Turbo-Granny Arc

## Arc Chronology

The **Turbo-Granny Arc** is the first story arc of the *Dandadan* manga series.

After a challenge to see whether aliens or spirits exist goes horribly wrong, Momo Ayase must help Ken Takakura (who she dubs as "Okarun") confront the Turbo-Granny in order to lift the curse the evil spirit has placed on him.

## Synopsis

### Encountering the Paranormal

At school, Momo Ayase goes to her friends to console her broken heart after breaking up with her boyfriend and later mopes in the halls. While walking, she notices a male student being bullied inside a classroom and steps in to defend the student by shielding him. She then leaves right after the bullies ceases their harassment but is reunited with the male student after he thinks that she might be interested in UFOs and aliens, having noticed her glazing at his magazine focusing on the paranormal earlier. Momo tells him that she has no interest in this and yells at him after becoming annoyed with his excessive ranting. Realizing that she was rude to him, Momo apologizes and lets him know that she is a believer in spirits rather than aliens since her grandmother is a spirit medium. Momo then sees the male student making light of her since he is not a believer in spirits and enters into a dispute with him, which leads to them challenging each other to proof whether aliens or spirits exist.

To proof that aliens exist, the male student has Momo go to the Nagi Hospital where he is sure that she will encounter one, while Momo has the male student enter a tunnel where a spirit known as the Turbo-Granny is said to reside. As he listens to Momo talk over the phone about her childhood with her grandmother, the male student finds himself face-to-face with the Turbo-Granny and flees in panic. Momo tries to warn the male student not to run from the Turbo-Granny since he will end up being cursed by her once she catches up to him in a race, which ends up happening as the male student tries to escape on his bike. At the same time, Momo ends up being abducted by three humanoid aliens known as the Serpo who plan on extracting her womb and reproductive organs to evolve their race. However, their plans are interrupted after the Turbo-Granny, who has taken over the male student's body, emerges from Momo's phone and starts attacking the Serpo. The male student then partially regains his senses around his head after the Serpo binds him with their psychokinesis and begs them to not harm Momo since she was the first person in his life to acknowledge his existence. The Serpo choose to ignore the male student's request as they proceed with Momo's extraction procedure by first stimulating her brainwaves. As a result of this happening, along with her remembering her grandmother's past instructions to her on how she can release her chi from her body, Momo awakens her psychic powers and attacks the Serpo, which results in their aircraft being destroyed. She then uses her powers to release the Turbo-Granny from the male student's body but sees that he is still cursed. Before vanishing, the Turbo-Granny warns Momo that as long as she is in possession of his balls the male student will remain curse and challenges her to come to the tunnel to defeat her.

After escaping the UFO, which ends up crashing down on the Nagi Hospital, Momo and the male student come to learn the truth that both aliens and spirits exist. While suppressing his curse, Momo informs the male student of the Turbo-Granny's warning to her and sees him about to head off on his own as he doesn't wish to burden her with his situation. However, Momo insists on helping him and asks for his name, realizing that she hadn't asked him before when they met. Momo then becomes speechless after the male student reveals his name to be Ken Takakura and states her refusal to address him as such since it is the same name as the actor she greatly idolizes. This then leads to her demanding to him not to speak his real name in her presence and decides on calling him "Okarun" instead, to which he was fine with.

With the sun rising, Momo invites Okarun to her house until it becomes night again when the Turbo-Granny reappears. After removing the evil spirit thwarting talisman from the torii gate to allow Okarun entrance and giving him a change of clothes, Momo learns from him that he challenged her at school out of desperation to make friends with her and hears him starting to doubt himself. Hearing this, Momo explains to Okarun that the reason he has a hard time making friends is because he was too quick to make assumptions about others and that she is okay with talking to him, which relieves Okarun. After hearing the sound of the evil spirit doorbell, Momo and Okarun find themselves confronted outside and attacked by the Flatwoods Monster, an alien associated with the Serpo, and are unable to escape its wrath after the alien had erected a barrier around the area. Theorizing that the Flatwoods Monster is vulnerable to touching the ground based on its sumo-like appearance, Momo uses her powers to partially suppress the Turbo-Granny's curse so that he could use her immense speed to fight back against the alien, while also using her powers to have the Flatwoods Monster fall. The two become successfully in harming it, however, the Flatwoods Monster grows another pair of legs to keep itself upright and pummels Momo to the wall blocking the torii gate. Having endured long enough to have the Flatwoods Monster create a crater in the wall, Momo is given enough space to place the talisman back on the torii gate to exorcise the Flatwoods Monster but not before using her powers to send Okarun her way as to not have him get caught in the effects as well.

After defeating the Flatwoods Monster, which results in them being released from the alien's barrier, Momo passes out from exhaustion and is left helpless as the Turbo-Granny possessed-Okarun prepares to eat her. However, Momo's grandmother Seiko, who had returned back from guest starring on a television show, arrives on time to save her and sedate Okarun by fighting back against the Turbo-Granny. Later, Momo wakes up worrying about Okarun and becomes relieved to find him safe in the shrine Seiko had placed him in order to keep him under control. After learning about her granddaughter's situation, Seiko tells Momo not to get involve with Okarun since the Turbo-Granny is dangerous, having fused with the bound spirit inside the tunnel where she resides. However, after Momo states her refusal to turn her back on Okarun, Seiko becomes willing to help them prepare for their confrontation with the Turbo-Granny by training them to lure out of the evil spirit from Shono City through a game of tag.

To properly control her psychic powers, which she believes has been limited ever since her encounter with the Serpo, Momo is instructed by Seiko to use her sense of touch to suppress Okarun's curse but unfortunately fails on her first try, which then leads to her having to suppress Okarun's curse while he is using the bathroom. Momo then finds herself confronted by the Turbo-Granny, using Okarun's body to communicate with her alone, and is demanded by her to arrive at the tunnel tonight or she will harm the ones Okarun has laid eyes on, starting off by giving Seiko a nosebleed. Unable to refuse, Momo agrees to her demand and later explains the situation to her grandmother and Okarun.

### A Game of Tag

After arriving at the tunnel late at night, Momo and Okarun enter and find themselves suddenly cornered by the Turbo-Granny after the evil spirit creates two large heads of herself to block both the front and back paths of the tunnel. The Turbo-Granny then makes their attempts at defending themselves from her futile as she destroys the bats Momo launched towards one of her heads and lifts Okarun's curse by giving back his genitals, thereby preventing him from using her powers against her. Momo and Okarun then become helpless as the two heads begin to close in to eat them. Remembering her grandmother's instructions to trick the Turbo-Granny into leaving Shono City, Momo manages to have the Turbo-Granny cease her assault on them after challenging her to beat her and Okarun in a game of tag, seeing as how she has great pride in her speed. The Turbo-Granny accepts the challenge and agrees to countdown to ten minutes to give them a running start. However, the Turbo-Granny tricks them by using her own way of counting to ten and captures Momo after her time is up. Okarun then complains to her for using an underhanded trick, which results in the evil spirit using up his ten minutes. In retaliation, Okarun bites down on the Turbo-Granny's breast and causes her to become aggravated by his actions as she tries to pull him off. She then resorts to entering her spirit form to become intangible and fully possess Okarun. Having taken control over him, the Turbo-Granny gets herself ready to eat the trapped Momo, however, she finds herself being strangled by Momo within the cage after she manages to become successful in using her powers through her sense of touch. After the Turbo-Granny accidently sets her frees her from her confinement in an attempt to have her stop, Momo seals the Turbo-Granny within Okarun who reverts back to normal. The two then immediately exit the tunnel after its earthbound spirit tries to free the Turbo-Granny.

To outrun the Earthbound Spirit Crab, Okarun assumes his Turbo-Granny form while carrying Momo on his back. However, since he can't maintain the form long enough to make it out of Shono City, Momo has Okarun head towards a hot springs to boil the giant crab and manages to buying some time to get some distance from it. However, the two soon find themselves surrounded by citizens possessed by Shono City's spirits called on by the Turbo-Granny and the Earthbound Spirit Crab to prevent Momo and Okarun from leaving their territory. To get past the crowd, Okarun once again assumes his Turbo-Granny form to charge right through them with Momo but ends up freeing the Turbo-Granny as a result of Momo being overwhelmed by the intense speed. Momo then witnesses the Turbo-Granny fusing with the Earthbound Spirit Crab as she prepares to eat them. To escape, Momo uses her powers to grab and ride on top of a moving train, along with an unconscious Okarun, and successfully manages to trick the Turbo-Granny into climbing onboard as well, knowing that her grandmother had setup a trap on the rails that leads to Kamikoshi City. To prevent her from escaping, Momo uses her powers to retrain the Turbo-Granny and successfully exorcises her and the Earthbound Spirit Crab after reaching the trap.

### A New Friend

As the two spirits start to disintegrate, Momo witnesses girls emerging from the Earthbound Crab Spirit's body and quickly jumps off the train to see the Turbo-Granny completely exorcised. After Okarun regains consciousness, Momo confirms to him that they had defeated the Turbo-Granny and goes with him and Seiko to revisit the tunnel where they pay their respects to the deceased. She then learns from her grandmother that the tunnel is a murder site where girls were murdered and that the Turbo-Granny had come to the tunnel to console their spirits, which makes her become teary eyed. Seiko also tells her the rule of coexistence between the dead and the living and tells her that she is relieved that she made it out of her ordeal alive.

After having dinner with Momo and Seiko, Okarun prepares to head home and says his goodbye to Momo, followed by Momo telling him that she will see him tomorrow, much to Okarun's surprise. The next day, Okarun becomes nervous to reunite with Momo at school to say hello to her and looks to see her waiting at the entrance after arriving. Okarun doubts to himself that she was waiting on him and thinks that he should get out of her way of meeting her intended person, however, Okarun sees Momo intentionally bumping into him as she suggests that they walk together.

## Story Impact

* The main characters Momo Ayase and Ken Takakura are introduced.
* Ken is given the name "Okarun" by Momo after she finds out that his full name is the same as the actor Ken Takakura, who she idolizes.
* The Turbo-Granny is the first spirit and yokai to be introduced.
* The Serpo are the first aliens to be introduced.
* Momo and Okarun's bet with each other leads to them finding out that both spirits and aliens are real.
	+ Momo's abduction by the Serpo leads to her psychic powers awakening and her believing that her grandmother Seiko is a true spirit medium. Later, Momo reveals that her psychic powers have been limited ever since she awakened them, however, her control has improved ever since her confrontation with the Turbo-Granny.
	+ Okarun's encounter with the Turbo-Granny leads to him losing his genitals and being cursed.
		- A possessed Okarun attacking the Serpo results in the alien group becoming interested in his yokai powers and targeting him in the Serpo Arc.
* Momo reveals to Okarun that she had a childhood crush. At the end of the Serpo Arc, Seiko reveals to Okarun that Jiji is Momo's crush upon his arrival at her house. Jiji's reunion with Momo leads to him apologizing to her for how harsh he treated her back then.
* Momo and Okarun's confrontation with the Flatwoods Monster marks their second encounter with aliens.
* Momo and Okarun find themselves trapped in Empty Space for the first time.
* The Flatwoods Monster setting off the evil spirit chime in Momo's house gives proof to Okarun that aliens and spirits have some points of commonality. The Flatwoods Monster's death by a talisman further proves this theory. Okarun also reveals that there has been research that those who see psychic phenomena often see UFOs.
* Okarun enters his Turbo-Granny form for the first time.
* Momo reveals the nature of auras.
* The Earthbound Spirit Crab is the first earthbound spirit to be shown in the series.
* The Turbo-Granny inconspicuously hides inside of Okarun in the midst of being exorcised, which leads to her later being trapped inside a maneki-neko doll in the Acrobatic Silky Arc and Okarun's kintama missing, thus setting into motion the main plot of the series.
	+ Okarun's kintama are found by Aira Shiratori and Rin Sawaki, which results in them gaining the ability to see spirits.
* Momo learns from Seiko that the Turbo-Granny had been going around comforting the spirits of deceased young girls who died tragically. This information helps Momo to not see the Turbo-Granny as a bad entity and give her a chance to reclaim her power from Okarun.
* Momo, Okarun, and Seiko having dinner after exorcising the Turbo-Granny and the Earthbound Spirit Crab starts a pattern in the future where Seiko makes dinner for Momo, Okarun, and their allies at her house after overcoming a threat or situation, thus leading to the formation of the Family.
* Momo and Okarun officially become friends at school, which gradually leads to them developing feelings for each other the more time they spend together.