Ranma ep 1.2: "School's No Place For Horsing Around!"

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Characters in this ep:
Ranma
Akane
Genma
Soun
Nabiki
Kasumi
Dr. Tofu (first appearance)
Kuno (first appearance)

Summary:

Open on a pan of foggy morning Nerima. Akane is out jogging, looking absolutely adorable. She comes home to find Ranma and Genma loudly sparring in the backyard, and they've woken up a grumpy (and even more adorable) Nabiki with their noise. Akane stops to watch, and is first impressed by their skill and then floored by their sheer vindictiveness... not to mention, that's just a weird freakin' curse.

Genma informs Ranma that he'll be attending high school starting with Akane, starting that morning. Akane is not enthusiastic about walking him to school, but she does so, even though he's equally unenthused about going with her. She tells him on the way that, once they get there, they don't know each other. He agrees and says he can't stand tomboys like her, and the only thing that stops a fight is an appearance by Genma. However, Ranma is shortly doused with water when the little old lady who likes to toss water around makes her first appearance. Akane makes a stop in at Dr. Tofu's office to borrow some hot water.

When they arrive they find no one, but Tofu manages to sneak up on Ranma and scare the daylights out of her with "Betty", the human skeleton he carries around with him. Akane comes back with the water and turns into a meek girly-girl around Tofu; Ranma puts two and two together, and grins, but for some reason says nothing. On their way to the school he starts to bring the issue up, but they're interrupted by the onset of Akane's daily morning ritual: Beating Up the Guys Who Want To Date Her.

Seriously: she's attacked by about half the male student population, all in sports gear, and single-handedly defeats them all in about three minutes. Ranma is impressed, though he doesn't tell her so. Before they can get to class in time, though, another suitor enters; dressed in samurai robes and carrying a wooden bokken, he quotes poetry (Shakespeare, in the dub) introduces himself as Tatewaki Kuno, the Rising Star of the Kendo Club, the Blue Thunder of Furinkan High, and demands to know why Ranma is so familiar with Akane. Upon being given the quick and impersonal answer - "He's a guest at our place" - Kuno deems this entirely unacceptable and decides to trounce Ranma, who is pleased at finally being involved in something he can understand.

Kuno is incredibly skilled with the bokken, and Ranma spends most of his time dodging the blows (albeit fairly easily). It starts to rain just as each make their final strike, and Panda!Genma runs in, knocks Kuno over, and runs off with Ranma, who has just turned into a girl. In a P.E. shed, Ranma uses hot water to turn back into a guy, and says that if it hadn't started raining, he would've taken Kuno out in one blow... But Akane points out the bruise on his neck, where the bokken just barely grazed by his skin. Not that Ranma didn't get in his own good mark...

In class with Nabiki, the year ahead of Ranma and Akane, Kuno sits at his desk and examines his forehead in a mirror, where Ranma has somehow managed to tattoo a misspelling of his name (using the kanji for "insufferable"). Kuno insults Ranma's kanji abilities and writes his name correctly on the board, with the kanji for "capable"; Nabiki fixes it to mean "incapable", and they glare and have UST (well, I think so, heh. *G*).

Meanwhile, in their own class, Ranma and Akane are sent to stand in the hallway for being late, and forced to hold buckets of water (is that legit? how odd). In between the arguing, which takes up most of their time, Akane explains how this become the morning standard practice: early in the semester in a speech contest, Kuno took the opportunity of being the centre of attention to make an edict that anyone who wishes to date Akane must first defeat her in combat. I guess before even trying to ask her out. Which doesn't make her particularly happy, and probably contributes to her "I HATE BOYS!" battle cry.

Back with Kuno, Nabiki has told him about the engagement, and he stands up in the middle of class and freaks out, earning him a prompt sentence of standing in the hall. Yes, with a bucket of water. Kuno uses the opportunity to go after Ranma, and picks a fight in the hallway, announcing Ranma and Akane's engagement to the whole school as he does. Ranma gets him to take the fight outside, and they jump out of a window - from the third floor - into the pool below.