H. Torrance Griffin wrote:
Before you ask, this fic was exceedingly well written in my
opinion.
And now for the bad news....
Just once... just _once_ I would like to see a story where the
Sainted Warrior Mousse make the most agonizing sacrifice of his life and
finally harden his heart enough to engage his one true love in all-out
combat for her hand in marriage in order to save her from the path those
hated Joketsuzoku have forced upon her....
... and get his head handed to him for his trouble.
I can respect what you were trying to get at with the revelation
at the end about Mousse's love not being as Inconceveably Pure as he
wanted to believe, but if Shampoo quietly accepts her fate and pursues him
in the next installment I will be violently ill (especially since it's
obvious that he's falling in love with Ukyo).
<Shrug> Got to have some kind of conflict. Otherwise everyone gets
married, lives happily ever after and you have nothing to write about
except the next generation.
HTG (Why can't 'Poo _ever_ get a decent break in a dramatic 'fic?)
Because she's doomed. Ranma is NEVER going to love a girl who made
him cower in fear. In the main continuity Ranma finds Akane's assaults
irritating, but not frightening. But he was afraid of Shampoo when
she was hunting him because he never knew when she'd show up and
try to kill him by surprise. He is afraid of Shampoo when she
turns into a cat. He's even a little afraid of her sexual overtures.
That means if we define a happy ending as one where Shampoo ends up
with Ranma, or really, anyone we know except Mousse, a happy ending
ends up being a real stretch.
What I can't figure out is why this makes a difference at all.
Shampoo has still disgraced the tribe by giving the kisses of death
and marriage and failing to follow through on either. The political
reasons for Shampoo and Cologne to be targets in the story are still
there. How does Shampoo getting her butt kicked by Mousse make her
any less of a failure and a disgrace?