うる星やつら OVA episode 10 (OAV anime)
Urusei Yatsura OVA Ep. 10 review

SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:

Ataru is on a girl hunt when he encounters Ten-chan, who’s fleeing from Lum since he doesn’t want to get a medical shot. Ataru rats him out, but finds himself and Ten-chan quarantined in Ataru’s home due to a disease they might have, known as Girly-eyes Measles, which gives male recipients female, anime-manga eyes.  Ataru doesn’t believe it until he sees his face in a mirror, but since the needle Lum has is massive, Ataru and Ten-chan try to avoid it. Eventually, Lum succeeds and the two get their normal eyes back, but Ataru decides to return to the girl hunt rather than get the required 2-3 days of rest. An infuriated Lum pursues him, revealing that his eye problem isn’t completely solved. In attempting to elude Lum, Ataru encounters Shuutaro, who instinctively attacks, but doesn’t recognize Ataru with his new eyes. To Shuutaro’s dismay, he too get the girly anime eyes.

Upon learning that Ataru did this to him, Shuutaro starts hunting for him, running into Ryuunosuke. Hearing the truth of Shuutaro’s condition, Ryuunosuke ponders being allowed to dress as a girl, leading her father to bust in on the scene to forbid this. Ryuunosuke lays him out, then after learning that Lum is hunting for Ataru, Ryuunosuke decides to hunt for him too.  Upon finding him, Ataru is happy that Ryuunosuke came to him, but he tells a fib on how she can get the disease. Lum arrives to tell Ryuunosuke the truth – only men can get the disease. Ryuunosuke is shattered and Ataru flees, causing Lum to chase him with a special goop gun to snare him, but instead, she ends up spreading this snaring goop all over town.

The Principle and Onsen-sensei are in town and decide to investigate the cause of all this commotion.  They encounter Ataru, but since his eyes are wrong, they just assume that this is someone acting like Ataru. Ataru makes an escape by using the “look over there gag.” This allows Lum to slip by them as well.  However, there is something in the sky, namely Cherry and Fujinami-san, who’d previously been knocked up there. They land on the Principle and Onsen-sensei.  Lum continues her desperate pursuit of Ataru, who in turn is pondering getting the treatment just so he can pick up girls. Meanwhile, Cherry, Fujinami-san, the Principle, and Onsen-sensei are at Sakura’s place playing Mahjong and irritating her. Ataru arrives, hotly followed by Lum, who snares them all. However, Ataru has spread his disease to all the males in the city, causing Lum to pass out from the horror of it. Ataru takes her home and though he’s now healed, he tends to the ill Lum, feeling guilty over what he’s done.

Thoughts/Review:

Although this was a chase episode, it wasn’t as funny as some of the others. I think that’s partially because of the change in character designs.  They are somewhat different and as others warned me, they animation quality isn’t as good.

I’m trying to pinpoint why else this chase episode wasn’t as funny.  I think that this episode didn’t have the normal, unexpected qualities that usually make the chase sequences funny. The unexpected stuff is always funniest to me.  When it comes to expected moments, changing up the timing of the delivery becomes the unexpected, thus that’s funny.  However, there weren’t any of those moments here.

The second Ataru fled, I knew what he would do and what Lum’s response would be. I knew that Ataru would spread his disease all through the town. Once Lum’s weapon was revealed, I knew that she’d snare everyone but Ataru until the very end.  As such, it was predictable, thus not so funny.

The concept of this disease was amusing though, since it does poke fun at the large, anime/manga eyes that are a trademark of the industry.  In addition, with the males all covered in goop, there was a parody of zombie horror movies.

I did like that even though Ryuunosuke didn’t get to dress as a girl, she did get to imagine herself in a female, sailor seifuku.

Of course, the episode HAD to include the annoying Fujinami and Cherry. That was also a negative.

In the end, the episode is just average, made so by changed character designs, lower quality animation, and an entirely predictable story.