Crystal Jewels: Adventures of the Crystal Monsters! (partially found first Crystal Jewels anime series; 1991–1992)

Crystal Jewels: Adventures of the Crystal Monsters! is the 1991 anime series created by Maruko Jinko. It aired on TyataTV from November 1, 1991 to May 1, 1992 in Japan, with 52 of the 12-15 minute episodes broadcasted. It was succeeded by the 1992 long running anime series (which also aired six months and 12 days after the ending of the 1991 series), and simply titled, Crystal Jewels, and is currently running over 1,900 episodes to this day. The series have featured Crystal Monsters, Roaracryst, Ninecoat, Plantmore, Mouselette, and many of the other characters who also later appeared in the 1992 series. However, the character designs, the animation style, and the themes are different than the 1992 anime, also this anime is aimed at the younger audience (PG), while Crystal Jewels are aimed at teenage/young adult audiences in it's original format. The series is also produced in NTM (Nippon Titan Movie)

Availability and Surviving Materials
The first series of the Crystal Jewels franchise have aired from November 1, 1991 to May 1, 1992 on TyataTV in Japan, with 52 episodes running 12 minutes each. However, after the last episode have aired, it was planned for home releases because it got good ratings from the first episode. However, the NVM (Nippon Video Media), have rejected the home releases likely because of copyright problems and the Nippon Video Media have low budgets for that series at that time. It was difficult to put all 52 episodes on home release, so the series begin reruns from 1992 to 1994. Also, the series have three reruns: the first rerun from May 8, 1992 to October 30, 1992 (TV Tokyo), the second rerun is from April 30, 1993 to October 29, 1993 (TV Asashi), and the third rerun is from April 1, 1994 to October 1, 1994 (Fuji TV), and since 1995, it haven't reran ever since, and the series haven't even released on home video.

The reason why the series wasn't released in home video and reran was because the director, Sano Ukuto, complains that the 1991 anime's humor and plot are senseless, and he doesn't like how the 1991 anime have the way the characters are. For an example, in the 1991 anime, Roaracryst (Roakijushiku), has a big crush on Plantmore (Puranmora), while in the 1992 anime he and she are friends. Another reason is that the series couldn't make more sense because he claimed that in his research, spider kills plants. It is also Maruko Jinko's least favorite Crystal Jewels anime series because of some of the off-model animation can be easily seen in most episodes. Since then, the episodes can be seen nowhere around the internet nor websites, with the fate of the episode animation videos unknown, and the only surviving materials we have left is the poster, the title cards from every episode (not the animation), few of screenshots, eyecatches (screenshots only), part of the audio from some episodes, and the animation cels.

Differences between the anime and the 1992 series

 * The anime has 12-minute long episodes, while the 1992 series have 24-minute long episodes.
 * The anime only runs 52 episodes, while the 1992 series ran over 1,900.
 * The anime ran from November 1991 to May 1992, while the main 1992 series ran from November 13, 1992 all the way to 2021.
 * Some of the characters that didn’t appear in this anime have appeared in the 1991 video game Crystal Jewels. They didn’t appear in this anime but they debuted in 1992. These characters are:
 * Dustin Withness
 * Elliott Mitoa
 * Samantha Shari
 * Shurika
 * These anime debut dates are apart by almost a year.
 * The character designs
 * Roaracryst has a unrequited crush on Plantmore, while in 1992 he has no feelings for her.
 * Kouchu and Kouchu from 1992 are completely different characters. The 1991 Kouchu is good in grades, and is successful most of the time, and Kouchu seems to fail most of the time in the 1992 anime.
 * The opening and ending is short while there are longer songs in 1992.
 * Unlike the 1992 anime series, this anime series wasn’t even dubbed because it was only in Japanese
 * There was no home release for this series unlike the 1992 series have.

Title card
In the title cards, the animation shows Roaracryst sleeping on the Crystal Ball. After the text is read, he falls off. The animation video cannot be found, but the screenshots of title cards from every episode can be seen.