Vol.7 – Fantabaires Taboo variant

Volume 7 cover variant sold “under the counter” at Fantabaires 1999, an independent Argentinian festival born from the defiant spirit of local comic shops.

Westernized reading, wafer-thin format, but astonishingly… uncensored, Ranma 1/2 wasn’t just a normal series but a manifesto for all Argentinian readers. The very first Japanese manga published by Ivrea, it landed in Argentina like a cultural meteorite during one of the most devastating economic crisis a single country has ever experienced. It’s no exaggeration to say that Ranma taught Argentina what manga was and how to read it. Each volume included a dedicated section called The Odyssey, where the localization team explained the original material, dissecting translation choices and providing the kind of cultural context that today we take for granted but back then? Anything but obvious.

And then, there’s this variant cover, a “sexy” piece of history with an atrociously recolored artwork, yet charged with an audacity that makes it unforgettable. The first-ever Argentinian variant for a Japanese comic, dripping with that raw, unfiltered energy of an era still finding its footing.

Fans of Ranma know that Rumiko Takahashi uses nudity as a comedic tool devoid of any erotism: a stray boobs here and there, a lifted skirt, a glimpse of panties…always cheeky but never lewd, witty without being vulgar. But slapping a naked Shampoo with a visible nipple on the cover was a punk act of extreme recklessness, the kind of move that could have severed ties with Shogakukan in an instant. No wonder it was sold at a semi-amateur convention.

A variant of unfathomable rarity that stands as an invaluable artifact, a bizarre anomaly, and a time capsule brimming with nostalgia for those who lived through that wild, unrepeatable age.

Anarchic