Some of those objecting to Belldandy twisting Ranma's wish the way she
did Keiichi's have missed a couple of points.

1. Unlike Keiichi's wish (for a girl like Belldandy to stay with him
   forever), Ranma's didn't mention a time frame. If they break up
   after a day or a week, his wish has been fulfilled.

2. From the manga, Belldandy would seem to be on detached duty from
   the Goddess Relief Office as a result of Keiichi's wish, thus this
   would seem to be a timeline where she has not met Keiichi. Perhaps
   as someone suggested a young Ranma met a little girl in the forest
   one day...

3. Belldandy's plan may be to bring about a rapprochement with one of
   his current fiancees, assuming she doesn't want Ranma for herself.

On Tue, 24 Feb 1998, Scott Schimmel wrote:

	Well, it seems like it would be less troublesome for the wish
to change one (or more) of Ranma's -current- fiancees.  

   I don't think the goddesses generally go in for directly changing
someone's personality by using their powers. Urd generally tries to
get Keiichi and Belldandy to express the feelings they already possess.
The only counter-example that comes to mind is Urd's effort to keep Skuld
from falling in love with Keiichi, and her direct attempt was a last
resort.

   Belldandy does have the ability to change people, but mainly by
always seeing the best in everyone, which with her nature becomes
almost a self-fulfilling prophecy (as in the current Ninja Master
stoy line). This story could have Belldandy trying to persuade one
of Ranma's fiancess to become more understanding and forgiving (as I
suggest above).

H. Torrance Griffin writes:

	Actually, the 'or more' statement here would provide the seed of a
decent 'fic.  What _would_ become of Ranma's situation if 'Poo, Ucchan,
and Violent Tomboy became as understanding/forgiving as Bellandy
(especially if the rest of their personalities and self-delusion remained
untouched ^_^)

   I don't think it would work if they ALL became like Belldandy - her
only self-delusion seems to be seeing people as better than they are,
as I said, and you can't even count that as a real delusion. The girls
would each realize that Ranma was in love with Akane, and the others
would selflessly step aside. More interesting would be if only one of them
changed. Take Shampoo, for example. She realizes that Ranma loves Akane.
Frankly, though, if Akane remains the same, Shampoo would also have to
realize that she was a better choice for Ranma than Akane. So would
Ranma's wishes take precedence, or would she try to cut Akane out for
Ranma's own good, even though it's not what he wants? That wouldn't seem
like much of a change from the canonical story line, except that if
either Shampoo or Ukyo was as understanding as Belldandy, she'd actually
stand a good chance of winning (as is, neither one of them really
understands Ranma all that well).

Reid Carson
rcarson@mnsinc.com