October 24th, 2014 
AstroNerdBoy 愛・天地無用！ Ep. 07 (08 w/ recap episode)
Ai Tenchi Muyo! – 07 Review
SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:
Note: The episode numbering used here is based off of the official video releases, which aren’t numbering the various recaps and such in the episode numbers.
A spacial rift from Washu’s experiment opens up in front of a ship in planetary (Earth?) orbit. A girl named Beni sends the Princess Momo to Earth in an escape shuttle.
In the past, Tenchi takes young Momo to a wooden, walled structure. Tenchi is challenged by Inukai (Hachiko). She’s stopped by (Hana), who asks Tamaomi (Touri) if she’s seen Tenchi and Momo before, which she hasn’t. Tenchi heads off with Momo, followed by the girls, who speak of a terrifying oni who’s been terrorizing the place.
The group meets the oni, who turns out to be Ryoko. Tenchi recognizes her, but she doesn’t recognize him. As the notorious space pirate, Ryoko decides to have some fun with Inukai and the others. However, she’s stopped when Momo steps in her path, then sends out a pulse that send Ryoko flying back. Ryoko is impressed, but before she can attack, a large mecha lands, containing Galaxy Police Officer Mihoshi.
Thoughts/Review:
This was another fun episode, but mainly because of Ryoko and Mihoshi.
In terms of plot, it seems that Tenchi in the past and Tenchi in the present are not aware of each other as neither seem to recognize Hachiko, Hana, Touri, or Momo. I suppose it is possible that this rift caused people from the present to also appear in the past. We’ll see how that goes.
Obviously, Momo in the present is the kid in this episode. Beni will likely turn out to be the oni-like character in the present.
Speaking of oni, I have to admit that I got a kick out of Ryoko being portrayed as the evil oni again, along with her high praise of herself as a notorious space pirate. ORIKASA Ai hasn’t lost a step in how she plays Ryoko.
On the other hand, MIZUTANI Yuko does seem to have lost a step when it came to voice Mihoshi in this episode. However, it was still nice to see Mihoshi.
Finally, seeing the blue mecha, I feel stronger than ever that this series will end up being part of the Tenchi Universe continuity. I hope that does turn out to be the case.
So an enjoyable episode, but again, mostly for nostalgia.
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“In terms of plot, it seems that Tenchi in the past and Tenchi in the present are not aware of each other as neither seem to recognize Hachiko, Hana, Touri, or Momo.”
How do you know? I’m almost sure that “the past” came first or is concurent (as you sugested). In “the present” pretty much everyone of the gang is there and knows what is going on… more or less. So Tenchi’s “not recognizing” Momo and the rest of the new gals might be a just bluff or not showing it that he knows them.
Also, I don’t really remember that he showed in any way that he doesn’t know/recognise them.
OK,
my initial reading of the story so far has Tenchi traveling through time starting in the past and then moving on to the seeming present trying to collect first the crew of that ship (Momo and Beni) and perhaps also the other girls, who it is my surmise, are all trapped in an artificial reality bubble created by Washu’s Rift. This bubble may also be fluctuating, resetting or something, which might be the explanation for the time travel and for the people in the bubble not recognizing each other or remembering the events that seemed to happen in (what I assume is a flashback to) feudal era Japan. That Flashback shows us Tenchis first appearance in the bubble and attempt to track down the crew of the ship. He finds Momo and is tracking Beni when he encounters the other girls and Ryouko. We don’t know what happened then. But in the present day version of the bubble (has to still be an artificial world – that high school makes no real sense!) nobody remembers those events from the past, except perhaps Tenchi, who’s job presumably is still to rescue people from the anomaly, except we still don’t know what stands in his way. Perhaps the fact of Momo not remembering Beni (and vice versa?) is the great hurdle here, I don’t know.
One thing that really puzzles me though ( and could be a real problem for my interpretation of events) is the appearance of pre-Tenchi Ryouko and Mihoshi in the feudal past scene. If this is based on Tenchi Universe then Ryouko’s first appearance on Earth and Mihoshi appearing in hot pursuit happened in the present and not in the feudal past (as was the case the OVAs (minus Mihoshi, I mean)). This makes no sense. However, if we assume that Washu’s Rift didn’t just distort space but also time, then it’s possible that people and parts of the world were swallowed from different periods as well as different places. So we get a Ryouko and Mihoshi who havent met Tenchi yet in addition to Momo and Beni, plus the other girls in the school (who I am assuming came from the feudal past, although they could have come from everywhen). Our Tenchi, Sasami, Aeka and Ryouko were all sent into the Rift by Washu to fix the situation somehow, but as of yet there still seems to be no firm plan in place of how to achieve that. We already know there is a Mihoshi around somewhere and presumably she’s the pre-Tenchi version. Might we also still meet the pre-Tenchi Ryouko again? and will there be a meeting of 2 Ryoukos? Now that thought actually gets me excited!
I still hate the limitations of the 5-minute format, and I’d much rather have seen some continuation of the OVA version of things (as long as they do a better job of it than OVA 3 did) but it is good to see Ryouko and Tenchi back in action!
Plus, you can’t deny that the speculation is fun, even if I turn out to be completely wrong!
“has to still be an artificial world – that high school makes no real sense!”
Erm… have you been watching other anime that have schools as main setting in them? Because half the schools there are depicted in a similar fashion – over the top and ridiculous. So this one doesn’t really stand out that much. Just a normal Japanese anime school.
😉 I hear what you’re saying, but I think even in anime high schools there is some gradient of believability, between reality and unreality, and the weirdness of this high school is what I take as a possible sign for it being part of the anomaly. Also, the fact that none of the girls in that school seem to be aware of weirdness or the past events points in that direction, I think.
But yeah, of course this is pure speculation. I’m prepared to be proven wrong!;)
The school setting is pretty normal, but I do like the artificial reality theory though (or alternate reality).
That is an interesting theory. I like it.
Assuming the bubble theory is true, then the different places people could have been taken from could be anywhere in the universe.
Ditto.
I agree. I do like OVA 3, but there were definitely things done wrong there. Which reminds me, I still have not written a piece on OVA 3. ^_^;;;;
I agree, it is fun. ^_^
I don’t know. It just seems as if the past and present are running simultaneously.
That’d be interesting — time’s irreversible arrow circling back on itself with the radius infinitely adjustable by somebody. Very short radius (0.0000000000001 secs) could apparently stop the universe. OR a not so short (5 secs) radius could eliminate apparent cause and effect. A long radius (about 100 yrs) simultaneously adjustable for each person could establish reincarnation. Are these authors exploring this? Very cool if so.
I prefer a circling time-arrow rather than a reversible one. Imagine you’re in charge of the radius nano machine.
We’d have a lot of trouble with randomness though.
Heh. Well, as it turned out, he was sent to the past first, then sent to a specific place in the present.
AIC has the schedule out now until the end of November, with episode titles and numbers. It shows when the mystery chunks air and how the small chunks make up days. All Fridays are recaps.
And what’s that on Saturday and Sunday? And is the next “in the past” (mystery?) episode 31? And there’s some text beginning with 24-some-characters… What do they mean?
That I can’t help with. 🙁
Thanks for the info. ^_^
Off-topic:
Short review of the game Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-Ohki FX: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aqCMy51_Jfk
Thanks for the link. ^_^
I’m still waiting for Ryo-ohki…
You’re right, Ryo-ohki hasn’t shown up yet. Surely Ryo-ohki has to show up before the series is over.