User reviews

Ranma 1/2 is the only romantic-comedic anime that I've enjoyed. I usually only watch serious adult anime, but Ranma 1/2 is quite exceptional both in its humor and unique character design. If you love randomness and quirky plots, this anime is for you. However, I feel that the full Ranma experience is in reading Rumiko Takahashi's superior manga.

As far as the animation goes, it tends to get progressively sloppy as well with the scriptwriting, which heavily borrows on Takahashi's brilliance to make ends meet. Despite this, the funniest episodes are later on in the series hidden within the hit-and-miss seasons. There are some admittably stupid episodes, but what can you expect from a long-running series?

The show's strong points are its accurate portrayal of teen romance, complex character profiles, unpredictable non-linear plot lines, and zany humor.

The first season was a bit more consistent, But some of the BEST episodes are in Anything Goes and Harder Battle! There are some Great ones in the new seasons like Outta Control, Martial Mayhem and Random Rhapsody too! I would stick with the Subtitles though. The voices are much better, and for some reason the jokes are much funnier. I've tried watching the English Dubbed versions and though I don't have to read, it's just not the same. I'd rather have read the subtitles and laugh so hard I have to rewind to get the next joke!

Yes it does. This follow-up series for TV keeps getting funny every time I watch it. With a few new characters and side stories with different twists, and it even reveals more secrets, and more weird and pathetic but funny fighting styles and moves done by each character and stock character, and more funny antics of Happousai, and Kuno and Ryoga, and a few filler episodes with crazy references to old classic shows like Dragnet and Mission Impossible, Twilight Zone, Kage no Gundan and much more, look for them yourselves! And also weird references to ancient Chinese and Japanese culture once again, and funny as always, I especially like the ones with the French guys, they were portrayed funny, and how Souun and Genma end up screwing up in some. And no to mention, the return of some of the stock characters such as the skating girl that like things that are cute, and the guy at Jusenkyo. Recommended to fans of the series and fans of Rumiko Takahashi's works.

This STUPIDEST anime is worse, in these seasons and the episodes are very silly, a bad romance, the silly comedy, the Bad battles, the silly characters accept bad jokers. This anime won't be popular as Inuyasha. I Hate You Ranma ½. DAMNED Ranma ½.

Ranma succeeds at one thing,being fun to watch.The first season was magnificent as stated in another review but the second season isn't a complete waste by anymeans. It's not gonna win any awards but everything after season 1 is still fun as hell to watch. BTW, I like the English VA's better :)

The first series of 18 episodes is brilliant. It follows the original Manga almost precisely and the animation and voice acting (original japanese) are excellent.

Nettouhen, however, is the second series. It is bad. The voices continue to be wonderful, but the animation quality takes a sharp downturn. Also, they change/alter/skip entirely sections of the original Manga story. Most irritatingly moving a storyline that took place on a Beach into a snow-covered mountain, yet still keeping the overall story the same. Rediculous. %r %r Ranma 1/2: Nettouhen. Skip it. Watch the original series, and read the Manga. %r %r Miki!

Here's the story as I've heard it, regarding the first story arc in Ranma's second season (which is referred to in the first season, when Akane remember Ranma saying, "Akane is my fiancee. You touch her, and I'll kill you."). First of all, in the comic, the martial arts figure skating appears *before* the Shampoo incidents, so it makes sense to have the reference. But from what I've heard, they were thinking about cancelling the show, so they skipped it and did the Shampoo episodes, hoping to garner more viewers, then tacked on the silly final "rememberance" episode to cap the story, in case it was cancelled. It wasn't, but it was sent to a very different animation house (I think--at least it was directed by different people) in hopes of making it more lively. And in some ways, it is. The cheaper production values allowed them to have continuous motion and stuff, but in the process lost it's thoughtfulness and visual creativity. The animation is often repetitious and downright crude at times (fast-moving kicks that are simply animated as the same series of blurred lines, bodies that warp too much as they spin, choppy walking, etc). Still, the first storyline is well told and animated, and for the most part, the stories are still pretty good. But by the end, they're all just a bunch of one-episode arcs that often have no connection to the ones before it, and the same sorts of things happen over and over, especially in regards to Akane and Ranma's relationship (this was also starting to become a problem in Rumiko Takahashi's comic--they would fight, make-up, and break-up again in the last page of a story arc). Finally, the dubbing quality goes downhill, especially in Hard Battle and Outta Control (I stopped watching them after the voice-actress (Sarah Strange?) of Boy-Type Ranma quit and was replaced). I don't know if the Japanese version did any better after the second season.

While I enjoyed watching Viz's imports of the series, I was curious enough to decide to watch the OVAs that were produced during the series' popularity. Of course, I should have been laughing at one of them, but I was really horrified by what happened in the first OVA. Of course, I didn't watch all of it yet, but the first 6 minutes, which showed Shampoo beating Ranma to a pulp, were too much for me. It was enough to head to IMDb and write this review. I'd give the series 5 stars, but the OVA deserves far less than that!

I was totally left speechless and gaping by the way Shampoo was treating poor Ranma, normally I had no sympathy for Ranma whatsoever (I cared more for Shampoo, Ryoga, Mousse and Akane) I was completely horrified regardless. Seeing Ranma get smacked repeatedly was just hard for me to tolerate. The OVA gets -5 stars for this reason, I can't believe many people allow their children to watch that stuff, that's why people get into brutal fights at schools and their victim ends up on life support in the hospital.

Simply put, CONDEMNED!