YMMV / Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-Ohki

• Americans Hate Tingle:
  • In the west, Noike is almost universally derided for her spotlight stealing role in OVA 3. In Japan, opinion of her is a lot more balanced, and is overall accepted and liked by the masses. This is probably due to Kajishima's continued releases of doujinshi and novels that expand upon the 'verse. Americans were pretty surprised by Noike due to No Export for You.
  • Ayeka is a lot less liked in the west than she is in Japan.
• Base-Breaking Character: Ayeka, Mihoshi and Ryoko. Is Ayeka a nice princess who cares about the others but doesn't really now how to express it properly, or a bitch who only cares for herself? Is Ryoko a Jerk with a Heart of Gold whose antics are funny or an annoying and selfish Jerkass who constantly abuses others? Is Mihoshi a sympathetic Cloudcuckoolander or an irritating Too Dumb to Live character who always gets her friends in trouble?
• Broken Base: The direction of the 4th and 5th OVAs. Some people like that we actually get to see the characters age and that we're getting background info on Kenshi for his spinoff. Moreover, Tenchi finally marries his harem and even has babies with Ryoko and Ayeka. Others lament that the OVAs have gone full on Slice of Life and that Tenchi and his harem are basically Advertised Extras. And since most of the expanded material never leaves Japan, the 5th OAV ends up bombarding you with new character after new character.
• Continuity Lock-Out: Not at first, but by the time of the 5th OAV, most of the cast getting the lion's share of the screen time were properly introduced in either the spinoffs (which at least did make it outside Japan), or in the light novels (which didn't). If you only watch the anime, everything after the 2nd OAV is going to be extremely confusing.
• Complete Monster: Kagato is an intergalactic researcher who utterly lacks anything resembling a conscience. Kagato turned on his mentor, Washu Hakubi, and imprisoned her for thousands of years, hijacking everything she had left behind, including Washu's created "daughter" Ryoko. Brainwashing Ryoko, Kagato sent her to discover the truth of the "greatest treasure in the universe," having her hunt down traces of it, and then destroy the worlds that contained it to make certain nobody else could replicate his discoveries, whether they were inhabited or not. Over 3,000 worlds met their fate this way. After losing Ryoko, Kagato continued the process himself until he discovered her alive on Earth. He wastes little time in trying to kill Tenchi and his Unwanted Harem and succeeds in blowing Tenchi apart from his ship. When Ryoko offers her life in place of Tenchi's, Kagato merely responds he'll just kill both. When Wahsu is freed, Kagato decides to "reminisce" about the old days by drawing on his ship's power to destroy the Earth. Kagato is defined by his drive for his "scientific method." Anything and anyone that gets caught in his path is simply collateral damage to that end.
• Ensemble Dark Horse: While most of OVA 3 is considered a Contested Sequel and inspires much Base Breaking, the character of Z is pretty universally well liked by Tenchi fans.
• First Installment Wins: Despite future versions of the story having their fair share of fans (Tenchi Universe and its sequel films, most notably), when somebody talks about Tenchi Muyo!, they will almost always be referring to the first two OVA's (the third OVA is often referred to the Market-Based Title of Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-Ohki).
• Genre Turning Point: Although Urusei Yatsura is generally credited as the first harem show, Tenchi really set the genre on fire, launching a host of imitators. Perhaps its biggest innovation was to make the male lead a soft-spoken, incredibly Nice Guy (and have this be why the girls all like him) as opposed to Ataru, who is a sex-crazed jerkass. It was easier for viewers to see themselves in someone like Tenchi, which amped up the wish fulfillment.
• I Knew It!:
  • As far back as War on Geminar, fans suspected that Kenshi Masaki was a descendant of the Masaki family who was sent to Geminar after training on Earth. Sure enough, by the time of the fifth OVA, Kenshi begins his training on Earth so he can be sent to Geminar.
  • Many correctly predicted that Tenchi would marry his harem in the fifth OVA series.
• Inferred Holocaust: Destroying half the Earth? Yeah. That'll definitely kill some people on the planet but the Reset Button made it so that didn't actually happen.
• Moral Event Horizon: Kagato does this via mind controlling Ryoko to attack the group and Tenchi, then by killing Tenchi in the upcoming battle (with only the timely intervention of Tsunami bringing him back) — while forcing a kidnapped Ryoko to watch!
• Replacement Scrappy: Noike is often seen as a poor copy of Kiyone. Although she actually predates Kiyone in creation (she just wasn't implemented into the show until much after Kiyone's first appearance), some fans wonder why she wasn't just replaced with Kiyone in the first place, making this an odd inversion of the trope.
• Romantic Plot Tumor: Probably one of the shortest examples. Three quarters into OVA 3, an entire episode is spent exploring the budding romance between Misao and Mashisu. This might not seem like a big deal, but considering that OVA 3 is only seven episodes long and the love reveal distracted from other more pressing plot elements, this definitely fits.
• The Scrappy:
  • Noike for American fans but the obvious is Yugi for her smugness and the Karma Houdini for the truly monstrous acts she commits.
  • Both Mashisu and Misao from the OVA 3 are almost universally hated because one episode focused on their romance instead of the plot. And Sakuya is seen as annoying for a large portion of the fandom.
  • The Paradise War cast in OVA5 for a variety of reasons, largely due to their novels not getting animated and never leaving Japan. The fact that the female members of the cast seem to have an unhealthy obsession with the underage Kenshi can lead to some Squick for some viewers as well.
  • Kenshi himself, for being a Spotlight-Stealing Squad for the final two OVAs despite having his own spinoff.
• Seasonal Rot: It's generally agreed that the OVA series fell off a cliff in terms of quality starting with OVA3. In fact, OVA3 seems to have soured opinions of the franchise as a whole in the west, hence why Funimation doesn't seem to be in any hurry to localise the newer products these days.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
  • Western opinion on Noike is generally poor, but a lot more could've been built around her status as an official fiance for Tenchi and a spy for Jurai. The other girls' reactions to this would've made for good entertainment and development, and the spy angle could've introduced the political elements of the story in a more controlled manner. Instead, her status as a spy is just explained away to Ryoko and Ayeka after they basically just accepted Noike's existence. And despite having some episode focus, she still gets so little actual character progression she barely qualifies as a Satellite Character. Then there are those who just feel she could have just as easily been replaced by Ensemble Dark Horse Kiyone from the alternate continuities.
• Values Dissonance: Seiryo's incredibly camp personality and "gay lisp" in the English dub would very likely not fly today since many would probably accuse the dub of homophobia by having a jerk like him behaving like a stereotypical gay man. It would seem Cartoon Network knew this at the time and had another voice actor dub over the original with a much less flamboyant performance for the Toonami version.

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