----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Sebastian Palm" <sebastian.palm@myrealbox.com>
To: <ffml@anifics.com>
Sent: Wednesday, November 12, 2003 11:19 AM
Subject: [FFML] Re: [Fanfic][Ranma/SM] Relatively Absent: Chapter 5
(part 1 of 2) ...

Damned outlook and its massive herader spamming...
Thermopyle wrote:

Heh.  Really?  Okay, I'll go with that, then.  Although I do have

to

say that with Eiko on Ranma's side, it's pretty goddamn unlikely

that

he couldn't be cured.  I mean, Eiko's forever old and Ranma's

going to

have plenty of time to work with Eiko.  Why the hell can't he

reinvent

the unlocking kettle?  It had to be invented at some point.  Ranma

can

presumably look backwards in time to find out about such things,
right?  I mean, UbEr EbIl Plooto has all these time-watching

related

tricks, shouldn't Ranma be able to get something out of that?

...except that Eiko blundered and destroyed the male form, and the

curse

magic, while bonding itself to Ranma in chapter one, and states flat

out

that due to the blunder, Ranma wouldn't be able to unlock the curse

even

with the Kaisufuu. Eiko also states that there's a way to use the

guardian's

powers to assume male form, once the bond is complete - that's the

"cure"

that Ranma has to hope for.

Hm, really?  Okay.  I'd forgotten about that.

Pluto turned Eiko's I/O off - Eiko says so when it talks to

Ranma in

chapter

one. Only Pluto being "dead" allowed Eiko to circumvent the

lockout -

referred to as "emergency command override" in the next half of

the

chapter.

That really doesn't mesh with Pluto's thinking that the gates are
nonsentient at the end of this chapter.

There is a bit in the first chapter that said that Eiko tried

communicating,

several times, but Pluto apparently though something was wrong and

used the

key to switch operating modes. I'll have to look things up again -

it might

be that Pluto thought Eiko's consciousness was an AI on the order of

an

advanced "Clippy", rather than a self-aware intelligence, and did

what any

power user does when faced with an annoying "helper program" -

turned it

off.

Checked the first chapter.  Here's the relevant passage:

"The artifact was not altogether displeased with its current
situation. The now-former guardian had stopped communicating directly
with it a millennium ago when she succumbed to the temptation of the
powers that the artifact bestowed. This had disturbed the artifact
greatly at the time and had left it bereft of the warmth and
companionship that the bonding had originally brought, but there had
been very little the artifact could do about the situation until now.
The strict rules governing the roles and powers of the artifact and
its guardian companion were woven into the very fabric of the artifact
's existence."

There are other comments from Eiko about Pluto not talking to her in a
thousand years.  This really, really reads to me as though Pluto is
supossed to be power mad and simply started ignoring Eiko.  It
definitely sounds as though Pluto knew Eiko was sentient.  This
doesn't really work in combination with Pluto's POV at the end of
chapter five.

It gives us setup for a resolution for the fianc�e mess, and

Ranma's

parents. I've got a pet theory, which I'm not sharing...

Yes, but it's overly complicated and so far there's been nothing

to

justify it.  Hell, Ranma just being locked as a girl resolves the
fiancee situation, so that's automatically fixed.  For the

parents...

what really needs to be fixed?  Why does the fiancee situation

really

need to be fixed?  Ranma is going to be 'cured' soon enough

anyway, so

there's no reason for things not to go back to normal if Ranma

wishes

it.  Intervention from some third party to 'fix' things usually

just

ends up with ANCs who want to solve all the problems the author

sees.

In this fic, that certainly seems to be the case.  Instead of real
characters, all we get is a bunch of Ranma-supporters whose

existences

seem to revolve around remaking Ranma's life in the author's

image.

First off, it's too early to dismiss any form of setup for future

chapters -

if there's a natural place for discussing the familial relations,

this is

it. Consider Jim Bader's main fics - and the *****huge***** family

tree he

put in there, connecting basically everyone in the original cast,

plus the

cast of another dozen or so Anime and Manga. That was revealed in

chunks

because it was natural in that story - yet some of it felt like

retcon just

to get another crossover in. In this story, the relations are more

or less

on the table, and nothing needs retconning in later.

Don't bring up Jim Bader.  Please.

No.  There were a number of other scenes that I didn't make that
comment for that felt unnecessary, actually.  Hell, even being

told

that Ami found nothing is unimportant.  It could have been cut
completely.  As it is, there's no sense of conflict in the scene.

It

reads like "The senshi searched and searched, but found nothing."
It's actually a major problem the story has--lack of real

conflict.

Sure, there's people hitting each other, but there's no central
conflict that the story revolves around.  That's probably why

there's

so much filler and useless crap--lack of focus.

Considering where we are in the source material, there's a set of

villains

coming up soon - either the manga or anime Super S villains,

depending on

which TG swears by. (Can't remember off hand.)

Hm.  That's not really what I would consider appropriate conflict for
the story, considering those villains are handled quite nicely in the
original SM universe.  Even if that were to be the primary conflict,
well, having so much story leading up to that is a bad decision--no,
that wouldn't work at all.

Anyway, I repeat what I said.  There's no central conflict at this
point.  I can't really feel the story revolving around Ranma's quest
to get his illusionary manhood back, for instance.  The family issue
is diffuse and not very compelling.  Pluto's sudden loss of control is
barely even mentioned.

What exactly is this story supposed to be about?

The problem here is the definition of ninja - I've yet to read a

story in

which ninja are portrayed historically. Ninja weren't combat

masters - they

were a combination of actor, parlor magician, and chemist. If

the

enemy is

blinded by smoke or a flash of light, they won't be able to

defend

against

even a novice with an appropriate weapon. Ukyo and Konatsu are

close

to

being ninja, but not quite there.

I'm not sure how this is a reply to what I or the other person

said...

It was an agreement, and a comment on the situation that leads to

ninja

being defined as martial artists. Actually, what little I know of

the ninja

historically, says that "Anything Goes" as shown in the manga comes

fairly

close to what was actually used, except with fewer weapons. Ukyo and

Konatsu

come closer to the lifestyle of the ninja than Ranma, though.

Hm.  Okay.

Sure!  That's great!  But there's only problem--it's NOT IN THE

STORY!

All we get is the standard 'Pluto's fucking with the timelines,

she's

an evil bitch!' explanation.  There's no attempt to characterize

Pluto

at all.  Pluto's conflict--the desire to fix the world population
level, apparently--is never addressed.  She's not real in the

story at

all, except maybe at the end of the chapter and even then not much
effort is put into giving her a personality.

Check the previous chapters - there's a bit more on Pluto in there.

There's a brief passage in chapter two where Pluto is trying and
failing to access the Gates.  She keeps getting hit with a painful
backlash.  That's the only previous scene from Pluto's POV.

I really need to reread that one...

Well, after reading this, I'm not sure you need to... ^_^;

Of course I do. I *always* need to reread "Destiny's Child".

Hah.  Actually, I actually reread that recently and noticed a rather
amusing.  Chibiusa gets upset with Ranma, thinking he didn't really
like her since he's so old that he must have though such a young child
was annoying.  Chibiusa is 900 years old.  ^_^;;;

Um, it says straight out that she can't leave, since her access to

the

Key is disabled.  By millennea I meant 'forever', sorry if that

wasn't

clear.  From Pluto's perception, she has no way to escape.  It's

not

like she knows Ranma is coming to beat the crap out of her.

It's a self-inflicted situation, in my mind - and it does look worse

than it

is...

It doesn't sound self-inflicted.  Maybe it is, though...

As for Pluto's assumption, yes, she would WANT anybody with

control

over the artifacts to be from the SM, but that doesn't mean she'd
think nobody else had the capability of using them.

Depends on what kind of info she's gotten on them. If she was flat

out told

that only she and her chosen successor could use the gates - and she

never

did choose a successor - she'd be surprised. Even better would be if

the

wording was "*a* chosen successor" - she might have assumed it was

her job

to find the successor, and not the gate's...

If that were the case, she wouldn't be so worried about Ranma, I
think.  ^_^;


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