The first time I got a reference to anything Urusei Yatsura started with this series:
There are other works that have made references or was inspired by it, but I wanted to point out this one because 1) I remembered it, and 2) Rosario + Vampire was a series that began in 2004 (this reference was in Season II so likely around 2010-11) and Urusei Yatsura was created in 1978.
Needless to say, Urusei Yatsura has made a major impact for a ton of people, and it still does today.
Rumiko Takahashi is a name you’ve heard about if you’ve been reading manga or watching anime for a while. It’s also likely a name you’ve heard if you stayed up late enough to watch Inuyasha on Adult Swim. That was my first introduction to her, where we meet a young girl named Kagome managing to find herself in a world full of demons, shikon jewels, and Inuyasha.
The editor of the upcoming release of Urusei Yatsura got introduced in a different manner. “A classmate lent me his Ranma 1/2 graphic novels,” said Amy Yu, who is also editing some of the biggest titles on the market today (Yona of the Dawn, Ran and the Gray World) and will now be tackling a new challenge: revisiting a series created four decades ago and bringing it up to speed in 2019.
This will be the third time Urusei Yatsura will be published by VIZ. The first was back around 1989, when it was released as Lum: Urusei Yatsura. This was dropped after eight issues. It was then serialized in VIZ’s Animerica magazine before getting its own individual release under the name The Return of Lum. This ended in the late 90’s with only 11 volumes of the series released — note that there are 34 volumes of it in Japan — and chapters not included in a couple of them.
However, times have far changed since then. Discotek brought over the film, Beautiful Dreamer. The manga industry has grown over the past few years, which means more manga can be published in the market. VIZ also re-released Takahashi’s Ranma 1/2, so that likely was a factor to try again with Urusei Yatsura.
But over the past couple years, a lot of classics have been licensed when it really didn’t seem possible. Seven Seas can take some credit for that with them licensing a number of classic titles from Go Nagai (Cutie Honey and Devilman) and Leiji Matsumoto (Captain Harlock and Space Battleship Yamato), to Ryo Mizuno’s Record of Lodoss War and Ryusuke Mita’s Dragon Half. Other publishers have also done the same to an extent (Kodansha releasing Queen Emeraldas, VIZ releasing Master Keaton, Fantagraphics will release The Poe Clan, to name a few), which at least signals that people do want to read these works, even in 2019 or 2020, etc. So bringing back this particular classic is far more feasible than, say, maybe 5 years ago.
The premise is pretty bonkers — Ataru Moroboshi is a high schooler who immediately gets rejected by his childhood friend and classmate Shinobu Miyake in the very first few panels. When a suspect monk claims something bad will happen to him, Ataru heads home only to learn three things:
- He’s a human, randomly selected by an alien generator created by ogre people from outer space, who has to grab the horns of an alien girl in order to save the Earth.
- As in, a group of aliens beamed down to his house, waited until he showed up, and threatened that if he doesn’t grab the horns of an alien princess called Lum in 10 days, he would be solely responsible for the destruction of the Earth.
- He really does have crap luck.
As you probably figured out, he does manage to save the Earth, but that comes at a price — he accidentally blurts out at the end that he wants to “marry her”. Note, the reason he says this was because Shinobu promised that if he did grab Lum’s horns, she would marry him. But because Ataru’s horniness is too much and the thrill of victory was too high, he says this aloud, and right in earshot to Lum.
Lum accepts this. Ataru, however, does not.
That said, after this we get a couple of chapters without Lum actually. That’s because originally, the focus was not going to be on Lum — the manga was going to feature a ton of different stories centering around the Moroboshi family and how odd Tomobiki Town is. However, Lum of course was brought back, and more wacky hijinks ensued. Like at least a couple of these chapters just sees Ataru get rejected by Shinobu in different ways, often due to Lum showing up at inopportune times. He even manages to have his parents want to disown him. “Why, it’ll be cheaper to pay for your funeral than the phone bill,” says his own mom during a time where Lum called him a lot, which means he’s driven his parents crazy enough to where they want him gone.
…And then we get a brand new story somehow!
“It’s a mix of out-of-this-world absurd happenings and observations of mundane human life,” said Amy as she explained why Urusei Yatsura’s humor manages to work without seeming too off. The manga keeps the characters and personalities and throws them a new problem in each chapter. So basically, it’s an alien gag manga, but it keeps a number of the strange personalities the same. Well, they do seem to change, or at least accept some things. Or take a turn for something completely different (like Ataru’s mom wanting to shack up with an alien cow. Yes, this does require more explanation…but not in this article).
Here’s the rest of the interview with Amy Yu, as she explains this upcoming release of the manga, some of the challenges of editing the series, and what long-time fans and new readers should look forward to from this one.
TheOASG: How were you first introduced to Rumiko Takahashi?
Amy Yu: When I was in high school, a classmate lent me his Ranma 1/2 graphic novels, and I was hooked! The comedy from this series was wonderful and really saved me during the stress of finals. After that, I started collecting the series on my own. I still have some old pamphlet-style comics (preserved in bags and boards) in my treasure trove at home.
When did you first encounter Urusei Yatsura? What about that title struck you when you first checked it out?
The very first time I encountered Urusei Yatsura was seeing a group shot of the characters on a poster inside a store in San Francisco’s Japantown. I didn’t know what it was about, but I remember the picture of green-haired Lum flying, and that stood out to me. Lum is still the stand-out to me in the series, along with some of the female protagonists like Benten. I didn’t actually get to read Urusei Yatsura until I started editing this series because older copies of it are hard to find.
Since this was serialized in Weekly Shonen Sunday, can you share what led to the decision to include it under the VIZ Signature Imprint?
Part of the reason is simply that we consider Urusei Yatsura a classic series, and the VIZ Signature imprint is a good fit for that. Also, this imprint has a larger trim size, which works well since each volume has 400+ pages.
What were some of the challenges of editing this title?
There are a lot of cultural references to things that a non-Japanese reader won’t get right away (holidays, practices, history, etc.). We decided to add a glossary for each part of the book to shed some light on some of these references. Another challenge was trying to keep certain puns intact. Sometimes we had to add a note on the page itself to explain a pun. This only happened when I didn’t want the immediacy of a joke to get lost. Otherwise, a note in the glossary would do.
Did its age play a factor while you were editing it?
There was definitely a conscious decision not to make the language too slangy (either using dated language or trendy modern phrases). This didn’t affect my editing, but I do wonder what younger readers think when they see images of things like a rotary phone or a disco club in the manga.
The humor in this manga is nuts: From Ataru at one point getting told his funeral will cost less than the phone bill by his mom to the time where he and his classmates get alien transportation (and leads to an alien stealing oil since Ataru can’t pay alien funds). How would you describe just how crazy Urusei Yatsura can get, and how difficult it was to make sure the humor came across in English?
In the first chapter alone, we’ve got unlucky human boy Ataru forced to play a game of tag against tiger-stripe-bikini-clad alien girl Lum in order to save Earth. That’s just the beginning of all the crazy!
I love how wildly imaginative this series is. I honestly don’t know how Takahashi Sensei came up with half this stuff! It’s a mix of out-of-this-world absurd happenings and observations of mundane human life. Comedy often marries the two, and there are some really brilliant and creative stories here. Takahashi Sensei does physical gags really well, so I’d say the humor is immediate with a lot of the scenes. Sometimes the humor with cultural references or puns was difficult to convey, but as I mentioned earlier, we added notes and glossaries to help the reader get a more detailed story behind certain jokes and plot lines.
What surprised you the most as you were editing this manga?
I’m always amazed at how mangaka come up with engaging characters and stories, but Urusei Yatsura in particular pushed me to consider things from a non-perfect, human angle. For example, I think Ataru is a terrible womanizer and I easily dismissed him in the early volumes. Over time, however, I came to appreciate his honesty (especially when he’s juxtaposed with Shutaro Mendo). I realized that this series has a ton of imperfect beings, and I wouldn’t have them any other way.
URUSEI YATSURA [SHINSOBAN] © 2006 Rumiko TAKAHASHI/SHOGAKUKAN
In your opinion, why has this series stood out and been beloved by many?
Lum is a timeless, iconic character who’s confident and fun–you naturally want to see what she’ll get up to next. I’m sure a lot of the fans appreciate both her beauty and her lively energy.
What should first-time readers look forward to as they check out this manga?
You get to meet Lum and see what all the fuss is about! She’s really fun and will bring a smile to your face. Also, if you’re a Rumiko Takahashi fan, it’s super neat reading her first long-running series and seeing glimpses of characters you like.
What should those who’ve picked up the older VIZ releases or been long-time fans of Urusei Yatsura look forward to as the manga now returns?
They get to collect the whole entire series for the first time (the older version only had selections of certain stories)! There are these bonus sections called “Data File” at the end of each part where you get to read more about the setting and characters of this fun series too. I think long-time fans will appreciate seeing Lum reappear in their lives.
Urusei Yatsura will be out in stores Tuesday, February 19, and available digitally. The digital is important — it’s the first collected Rumiko Takahashi series where it can be bought digitally in English.