Your Top 10 UY Episodes (Spoilers)?

[KatsuhikoJinnai]

I just finished the series finally --- the second to last episode was a top 10 favorite episodes according to the Japanese audience at the time.

I'm wondering what are your personal top 10 episodes? Any order, you don't have to be deadly specific to the episode number or title, just the content in the episode was enough. It can also be sort of a best combination of two stories (since earlier episodes were split into 2 stories per episode). Naturally, this is very spoilerific.



My top 10:

1) The "Pitter Patter" Christmas Eve one was definitely my first pick. I think it's the first full-length episode and it's got a semi-serious tone... the ending was really warm too. Perfect.

2) The episode where Lum and Ataru go on their first date. My favorite scene being where he falls off the high-dive (which is like a mile high)... free falls for like 10 seconds, screaming the whole way, and then and hits the pool in a way that made me cringe.

3) The episode where Mendou invites Ataru over to his estate for the sole purpose of trying to show Ataru how much better he has it. They end up getting locked inside Mendou's indestructable safe though.

4) The episode where Lum and Ataru have the house to themselves. There's the part where she shouts about them sleeping together and Megane has some sort of crazy Star Wars-esque mental breakdown.

5) The episode where Ryuunosuke was really trying to delve into her mother's (Masako's) history. Mr. Fujinami creates some long-winded story about being torn apart by war or something similar.

6) Where the UY gang goes to Hawaii --- they participate in the big eating contest.

7) Kotatsu Neko's introduction.

8) Onsen Mark's home visits --- even though it was a later one, I really enjoyed it. I think Onsen is a really tragic guy... nice to have some spotlight on him.

9) Ryoko's Christmas party... where she has everyone pair up and climb a giant christmas tree. Shuutaro dives from the top a couple times (wanting to kill Ataru) but ends up missing the mark and falling all the way down.

10) The episode where Lum tries to make Ataru jealous at the beach. It's been a long while, but she turns some sea-creature (like a dolphin or something) into a studly guy that's got everyone jealous.

[lostnomad84]

I'll post my top 10 list once I finally make my way through the last 10 volumes (they just arrived on my door yesterday).

But without a doubt, my number 1 favorite episodes was a 2 parter (so, can't be a single episode), the last 2 episodes Oshii ever directed, episodes 105 "Scramble! To the Rescue of Lum!" and 160 "A Fight to the Death! Ataru vs. The Mendo Brigade!".

[jerright]

Yikes, too many to name and sort out. But in general, I'm partial to the sappy episodes, so here's my top 3

1) "After You've Gone" - Lum disappears, leaving behind only a hand-sewn doll of herself.

2) "Pitter Patter Christmas Eve"

3) "Darling I Love Your Kindness" - Ataru goes on a date with a ghost girl who has knitted a wooly sweater, cap, and mittens for him. Too bad it's the middle of summer.

(Here are some of my UY cels (http://web.wt.net/~tralfaz/10O0OlIO01I010110lO011lOl/uruy.htm), for those of you interested in that sort of thing.)

[O-chan]

Off the top of my head
(ones I've rewatched the most):

1. And Then There Were None- I LOVE this episode because it's soooo Oshii and less UY. This episode was dead serious until the finale.

2. Don't Die! Ryoko Special Straw Doll- Mendou abuse and lots of Ataru/Mendou yaoiness.

3. Dimensional Switch! Where's Darling- Multiple universes,a lesbian Megane freaking out Lum, and the ending was just...O_O. It really showed that Lum cared specifically for her Ataru. Kudos to Kazuo Yamazaki for this being his first directed UY episode.

4. Pitter Patter Christmas Eve- A classic Christmas episode, I also liked the manga version of this one.

5. After You've Gone- Another classic episode! Really showed Ataru's caring side.

6. Happy Birthday Darling- Okay, Ataru was an ass this entire episode. But the ending and the overall animation quality made this a favorite episode.

7. Girl's Day! Ran-chan's introduction!- I love this episode simply because the late Inuoe You's performance was just riveting. Hearing her go from girly girl Ran to psychotic Ran just sent chills down my spine. "Then I started to remember the bad things...."

8. Mendou's Ariives With Trouble- Mimiced the manga almost exactly but I like a lot of the animation techniques used in this episode.

9. Druken Boogie- Lum and Ten drunk and that funny margarita song in the middle of the episode.

10.Lum and Ataru, A Night Alone- Watch for those few seconds where they cover the entire Star Wars saga (or at least Return of the Jedi).

O-chan

[Hunter Sopko]

I've only gotten up to Volume 25, the OVAs and some of the movies.

1. The Mysterious Matsutake Mushroom Soup- The most laughter I've ever gotten out of a UY episode. So very goofy with rapid-fire gags that really made it a treat. The repeating frames, the stunts the students pull... all awesome.

2. And Then There Were None- A very Oshii episode. Very creepy, un-UY like atmosphere, but very enjoyable. Ending was great and catches you offguard.

3. Shinobu's Cinderella Story- Another very Oshii episode. Shinobu is my favorite character in the series, so seeing an episode focusing on her is nice. Plus she plays against her usual role of "girl with temper".

4. Shocking Library! Quiet Please!- All the literary references make this episode hilarious. I almost died laughing when I saw Hitler run across the screen. Very awesome. Wendy was cool too, and honestly didn't seem to mind Ataru's minor leching<G> Would have been interesting to see her in more.

5. Document! Who Will Be Miss Tomobiki?- Another Oshii-influenced episode with an amazingly comic bent. The byzantine politics that the pageant devolves into were hilarious.

6. A Beautiful Girl Comes With the Rain- A surprisingly good episode. Ataru plays slightly against role and wholehearted helps Tsuyuko. Funny moments in there, but my heart's out to Tsuyuko, my favorite one-shot character. While it would have been interesting to see Wendy again, Tsuyuko NEEDED to be in there more.

7. Demonic Jogging- It's just fun watching Ataru completely own Mendou.

8. Full Course From Hell- Proof of why Sakura can out-eat ANYONE.

9. Drunkard's Boogie- Drunk Lum and Ten... how can you not lose?

10. Cherry Blossom Poetry Contest- One of the most absurdly funny episodes. Dunno why I like it so much, but it takes the 10 spot. Ataru winning the contest is just... funny.

[Njr Scrawl]

Can't remeber episodes titles, but the story AFAIR is described. No particular order. /images/graemlins/happy.gif

Early episode when Ataru & Shinobou are still trying to keep together/see each other & Lum is in her UFO creating a thunderstorm overhead.

A lonely goblin living at the bottom of Mendou's swimming pool - this one shows Lum & the others at their most humane.

Haunted inn episode where the gang are all killed off one-by-one. So Friday 13th!

Another haunted inn episode where a family of cannibals live. Good Shinobou moments.

The "octopus" episode where the girls are swimming & having their swimsuits torn off them.

Bathing house episode when Ataru gets a job there to spy on female bathers.

Love-Love ball episode when the gang see who they think they'll marry.

so far that's it. Any episode where Rei went on a food-hunting rampage, Ran went on a revenge rampage & Ten gets the crap beaten out of him are watched a lot. /images/graemlins/cool.gif

[vanfanel]

<ul type="square">
Pitter Patter Christmas Eve
Since You've Been Gone
The one where Mrs. Moroboshi gets hit on the head and hallucinates about her life.
The one where the students are sneaking away from school to eat lunch off-campus, and the teachers try to stop them. Lum says "How pointless" as she surveys the carnage at the end.
The one with the contagious alien toothache that can only be eased by biting someone...and the zombie movie parody that ensues.
The one where Megane thinks Ataru is going to give him his shot at Lum (when he was really just asking him to take over a student council job for him). Just an episode that shows how you should never ask "how far can they really take this?" about UY.
The one where Ten's horn falls out...Ran thinks its Lum's horn...and Ten ends up with a cactus growing out of his head.
The one where Mendou's sister promises a kiss...a passionate kiss, mind you...to whoever can climb to the top of her ridiculously giant Christmas tree first. I just enjoyed seeing the guys sabotaging each other on the way up.
The episode where Mendou and Shuu-chan had their annual baseball showdown.
The library episode as well.
[/list]

[Redcoffin]

I haven't finished the series yet so it would be premature to list ten, but the "Love Love Catch Ball" episode sums up everything I like about all my favorite UY episodes. The humor in UY doesn't come from silliness or word play per se; those are present but secondary. UY is almost unique in that the foundation of its humor is people frantically trying to make the world do what they want, and clashing with each other, and making choices and accommodations that are totally crazy and yet at the same time completely rational given their background and personality.

Any episode with Ran-chan in it will bear this out most clearly. Ran-chan yearns for love and compassion so desperately that it's painful to watch, which is exactly what makes her inappropriate reactions and the wreckage that she brings down around herself, so funny. The basis of this kind of comedy is human tragedy, loneliness and pain, and it's very hard to pull off. I know of a few other shows that do it (Excel Saga occasionally, FLCL quite consistently, CCS now and then) but none that sustains it over so many episodes as Urusei Yatsura: the greatest comedy anime, and the greatest that will ever be.

Sorry to go off on a tangent... /images/graemlins/catgirl0.gif

[Chloe]

No, no, I quite agree with you. "Love Love Catchball" is definitely going to make my top ten list, but I can't make one yet since I've only seen half of them. Just to see all the misconceptions and the way it just snowballed into a disaster was incredibly funny. like the way <span style='color:#dddddd;background:#dddddd'> Shinobu instantly dropped Mendou as a candidate for romance once she got a look at her "destiny". </span> That episode so rocked! /images/graemlins/sdsmiley.gif

I also am very fond of the student/teacher off-campus eating war episode as well as the one where the guys all caught the alien flu that left stripes on their faces.