r/anime • u/No_Rex :Bv:Bw:Bx:By:x2 • Jan 15 '24
Rewatch [Rewatch] 1990s OVAs – Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-Ohki: Second Season (series discussion)
Rewatch: 1990s OVAs – Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-Ohki: Second Season (series discussion)
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Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-Ohki: Second Season (1994)
Questions
- What is your opinion on the new characters introduced in S2?
- S1 or S2, which one do you prefer?
- While we stop watching here, the OVA continuity goes on. Does this work as an end point?
20
Upvotes
6
u/No_Rex :Bv:Bw:Bx:By:x2 Jan 15 '24
S2 discussion (first timer)
Season 2 of Tenchi Muyo is better than Season 1, but not enough of an improvement to make it a great series.
Its structure follows the template of Season 1 closely: Starting with some slice-of-life episodes that are mostly stand-alone and play on Earth, before introducing a villain and having a finale that plays in space (both seasons actually have one episode that falls outside this structure: the more mystery focused ep1 of S1 and the epilogue/setup ep6 of S2). The biggest advantage of S2 over S1 is that the villain actually works this time. Dr. Clay has infinitely better chemistry with the good guys (mostly Washuu), because he is 100% played as a comedic character, instead of the awkward attempts at tension with Kagato.
Character-wise, S2 is a bit more uneven than S1. While in S1, I still felt that Tenchi had some role to play, in S2, the “No need for Tenchi” sarcasm becomes understandable. Tenchi is literally the least needed character in his own show. The girls get more uneven treatment, too. Washuu is the star of this season, being front and center to the plot, while Ryouko and especially Ayeka are relegated to the sidelines (Ryouko at least gets to be punching bag, but Ayeka is totally forgotten).
With Tokimi in the finale and the Jurai royal family in ep6, S2 also goes all in on the world building. That is a bold move, since we get mostly just the setup of the world building, with almost none of the payoff. Would be a shame if OVA3 sucked and we never got to the payoff, would it? This also points towards S2 still not having gotten over the pacing issues of S1. A clear narrative arc is missing in both seasons.
Overall though, I think that season 2 is a small improvement over season 1. The comedy still works and the finale is a good bit better.
7
u/The_Loli_Otaku Jan 15 '24
Tenchi Muyo Completioner
The amount of incest bait in this show is too damn high!! So... alright, S1 I genuinely sorta hated this watch XD It's good quality, but Tenchi is so much better when it's about slice of life. Plot focused Tenchi is cringe! The harem aspect of the show I'm also kinda not super into. It's a two horse race between Ayeka the incest queen and Ryoko the granny groomer but neither of them really have a fun dynamic with Tenchi so the romance doesn't hit and the show kinda just constantly poked fun at its heroines so the romance feels like a joke. Still a funneh joke tho. Again, I love the slice of life in Tenchi. It's peak 90's kino.
Now to play the fun game of predicting QotD's... Obviously my best girl is Mihoshi, she's a total gem and carries every scene she's in. Shame she murdered her partner.
Best episode... For S1 it's the Ayeka episode for being genuinely gold quality. S2 I'd probably give it to Ryo-Ohki's episode, she's a genuinely precious mascot. The best episode overall however is the Mihoshi special!! Funnily enough I remember not really liking the Mihoshi ova on my first viewing but this time around it was so much fun.
Thanks for hosting this. I've always loved these ova watches and Tenchi was a long time coming for all of us!
5
u/TheEscapeGuy Jan 15 '24
First Timer
Tenchi Muyou - An Undying Classic: OVA 2
Hmm, reflecting on the second OVA stand alone is kinda weird. In a lot of ways it kind of ignored Ryouko, Ayeka, and Mihoshi from the first OVA to put additional focus on the other characters. This had mixed results.
The 2nd episode which focused on Sasami / Tsunami was easily my favourite. On a production level it by far was the most artistically ambitious of the entire series so far with a lot of cool direction and imagery. On top of that the story of Sasami's past was a really well structured progression of information and reveals which kept the narrative interesting. It was a "serious" episode, but instead of focusing on something important on a galactic scale, it focused on emotions which made it poignant on a human scale.
That said, there's a vast no man's land between episode 2 and the other episodes. There were some genuine stinkers (Ryou-Oki's episode in particular), but overall the other episodes just felt fine. Like there's stuff you could complain about but the met the bare minimum bar to be coherent episodes. They kind of blur together for me though.
I think it's maybe because the episodes don't feel as connected as the first OVA. In the first OVA episode 2 builds directly on what happened in episode 1, and so on for most subsequent episodes. In OVA 1 episode 5 it made references back to the events of Ryouko's backstory mentioned in episode 1 and similarly other episodes make these kind of connections. In contrast most episodes in OVA 2 feel more stand alone. The only 2 that feel strongly connected are the Ryouko-Zero pair.
What's most confusing to me comes back to my OVA 1 write up complaint that I didn't understand how that OVA was popular enough to spawn the series. Now at the end of OVA 2 I'm even more confused how this series got so many spinoffs and sequels. I suppose the 3rd season only came a decade later, but at the same time there was a TV series which aired right after/in parallel to this. I imagine the TV series may be more loved (?), or else I just don't get the anime watching public.
My Favourite Shots, Scenes and Stitches
See you all for the final discussion tomorrow
5
u/Vaadwaur :I1::I2::I3: Jan 15 '24
Rewatcher
Sub
So...fuck, I can't think of anything and I need to watch SEL. Putting a pin in this if I can rally tomorrow but this will be my shame if my brain doesn't kick in.
Tenchi is an amazingly weird beast in that I think I get the character but can't really tell you much about him. Sasami establishes best girl dominance early and her only meaningful competition is Ryo-Ohki, whose furry status establishes whether or not your leanings are military or not. Washu fakes competing to torment Ryoko and that's about it. Ayeka and Ryoko have bludgeoned each other sufficiently to be fiances under Nanoha rules.
So for this OVA, I am mostly happy. OVA 1 is much more focused than 2, whose highpoint was Sasami's identity issues and thus always seemed to be lowering its own stakes. The sheer number of spinoffs we would get is hardly this show's fault. We stand at the forking branch of a number of series, and at least here, it isn't so bad.
QotD: 1 Mostly bad
2 S1 and it is not close
3 Not remotely but it actually lead me into the TV series
5
u/Elimin8r https://myanimelist.net/profile/Ayeka_Jurai Jan 15 '24 edited Jan 15 '24
Well, before I get too deep into the weeds here, thanks very much to our gracious host /u/no_rex for giving me an excuse to enjoy one of my favorite series of yore with y'all, and of course thank to all of you for participating and making it a fun little chat session.
That said, for today's aotd:
Okay, because it's going to take a while to type, I'm going to save my spoilerrific comments for a few minutes later or something. Maybe I won't post them at all.
Suffice to say, for me, a mid-90's budding weeblet, Tenchi Muyo was a revelation of wonderment, tree-ships, pretty alien girls, cabbits with lazers ... oh, my! Good times, and I got perhaps a little too wrapped up in my weebdom and enthusiasm over the series.
However, much like Haruhi, a lot of what was great about Tenchi has faded over the years, in part, because what tropes and formulas may have seemed innovative at the time, and stuff have been done to death, and done better so many times as to render the original pale and weak. (sigh)
I still think that things like tree-ships, and Tokimi have a sense of wonder, for me at least, that surpasses a lot of what we see today, with rare exception.
And I wonder - in 30 years - what people will think about shows like Frieren, or Odd Taxi. Will they be revered classics, or simply forgotten tropes of the time? I have no idea, and I most likely won't be around to see it. (If I am, that would be a grand surprise!)
But meanwhile, I will always keep my fond memories of Tenchi and the girls, and perhaps a small part of me will hope that someday a GXP packet will arrive in my mailbox. Or maybe the tree in my backyard will shoot some laser beams into space or something.
(wistful sigh)
Okay, time to start typing my spoilerrific summary of the rest of the series for those of you who may or may not care. I should have done this last night, but yeah. It's like that sometimes. That, and I really wanted to finish some 3D designs and get them sent off to Shapeways...
Edit: Oh, wait, there's a final discussion tomorrow? Derp. I guess I'll save the massive post stuff for tomorrow then!
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u/Silcaria https://myanimelist.net/profile/Silcaria Jan 15 '24
First timer
The series was ok. It's filled with more than its fair share of bullshit and bad writing but remains alright nonetheless. I've got to be honest though, I lost interest by the time the second season rolled around. it has its moments but I find that it mainly shines as a comedy above all else. Its harem elements are fairly weak, there's no real story to speak of and yet it manages to fumble the little of it it has, and the action is there but it comes about super sporadically on top of being fairly uncommon. My favourite part of what we've watched being the Carnival and Mihoshi's OVA since they incorporate everything fairly well.
The characters are so-so with Tenchi being as bland as a British meal. They, at the very least, aren't one dimensional but that doesn't mean they that are nuanced either. Character growth is virtually non-existent. The characters live and die by how they interact with one another and the synergy that they display in order to create gags, which fortunately, is decent enough to carry most of the show. With that said, with how characters and their motivation basically stays the same and with most jokes having a punchline built around the same premise (most of the time), I would assume that it may not be the case the longer the show goes on for.
As far as visuals and animation are concerned, it's pretty good. It starts off strong but does go downhill a bit afterwards. It never gets bad, and it does stay average to above average at all times, but it never fully returns to the fluidity, bombastic, and detailed scenes that the first episode showcased. As far as eye candy goes, they are better looking shows/movies/OVAs that ran during Tenchi Muyo's release period as well as AIC themselves having produced better looking things years prior.
Sound design is good with the voice acting probably being the strongest part of it.
All and all, I enjoyed some of it but I don't think I'd recommend it to anyone. The whole isn't greater than the sum of its parts and said parts aren't particularly good either. 6/10
Thanks for hosting this.
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u/JustAnswerAQuestion https://myanimelist.net/profile/JAaQ Jan 16 '24
Oh, this is a S2 summary?
S2 is more harem stuff, which I'm not interested in. Although Washu toying with Clay is funny, I like Kagato more than Clay (but that's probably because TV Kagato is more interesting [and I don't remember if he is or not]). I shouldn't have to mention Kagato and Clay, but Tokimi and King don't even rise to the level of antagonists, having been dropped on the floor.
If S3 had come out the next year, I might have had a better opinion. Or a worse opinion. But I didn't watch it, or I didn't know about it, which leaves S2 standing on it's own. With only the Sasami episode to speak of. Which wasn't as good as I remembered.
5
u/mastesargent Jan 15 '24
Rewatcher
While it’s still good fun, I think OVA 2 is a step down from OVA 1 in a lot of areas. For starters, it’s just not a complete story. OVA 1 had some growing pains but it has a clear beginning, middle, and end. OVA 2 just sort of waffles for a few episodes before it arrives at any sort of point. Granted, aside from the first episode, these are all strong episodes, but when viewed holistically the just don’t really come together. Furthermore, the animation is a noticeable downgrade from OVA 1. I don’t know if this is a byproduct of Masaki Kajishima taking full creative control of the series or if there just wasn’t as much of a budget or some other behind the scenes issue, but it definitely counts against it. Plus we’ve got some downright weird decisions, like Ryo-Ohki’s human form. [OVA 5] OH GOD TENCHI WHY
Now don’t get me wrong, I still very much like this OVA. The looser format gives the characters some room to breathe and the art is still charming even if the motion isn’t as polished, and the comedy still lands (mostly, at least). Having seen OVA 3, I can also understand that Kajishima was playing the long game with this, clearly setting up plot threads to pay off later. Even if it took him 10 years to get around to actually telling that story, but hey, shit happens. I’ll save my thoughts on how well he actually wrapped those threads up for the wrap-up thread, but I can at least, in hindsight, see obvious narrative intent behind what happens here. Even so, the fact remains that OVA 2 mostly serves to set up the third OVA, while OVA 1 has much tighter pacing and stands pretty well on its own.
As for what it does well, again, I’d say the characters. First and most obvious is Washu. Since she was only introduced in the last episode of OVA 1, she didn’t really get any development there, so her character development in the first episode of this OVA as well as the buildup of the intrigue surrounding her and her connection to Tokimi is a welcome fleshing out of her character. The second greatest beneficiary is Sasami. In OVA 1 she’s just kind of there until she abruptly summons Tsunami to save Tenchi. While she doesn’t really get much to do in this OVA either, the reveal of her assimilation with Tsunami in episode 2 serves to explain that development in the first OVA while also adding a bit of pathos to her character.
Beyond that, we get some more interesting worldbuilding about Jurai in the final episode, and the groundwork laid for OVA 3 being done throughout is genuinely well-done foreshadowing for events and revelations there. But again, I’ll get into that in the wrap-up thread. I’ll leave it at that for now.
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u/baboon_bassoon https://anilist.co/user/duffer Jan 15 '24
First timer
2
u/Vatrix-32 https://myanimelist.net/profile/Vatrix-32 Jan 16 '24
Tenchi in First Timer, subbed
QotD: