It’s good that Ranma ½ airs more or less at the same time of the week (for my blogging purposes it’s materially the same time) as Witch Watch.  From a mood standpoint they fill absolutely the same slot for me. Abjectly silly comedy that puts a smile on your face and doesn’t make you work too hard. Dumb where it needs to be, smart where it needs to be. And both fortunate enough to be getting really excellent adaptations, probably better than we had any right to expect in both cases.

While this ep will eventually get hijacked by new (and one new old) faces, we start with the fallout from the kissing incident. Ranma can be a boy, a girl, and a cat – though with the latter he claims to retain no memory. He’s seen the photo evidence though, so Ranma can’t deny what happened. Obviously Akane is upset, even Ranma can see that. But he’s meowing up the wrong tree when it comes to the reason. She’s not upset that Ranma kissed her – she’s upset that it meant nothing to do him (apparently). And it’s not a charge he’s really in any position to deny.

Soon enough Akane will have other things to be pissed about, never fear. Like finding Ranma in the bath with Shampoo, (that would sound a lot ,more innocent in a different series) who’s returned from China (a changed woman) and opened a ramen shop. And she has company – her great grandma Cologne (played by Mayama Ako this time, replacing the late Miyako Asou). Cologne is determined that Ranma should marry Shampoo, as that’s the law of her people. The fact that he’a already engaged to Akane is of no import to her. Eventually Cologne uses a little acupressure to plant a time bomb in the boy – she wipes out his resistance to hot water.

As if the default mode with Shampoo wasn’t loopy enough, because she fell into “Drowned Cat Spring” in Jusenkyo (the best thing about this is the flashback which gives us a bit of Yamadera Kouichi’s Jusenkyo guide) she’s joined the curse parade. Shampoo now turns into a cat when splashed with cold water, and apparently knowing it’s Shampoo is not enough to quell Ranma’s cat phobia (or maybe he’s just that afraid of Shampoo). And as if all that weren’t enough, yet another idiot joins the party, another Chinese import – Mousse. And this time it’s another legend reprising their role in the 1989 series, this time Seki Toshihiro.

Mouse’s deal is the friendzone, literally. Because Shampoo beat him when he was three, by law she can’t marry him. Not that there’s any indication she wants to. He’s the master of hidden weapons, except his hidden weapon is a plastic (I guess it could be wood) swan. Soon enough he challenges Ranma to a duel he reluctantly accepts, though after what Cologne did to him it’s an appointment Ranma is going to have a hard time honoring. In short, the hits just keep on coming in more ways than one…