Tenchi Muyo: The Japanese Anime Series Guide

                                                               



    If you have never have had the opportunity to see any of the Tenchi animation series, this is a long overdue introduction into the Tenchi phenomena. Set after the events in the Tenchi Original Video Animation (OVA), this series brings us straight into an intergalactic jailbreak by a fantastically powered, vengeance fuelled super-being with a grudge against all those whose veins flow with the blood of the Jirrai! As Tenchi fans already know, or anyone can take a wild stab in the dark at - that means Tenchi, but more specifically, his mother. Cue a Back To The Future-esque Tenchi disappearing trick due to the timeline being disrupted! Time for Tenchi and pals to take a jaunt through time (way, way back to the 1970`s) and protect any harm from befalling his mother, or otherwise Tenchi can never be born! Shock, GASP!!



                                                       



   Now for any fans of the Tenchi series, all the cast regulars will be returning: Tenchi, Ryoko, Washu etc., but this causes problems for any newcomers to the Tenchi universe. Due to the fact that this series builds upon the history of the series, it may leave many newcomers stumped by what is going on! The Jirrai? Never heard of them or Tenchi's connection to them? So when it's brought up about halfway through even one of the Tenchi Muyo series, you just have to roll with it. Tenchi suddenly pulling out a light saber? Just get over it. The complete lack of introduction to the characters, their relationships and rivalries? People new to the Tenchi universe will just need to accept these things and sit back and enjoy the fantastic animation, stunning special CG effects, and not the least, mesmerizing quality soundtracks.



                                                    

 

   But what is the complete Tenchi series like? Bit of a mixed bag actually. It starts off badly mainly due to an assumed level of knowledge for the viewer of Tenchi's past, but the longer it goes on this series gets into its stride, and by the end you may down-right be enjoying it. The Tenchi Muyo series tries to accomplish so much that it was bound to fail in certain respects: a space opera, a love story, a comedy... it tries too much! Yet no aspect of the even the weakest episodes of the series is a complete failure. The comedy suffers the most, but still manages to get a few genuine chuckles! The love story as a sub-plot between Tenchi's parents is handled superficially at best but it was a nice touch to have the relationship equally threatened by Ryoko's interfering than by Kain the intergalactic criminal! But the sci-fi space opera aspect of this series is pure gold - aliens, time travel, Jedi-like powers... it's a shame that this aspect of the series doesn’t really take off until the latter half.



   OK, so a few drawbacks about the series you for those still may not convinced is worth the effort to start viewing Tenchi Muyo DVD`s. The animation is as expected of Japanese quality artistic creativity, but looks more like OVA quality rather than feature film. The sub is fine for most of the series and especially the movies, but I warn you now - the sub is often atrocious! I highly recommend to stay clear of the English language track. This could just be because the ridiculous dialogue doesn`t sound as bad in Japanese when reading, but in English its often just laughable! The discs extras are a nice extra as well, and the director`s comments are OK, but the interviews with Christopher Franke and the like of Japanese anime specialists are likely to bore you stiff as they did me.



                                                             

 

    Well, I'm pretty sure that Tenchi fans love the Tenchi Muyo movie series, and honestly I did find myself enjoying the movies by the end, but I cannot help but think that previous knowledge of the OVA series would bring an extra level of understanding and appreciation to these films. Fans of Tenchi - you probably have already gone out and bought these on DVD`s already. Newbie`s - maybe try the original OVA series first to test the water!

 




*Special thanks to Otaku Kei for helping with the correcting and editing my guide.