There is an amusing anime series called Ranma 1\/2, based on the manga of the same name.\u00a0 The basis of the story is the title character, Ranma Saotome changes from a boy to a girl when hit with cold water and back to a boy when hit with hot.\u00a0 The girl transformation doesn’t require the water be particularly cold; a good rain does the trick.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Ranma gained this odd affliction by training in martial arts at a fictional place in China called Jusenkyo.\u00a0 Jusenkyo’s claim to fame is a number of small pools of water which have all had somebody or something drown in them.\u00a0 Anybody who falls into one of these pools takes on an affliction similar to Ranma’s, based on which pool they fall in.\u00a0 Among Ranma’s friends is his father (Genma) who turns into a Panda, Ryoga, who turns into a small black pig, Mousse, who turns into a duck, and Shampoo, who turns into a cat.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The series is amusing and I like it a lot.\u00a0 I can suspend my disbelief for the supernatural things which happen; many are standard anime fare.\u00a0 In addition to the shape-shifting, the characters can make super-human leaps, like jumping from rooftop to rooftop, perform feats of super-human strength (other than jumping), make weapons appear out of thin air, etc.\u00a0 Ryoga, for example, loses his clothes and belongings when he turns into a small pig as he has no practical way to carry his things around in that form.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Setting aside disbelief for such things, there are some reality checks that bounce on the show.\u00a0 Part of the premise is that Ranma and his father move in with the Tendo family.\u00a0 Genma’s lifelong friend, Soun, is the head of that household and they decided many years before that their children would marry so their dojo could stay in the family.\u00a0 When the Saotomes move in, it is decided Ranma will marry Akane Tendo.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Ranma and Akane are combative from the outset and don’t care for the arranged marriage.\u00a0 However, they are<\/em> both sixteen, and they soon warm to each other.\u00a0 They refuse to admit this.\u00a0 Ever.\u00a0 Throughout the series, they remain antagonistic towards each other, but at the same time they have jealous fits at the drop of a hat.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Let’s look at this in a different light.\u00a0 Ranma and Akane are, as I said, sixteen.\u00a0 Their fathers on several occasions encourage<\/em> them to be affectionate with one another.\u00a0 In an early episide, Akane’s dad goes so far as to give them permission to sleep together.\u00a0 This, for most modern teens, is a dream situation.\u00a0 But Ranma and Akane balk at it, refusing to show affection except on the rarest of occasions.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The problem, really, is Ranma.\u00a0 He shows no sign of being gay, but he turns away the affections of several women.\u00a0 There are three girls–Shampoo, Kodachi and Ukyo–who pursue him from their introduction to the series.\u00a0 Ranma rejects them all.\u00a0 It could be argued this is out of some sort of loyalty to Akane in spite of his protestations to the contrary.\u00a0 His actions sometimes suggest this.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n This mystifies me.\u00a0 Why does Ranma show no interest in any of these girls or any of the others who show up throughout the series?\u00a0 He seems to like girls, but absolutely refuses to act on any feelings he might have.\u00a0 He’s not particularly shy in his male or female form.\u00a0 Of course, romantic relationships are often awkward or difficult for even the most extroverted of people.\u00a0 Ranma may just be an extreme example of this.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Even allowing for this, I think the Ranma character takes the romance avoidance to an unrealistic extreme.\u00a0 If I were to rewrite the story, Ranma and Akane would eventually become a couple.\u00a0 Akane would figure out Ryoga is the little black piglet she adopts as a pet, be mad at him for not being truthful about this, but then forgive him.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n (This is another point of contention for me.\u00a0 Akane is bright enough to figure out P-chan [her name for Ryoga’s pig form] is Ryoga.\u00a0 Even if she did not, somebody<\/em> should have pointed it out to her at some point.\u00a0 Her own father witnessed Ryoga’s transformation from pig to boy twice in one episode, but never said questioned the pig sleeping with his daughter.\u00a0 Sure, it was a running joke of the series akin to nobody figuring out Clark Kent is Superman, but it was still a bit overboard and baffling for me.)<\/p>\n <\/p>\n I’d rewrite a few other relationships, too.\u00a0 Mousse and Shampoo seem destined for one another in spite of Shampoo’s protests.\u00a0 I think Ryoga could easily end up with Ukyo; they did acceptably well when they were paired in a three-legged race competition.\u00a0 Wealthy Kuno would do well with Nabiki, Akane’s money hungry sister.\u00a0 Kasumi seems destined for Dr. Tofu.\u00a0 Kuno’s sister, Kodachi, seems destined for a madhouse or at least spinsterhood; she exhibits more madness than anyone else in the series (which is saying a lot).\u00a0 Dirty old man Happosai would reunite with the lady love of his youth, Cologne, Shampoo’s great grandmother.\u00a0 (This pairing could be dangerous for the world at large; both are martial artists of extremely high caliber as anime martial artists go.)<\/p>\n <\/p>\n This relationship forecast brings another point about the unrealism of Ranma’s lack of romance:\u00a0 Without exception, all of the other significant male characters in the series have a healthy interest in girls and express it in some way or another.\u00a0 Mousse chases Shampoo throughout and Ryoga professes his love for Akane many times (albeit never to Akane herself).\u00a0 Dr. Tofu goes nuts whenever Kasumi is around.\u00a0 Kuno worships both Akane and Ranma’s female form without shame.\u00a0 Ranma stands alone in this baffling aspect.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n So if I were to rewrite Ranma 1\/2–if I had the time and could avoid a copyright lawsuit–I would have Ranma and Akane warm to each other and then become a couple.\u00a0 Ryoga would enter the picture early in this process, develop an affection for Akane.\u00a0 Ranma would put up with keeping his piggy secret for a very short time; as his relationship with Akane progressed, he would become less tolerant of Akane’s attention to P-chan and vice versa.\u00a0 Akane would learn Ryoga’s secret, there would be a falling out, but eventually she would forgive him and tolerate his presence.\u00a0 (This is a comedy, after all; lighter attitudes are better.)<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Shampoo would enter the picture and Kodachi.\u00a0 Ranma would tell them he’s with Akane, period.\u00a0 They would probably still pursue him, but Shampoo would eventually give up and hook up with the man who will worship her, Mousse.\u00a0 Kodachi would continue to be insane but Akane would get violent about Kodachi’s affections towards Ranma until Kodachi backed off, assuming she ever did.\u00a0 Ukyo would show up, make her play for Ranma, and then, being the practical girl she is, find a better target for her affections.\u00a0 This might be Ryoga or her own version of Mousse, a strange fellow who only made rare appearances and seemed to have only a few less mental issues than Kodachi.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n That’s a very brief summary; the series lasted for seven seasons.\u00a0 (That may be an American breakdown; I do not know how it was broken up in its original Japanese broadcasts.)\u00a0 There were other characters who flitted in and out of the series, but the above group were the major ones.\u00a0 Maybe someday I’ll do a parody of the series to get around the copyright bit.\u00a0 In the meantime, I’ll keep my eye out for cold water transformations…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" There is an amusing anime series called Ranma 1\/2, based on the manga of the same name.\u00a0 The basis of the story is the title character, Ranma Saotome changes from a boy to a girl when hit with cold water and back to a boy when hit with hot.\u00a0 The girl transformation doesn’t require the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/441"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=441"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/441\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":442,"href":"https:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/441\/revisions\/442"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=441"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=441"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.shadowkatmandu.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=441"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}