The first three episodes of the fifth season of Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-Ohki are currently available to stream on Crunchyroll, with the fourth episode coming at the end of November. Tenchi Muyo! is an anime franchise that was originally created by Masaki Kajishima and Hiroki Hayashi in 1992. The series follows seemingly normal high school student Tenchi Masaki as he finds his life turned upside down when several alien women come to live with him on the small Shinto shrine grounds where he resides with his father and grandfather. Of course, the girls eventually end up having the hots for Tenchi and finding out who he will end up with is one of the reasons that audiences feel compelled to keep watching.
Tenchi was not the first harem series, but it was a hugely influential title that popularized the genre and created the basic archetypes and character templates that future harem series continue to use to this day. The original OVA series was so popular it has spawned over eighteen subsequent OVAs, TV series, movies, and spin-off series. Most people will be familiar with Tenchi Muyo! from when several of the series aired on Toonami back in the early aughts. Was that the show with all the confusing continuities that were impossible to follow? Yes. It was. And it’s even more confusing now. For anyone excited to start on season five, here’s a quick (as possible) breakdown of what canon material needs to be watched before season five will make any sense.
OVA means Original Video Animation. Think of it as a direct-to-video release. These kinds of releases were popular for anime in Japan and generally had higher budgets than TV series. In the US, direct-to-video has a negative connotation and generally means something that wasn’t good enough to air on TV or get a theatrical run. OVA releases are different. So many people wanted to buy more anime that a whole new distribution model was created to meet demand back in the 1980s.
The first Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-Ohki OVA series consists of seven episodes and was released from 1992-1993. The first few episodes focus on character introductions before building up to the battle with the main antagonist, Kagato, in episode six. While Hayashi was credited as an original creator, he would leave after the first OVA and Kajishima would take the reins of the canon Tenchiverse going forward. The 6.5 episodes of the second OVA series were released in 1995, focusing on further character development while building up to a conflict with Dr. Clay in the last few episodes and setting up plotlines for the third OVA.
One of the things that made the first two OVA series so popular was the diverse female characters. While the basic idea of a harem series may seem inherently sexist, all of the female characters are strong and well-developed with complicated backstories. Ryoko is a space pirate, Mihoshi is a First Class Detective in the Galaxy Police, Ayeka and Sasami are princesses from the most powerful house on the planet Jurai, and Washu possesses the greatest scientific mind in the universe. While the target demographic was obviously male, the series also became popular with females who identified with one of the strong female personalities presented.
Despite all the space stuff, most of the episodes are slower and focused on character development and interactions. This side of Red Dwarf, slice-of-life sci-fi isn’t especially common, especially back in the mid-90s. Tenchi Muyo! was a different kind of show.
The third OVA consists of seven episodes that came out between 2004-2005. Its main antagonist is Z, a powerful warrior who ultimately wants to kill and replace Tenchi. This was a bit of a departure from the first two OVAs as the focus was no longer only on the main cast. In fact, those who hadn’t been keeping up with other supplemental material (see below) couldn’t possibly know who certain new characters were or why exactly certain events were happening. This is where the series starts to shift from a smaller harem series to an epic space opera.
The four-episode fourth OVA came out between 2016-2017. It covers Tenchi’s father marrying Rea and the birth of his half-brother, Kenshi. The series is mainly exposition for other series and a set-up for OVA five, and to say that a large portion of the series is just characters sitting around talking isn’t that much of an exaggeration. While it’s interesting for Tenchi fans, the series becomes impenetrable for new people to jump in at this point.
Tenchi Muyo! GXP is a 26-episode TV series that aired in Japan in 2002 and on Toonami in 2012. Seina Yamada, a classmate of Tenchi Masaki, is prone to accidents and despite his positive disposition, nothing seems to go right as his bad luck gets him into all kinds of trouble. Due to a series of coincidences, he ends up accidentally signing up for the Galaxy Police, where he finds that his bad luck actually comes in handy when it comes to hunting space pirates.
The core Tenchi cast only shows up for a single episode. Instead, this series focuses on establishing new places and characters in the Tenchiverse that are off the planet Earth. Events and characters included here directly correspond with events that happen in OVA three. In fact, OVA three onward will make very little sense without having seen Tenchi Muyo! GXP.
Tenchi Muyo! War on Geminar is a 13-episode OVA series that was released in 2009. It follows Tenchi’s half-brother, Kenshi, as he’s sent to an alternative fantasy-sci-fi world where he must pilot this world’s version of mecha, Sacred Mechanoids. Technically, this takes place several years after the events of OVA five and is largely its own story, though directly connected to OVA four and five since Kenshi is the main character.
Dual! Parallel Trouble Adventure is a 13-episode TV series and single-episode OVA that was released in 1999. Its protagonist, Kazuki Yotsuga, similar to the Kenshi in War on Geminar, travels to a parallel world to his own where he must learn to pilot a mecha. It’s a huge spoiler to talk about how this connects to the other series, but just know this takes place around a billion years before anything else in the canon Tenchiverse.
To make things even more frustrating, to fully understand the story there’s some additional reading to be done. There are several light novel series that directly tie to the Tenchi canon. Some have been translated into English and some haven’t. The three True Tenchi Muyo! novels give an in-depth background and history of some of the more notable characters in the franchise. There are currently 17 light novels in the Tenchi Muyo! GXP! series, which goes much deeper into the events portrayed in the GXP anime. There are three light novels in the Paradise War series, which takes place after GXP but before OVA five. Simple, right?
If following the original Tenchi canon isn’t confusing enough, the basic concept and characters were so popular that they inspired several other continuities and spin-off series, which sometimes created their own spin-off and sequel series. Non-canon Tenchi series include: Tenchi Universe, Tenchi in Tokyo, Pretty Sammy, Magical Project S, Sasami: Magical Girl Club, Ai Tenchi Muyo!, three theatrical movies, and Battle Programmer Shirase. Quality of these spin-offs varies. Some are just watered down worse versions of the OVA, while others do their own thing and offer an enjoyable watch.
It is. And there are some technically canon series from Kajishima like Photon and Spaceship Agga Ruter that haven’t even been discussed yet. Additionally, there’s other canon material that isn’t anime or light novels. Let’s make this simple for newbies. For anyone Tenchi-curious, watch the first few episodes of the original series. If that creates a desire to get to know the rest of the universe, the necessary curriculum will start to make sense. Anyone who has already gotten their PhD in Tenchiology can graduate and is free to get started on Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-Ohki season five.
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