‘Ranma 1/2’ Reboot Delivers a Martial Arts Comedy with a Big Twist

***This article was written for the January ’25 issue of Animation Magazine (No. 346)***

‘More than 35 years after Ranma Saotome first transformed from “boy-type” to “girl-type,” Takahashi’s comical story-telling lives on.’

At a time when questions of sexual identity have become a hot-button issue, the new animated adaptation of Rumiko Takahashi’s gender-bending slapstick series Ranma 1/2 (on Netflix) provides a welcome dose of humor.

Ranma Saotome is a 16-year-old black-haired martial arts champion. He and his father Genma took a trip to Jusenkyo, China, to continue training — despite the attendant’s dire warnings. During a midair exchange of kicks and blows, Ranma fell into an accursed spring where a beautiful maiden had drowned centuries earlier. As a result, he turns into a spirited, red-haired girl whenever he comes in contact with cold water. (Hot water restores his original gender.) Genma fell into a nearby equally cursed spring: He turns into an enormous panda under similar conditions. Rain storms, swimming pools and buckets of water tossed away after mopping a floor are all threats.

In Cold Water

The Saotomes move into the home of Genma’s pal, Suon Tendo, as full-time freeloaders. The two fathers decide to betroth Ranma and Suon’s youngest daughter Akane to ensure the continuation of the Tendo Anything Goes School of Martial Arts Dojo. But the intended partners want no part of the arrangement. Akane, who’s a formidable martial artist in her own right, hates boys and dismisses Ranma as a jerk. Ranma finds Akane bossy, loud and “uncute.”

But the filmmakers make it clear that underneath the comic bickering, they share a grudging affection. When a carelessly thrown battle parasol cuts off some of Akane’s hair, Ranma is genuinely concerned about how she feels, although he expresses that concern awkwardly. He’s surprised to discover how cute she looks with shorter hair. That soupçon of warmth leavens the slapstick and keeps it from feeling mean-spirited.

When Ranma enrolls at nearby Furinken High, the complications multiply like coat hangers in the back of a closet. Kendo champion and school gasbag Tatewaki Kuno (he styles himself “The Blue Thunder of Furinken High”) has been pursuing Akane, although she responds to his advances with a right to the jaw. But he’s also instantly smitten with the lovely “pig-tailed girl” who mysteriously appears whenever Ranma disappears.

After years of wandering from Shikoku to Hokkaido in search of Tokyo’s Furinken High, geographically challenged Ryoga Hibiki arrives, eager to re-open a quarrel with Ranma that dates back to junior high school. He accuses of Ranma of running away from their earlier duel; Ranma replies he waited for three days — and how could Ryoga get lost on the way to the vacant lot behind his own house?

The original Ranma 1/2 story appeared in the Weekly Shonen Jump magazine from 1987 to 1996 and scored an immediate hit; it’s since been collected in English in 18 volumes (available from Viz). The first TV series ran for 161 episodes (1989-1992), followed by OAVs, three features, games and specials. In an interview conducted at San Diego Comic-Con in 2000, Takahashi said, “A lot of Ranma is slapstick and wacky situations, and that kind of humor doesn’t have to stay within one country. Ranma is very popular in America; it’s very popular in other Asian countries. Funny is pretty borderless.”

In contrast to the very limited animation in the original Ranma 1/2 series and OAVs, the new series (produced by Tokyo-based MAPPA) incorporates some moments of fluid movement. Director Konosuke Uda uses contemporary graphics, split screen effects and shifting backgrounds to add visual interest to still images of the characters. He also adds pan shots of kanji characters to illustrate some of the sound effects and screams.

Although both adaptations follow Takahashi’s manga closely, the storytelling is more tightly focused and concise in the Netflix version: The episodes that have aired at this writing cover the same material as the initial episodes of the original show. (The new season features 12 episodes, and Netflix unveils a new episode each Saturday.)

Trailblazing Characters

Ranma’s constant shape-shifting isn’t new. Cross-dressing characters and gender fluidity have a long history in Japanese culture. Men in masks and dazzling brocade costumes have performed female roles in austere Noh dramas since the art form were established in the early 14th century. (Masaaki Yuasa evoked Noh performances in the recent feature Inu-Oh.) After women were banned from performing on the Kabuki stage in 1629, onnagata, male actors who specialize in female roles, took over. For next two centuries, courtesans and geishas would study their performances to learn how a woman of refinement should comport herself.

The Takarazuka Revue, an all-female musical theatre troupe (founded in 1913), was an important influence on the work of Osamu Tezuka. Tezuka’s Princess Knight (1953), was a girl born with both the pink of a girl and the blue heart of a boy. She dressed as a boy to foil the schemes of the evil Duke Duralumin.

Cross-dressing characters have continued to appear in anime and manga ever since. Riyoko Ikeda’s overwrought romantic fantasy The Rose of Versailles (Berusaiyu no Bara) began as a shojo (girl’s) manga in 1972. The story centers on Oscar François de Jarjayes, whose noble father wanted a son so desperately, he gave his daughter a man’s name and raised her as a boy. An ace swordswoman, an excellent rider and a crack shot, Oscar becomes an officer in Marie Antoinette’s royal guard. The story was animated in 1979, and a musical version was staged by — the Takarazuka Revue. One of the more dynamic characters in Fushigi Yuugi: The Mysterious Play (1995) is Nuriko, who wears women’s clothes in honor of his dead sister. The rest of the cast accepts him as one of the Celestial Warriors.

At Comic-Con, Takahashi also reflected, “The whole situation in Ranma was supposed to be the wackiness of a guy becoming a girl. I never really explored in the manga — or would have wanted to think about — what the deeper implications of such a thing would be. I just wanted it to be part of the comical storytelling.” More than 35 years after Ranma Saotome first transformed from “boy-type” to “girl-type,” Takahashi’s comical story-telling lives on.

Ranma 1/2 is currently streaming on Netflix.