Tenchi Universe / Tenchi Muyo!
天地無用!, Tenchi Muyō!, lit. "Do Not Turn Over" or "No Need for Tenchi"
Tenchi Universe (or Tenchi Muyō!) is a Japanese adventure/harem anime series that was aired on Toonami, as we didn’t have any access to manga (with the exception of the first Pokémon manga series in edited/flipped form) back in the days. The edits lists (which are done by then-ANN writer Kyle Pope) can be found here. The original series began with a six-episode OVA called Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-Ohki (天地無用! 魎皇鬼, Tenchi Muyō! Ryōōki). This original series was created by Masaki Kajishima and directed by Hiroki Hayashi, and it was released in Japan on September 25, 1992. The series was released by Pioneer LDC in the United Kingdom in 1994.
The Toonami version (pre-Adult Swim era) of the anime was heavily edited in order to comply with the North American broadcast standards from morning to evening and to avoid offending North American morals at the time. The anime is loosely based on the first six episodes of the Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-Ohki OVA series. The series premiered on April 2, 1995 in Japan and concluded its airing on September 24, 1995. The series aired in the United States on Cartoon Network’s cartoon block Toonami on July 20, 2000 and ended on August 24, 2000. This series introduces three new characters: Mihoshi's partner Kiyone Makibi (who first appears in the “Mihoshi Special”), the bounty hunter and Ryoko's rival, Nagi, and her cabbit companion, Ken-Ohki. The series portrays characters with different personalities; Washu is a mildly-insane egomaniac with two pop-up dolls that proclaim her greatness, and Mihoshi is a comic relief character whose constant bumbling, blunders and crying fits often cause the gang to get into trouble. The license was handled by Geneon Entertainment until Funimation picked up the rights in 2005. Cartoon Network’s rights to broadcast the show expired around late 2001. The anime series features the following characters:
Tenchi Masaki (voiced by Masami Kikuchi/Kermit Miller)
Ryoko Hakubi (voiced by Ai Orikasa/Petrea Burchard)
Ayeka Masaki Jurai (voiced by Yumi Takada/Jennifer Darling)
Sasami Masaki Jurai (voiced by Chisa Yokoyama/Sherry Lynn; both voice actresses also voice Tsunami)
Mihoshi Kuramitsu (voiced by Yuko Mizutani (later deceased mid-2016)/Ellen Gerstell)
Ryo-Ohki (voiced by Etsuko Kozakura/Debi Derryberry)
Washu Hakubi (voiced by Yuko Kobayashi/Kate T. “Gee Gee Loo Loo” Vogt)
Kiyone Makibi (voiced by Yuri Amano/Sherry Lynn)
Many of us 90’s kids will remember this anime series, which was aired on Toonami during the afternoon when we arrived from school and during Midnight Run when we were in bed. When we were young, we didn’t have the term “cabbit” (a fictional hybrid between a cat and a rabbit) until now. It’s sadly not on Netflix, but it is still in Funimation’s (later renamed Crunchyroll in 2022) hands, but you’ll know. The song “Kimi no Carrot Cake” can be heard throughout this YouTube video.
The Substack rewrite restores almost everything that was originally written on Medium in late 2021, but with some changes. It’s been almost a decade since breast cancer killed Yuko Mizutani on this exact date, May 17, 2016.