaths of the Sailor Starlights. As they watched the butterflies overhead, a mysterious Sailor Senshi with wings explained that the butterflies were what remained of the Sailor Senshi captured by Sailor Galaxia, and that it was her job to help extinguish the remains. Behind her was a graveyard where a funeral procession was going on. To everyone's shock, they discovered that the Sailor Starlights' graves had appeared there.

Before the group could properly mourn, the mysterious Sailor Senshi pointed them to another set of graves being dug - their own. She then summoned forth vines to trap Sailor Moon, Princess Kakyuu and Sailor Chibi Chibi, introduced herself as Sailor Heavy Metal Papillon, and attacked them with fire to extract their Sailor Crystals. Before they were burned to death, however, Sailor Chibi Chibi summoned Sailor Chibi Moon and the Sailor Quartet from Earth. With Sailor Chibi Moon's Pink Ladies Freezing Kiss and the Quartet's Amazoness Jungle Arrow, Sailor Heavy Metal Papillon was obliterated.

Other Information

Sailor Heavy Metal Papillion's attack name is Galactica Scales, a powerful fire-based attack. She used this to melt the bodies of her victims in order to scatter their remains or perform their funerals. (The name of this attack was given in the Materials Collection; it was unnamed in the manga.)

While Heavy Metal Papillon's appearance in the manga was brief, the publication of the Materials Collection gave readers more information about her than had previously been known. Amongst other things, it was revealed that the character's name was originally just "Sailor Metal Papillon."

Unlike the other Animamates, no planet of origin or attack name had been given for Papillon, but the Collection states that Heavy Metal Papillon came from the planet Cocoon (and it is generally assumed that she also usurped the power of Sailor Cocoon). The name given to her attack was "Galactica Scales."

The Collection also gives several other, more personal facts about Papillon that were not revealed for the other Animamates. It is stated that she was very emotional, was very sexual, was a samba dancer, and even had one (unnamed) child, thus making her the only Sailor Senshi known to have a child in canon besides Sailor Moon.

In keeping with the Animamate tradition of being named after metals, the reference in Papillon's name is "heavy metal," an old and now deprecated term in chemistry referring to a large group of metallic elements. "Papillon" is the French word for butterfly. Butterflies are indicative of the soul in many cultures, and are particularly abundant in Sailor Moon canon.

Sailor Heavy Metal Papillon was a character in the musicals Starlights - Ryuusei Densetsu and Kakyuu-Ouhi Kourin - The Second Stage Final, the 2003 Summer and 2004 Winter Specials respectively. Like the other Sailor Animamates, she posed as a member of the Dancing Animamates, an "International Dancing Team." She went by the name "Miss Butterfly" and was described as being "in charge of the opera." She was played by Keiko Endou.

From WikiMoon.Org