うる星やつら episode 138 (TV anime)
Urusei Yatsura Ep. 138 review

SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:

The female ninja Kaede is on the run and encounters Yatsude-sama, an old woman in charge of the ninja clan. Defeating the old woman and leaving her midget ninja stunned, Kaede is off to find a new life for herself lest she become old and grotesque as Yatsude. Kaede gets a job at a burger joint that serves customers outside, but Yatsude and her ninja arrive on the top of a bus, forcing Kaede to flee. Yatsude is amused at Kaede’s city of choice to hide herself in as Kaede desperately looks for work. Finding none, Kaede goes three days without eating until she’s found by Shuutaro, who takes her back to his mansion where she’s able to eat to her fill.

As Shuutaro and Kaede talk of her predicament, Ataru shows up and does his usual thing. Lum shows up for her electrical punishment, leading Kaede to assume Lum is a kunoichi sent to take her back. Ryoko arrives with a present for her “oniisama,” so Kaede decides to throw it away and escape in the confusion. Since the gift was a bomb, Kaede saves Shuutaro’s life, leading him to ask her to be his bodyguard. Ryoko objects and proposes a test with Ataru as judge. Ryoko then informs Yatsude of the plan. The ninja try to deploy in Kaede’s path, but a mined street takes some out with Kaede disposing of the rest with money and food. Ataru gives chase and is able to keep up until Lum takes him out with a bolt of lightning.

Kaede then encounters Yatsude, who vows to stop her. Yatsude counters Kaede’s defense against her attack but still loses. Kaede flees and Yatsude fires a rocket to bring the Kusa, a sleeper ninja in the city, into the fight. She defeats them all but is snared by a final one at the school where her objective is. However, Ataru’s sudden arrival allows her to escape, though Lum’s punishment snares Ataru and Kaede, causing her to lose the challenge. She graciously accepts her loss and as Ryoko leaves, the two agree to meet again. Kaede realizes she can’t get a job here, so its on to the next town to try her luck.

Thoughts/Review:

I don’t remember Kaede at all, though the episode implies that she has been here before. Doesn’t surprise me considering how many years I’ve been plugging away at Urusei Yatsura. Still, with Akamatsu-sensei using the name “Kaede” for his female ninja character, one wonders if the name is associated with ninja.

The episode was fun for the most part but only got funny when Ataru got into the chase. It took nearly half the episode before Lu and Ataru arrived. In fact, at a certain point, I started going, “When’s Ataru going to show up?” After all, Kaede is drawn as a babe ninja and Ataru chases the babes. When he finally does show up to chase Kaede, I had to laugh at how he’s again able to do those extraordinary things (in this case, ninja jumping techniques) in the pursuit of a girl. What was funnier is when he shows up on the Kusa ninja’s back, trying to hit on Kaede. There was something wrong about that imagery that made it funnier to me.

Speaking of funny, the production team brought back the old censorship joke so that when Shuutaro gets hit by the blast of water, a member of the staff is waiting with the black circle on a long stick to hide Shuutaro’s gentiles as Shuutaro goes flying past.

Yatsude reminded me of Cologne from Ranma 1/2, which is understandable. Assuming Yatsude was in the UY manga, I can see how Takahashi-sensei could have taken the Yatsude character and changed her into Cologne.

Beyond that, not a whole lot else to comment on. I’ve really got to push ahead to finish this series though. ^_^;