I didn't know they brought that joke back for New Myu! Mikako's reaction is so great. (I like that they have brought back little things from the old myus...like Un Nouveau Voyage had that little ping when Haruka and Usagi shake hands, the one that they had with Haruka and the Starlights - I think Seiya in particular - in Old Myu where they sensed each other's power when they shook hands) Of course the reason Setsuna comes across like an old lady is that Pluto has been guarding the Time-Space Door for thousands of years and, since we first meet her in Crystal Tokyo, probably will for thousands of years more. Even King Endymion says in the manga that she has lived for a very long time. She may not have aged, but she has an old spirit. Also I think the actress playing Pluto was often one of the oldest in the cast, at least in Saitou Rei and Hosaka Yuuko's cases. In the fankans, they make jokes about those actresses being the "mother" of the group. I ended up becoming Pluto back when my friends and I pretended to be Senshi in junior high and high school. This is probably cause I was the oldest (I had started school a year late cause my birthday's in October, so I was always older than everyone else in my grade), and also because my favorite Senshi (Mercury) was taken. It did make me interested in Pluto though, and she's my favorite Outer Senshi now.
Haha yeah as much as Yuuko is my favourite of all Mikako gets funniest reaction when it comes to the old lady jokes XD Plu definitely is an older spirit than the others but that is so part of her awesomeness. Yeah I think the Pluto actresses were generally some of the older cast members (especially Rei who I believe would have been near 30). Btw what day in October is your birthday?
I actually researched ages a while ago. The very first Sailor Pluto was Hosoki Miwa, who was in 1995's Super Sensi e no Michi (it was never recorded so it's not on video) and she was 18. All the other actresses who played Sailor Pluto after her were all 20+. Saitou Rei was the oldest actress, as she was 30 during her last performance.
It’s hilarious when characters who have no idea who Setsuna is call her an old lady. Like it would make sense if her friends did it because she *is* really old even if she looks young, but then random characters who have no idea that she’s not 20-something years old do it.
Atelier games also do this with some female characters that dare being in their late teens or older. And in Rhapsody: a musical adventure there are lots of jokes about one character looking old when she just looks like an anime woman in her 20s (she -is- actually supposed to be about a thousand years old but really it feels like Usagi being called fat).