English Dub Review: Ranma ½ “Who Says You’re Cute”

OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)

Ryoga reveals he too has a curse, just like Ranma.

OUR TAKE

We continue the introduction of Ryoga Hibiki into the main cast, as well as further developing the relationship building between Ranma and Akane. Both are things that I have already gone into great detail about plenty already so forgive me if there isn’t a whole lot of new material to cover. In regards to Ryoga, we do have a major revelation about him this time: it seems in his pursuit of fighting Ranma, he followed him all the way to China, right around the time Ranma was first turned into a girl by the cursed spring, and ended up knocking Ryoga into a DIFFERENT cursed spring. So, instead of become a hot lady around cold water, Ryoga instead becomes a cute baby black pig, which comes with its own problems and hilarious moments. I guess I can’t help but think about in other shows, two people who have the same curse would normally use that for pathos or way to connect with each other, whereas here it’s used to have more funny moments because this is a comedy. Not saying that’s a bad thing of course, it just seemed like something worth pointing out. Again, trying to get as much to talk about here as I can.

The other thing is, as mentioned, Ranma and Akane, who will probably be the main thing to talk about in future episodes. At the end of the last episode, a mishap caused Akane’s long hair to get chopped off (something that is now reflected in the ED, where previously her hair was also long). Often times in anime (and probably real life too), women cutting their hair is a seen as them making a big change in their lives, usually to show signs of getting over a breakup or, in Akane’s case, an unrequited crush. We see a flashback to her as a kid with short hair and deciding to grow it out to be like her older sister, who Dr. Tofu has always had a crush on, though now that she has accepted that he’ll never like HER that way, it seems this accident has given her a chance to make a clean break. AND it seems that Ranma is also growing more fond of Akane as well, though that’s probably happening a bit more gradually. Either way, the plot thickens and we’ll likely see that continue in the next few episodes.