Ranma ½ Ends

Posted in Manga News on November 7, 2006 by Johanna

It’s the end of an era… the final volume of Ranma ½, book 36, will be on sale next week. (Although Amazon says they have it available already.)

Viz has been releasing entries in this series, in one format or another, for fourteen years. It was a major marker in affirming the dominance of the right-to-left small-size manga format promoted by Tokyopop, as larger flipped volumes were later reissued in the more “authentic” format.

Ranma ½ Book 36 cover
Ranma ½ Book 36
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From their press release:

RANMA ½ has sold more than 49 million copies in Japan, and is one of the most recognized and acclaimed series ever produced.

But what’s it sold in the US? Or in translated form?

The final volume of RANMA ½ will be celebrated with a farewell letter to North American fans from series creator Rumiko Takahashi.

That’s kind of sweet.

The final volume will provide a zany and fitting end to this much loved epic series and readers will delight in the crazy antics that happen when Ranma and Akane finally get married.

Because it’s not what happens that matters, but enjoying finally getting there. And come on, the cover gives it away! How cute.

Similar Posts: Ranma ½ Book 2 § New Rumiko Takahashi Manga RIN-NE Now Online § Yu-Gi-Oh! Concludes Today § How Should a Manga Publisher Cancel a Series? Viz Ends Gin Tama § Takahashi Manga Out Loud Podcast

13 Comments

  1. Wow, and I thought Maison Ikkoku was long! ;-)

  2. Ed Sizemore
    11/08/2006 at 7:48 AM

    I will miss it when it’s gone. This was the first manga I read and it got me hooked. Thankfully, there is Inu Yasha to help fill the void.

    Dan, think how many volumes Superman or Fantasic Four will be then they are all collected!

  3. Ranma was my introduction to Manga as well, although it started with the television series, so very long ago!

    I’ve been waiting for this a long time, and serioulsy did not think it would take this long for Viz to release all of them. I’ve even looked for this in Japanese bookstores, but could never find the final volume, so it must be good.

    Inu Yasha is entertaining, but I feel Maison Ikkoku is Takahashi’s finest work to date, and would love to see her use her talents towards something like that again.

    It’s been twenty years since Maison Ikkoku ended in Japan!

  4. Ranma got me back into anime in high school in the early 90′s. I actually kinda feel like the endings for a lot of Rumiko Takahashi stories disappoint, but Ranma will always have a special place in my heart. BTW, that last story arch is really fun. The cover doesn’t tell you everything. ^_^

  5. Robin Hermann
    11/08/2006 at 11:36 AM

    >

    I’m not sure I understand this. Yes, the first Ranma releases were in the larger TPB format, for $14.95, and after Tokyopop came along, Viz started releasing Ranma in the smaller $9.95 formats. But Ranma (and Inu-Yasha) have -never- been released in r-t-l format. Maison Ikkoku was, but the other two long-running Takahashi titles were never “flipped.”

    And the cover doesn’t give everything away, as mentioned above. So what’s with the snark?

    -rob

  6. Oh, I’m mistaken about the page order of Ranma, then — I didn’t realize they kept it flipped when they shrunk the size.

    And I’m afraid you’ve misread me — there’s no snark in the above. The last few sentences should be read “straight”.

  7. Ed: Actually, a Takahashi FF might be a good comic!

  8. WHY RANMA???????????
    I WISH THE COMICS WOULD NEVER END

  9. did they get married i must know

  10. Hunter, technically the story doesn’t end. Takahshi just stopped telling it. So Ranma and Akane are still high school students, still engaged and still have a lot of issues to work out in their relationship. Sorry, no resolution to this manga.

  11. Ah. I miss Ranma. And now that InuYasha is over, there’s a big void. I can’t wait for Takahashi to write up something new. And Ed is correct, the story didn’t end. Takahashi gave up on it, actually. She never liked Ranma. :< Sad, it’s my favorite manga out there, and I’d rank it #1 if it had an actual ending.

  12. hunter? they didn’t get married

  13. [...] of the series’ end (or rather, felt, since I’ve been meaning to blog about this since I first heard about it in November). The history of Ranma 1/2 in North America is pretty much the early history of manga and anime in [...]

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