Ranma ep 1.4: "Ranma and... Ranma!? If It's Not One Thing, It's Another!"

Summary | Dub & Animation | Notes & Comments | Screencaps

Animation (1 to 5):
Definitely a four, and I would give it a five if it weren't TV animation. Everyone looks awesome in this one, the fight scenes are great, the timing is excellent, the gag takes are hilarious, and the panda looks funny. What more do you need? :)

Dub (1 to 5):
Four here, too. I have very few complaints on this one; everyone is "on", and the fact that it showcases two of the best voices can only help. :D Don't have many specific notes on specific people, either.

I will say that, like in the last ep, the dub loses some of the subtleties of the characters. In particular Kappei Yamaguchi as Ranma is fantastic during the scene when he and Akane are bantering (and Noriko Hidaka's not bad either), but it's just sort of flat with Sara Strange and Miriam Syrois. It's still a fun scene, but all the fun is in the lines themselves, not in the delivery the way it is in Japanese; Kappei is SO OBNOXIOUS :D

Ted Cole runs the whole gamut here, from kinda creepily sexy during Ranma's dream, to pseudo-Shakespearean in his letter to Nabiki, to psychotic when fighting Ranma. Oh! My lord, and the NOISES he makes while he's looking at pictures of Ranma! "WHOA!" The man rocks. :D Angela Costain - well, this is a Nabiki episode at its heart, and she was always what stood out in this ep for me, from the first time I saw it.

Other than that, most of what we have to talk about in terms of dub rate-a-bility is the line changes. This is the point at which they start really tweaking the lines to get them to flow for the actors (and, well, heck - the language). The one that stood out for me was at the beginning when Genma's "at his morning toilette", and Ranma yells at him; in Japanese it's just "Why're you washing your hair in the morning like some kinda teenager?" But in English it's what we're all thinking: "What are you washing, anyway?! You're BALD!" *SNERK* Which got me thinking: do we EVER actually see Genma's head? He's always either a panda, or wearing that kerchief, or wearing a wig *giggle* Or it's a flashback to when he was younger, and HAD hair.

Anyway, most of the best, standout lines in this ep are actually in the dub:
"So THAT'S what they call it!"
"It's to the boy-half this time. Cutie... he just can't get enough!"
"What is this, a riddle?" "No, it's a cute dolly."
"*sob*... It's so terrible!"

Whither the Bard?:
I am however, sorely disappointed by the virtual lack of Shakespeare in this ep. I guess there just wasn't room for another speech. *sigh* They do take pains to give Kuno a few legit lines, other than just statements that sound Shakespeare-esque (which I fear they resort to in later eps).

In the beginning of his letter to Nabiki, Kuno's original quote is translated as "Lo, it is spring! What glories lie in store. Anyway..." I can't find a source for that. However, in the dub they do me a favour and pull out the Shakespeare again, substituting a quote from "Two Gentlemen of Verona":
Oh, how this spring of love resembleth/The uncertain glory of an April day.
The quote itself is basically like - on an April day, one second it's warm and beautiful and the next a cloud passes over and it's winter again. The funny part is that I doubt very much that this quote means anything at all except that Kuno Likes Shakespeare. ;)

Other lines from Shakespeare are actually paraphrased rather than directly quoted: "So sweet and voluble your discourse" (after Nabiki spits her food into his face while laughing) comes from "Love's Labour Lost", and "Thus do quick bright things come to confusion" is from "A Midsummer Night's Dream", which would seem to be Kuno's favourite. Which is cool; it's mine, too. ^_^

From manga to episode:
The story itself comprises a chapter and a half; but there is a TON of fleshing out, and it's some of the best fleshing out ever. None of the Nabiki/Kuno "date" actually happens in the manga, only about half the dream is there, and Soun's unintentional grope is missing. ;) I must say, they really knew what they were doing when they added on to this ep, because it sets the tone of the characters in stone. Making it virtually a Nabiki/Kuno episode was a stroke of genius; they can easily float an entire ep together, even without Akane and Ranma.