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It’s even available in schoolgirl uniform blue!

Getting older can be a little strange when your hobbies include things as unabashedly youth-oriented as anime. After years of feeling like the tone of the medium is in tune with your own psyche, one day you realize you’re twice the age of the main characters of the latest hits, and as the time demands of adult life pile up, it becomes harder and harder to watch every single episode of every new series.

But perhaps the most surreal moment is when your favorite anime characters aren’t just being used to sell you posters and plushies, but actual automobiles.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L_M7j5SDtQw

As part of its sporadic Overdubs series of Internet advertisements, Ford Motor Company is once again tapping into the nostalgia that lies in the hearts of 1990s-era otaku with a new video featuring Sailor Moon pining after the automaker’s Fusion compact sedan.

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As the video opens, we see series lead Usagi (the video earns a little otaku cred by calling her by her original Japanese name, as opposed to Serena, Bunny, or one of her other localized monikers) staring up at the night sky with feline mentor Luna. Together, they spot the constellations Sagittarius, Libra, and…Ford Fusion…?

▼ Huh. Don’t remember seeing that one at the planetarium.

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Charmed by its looks, Usagi gushes “It’s the most stylish car I’ve ever seen.” Relatively handsome though it may be, that seems like a bit of an exaggeration, but then again, restraint was never Usagi’s strong suit. The cooler-headed Luna points out that the car also has some hi-tech safety features, such as pre-collision assist and pedestrian detection, before Usagi adds “A Lightning Blue one would match my uniform perfectly.”

▼ She’s got a point, although I can understand why Ford, to appeal to the widest market possible, went with the name “Lightning Blue” instead of “Japanese Schoolgirl Navy.”

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Of course, as Luna points out, junior high student Usagi is to young to get a license just yet. She’ll be old enough in a couple of years, though, and when she finally does find herself behind the wheel, hopefully she’ll have the maturity to resist the urge to race Dragon Ball’s Krillin and Gohan when they rev up on her in a Ford of their own.

Source: YouTube/Ford Motor Company via Anime News Network/Lynzee Loveridge
Images: YouTube/Ford Motor Company, Ford Motor Company

Follow Casey on Twitter, where he still thinks the RX-7’s “Innocent Blue Mica” was a pretty awesome name for a paint color.