There are few things more EVIL and insidious than the following picture:

Look familiar to anyone? Sure the left half has become quite famous over the years—usually in the sense that people like to use it in their website layouts for one reason or another, but the right half is famous as well.

It's that DAMN generals picture! I will be the first to admit that I just do not understand what the fascination is with that damn picture. People see that and suddenly, "Oh! So the generals were all hooked up with the senshi! I get it now! That's so much better!"

I don't get it. Not in the least. It was a concept picture. Nothing more. Yes, in the manga, Venus and Kunzy were hooked up and Jeddie over there had the hots for Mars. (Whether that actually culminated in anything, I suppose we'll never know. However, considering Rei-chan's character, I like to think that she used him for random sex…. Oh come on, we all know that she'd do it!)

Now, for some reason, a lot of fic authors tend to think that every single character in a story needs to have their own respective boyfriend to horse-whip. It's all annoyingly sweet and sappy. Not only do we have to put up with Usagi and Mamoru being uncharacteristically mushy for portions of the fic, but we also have to put up with the OTHER characters being uncharacteristically mushy whenever Usagi and Mamoru AREN'T being mushy… or are just being mushy "off-camera." There is mushiness abounding here, people. This also leads for some very odd pairings. Otherwise attached characters or characters that one sees in maybe one episode end up becoming permanently attached to everyone's favorite senshi.

Usually, there's some reason for this. One episode where there is even the slightest instance of romantic tension can send a fanfic writer off on whole bouts of "Oh! Aren't they the cutest couple EVER? Kawaii!"

And then there's that damn generals picture. The sheer amount of badfic spawned by this image is far too large to even begin to consider and retain one's sanity.

And then, as I began to write this rant, I took a look at the pic and something started to seem a little bit funny to me. Something was just a wee bit off-kilter. What could it be? Then I remembered that while this image MAY have been concept art, that didn't mean that the concept was all that romantic. Maybe Naoko was thinking of something a little more complicated than a mutual love-fest. Let's look at this image a little bit closer, shall we?

First of all, I notice that both Jupiter and Mercury are being groped. It's nice to know that even in the Silver Millennium, men were always thinking with the same parts of the body. Ladies and gentlemen, I present official proof that no part of the human anatomy is as important as the breast.

But I digress.

My second reaction is, why in the HELL does Venus have the Silver Crystal? Furthermore, her hand is over her mouth in the same way one would place it over one's mouth if he or she were shushing a person. Or keeping a secret. Interesting. Very interesting.

If you take a look at the faces of all of the generals, they don't really seem happy or all that "in love". Instead, there is this sinister gleam in their beady eyes. They are planning something.

Mercury seems fairly oblivious of this (of course, we all know that people who have high IQs are extremely lacking in common sense), and Rei just looks like a woman who's into using her men. Guess I called that one. I am so damn good!

Jupiter has a hand clamped over her mouth. Uh oh. She knows something. Perhaps she is screaming RIGHT NOW and Nephy is attempting to muffle her cries and protests!

I can come to only one conclusion: It was a plot.

It was an evil plot enacted by the generals to gain the trust of the senshi and steal the silver crystal!

Wanting some proof for this, I tried to contact Ms. Takeuchi in regards to the image, but apparently, she has no time for a ranting, sort-of fanfic critic. Tis a shame.

I was, however, able to get in contact with her ex-assistant at the time. Surprisingly, her assistant was a trained monkey named "Mohawk."

Who knew?

This was what Mohawk had to say (as translated by trained specialist in simian-ese):

It's important to remember that Minako was eternally cursed to never have a man! (Read your Sailor V manga... Oh, okay, not really. But I exaggerate. Just work with me, here.)

What no one realized was that Adonis made a teensy-weensy mistake causing the curse to be applied to ALL of the inners

Thus, all of the other generals were compelled through magic to get close to an inner w/o becoming too emotionally attached to them and leading the inners on the whole time.

See, now, it was part of the scheme that the man Minako left Adonis for would find out that, dammit, he was more gay than a lavender-wearing interior designer! However, homosexuality among men was frowned upon in the Silver Millenium (though lesbianism was A-OK!) and both he and "Cherry Lips Zoey" tried to deny their feelings for one another.

This is where things get interesting.

One night at an all you can eat buffet and ball, the generals were hangin' and chillin' and puttin' back the wine and they had a little too much of it. So, as they were heading back to their quarters, one thing led to another and... uh... well... That's censored.

So they wake up the next morning completely hung over and they realize that they all, uh, "work best as a team" without any women to get in their way. All the girls were really good for was finding holes in the ground, anyway. They could find some holes themselves, if they tried hard enough.

Now, meanwhile, Beryl was recruiting for her troops and she posted these giant fliers that basically declared evil to be the best thing since sliced bread -- which was quite a big deal as sliced bread had yet to be invented. The generals decided that if they couldn't be together and good, they'd all go evil. Besides, they heard that Beryl threw some wicked parties and knew how to make kinky-sounding mixed drinks.

Under Beryl's evil command they concocted a scheme to steal the silver crystal and take over the world!

The rest is, as they say, history.

There you have it folks! Proof from a monkey that the infamous "Generals pic" is truly evidence of an insane plot to take over the Earth and the moon.

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