Ranma ½
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to navigationJump to search
Ranma ½
Cover of the first tankōbon volume of Ranma ½, as published
by Shogakukan in 1988, featuring Ranma and his father transformed
into a woman and a panda respectively.
らんま 1/2
(Ranma Nibun-no-Ichi)
Genre Adventure[1]
Martial arts[2]
Romantic comedy[3]
Manga
Written by Rumiko Takahashi
Published by Shogakukan
English publisher AUS
Madman Entertainment
NA
Viz Media
Imprint Shōnen Sunday Comics
Magazine Weekly Shōnen Sunday
Demographic Shōnen
Original run August 19, 1987 – March 6, 1996
Volumes 38 (List of volumes)
Anime television series
Directed by Tomomi Mochizuki
Tsutomu Shibayama
Produced by Hidenori Taga
Yoshinobu Nakao
Yoko Matsushita
Makoto Kubo
Music by Hideharu Mori
Kenji Kawai
Studio Studio Deen
Licensed by AUS
Madman Entertainment
NA
Viz Media
Original network FNS (Fuji TV)
English network SEA
Animax Asia
Original run April 15, 1989 – September 16, 1989
Episodes 18 (List of episodes)
Anime television series
Ranma ½ Nettōhen
Directed by Koji Sawai
Junji Nishimura
Produced by Hidenori Taga (executive)
Takashi Ishihara
Koji Kaneda
Yoko Matsushita
Hiroshi Hasegawa
Junpei Nakagawa
Kei Ijichi
Music by Hideharu Mori
Kenji Kawai
Studio Studio Deen
Licensed by AUS
Madman Entertainment
NA
Viz Media
Original network Fuji TV
English network SEA
Animax
Original run October 20, 1989 – September 25, 1992
Episodes 143 (List of episodes)
Anime film
Ranma ½: Big Trouble in Nekonron, China
Directed by Shuji Iuchi
Produced by Hidenori Taga (executive)
Yoko Matsushita
Hiroshi Hasegawa
Written by Ryota Yamaguchi
Shuji Iuchi
Shigeru Yanagawa
Music by Kenji Kawai
Studio Studio Deen
Licensed by AUS
Madman Entertainment
NA
Viz Media
UK
MVM Films
Released November 2, 1991
Runtime 77 minutes
Anime film
Ranma ½: Nihao My Concubine
Directed by Akira Suzuki
Produced by Kei Ijichi (executive)
Yoko Matsushita
Motoko Naritome
Hiroshi Hasegawa
Written by Ryota Yamaguchi
Music by Akihisa Matsūra
Studio Studio Deen
Licensed by AUS
Madman Entertainment
NA
Viz Media
UK
MVM Films
Released August 1, 1992
Runtime 65 minutes
Original video animation
Directed by Junji Nishimura
Produced by Ayao Ueda
Junpei Nakagawa
Kenji Kume
Music by Akihisa Matsūra
Studio Studio Deen
Licensed by NA
Viz Media
Released October 21, 1993 – August 19, 1994
Runtime 30 minutes
Episodes 6 (List of episodes)
Anime film
Ranma ½: Super Indiscriminate Decisive Battle! Team Ranma vs. the
Legendary Phoenix
Directed by Junji Nishimura
Produced by Ayao Ueda
Junpei Nakagawa
Kenji Kume
Written by Ryota Yamaguchi
Music by Akihisa Matsūra
Kenji Kawai
Studio Studio Deen
Licensed by NA
Viz Media
Released August 20, 1994
Runtime 28 minutes
Original video animation
Ranma ½ Special
Directed by Junji Nishimura
Produced by Ayao Ueda
Junpei Nakagawa
Kenji Kume
Music by Akihisa Matsūra
Kenji Kawai
Studio Studio Deen
Licensed by NA
Viz Media
Released December 16, 1994 – February 17, 1995
Runtime 27 minutes
Episodes 2 (List of episodes)
Original video animation
Ranma ½ Super
Directed by Junji Nishimura
Produced by Ayao Ueda
Junpei Nakagawa
Kenji Kume
Music by Akihisa Matsūra
Kenji Kawai
Studio Studio Deen
Licensed by NA
Viz Media
Released September 21, 1995 – January 19, 1996
Runtime 28 minutes
Episodes 3 (List of episodes)
Original video animation
Ranma ½: Nightmare! Incense of Spring Sleep
Directed by Takeshi Mori
Music by Kohei Tanaka
Studio Studio Deen
Sunrise
Released July 30, 2008
Runtime 32 minutes
Related media
Ranma ½ specials
Ranma ½ video games
Live-action television film
Directed by Ryo Nishimura
Written by Yoshihiro Izumi
Music by Kei Yoshikawa
Studio Nikkatsu
Original network Nippon TV
Released December 9, 2011
Runtime 95 minutes
Anime and manga portal
Ranma ½ (Japanese: らんま 1/2 , Hepburn: Ranma Nibun-no-Ichi, pronounced Ranma
One-Half) is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Rumiko Takahashi. It
was serialized in Weekly Shōnen Sunday from August 1987 to March 1996, with the
chapters collected into 38 tankōbon volumes by Shogakukan. The story revolves
around a teenage boy named Ranma Saotome who has trained in martial arts since
early childhood. As a result of an accident during a training journey, he is cursed to
become a girl when splashed with cold water, while hot water changes him back into a
boy. Throughout the series Ranma seeks out a way to rid himself of his curse, while his
friends, enemies and many fiancées constantly hinder and interfere.
Ranma ½ has a comedic formula and a sex-changing main character, who often willfully
transforms into a girl to advance his goals. The series also contains many other
characters, whose intricate relationships with each other, unusual characteristics, and
eccentric personalities drive most of the stories. Although the characters and their
relationships are complicated, they rarely change once they are firmly introduced and
settled into the series.
The manga has been adapted into two anime series created by Studio Deen: Ranma
½ and Ranma ½ Nettōhen (らんま 1/2 熱闘編), which together were broadcast on Fuji
Television from 1989 to 1992. In addition, they developed 12 original video
animations and three films. In 2011, a live-action television special was produced and
aired on Nippon Television. The manga and anime series were licensed by Viz
Media for English-language releases in North America. Madman
Entertainment released the manga, part of the anime series and the first two films
in Australasia, while MVM Films released the first two films in the United Kingdom.
The Ranma ½ manga has over 55 million copies in circulation. [4] Both the manga and
anime are cited as some of the first of their mediums to have become popular in the
United States.
Plot[edit]
See also: List of Ranma ½ characters
On a training journey in the Bayankala Mountain Range in the Qinghai Province of
China, Ranma Saotome and his father Genma fall into the cursed springs at
Jusenkyo (呪泉郷). When someone falls into a cursed spring, they take the physical
form of whatever drowned there hundreds or thousands of years ago whenever they
come into contact with cold water. The curse will revert when exposed to hot water until
their next cold water exposure. Genma fell into the spring of a drowned panda while
Ranma fell into the spring of a drowned girl.
Soun Tendo is a fellow practitioner of Musabetsu Kakutō Ryū (無差別格闘流) or
"Anything-Goes School" of martial arts and owner of a dojo. Genma and Soun agreed
years ago that their children would marry and carry on the Tendo Dojo. Soun has three
teenaged daughters: the polite and easygoing Kasumi, the greedy and
indifferent Nabiki and the short-tempered, martial arts practicing Akane. Akane, who is
Ranma's age, is appointed for bridal duty by her sisters with the reasoning that they are
the older sisters and can dump the duty on her, and that they all dislike the arranged
engagement and think Akane's dislike of men is the right way to express it to the
fathers. At the appointed time they are surprised when a panda comes in and puts a girl
in front of their father. The Tendo girls all laugh. It takes several more pages for the
situation to be explained to Soun Tendo and his daughters. Both Ranma and Akane
refuse the engagement initially, having not been consulted on the decision, but the
fathers are insistent and they are generally treated as betrothed and end up helping or
saving each other on some occasions. They are frequently found in each other's
company and are constantly arguing in their trademark awkward love-hate manner that
is a franchise focus.
Ranma goes to school with Akane at Furinkan High School (風林館高校, Fūrinkan
Kōkō), where he meets his recurring opponent Tatewaki Kuno, the
conceited kendo team captain who aggressively pursues Akane, but also falls in love
with Ranma's female form without ever discovering his curse (despite most other
characters eventually knowing it). Nerima serves as a backdrop for more martial arts
mayhem with the introduction of Ranma's regular rivals, such as the eternally
lost Ryoga Hibiki who traveled halfway across Japan getting from the front of his house
to the back, where Ranma spent three days waiting for him. Ryoga, seeking revenge on
Ranma, followed him to Jusenkyo where he ultimately fell into the Spring of the
Drowned Piglet. Now when splashed with cold water he takes the form of a little black
pig. Not knowing this, Akane takes the piglet as a pet and names it P-chan, but Ranma
knows and hates him for keeping this secret and taking advantage of the situation.
Another rival is the nearsighted Mousse, who also fell into a cursed spring and becomes
a duck when he gets wet, and finally, there is Genma and Soun's impish grand
master, Happosai, who spends his time stealing the underwear of schoolgirls.
Ranma's prospective paramours include the martial arts rhythmic gymnastics champion
(and Tatewaki's sister) Kodachi Kuno, and his second fiancée and childhood
friend Ukyo Kuonji the okonomiyaki vendor, along with the Chinese Amazon Shampoo,
supported by her great-grandmother Cologne. As the series progresses, the school
becomes more eccentric with the return of the demented, Hawaii-obsessed Principal
Kuno and the placement of the power-leeching alternating child/adult Hinako
Ninomiya as Ranma's English teacher. Ranma's indecision in choosing his true love
causes chaos in his romantic and school life.
Production[edit]
Rumiko Takahashi stated that Ranma ½ was conceived to be a martial arts manga that
connects all aspects of everyday life to martial arts. [5] Because her previous series had
female protagonists, the author decided that she wanted a male this time. However, she
was worried about writing a male main character, and therefore decided to make him
half-female.[6] Before deciding on water for initiating his changes, she considered Ranma
changing every time he was punched. It was after deciding this that she felt Jusenkyo
had to be set in China, as it is the only place that could have such mysterious springs.
[7]
She drew inspiration for Ranma ½ from a variety of real-world objects. Some of the
places frequently seen in the series are modeled after actual locations in Nerima, Tokyo
(both the home of Takahashi and the setting of Ranma ½).[8]
In a 1990 interview with Amazing Heroes, Takahashi stated that she had four assistants
that draw the backgrounds, panel lines and tone, while she creates the story and layout,
and pencils and inks the characters.[9] All her assistants are female; Takahashi stated
that "I don't use male assistants so that the girls will work more seriously if they aren't
worried about boys." In 1992, she explained her process as beginning with laying out
the chapter in the evening so as to finish it by dawn, and resting for a day before calling
her assistants. They finish it in two or three nights, usually utilizing five days for a
chapter.[6]
