Archive for November, 2014


Western Comic: Tomboy

November 18th, 2014

tomboy Graphic Memoirs are a bit of a conundrum to me. They are super popular, often incredibly well executed and yet, as I read them I often feel a sense of intense boredom, as I might if anyone were to tell me their entire life story in a monologue, without any kind of break.

Tomboy by Liz Prince hit me square in the middle of my problem area. Prince’s art is quite good, but her life…was my life. I already knew about the feelings, the gender expression issues, and the teasing. Although the details were different, the substance is the same. I wouldn’t bore anyone else with those details – at this point they are 40 years old anyway, what’s the point? So, reading about Prince’s experience with a gender expression at odd with society’s expectations was, for me, a trifle exhausting.

Two things made this book pop for me. The rare moments when Prince stops telling the story to comment on it were exceptional. It’s the adult voice looking back at the child that interested me most. I dealt with 13-year old issues at 13, it’s hard to be terribly enthusiastic about that now. But 31-year old Liz Prince commenting on things that were incongruous…“The irony of being called a farmer while wearing a suit jacket and carrying a leather satchel briefcase was lost on me.”…that was worth reading!

The second stand out feature was, honestly, the very end of the book, when she suddenly realizes that, although she thought she was telling a story about her life and the guys she looked up to and wanted to hang with and be with, she has a sudden epiphany that the story is equally about the women in her life. The girls she emulated, adored, befriended, who guided her and gave her the chance to become who she is. As I read that bit, I – for the first time in my life – had my life flash before me, in a series of memories of all the girls I looked up to, who broke my heart before I knew that was what was happening, who were my best friends until they weren’t and those who were there for me when no one else was.

In that one moment, this book went from good to excellent. Because while I don’t expect everyone to care about me, or my childhood, Liz Prince quite literally pulled it whole out of my brain and laid it out for me to see.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 8
Characters – My life, my friends, my experiences and me. 10
Service – 1 on principle
LGBTQ – 5 the narrative is wholly about being gender non-conforming

Overall – 8

So, from one tomboy to another (and who also gets mistaken for a guy about half the time) – Thanks, Liz Prince. Let’s climb a tree together one day. ^_^





Artbook: Akogare – Takahashi Makoto Collection (あこがれ―高橋真琴画集)

November 17th, 2014

akogareOne of the nerdliest things one can do in Japan after walking down the main drag of Akihabara, gaping at the tacky flashiness of it, is to get on the Chuo Line to Nakano. Right outside the North Entrance is a well-used looking shopping arcade, the Nakano Sun Mall. When you enter the arcade, it looks utterly normal with discount health and beauty goods and discount sock and shoe stores, interspersed by small fast food places, cafes and other places to rest one’s weary feet and get unhealthy food. Just like any mall anywhere.

But if you keep walking towards the back, then go up to the top floor and work your way down, you’ll discover the most amazingly rag-tag collection of stores that want to sell you old crap at fairly steep prices. ^_^ This is the home of the Nakano Mandarake, which is spread out in pieces among many other stores filled with fan favorites of days gone by, weird crap you think is weird, old toys, posters, albums, and other things that are not your obsession, but holy crap, are they selling that old Suica card for more than $500? (Yes, they were.)

There are a lot of collectibles stores. We tend to throw money at the Robot, Robot on the top floor for gashapon figurines that we want to pay a premium for, so we get the one we want and in the Mandarake book store for older printed material that we’ve never seen elsewhere. But if you’re into collectible cards, anime cels, train cards, trains, coins, cel phone customization, and of course, discount socks, Nakano Sun Mall is a great way to blow an afternoon and a lot of money. Pro tip for American shoppers: Don’t buy figurines here. Or indeed anywhere in Japan anymore. You can get them cheaper off Amazon and save yourself from carrying them home. In fact, don’t buy anything current or popular in Nakano. You will pay too much. Nakano Mandarake is best for the old, the obscure, the WTF and the OMG. This time I found both a WTF and an OMG. ^_^

The OMG was 2006 artbook called Akogare – Takahashi Makoto Art Collection, (あこがれ―高橋真琴画集) by Takahashi Makoto, who you may remember as the creator of proto-Yuri manga Sakura Namiki.   Takahashi-sensei’s style is incredibly distinctive, his girls are exceedingly stylish, whether they are western fairy tale princesses, or formally dressed Japanese girls. Their faces are round and healthy and pink cheeked, their eyes sparkle with joy.  Even when they face hardship, as they do in the retellings of well-known fairy tales, a slightly doll-like smile curves up their lips. These are girls who faces will never see wrinkles nor become careworn. Their beauty is eternal and unreal.

The collection is called Akogare, but I’m not sure if we, the reader, are meant to admire the beautiful china doll faces we’re seeing and the fairy tale princesses or we are being admired by the faces who smile at us from the page with fixed emotion. Girls are shown mostly in single portrait, staring directly at us, with the occasional fairytale doll-faced prince as company.

The collection appears to span 1960 or so through 1990. From the mid-60s on, anyone would recognize the O-hime-sama look of the characters. And toward the mid-70s, his work developed a very baroque sensibility that was popular right into the 1990s.

Some of his best work, from the mid-20th century girl’s magazine Monthly Shoujo Friend is included. These pictures have faces that would play well even now in girls magazines.  There are a very few pieces from his work, Tokyo-Paris. Nothing, however from Sakura Namiki.

My favorite picture, in fact is the one on the back cover that shows two women walking through a garden, one turned to look at the other.

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Ratings:

Overall – 8

For more information about Takahashi Makoto-sensei, current exhibits, etc., visit his Official Site. He’s still around, you can see him in some of the photos of the his exhibit last spring, カワイイの原点・高橋真琴展「ROOTS OF JAPANESE KAWAII」.

Above all, I’m delighted to have discovered this treasure. I’m fairly certain I would not have had the opportunity to see this collection without the acid trip down memory lane that is Mandarake. ^_^

So, what was the WTF? Wait, wait, we’ll get there….





Yuri Network News – (百合ネットワークニュース) – November 15, 2014

November 15th, 2014

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Upcoming collaboration between Ikuhara Kunihiko (Revolutionary Girl Utena) and Yuri manga artist Morishima Akiko , Yuri Kuma Arashi, has finally moved past it’s obsession with the male characters long enough to give us the first glimpse of setting and tone with a short Promotional Video. I’ve read some of the manga and the story synopsis, and I still don’t really know what this story is about. But I know that the best way to deal with Ikuhara’s anime is to let it wash over you and not ask too many questions until the end. ^_^ Volume 1 of the Yuri Kuma Arashi, drawn by Morishima-sensei is hitting shelves next week in Japan!

Psycho-Pass 2 is well under way and Okazu is looking for a Guest Reviewer! If you’ve been watching the second season of this psychological thriller and want to tell us about it, please read the Okazu Guest Review Guidelines and shoot me off a email to anilesbocon01 at hotmail dot com.

The first season of Psycho-Pass  is available now in a Part 1 DVD/BD Combo and Part 2 DVD/BD Combo and as a Complete First season Premium Edition BD set. For those of you, like me, who are moving away from physical media for anime, Psycho-Pass can be watched in HD on Amazon,  or streamed for free on Funimation or Hulu.

If you’re watching anything else that you feel has notable Yuri content, please feel free to write in and let me know! Review proposals are especially welcome for anime, since I watch slowly and am way behind…. ^_^

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Yuri Manga/Comics

YNN Correspondent Emily-chan has some very cool news to share. “Chiisai Yuri Miitsuketa  will be going on sale on November 22nd this year. It’s a compilation of a Newtype column focused on Yuri, and is written by Ayana Yuniko with accompanying illustrations by HERO. The tankoubon will also feature an illustration by Amano Shuninta and a short two-page manga by Shimura Takako”. Well, thanks Emily-chan, that sound really interesting!

Considering the December release of the Yuri-focused volume of Eureka, (also with a contribution by Amano-sensei) I think we can say that Yuri as a genre, has arrived. ^_^

And YNN Correspondent Pucca has written to make sure we know about Sunstone, a popular webcomic on Deviantart, by Stjepan Šejić. Looking into it for this column,I learned that it is an upcoming Graphic Novel from Image Comics with a release date in January! Mature content, nudity and, it seems, lesbians. You know what to do. ^_^

While you’re compiling that holiday wish list, add Neil Gaiman’s The Sleeper and the Spindle, in which Sleeping Beauty is woken up with a Queen’s kiss, not a mere Prince’s.

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Other News

Reporting from the University of Woolongong, in Australia, Khursten Santos of Otaku Champloo wrote up a terrific summary of the papers presented at the Manga Futures Conference. Topics covering BL, Yuri, and other non-mainstream genres were presented. I had hoped to make it, but had to miss it this time.  Hopefully next time! Some good conversation in the comments as well. ^_^

And a happy birthday and congratulations to manga translator and friend Simon Stanzani, who was profiled in a recent HuffingtonPost Japanese edition!

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Know some cool Yuri News you want people to know about? Become a Yuri Network Correspondentby sending me any Yuri-related news you find. Emails go to anilesbocon01 at hotmail dot com. Not to the comments here, please, or they might be forgotten or missed. There’s a reason for this madness. This way I know you are a real human, not Anonymous (which I do not encourage – stand by your words with your name!) and I can send you a YNN correspondent’s badge.

Thanks to all of you – you make this a great Yuri Network!





Yuri Manga: Lepakkoluola Anthology (Finnish and English)

November 14th, 2014

lepakkoluola_350Lepakkoluola is a Finnish Yuri anthology created by a circle called Team Pärvelö.

I was originally made aware of the collection last June when I was contacted by a Team member, Hanna-pirita, to let me know about the Kickstarter for the anthology. Crowdfunding was successful and it was my very sincere pleasure to receive a copy! Really, all I can say about the anthology is – wow.

The story content and variety were exceptionally strong. A female Prussian officer and a woman of the nobility, young black singers in early 20th century Harlem, witches during the Inquisition, Eve and Lilith, a samurai’s wife and a Buddhist nun…the variety of time and place was mind-boggling.

While the text in the body of the comics is in Finnish, pages are subtitled in English. It made reading the book an adventure, as I’d read the English, then spend time just looking at the page and enjoying the art and the flow of the story.

Artists did not attempt to imitate any style, what we have here are young artists letting themselves draw what they wanted, the way they wanted. And I have to say – a lot of the art was really, incredibly good. Each story is so utterly unique that they all stood out in their own way.

My personal favorites were an Annie Oakley x Calamity Jane fanfic I had no idea I needed, but apparently, I did; A story about Sappho and her super #1 Fan harpy and a lovely, lovely little story about a “crazy” woman and the troll who loves her.

Every single story was good. I ended each and every one with an “Aw,” or a “Cute!” or “Squee.”

You can order a copy (priced in Euros) from the circle directly on their website.

And, if you should one day run across this unique and lovely anthology, do scoop it right up. It’s a delight.

Ratings:

Ratings are all variable of course, but…

Overall – 9

This was an excellent read and will be an excellent re-read . Thank you Hanna-pirita and the other members of Team Pärvelö! Lepakkoluola is a delight.





Yuri Manga: Mamiya-san to Issho (間宮さんといっしょ)

November 13th, 2014

The subject of today’s review is not the manga itself so much, as how and why I bought it. ^_^

Those of you following me on Twitter and Facebook, saw a series of pictures I stealth shot while in the Toranoana and Comic Zin stores in Akihabara. They had something I had never ever seen before in Japan and I wanted to share it with you all.

For the first time ever, Toranoana in Akihabara had a real, multi-publisher “Yuri” section! Here are my crappy cell phone shots of this phenomenon.

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I’m not sure if you can really see what’s going on in these shots unless you are familiar with Japanese bookstores and the way they shelve books. Books are basically split by whether they are targeted to men or women, then by publisher and imprint. So if I’m looking for a Kodansha book, I look at the spine to see if it’s KDX, KC, or another imprint. You have to look at for the Rakuen Le Paradis comics in one place, the MangaTime KR comics in another, Comic Yuri Hime in a third, etc. Sometimes those aren’t even shelved in the same section of the store. Comic Yuri Hime might be in the women’s comics, they might be in the men’s. You don’t really know for sure until you look. I’ve seen them in both.

What you are seeing here is practically a miracle…books from different publishers, different imprints nestled side by side in a kind of “Yuri’ section I’d only ever dreamed of.  Dengeki side by side with Comic Yuri, next to Hakusensha’s Rakuen comics.  I was so busy trying to snap a few shots, I barely even looked at the shelves. ^_^

Later, we walked over to the Comic Zin store back up the street, and found that they also had a smaller, but also multi-publisher Yuri section, and a number of Yuri doujinshi. (I knew about the doujinshi, that was why I wanted to go to the store, but the books were a surprise.)

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The thing I thought, and shared on Twitter, was this – it was really nice to see them all together in one place. In Toranoana, it took up two or three shelf-widths, and the counter in front of them, so it felt substantial. In Zin it was one shelf width, but hey, it was there!

So, the point here is, because the Yuri books were shelved together, I was able to find a few things I’d never even heard of, from imprints I was unfamiliar with, or hadn’t seen any Yuri from before – which is the whole point of having Genre sections in a book store in the first place! ^_^

mamiyatoissho1I picked up the subject of today’s review because I’d never heard of the series or seen that imprint in the Yuri section before. Mamiya-san to Issho (間宮さんといっしょ) begins with a girl, Sasara, being asked out by a boy in her school. She says, sure, she’d go out with him, if he died for her. Not surprisingly, he bails instantly.

Her friends are jealous, because she receives so much attention, but Sasara is unimpressed.  Until she is asked up to the roof by the mysterious Mamiya Ryou, a beautiful female upperclassman. When Sasara states her requirements for love, Ryou agrees and leaves.

Sasara asks her classmates about this Mamiya Ryou, and is told that Mamiya Ryou is whereabouts unknown and presumed dead. Ryou confirms that dead it is, and asks Sasara if she’ll go out with her now? Sasara agrees.

The book immediately falls into a kind of talky chaos, that indicates to this reader that nothing had been sketched out beyond the premise. A classmate of Ryou’s who has some impulse-control issues first attacks Sasara for having the nerve to even ask about Ryou, but then becomes convinced that Sasara knows where Ryou is. She brings in her younger sister, who can see ghosts, to meet Sasara (and Ryou,) but Ryou convinces her not to say anything. And then the book, um, ends.

The relationship pretty much goes nowhere, because Ryou is dead and so is the plot. ^_^;

Ratings:

Art – 6 Trying to be better than it was, but not bad
Story – 4
Characters – 5
Yuri – 4
Service – 2

Overall – 6

SO, while it was really super cool to get a Yuri manga from Shounen Sunday, it wasn’t a terribly compelling one, beyond the plot idea. ^_^

But yay for Yuri sections!