Rumiko Takahashi's Urusei Yatsura, a Japanese anime and manga series, has six films and twelve OVA releases. During the television run of the series, four theatrical films were produced. Urusei Yatsura: Only You was directed by Mamoru Oshii and began showing in Japanese cinemas on February 11, 1983. Urusei Yatsura 2: Beautiful Dreamer was also directed by Mamoru Oshii and was released on February 11, 1984. Urusei Yatsura 3: Remember My Love was directed by Kazuo Yamazaki and released on January 26, 1985. Urusei Yatsura 4: Lum the Forever was directed again by Kazuo Yamazaki and released on February 22, 1986.
After the conclusion of the television series, two more films were produced. A year after the television series finished, Urusei Yatsura: The Final Chapter was directed by Satoshi Dezaki and was released on February 6, 1988 as a tenth anniversary celebration. It was shown as a double bill with a Maison Ikkoku film. The final film, Urusei Yatsura: Always My Darling was directed by Katsuhisa Yamada and was released on November 2, 1991. In North America, Beautiful Dreamer was released by Central Park Media. The remaining five films were released by AnimEigo in North America and MVM Films in the United Kingdom. After re-releasing Beautiful Dreamer in North America in 2018, Discotek Media acquired the rights to the other five films in 2020.
On September 24, 1985, the special Ryoko's September Tea Party was released, consisting of a mixture of previously broadcast footage along with 15 minutes of new material. Almost a year later on September 15, 1986, Memorial Album was released, also mixing new and old footage. On July 18, 1987, the first OVA for the series Inaba the Dreammaker was released. It was followed by Raging Sherbet on December 2, 1988, and by Nagisa's Fiancé four days later on December 8, 1988. The Electric Household Guard was released on August 21, 1989 and followed by I Howl at the Moon on September 1, 1989. They were followed by Goat and Cheese on December 21, 1989 and Catch the Heart on December 27, 1989. Finally, Terror of Girly-Eyes Measles and Date with a Spirit were released on June 21, 1991. The OVA's were released in North America by AnimEigo who released them individually over 6 discs. AnimEigo produced dubs for the DVD releases.
On December 23, 2008, a new special was shown for the first time at the It's a Rumic World exhibition of Rumiko Takahashi's works. Entitled The Obstacle Course Swim Meet, it was the first animated content for the series in 17 years. On January 29, 2010, a boxset was released featuring all of the recent Rumiko Takahashi specials from the Rumic World exhibition. Entitled It's a Rumic World, the boxset contains The Obstacle Course Swim meet as well as a figure of Lum. The OVAs are not true OVAs, however, as they were all released theatrically prior to being released on video.
Only You
Release date: February 13, 1983, dubbed 2003.
was released in 1983. The guest characters include Elle, another alien princess, who is in charge of Planet Elle.
6-year-old Ataru Moroboshi steps on Elle's shadow during an impromptu game of shadow-tag; in Elle's culture, this is viewed as a marriage proposal. Eleven years later, Elle returns to Earth in order to marry Ataru — by which time not only had he forgotten the events of his childhood, but he was also going out with Lum. The rest of the plot focuses on Lum's attempts to prevent the marriage.
The film was directed by Mamoru Oshii, who was mad at the many requests that the producer made of him to alter the film. Rumiko Takahashi considers this film her favorite and it is the most true to the original series.
A subtitled Laserdisc of the film was released by AnimEigo in North America on September 25, 1993.
Additional cast
Yoshiko Sakakibara as Elle
Hisako Kyouda as Babara
Hiroko Maruyama as Rose
Kazuyo Aoki as Commander
Bin Shimada as Assistant Commander
Shiori as Elle (young) Kazuki Suzuki as Child A Nariko Fujieda as Child B
Beautiful Dreamer
Release date: February 11, 1984, dubbed 1996.
is the second Urusei Yatsura film.
Like its predecessor, Beautiful Dreamer borrows heavily from the Japanese fairy tale of Urashima Tarō. Writer/director Mamoru Oshii, unsatisfied with how the first film, Only You, had developed, rejected the idea of catering to audience expectations and decided to do the film his own way. This almost caused Takahashi to reject the script because it deviated so far from the original story.