Archive for 2023


If My Favorite Pop Idol Made It to the Budokan I Would Die, Volume 4

November 26th, 2023

Seven female pop idoss, dressed in slight different iterations of yellow chinese-dress style costumes face us. No one thinks that the life of a pop idol is a free and easy life, not any more. We all know that – even aside from abusive management companies – it’s a hard life. It’s a lot of work that is rewarded by the whims of fans. If the fans don’t show up for the idols, no matter how much they do, it’ll never be enough.

But what does that make the life of a fan? You show up to the shows, you buy the merch, you get a handshake and, maybe, a kind word. Does the idol remember you among the many fans they have? In If My Favorite Pop Idol Made It to the Budokan I Would Die, Volume 4 we see this overtly transactional relationship from many different angles.

Cham Jam’s participation in the Okayama Idol festival is finally announced, but the fans already knew…which takes away a bit of the energy. While the idols toil to be their best selves, we get a glimpse of their motivations. Yuka’s only real desire is to be liked, while Maki really wants Yumeri to surpass her. Maina is happy where she is, Aya is not happy where she is. Sorane looks to Reo who is having a small crisis. Cham Jam will be on the same stage as Maple Doll, a popular group from Hiroshima, which features another member of Reo’s former group. It’s hard for Reo to see Mei’s group and not feel as if she’s lost something.

From the other side, the fans are struggling with just how best to support Cham Jam. Kumasa and Eripyo visit a Maple Doll concert to see the competition where they are spotted by Yuka and Aya. This causes all kinds of miscommunication that they are “two-timing” Maina and Reo. I’m gonna admit that that this section made me rage. People can like more than one thing at once, folks. It is really not at all okay for companies or other fans to make that taboo. Like, really, fandoms, get a grip.

Eripyo invites a coworker over to watch a promotional clip for the Idol Festival, only to accidentally create a rabid fan in another fandom. Woops.  She also becomes incoherent whenever she’s near Maina and it annoys her as much as it does me.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – Painful, but poignant at times
Character – 8
Service – 1
Yuri – Argh

Overall – Argh

I know I struggle with the “comedy” aspect of this series. Maybe if you read it, you’ll think it’s hilarious. I hope you do and let me know in the comments!

Thank you very much to the folks at Tokyopop for their excellent work making this convoluted tale of business and love make sense and for the review copy!





Yuri Network News – (百合ネットワークニュース) – November 25, 2023

November 25th, 2023

In blue silhouette, two women face each other. One wears a fedora and male-styled attire, one is in a dress and heels. Their body language is obscure - they may be dancing, or laughing or fighting.

Yuri Manga in English

On the Yuricon Store, we have Otherside Picnic Manga, Volume 7 and If My Favorite Pop Idol Made It to the Budokan, I Would Die, Volume 4! Reviews for both are forthcoming. ^_^

Rafael Antonio Pineda has the news that Kuzushiro’s The Moon On A Rainy Night has made the New York Public Library’s “Best Book For Teens” list! I’m so very happy about that. It’s such a good series.

Christian reviewed Kiss the Scars of the Girls here on Okazu last month. This week ANN’s Rebecca Silverman took a look at the same title with a completely different perspective!

 

Yuri Manga In Japanese

On the Yuricon Store we have Kuwabara Tamotsu’s Zenbu Kowashite Jigoku de Aishite, Volume 1 (ぜんぶ壊して地獄で愛して) a story of manipulation and sex.

Ichijinsha has a bunch of releases this month… Kiraware Majyo Reijou to Dansou Ouji no Konyaku (嫌われ魔女令嬢と男装皇子の婚約)  follows a powerful young witch’s life after the crown prince asks her to marry him, only he turns out to be a she.

Shikabane Shoujo to Ai ga Omoi Seikishi no Toubatsu Gakuen Life (​しかばね少女と愛が重い聖騎士の討伐学園ライフ) follows a zombie girl at a magical academy who is partnered with the holy knight and star of the school.

FLOWERCHILD’s newest series, Utsushicha Damena Kao (映しちゃダメな顔) has reached a Volume 1. Two women meet at a “happening” place where women can have a one-night stand.

Sukina Onnanoko ga Watashi ni Dake Nazeka Kibishii (好きな女の子が私にだけなぜか厳しい) is a Champion Red (urk) story about a girl who tries to befriend the nicest girl in school, only to find that she’s treated harshly. Comic Natalie flat out tells us that this is a Yuri love comedy, in case we aren’t sure. ^_^; Also Champion Red magazine is not known for it’s excellent treatment of female characters, just sayin’.

 

Yuri Audiobook & Voice Drama

I’m in Love with the Villainess Audiobook, Volume 2 is on the Yuricon Store and available for pre-order! This will be hitting our devices on December 7.

The Lonely Witch & You, The Abandoned is an ASMR Yuri voice drama that has been translated into English for DL Site, by their Translators Unite guild.

 

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Yuri Event

While not a “Yuri” event, Comitia 103 is coming up soon, on December 3rd, 2023, at Big Sight in Tokyo…and I will be there. You can be sure I’ll be picking up stuff like Kyoto University Yuri Research Association’s doujinshi Lilyology, Volume 3…with cover art by Hibiki Reine!

Also at Comitia will be Tomboys and their Boyish² Butch x Butch anthologies.

This is my first time back since 2019 and I’m looking forward to it, wish me good health and good luck.

 

Interviews

LN News talks to inori-sensei about her newest light novel, Yuusha ni Naritai Shoujo To, Yuusha Narubeki Kanojo (勇者になりたい少女と、勇者になるべき彼女) with some insight to both the main characters and the setting.

Via Sr. YNN Correspondent Ashley, Indie Tsushin has an interview with Nekobungi Sumire, whose new game Neko Can Dream is available in English!

A Cutey Honey 50th anniversary event includes a discussion with Go Nagai-sensei about his work. This video is only available in Japan, so you’ll need a VPN. I use Nord, and think it’s pretty easy to set up and use. If you’re looking for a VPN, feel free to use my referral code. (This was an unsponsored ad, but obviously I get free months if you sign up with my code.)

 

Yuri Anime

At Anime NYC last week, Aniplex announced that Lycoris Recoil will begin on Cartoon Network’s Toonami slot on January 20th.

 

Yuri Light Novels

Via Sr. YNN Correspondent Sean G, two Yuri Light Novels made this year’s Kono Light Novel Ga Sugoi top ten lists!  ANN’s Crystalynn Hodgkins has the details. The titles are Shuu ni Ichido Classmate wo Kau Hanashi, the first of which we just added to the Yuricon Store last week, and Stella Step (ステラ・ステップ), about a world in which idols replace war, and two idols who fall in love.

 

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Yuri Research

Translator (and our good friend here on Okazu!) Verena Maser has written about her work translating Taguchi Shouichi’s Futari Escape into German in Flüchtiger Humor, for The Toledo Journal.

We have three new essays up on the Yuricon Essays Page!

Starting off under Articles on Yuri, Frank Hecker takes a chronological look at Yuri in Notes toward a unified theory of yuri.

We’ve added A Husband is Unnecessary: Yoshiya Nobuko & Japanese Girls’ Culture to the Yuri and Shoujo, Feminism, Gender and Lesbian Themes section. I and History is Gay podcast host Leigh Pfeffer get together to chat about Grandmothe of Yuri, Yoshiya Nobuko’s life and work.

Under Fan Studies and Perspectives, we have:

Witch From Mercury‘s Finale Made One of Gundam’s Most Fascinating Ideas Queer as Hell by James Whitbrook for Gizmodo.

Alex Henderson looks at queer lives, and coming of age in Queer time and the quarter-life crisis in contemporary yuri for Anime Feminist.

Please send us links to any any articles or recorded material you’ve created on Yuri or Yuri-adjacent work and we’ll add it to the Essays Page. We’re always looking for more Yuri research resources.

 

If you’d like to support Yuri journalism and research, Patreon and Ko-Fi are where we currently accept subscriptions and tips.  Our goal now, into 2024, is to raise our guest writers’ wages to above industry standard, which are too low!

Your support goes straight to paying for Guest Reviews, folks helping with videos, site maintenance, managing the Yuricon Store and directly supporting other Yuri creators. Just $5/month makes a huge impact! Become part of the Okazu family!

Become a part of the Yuri Network, by being a YNN Correspondent: Contact Us with any Yuri-related news you want to share with us.

 





I’m in Love with the Villainess Audiobook, Volume 1

November 24th, 2023

Two girls in red jacket and blue skirt uniforms embrace as if to dance. The girl with medium-length brown hair smiles slightly, the girl with blonde hair looks put out.

If you’ve been reading Okazu for a while, you may know that I love(d) Drama CDs. The Drama C D category here on Okazu has nearly 100 Yuri Drama CD reviews. But the age of the Drama CD passed when the 2020s began. Instead, the genre shifted to digital…which makes a lot of sense, honestly. And, possibly more importantly, a lot of the Yuri manga that might previously have gone to Drama CD is now being made into anime, so skipping that voice-only medium altogether. I’m not complaining. But I do miss those days of popping a CD in on my way to drive to work or a con. ^_^

As a third driving factor in the shift from Dramas CDs, audiobooks – full readings of novel by a narrator – has become way more popular than it was some years ago. In the 1990s I did a LOT of driving and my wife and I constantly listened to Recorded Books on Tape, a company that kept me sane on many a long drive. But then I stopped driving and didn’t have nearly as much time to listen to things and audiobooks went from something hardly anyone did, to something Amazon could make money on. And now we’re sort of full circle as audiobooks have hit Light Novels. We may not have Drama CDs, but instead we have I’m in Love with the Villainess Audiobook, Volume 1 from Seven Seas Siren.

Narrator Courtney Shaw does a fantastic job. She captures each character well, to the point that by the end of the book, I knew who was speaking in most places, even if they weren’t immediately named. It was a pleasure to have her read the story to me, which gave me yet another perspective on words I have now experienced 4 or 5 times now.

I know you’ll care, so yes, the entire “Are you gay” conversation – including Rae talking about being impacted by Japanese media representation of gay people – is included. This is a reading of the whole novel, save for inori.-sensei’s author’s notes. Nothing was left out.

My only “complaint” (and it is not a complaint, just something that was impossible to not notice) is that a few of the pronunciations are at odds with both the written Japanese and the anime dub. The one that impacts us the most here is Lene, which is pronounced “lean.” We had a lively conversation on the Okazu discord about the various ways the Japanese レーネ could be adapted to English. My assumption was, since the Bauer kingdom is Frenchish (e.g., Claire François) was that it was meant to be Renée. The Japanese predilection for choosing ‘l’ over ‘r’ in transliteration gives us Lenée, which is pretty much how the anime dub handles it.  This and another choice makes me think that no one on the recording studio staff had thought to ask someone who could read Japanese. It was a very minor thing and didn’t really effect the overall presentation, it was just impossible to ignore – especially as we have the anime at the same time.

But do not let this very minor thing deter you from getting this audiobook. In every way, it’s an absolute delight.  While Shaw’s Rae is less over the top (or, as I like to think of it it, less “Pinky Pie”) than Hannah Alyea’s anime version, it works better for the more fully featured light novel narrative, in which we are given more of Rae’s motivation and backstory.

The first novel ends where the anime will be in a week or two, which means you can safely listen to this and not be spoiled for much.

Ratings (for the adaptation only)

Overall – 9

You should definitely get this audiobook to experience (or re-experience) the fun of the whole first novel. Then, once the anime is over (and after you have written Ichijinsha to let them know you want a second season, run out and pre-order Volume 2, so you get into the meat of the story!





Watashi No Oshi Ha Akuyaku Reijou. Maid Kitchen, Volume 1 (私の推しは悪役令嬢。 メイドキッチン)

November 23rd, 2023

Two girls in maid uniform hold out treats, while a girl with long blonde hair sips tea, surrounded by cookie designs.Lady Claire François, daughter of the Minister of Finance, has a problem. She turns to her maids, Lene Arrouseau and Rae Taylor to solve that problem…with food.

In Watashi No Oshi Ha Akuyaku Reijou. Maid Kitchen, Volume 1 (私の推しは悪役令嬢。 メイドキッチン), food is the answer, whether the problem is bored taste buds, or social status or a fever, or even the unpleasant temperature outside. There is nothing that can’t be solved by the application of just the right culinary item. Lene and Rae even conspire to cure Claire of her dislike for carrots.

The primary relationship here is between Claire and her maids – how they understand her, want her to be happy and healthy and through that, between themselves. Lene is given a little room to be seen as an individual and Rae gets to flex her knowledge of cuisine.

tsuke-sensei’s art is quite good – especially considering that readers are now used to Aonoshimo-sensei’s art. I find the use of goofy faces – including “horror face” suits the bwah-bwah-bwah tone of what is, at least in part, a gag manga with characters we already know and like.

We’re not given recipes here, but we are given enough information that, should we too wish to make a cake salé, it would not be hard to find a useful recipe. And, since it is Thanksgiving in the USA, today seems like a good day to bring something different to any shared meal you might be attending. The older I get, the more I realize how much of French cuisine is really just “what do we have in the house and how do we use it for dinner?” ^_^

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – Claire has a problem, food solves the problem
Character – 7
Service – Rae is Rae
Yuri – Rae is Rae

Overall – 7.5

This is very much a manga for fans of the I’m In Love With The Villainess series. It won’t add anything to the story proper, but it will allow you to spend more time in the company of Claire, Lene and Rae. And food.

 





A Tropical Fish Yearns for Snow, Volume 9

November 22nd, 2023

Two girls in navy blue jumper-style school uniforms smile at us, their arms entwined. One wears a flower and holds a diploma scroll, the other wears frog and salamander mascots on her bag.I’m playing clean-up in my files this week and this book, which is the final volume of the series, had been put aside for several reasons. The main one was that a friend of mine was really into it and planned on reviewing it for us on Okazu, but she died of COVID in 2021 and was never able to do so. So, I spent a year avoiding this series like the plague I associated it with. A little over a year ago, I finally was able to finish the series in Japanese. Today I’m holding up my promise to Claire Monserrat Jackson and reviewing A Tropical Fish Yearns for Snow, Volume 9, by Makoto Hagino.

Konatsu and Koyuki have come a very, very long way since they first met. Koyuki has begun to understand the people around her, and allow herself to be part of a group. Konatsu is still not entirely sure she’s communicated everything she wanted to say to Koyuki, but is definitely sure that the other girl is very important to her.

Their final school festival together is a culmination of these two refrains. Even when her classmates’ behavior is a little frightening to Koyuki, she is able to understand that they don’t mean to hurt or scare her. And when she comes to the Aquarium Club’s cafe, she completely understands Konatsu’s message to her, in the form of a frog and salamander pancake combo.

Koyuki graduates and is off to the big city.

In an epilogue, we learn that Kaede’s big sister is a famous model and she thinks that Kaede has the chops to be one, too. Poor Fuyuki. But he finds an interest in photography…so maybe they will meet again after all.

When she comes to Tokyo to visit, Konatsu learns that Koyuki absolutely understood her message to her…and, at last, the older girl is able to respond. This salamander and frog need each other and they want to be together. As I said in my review of the Japanese edition, they will not be heading into the future together, but they will be there for one another. Whether their relationship develops into more than friendship will depend on many things. I see it as a possibility, not a probability. Upon re-read, I call it a fairly high possibility. ^_^

Regardless of any romantic possibility, this series was a very gentle look at the relationship between two young women. It was worth reading for that alone, but I’m also glad that the ends leaves room for recognition of intimacy and desire to have the other person in their lives.

Ratings:

Art – 6
Story – 7
Characters – 8
Service – 0
Yuri – 5

Overall – 8

I sincerely hope the Nagahama High School Aquarium Club got  lot of new members from this series. It looks like they do a lot of cool stuff, in this article from earlier this year!