On Mon, 9 Mar 1998, Matthew Campbell wrote:

Ranma Al'Thor wrote:

Hmmm.  I have some straight commentary on this, but first a minor point.

         "Well, you kinda go mad by inches, I guess.  Rand seemed
pretty sane when I met him."  Ranma-chan said, returning to
her exercises.

I'm not really clear on the timeline here.  How long have Ranma and 
Ukyou been traveling together?  If it's been any serious length of time 
(say more than three days), I can't believe he wouldn't have told her 
these things before.  Either Ukyou would have asked about channeling or 
Ranma would have volunteered the information.  If it has been a while, I 
would suggest simply converting the scene into a brief flashback.

They've been travelling about a month.  They did talk earlier about
channeling (back in Chapter 3), but the topic of men channeling didn't
come up.

As I remember from last time John, there's a rather convluted story 
about how this fanfic came to be.  The result was that a considerable 
amount of the story had already happened by the point where "Parallel 
Lives" begins.  Would you consider going back and actually writing that 
story for those of us who weren't on Ranma MUX?  I'd like to know more 
about how they first came to Randland and how Ukyou and Akane got curses 
and got split.  You telling it to people who ask isn't the same thing.  
If you don't want to do that, at least write a detailed "what has gone 
before" to append to the beginning of the chapters.

Well, some of it is in the previous chapters.  (I showed Akane and Ukyou
getting cursed in Chapter 2 in Flashbacks), and eventually, I should have
a flashback to explain more clearly why Ranma originally came to the WOT
world and ended up in the Tower, and what happened when they came looking
for him (And further explaining the incident that split Akane)


 

Now comments on Part 4.  Obviously this part deals extensively with the 
issue of gender and sexual orientation.  Ranma certainly had a sense of 

Hai.

desperation about her as she insisted to Akane that "she" was still a 
boy underneath it all.  Quite naturally, since she did indeed feel her 
masculinity slipping away.

I'm glad that came through clearly.
 

However, Akane had was just as desperate, if in a more quiet manner.  
She told Akane that "you're a girl now" and insisted that "Kaneda" was 
very real and a permanent part of her.  She too had a very good reason 
to be desperate.  After all, what was she going to do if Ranma still 
felt as much a "boy" as ever?  Akane would feel that her feminimity had 
slipped away from her when she could have done something to prevent it. 
 It was just as important to Akane that "he" be be right as it was to 
Ranma that "she" be right.

Hai!
 

What I found disappointing was that the issue was so clearly settled.  
All three of the people that had their gender "permanently" changed 
found their sexual orientation inevitably switching as well.  What's 
strange about that is that very rare is the situation that everyone will 
react exactly the same to.  People are different, and will respond in 
different ways to events of such importance.

There are reasons for this, which will be explained later in the story.  I
cannot say more without spoiling certain things.
 

For instance, I at least would have found it more interesting if only 
_two_ of the three felt their orientations changing and felt themselves 
thinking in a manner appropriate to their new gender.  The third person 
would still be attracted to the same gender they'd always been attracted 
to and remain pretty much themselves.

Well, in this case, the difference of reaction is going to be how they
respond to the change in sexuality, rather than how they respond to being
permanently in a male or female body (Which isn't going to be permanent,
permanent for any of them anyway...(Being stuck male or female, that is))

More on this in the next chapter, when Ukyou and Ranma are still stuck in
cursed form and Akane is not...:)

 

After all, why should _everybody_ respond the same way to something like 
that, really? 

Well, I'd like to hope I didn't show them all having EXACTLY the same
reaction to their situation.  

Also I would take issue with "not channeling"= "automatic death".  If I 
had to approximate it emotionally, I'd say its about the same way..... 
oh, say the same way normal series Ranma would feel if Akane dies.  He 
would do just about _anything_ to get her back, but if she was gone for 
good he would eventually get on with his life.  That's what people do.

In the Wheel of Time Universe, if you are stilled, or burned out, you
wither away and die unless you find some sort of overriding quest to give
you a purpose in life.  For men, it's pretty much a guaranteed Death
Penalty.  For women, it's pretty close.  

It's part of the universe.  That's not to say that the Ranma cast couldn't
find sucha  purpose to sustain them, but the two of them who actually know
anything about it have been fed lots of horror stories of how you wither
away :)

the > characters think.  It's quite possible that you as the author have 

decided they could survive, but Ranma and Akane think differently.  Even 

See my comments above.

Anyway, I hope by the end of the series, everyone ends up back in their 
proper gender (or at least regains the ability to switch back to that 
gender).  I wouldn't mind having Akane and Ukyou drop their curses 

By the end, all three of them will be back to their normal cursed state.
Physically, anyway :)

entirely, but I don't see that happening.  (And how long _were_ you 
planning to leave Ukyou stuck as a man, Mr. Biles? Giving yourself 
plenty of fodder for revenge-fics, aren't you?)

You always hurt the ones you love :)
 

I really, really don't want to see Ranma-chan "getting together" with a 
guy, regardless of the "guy's" original gender.  However, as I said, 

I have no plans to introduce any love interest for Ranma, male, female, or
giant wombat.  Akane and Ukyou are enough for any sensible aquatranssexual
:)


Things will not, however, be back to the Status Quo, at the end of the
story.  

John Walter Biles :  MA-History, Ph.D Wannabe at U. Kansas         
ranma@falcon.cc.ukans.edu       
rhea@tass.org              http://www.tass.org/~rhea/falcon.html
rhea@maison-otaku.net      http://www.maison-otaku.net/~rhea/


      Clever Nabiki sighed.  Magic wouldn't do the trick, either.  The
next day, she tried putting poison in the ogres' food, but everyone just
ended up thinking Princess Tomboy had tried to cook it.
"The Tale of Clever Nabiki", by Hans Christian Anderson