Tenchi Muyo in Love 2 Blu-ray Review
Love hurts.
Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman, December 14, 2012
Note: This film is currently available only in this set:
Tenchi Muyo!: Movie Collection.
There's no getting around the often confusing promulgation of various entries in the vast
Tenchi Muyo! universe,
and that confusion spills over into what would seem to be a fairly clear cut group of three feature films. But due to
these
films having been released with various titles in different markets, sometimes with numbers attached to them that don't
really accurately convey their actual chronology, some may think that
Tenchi Muyo in Love 2 (which also bears
the
name
Tenchi Forever! in some releases) is a direct follow up to 1996's
Tenchi Muyo in Love, but the similarly multi-named
Tenchi Muyo! Daughter of Darkness actually came in between the two.
Tenchi Muyo in Love 2 is actually
fairly divorceable from
both of the previous feature film entries, for it's a much more somber, even melancholic,
affair that deals with Tenchi being drawn into a sort of trance state where his real memories are slowly erased and he's
led to believe he's in love with a long ago paramour of Yosho. The first
Tenchi Muyo in Love really had very little
to
do with romance, but the title is decidedly more apt for this third film, at least if one takes being put under a spell of
sorts
as
one form of romance.
Tenchi Muyo in Love 2, like
Tenchi Muyo! Daughter of Darkness has a brief prelude that isn't instantly
relatable to what comes afterward, but once the actual main story gets underway, we're in familiar territory as Tenchi
watches Ryoko and Ayeka having a knock down, drag out fight where they each injure each other (repeatedly) "by
accident". Tenchi tries to get them to calm down, but of course only makes things much worse, and ends up running
into
the forest to escape. There a sort of sylvan spirit seems to appear within a tree after Tenchi notices a beautiful camellia
bud on the ground and moves to pick it up.
Though anyone who has weathered the
many different versions of
Tenchi Muyo! through the years will
attest that there hasn't always been a lot of attention paid to consistent tone or even character development,
Tenchi
Muyo in Love 2 is such a drastic departure from most of the rest of the
Tenchi Muyo! canon that some may
think they, like Tenchi himself, have wandered into a parallel universe. What's so especially interesting about this film is
how it
starts like any given
Tenchi Muyo! OVA or even anime series episode, with bickering harem-
mates,
and then quickly becomes something much deeper, more disquieting and ultimately rather sad.
Part of the sadness is due to the film focusing on those Tenchi has left behind in the "real world". Tenchi's family is
destitute after the boy disappears seemingly into thin air, and just as interestingly, Ryoko and Ayeka are both
absolutely distraught as well, actually taking side jobs as they attempt to find clues as to what happened to their
"Lord".
Tenchi Muyo in Love 2 is therefore an unusually emotional experience, especially for a franchise that so
often offered silly (even goofy) humor combined with some fairly standard action elements.
In the meantime Tenchi is lost in a haze created by Haruna, a woman with at least a couple of ulterior motives up her
sylvan sleeve. Tenchi has become a totally new person in this dream state, slightly older and with different hair, and
with a newfound talent and interest in drawing. Haruna is struggling mightily to keep Tenchi entranced, so to speak,
and several times she needs to "restart" his life with her when his old memories start intruding. Meanwhile his harem
has experienced several "close encounters" with this new, not so improved Tenchi which causes them to realize he's
locked in a parallel universe that in some way is overlapping with theirs.
There's a quiet, almost meditative and mystical, quality about
Tenchi Muyo in Love 2 which is distinctly at odds
with a lot of the rest of this sprawling franchise, but which in some very real ways helps this film to become one of the
most memorable in the entire
Tenchi universe. Part of this is due to the fact that unlike a lot of the rest of the
Tenchi outings, there seems to be some real, honest to goodness human emotion at stake, even if that
"human" emotion is on the part of non-humans like Ryoko and Ayeka. But there's also something undeniably touching
about Tenchi's "new" life with Haruna, as we slowly begin to realize that this ostensible villainess is herself a wounded
soul, trying to come to grips with a long ago heartbreak. In fact virtually everything about this film has heartbreak
written across it in varying levels, making it an often gripping story that eschews some of the goofiness of the franchise
and earning kudos for suddenly making a lot of these often childish characters seem surprisingly mature.
The film does try to get back to something approaching the "normal"
Tenchi way of doing things in the closing
few minutes of the film, but it might have been a stronger property with less emphasis on the old way of doing things.
There is a nice beat or two with Ryoko and Tenchi which is obviously a throwback to another scene in the first
Tenchi Muyo in Love. It's a really touching moment for those who have stuck with this franchise through its
many, many changes in tone, and it helps to settle some of the queasiness that this unusually disturbing and
unexpectedly serious entry in the
Tenchi canon is.
Tenchi Muyo in Love 2 Blu-ray, Overall Score and Recommendation
If I were forced to choose only one
Tenchi Muyo! film to keep in my collection, this one would probably be it. That
might strike some fans as kind of strange, as this is by far the least typical
Tenchi Muyo! outing maybe in the entire
franchise, let alone the three feature films. But there's something so undeniably hypnotic about this film that gives it an
emotional power that is really not just surprising, but actually becomes unforgettable. This isn't "your father's
Tenchi
Muyo!, so to speak, and someone experiencing only this film would probably not have a very good idea of the franchise
as a whole, but it's a really unique little property that is among the best things this sprawling, sometimes unmanageable,
franchise has ever offered. This Blu-ray features the same middling video quality as the other two releases, but the audio
is very good, and unlike the other two films, this one at least has its trailer attached as the lone supplement.
Recommended.
