SUMMARY
Ataru is the worlds
laziest, lecherous, looser. Everything he does winds up causing himself as
well as the people around him more trouble. Now, this waste of a human
being has somehow managed to save the Earth from the Oni, a group of
intergalactic invaders who came to take over Earth.
Due to an off handed comment in the heat of battle, Lum,
the champion for the Oni, is now convinced that Ataru wants to marry her.
Now he is stuck with a girl who will give him electric shocks if he so
much as looks at another woman. He also has to put up with Lum's family, a
legion of male Lum fans who want to kill Ataru, and his long suffering
girlfriend, Shinobu, who also wants to kill him.
A new rival for Lum's and Shinobu's affections has
arrived. His name is Mendou Shutaro, he is the descendent of the
Mendou clan, an ancient and powerful family that has been a part of
Japanese history for hundreds of years. He is rich, smooth, and
handsome, everything Ataru is not. Medou has once purpose in life,
to make all those bow to his will.
Not only does Ataru have to fight for the affections of
his lady lusts, he also has to fight Benten and the Lucky Gods, the bitter
rivals of Lum's race, the Oni. Of course, Benten is very beautiful,
and so Ataru is compelled to go after her, even if it means the Oni loose.
It seems that Ataru is close to loosing everything he
wants in life.
Don't you believe it.
DVD VISION TEST
VIDEO: AnimEigo has done a fine job of transferring this
20 year old anime to DVD. The colors are solid, with no color bleeding,
wrinkles, or pixels to be seen. The image is sharp and the washed out look
of the original video is gone except for the opening. However, a lot of
the scratches and nicks still remain, especially in the opening segment.
AUDIO: The original Japanese 2.0 audio track is pretty
sharp and clear. Despite it being a 20 year and counting TV series, the it
sound almost like new. There is a barely audible mono hiss, and there is
slight surround sound mix. Audiophiles may be disappointed. Purists
will be pleased.
EDITS: Not a single frame has been edited. The original
open and close are still there, with optional subtitles.
EXTRAS: None on the disc. There is a set of Liner notes cards in the box,
with some explanations about the plethora of in jokes.
WIDESCREEN REVIEW
STORY: Based off of
the manga series by Rumiko Takahashi, Urusei Yatsura is a funny and
interesting take on Japanese life. Many of the typical conventions of life
in Japan (despite it being set in the 80, many of
its themes are still current) are blown up way out of context. At times a
romantic comedy, at times slapstick, the team of writers do a good job of
balancing the two.
ACTING: With only the Japanese track to review, it is
pretty easy to sum up the acting. Wonderful. When anime really hit its
stride in the late 70's, early 80's, so did the voice acting. Never has a
voice sounded so perfect for a character as Fumi Hirano's Lum. With the
right mix of playful sexuality and strong femininity, she gives us the
voice to go with this fan favorite. The other great actor in UY is Toshio
Furukawa as Ataru. He screams well, his voice takes on a sort of a dreamy,
lecherous drawl that reminds me of Homer Simpson in one of his
"transcendent" moments. Like Lum, you can imagine another voice
doing it.
FAN SERVICE: Plenty. There is Lum, queen of the fan
serve. The first episode on this disc takes place on the beach, so there
is tons of women in bikinis and sexy swimsuits.
Of course, the other type of fan service is there. There
are references to several classic anime as well as joke about Japanese
culture and history and even literary jokes. There is even a scene that
fans of Project Ako may find familiar. While many jokes may be
obscure to American audiences, those with a watchful eye will have a great
time figuring out what they are satirizing.
CONCLUSION
After the rather luke warm offerings of the previous
disc, this one brings back some more of the over the top, improbable
stories we have come to expect. There are some real funny episodes
in this volume, and plenty of "fan serve" to go around.
In a change from previous volumes, the new character for
this disc is a Man. Mendou Shurato, perhaps the suavest, most driven
character since Char Anzable of "Gundam". This man is a
master of all things, he is brilliant, he is rich, and he can draw women
to him instantly. You would think he is the total opposite to Ataru.
He is not.
Superficially, they are different. Ataru is a fool
while Mendou is smart. Ataru's policy is to attack women first,
Mendou's policy is to make them come to him. Mendou is driven to
succeed, Ataru is driven to succeed with women. However (and I give
the writers credit), there are cracks in Mendou's perfect veneer.
First, he and Ataru are Aries. According to
Shiobu's horoscope book, they are lewd and vulgar, and nothing can
eliminate their urge to fulfill their desires. Second, while Ataru
is open about his urges and desires, Mendou hides them with his cool
demeanor and handsome good looks. Third (and I am getting into the
next volume here), Mendou does and says some things you would never expect
to hear.
Some more insights into Japanese culture are revealed in
this volume with the Spring Festival, where people throw beans to drive
the Oni away, and Open Class, where parents come to school to watch their
children and their teacher conduct class. The funny thing about Open
Class, it has nothing really to do with education, but a lot to do with
"keeping up with the Joneses".
Another interesting part about this volume is the use of
languages other than Japanese. While Lum uses "Darling"
and other English words, it's a shock to her Ataru actually speak a full
sentence! Okay, it may not be grammatically correct, but he doesn't
mangle it to bad. Perhaps an un-intentional book end, the last
episode on this disc has Lum's mom arriving on Earth. Lum's mother
does not speak Japanese or even English (while Ataru once again tries his
English on mom). She speaks Oni, which makes no sense to non-Oni
speakers. AnimEigo, in the spirit of fun, have given us Oni
subtitles, for those of us who can actually read Oni.
A couple of other "random" observations. One,
the introduction of a teacher that looks a cross between "Lupan"
and "D" from the beginning of "Project Ako".
Another is that the fighter planes from Mendou's army looks similar to the
new F-22 Raptors.
Wouldn't it be funny if those planes were really based off of UY?
Disc wise, I did notice something a little different
with this volume. When I watched this DVD on my computer, I really
noticed the slight mono hiss and the large amount of wrinkling in the
video. I also noticed that the far left edge of the screen is a
little blurry. When I watched it on my stand alone DVD player, it
looked fine. For those of you with 16X9 TV's, you may notice this.
I could do a whole
site on the interesting things I noticed on this disc, but that is not the
point of this review. While the third volume was okay, this one
restores my faith in the series. While the technical issues may be a
problem for some, for the most of us, we will do just fine. So sit
back, have a beef bowl, and enjoy Urusei Yatsura vol 4.
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