Publisher: 5-Ace (Pony Canyon)
Format: VHS, NTSC, Japanese Dialogue
Length: 22 minutes
Original Release Date: 7 November 1990
Animation Exclusive to this Release: Yes
Other Sources (Japanese unless noted): Ranma ½ Hot Song Contest (Laserdisc, VHS 1990), Ranma ½ Hot Song Contest (DVD 2002)
Currently Availability (as of writing): Out of Print
Despite the fact my early foray into anime fandom was the mid 1990’s, surprisingly I was never a fan of the “Ranma ½” franchise. Although little of the series was released on video in Australia (one OVA, one movie from memory), I found many local fans had paid a fair amount of cash to import Viz’s English dubbed VHS tapes. This was unsurprising as the series was huge in western fandom at the time. Based on yet another one of Rumiko Takahashi’s long running manga series and serialised in Shonen Sunday, the core anime adaptation (outside later specials) ran from 1989 to 1996 with numerous TV series, OVAs and movies. While Viz in the US released pretty much everything anime related to the franchise, this music video compilation, which is completely made up of brand new animation, was ignored by the company. I suspect that either a music rights issue or the fact it was too hard to dub the songs forced Viz to scrap any English language release of it. The video uses songs from the “Hot Songs Contest” Image album which was released in April 1990. For those who don’t know, an Image album is one where the voice actors perform songs in character. Kenji Kawai (of “Patlabor” and “Ghost in the Shell” fame) wrote the music for all the songs, though several writers wrote the lyrics. Two videos were released compiling all the songs from the album, both in November 1990. I’ll be looking the first video. But before we get to the individual music videos, I better tell you about the series;
Soun Tendo, head of the Tendo Dojo, is overjoyed that Genma Saotome and his son, Ranma, are coming to visit. Genma, like Soun, is a practitioner of the “Anything-Goes School” of martial arts. Years ago Genma promised Ranma would marry one of Soun’s daughters so the Tendo Dojo would carry on for at least another generation. However the girls, 19 year old Kasumi Tendo, 17 year old Nabiki Tendo, and 16 year old Akane Tendo aren’t all that terribly impressed that one of them will be in an arranged marriage. Rather than two men arriving at the Dojo, the Tendo family are absolutely dumbfounded when a teenage girl and panda end up on their doorstep, fighting each other. The girl later introduces herself as Ranma Saotome which only confuses them further. The odd pair explain that a month ago, Ranma and Genma trekked to China to train at the fabled Jusenkyo spring. However during their intense training, Ranma fell into the “Spring of Drowned Girl” while Genma fell into the “Spring of Drowned Panda”. Both have been cursed; when splashed with cold water they respectively turn into a girl and a panda. Hot water returns them to their original forms. Katsumi and Nabiki nominate Akane to be Ranma’s bride; however the Akane and Ranma refuse, despite their father’s insistence. However as the series progresses, they end up being closer to each other, although almost always end up bickering and fighting with each other.
Though wanting to return to the Jusenkyo spring in order to rid himself of the curse, Ranma ends up going to Furinkan High School with Akane. There Ranma has a rival for Akane’s affections, Tatewaki Kuno, the conceited captain of the school’s kendo team. But not only is he after Akane, he falls for Ranma’s female form as well. His sister, Kodachi Kuno, captain of the gymnastics team at an all-girls school, ends up being infatuated with the male form of Ranma. Yet another suitor for Akane arrives in the form of the Ryoga Hibiki, who has a terrible sense of direction and is always lost. In addition Ryoga also wants revenge on Ranma as he followed him to the Jusenkyo spring where he promptly fell into the “Spring of the Drowned Piglet”. Unware that Ryoga turns into a small black piglet when splashed with cold water, Akane takes in the piglet as a pet and names it P-chan. Ryoga uses Akane’s affection for him in piglet form to deliberately frustrate and anger Ranma. As the series progresses, several other characters appear, most whom have had contact with various cursed springs at Jusenkyo including Chinese Amazon Shampoo, who turns into a cat and is after Ranma’s affections and her childhood friend Mousse who becomes Ranma’s rival who turns into a duck. Other major characters include Happosai who is the elderly perverted founder and grandmaster of Anything Goes Martial Arts ,and Azusa Shiratori and Mikado Sanzenin, the figure skating golden pair of Ranma and Akane’s school who just had fuel to the fire falling for various members of the Tendo household.
Once this main cast of characters is introduced, the series follows a formula of slapstick comedy with plenty of misunderstandings between various characters, most of which are never really resolved by the end of the episode in order to reuse the same misunderstandings for comedic effect later on. With that intro out of the way, time to talk about the videos;
“Little Date (TV Service Version)” Performed by Ranma, Akane and Shampoo [Megumi Hayashibara, Noriko Hidaka and Rei Sakuma]
The video compilation opens up with Shirokuro (Checkers in the English dub), Ryoga Hibiki's pet dog and Ryoga himself in P-chan form, switching on a TV. We are then introduced to the hosts of this video special; the nameless Chinese guide from Jusenkyo spring and Sasuke Sarugakure, the ninja of the Kuno family. After some brief introductions we are thrown into the first video, “Little Date”. This was originally the opening theme to the second TV series and performed by idol group Ribbon. This version is a remake with the voice actors for the female type Ranma, as well Akane and Shampoo singing the theme in character. The video is a simple affair which shows off the main characters and the choruses showing the main cast dancing. Unlike the other songs in this compilation, Tsugutoshi Goto wrote the music though Kenji Kawai arranged the track for this version.
“Anything-Goes Martial Arts Goes On ~ Panda Can't Sing the Song (Musabetsu Kakutou Icchokusen ~ Panda wa Uta wo Utaenai)” Performed by Genma Saotome [Kenichi Ogata]
The song title is literally a synopsis of the music video. Genma prepares to sing a song and asks Ranma to give him a glass of water. Ranma responds enthusiastically by throwing a glass of water to him, which naturally spills over Genma. In panda form Genma attempts to sing, while the Tendo household stare with their mouths agape. The video is shot mostly in the dark with spotlights passing the cast (I’m assuming to hide the limited animation), and due to the lack of light, Genma bumps into Ranma, which causes them to fight. Eventually water is spilt on Ranma which transforms him into his female form. This continues on until the set on the soundstage is destroyed. Afterwards a commercial appears for the Neko Shopping Network advertising the Nekohaten restaurant. Katsumi and Nabiki star along with Genma and Soun Tendo who appear dressed as housewives.
“Love Letter from China (China kara no Tegami)” Performed by Ranma & Ranma [Megumi Hayashibara and Kappei Yamaguchi]
The next video mimics a clichéd ballad done in a duet style and also satirises karaoke videos, including the subtitles and the old style laserdisc karaoke machines. The video shows the doomed love of Happosai and Shampoo’s great grandmother Cologne and is portrayed in the style of an old Japanese drama. The song is sung by both the male and female version of Ranama, with someone throwing hot or cold water on Ranma at appropriate timers to create the duet effect. While I find the metamorphosis gag in “Ranma ½” to be generally tiring, here the gag is used really effectively and is quite amusing. Afterwards Ryoga comes on to perform but is splashed with water and turns into P-chan. The Jusenkyo guide and Sasuke start to introduce Ryoga but are puzzled at his sudden disappearance.
“Uncute, Unsexy (Kawaikunee, Iroke ga nee)” Performed by Ranma [Kappei Yamaguchi]
This upbeat number has Ranma initially training and then fighting off a number of Akane’s suitors and rivals such as Ryoga Hibiki, Mousse, Happosai and Tatewaki Kuno. A great deal of the video is dedicated to various individual fights between those characters and Ranma and also a some sequences where all four team up to fight Ranma. The choruses have close ups of Ranma singing whilst two of his rivals squeeze the frame Ranma is in to push him out of the picture. Ranma retaliates usually by squashing his rivals. Akane later shows up the video joining Ranama, much to Ryoga’s frustrations, though some of the other rivals try to woo Akane.
“Two-Part Secret Heart (Heart Naisho/2)” Performed by Akane [Noriko Hidaka]
The Jusenkyo guide and Sasuke cross live to Tatewaki Kuno who is outside a concert hall which is hosting an idol concert featuring Akane. Tatewaki proclaims himself to be the head of Akane’s fanclub and rushes into the concert hall with a camera to film the concert. Akane jumps on stage in a stereotypical idol dress of the era and the enthusiastic audience performing the clichéd chants and calls at the appropriate times during the song. During one section of the song, Akane points at the audience with Tatewaki mistakenly thinking it is aimed directly at him. He gets over excited and rushes toward the stage which freaks out Akane who runs off stage in terror. Concert security tries to subdue him with the camera falling to the ground and eventually fading to static. Afterwards we are treated to faux theatrical trailer for an action film where Mousse is seen on top of the burning Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building fighting a helicopter and Shampoo is seen inside the Forbidden City in Beijing.
“Akane's Lullaby (Akane no Komoriuta)” Performed by Akane [Noriko Hidaka]
The final video is a collection of story book-like water colours mostly revolving around Akane and her nearest and dearest. The end credits are displayed over the top of the artwork. And that’s the end of the video. The second part, which I’ll be covering down the track sometime, was released about two weeks after this video.
As I said before, I was never a fan of this franchise, I tried getting into the series again after Viz Media began releasing the series on blu-ray, but soon discovered that after the main cast were introduced, it’s pretty much a one note joke revolving around easily resolved misunderstandings and the supposedly hilarious switching back and forth of various characters with water due to the curse placed on them by Jusenkyo spring. I find that sort of humour tiresome but note that a lot of Rumiko Takahashi’s popular longer works adhere to similar types of formulas for their humour. One of the problems I do have with “Ranma ½” as a franchise is that it hasn't aged well. In particular the deceptions of Chinese people seem to veer on rather unpleasant racist stereotypes.
Having said that, I do find a lot of the videos in this collection really funny. I think in smaller doses, “Ranma ½” can be very amusing. It still baffles me though as to why Viz never bothered to release this compilation, even as a sub only extra. In Japan the compilation was compiled with the second part on VHS and laserdisc in December 1990 (less than a month after the original separate VHS releases) and later on DVD in 2002. Strangely (as far as I can see) the compilation was never re-released as part of any DVD or blu-ray box set along with the TV series, OVAs or movies. The compilation is currently out of print in all formats. You can buy the separate VHS tapes for as little as ¥1, but the tape containing both parts usually sells for less than ¥1,000 in the second hand market. The laserdisc version sells for a little more than that. I found one set of new shrink-wrapped VHS tapes (both part 1 and 2) being sold for an astronomical ¥65,000. The DVD is quite rare. Second hand copies run well over ¥10,000.
In conclusion, this is a pretty fun music video compilation that should please both the casual and hard core “Ranma ½” fan. The main impediment for most fans however is the cost and rarity of the video itself in a legitimate format.
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