Yuri Manga: Fujiyuu Sekai Perfect Edition (不自由セカイ 完全版)

June 26th, 2016

In 2012, I read and was traumatized by Kodama Naoko’s Fujiyuu Sekai. It’s one of my most popular reviews, presumably because folks who read scanlations are equally as traumatized and want someone to tell them it’ll be alright.

Well, this hideous monster is back in a new collection, Fujiyuu Sekai Perfect Edition (不自由セカイ 完全版) and things are most definitely not alright.

Reo befriended Meiko back in high school when Meiko was not treated well by her classmates. Popular and attractive, Reo drew Meiko into society. Meiko joined the tennis club in order to be closer to Reo and, as a result, hurt her ankle during practice. One day not long after, Reo offered to walk Meiko home, but she refused because she was getting better. Reo went off and unknown to her, Meiko was attacked and raped.

Now, years later, Meiko is still making Reo pay for it. Meiko is abusive and neglectful, Reo is tortured, and the fact that they get a “happy” ending is only one of the many things wrong with the narrative.

I reluctantly coughed up for the Perfect Edition, hoping that any new chapters would have Meiko abjectly begging for forgiveness or, barring that, Reo walking away and getting a better life. But no. In all my many concerns about the wrongness of all the plot elements in this story, the one resolution Kodama-sensei went with hadn’t even occurred to me.  Because, god, no.  (I’m not saying that it might not work, I’m saying this story needs to die in fire.)

Ratings:

Overall – 3, down 2 points from the original.

In 2012, I said, “It really could have been good, but it wasn’t.” In 2016, I have to admit that this was just a shitty manga that had no chance of being good.

5 Responses

  1. Day says:

    Before even reading the review, before I recognized the title, I saw the cover, and thought, “Wow, what an unpleasant cover.” Err, at least the label matches the goods? I guess?

  2. Cryssoberyl says:

    It was indeed not a pleasant manga that, I feel, is actually mired in what strikes me as some stereotypical gender-role thinking in the way they and their relationship is depicted, with Reo as the rational “male” tortured by the selfish, self-indulgent whims of the aggressively, stereotypically feminine Meiko.

    [i]However[/i], I’ll be honest, I didn’t hate the ending, simply because these kids are still young, still learning and growing toward and into something hopefully better. I know it’s dumb, and that I’m falling into the trap Kodama has set, but the strife made me want that “something better” for them.

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