There are not many restaurants that I have tried in Phoenix that make me roll my eyes at the mention of their name. Ra is one of them. This is sushi for yuppies and wannabes.
Why one star at all? The sushi is slightly more interesting than what you can purchase at a grocery store. Occasionally a very friendly waiter will offer you an experimental off-the-menu roll, but this has happened to me three times, so I suspect it's a ploy similar to how Trader Joe's cashiers talk about how one of your items is their FAVORITE EVER, OMG! The drinks are decent and the business offers lots of perks (I joined their customer club as a favor to a friend...who has bad taste in sushi).
Now the bad stuff. The ambiance is cheaply over-sexed, and not in a clever burlesque way. More like a high school boy-who-fantacizes-about-Laura-Croft way. The menu tries too hard to be cute and sexy. Most of the the wait staff could easily sub at Starbucks or Applebee's. For a place that specializes in sushi, there really is no good excuse for why it's so mediocre. They don't even offer real Japanese wasabi. Half of the time I've ordered, ginger was omitted from my plate. And of course, the miso is that generic brownish stuff that you find in every Japanese-ish place that doesn't care about miso.
Every time I walk near Ra on Mill, I am reminded that I haven't had sushi in a while. Then I glance at it again, and keep walking.