Ranma/Otomen fusion

[Dumbledork]

Otomen Ranma

Since most people probably don’t know Otomen, here’s a short summary of the story and a presentation of the main characters.

Firstly, what is an Otomen?
Otomen are men who think like girls and who likes the same things a girl does. They are generally very talented in doing girly things. Quite often they are very virile men who also show great sensibility.

Plot: Asuka Masamune is a man amongst men. He’s a brilliant student, 1st dan in judo, 2nd dan in karate and high school kendo champion, and of course a chick magnet. He’s the most popular guy in school and everybody loves him. He’s considered the epitome of manliness. However, he has a secret; he’s an otomen. He loves cooking, sewing, shoujo manga, and other cute and girly things. And he’s doing everything in his power to hide his true nature.


Asuka’s father abandoned his mother and him when Asuka was still little because he “always wanted to be a woman”. This traumatized Asuka’s mother so much that she fainted and got so sick that she had to be transported to hospital. Asuka has always like girly things, but after what happened with her husband, Asuka’s mother feared that her son might turn out just like his father and so she made him promise to be the manliest man in the world. Since he didn’t want to cause his mother’s death he promised and tried to hide his true nature for many years.


But when he met the new girl at school it was love at first sight, especially since she was not a fangirl, unlike the other girls at school. And his true nature slowly asserted itself when he is in her presence.

Main characters:

- Asuka Masamune: read above
- Ryo Miyakozuka: she’s the new girl at school, but rapidly gets popular with the girls who idolize her and think that she’s the epitome of feminity. Too bad she’s extremely bad at doing womanly things (just like Akane). She can’t cook, sew, doesn’t know tea ceremony, but she’s a great athlete and an excellent martial artist and has been trained by her father who’s a cop.
- Juta Tachibana is the school Casanova. And he has a secret. He’s a shoujo mangaka, and an extremely popular one at that. Asuka and all the girls in school love his manga ‘Love Tic’, which is a loose retelling of Asuka’s day to day life. It’s also Asuka’s favourite manga, but he fails to botice the concidences with his own life. Juta has been stalking Asuka for a long time and knows everything about him. When he sees that Asuka rapidly falls for Ryo he tries everything to push them together to get even more ideas for his manga.
- Hajime Tounomi is a student at another school and has lost 4 times in a row against Asuka in the kendo championship finals. He considers Asuka as his greatest rival and hates him. But Hajime has a secret too. He loves make up and he’s an incredibly talented make-up artist who can turn any ugly girl into a beauty. And just like Asuka he tries to hide that part of him.

My plan is to replace the original Otomen with Ranma characters but keep most of the plot.

Asuka will of course be replaced with Ranma and his mother with Nodoka. Ranma’s father leaves the family home when Ranma is 4 bvbecause he’s always wanted to be a woman. Ranma loved his father and loved collecting cute things and other girly stuff. Nodoka was devastated of course, and made Ranma promise not to turn out like his father and become the manliest man in the world. Ranma is still young and doesn’t understand everything, but he promises.


Nodoka becomes so obsessed with manliness that she tries to find the manliest man she can and marry him to give her son a good role model. She manages to divorce her husband very quickly and it doesn’t take long for her to find a ‘suitable’ man… Genma Saotome. Apparently she hasn’t really recovered from the shock and gone slightly loopy, since she hopes that Ranma will somehow turn out like Genma’s master Happosai. Two months after they met they get married. She was sure that Genma would turn Ranma into a real man.


When Genma mentions the training trip Nodoka is really enthusiastic and after Genma promised he would keep Ranma away from anything girly she gave him her blessing.


Well, the training journey goes like usual, except that Ranma has to constantly try and avoid doing girly thngs, but he hopes that agreeing to Genma’s insane training methods would somehow keep him from thinking about it. . Jusenkyo happens when Ranma is 14. Ranma gets his usual curse but Genmadoesn’t get one .. Instead of hating the curse like in canon, Ranma is ecstatic. The dam breaks and he’s happy to have an outlet for his true nature much to Genma’s horror. But there isn’t anything Genma can do about it. He had noticed right from the start how hard Ranma was trying to hide his true feelings, and so he made a deal with his son. He wouldn’t say anything if he hid his curse. Ranma agrees and goes as far as creating an identity for his girl side. He has a tough time trying to avoid water accidents, though, since he still gets splashed from time to time. Curiously enough he’s lucky enough that each time it happens there’s either no witness or they become distracted somehow.


Genma is thinking about taking Ranma to see the Tendos but then realizes that Ranma is too young to meet his potential fiancée. So he returns home and both he and Ranma try their best to keep Nodoka from finding out about the curse. It’s not that difficult since Nodoka is very rarely at home but has to take care of business.

So Ranma goes to school for two years and to please his mother tries his best to excel at everything he does. He’s a model student, an excellent athlete who wins lots of martial arts tournaments and idolized by the girls and boys. Nodoka couldn’t be any prouder of her son.


And then there’s the mysterious redhead that is seen at school from time to time, but not much is known about her. She’s become a legend, because she shows up whenever a girl is in trouble and need helps with traditional female arts. Much like Ranma is the epitome of manliness the mysterious redhead is the epitome of feminity. But that’s once again because of Ranma’s need to be the best at everything he does, be it as a boy or a girl.


But his whole world changes when a new arrives in hi school a few weeks after school started again. Apparently the girl changed schools to get away from an upperclassman that harasses her constantly. The girl is Akane Tendo and because very popular very quickly. Ranma rapidly falls for her since she’s not a fangirl and more of a tomboy, although she tries to hide that fact. In fact, everything thinks of her as the perfect girl although she’s hopeless at classical femine arts.


Other characters:

Hiroshi or Daisuke will replace Juta and Kuno will replace Hajime. Kuno will still keep his quirky personality, but he’s also an incredibly talented make-up artist. He hates Ranma because he0s constantly beaten in kendo tournaments, but loves the mysterious pigtailed girl he’d seen once at a tournament and he’s desperately trying to find her.


I have a lot of different ideas for this story, but I’m not sure which one I should choose. Here are some of them:

1) Akane takes an immediate liking to ‘Ranko’ when the redhead helps her out of a bind, but she doesn’t care much for Ranma who is just another stupid boy in her opinion. She slowly develops feeling for Ranko while Ranma develops feelings for Akane. Ranma doesn’t know what to do. Should he reveal the curse to Akane and maybe have her hate him or keep hiding the curse and get in a relationship with the girl in that form.

2) Akane rapidly notices that Ranma is not like other guys. She also sees the transformation, but since she didn’t have the canon confrontation in the bathroom and since Ranma is cured of his foot-in-mouth-disease (two years worth of tutoring in manners will do that) she accepts it and seeing that the manliness thing is just a façade for the sweet boy slowly develops feelings for him.

Not much later Genma takes Ranma to meet the Tendos, but without telling him why. Once there he drops the bomb on the poor boy who’s very reluctant since there’s a girl he has feelings for. Only two Kasumi and Nabiki are present and Ranma doesn’t know that it is Akane’s family. Since the curse is a secret and Ranma is very famous and filthy rich Nabiki is of course interested in becoming his fiancée. A short while later Akne comes back and seeing what has happened she’s devastated, but doesn’t show it. Knowing what a money grubbing bitch her sister is she tries everything she can to sabotage the couple.

That’s for the main ideas. Other characters will include Kodachi who is the fiancée selected by Nodoka. The usual crazies will appear too and replace some of the other characters. I’m not sure yet who I’ll use to replace the other Otomen.

[Ellen Kuhfeld]

I can see this story needing a lot of setup, but running exceedingly well once that is done. The biggest peril would be embarrassment, but I've not seen your writings having this problem.