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yumedoca · 11 months

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Why did Lum love Ataru in the first place and how her love grew into the real thing as time went on? - An Analysis 🧐 (Long Post)

Hai there, hope you’re having a great day! Today on ‘Yuca Analyzes Silly Things (For No Reason)’, we’ll be talking about the question that is the most asked in UY, both in universe and the fandom as well. “Why did Lum love Ataru in the first place and what made it into the real thing?” Note: All of the facts and evidence and such are taken from the manga because: a) it’s the canon source, b) the og anime changes a lot in relation to character to the point it isn’t consistent and c) the remake is an adaptation of selected chapters from the manga, as in it’s not the complete story. Also most of this analysis are just theories put together using canonical facts, as in what I say is speculation and not 100% confirmed (considering the manga ended like 3 decades ago, we’ll probably never get a confirmation).

With all of that aside, let’s begin!

First, We’ll divide the analysis into parts to make it easier to understand and explain:

Marriage Proposal

Evading First Love

The Beginning of True Love

The Eventual Reason

Conclusion

Marriage Proposal Lum’s first impression of Ataru wasn’t all that big, he was a human who she was supposed to play tag with but she looked down on him because she can fly and was sure that he wouldn’t be able catch her. Cue ‘Day 8’, In an attempt to catch Lum so he could grab her horns, he accidentally groped her breast and when Lum slapped him in anger, he fell down but since he was holding onto her tightly, her bra came off (as in the bra coming off was not Ataru’s fault, it was actually Lum’s which happened due to circumstances).

Later on she goes to visit him and tries to get it back, but since Ataru believes that things were finally going his way, refuses. This causes Lum to get mad it him and spite him, so the question is why would she accept his ‘marriage proposal’ later on? It took time to figure out an answer to this but I was finally able to put together an answer which makes sense: Revenge, as in for the trouble he put her through by refusing to give back her bra and flashing her to the neighborhood, she ruins the relationship between him and his girlfriend. Pretty bitchy behavior? yes, but it fits Lum’s character back then.

Look at her evil little grin…

Sure, there’s also the alternative that she just gave up to him and agreed thinking he actually wanted to marry her, but it doesn’t fit Lum’s character to give up to someone who she was frustrated with a couple seconds ago, it just doesn’t make sense story wise, which is why I’ll disregard it. Moving on, since Lum isn’t there and that Ataru and Shinobu’s relationship has been mended in the next chapter, we can think that the misunderstanding was resolved sometime between chapter 1 and 2… But Lum appears once again in chapter 3 and announces that she’ll be living with Ataru (as a part of a deal obviously) and even breaks out a tantrum when he refuses, so you may ask, why did she come back to him if her revenge idea was already resolved beforehand and why is she so eager and stubborn to be with him? The answer for that is simple and it is all because of…

Yup, him.

Evading First Love For now we’re going back to Lum’s past, back when she dated and broke up with Rei and theorize the aftermath of that. In the chapter(s, since it’s a two parter) ‘Heartbreak Crossin’’, we are shown a flashback to when Lum and Rei broke up:

We can’t really tell how old they are since it was never stated, but considering that Lum’s drawn a bit shorter and smaller (and her outfit), we can guess that this happened a few years back. Now every time Rei appears, he is seen going after Lum (that or eating) and since it’s because he wants to get back with her we can assume this started when they broke up. This means that Rei’s been, well, stalking Lum for a couple years and she’s clearly getting tired of it. I also have to mention the fact there seems to be no high school in space since Benten just hangs and rides around on her bike and Oyuki is her planet’s ruler (Lum and Ran go to school because they’re on Earth). It seems as if Junior High is where their education ends and then they do what they want or what their supposed to do and since we see that Lum was with her dad in the first chapter invading, it is likely that after graduation she decided to become an invader with her dad, but then she retired cuz she got ‘married’. She probably made the decision to work with her dad so she doesn’t want Rei to come after her anymore, however invading planets take a couple of days (10 days) and she’ll be back on her planet again and will have to put up with Rei all over again. And during one of the invasions is when she played with Ataru and answered his proposal, and like I said earlier she went back home later on. I think, after she went home, she realized that a permanent way to end the Rei issue is to get a boyfriend, and stay on another planet so he won’t be able to bother her all the time and then she remembered Ataru and that it how she eventually lives with him now.

The Beginning of True Love From there on, Lum stayed with Ataru so she could be free of Rei, if we believe this to be the actual reason then Rei’s introductory chapter makes a lot of sense. She kept trying to provide assistance to Ataru (except it hilariously backfires most of the time and causes him trouble instead) so he would accept her and tries to rid of Shinobu (and other woman) so she would have more chances with him. But eventually, in the chapter ‘How I’ve Waited For You’, Lum contemplates when she was faced with the question on whether she truly loves Ataru or not, and we her finally have her admit that she really does love her darling after all.

Now, we have to note that Ataru hasn’t shown his more positive side at all, by this point. So, why this feeling of love? Two reasons: a) It’s because she enjoys being with him. Since, Ataru is very unlucky, he tends to naturally attract all sorts of weirdness towards him causing him to end up in strange situations and we all know that weird means fun and Lum is someone who actively enjoys taking part in fun, rather than just sitting around and watching (That’s what Ran does when she’s on dates with Rei, isn’t it?). And of course, b) Overtime, she’s grown to care for him. Lum has bonded with Ataru through their experiences and since she lives with him she spends a lot of time with him. ‘The more time you spend with someone,the closer you get to them’, this isn’t a theory, it’s fact and I’m pretty sure you yourself can confirm it. Of course, by the end of the chapter, Lum got a hint that Ataru has started to accept her as well. And because of various instances such as ‘Since Your Parting’, ‘Deranged Marriage’, ‘Valentine’s Disillusion’, etc. where Ataru shows his affection has caused her own affections to grow cuz ‘If you learn that someone loves you more than you think they do, Your love for them grows as well’ (another basic fact!).

The Eventual Reason So as time went on, not only has Lum begun to see that Ataru does care for her, but she’s also seen his softer and nicer sides: The side which cries because she’s gone, The side of him which keeps a diary (“It takes a sensitive guy to keep a diary!”), The side of him which fights his entire class to protect a little caterpillar, the side of him which goes on a date with a girl to cure her of a curse, etc. and the more of those sides she sees, the more she’s in love. The final page from the chapter ‘Last Date’ is enough to see that Lum really loves and admires the man beneath all those flaws…

…More specifically, this panel of silent love:

Conclusion In the end Lum’s reasons for loving Ataru has changed overtime: At first it was an act of spite, then it was to escape her ex, then it was because she’s bonded with him and because she enjoys his presence and finally it’s because she loves the Darling underneath the mask… It’s nice to see love grow from something so fake to something so real and the writing really helps, so big props to Takahashi- sensei. Thanks for taking time to read this analysis and I hope I was able to make things clear about Lum. I love her and she’s probably my favorite female character of all time so hopefully this post does justice to her. I also apologize if I’ve overlooked anything or made any mistakes. If you have any doubts or questions about this analysis feel free to send an ask and if you want me to do an analysis about other characters, feel free to send an ask for that as well. I have previously done an analysis on Ataru’s love for Lum and how that grew overtime, so please check it out if you haven’t. It’s a lot smaller (since it’s not as complicated as this one) and isn’t as detailed (it doesn’t use images either), but it still conveys the point otherwise. I have also done two other analysis, one on Lum’s character and other one on Ataru’s character, so check those out if you haven’t as well. And finally, likes are appreciated and reblogs are even more appreciated (seriously, please reblog this so more people can see this post, I’m usually not this kind of person, but I spent a lot of time on this so I want it to feel worth it, ok?). Hope you have a great day ahead.

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