Tenchi Muyo - OVA 1 & 2

Summary: >

There's a legend in Tenchi's family, that his ancestor Yosho sealed a demon within a cave at the Misaki shrine. Even if he'd never believed it, curiosity finally got the better of him. When Tenchi finally explores the cave, he finds out the legend is true! The demon is in fact a cute woman from space who crash landed on earth, and ends up living at Tenchi's house. Not long after, she's pursued by princesses from planet Jurai.. who crash and end up staying with Tenchi. Galaxy police officers, genius space scientists; Tenchi has a knack for collecting oddball girls from around the galaxy. Tenchi however, may have the most unusual gift out of all of them.

Thoughts: >

If there's one title I'd consider worthy as franchise launching, it's this OVA. Tenchi Muyo was among the first anime titles I watched, and at the time I was pretty excited to see anything anime. Over the years I've recognized many of those shows as nowhere near as good as I recall, however every re-watch of Tenchi I enjoyed just as much. It's a good show that's aged well. I think the only real downfall is being copied so much over the years that many of us have burned out on such shows.

Tenchi Muyo is in many ways, the godfather of harem anime. I hesitate to use that term with Tenchi due to the modern stigma associated with it. Many girls live at Tenchi's house, however they are intended as characters, not simply as love interest options for the protagonist. As harem shows distilled this formula, details making characters important to the story were often lost. Each of them plays an important role in Tenchi Muyo. From the love interest angle, an unusual nuance of the girls in Tenchi Muyo: all of them are the WRONG choice. Each one (excepting Sasami unless age is her flaw) has one or more critical flaws making a relationship a bad idea. I think that's the reason Tenchi never pursues any of them, not because he's indecisive.

Production values are very high, as was the case for old school OVAs. Art style and animation hold up well even compared to modern titles. Originally available on VHS, this is a show which looks fantastic on Bluray. All that aside, what makes the OVA exceptional is a great sci-fi story which excels in imagination. I can't stress the imagination point enough; Tenchi Muyo has a fantastic backdrop few titles approach in reproducing. For a show which tries to do a bit of everything, this is the reason I came to like Tenchi over other such "all purpose" anime titles.

The first six OVAs are incredible, and I hate to say it, but it's been all downhill since then. Even the second OVA series (six episodes) started to taper, even if great quality. Starting at such a high point, the franchise has had a long slow descent into poor quality. Strangely enough, that also includes the third set of OVAs. After the second set of OVAs, the TV series began a run which is a completely different take on Tenchi with its own stories, but after a decade the OVA story was picked up again... and not well received. Anyway, if you've seen other Tenchi incarnations and wasn't impressed, the first two OVA series are well worth picking up.

[+] Dub and Sub Info

Well deserving of it's position as a classic, Tenchi Muyo is a well rounded fun anime with a good story, excelling with a wonderfully inspired environment. The story ends up in a odd spot that's not quite finished by the first two OVAs, but I can't say I ever felt it unfulfilling - even if I wanted to know what happened. (the third OVA series released so much later will have its own review). Tenchi Muyo is a great anime that's worth the watch.

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