LUM URUSEI YATSURA Perfect Collection
Comic review

If there's one thing I want out of life, it's value for money. Not necessarily quality or quantity, but more something that looks like how much it costs.

Take the re-run of the classic Masters Of The Universe toys for example. Now I'm pretty sure these things used to cost around £4-£5 when I was young; now of course they get their cult/collector status and so how much to they charge for them? £18! a great example (along with nouvelle cuisine and coffee shops) of bad value for money.

Now take the recent reprint of the Lone Wolf and Cub comics and the HMV 3 videos for £15, examples of good value for money; Roxanne, The Money Pit and Weekend At Bernie's all for £15, can life possibly get any better?

It is this last example where the Lum: Urusei Yatsura Perfect Collection fits in; eighteen issues of the offbeat manga series in one chunky, truffle-shuffle book for £14.99.

Ok, so maybe I'm sounding prematurely old here, but when you're underpaid as I'm sure everyone else thinks they are, you can't afford to be flippant.

Lum is the story of possibly the unluckiest kid in the world, Ataru. We are introduced to his bad luck from the very start by Ataru getting slapped and dumped by his girlfriend, Shinobu, for looking at another girl, and then getting pushed into the river by Cherry, the wise old man who is ironically the first person to tell Ataru just how unlucky he is.

Upon arriving home, Ataru discovers that a race of Alien Demons have arrived at his home specifically for him. It seems that they want to take over the world, but they're not totally unfair and so they have given us a chance.

Out of the entire population of the world their computer picked Ataru as the earths champion. What does this mean? Well Ataru must compete in a 10-day game of tag against the Demons' champion. Enter Lum.

To win the game Ataru must tag Lums horns. Sounds easy doesn't it; it's only when they begins that Ataru discovers that Lum can fly, making things all a little difficult for him.

Anyway, Ataru manages to win and from then on it's a comedy of errors, the biggest and main drive for the book being Lum's misunderstanding of Ataru's proposal to his girlfriend, Shinobu. Lum believes Ataru proposed (and was married) to her and so constantly hampers his life and any time he tries to share with Shinobu.

Each episode then deals with yet another bad hand that has been dealt to Ataru, including a balls-in-the-basket war between the Demons and the Gods, being chosen as the ideal mate for a crow princess and receiving a bill of "the entire stock of the worlds oil supplies" for an accidental intergalactic taxi ride.

You can't help but feel some sympathy for Ataru, despite his hormones making him letch at every girl he comes across (not taking into account the fact that they may be an alien princess or not) and forever yelling at his parents.

His anger comes across as humorous as you realise that with all his bad luck in mind anyone else would probably be the same. Come on, if every day you were met with a small old man telling you that this was going to be a very bad day for you, you'd be a little annoyed from time to time.

And despite Lum's constant nagging at Ataru (who she constantly, and amusingly, refers to only as "Darling"), you can't help but love her. I think it's probably the fact that she only wears a tiny bikini with 60s hot pants, knee length boots and has fangs.

Also, taking into consideration Ataru's constant slobbering and lust over every female to appear, I have to say that Shinobu is the most forgiving girl on the entire planet; forever forgiving Ataru and putting up with his bad luck.

The only flaws with an 18-part collection of what are essentially one-off funny books is that it can get s little repetitive after a time. In fact there is a bit of a contradiction on the cover of the book, with the top title referring to it as a "Viz Graphic Novel" and also being called a collection, which is essentially what it is, despite the underlying story that runs throughout.

Lum: Urusei Yatsura is an extremely funny book. I don't think it's the fact that Ataru has been born with this bad luck, but more the way he deals with it. The usual shouting and humorous anger at each new awful situation is easily quashed when he sees a pretty face. And who could argue with that?

8/10

david twomey

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