We are coming to the end of another surprising season of anime with a number of Yuri, Yuri-adjacent and Yuri-adjacent-adjacent series. Most of these anime were interesting to watch, One was outstanding – we’ll talk about that one shortly, some were overall excellent with fatal flaws – weirdly, two of them shared much the same flaw, IMHO. Today we’re going to look at one of the latter.
As I watched Jellyfish Can’t Swim In the Night, streaming on HIDIVE,, I was once again reminded of Bee Train being asked about the Yuri in Noir at Anime Expo 2002, a panel that for reasons, I moderated. When asked about the Yuri in Noir, Bee Train members replied “If you want to see it, it’s there.” That was 22 years ago. In 2024, that same cavalier attitude toward Yuri has very much colored fans feelings about the ending of Jellyfish, an otherwise good story about finding people who help you accept yourself and whom you can accept in return. It’s a pretty standard cute-teen doing cute stuff, on a larger scale than just a high school club, so I hesitate to call it “slice-of-life.” It’s a rare life that is writ that large. And good for those folks who do get to that scale. They work hard to get there, as our group utilizes the skills they each uniquely bring to the whole.
On the one hand, this is a glossy story of outcasts making a place for themselves…which becomea a little complicated if you read it “You should find friends that accept you,” instead of “When you accept yourself, it might be easier for you to find a place for yourself in the world.” But these outcasts do learn to love themselves, and each other and they take their moment in the limelight to do their very best. It doesn’t matter whether it was good or not, honestly. They embraced their chance.
For many fans the major problem of the series is the staff’s comments about potential Yuri in the series. Like that Bee Train comment, this is another example of a bunch of people with no emotional skin in the game, using Yuri as a tactic to create engagement within fandom. As a person who has been watching companies do that to fandom for literal decades, I’m more surprised at the series that do stand up for their characters, like the folks involved with Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch From Mercury, than I am at those which do not and don’t much care about the consequences.
Fans have been pretty vocal about their disappointment in the use of a kiss between two characters as a throw-away, “This is something that might happen, but no matter, it has no meaning” moment. Especially in a series which did have a solid plot line about gender identity. I hate to paint myself as jaded, but given the overt Yuri of Whisper Me A Love Song, I felt that loss less keenly than the one real problem I had with the anime. That last song disappointed me. Music is subjective of course, but I was hoping for something more epic. On the positive side, the story did avoid an obvious pitfall in which our leads are pitted against one another, but I am convinced we have limited budget and time to thank for that, rather than pure-hearted storytelling. Had the series been 24 episodes long, I have no doubt it would have gone there
The phrase “Yuri scam” seems to have been coined by some portion of fandom online for this series, when Yuri bait doesn’t quite strike the same chord. The sentiment expressed by those people are “we were set up, and let drop. Just to see what happened.”
Do I think this was a Yuri anime? No and I don’t think it was trying to be one.
I do think this was an anime about intimacy and friendship – something I apparently can’t get enough of. But as for what we wished to see, we’re going to have to get directors and producers in anime who have some need to give us representation, in the way the staff of She Loves To Cook, She Loves To Eat, does, before we’ll see anything change.
Ratings
Art – 8
Story – 8
Characters – 8
Yuri – 4
Service – 5 There were some seriously unneeded ass and crotch shots that make me worry about the future of humanity, but then so does the massive money being poured into “AI” that tells people to eat a rock a day.
Overall – 8
Will Jellyfish be something we come back to year after year? Probably not. Nonetheless as an ultimately “feel good about yourself” anime, Jellyfish did what it set out to do, did not do things it had no intention of doing, and told the story that it had to tell.
Watch Jellyfish Can’t Swim In The Night on HIDIVE and let me know what you think!
Thanks for posting this review. While I personally wouldn’t go as far as to say this was a “yuri scam,” I do generally agree with your thoughts on this series. I still believe it had some yuri subtext, despite the “all interpretations are welcome” approach from those leading the anime, but that obviously was not made textual by the finale. There was also surely some fan service (Anime Feminist criticized this in their review of the first episode back in April), but generally I did find the story, art, and characters to drive it forward. And as you noted, there was a focus on gender identity too, with Kiui coming out as trans or non-binary in the 11th episode. In some ways, I do wish that the series was longer, so they could give more time to the interconnections between the characters. I don’t believe that would have necessitated the protagonists being pitted against each other. And this series comes when there are series with yuri subtextual themes airing this season (Train to the End of the World, The Many Sides of Voice Actor Radio, and Girls Band Cry), while Whisper Me a Love Song is the only one with those themes becoming textual. As your point that we will only get the necessary representation when producers and directors make that yuri integral to a series, like they did in ILTV or Whisper Me a Love Song. I have low expectations for the incoming set of yurish series, set to begin airing next month, namely Narenare: Cheer for You!, Mayonaka Punch, VTuber Legend, My Deer Friend Nokotan, and Shy S2, as I expect that the yuri in each of those series will only be subtext. Perhaps they will be enjoyable, but whether that yuri will be textual, I doubt it.
I don’t think it was a “Yuri scam,” I noted that some folks are saying it was. I don’t think it was “Yuri” at all, but it was a very good story about female intimacy and friendship.
It is troubling that no one seems to have understood that when I say “some fans” I do not, in actual fact, mean myself.
Perhaps you intended it to be understood differently and have simply worded it badly, but the following paragraph does read like you’re saying you think it is a “yuri scam”:
“Do I think this was a Yuri anime? No. I don’t think it was trying to be one. The phrase “Yuri scam” seems to have been coined for this series, when Yuri bait doesn’t quite strike the same chord. We were set up, and let drop. Just to see what happened.”
I thought I was clear that I did not think it was Yuri at all.
I have edited to, I hope, be clearer.
Thinking something is a “yuri scam” normally does involve thinking that it ultimately was not yuri at all, so that wasn’t what was unclear.
“Yuri scam” wasn’t coined recently. It’s basically one way of translating 百合詐欺 into English.
Thank you. It is, however, a recent addition to English fan discourse.
I suppose I have a different view than yuri than you do, then. In any case, there don’t seem to be any textual yuri upcoming this summer. In my comment I didn’t say you called it a “yuri scam” but I was disagreeing with those fans who did give it that label. I don’t know if the manga will be different or have any more yuri themes, or will even ever be published in English (I am doubting it will be). I do tend to think that some fans overuse “yuri bait” too much and at least for me it has lost a lot of meaning. I tend to be a bit skeptical of fan discourse (I tend to be more familiar with the English fan discourse) to be honest, its is too easy to be swept up in it all.
Otherwise, I have been purchasing some yuri manga for myself recently, like the first two volumes of I Don’t Know Which is Love, the first volume of Yuri is My Job!, the first two volumes of Bloom Into You, and the first volume of Magirevo. I’ve also heard that two female supporting characters kissed one another in a recent episode of My Adventures with Superman, although I can’t attest to more than that, as I haven’t seen the episode as of yet. Interestingly, Josie Campbell, one of the showrunners, wrote seven of the episodes of the new She-Ra, so some of those same themes/ideas are in the new Superman show, and Superman even has a PreCure-esque transformation sequence (some people thought it was inspired by Sailor Moon, but Campbell and one of the artists made clear it was Pretty Cure). I’m also planning a watch of Dear Brother sometime this year, along with some other yuri anime.
We seem to agree more than disagree. ^_^ I don’t think it was a scam, but it was undeniably Yuri bait – for the kinds of people who see any kinds of emotional/physical intimacy between two women as “Yuri.” I have developed a love for series that show women as intimate with each other that does not rely on romance as a driver. ^_^
I see. In any case, I did watch the My Adventures with Superman episode I mentioned today and yes, two female supporting characters do kiss, as I had seen on social media, and are affectionate with one another. While they are villains, they DO help the protagonists (after being paid a lot of money), with one of them even giving inspiration to Lois Lane to pursue the person she loves. I think that’s as much as I can spoil about it. I hope there are some yuri series like that in the future, although I don’t have as much hope for that.
There will probably be more of it in Western animation, like in Adventure Time (I even created a guide to all the episodes that feature Marceline years ago, because I really like her character) and remember avidly watching “Distant Lands” (especially the episode “Obsidian”) and the new series (which also features her with the woman she loves, occasionally). And the new Arcane season is coming this year and that is set to feature two of the female protagonists who have been confirmed as in a relationship already. I hope some news about the Lumberjanes adaptation (apparently filled wit LGBTQ+ characters) or Molly Ostertag’s “Neon Galaxy” (reportely about a trans character) come this year.
Otherwise, I’m going to keep reading more yuri manga and making a paper index for your book (honestly, that’s the only downside, as the glossary of terms, sources, and shows cited, along with with each chapter itself, are filled with information and detailed analysis), with a goal of hopefully citing it in future articles. I already got the go-ahead to review older anime and animation for where I write, so I’m probably going to do that, slowly.
I considered doing an index in BYS, but suspected it would have little or no value to most readers for the effort of doing it, and as I was not working with a non-fiction publisher, who had the resources to create one, it did not get done. My apologies. It was simply too much of a task to do at the time.
I enjoyed this series more than it deserved.
There’s a lot to like about this series, and a lot to be frustrated by: one gets the sense that there was a lot of story that they just didn’t have room for (on the other hand, if that’s the case, there are a few things they put in that are questionable). I’ve picked up the novel, hoping that there’s more to the story.
I’m very much a fan of Kiui’s arc, short as it is. I think they managed to tell their story and do it justice. Plus, they’re a lot of fun as a character.