The Shining Shooting Star: Saturn and the Messiah

Posing as Hotaru, Mistress 9 works to coax the Holy Grail out of Sailor Moon's grasp. Uranus and Neptune sense the deception and urge her to guard the relic, yet Usagi, still certain her young friend survives inside the imposter, hands it over. That single act tears open the passage that lets Pharaoh 90 slip from the Tau Star System down to Earth.

With help from Usagi and Professor Tomoe, the true Hotaru stirs back to awareness. Memories of her father's affection and her bond with Chibiusa flood back, and she rounds on Mistress 9 within her own mind, insisting she has people she truly treasures. That conviction shatters the parasite, and Sailor Saturn awakens in her place. She restores Chibiusa's stolen Pure Heart Crystal and calls her the one real friend she ever had, while Luna, Artemis, and Mamoru all feel the new guardian arrive.

Furious at the reckless surrender of the Grail, Uranus blames Sailor Moon for dooming the planet. Saturn then steps forward, grateful to Usagi for shielding her, but she explains that she alone can put an end to Pharaoh 90, and doing so demands the ultimate sacrifice from inside his core. She levels her Silence Glaive to hold Sailor Moon back and vanishes into the enemy. Straining to reach Super Sailor Moon form without the Grail, Usagi draws strength from the other six guardians, her own Pure Heart Crystal blazing outward, and plunges into the core to destroy Pharaoh 90.

When the light clears amid a swirl of butterflies, a battered and wounded Super Sailor Moon stands cradling a newborn. Hotaru has been saved and reborn as an infant.

The manga tells this climax differently. There Mistress 9 never covets the Grail, chasing instead the Silver Crystal inside Chibiusa's compact, which she seizes after killing her. Saturn awakens through the three Talismans and unleashes Death Reborn Revolution, banishing Pharaoh 90 and razing the world, after which Neo-Queen Serenity revives the planet and its people. That final clash also draws in Super Sailor Chibi Moon, Sailor Pluto, and Tuxedo Mask.

This marks the Holy Grail's last showing, since it is destroyed here, along with the final time Usagi transforms using Crisis, Make Up. Voice actress Kotono Mitsuishi later named the failed transformation scene her most memorable moment from the '90s series. A single frame from the episode was widely redrawn by artists from July 2019 onward and spread during the COVID-19 pandemic. Sailor Saturn, the Silence Glaive, and the Moon Cosmic Power attack all debut here.