Wind Breaker Solved the Tsundere Problem by Veridian
I've said this before, but I only like tsundere when the story does the work to frame their behavior as harmless. When the story takes the time, during the tsundere's introductions, or throughout their entire portrayal, to make it constantly clear, that their outbursts aren't malicious, but just signs of their embarrassed insecurity, I usually don't have problems with them. Hetalia's England and Lucky Star's Kagami are both tsundere that I have no problems with.
I remember that decade of the tsundere trend, when studios/creators very badly tried to emulate Rumiko Takahashi's characters like Akane Tendo and Lum Invader (while often forgetting that Takahashi's leading men characters were also tsundere). I remember when years of Ranma 1/2 anime filler episodes reduced Akane into primarily a slapstick running gag of her being angry and hitting Ranma. Even today, I've seen comments complaining about the Ranma 1/2 remake's season 3 getting sakuga because, (to paraphrase) "What more do they need than girl gets angry, girl hits guy, funny laugh laugh?" As if Ranma wasn't constantly doing things to deserve it, like being rude, saying callous things, and being sexist. (That's why we got that decade of "harem anime" where the leading men were milquetoast, blank slate, "nice guys". Producers of the harem trend wanted the fantasy of a group of girls all chasing after one guy; not a male lead with interesting characterization, like Rumiko Takahashi. "Tenchi Muyo" literally means "No Need For Tenchi".) I remember when Rukia Kuchiki from Bleach got reduced down to another tsundere running gag, in more filler anime adaptations. Anime-Rukia was picking fights for NO REASON, just so the audience could giggle at ridiculous behavior. Nevermind that not everyone finds artificially-induced "drama" entertaining, and some of us actually find it extremely abrasive. The Bleach anime filler eventually sacrificed the characterization of Rukia, from a rounded and unique character with reasonable moments of slapstick, to just an abrasive character, frequently yelling and hitting Ichigo for no reason. Nevermind that the manga's portrayal of Rukia had her hitting Ighigo when he literally needed to be knocked out of bad mindsets, when the story had so much tension that only ridiculous slapstick could break it, or when Ichigo literally said something insulting or offensively stupid (from Rukia's perspective). That decade of trending tsundere very often forgot that these characters that act tsundere are very often REACTING to something so stupid or offensive, that their violence or moments of abrasive behavior is actually REASONABLE. That's why so many forgettable tsundere from that era were so abrasive; they forgot to give acceptable reasons for the behavior.
Otherwise, a tsundere is just an abrasive character, picking fights for no reason, and being violent to people who didn't seem to deserve it. And that's why I hate an abrasive tsundere.
But a good tsundere, on the other hand, is sympathetic. Show me why their insecurity is something to be reacted to with kindness and consideration for their emotional wounds, the fragility of their egos, and compassion for their oversensitive embarrassment. Show me why all thier bluster is toothless and why their threats have no fangs. When England/Arthur Kirkland, Kagami Hiiragi, and Haruka Sakura get portrayed like that, I can't help but focus on their embarrassment, rather than their lashing-out. That's what gains sympathy for a tsundere, in my eyes.
Ranma 1/2 has been my favorite manga for years. But I never called the 1989 anime my favorite anime, because that was such a horrendous adaptation.
Immediately, after the first 1 or 2 seasons, the animation quality went so down. I can't tell you how happy i was when Sunrise finally took away the animation licensing monopoly that the previous studio seemed to have on adapting Rumiko Takahashi's series.
Before Naruto, Ranma 1/2 1989 was the poster child for filler anime. And they had such terrible filler too. Even before I knew which episodes were anime-only and which were based on the manga, I retroactively noticed that the 1 filler episode in season 1, strangely, coincidentally, was the only episode not to make me laugh aloud, throughout the episode, like all the other season 1 episodes had. I know there are some people who like the filler episodes, but to me, the writing was so terrible compared to Rumiko Takahashi's writing. She knew how to pace story arcs, have just the right amount of a break between high tension chapters, and everything from her humor to her drama, emotionally landed.
But then the 1989 anime would do weird things like adapt manga chapters, but pad them out with noticeably worse B plots. Or they'd change individual scenes to be worse. Or they'd adapt a story arc, but switch major things. Like, the manga's beach race while carrying a watermelon makes sense. Breaking watermelons with a big stick is a common beach game. But why did the 1989 anime turn it into mini snowmen on a snowy mountain while skiing???? Why did they change the food delivery race, to swap out Shamooo with some random OC??? Was it to give a sense that Genma is a jerk who keeps making promises he won't keep? Or to reinforce that Ranma keeps acquiring suitors that he doesn't want? I promise you, the original story will do all that on its own!
And Ranma 1/2 was the prototype for multiple trends, but it became that way because the 1989 anime adaptation bent some things from the manga, to overemphasize what they wanted. Did you ever wonder why Harem anime with tsundere, violent, leading lady, love interests took over in the 1990s/2000s? It's because that's what the anime industry latched onto from Ranma 1/2. Not Takahashi's perspective as a woman. Not pointing out the absurdity of romance tropes. Not Akane's kindness. No. The 1989 anime adaptation wanted to emphasize girls falling into the MC's lap, and a masochism fetish---that became more clear with series like MM!, Love Hina (whose anime adaptation was also less romance/drama than the source manga, and more Naru punching Keitaro), anime filler scenes/episodes/movies of Bleach (that also turned Rukia's no nonsense personality and narratively strategic slapstick, into grossly frequent, less justified violence and irrational temper tantrums). Lots of anime girls in 1990s/2000s anime adaptations suffered the same as Akane Tendo in anime adaptations. Because that's what happens when men in the industry figure out they can sell waifus and think that just because a female character is tough and can defend her own boundaries, then her characterization must be "angry all the time". Go read Otomen, Buso Renkin, or Bleach: these manga have leading ladies that clearly descend from manga-version Akane Tendo, who isn't just angry all the time, at everything. But then the majority of popular anime from the 1990s/2000s focus on all the irrationally violent tsundere, overemphasizing their anger and little else for the majority of the time. At least, that 1990s or 2000s weekly, Japanese, live action show of a woman angrily yelling into a first-person camera, for a collage of different scenarios, was honest about what those trends, at the time, were about, what they were accumulating towards: fetishizing women's anger. I'm so glad now that the deredere seems to have become the most popular archetype in the 2020s, overtaking the tsundere. Now, when Akane Tendo gets adapted into the new Ranma 1/2 2024 anime, they're not afraid to show her kindness and vulnerability---AS IS MANGA ACCURATE---vs overemphasizing her anger, just because "that's what's popular" to those industry heads from the 1990s/2000s who wanted to play into a masochism kink.
I don't blame Takahashi for condoning the changes that the 2024 Ranma 1/2 made, versus the manga. Sometimes people take satire making fun of them, as affirmation. And sometimes, that's not clear until much later. (All in the Family, Colbert Report, The Prince) I keep seeing comparison pics of manga Happosai groping Ranma's boobs, vs 2025 anime Happosai groping Ranma's leg. I remember going into Anime Expo video rooms, years ago, and all the men cheering when Happosai came on screen. Takahashi made that character to represent all things bad and villainous. It made him a convenient antagonist whenever one was needed. Because she assumed that everyone would see a pervert like that as clearly bad. It was a given that no one would sympathize with a character who constantly gropes/harasses women. (Happosai didn't even get more dimensions like Araru Moroboshi. Ataru was just enough of a pervert so you'd enjoy watching him get the bludgeoned by slapstick. But he often was unsuccessful in grabbing girls, so he wouldn't seem as unforgivable, unlike Happosai. But Ataru also got enough humanizing characterization so you'd root for him to be with Lum.) Happosai was also an important lesson for Ranma to learn about the female experience, being on guard against creeps---just like every other "boy turning into girl" manga (of which, i have a whole shelf of…mixed in with crossdressing heroines). And unlike most anime that turned a pervert's groping into a "funny" joke and opportunity for fanservice, Takahashi treated it as actual villainy, for which Happosai got pummeled for---on screen! The camera/panels lingered on him beaten up, closed in on him beaten up with close-ups, more than lingering on his hand groping boobs, unlike lots of other anime do. Time and again, men adapt Takahashi's manga, and miss the point. (Even 2024 Ranma 1/2 angered me by omitting dialogue about a very important feminine experience: getting gender policed/trauma, from motherly figures that were previously emotionally safe. But noooo…Can't taint Kasumi's image apparently.) So if taking Happosai out of Ranma's boobs and onto his leg, re-shifts the focus back onto the actual points of those scenes, vs men getting distracted with enjoyment of the images, then it's a good change.
You were supposed to sympathize with Ranma as the main character, being horrified, angry, violated, and humiliated, ya goofs! And not just humiliated as a girl or human, but also as a martial artist. The reason Happosai, the grand master of the Anything Goes School of Martial Arts, is the pervert, is because who else but the founding grand master of their entire martial arts style could so easily and often, get past Ranma's defenses as a martial artist, to grope him, after the whole series had been building him up as a martial arts genius? And why is it so imperative that Ranma get groped? Because he's a misogynist whose character arc revolves around him coming to respect women, the female experience, and his own "feminine" sides. Every gender switching series knows this is one of the most important themes, if the protagonist is AMAB. Cheeky Angel, Your & My Secret, Futaba-kun Change, Image comics' Mantra, etc. (I haven't read enough of Pretty Face. My 6 volumes have been sitting for years.🙃) But I saw men cheering in that video room at Anime Expo, because they were excited to see some tits groped and underwear stolen. So no, I don't mind the changes from the manga made in Ranma 1/2 2024. I think the boob groping better conveys the horror that Ranma experiences and the intensity of fear/danger that real women have to endure…But any kind of touching without permission is disgusting and disrespectful. (Especially since just today someone ran their hands down both sides of my torso without my permission! I can tell you, it doesn't have to be on the boobs to feel disgusting and horrifying.) And if leg groping helps properly re-focus on the horror that Ranma experiences with Happosai, rather than the audience getting distracted by fanservice, then those changes are true to the intent of the original source manga.
To address the lack of nipples issue: Yes, even I think it looks strange. But then I realized that Rumiko Takahashi herself never drew nipples on her boys. In fact, most anime outside of BL or older series with more realism in their art styles, usually omit male nipples. And I just got used to it, without realizing! I remember when one of my parents walked in on me watching the old Ranma 1/2 OAVs and asking why Ranma didn't have nipples. Since then, I've noticed how often anime skips male nipples, and more importantly, how odd it felt to me when they didn't. So I think it's important to invert that feeling and explore what it's like to invert the trope---at least for me. Also, it's more cohesive in terms of character design if everyone either has no nipples or everyone has nipples. And frankly, with the amount of times Ryouga and Mousse end up naked after a transformation, compared to how much less frequently Ranma and the girls are top-less in the manga (or even NEED to be top-less for the situations), it stays more true to Takahashi's manga for the boys to remain nippleless and just omit the girls' nipples. I don't see it as censorship, so much as better, cohesive design. (If you really want to see nipples, just read the manga. It's a very good manga anyway.)
I'll admit. I initially preferred Ranma's red and green retro shirt. But now i can see the black and gold being used in a real life, modern, ice skating costume.
I remember the first half decade that I was newly into anime, I was so insufferable about changes from the manga. Believe me, after the second or third time you realize you publicly overreacted or acted elitist about a series, you start trying to keep it down. You learn to grow out of it. When anonymous people online complain about non-issues like the text on clothing design, I can only assume they are little kids who haven't learned better yet.
Google translate:
"Figure images now available for preview! Ichiban Kuji TV anime "Ranma 1/2" Scheduled for release in early January 2025 A Prize: Ranma figure https://animetoyinfo.com/2024/10/10/ranma-itibakz/… #一番くじ #ranma #らんま #らんまアニメ"
