Urusei Yatsura, TV Series 1 (Episodes 1-4)

Amazon.com

This disc offers the first four installments of the 195-episode TV series based on Rumiko Takahashi's popular manga series, Urusei Yatsura ("Those Obnoxious Aliens"). In Japanese mythology, oni are hideous demons; Takahashi turns them into aliens. To save the Earth, high school lecher and nerd Ataru Moroboshi is pitted against the lovely, curvaceous Lum in a game of tag. When he wins, Lum believes he's proposed and moves in with his long-suffering parents. Shinobu, Ataru's girlfriend, objects and a skewed romantic triangle develops. Lum's friends and relatives begin arriving and complicating life further: cute little Ten breathes fire; staggeringly handsome Rei transforms into a tiger-monster. No wonder the neighbors want to run the Moroboshi family out of town. This slapstick comedy-romance anticipates Takahashi's Ranma 1/2, but Ataru, who has virtually no redeeming qualities, is less likable than Ranma. Unrated; suitable for ages 12 and up: Risqué humor and brief nudity. --Charles Solomon

Customer Reviews:

No Words to Describe.......2006-03-16

There really are no (English) words adequate to describe Urusei Yatsura- it's an animated absurdist romantic-comedy from outer space, it's a work of art which helped form the famed avant-garde anime director Mamoru Oshii's career, a groundbreaker which pioneered anime aimed at a more mature audience and popularized many of the now-standard anime gags; the list could go on for a VERY long time.

Before I go on with the review, I'd like to make a few corrections of misunderstandings from other reviews- for one, the DVD does indeed have a menu from which you can access the individual episodes (you just have to press the "Menu" button on your remote) and the transfer is top-notch for a show that, bear in mind, is from nearly thirty years ago. Originally a dub was created for the first four episodes, but due to its general atrociousness it was discontinued. I doubt many of the people buying this anime (generally being pretty hardcore anime fans) could care that much. The animation, while not as shiny as the later episodes or modern anime, was some of the best from the period. And Ataru is indeed likable- but I'll get to that later.

Urusei Yatsura (the title is a Japanese pun which is much too hard to explain in a limited format, but could rougly translate as "Those Obnoxious Aliens") was a breakthrough for several different giants of the manga and anime worlds. For one, it was the debut series of Ms. Rumiko Takahashi, the world's most popular female comic artist and multi-multi-multi-millionaire creator of some of the most loved and very best manga ever, and which helped her to cement that position. But if the manga was Takahashi's breakthrough, the anime was twice that for many of the most acclaimed directors, artists, and writers of the anime world, especially Mamoru Oshii, directors of such films as "Ghost in the Shell". But enough history.

The plot has been described in detail elsewhere, so I won't go that far into it, but suffice it to say that yes, it is just as weird and crazy as it sounds. What else could it be when the plot is centered around the most luckless, lecherous, nerdy loser on the face of the earth who just happens to be the exclusive, passionate love interest of a green-haired, tiger-skin bikini wearing and pheromone-exuding space princess with the sensual name "Lum" (pronounced "luhm", or in Japanese, even "ramu", not "loom" as I originally believed)?

For some reason, and I am no exception, many fans of Takahashi's work originally feel a little hesitation to pick up Urusei Yatsura, probably mostly from misinformed or biased reviews which describe the animation as outdated, etc. But trust me- its really hard, if you're a fan of anime, to NOT become hooked on this show. The comedy is much more wacky than what you can find in Ranma 1/2, but besides that, the show really has heart, with extraordinarily likeable characters and enjoyable situations. It's easy to fall in love with Lum, but Ataru is another story- many complaints say that, unlike Godai or InuYasha or Ranma, Ataru has no strong points. I disagree; yes, he may be a loser compared to the characters just mentioned, and yes, he really is an a**hole most of the time, but he has something that not many other male anime characters have- identifiability. He's just a normal, if very persistent, high-school age loser, who is thrust into the weirdness mostly against his will. Besides, I know it sounds cheesy, but the character has an ultimately good heart, and it comes out even in some of these earlier episodes.

The only reason I give 4 stars instead of 5 is that this first season is hardly the best, featuring the most dated animation and less interesting character development than the second season and onward(Oshii had yet to take the reigns). Indeed, many picking up the first four episodes might even be turned off- leaving us Urusei Yatsura veterans to only say "Please, hold out a little longer". The series really is a classic and a gem, but you have to give it a chance. I would suggest picking up one of the later volumes first, to get a sense of the series' potential, and then coming back to the first season.

Hugely Funny.......2005-12-25

Urusei Yatsura is based on the manga by Rumiko Takahashi, creator of Inuyasha. U.Y. was Takahashi's first success, and one of the most beloved series of the 1980's. Tiger bikini-clad Lum is still a popular character at cosplay conventions. However, the series is not as voraciously watched as Inuyasha. Whether this is because people think it is old, or dated, or the animation is not slick, they are missing out on true zany hilarity.

A little naughty, with a little nudity, the story is about an unlucky teen named Ataru who lives with his parents and becomes the love target of a sexy alien girl named Lum. There are so many crazy characters, most based on Japanese mythology, and an anything-goes "plotline." Ms. Takehashi has a wonderful imagination, and this series is strictly a steady stream of laughing gas.

Boys mets Alien.......2005-10-20

This tale of an alien princess, Lum in love with the worlds biggest lecher, Ataru, could only come from the wild mind Rumiko Takahashi. This comedy/sci-fi/romance is full of memorable characters like Ten, Sakura, Mendo, Shinodu, Ryunosuke, Ran, Cherry, and a lot of others. The stories will have you busting laughing and the animation is pretty good for 80's standards.

Those annoying aliens..........2005-04-12

Everybody has had bad days, but the bad days in "Urusei Yatsura (Those Annoying Aliens)" go on and on. The animated adaptation of Rumiko Takahashi's boy-meets-alien comedy is fairly good, but the DVD transfer is, well, definitely lacking. Think a videotape on disc.

Ataru Moroboshi is a woman-hungry teen with notorious bad luck. But things take a nasty turn when he is chosen as the champion of Earth. If he loses in a tag game, the Earth will be conquered by the alien Oni. Ataru initially refuses, until he sees his opponent -- buxom bikini-clad alien princess Lum. But tag with Lum is a bit harder than Ataru expected, because Lum can fly. It will take something major -- like a proposal from his long-suffering girlfriend Shinobu -- to get Ataru to win.

No sooner has Lum left Earth than Ataru is captured, and used as bait to lure her back. But an alien taxicab arrives instead, and soon the Earth is facing a fare of.... all the oil on the planet. Only Lum can help -- and she will only pay the fare if she can live with "Darling" from now on. With a jealous ex-girlfriend, a creepy monk and a devoted "wife" who can literally shock him senseless, Ataru has quite a few problems.

Soon Ataru has a new slew of "obnoxious aliens" to deal with: fire-breathing toddler Ten, and Lum's sexy but stupid ex-fiance Rei, who transforms into a tiger-cow, and has the appetite of a black hole. Then a toddler riding on a flying bear arrives, and causes more mayhem when he decides that he's going to find out what life is all about... even if he has to axe-murder Ten to do it.

For a twenty-year-old series, "Urusei Yatsura" has aged remarkably well -- except for the odd dated outfit, nothing much has changed. While it was Takahashi's earliest series, it was a good sitcommish story without much of a central storyline. It's a pretty faithful adaptation of the original comics, except that a few scenes have been omitted, and the stories have been shuffled around a little.

The DVD, sadly, is not quite as good. There is no English dubbing (except for "Darling!" and a handful of other English words), no extras, and no menu -- it simply starts playing, like a videotape. So you can't access an individual episode unless it plays to the end first -- very awkward. It does have a set of index cards in the box, which clue in American viewers on in-jokes, linguistic puns and Japanese cultural references (of which there are many).

Don't expect Ataru Moroboshi to be anything like Takahashi's later male leads -- he hasn't got the meek charm of Yusaku Godai, or the brash heroism of Ranma and Inuyasha. But despite the fact that he chases anything in a skirt, it's hard not to feel bad for him -- his luck is almost unnaturally bad. The super-strong Shinobu and determined Lum are good rivals for Ataru's affections. Bratty baby Ten and the brainless, monosyllabic Rei are also fun, and many a scene is stolen by the creepy monk Cherry.

While the DVD is below par, the first volume of "Urusei Yatsura" is enormous comic fun, especially for fans of the flying horned bikini-girl.

Classic of Anime Goodness!.......2003-06-10

This is a classic series brought to you by Takahashi Rumiko's unique brand of humor. Of course it wouldn't be a Takahashi series without a weird catch. In this, her first series, it happens to be that Ataru, a perverted HS student is cursed (through a series of bizarre events in the first episode,) with an alien girl named Lum who follows him everywhere in a tiger-striped bikini, calling him Darling. On the other hand Ataru kind of has real feelings for Shinobu, the girl he was kind of dating before Lum came to earth, and lusts after anything and everything female that he comes across, from the school nurse Sakura to a snow princess and a princess of the crow demons. This show is awesome. For fans of retro classics, this is definately it. I'd also like to say that if you like music in the early 80's style, the soundtrack to this is rather fun.

DVD:

DVD

DVD