On Wed, 27 Jan 1999 Algerhorn@aol.com wrote:

She does try to clobber him in the movie "Big trouble in Nekonron China"
with a mallet, but never gets him. In the battle music video, she clocks
him once there (but neither of these were created of approved of by miss
Takahashi). The anime is "loosely" based on her manga... and therefore is
"loosely" canon. 

   Geez, I'm starting to feel like writing fanfics is considered a privelege
reserved only for those who've either seen all or most of the anime or read
all or most of the manga. I've read none of the manga and seen only about
fifteen anime episodes. Are people like me, who haven't got the cash to rent
or buy every video or comic not qualified to write a story? True, a fic isn't
as enjoyable (to me anyway) if the characters bear the names of Ranma, Akane,
Ryoga, etc. but act like completely different people. Is it really *that*
important whether Akane hits Ranma with a table, a wet fish, her fist, or a
mallet though? Is it really that bad if someone wants to give Nabiki some kind
of a heart underneath what we usually see?

I think there's also a difference between fanfic errors which are genuine
errors, and fanfic "errors" which involve emphasis, even if they are also
cliches.  For instance, if you say that Ranma's hair continues to be affected
by the Dragon's Whisker after the Dragon's Whisker story, you're outright
wrong.  It is or it isn't affected, only two choices, and the canon says
that it's not.

On the other hand, Akane _does_ use mallets.  People who object to Akane
using mallets in fanfics aren't objecting that she doesn't do it in the
series, they're objecting that it's emphasized too much.  The same goes with
all the character debates: "Ukyou isn't Ranma's best friend", "Nabiki
doesn't care for her family", etc.  You might find evidence for or against
them, but you're never going to find something in the anime or manga which
says that they are outright true or false--they're just not the same _kind_
of questions.

We could do with a little more criticism of errors of the first sort.
We could do with a lot _less_ criticism of fanfics for using "cliches",
except when the entire story is based around the cliche.