Tenchi Muyo GXP: Galaxy Police Transporter is a Spin-Off of the Tenchi Muyo! series (specifically, the original OVA incarnation), directed by Shinichi Watanabe. It begins during episode 5 of the third Tenchi OVA and progresses further outwards from there, providing something of a detailed look at the series' Verse and life in "civillized" space, as opposed to the original, which by and large mostly takes place on Earth and in uninhabited space.
The focus character is Seina Yamada (Shigeru Mogi), a young man with a kind heart, a spiky crewcut that is unusually pleasant to the touch, and the absolute worst luck ever (His bicycle frequently falls to pieces while he's riding it, doorknobs snap when he's trying to open them, windows and awnings collapse when he's under them, the horse you've bet on loses its jockey while you're listening when he passes, etc). The series opens with said luck bouncing him and anyone in his path around while he hurries to visit Kiriko Masaki (Kumi Sakuma), a childhood friend who just returned after months out of town. Tempting fate, he takes a shortcut by the home of Tenchi Masaki (Masami Kikuchi), whom he admires and respects — just in time to be knocked in the lake by a passing spaceship. This begins his chance encounter with Amane Kaunaq (Mariko Suzuki), a Galaxy Police officer who had stopped off on Earth to make a delivery to Tenchi. She assumes that Seina knows about Tenchi's houseguests, and she's impressed that he survived the crash in such good shape, so she gives him an application form for the "GP" and tells Seina to look her up.
Seina finally meets Kiriko, and the visit goes fairly well — although he has trouble explaining the lipstick on his neck! Afterwards, Seina's family forces him to complete the form (they think it's a lottery application), and he's abducted and shanghaied into the Galaxy Police by the end of the episode. Luckily for him, his terrible luck makes him a natural-born magnet for Space Pirates, and he's soon convinced to try to use his "powers" for good. Before even finishing his training, he is assigned to the GP's decoy unit, which hopes to use his luck as a weapon in order to draw out more pirates and crush them. Of course, since Seina is Willfully Weak, he also acquires a sizable Harem, who, true to the spirit of Tenchi Muyo!, fight over and embarrass him at every possible opportunity as they hunt down pirates, deal with the intergalactic bureaucracy, and of course, enjoy lots and lots of Hot Springs.
Tenchi Muyo GXP builds on both the formula and setting of the original Tenchi series. Funimation has released this series in English, and it aired on the [adult swim] Toonami block on Saturday nights at 3:00 AM (following in the footsteps of the first two Tenchi Muyo! OVA series, Tenchi Universe, and Tenchi in Tokyo, all of which aired on the original Toonami block on Cartoon Network, albeit heavily censored).
In December 2022, a new OVA series, titled Tenchi Muyo GXP Paradise Starting, was announced. Directed by Hiroshi Negishi, Paradise Begins is set during the Paradise War spin-off. Hirofumi Nojima replaces Shigeru Mogi as Seina Yamada, reprising his role from the fifth Ryo-Ohki OVA.
This anime provides examples of:
- Arbitrarily Large Bank Account: Seina seems to be making a lot of money as a Fleet Captain even if he is just a Decoy. It is never stated how much because most of the money he earns is put into a savings account he does not have access to until his graduation. Yet it seems the interest alone is enough for his family to live in a mansion, after upgrading their convenience store into a small supermarket.
- Attack Drones: In the second episode, the space pirates pursuing Seina's GP transport ship fire a barrage of Boarding Pods that release a swarm of "rats" — robotic drones designed to disperse throughout the ship and either hack it into submission or explode to sabotage as much as possible. Despite the force-field traps the GP ship deploys as countermeasures, the rats are able to damage the engines and force a Blind Jump.
- Beach Episode: Twice. It helps that the Kamidake II has its own beach holodeck or pocket dimension.
- Betty and Veronica: Kiriko and Amane, with Ryoko B. as Third-Option Love Interest.
- Beware the Nice Ones:
- Kiriko during the Wham Episode
- Seina.
- Beyond the Impossible: Two examples in episode 24 involving Seina's Kamidake mode mecha.
- It generates Lighthawk wings without Kiriko's Jurian Tree, Misuki. Both Tarant and Seto are flabbergasted how he can do this since Lighthawk wings are a Jurai only power. This one is explained by the mecha possessing a First Generation Jurian Tree that the royal family didn't know about.
- It reaches into hyperspace and pulls Tarant's ship back into regular space. One of Tarant's allies would rather believe this was a trick than truly happening. One of his sub-ordinates confirms the trope:
"The laws of physics have just been shattered." - Big Fancy House: Amane's "second home"; later, the new home Seina's parents bought after he moved away.
- Black Comedy Rape: Of Machines by Machines: NaBiko to NB. NB suffers a nervous breakdown for the next several episodes, and winds up with a fleet of baby robots — all played for laughs.
- Blind Jump: The GP ship bringing Seina from Earth in the second episode attempts several blind jumps to escape a pirate ship, to no avail. When they ask Seina to randomize the destination, he somehow gathers an entire fleet of pirates pursuing them — which are then captured by the Devil Princess of Jurai.
- A later episode has the Kamidake damaged in a way that it's only capable of blind jumps, while being pursued by a relentless horde of pirates and running low on supplies.
- Born Unlucky: Seina's terrible luck is so bad that the GP actually uses it as a weapon. Since his luck is so horrible that if often attracts space pirates, he's assigned the job of decoy in tracking them down.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall:
- Seiryo: "Oh! The good luck meter!"
- Alan, Barry, and Cohen have a brief Fourth Wall-breaking moment of this when one heads off on his own and the other two protest that he can't, because the three of them together comprise a single character.
- Butt-Monkey: Seina for the first few episodes, and Seiryo for practically the entire series.
- The Cameo: Seina sees Ryoko flying at the beginning, which causes him to crash. Washu with a suspenders, scarf, shades can be seen running an open-air market booth. Seina meets Tenchi near the end.
- Canon Discontinuity: Rumor has it that Kajishima was dissatisfied with the anime of GXP, that he decided to write light novel series that toned down the harem antics, gave more character depth and even increased Seina's harem up to 20 women! Including his future mother-in-law and Fuku! The novels are also used as reference for the fourth Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-Ohki series, thus making the anime GXP knowledge obsolete.
- Cat People: The Wau are best described as a race of anthropomorphic mountain lions.
- Chick Magnet: A rather strange version. Most girls on Earth don't particularly take notice of Seina, but once he's out in space... Everyone! It's not just his Harem either. After he gets into an accident while apart from the harem, a lady doctor shows more than a glancing interest in him and tries to jump him. He gets away, but not without a lip-stick stain on the cheek.
- Continuity Nod: A lot, mostly towards the third Tenchi Muyo! OVA. For example, Minami Kuramitsu is seen running the GP spaceship mechanic team after having been sentenced to do so at the end of OVA 3, the planet-sized warship Chobimaru still bears all the grafitti/damage inflicted upon it during its Curb-Stomp Battle against Ryo-Oh-Ki, and Amane makes reference to having sung at the wedding of two characters who became engaged thanks to Tenchi and his harem.
- Continuity Nod / Crossover: There is also one to Dual! Parallel Trouble Adventure. At the Last episode of that series Zinv (the primary mecha said to have access to the Light Hawk Wings was sent to "another world" and in Ep 24 Seina gets "sacrificed" to a mech that bears a very striking resemblance to Dual's Zinv. This is later confirmed by
Kajishima in the GXP novels which go further in depth.
- Continuity Nod / Crossover: There is also one to Dual! Parallel Trouble Adventure. At the Last episode of that series Zinv (the primary mecha said to have access to the Light Hawk Wings was sent to "another world" and in Ep 24 Seina gets "sacrificed" to a mech that bears a very striking resemblance to Dual's Zinv. This is later confirmed by
- Cool Ship: The Mikagami, Kamidake and Kamidake II. The Unko is an inversion of this trope, being decidedly uncool in every single possible way.
- Demoted to Extra: Since GXP primarily focuses on Seina, Tenchi's group has considerably less screen time as opposed to Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-Ohki.
- The Determinator: Seina suffers through days of a Physical Training regimen designed for cadets with Super-Strength just to prove to himself that he can make it.
- Deus ex Machina: A Humongous Mecha shows up on an alien planet when it's needed most. It's even called a god by the locals.
- Does Not Know His Own Strength: Seina suffers this after being enhanced — other characters live with him to help him control it.
- Does This Remind You of Anything?: Toyed with. An early Running Gag sees NB having large, pointy parts of spaceships jammed into his rear end (don't ask). He reacts just as you would expect. Also played with later on... When Seiryo talks about how his day with Seina has come, a droopy shock baton stands up firmly.
- Double Standard Rape: Female on Male: The grand finale.
- In front of a massive audience. With audio. With major political figures attending.
- Also NB gets one with Namiko. She clearly enjoyed it where he is terrified.
- Earth All Along: The novels say that the world Tenchi and Seina come from isn't the original Earth. The galaxy was colonized billions of years ago by the humans from Dual! Parallel Trouble Adventure.
- Earth That Was: When Seina visits the home system of the Great Prehistoric Civilization in the novels, he finds the third planet barren but the fourth had life on it. When he realises the third planet is Earth All Along, he figures the homeworld of humanity must have exhausted all its resources and colonized Mars.
- Easily Forgiven: Many of the actions of the characters that would normally have someone court martial and dishonorably discharged are often forgiven without a second thought.
- The Easy Way or the Hard Way: Seto's husband. He claimed that she gave him a chose "marriage or death" and he never takes the easy way.
- Energy Weapons: Both Laser Beams and Laser Blades are used.
- Ensign Newbie: Seina is given command over a decoy ship despite still technically being a cadet.
- Justified in that the higher ups were trying to weaponize his bad luck. Putting him onto a battleship might seem like a good idea until you realize his bad luck bleeds onto everybody (barring his harem), not just pirates.
- Evolving Credits
- The opening credits show four silhouettes, The final three are obviously Aeka, Ryoko (Hakubi), and Tenchi, while the first is eventually revealed to be Neige in the episode that introduces her. Tenchi and co's silhouettes are revealed in the crossover episode. The Kamidake II appears at the end of the sequence after its introduction, and Neige, Fuku, and Ryoko are added to the Team Shot following Fuku's addition to the cast.
- The ending credits intially use an Idiosyncratic Wipe which causes the background to change each time copies of Seina's trademark band-aid fill the screen. Halfway through the series, the band-aids are replaced with multiple Fukus. Nude images of Amane and Kiriko (Nipple and Dimed for your convenience, naturally) shown towards the end of the sequence are replaced with ones of Ryoko, and for some reason, Mitoto.
- Looks like she got lost cleaning again.
- Exact Words: Rookie informs the girls while kept in custody they have access to "everything in the room is at your disposal to use as you see fit", emphasizing the word "everything" while his eyes look over to something covered by a blanket. Cluing them in that he is on their side.
- Expy:
- Fuku is a Suspiciously Similar Substitute (and a new little sister) for Ryo-Ohki.
- Alan, Barry, and Cohen are expies of a Yuppie Trio from Super Dimension Fortress Macross.
- Most of the main cast are arguably Expies of Tenchi and his harem.
- The combat uniform Amane wears in episode 19 is nearly identical to the Kazuki wears in Dual!
- Arguably, a lot of characters are based on the cast in Dual!, if only to some amount of appearance. Kiriko = Mitsuki Sanada, Amane = Yayoi, D = Neige, Ryoko = Mitsuki Rara. Seto = Ayuko. The Light Novel adaptation of the series doubles down on this, introducing Tenchi-verse counterparts of Mitsuki Sanada and her father, as well as revealing that Seina's another counterpart of Kazuki.
- The Artifact/ancient mech is Zinv from Dual!
- Eye Catch: Of the "General Footage" variety. When going to a commercial break, it has footage of something occurring later in the episode, and when returning it shows a quick clip of something that already happened.
- Fantastic Slurs: The pirates like to call the Wau "Dog Faces".
- Fish out of Water: Seina. He is often confused or lacking knowledge of alien cultures.
- Four Is Death: Inverted, The GXP novels and fourth OVA series of Ryo-oh-ki reveal that so long as Seina is within proximity of four members of his harem, his bad luck doesn't affect anyone allied with him. However, there is a caveat to this, being that each of the girls has to be an Astral, ie reincarnation, of one of the different heroines from Dual! and there can be no repeats.
- Gambit Roulette: It's been theorized that Lady Seto had planned for most of Seina's career since their first meeting — including the wedding fiasco.
- Genius Ditz: Mitoto Kuramitsu, daughter of Minami and mother of Mihoshi and Misao. She's a bubbly, airheaded lady who has as much navigational sense as Seina has luck, but is frighteningly competent when it comes to spaceship systems and repelling pirates. She also is able to enter hyperspace on foot, leading to her finding herself in the most interesting places.
- She seems subject to quantum uncertainty when it comes to her location.
- Gilded Cage: Seriyo is kept in a very well furnished cell when captured by the pirates. He still considers it a Hell Hole Prison though.
- The girls are kept in a castle when Seina is believed to have stolen the Kamidaki II.
- Girl Posse: Vega seems to have girls around her simply to smile and agree with whatever she says.
- Glowing Eyes of Doom: Shank gets one after he starts becoming a cyborg.
- Gunship Rescue: Ryoko B. is released from prison to command a GP ship and rescue Seina and his crew from a pirate siege in episode 12, which she accomplishes in Big Damn Heroes style.
- Heroic BSoD: Seina has this happen if somebody sticks a gun in his face. The one time it didn't happen was when Elma shoves a gun in his face. That time he keeps his wits about him.
- Hijacked by Ganon: In a heroic variation, Seina is relieved of command of the Kamidake II during the raid on Da Ruma's hideout because Seto wanted to ruin the pirates personally.
- Hot for Student: Most of Seina's harem is visibly older than him, and serve as his instructors at the GP Academy for most of the series.
- Humongous Mecha: Seina gets to pilot one in episode 24. It looks a lot like an EVA Unit, and even growls like one in combat.
- Hyperspeed Escape: Epically subverted in the second episode, especially once they let Seina "drive".
- Improbably Female Cast: Siena is the only major male character. Even the picture at the top shows this off.
- Infinite Supplies: Averted in episode 12 in which Seina's ship is being tracked by pirates who are preventing them from resupplying at at a space station, and after a few days the characters are shown gazing longingly at the last of their rations; a glass of water and a single cracker.
- Informed Ability: The GP are talked up as a major galactic peacekeeper by both Amane and Seto when trying to convince Seina to join their ranks. However, with a few exceptions, every single encounter that the GP has with pirates ends up as a Curb-Stomp Battle in the pirates' favor. Partly justified in that many of the GP ships that are featured are cargo transports, however,
given the frequency of pirate encounters in general, that still begs the question of why the GP doesn't provide those transports with armed escorts as a rule of thumb. - I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: All of Seina's harem decides this at the same time in the second-to-last episode. This makes Marry Them All much easier to pull off.
- Jumped at the Call: Seina, as soon as he realizes he can accomplish something with his bad luck. However, this was due to goading by Seto and she specifically catered to this idea so she would have a new toy to wreck havoc with. One of her attendants (the guy that's usually seen with her along with Minaho) lampshades how she did the same thing with him.
- Kabuki Sounds: Used for the title cards.
- Kick the Dog: Tarant attempts this multiple times, and probably would have gone through with it if the Scale sliding over to Idealism didn't always throw a monkey wrench into his plans.
- Knight of Cerebus: Tarant Shank, as much as the plot allows him to be.
- Leaning on the Fourth Wall: Except for one scene, Amane's mother always looks straight at the Fourth Wall, no matter the camera angle.
- Left It In: After some not-so-heartfelt goodbyes, Seina's mother mentions they can cut out the part about his family leaving for Hawaii without him. Seina sees the unedited version.
- Living Ship: Jurai ships are all trees. Fuku is downplayed, as she is only the Kamidake II's will/power amplifier.
- Man Behind the Man: The Galaxy Army are secretly using the pirate guilds to raise money.
- Maneki Neko: This is one of the many types of good luck charms present on the Da Ruma pirate ships.
- Marry Them All: Seina winds up marrying all eight members of his harem. Nine, if you include the questionable case of Fuku. This makes it symbolic as nine is an unlucky number in Japanese (similar to four).
- Mars Needs Women: The Fridge Logic of Fuku's affection for Seina.
- Meet Cute: Parodied by Gyokuren, Hakuren, Suiren, and Karen when they try seducing Seina.
- Meido: Hakuren wears the outfit during her attempt at Meet Cute.
- The Mole: Elma and four non-GU agents.
- Mundane Utility: Apparently, technology in the Tenchi-verse is so advanced that access to pocket dimensions are used for private beaches to washing machines & dryers...
- Nanomachines: Used on all GP members to give them Super-Strength, Super-Speed, a Healing Factor, and a dramatically extended lifespan.
- No Kill like Overkill: Seto commented with the combination of the Jurai Tree Misuki and the Kamidaki the power might be that of a 1st Class Jurai Battleship. One of the underlings comment on the power might being excessive.Seto: Nothing's excessive about full potential.
- Nonhuman Side Kick: Fuku, NB to a lesser extent.
- No Sense of Direction: Mitoto, who even drags along Seina and Seiryo.
- Oblivious to Love: Seina; not once until the last episode is he aware that any of the girls are in love with him despite how many times they have openly thrown themselves at him. Even during the wedding he seemed to fully believe that the only reason they were marrying him was because it was a political marriage and they were under orders rather than they genuinely loved him.
- The Omniscient Council of Vagueness:
- When Lady Seto, Airi, and Misaki get together to discuss the plot.
- A more traditional version appears in the kidnapping arc.
- Only Six Faces: A variation played by the spaceships instead of people. Every fleet of pirate ships portrayed in the series features the same twelve or so ship designs - the only exceptions are named ships owned by main or supporting characters.
- Personal Raincloud: Part of Seina's Establishing Character Moment.
- The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything:
- Averted in one instance; the pirates we do see pillage plenty.
- Played straight in a second instance; Seina is only seen in class once in the entire series.
- Pixellation: The obscene-looking tattoos.
- Brown Bag Mask: Seina and his classmates were forced to wear paper bag masks to cover up the obscene-looking tattoos that appear on their faces.
- At the end, half the GP academy graduates can be seen wearing Brown Bag Masks during their graduation ceremony.
- Poorly Disguised Pilot: The episode where Seina visits Tenchi's house, set after the 3rd OVA series but released well before it.
- Power Gives You Wings: The Light-Hawk Wings, of course.
- Propaganda Piece: the Galaxy Police have a really bad recruitment film, with things like Scoring Points and even a grabber-claw enticement offer.
- Rainbow Pimp Gear: The Unko manages to embody this for starships.
- Really 700 Years Old:
- Every Juraian character shown. Neige trumps everyone else by being somewhere over two thousand years old.
- Seto is over 4,600 years old. Then there are certain members of the Tenchi household who absolutely dwarf Neige in terms of age.
- Rebellious Princess: Amane ran away and joined the Galaxy Police to get away from the shadow of her overbearing father. He's still trying to get her to come home until the second half of the series.
- Required Spinoff Crossover: Ryoko shows up in silhouette in the first episode. Two later episodes feature Washu and Ryo-Oh-Ki, and then along comes episode 15, in which Seina hangs out with the entirety of Muyo's cast.
- Ridiculously Cute Critter: Fuku, and Cabbits in general.
- Scary Shiny Glasses: Done by a whole group of scientists in episode 5.
- Serial Escalation: Mostly in regards to how much destiny well screw over/aid Seina in any give episode.
- "Shaggy Dog" Story: Seiryo's quest for good luck charms in episode 18.
- Shout-Out: Seina gets trapped in a 2D box overlaid in on a video of space in episode 2.
- Alan, Barry, and Cohen are a shoutout to Super Dimension Fortress Macross.
- Single-Stroke Battle:
- Played straight with a dual between Seiryo and Tarant which occurs just before his Scrap Heap rescue described above.
- Played with in Seiryo's duel with Seina. It was single-stroke... in a roundabout way.
- Space Pirates: Loads and Loads of them.
- Space "X": the Galaxy Police, the Space Pirates, etc.
- Take Our Word for It: The horribleness of the (pixelated) tattoos dished out by Academy night security.
- Tangled Family Tree: Lampshaded when Airi pulls out a visual aid to explain how she fits in.
- Tastes Like Friendship: Fuku (or Cabbit's in general) seems to instantly like anyone who gives her a carrot.
- Thing-O-Meter: A Good Luck Meter appears during Seiryo's search for any lucky relics across the universe.
- Those Two Guys: Kenneth and Rajau, Seina's pals during his stint at the academy are the initial set. They eventually get replaced by Alan, Barry, and Cohen, a trio of male bridge operators.
- Tomboy and Girly Girl: Amane and Kiriko.
- Underboobs: Amane wears some VERY short tops while teasing Seina.
- Unexpected Successor: By gaining control of the Zinv-look-alike which has a First Generation Juraian tree seed in it, Seina becomes third in line for the Juraian throne. However, because Tenchi and his grandfather do not really want to succeed the throne, this effectively puts him first.
- Unfortunate Names: Due to the fact that every other "lucky" name was taken at the time, Seiryo is forced to christen his ship the Unko, which is supposed to mean "bringer of fortune", unfortunately for Seiryo, "Unko" also means, and is more commonly used to refer to, poop.
- Unknown Rival: Seina never really perceives Seiryo as an enemy; despite this, he's one of the few people on the show who takes Seiryo seriously.
- Unusual User Interface: Seiryo uses a giant game of bingo to control the Unko in combat during one episode.
- Unwanted Harem: It's a Tenchi Muyo! spin-off, what did you expect?
- Weakness Turns Her On: A possible explanation for Seina's harem.
- Wedding Smashers: Happens not once, but twice in the final episode. The first being attempted by Tarant Shank being disguised as an assistant that appears to apparently help him get into his wedding attire, only to attempt to murder him, and nearly succeeds as he manages to get Seina alone, but fortunately fails due to Seina's cunning reflexes and wits. The second being done by the other four girls not part of Seina's group that occasionally try and seduce him into either getting into his pants or attempting to marry him. They kidnap him, and the girls are alerted to this when the wrong "groom" appears in the form of Seina's sister and best friend Kai arriving in his stead and inform them of the earlier events. While they manage to get some distance away from Seina's group, they fail eventually as the Kamidake quickly arrives and subdues them.
- Wham Episode:
- Pirates attack, Seina's in danger. Kiriko goes badass. Then everything goes back to normal.
- The episode in which it turns out that Erma is Ryoko Balta and was coerced into being sent to kill Seina also qualifies because the character is never seen again.
