urusei yatsura

By Rumiko Takahashi. Released in Japan in two separate volumes by Shogakukan, serialized in the magazine Shonen Sunday. Released in North America by Viz Media. Translated by Camellia Nieh.

Every fan has their obsessive favorite minor character. Usually more than one. I have two when it comes to Takahashi’s work. I’ve already discussed Akari Unryuu, Ryouga’s girlfriend in the later parts of the manga in my reviews of that. As you might have guessed, my favorite Urusei Yatsura character makes their debut in this volume. No, not Kotatsu-neko, though he sort of amusingly stoic. No, not the school principal either, though it is funny that both he and Kotatsu-neko debuted around the same time. No, it’s Shutaro Mendo’s younger sister Ryoko, introduced here as essentially an agent of chaos in a series entirely composed of agents of chaos. Ryoko is fickle, bored, and also a sociopath, happy to trigger her brother’s fears of the dark, annoy him by flirting with Ataru, or simply toss a hundred grenades out her window because it’s fun. Most North American fans experiences her Ranma knockoff, Kodachi Kuno, first. Accept no substitutes, though, Ryoko is best unfiltered.

Having established most of the regulars by now, Takahashi is starting to experiment with her work, dialing up some things and ramping back some others. Ran, who’d vanished for a while, is back on a semi-regular basis. So is Rei, and we start to get the start of the eventual Ran/Rei pairing when we see the one thing that’s sure to win Rei over: food. (Lum’s cooking, usually lethal to Ataru, is implied at times to also be lethal to actual aliens – she fills the ‘can’t cook’ stereotype box.) Oyuki is starting to be the soft-spoken yamato nadesico, but is still wearing her battle bikini rather than her kimono. And she’s dipping back into Japanese history again – this is the first book to feature new, never before officially translated manga material, and I can imagine 1990s Viz translators wanting to cut the chapters where Ataru is Zenigata (no, not the Lupin one). Nowadays, there are actual endnotes to explain things like Ryoko’s kuroko attendants (being a drama major, they are another reason I love Ryoko).

Also, while it’s always been around, we’re really starting to see a lot more fourth-wall breaking here. Tezuka started this, of course, and Takahashi’s friend and colleague Mitsuru Adachi also does it. But Takahashi is as broad and blatant about it as with the rest of UY’s humor, with Lum appearing on the title page to complain that she’s barely in this chapter, and other characters complaining about Ataru not being in it at the start because he’s still in bed. UY is a performative manga that its characters know they’re in, but they aren’t actors. For the most part the stories are still one-shot chaotic messes, though sometimes chapters run into each other, such as the first part of the book detailing the students trying to leave school to get lunch outside campus, which ends up being the students simply ditching school entirely.

As these chapters were being written, the anime was also being created – it debuted in the Fall of 1981, right around the time the Ryoko chapters would have been in the magazine. As the manga goes on, there will be a little influence from one on the other – though less than you’d expect. Fans of the anime might be startled, though, by one chapter here early in the manga being the basis for the final episode of the anime. That said, even if you’re not an experienced UY fan, these volumes are still chaotic, funny fun.

By Rumiko Takahashi. Released in Japan in two separate volumes by Shogakukan, serialized in the magazine Shonen Sunday. Released in North America by Viz Media. Translated by Camellia Nieh.

One of the well-known factoids about the Urusei Yatsura manga is that is is unsentimental. Now, this is not really all that true. There’s plenty of sweet moments scattered throughout its pages. But it is, when compared to its anime adaptation, a lot more interested in laughs than heartwarming. There’s a chapter in this volume where the Moroboshi house is dealing with a hurricane that’s flooded the entire place thanks to some of Lum’s technology, and the manga does not have the touching Ataru/Lum moments the anime put in. Even the manga moments that clearly ARE sentimental are subordinate to the comedy – the longest extended story in this volume has Ataru hitch a ride on Ten’s spaceship to stop Lum getting married off by her dad. Ten being tiny, Ataru spends most of his time stuck in a funny crouch – it’s especially funny when he stops a guy from hitting on Lum by stomping on him, then goes back to pretending he’s not really there. But Lum recognizes him, and smiles. See? Sentimental. Just.

No new major characters are introduced here, though we do get a few two-or-three chapter girls for Ataru and company to deal with. The best of these is the girl who, thanks to her dad, is literally followed by rain everywhere she goes. Miserable, she is nonetheless touched when Ataru insists on dating her anyway, even if it means he just gets a cold. (Unfortunately, her father looks exactly like an abusive dad we will meet later in the series, which sort of threw me off as I was reading it.) And there’s a ghost who everyone tries to help move on to the next world, but is far more interested in mooching off of everyone in this one. Lastly, we get an elderly vampire and his bat companion, most noteworthy for the male bat transforming into a human girl to trick Ataru… something very quickly regretted.

Ataru and Lum have mostly settled into their permanent characterization here. Mendou and Shinobu are here as well, but they mostly function as part of the Greek chorus, so don’t get as much face time. Shinobu has not yet gotten to the point where she can rip trees out of the ground to threaten people with. As a result, these chapters feel very much like a relaxing rest stop for the series, where we can sit back and enjoy the chaos caused, with one exception, on Earth. Soon the “main cast” aliens will return in a big way, and the plots will get even sillier. Certainly there’s not going to be much romantic development – Ataru may not want Lum to get married, but he’s not about to stop trying to date anyone and everyone. Even Tsubame and Sakura, who are an actual couple, can’t settle down to make out without everyone horning in.

Fortunately, a new semi-regular debuts next volume. Unfortunately for you, she’s my favorite character in the whole series. So if you want to hear me gush – a lot – about Kodachi Kuno only done WELL, tune in next time. Till then, this is still a must read.

By Rumiko Takahashi. Released in Japan in two separate volumes by Shogakukan, serialized in the magazine Shonen Sunday. Released in North America by Viz Media. Translated by Camellia Nieh.

I’ll be honest, I wasn’t looking forward to this volume quite so much. Don’t get me wrong, I love UY with all my heart. But I knew we were going to get a heaping helping of Ten here, and Jariten has always grated on me. That said, as I re-read these manga chapters, he didn’t come off quite as badly as I’d expected. The thing is, Ten was SUPER popular when he first appeared in Japan – if not with the readers, then definitely with the animators of the soon-to-come anime series, which took the liberty of inserting Ten into the third episode and having him shoehorned into most episodes after that. But “bratty little kid” has always been a harder sell in the West, particularly if they’re not the ‘sarcastic adult’ kind of brat – look at the four or five failed attempts to sell Crayon Shin-chan here. So it was always hard for me to not just grit my teeth. But here, in the manga chapters written specifically for him, he’s a lot of fun.

Ten, like Mendo before him, is meant to set up a basic truth of the series. Many of the male characters are set up to be contrasts to Ataru, only for it to turn out in the end that they’re exactly the same as Ataru. Ten is a “cute little baby” to most of the women around him, which he uses shamelessly, as he notes he’s not into young girls his own age. (What age that is is left up in the air – he certainly seems very angry when someone calls his tiger skin a diaper.) But of course, Ataru never gets anywhere with any girl not named Lum, and the same applies to Ten – sure, he can snuggle in some bosoms, but he’s essentially just as much of a sad sack as everyone else in the book. He’s also naive enough to be taken in by Ataru’s really, really obvious schemes – see the chapter where he and Sakura go on a “date” that is meant to have her beat him like Ataru but doesn’t work as Ten is a x-year-old boy.

Elsewhere, Ran settles in as a main cast member, though when the focus isn’t on her, her characterization can vary – during the poetry competition, she seems like a different person! There’s a 3-chapter arc set during the Heian period… sort of, note they’re all watching TV and have electricity… which is basically there to show that the cast’s crazy adventures are timeless. Probably my favorite chapter is one where Ataru has made an “anti-teenage gang” movie for the school. It’s absolutely terrible, and Mendo tries to have it destroyed, but instead, thanks to Lum’s alien projector, the delinquents in the movie come to life and terrorize the school… then fend off an invasion by delinquents from another school. From seeing the main cast dressed up as stereotypical delinquents, to movie-Ataru’s ‘LOVE AND PEACE!’, to movie-Lum and Shinobu literally being able to fire huge missiles from under their skirts, it’s pure Takahashi hilarity.

With Ten’s arrival, we’re almost at UY’s middle period here. Takahashi has settled in and is doing what she does best – writing zaniness. Anyone who loves seeing what comedy manga was like at its peak should be reading this.

By Rumiko Takahashi. Released in Japan in two separate volumes by Shogakukan, serialized in the magazine Shonen Sunday. Released in North America by Viz Media. Translated by Camellia Nieh.

After the soft reboot of this series with the arrival of Shutaro Mendo, Takahashi is going back and trying to see how she can work the pile of characters she introduced at the start back into the series, while also introducing new and hilarious regulars. Sometimes this works and sometimes it does not. The first half of this volume succeeds in re-integrating Sakura into the cast, now the high school nurse in addition to a shrine priestess, and we also meet Mendo’s rival Tobimaro Mizunokoji, a baseball-obsessed samurai type who is after revenge but is too dim to get it. (He’s also really obsessed with his childhood friend/rival, and has a passel of gorgeous female bodyguards that he barely pays attention to. I don’t think Takahashi intended him to have gay overtones, but…) Sakura will stay a regular, and Tobimaro will pop up now and then throughout the series. But not every new character is destined to become part of our beloved cast.

(The cover art, which has Ryuunosuke and her father; Sugar, Ginger and Pepper; and Kotatsu-neko – none of whom are introduced yet – is a tad spoilery. As are the endnotes, which discuss Ran before Ran is introduced.)

The second part of this volume seems like a series of failed cast introductions. Hanako-sensei is introduced to be a variation on the “well-meaning teacher who wants to inspire youth”, but he’s honestly pretty dang dull, and will quickly be replaced by Onsen Mark (who we’ve seen before) becoming a regular. (I will gloss right over Onsen Mark’s name in this omnibus, thanks much.) Natsuko’s volleyball-obsessed girl filled with rage is a very amusing arc, with great facial expressions, but she’s not someone you can imagine showing up over and over again. The same with Kaede the runaway ninja girl, who honestly seems like she’d be better off far away from Ataru and company. Fortunately, at the very end we meet Lum’s cousin and childhood “friend” Ran, who arrives with a cute act and a thirst for revenge, and is easily the best part of the back half of the book. You can see why she sticks around.

As for our regulars, they do pretty well. Ataru and Lum are fighting less, and frequently team up against common enemies (my favorite part being “Cry, Lum.” “Waaaaaaahh!” “See, you made her cry!”). Now, Lum still gets angry, and can be seen hear biting Ataru on the arm in addition to shocking him, but Ataru doesn’t seem to resent her presence anymore. Which is good, as she transfers into his school in this volume, thus helping to avoid finding reasons for her to show up in the classroom. The addition of the other cast members also helps take the focus of the manga off “will Ataru choose Lum” and focus more on “this obnoxious cast of obnoxious humans and aliens”, which will help it survive for the remaining fourteen omnibuses.

So there are some growing pains in this book, but it’s still highly entertaining, and Takahashi’s art has gotten to the point where you don’t have to apologize for it anymore. Still essential.

By Rumiko Takahashi. Released in Japan in two separate volumes by Shogakukan, serialized in the magazine Shonen Sunday. Released in North America by Viz Media. Translated by Camellia Nieh.

UY gets a bit of a reboot about a quarter of a way into this omnibus. The cast is streamlined, with a lot of the alien girls after Ataru vanishing (some will be back – Benten, Oyuki – and some won’t – Kurama), and Megane and his three friends also vanishing from the manga (the anime will keep them around, for good and ill). In their place we get Shutaro Mendo, and he immediately shows us that he is going to be a main cast member fot the long haul. Indeed, after Ataru, Lum and Shinobu he’s the biggest member of the cast, and much of this volume is dedicated to showing off his best features (his money, his looks) and his worst features (everything else about him). Takahashi makes a point of showing early on that without his wealth and good looks, he’d be just like Ataru – but of course, he DOES have wealth and good looks, so the girls all fall for him anyway.

This includes Shinobu, who the endnotes at the end of the volume call out for having bad taste in men, and it’s hard to deny, as Mendo will forever be willing to abandon her at a moment’s notice if he can get Lum instead. (Shinobu will get a happy ending, but you may have to wait till Omnibus 16 or so to start seeing it.) There are a few chapters that show off Mendo trying to woo Lum, but he’s at a huge disadvantage, as Lum’s love for Ataru never really wavers at all – even when she’s dating others, it’s in an effort to make him jealous. Here we see her even disguising herself to save Ataru from his own foolishness, or alternatively so he can pretend she’s a real Japanese girl when they go out. As for Ataru, at the start we see he has the same attitude about Lum as he did before – he wants her gone – but this also changed as the story moves forward.

Ataru is, for the most part, a womanizing creep, and this won’t change, though it’s worth noting that even with these traits he’s still one of the better catches in the class. The ‘fake girl for Ataru’ chapter, which the anime put at Christmas and expanded greatly, is the first time that he actually realizes that Lum is gorgeous, and that plus the fact that she clearly went out of her way to help him leads him to soften his stance on her. He still declares that they aren’t going out or married, but she’s become an ally to him now. Two chapters in a row show this off best. In one, he befriends a caterpillar that wants to eat everything – and we do mean everything – and he and Lum try to protect it from the rest of the class, who find it creepy. This works out better than anyone could expect. In the other, possibly the most famous chapter of the series (its anime adaptation was voted the #1 episode by Japan), Lum vanishes, leaving behind only a cute little doll that looks like her, and Ataru worries that he genuinely drove her off.

Heartwarming moments like these are far more common in the anime than in the manga, but they do happen, and for a good purpose – now Ataru is fighting against his affection for Lum, rather than just seeing her as an invader. Now that the core cast of four has been solidified, we can also start to expand the world once more, and we’ll see that in the next volume. Also, Takahashi’s art settles down here – there are some gorgeous pieces of art on display in these pages.

By Rumiko Takahashi. Released in Japan in two separate volumes by Shogakukan, serialized in the magazine Shonen Sunday. Released in North America by Viz Media. Translated by Camellia Nieh.

I had reviewed the first five volumes of UY back in the days before my blog was part of Manga Bookshelf. At the time, it seemed like a pipe dream that we’d ever see more of it over here. It was started by Viz then cancelled, then put into Animerica Magazine and then cancelled there, then it was back to 32-page floppies, and finally it ground to a halt after 9 volumes (which covered up to about Book 11 in Japan owing to them skipping a bunch of chapters). It was the classic “how many times do you want us to beat our heads against this wall?” series. But now the manga market is stronger, Takahashi’s reputation is super high, and so not only do we get the return of UY, uncut and in omnibus format, we also get it released digitally, the first time this has happened for her series over a multi-platform format. It is truly a love song for Lum. Of course, new readers may be wondering: what’s the big deal?

The manga was originally supposed to be about an unlucky boy (whose very name loosely means “born under a bad sign”), his long-suffering and hot-tempered girlfriend, and the amusing situations that happen in their hometown of Tomobiki. Ataru Moroboshi attracts trouble. In the first chapter, that trouble is aliens, as he has to run a tag race against alien ogres so the Earth is not taken over. His opponent is Lum, who is a hot babe but also has a volatile temper. And can fly. After defeating and accidentally proposing to her, the next chapter is Lumless, and you might be deceived (if it were 1978, which it isn’t) into thinking that Lum would be a minor one-shot character… sort of like many of the other girls introduced in these two volumes. That said, the series is translated as “Those Obnoxious Aliens”, and it’s clear in the third chapter that Lum is back to stay. And also insanely popular.

As with a lot of long-running series, the characterization at the start is a bit off. Ataru is almost sympathetic at times, and occasionally makes the effort to be faithful to Shinobu and not be what he is famous for being, a giant horndog. By the end of this omnibus, that’s mostly worn off. Lum too is far nastier than we’re used to seeing, clearly an antagonist. As for Shinobu… well, no, she’s pretty much the same, though she too is unsympathetic much of the time. In fact, if you’re looking for anyone to root for, “look elsewhere” might be the best answer. This series runs on pure comedy, and Takahashi’s brand of comedy means watching people be terrible for fun. It works. These are terrible people. It’s fun. Ataru’s parents constantly wish he’d never been born. The town despises him (because he brings massive property damage). Cherry is possibly the most irritating character in the entire 34-volume series, which says a LOT. But the humor is there. This is a romp. You’ll find yourself laughing, but also slapping your forehead.

We do meet a large number of the main cast in this book, but they won’t last long… for now. Benten and Oyuki are oddly there to be Lum’s rivals for Ataru’s affection – that will change soon. Ataru’s friends aren’t even named (one is definable by his glasses… and not, thank god, his love of Nazi memorabilia), but they too won’t last long. Much as Viz attempted to reboot the series a couple of times here in North America, Takahashi will also reboot her own series starting in the next volume, with the introduction of the fourth and final “main” character. As for whether you should buy it again… yes. The quality of the reproduction is MUCH better than the original Viz volumes, especially the digital version. The translation is also less intrusive than the original, retaining puns when they’re obvious, but not feeling the need to make more jokes than Takahashi already is. It reads very smoothly.

Again, if you find yourself wishing “I wish everyone was a smidge less awful”, the second omnibus may help a bit. Only a bit, mind. These are characters to laugh AT, not with. I can’t wait for more.