Galaxy Police Transporter
(TV Series Spinoff: Episodes 1-26)

First of all, people tend to assume that this is hooked on to the OVA canon - but if you watch the series more closely, it could really be a canon in it's own right.

Most of the GXP episodes do not involve Tenchi and his "harem". (There is a nice touch, mind you, when Ryoko flies over Seina's head carrying sake and gives him the fright of his life). The few moments that do involve these characters, however, are full of things which contradict the original OVA series. Some things I've noticed are as follows:

1: Seina has apparently not met Mihoshi and Tenchi refers to her as a 'new housemate' in the English dub yet Mihoshi has been living with them longer than Washu and Noike, who he has already met. It's odd that if Mihoshi has lived with them that long...Seina has not met her ^_^.

2: Ryo Ohki has a sister, Fuku. But the impression is given at the end of OVA 2 that Washu does not intend/has not duplicated her technology. In fact she tells Funaho  that she "won't help anyone" - yet in this series every second invention seems to be something Washu created to help Jurai (Seto in particular, i.e Kamidake II and Fuku especially!) Since Ryo Ohki in OVA canon is powered by the gem on her brow, can Fuku really be Ryo Ohki's sister? There just aren't enough gems! Maybe this would have worked better with more explanation...however there is scant lack of explanation for a lot of things in GXP, even within the working plot...so lets let that one go.

3. Tenchi has suddenly developed an amazing talent for cooking, which apparently surpasses that of Sasami. Although in the original episodes, Sasami is always the house cook, and Tenchi is never shown to have any propensity for cooking. In the English dub, Tenchi also claims to have built the spa - although he did no such thing.

4. Airi calls herself Yosho's wife. This is included in OVA part 3 but not mentioned in OVA parts 1 or 2, nor is there any indication that she exists in these series - since Yosho offers himself in marriage to Ayeka when she discovers his true identity. Airi also is supposedly Tenchi's grandmother - biologically. You'd think, then, that someone would have heard of her in OVA 1 and 2??

5. Sasami and co have begun calling Ryo Ohki "Ryo" in the English dub. This just does not happen in the original OVA. Ever. :P

6: Ryo Ohki appears to have learnt to talk. Although in the original OVA series she does manage to say the word carrot, Ryo Ohki in human girl form is unable to speak normal language. She also fires green rays instead of the orange ones that typify both Ryoko and Ryo Ohki's magic in the original OVA episodes. She also goes flying through space on her own - although Ryoko is the only one who can fly Ryo Ohki correctly and she never flies herself in the OVA 1 and 2. This even contradicts the OVA 3 (ironically) because Ryo Ohki is treated as a small child in OVA 3 whereas she's old enough to travel all across the universe on an errand for Washu in GXP.

7: Washu claims that Fuku can change into human form 'if she chooses to'. However, Ryo Ohki's ability to change into human form is governed by her OVA 2 merging with the rogue Mass and is not an ability she has always have. Therefore Washu is contradicting her own science - Fuku should not have the ability to change her form in that way.

8.Seiryo is apparently in love with the former supermodel Amane, to the point where he wants to kill Seina pretty much every episode he's in because he thinks Seina is stealing her away. But Seiryo was supposedly in love with Ayeka and set to marry her. There's some mention of this broken betrothal in the series, but Seiryo's sudden change of heart is a touch strange! (Or maybe Seiryo is just fickle - he does propose marriage to yet another woman at the end of the series!)

You could call me nit-picking...but it would take a very devoted fan-brain to work all of those things into logical explanation.

Well, on to the show itself.

Seina Yamada is the most unlucky boy in the world. No, actually, he really is. So much so that his family are actually glad when he ends up in outer space as a cadet for the Galaxy Police. I have to admit that his disaster-prone-ness was kinda old by the end of the first episode, but I guess it's amusing if you like that sort of thing.

Seina really does not know what he's let himself in for. There is an element of 'teenage boy fantasy' about this show, with a large emphasis on men wanting to see naked girls and older women literally throwing themselves at Seina (who's english dub voice has to be one of the most annoying ever).

Seina's knack for picking up pirates on a whim in deep space brings him into the centre of action on many occasions. Between his tutor Amane, his old friend Kiriko and the scientist Erma (Ryoko Balta in disguise) he finds himself shacked up with several older women, all of whom are in love with him pretty much from the get go. There is a touching scene where Ryoko reveals her true identity to him (this is Ryoko Balta, not our Ryoko, lets not get confused) and turns the gun on herself rather than kill him. But the show is also much more drastically violent than any of the other Tenchi material. At one point I had to actually skim back and re-watch a scene because I couldn't quite believe it - Kiriko the mild splattering blood all over the place as she slays a pirate onboard his ship. Killing doesn't seem to be such a taboo in this series, so long as it's pirates the heroes are killing - Ryoko Balta even says "they were only Pirates on board, don't worry" or something along those lines when Seina questions the destruction of a pirate ship by Kamidake II.

Whereas other series of Tenchi appear to be geared more towards the romantic relationships of Tenchi and his harem alongside battles for power and control, this series focuses on women in general as a sexual icon, not in terms of genuine love (although Seina does have a genuine crush on Kiriko born out of his childhood). Equally, there is no relationship tension or any hint of it when Seina goes back to see Tenchi and his group of girls - though Ayeka and Ryoko fight, there's really no romantic spark between him and any of the women. There are quite a few battle scenes with pirate ships in space, however, and it's my feeling that this series in particular was designed more as a boy's show than a girl's one (though I'm not being sexist and I'm certainly not tainting all boys and girls with the same brush!).

One thing that does amuse me is Seiryo's antics. He's egotistical, stupid and comic relief, but he is funny comic relief and I have to admit laughing a whole lot, particularly when he turns up in the store with fish all over him, after the insults Amane and Kiriko had thrown at him in the cafeteria earlier in the show. Yes, the series is worth watching JUST for Seiryo Tennan. I'm serious. He's a scream.

It's not a terrible show but it does have some major gaps in it's backstory. There's no real explanation how Kiriko came to be involved with the Galaxy Police, and nor is there any real explanation regarding Ryoko Balta's conversion to the Galaxy Police. One minute she's arrested for being a pirate, the next Airi is asking her to help and that's it. Noone seems to question the fact she's in Galaxy Police uniform, which is a mite strange, even considering this is a Tenchi series (or why she seems remarkably blase about killing pirates when she was one earlier in the series!).

  Seina also seems to become a captain in his own right amazingly quickly. Also, someone needs to stop Mihoshi's family from breeding, since they are all over the Galaxy Police (from Mitoto who cleans the place to their grandfather at the top rung). It's never explained that Mihoshi is Mitoto's daughter though you presume they are related - too much reliance, perhaps, on outside materials to tell an inside story. Since I'm not familiar with Tenchi manga, I'm assuming that the majority of the wider characters appear somewhere in comics or other sources related to the Tenchi concept. However, shoving them into a cartoon doesn't make them part of the show's canon - it comes over more as someone's fanfiction idea that includes as many original ideas as possible but tends to jab them in at random (and not always logical) intervals (a trait shared by OVA part 3). There are also major contradictions sometimes between the English dub and the subtitling from the Japanese, which creates a major conflict in information for viewers depending which version you watch.

Rating: If you're judging it as a canon in it's own right, it probably deserves a 5 or a 6 at the very most. If you want to judge it as part of the OVA canon, however, it's inaccuracies and continuity blips mean it doesn't even rate. Produced as it is by a new company, many different voice artists and a new animation style, there's really very little comparison.