Tenchi Muyo! OVA 3

[Space Pirate Roberts]

I knew there was a thread about this, but for some reason it's been locked. Anyway...

Tenchi Muyo! was my first exposure to "real" anime (i.e. not sanitized and bastardized for US TV), so it holds a very special place in my heart to this day. The various spin-offs and movies were fun, but being that the didn't advance the "real" story, they always seemed somewhat pointless. For years I've waited and hoped, seemingly in vain, for a show that would resolve the mysteries established in the final episodes of the classic OVA. At last they announced a third OVA series which should have done just that.

On seemingly no level does this show fail to disappoint.

First, the dub. In its day, the original Tenchi Muyo! dubs was one of the best on the market - one of the few where it really seemed like some effort went into it, even if it's not too hot by today's standards. Even so, with the same cast being used by Pioneer in all the spinoffs over the years, I (and I'd wager most fans) came to associate those voices pretty strongly with the characters, to the point that it's much harder to accept change than it is with other shows that undergo this sort of change.

To be fair, FUNimation did go to the effort of getting most of the core cast to come back - too bad they apparently didn't show them examples of their old work so they could remember how to do the voices again. Even though the credits list the same names, Tenchi and Mihoshi sound just plain wrong. Ayeka and Washu fare better, but something's still off. The only one that sounds just right is Sasami, which is no surprise since Sherry Lynn has continued using that exact same voice in numerous other works over the years.

And then there's Ryoko. Hoo boy. According to AnimeOnDVD, reports from conventions were that she actually sounded more like the original voice than the characters whose VAs returned. I'd like to know what these people were stuffing in their ears. The old Ryoko had the voice (though of course not the personality) most like that of a mature woman. The new Ryoko sounds like a twelve-year-old boy. Also disappointing is the recasting of Nobuyuki and Katsuhito/Yosho, played now by the same actor even though their old voices were nothing alike.

Of course, I'm sure there are some subtitle purists here to whom none of the above will matter. Is there anything that'll tick you off? Oh yes.

The show's overall tone and sense of humor is far less akin to classic Tenchi than it is to the cast of Tenchi guest-starring on Excel Saga. An example -one thing we get a lot of is extreme reaction shots, with the characters drawn with beastial features such as exaggeratedly pointed teeth and heavy black lines around the eyes - in the classic series, Ayeka looked cute even when she was pissed. It's a lot like GXP really, but there it was acceptable since that was a spin-off with a whole new cast.

Worst of all, things are done with the plot that are not only dumb on their own, but that flat-out contradict the classic series. It is revealed that all Juraians are descended from Earth, and that their living secretly on Earth is fairly commonplace. If this is so, then why was Azusa pissed at the idea of his children having relationships with Earthlings? And if Yosho's concealing his true age is standard operating procedure for Juraians living on Earth, why didn't Ayeka at least suspect that he wasn't really an old man back in the Kagato story arc?

It's also disappointing that they decided to make Airi from GXP Tenchi's maternal grandmother, rather than the Earthling wife we had always assumed Yosho to have taken. And the whole business with Tenchi's long-lost older sister (who looks just like his mother) is needlessly convoluted.

In the first half, this series has only barely touched on the main things I wanted it to deal with - who and what Lady Tokimi is, and what she wanted with Washu and then Tenchi; and Azusa's further scheming to force Yosho to come home and accept his role as heir, using Tenchi and the girls as pawns to do so. Unfortunately Azusa's role has been roundly undermined by the emphasis on Lady Seto, yet another GXP character.

[Fe 26]

So, should I assume pioneer did not the get the orginal writers and such to come back and do this? This sounds really different from the first stuff

[Space Pirate Roberts]

Pioneer isn't involved at all, I don't think. Definitely not on this end; FUNimation is releasing it here. IIRC the companies listed in the credits as producing it were Nippon TV and VAP.

[washus-gun]

Well I must say that it pains me to hear this tragedy that has happened to the only anime that is still #1 in my heart to this day since I first saw it in 2001. First they make us wait for what seemed like forever to continue the first OVA, and then they change the whole game up on us with the dubs. I kinda figured that the voices would change though when ol boy said that they were really gonna try to have the entire original cast but he wouldn't make any promises. Oh well. (sigh) Ryoko won't be the same and from what I read they might as well had chosen someone else to do Sasami too. If you're gonna change the most popular characters in the story(and I think I speak for all TM fans when I say that we've all grown very accustomed to the voices with the personalities; Tenchi, Ayeka, and Ryoko for sure hell, even Noboyouki!) change Sasami's too. It really sucks but I'm still gonna buy it and love it. It certainly won't be the same though.

[Chux]

There are only a few dubs that are near and dear to me, Ranma pre-season 4 and Tenchi... Sucks but when they span the course of years it's bound to happen.

[Frogacuda]

Worst of all, things are done with the plot that are not only dumb on their own, but that flat-out contradict the classic series.

None of the different Tenchi series have any continuity between them. They're not supposed to.

[Space Pirate Roberts]

Wrong. This was supposed to be a direct continuation of the original OVA line. Notice how it still has the "Ryo-Ohki" subtitle.

[Chux]

That's what I was led to believe as well.

[washus-gun]

So what about that GXP series? It's said to be lsome sort of continuation with the original OVA as well....Honestly they really should've kept that ish and never released it. It's alright but I think they're doing too much. I really didnt see the need to add so many new characters. Now the family tree is updated and everything is screwed up and i'm confused as hell to who's related to who, where'd this person come from, if she's adopted...and so on and so forth.

[Scourge]

Wrong. This was supposed to be a direct continuation of the original OVA line. Notice how it still has the "Ryo-Ohki" subtitle.

Hmmm. My interest is actually piqued now.