Tenchi The Movie 2 – The Daughter of Darkness Review
Tenchi Muyo! Manatsu no Eve
天地無用！真夏のイブ
Tenchi Muyo! Midsummer’s Eve

Since the Community Anime Reviews site has been all but dead, I’m republishing some of my OG reviews from there. I have corrected obvious spelling errors though. I will add new notes in parenthesis, labeled “ANB  note.”  😅 I won’t count these as part of the “Back to the Vaults” series as I have not rewatched them.

–> Buy Tenchi Muyo!: Movie Collection on Amazon.com!

Community Anime Review of Tenchi The Movie 2 – The Daughter of Darkness

(ANB note: This series was originally reviewed on 24-Mar-2003. I’ve made some updates that I felt needed to be made.)

This is the only Tenchi Muyo! movie set in the OVA continuity. However, it’s not canon material as it is not a story by Kajishima-sensei. This movie is based off of the HASEGAWA Naoko-sensei novel Tenchi Muyo! Manatsu no Eve, that are based on the first OVA series. So everything from episodes 7-13.5 are ignored for this movie. And, the hideous, official English movie title gives away a ton.

The Story, in Brief

Storywise, a girl named Mayaku shows up at Tenchi’s house claiming to be his daughter. While this doesn’t set well with Ayeka and Ryoko, it is Ryoko who is able to see that there is more to her than meets the eye. Ryoko is right as a female demon named Yuzuha is looking to seek revenge against Yosho and thus the royal household of Jurai.

Character Issues

Of the characters, only Ryoko remained interesting to me. She showed that she indeed does truely love Tenchi and she was motivated to protect him with her life in needed. The other characters were mostly a waste. Mayuka seemed to be created to play with the incest fantasy since there are several times where she’s used to sexually come on to Tenchi by Yuzuha. It was very out of place.

Because this ignores the 2nd OAV and the OAV special (episode 7), the other characters feel so out of place. You wonder why certain things don’t happen or why certain characters don’t know things. I was wondering when talk of Tsunami came up why everyone seemed dumb considering what had been revealed about her. Yosho’s history was modified to fit into this tale and it just doesn’t work. In fact, nothing but Ryoko’s willingness to fight and die for Tenchi made sense.

Bottom line:

Ryoko fans will enjoy watching her at work, even if she is only a shadow of her OAV self. The other characters are just there, typified by Kiyone (Tenchi Universe) being in this movie. Huh? Anyway, if you aren’t a serious Tenchi fan or a Ryoko lover, you won’t even like this movie.