Archive for August, 2007


Yuri Anime: My Zhime (Mai Otome), Volume 1 (English

August 31st, 2007

How many fanfics have we seen where the main characters are transplanted to a different location, time or situation than the original source material? The Senshi at an agricultural college, the girls of Marimite visiting (or attending school in) some North American location that just *happens* to be the same place the author lives or attends. There are many series that do that kind of thing within the context of the actual series.

Star Trek:Next Generation used their omnipresent Holodeck to allow a sort of time and space travel (mostly so we could see that characters play dress up) and Xena:Warrior Princess had a few stories which fans called “Uber-Xena” stories, in which Gabrielle and Xena were portrayed as more modern, but equally as silly, characters. (Which led to a whole genre of “Uber-Xena” stories, many of which were better than the actual series. I wrote one Uber-Xena story myself, In the Hall of the Mountain Queen, a title which came to me in a very memorable dream.)

And so we find ourselves regarding the series, My Zhime, aka Mai Otome, in which the characters of Fuuka Academy from My HiME are now suddenly on a planet much like our earth, but more feudal. The HiME are now become Otome – the human nuclear arsenal of each country. The school at which young women are trained to become Otome candidates, Garderobe, is the center of the new conflict. And while all the characters from HiME are moved to the new time/place/location/ their roles, ages and, in some cases personalities, have been altered to fit the new storyline.

I had planned of holding off reviewing this series at all until I finished reviewing all of the My HiME DVDs, but last weekend I decided that I wanted to watch Volume 1. Then, as I watched it, I remembered all over again why I thought it was a vastly superior series to the original. Mostly because it starts off as stupid fun with a hint of plot, continues to be stupid fun with an actual plot, and ends as stupid fun and who cares about the plot, which short side trips to wallow into meaningless angst. The difference is that, IMHO, HiME primarily wallowed in angst with pretensions of having a Serious Plot ™, when in reality, it was all meaningless angst and plot was a self-fulfilling prophecy with reset.

My Zhime, Volume 1, starts off with the arrival of a strange girl from out of the wastelands, at the sophisticated and cosmopolitan city of Windbloom. Yumemiya Arika is strange in the she is a stranger, and that she is clearly an uncultured bumpkin……and she’s just kind of strange, too. But in a good-hearted, honest bumpkiny kind of way. She’s convinced that her mother was, or maybe is, an Otome, so after her guardian dies, she’s come to Garderobe to find her mother. After she witnesses the coolness that is Meister Shizuru Violeta, the Graceful Amethyst, Arika decides to become an Otome, as well.

This plunges her directly into intrigue and politics on both the micro- and macro-cosmic levels, as the great rulers decide her fate and in school as the new student is assessed for her level of threat to the status quo. Because not everyone at Garderobe will become an Otome – only the most talented few. Arika’s immediate rival, Nina, can’t stand the girl, so of course they are assigned to be roommates, along with sweet, blonde, starlet-like Erstin. And this is when I remembered how much I liked this series.

As Arika runs around Garderobe trying to find the council and defend herself (and Chie gets her first lesbian cred powerup) she’s the butt (pun intentional) of many stupid physical, servicey gags. But as she runs around, and later, as she meets her new classmates, I found myself happy to see every familiar face, from Yukino and her pet Haruka, to Ers, or Irina. In fact, as Irina introduced herself I felt something almost nostalgic blossom within me.

This is your basic shounen heroine action series. There will be many battles of one kind or another; an outclassed, apparently idiot savant heroine who will battle her way to the top; magical/mecha creatures; did I mention battles?; conspiracies, politics, intrigue on the grand scale and bullying, teasing and misunderstanding on the small scale; and service.

Yuri in Volume 1 is limited to a single knowing look shot at Natsuki by Shizuru, as she teases Arika in a decidedly sexual way, and Chie’s instant high reading on the Yuri-ometer. Yuri in Zhime is a popular fetish, so we’ll be seeing more as the story progresses.

Art – 8
Characters – 8
Story – 7
Music – 7
Yuri – 3
Service – 6

Overall – 7

All the characters I like are older, cooler and gayer. Is it any wonder I like this series better? ^_^





Yuri Manga: Jyoshi Kousei, Volume 9

August 30th, 2007

Brain still exploding. Thank god for Sean Gaffney.

I now have High School Girls Volume 9 in front of me. Despite the cover featuring the
two male teachers in the cast, and not a cute girl like the previous 8, it’s a good volume. (Standard ‘I don’t read Japanese so am guessing via the pretty pictures’ review warning.)

The first chapter does indeed focus on the teacher, Odagiri, and how he’s getting along on this trip. The answer is, not very well. His fellow teachers are freaks, and Kouda and the others torture him. He has a flashback to 3 years earlier, where we see him meet Kouda, fat Himeji, and Ogawa, and it’s clear that Kouda has been an appalling thorn in his side for a long time. Towards the end of the chapter we get the start of a running gag, as Eriko and Kouda imagine the female tour guide being taken advantage of by the horny male teachers. Instead, she’s drinking them all insensate.

The next two chapters are basically short little gags all strung together. Kouda discovers her appalling bathing suits are not the best when it comes to actual swimming… Ogawa resents being unable to wear a bikini as she’s so small, and Himeji tries to help her out… more touristy things as the group explores a cave… they once again think the tour guide is having sex, but she’s just getting her feet rubbed by the bus driver… and some more female-oriented bathroom and shower gags.

We then get a slightly longer bit where Yuma once again runs into the fact that her friends, mostly Eriko, have much larger breasts than she does. She thinks about the remedies she’s tried… drinking milk, working out, toilet plungers (?!), prayer… Eriko seems to suggest injecting silicone, something which is unlikely to work out well.

Then there’s a chapter with Yuma’s sister Momoka going to a boy’s school festival where they’re all cross-dressing. Including Ayano’s boyfriend Shimotakatani. I don’t care for Momoka, so this chapter wasn’t as good as the others. Perhaps translation may improve it. It’s filled with ‘guy’s in women’s underwear’ gags.

Then comes the chapters yuri fans will love. We get Nao and Sayaka, sitting on the hotel balcony at night after Eriko and Kouda have fallen asleep, reminiscing about how they met three years ago. Nao is in the nurse’s office for some reason and Sayaka comes in. We get a definite ‘my true love’ manga stare when they meet face-to-face. :) Nao’s lunch has gone bad, so Sayaka offers some of her ‘all-natural’ lunch, which isn’t much better. Then Kouda, fat Himeji (I do this merely to note the time period, sort of like Fat Elmer from Looney Tunes), and Ogawa burst in, as Kouda has done something stupid and hurt herself. More scenes of the two of them becoming friends and hanging out together. Then Nao shows Sayaka her dog, and the dog slashes open Sayaka’s hand. Off to the ER we go.

At the ER, Nao is being very apologetic and taking care of all the paperwork when she stares at Sayaka’s medical care card. And now, for those who recall Volume 8, we learn the Terrible Secret of Sayaka. No, she’s not secretly a man. :) She’s a year older than Nao, having been held back in school because of her various illnesses and allergies. Turns out Sayaka’s not just a naturalist because she wants to be – she’s allergic to almost everything in the world. Needless to say, being held back a year is a big deal, so she asks Nao to keep it a secret. As they walk back from the ER, we see the first scene of Nao acting cool and yuri-ish, and she notes that she’ll be Sayaka’s protector. From that point on, they were inseparable.

Isn’t that just adorable?

There’s a short epilogue where we see Nao (who was fairly lone wolf before this) dealing with Kouda’s being insane (there’s a short shot showing the now-thin Himeji beaming, so this is clearly the following spring) and Nao and Sayaka getting caught up in their antics a bit. Back in the present, we see the two of them wake up Eriko and Kouda to give Kouda her wish of the pillow fight. Of course, they have to use their own, natural pillows. Which are noticeably more solid. And Sayaka is VERY deadly with them. Despite this, Eriko and Kouda are clearly delighted to be ‘bonding’ at last.

Then there are some 4-komas, including Eriko smacking Himeji in the face with her bra pads using apparently just the sheer power of her boobs.

We then get the final big chapter, with the trip on its last day. They have a big party, with karaoke, and thank the tour guide woman for everything she’s done. The tour guide, watching them, gets melancholy and goes off, and Eriko follows her. After demanding an explanation, the guide notes that when she was in high school, she too had a group of inseparable friends that did everything together. And then came graduation, and now she hasn’t seen or heard from any of them in years. This horrifies Eriko, who is in tears. She returns to the others, determined that she will not let the same thing happen to the Baka Group, and a quick epilogue of them returning home, and Eriko being bright-eyed, optimistic and genki (as usual).

The manga then ends as usual with some more 4-koma wackiness.

I thought, aside from the Momoko chapter that didn’t hold my interest, that this was a very strong volume of HSG. It still had all of what makes it so not-beloved by others including grotesque toilet and sexual humor. But there was also some very good character development (notably, we see Kouda’s ability to be both totally appalling and draw people out of their shells in two different flashbacks) and even a good serious scene. And the story with Nao and Sayaka was not only perfectly done as a comedic romance, but for once handled the yuri beautifully. Can’t wait till Dr. Master imports this.

Ratings:

Art: 7. The art has lost all of the awkwardness it had in early volumes, and is very clean and well-defined. Plus, gotta love those funny faces.

Character: 8. Extra bonus points for Nao and Sayaka’s backstory.

Story: 6. To be honest, half of this was just standard gag manga. But it was FUNNY gag manga. And the story it did have was well done.

Yuri: 9. We didn’t get any of the usual fanservice yuri from the others, but instead we get the reward of REAL yuri. No, there was no kiss, but I don’t care. This was lovely.

Service: 6. The usual ambiguous rating, as the manga is filled with both titillating nudity and grotesque bodily function conversations.

Overall: 8. An excellent addition to the series.

–SG





Yuri Manga: Tetragrammaton Labyrinth, Volume 1

August 28th, 2007

When people first fall in love, one of the the inevitable feelings they encounter is that if their lover should, for even a second, stop needing them to exist, they might well cease to exist.

Imagine for a second if that were *really* true.

You would be tethered to that person forever. And they would be enslaved to you, or otherwise you could no longer be.

Somehow, it doesn’t sound so much like fun, does it?

In Tetragrammaton Labyrinth Volume 1, Angela is no longer alive, but neither is she dead. As long as her partner, a nun named Meg, needs her, she can remain in existence. If Meg should stop needing Angela, she would cease to exist utterly. But Angela has a need of her own – she wants to die as a human. To that end, she and Meg fight demons who infect and infest humankind in a battle to protect not only all humanity, but Angela’s chance at the death she craves.

The story takes place in Victorian England, but Angela is drawn as a Goth-Loli, and Meg is given rights and responsibilities not usually given to nuns. I particularly love the manga trope of nuns who hear confession, for instance. I’m not a Christian (although I have played Saint George in a mystery play, does that count?) but I know that only priests can hear confessions. And I am also fairly sure that Meg’s sexy nun outfits were bought, not from the convent, but from the local Halloween supply store. ;-) But I digress.

Aside from the religious dissonance, there’s temporal dissonance as well. This is a Victorian England in which occult magick and Big-Ass Guns(TM) coexist. If demons and their ilk didn’t *actually* walk the streets of Victorian London, I’m inured to their proposed existence from the oh-so-many series that include them. ^_^

Because of the existences of the aforementioned demons, B-A Guns and magick, it’s not too much of a surprise that Tetragrammaton Labyrinth is also full of violence and blood. This is your quintessential Victorian Goth-Loli horror manga, baby.

The book, like most of the adaptations by Seven Seas (and thanks once again to Jason and the folks at 7S for providing me with a copy to review!) is done well. The translation feels seamless, and in general, the reproduction is high quality. The fact that the source material is thoroughly and firmly “meh” is not their fault at all.

And therein lies the problem. Tetragrammaton Labyrinth just isn’t a very good story. Sure, there’s lots of action, and violence and some of what passes for plot, but at it’s heart, it’s basically a violent, bloody, string of servicey scenes that barely hold together.

Which brings me to the “Yuri.” I called this a “Yuri” manga in the title of the review, because it is an incontrovertible truth that Meg and Angela are inextricably bound to one another. Especially towards the end, they appear to even show affection for one another. The codependency of their relationship alone is grounds enough to call this relationship “lesbian.” ^_^ But with one being a nun and the other an undead pre-pubescent child, that sort of makes the relationship thing moot. So, really, the Yuri here is an implied fetish, no more. There’s no way to know if they are “in love” with one another and I’m fairly certain that the author is more interested in drawing Angela without underwear than answering that question, so don’t expect the Yuri to be more than two females draped over one another. If that’s enough for you, well then, enjoy! ^_^

Ratings:

Art – 6
Characters – 6
Story – 7
Yuri – 2
Service – 4

Overall – 5

Considering that I had read this manga years ago in the original Japanese and basically dismissed it as tripe, I was surprised that I didn’t hate it in English. Is it high art? Nope. (Quick, name three manga that are. Exactly.) But since Scape-God never went past one volume, this ought to fill yours (and my) random fake-Yuri with scads of violence and blood needs for a while. ;-)





The Countdown to Yuricon’s 2007 "Yurisai" is On!

August 27th, 2007

Quick post today because my brain is exploding.

There are just about ten (10!) days left for Pre-registration to Yuricon’s 2007 “Yurisai” event.

I just boxed up all the manga I’ll be bringing for the Yuri Library…it’s a lot of manga…and even more doujinshi. Some of it has never before been seen in America, some of it will be stuff that you will never see again. (That’s not meant to sound as ominous as it does….lol)

And time is also counting down on the Yurisai” Poster and Fanfiction Contests. Our theme is, quite naturally, “Fairs and Festivals”. We know that you’ll have a great time out our Festival of Lilies, and we want to see your artwork and stories showing our mascots Yuriko and Midori enjoying fairs and festivals too. Ferris Wheels or goldfish scooping, running with the bulls or watching fireworks over a lake – you decide the festival and show or tell us all about it. Check out the submission deadlines on the Yurisai home page.

Get those entries in before the September 7 deadline and we’ll see you at the “Yurisai in 33 days!





Sneak Peek at Yuri Monogatari 5 – "East End"

August 26th, 2007

Today I’m going to crack open the covers of Yuri Monogatari 5 once again and let you see the “East” side of the equation – 6 stories by some of my favorite Japanese artists. This was exactly the kind of stuff I wanted to bring to the western world – stories by women about women who love women. When Rica Takashima and I had that first discussion over lunch that eventually led to the creation of ALC Publishing, we both agreed that what had originally motivated us to create our own work, was that we wanted to tell silly yet real, fun to read stories about life as a lesbian. I genuinely think we hit paydirt this volume. Yesterday you saw that the “western” stories have such immense variety in tone, art, style, story…and today, you’ll see some of the “eastern” stories that broaden our book in both scope and style. Now is a really good time to thank our translator Erin for doing such a spectacular job with all these stories.

 

“The Last Day” is our first story, by one of the pair that makes up one of my favorite circles, Sakuraike Taki of Sakuraike. Her work is loose, full of movement and emotional swings. She does “cutely embarrassed” so well, that I find myself staring at those panels in her work for prolonged periods of time. As an aside note, this story was incredibly difficult to adapt to a left-to-right format. There is, in this story, a panel that took me a whole day to work on, but damn, I think it looks GREAT! With luck – you’ll never even notice. “Last Day” is a story about choices, about learning to face life – and love – head on, without running away.

 

Allow me to gush for one second. When I first read “Until The Sun Rises, Then Sets Again” I absolutely knew I had to get this story into a volume of Yuri Monogatari. There is nothing about this story I don’t love. The art, the story, the characters (who are part of an ongoing series that I would love to bring out as a collection,) everything. I was pleased as punch to meet the artist, Nishi UKO, last winter at Comiket and she was as delightful as her work. This story follows two teachers who have to get past a rather large misunderstanding at the beginning of their relationship. It’s simply wonderful.

 

This is the second Sakuraike offering, “On the Road Where the White Flowers Bloom.” It’s a goofy look at the life of the straight half of a Yuri doujinshi circle. There’s a lot of doujinshi world jargon, which we’ve attempted to make clear to the non-otaku audience, but I think that the general forehead-slapping silliness will communicate just fine. Sakuraike Kana’s stories often have a goofiness to them that appeals to me, even when she’s doing a “serious” love story. (This, btw, is not a serious love story. ^_^)

 

I am so excited to once again be publishing something by Tadeno Eriko. This story is a bit of a gamble, though. “The Everyday Adventures of Two Women in Love” is the story of an older couple who have long ago gotten used to each other’s foibles. Because one of those foibles is an obsession with name brands and shopping, this story has a zillion footnotes. I hope you all don’t get distracted by them, because the actual story itself is really sweet. (The wife suggests that you just read the story first, without worrying about the notes, so you’re not distracted. Then go back to learn what the heck she’s talking about.) I chose this story, because there is one panel in it that I adore with all my heart – when you read the story, you’ll probably guess the panel right away. It’s a totally long-term couple thing. :-)

One of the best things about Yuri Monogatari is that I’ve been able to guilt Rica Takashima into drawing more Rica and Miho for us! LOL We get a lot of requests for sequels to Rica ‘tte Kanji!? and nothing would make me happier than to be able to put together a second collection of stories about them. This time, Miho has to face a rather troubling question about their relationship. This story was clearly drawn with a sequel in mind – and I want to know what’s going to happen, so we’ll just have to nag Rica for more! Rica will be our Guest of Honor at the 2007 “Yurisai” event, so make sure you come and ask her about it. ^_^

The end of the book is a story about beginnings. “The Beginning of the Beggining” tells the story of…please don’t make me say it. lol I love Houjou KOZ’s clean art and bare storytelling style that allows for maximum reader participation. Her stories are so much about internal monologues and self-realizations, that this makes a great introduction to her work.

And there you have it – 14 stories, with a tremendous amount of variety. From school girls to old women, from first loves to old couples, from endings to beginnings and from harsh reality to freakish fantasy, Yuri Monogatari 5 has what *I* think is a brilliant variety of stories by incredibly talented artists.

Once again – pre-orders for Yuri Monogatari 5 are currently available on the Yuricon shop, at your local comic shop through the August Diamond Previews, through you local chain bookstore through Diamond and on Amazon.com.