[[quoteright:350:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/lost_universe.jpg]]

[[strike:Long , long ago, in a galaxy far, far away...]]

Often considered the sister series to {{The Slayers}}, Lost Universe is Hajime Kanzaka's take on the Sci-Fi genre. Following Kane Blueriver, Millie Feria Noturne and Canal Vorfeed, the anime (and novels) explore the trio's job--Trouble Contractors, who anyone can hire to solve their problems. These problems range from getting a witness to a trial on time (and alive) to tracking down stolen tea sets.

As the series progresses, the Nightmare Syndicate comes to light; this organization is out to conquer the universe, and Kane and Canal seem to have a personal problem with them...can Millie and Kane unravel the mystery of the Lost Ships and the Syndicate before it's too late?

The series is very much a Kanzaka series; it's 60% humor and 40% {{Serious Business}}. It pokes fun at the genre and has various shout outs throughout. The anime's 26-episode run was supposed to have been followed by a 2nd series that would have given it a more conclusive ending, but the funding didn't appear.

There's a widely-held {{Fanon}} belief that this series is set in the same universe as Slayers. To pull from the other Wiki:

''"In Slayers, it was mentioned that the main characters of that series live on a world that is one of the four created by the mother of all creation, called The Lord of Nightmares or simply [=LoN=]. This world was known as the Red World. Lost Universe, however, takes place in a different world, known as the Black World. Whereas the demi-gods of the various worlds such as Ruby-Eye Shabranigdo and Dark Star Dugradigdo had physical presence in that world, they appear in the Black World as "Lost Ships," or space ships that have mystical or somewhat magical powers.?''

{{Word of God}} (as you can read [[http://www.inverse.org/e/res/msgs/1933.shtml here]]) has explicitly stated that this is not true; the series are set in two totally different universes. He just liked the names, and reused them. Whether you feel this is an improvement or not [[BetterThanCanon varies]] among the community.

Creator/ADVFilms licensed and dubbed the show before they went out of business, and it was recently rescued by Creator/NozomiEntertainment along with several other titles. The light novels were never released overseas.
----
!!This series provides examples of:
* AwesomeMcCoolname - Millennium Feria Nocturne [[spoiler: or Stargazer]], Kane Blueriver.
* ClothingDamage - Kane shreds and/or loses his cape quite regularly; good thing he has a closet full of them...
* CluckingFunny: The cast once ends up on a flight that gets hijacked by religious fanatics in chicken suits. No, really.
* CompletelyMissingThePoint: Students at a school for nurses plant bombs in their test area in an attempt to remove their rivals for top of the class, proving that they completely failed to grasp the concept of medical ethics.
* CoolOldLady: Kain's grandmother was definitely this.
* CutShort: The LightNovel series only lasted for four books, and the ending was abrupt (see [[spoiler:KillEmAll]] below).
* DramaticWind: Darkstar, all the time.
* {{Expy}}: Millie looks like she could be [[TheSlayers Amelia's]] {{Elseworld}} counterpart, and Kane is more or less a male version of Lina. [[spoiler: Darkstar in human form is basically an evil looking Gourry, or his evil twin. See his picture here[[http://kanzaka.wikia.com/wiki/Spreader_of_Darkness#Lost_Universe]]. They're even voiced by the same seiyuu!]]
** Two secondary characters, Raily Claymore and Nina Mercury, both have a relationship and personality traits that parallel [[ShipTease Zelgadis and Amelia's]], and they even have the same voice actors in the anime (HikaruMidorikawa and Masami Suzuki respectively).
* FollowTheChaos - It's how you know dinner's ready.
* GenkiGirl - Canal.
* HeyItsThatVoice - MegumiHayashibara as [[LivingShip Canal]]; SoichiroHoshi as Kane; AkiraIshida plays a recurring government agent. Yasunori Matsumoto [[PlayingAgainstType is surprisingly cast]] as TheDragon. Incidentally, all three actors also have major roles in TheSlayers series, being Lina, Xelloss, and Gourry respectively.
* InformedAbility - Millie gets completely wrapped up in bandages by a group of medical students who are allegedly ready for their final exam because she ''sneezed'' - ''once''.
* KarmaHoudini - Despite the demonstrated lack of competence and professional ethics in the medical students mentioned in the CompletelyMissingThePoint and InformedAbility examples, all that happens to them is that they voluntarily end up having to retake their last year of classes instead of the expulsion and/or criminal charges that should have resulted.
* [[spoiler:KillEmAll]]: The climax of the novels.
* LaserBlade - Kane's primary weapon.
* LethalChef - Subverted: Millie is actually a very ''good'' chef...she just [[StuffBlowingUp blows up the kitchen]] every time she uses it. Once by literal application of OvenLogic.
* LightNovels - It began as a light novel series, four volumes in total.
* LimitedWardrobe - Kane's closet is nothing but the exact same cloak.
* LostTechnology - The Lost Ships.
* MagicFromTechnology - The Ships again, whose EnergyWeapons look a heck of a lot like magic. The commands used on Dark Star at the end that disrupts him is part of the Giga Slave...
* MegumiHayashibara
* NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast - Yami o Makumono (lit. He Who Spreads Darkness; "Dark Seeder" in the ADV Translation)
* NoBudget: Unintentional; it was being made during a financial recession, so it got a meager budget to begin with. To twist the knife even further, the masters for the first few episodes were damaged from a studio fire, so their quality also went down.
* TheMole - [[spoiler:Rail.]]
* OffModel - Episode 4, "Yashigani Hofuru", had so many animation errors that ''yashigani'' became a FanNickname for bad animation.
* RecycledInSpace - Lost Universe is {{Slayers}}, in...well, you know.
* SoichiroHoshi
* SpaceshipGirl - Canal, who is also a CoolShip.
* [[spoiler:ShootTheShaggyDog: Only several villains are alive at the end of the novel series; all of the protagonists are dead without any real justification.]]
* ShoutOut - Kane's LaserBlade.
* StunGuns - Millie often uses plastic rounds, which are played more like a less permanent InstantDeathBullet than a painful blow.
* ToBeAMaster - Millie wants to be the best in the universe - at ''everything''.
* {{Tsundere}} - Millie.
----