Yuri Anime

Sentai Filmworks has licensed The Executioner and Her Way of Life.This means that it will be exclusive to their HIDIVE streaming service. The anime will be premiering in Japan on April 1, Alex Mateo on ANN has more details. The first 3 light novels have been reviewed here on Okazu. (Volume 1 | Volume 2 | Volume 3)

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Yuri Event

Galette magazine’s Yuri Matsuri event is being held on March 20th, but if you can’t get there, maybe you can still get yourself the 5th anniversary 2-set on Booth! This anniversary special includes an anniversary book, a signed card and an original tote bag (they are currently out of stock, but fingers crossed they get more after the Matsuri is over.)

Yuri Visual Novels

SukeraSparo has a new Yuri VN out now in Japanese. Naisho One Room ~ Sewayaki Imouto to Sugosu Kyuujitsu ~ (ないしょワンルーム ～世話焼き妹と過ごす休日～).

MangaGamer is running a White Day Sale through March 21st, with 75% off of selected titles. They are including a number of Yuri titles in the sale, so drop by the sale page!

Via Yuri Navi, Lycoris is pleased to announce their newest Yuri VN,  Uso kara Hajimaru Koi no Natsu (嘘から始まる恋の夏). You can check out the Japanese-language trailer for The Summer Begins with a Lie on Youtube.

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LGBTQ Media News

Kabi Nagata’s newest manga My Wandering Warrior Existence will be hitting shelves in English this coming week! This book delves into Nagata-sensei’s connection to her gender, and her sexuality. CW: childhood sexual assault. I reviewed this in Japanese last year.

One of the very few podcasts I listen to regularly is the Mangasplaining podcast, featuring Christopher Butcher, David Brothers, Deb Aoki and Chip Zdarsky. Last month they launched a new feature – Mangasplaining Xtra, a substack newsletter with all the show notes, extra commentary and they are publishing manga that has never been seen before in English. I was honored to have an article published there, as a companion piece to their show on Takako Shimura’s Even Though We’re Adults. In An Introduction to Takako Shimura’s Work in English, which is free to read, even if you don’t subscribe, I take a broad look her other works that are available in English for folks who might not be familiar with her.

Senior YNN Correspondent Eric P wants us to know that a new Korra comic is on the way! The Legend of Korra: Patterns in Time, will be hitting shelves this summer. With stories by series creators by Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko and illustrated by Heather Campbell, Jayd Ait-Kaci, and Killian Ng… I’m really looking forward to this.

Last week Ogata Megumi-san, the voice of Haruka in Sailor Moon, Shinji in Evangelion, won the Seiyuu Award for Best Actress. Ogata-san’s acceptance speech was a forward-looking hope for genderless awards, and an announcement they don’t consider themselves male or female. The speech has been translated in this Twitter thread and its worth a read. ““There is so much talk about being “genderless” nowadays and there are voice actors in the industry who have come out [as queer]. And like myself, there are people out there who go on about their daily lives mostly not thinking of themselves as women.”

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Yuri Light Novels

Great news for fans of I’m in Love With the Villainess, via her twitter account inori-sensei’s newest novel Heimin no Kuse ni Namaikina! (平民のくせに生意気な！) will be hitting JP Kindle and US Kindle in Japanese this week from GL Bunko! I expect to see a license for “She’s Such A Cheeky Commoner” in English pretty soon. This is all from Claire’s point of view – and I have to say, it’s worth reading. There’s some new content that the original does not cover…and whole new character you’ve never seen. ^_^

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Yuri Manga

Seven Seas has licensed Yukiko’s collection, Neko to Sugar Pot, which they will release as Cats and Sugar Bowls. Alex Mateo has details on ANN.

Shimura Takako’s Even Though We’re Adults, Volume 4 will be headed your way in April!

Canno’s newest manga is live on Comic Walker in Japanese! Check out Koudou Ryou no Seizana Hibi (黄道寮の星座な日々).

Mao to Yuri (魔王と百合) is a Yuri harem rom-com in which the female successor to the Demon King must choose a wife from five human women, in order to bring peace between humans and demons.

Yuri Anime

Egan Loo has the news about the upcoming Yuri anime The Executioner and Her Way of Life. I’m still reading the series, and still not sure how I feel about it, and I don’t think the anime will help, but I’m sure going to watch it. ^_^ This Yuri action/adventure/horror isekai will premiere on April 1st.

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Yuri Events

I will be at Anime Boston, from May 27-29, 2022 at the Hynes Convention Center in Boston. On the good side, I’m a featured panelist, on the exhausting side, they are absolute slave drivers and I’ll be on about 6 panels. You’ll have an equal chance of catching me at least once and getting utterly sick of me completely. ^_^ If you run a podcast or website and want to interview me, I’ll be scheduling slots as soon as my schedule is fixed.

Also, great news – Yuri Mother herself will be joining me for at least one panel! (I say “at least,” because I am well known to recruit others into a lot of my panels… ^_^)

Tonight several Vtubers are planning a Yuri symposium – check out Honeymelonhime, Lirie and Pia on Twitch.. I know nothing about any of them, so you’ll have to let me know how it goes. ^_^

Yuri Essays

Helen McCarthy takes a look at Revolutionary Girl Utena for All The Anime.

On Tor.com, James Davis Nicoll takes us on a walkabout through Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou, which has at last been licensed. Thank you Seven Seas!

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Other News

ANN’s Adriana Hazra reports that Star Fruit Books is launching an indie manga magazine in English, Comic Bright. I’m super looking forward to this. I read The Blood Red Boy by Minami Q-ta from them and it was the best $2 I had spent that month. You can check out the Mangasplaining crew talking about that story, as well.

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Yuri Manga

Top news this week is Seven Seas’ license for Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou!

This incredibly gentle and sweet story takes place during the twilight of the human race, as advanced companion androids outlast their masters. One such android, Alpha, runs a coffee shop in what used to be the Yokohama metro area, but is now a windswept grassy plain. This series, also known as known as Yokohama Shopping Log went for 14 volumes. It had 2 anime OVAs, which have extraordinary animation, an artbook, and several Drama CDs, some of which I have reviewed over the years on Okazu in it’s own category, Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou. There are sporadic manga reviews, as nothing happens for most of the manga. Alpha will sit and watch the wind blow the grass for pages on end. Then she’ll take a ride on her scooter. It’s definitely an iyashikei-style manga, except for the idea that humanity is over. And even that seems okay. Seven Seas describes it as “quiet and bittersweet,” and I would add, just like Alpha’s coffee blends.

This has long been on my list of manga I have wanted to see licensed. My thanks to everyone who reached out to tell me – apparently everyone in the manga world knew how I felt about this series, because I received a *lot* of messages. ^_^

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We had some issues with the Yuricon Store this week, due to a conflict of a plugin and a PHP upgrade. That was fun. ^_^; It’s fixed and  we did manage to get Tamifull’s Tsukiatte Agetemo Iikana, Volume 8 (付き合ってあげてもいいかな)  and Bloom Into You Anthology, Volume 2 up.

It looks like Ikeda Takashi’s Futari ha Daitai Konna Kanji will be ending next month. Rafael Antonio Pineda has the news at ANN. But you’ll be able to read this in English as The Two of Them Are Pretty Much Like This (a title I absolutely adore, btw,) this summer.

Viz will be releasing Look Back, by Tatsuki Fujimoto as a print volume. Alex Mateo has the news on ANN. I reviewed that recently, and sobbed my way through it. It’s a brilliant and compelling book.

Hayate x Blade creator Hayashiya Shizuru has a new title that she is selling on Japanese online 18+ manga platform Fanza, ULTIMATE-MAMA. This series has all her hallmarks – lots of bloody gags, tons of fighting, and a woman with ripped abs. Lesbian sex. The synopsis reads “Manatsu, an ordinary school girl, is attacked by a monster one day. It’s a female warrior with a child who saves her?  The next day, Manatsu learns there is transfer student at the school. It’s the daughter of that female warrior–“

You *know* I’m getting this. ^_^

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Yuri Visual Novels

Via YuriMother, we have some Yuri VN news! She reports that “ebi-hime’s Yuri visual novel Blackberry Honey was released on PlayStation 4, Playstation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, and Nintendo Switch. The game is ported and published on consoles by Ratalaika Games.”

Yurimother also wants folks to know that Heart of the Woods by Studio Élan is being released on PS4 and PS5.

Yuri Doujinshi

Via Lilyka, Senpai no Kouhai, Part 2 by Alt Hanakage is now out. This concludes the series and now I hope we’ll get some of her beefier doujinshi. ^_^

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Yuri Web & Digital Comics

Via her Facebook page, Kuru, aka Color_LES, has announced that Mage & Demon Queen will conclude this year. Of course I will miss this wonderful Yuri comic. I’m thrilled for Kuru that she’ll be see it through a final arc – and I’m looking forward to what she does next!

Elise Schuenke wants you to know about her comic Love Rumble, a rival to lovers comic that has been submitted to the Bitter x Sweet artzine.

Via Natsuo Mutsumi, the host of the Boyish² butch x butch anthology, we have news of Electro Magnetic Bottle Rocket, which they praised as “Aliens, Mysterious Technology, and Childhood Memories: …… I’m so excited! Here was the romance I was looking for!” This is available on Gumroad.

Which brings me to two things I need to say, given some stuff that has happened in the past weeks in the comics industry:

In order to support comics creators that still use Kickstarter, I will continue to linking to projects, but I will no longer be supporting Kickstarters myself. I genuinely believe blockchain is wasteful and stupid, NFTs are exploitative, harmful to the environment and only appeal to suckers or the con men who rip them off.

Likewise, I will not be purchasing work on Gumroad, after the handler for their Twitter account attacked NFT critics with some deeply unpleasant comments and what came very close to doxxing.

Comics are hard enough and right now we need people who are not exploitative or harassing at the top of the systems we use. I will not condemn anyone for using what they use (I know I’m worried about Patreon going crypto, as they have been threatening to do for a while now,) but I can choose to not support it. Spike Trottman, founder of Iron Circus Comics  pulled all her content from Gumroad, and resolved to not use Kickstarter (a system she largely validated with her hugely successful campaigns.) Going forward, she’s created her own crowdfunding platform.

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Yuri Manga

Seven Seas is doing their annual #yuriVday giveaway on Twitter. Drop them a tweet about your fave Yuri, use the hashtag #yuriVday and be entered to win some of their new titles! They are also running a giveaway on TikTok, if that’s more your style. ^_^ They’ve got a lot to celebrate, too, as there are 9 new Yuri titles out just this month from Seven Seas, 5 ongoing series *and* RightStuf is running a sale on all their titles.

Yuri Light Novel

Seven Seas continues their domination of Yuri licensing with both the manga and the light novels of a decade old series, Qualia the Purple  – about a girl who has the ability to “evaluate” the bodies of the people around her. I never read any of this originally, although I remember being told about it. To be perfectly honest, those people who were most into it had tastes that did not align with mine, so I gave it a pass.

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Yuri Anime

Via Senior YNN Correspondent Mariko Shinobu, we have a fun tidbit – Paste Magazine published a list of their “30 Greatest Anime.” Mariko wants you to note that Utena is #4 and Sailor Moon is #11. I also notice that a few other Okazu classics are in the list, notably Serial Experiments Lain, Wandering Son, and .hack/Sign.

Egan Loo at ANN has the news that Black Rock Shooter is returning with a new anime, Black Rock Shooter Dawn Fall. I doubt it will go back to it’s Yuri(ish) roots, but I can hope. ^_^ Looks like we’ll get Mato, Yomi and Yu, but a whole different set-up. Check out the trailer on Youtube!  Komatsu-san has a related report about Kanako Takatsuki (a member of Love Live!‘ s Aquors) who is singing the ED for the new BRS anime.

Egan also has the news of a new anime by Tsuzuki Masaki, creator of Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha, Extreme Hearts, which looks like a serious sports anime. I’m…hopeful, primarily because of this quote, “This is the story about how we met our greatest friends.”  Sports and yuujo and girls. I’m in. ^_^

Kara Dennison over at Crunchyroll News has the very scoop that GKIDS is teaming up with Tubi to release great anime. Among the first batch is Liz and the Blue Bird, so if you haven’t yet seen it, do! You may recall that I thought it outstanding.

Other News

Crunchyroll is doing a series for Black History Month, in which they are highlighting black talent in the anime industry. I hope you take a look! Week 1 | Week 2. Week 2 includes a profile of our own Okazu family member, Meru Clewis, who has recently become part of the LN staff at Seven Seas. We’re so proud of her!

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Yuri Manga

We’re starting off with some truly wonderful news – Seven Seas has licensed a title from Galette magazine! Intelligently, they have picked up Morinaga Milk’s Watashi no Kawaii Neko-chan, which they will release in December as My Cute Little Kitten, Volume 1. I hope this means we’ll be able to see some other titles from Galette Works as well.

Out this week from Seven Seas is Hello, Melancholic!, Volume 1. This story is 3 volumes of high school redemption. Girls, bands, and love and at last a Ohsawa Yayoi title in English!  This series made my Top Yuri list in 2020, so I’m really excited to see it in English!

The Kase-san series continues with Kase-san and Yamada, Volume 2, which brings us up to date with JP tankoubon releases.

Also out this week from Seven Seas are: 

Monologue Woven For You, Volume 1 a college life story. I reviewed Volume 1 in Japanese last year.

I Can’t Believe I Slept With You! Volume 1, a story about a tenant who strikes an uncomfortable bargain with her female landlord.

5 Seconds Before a Witch Falls in Love, a one volume story that follows a witch, a witch-hunter and hijinks ensuing.

Heading our way this week from Viz is How Do We Relationship, Volume 5.  You’ll have to trust me on this – things change a lot after this volume. ^_^

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Galette magazine is celebrating a 5th anniversary with upcoming Issue 21! To celebrate they are running a campaign on digital platform Booklive, where you can read Issues 1-10 for free in Japanese! They will be doing multiple campaigns and a 2nd Yuri Matsuri in March.

Hana ni Arashi, Volume 10 ( はなにあらし) is up on the Yuricon store. This first love story is very slow and very sweet, but looks like it’s building towards an end.

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From Gangan Online, we have Tokuwotsumu’s newest series, Haru Tsuzuru, Sakurasaku Kono Heya de, a college life story. Sample chapters are available on Gangan Online for free, or all of them with the Gangan app!

Ichijinsha has another entry in the “anthologies I cannot get too enthusiastic about, but you may like” with Nakigao Yuri Anthology (泣き顔百合アンソロジー) an anthology around the theme of crying.

Via Comic Natalie, we have some more details about Canno’s new series, Koudou Ryou no Seizana Hibi (黄道寮の星座な日々). The story takes place in the Ecliptic Dormitory where residents refer to each other by the names of the Zodiac. The protagonist has a reason she wants in, but needs to be accepted as the new ‘Virgo.’ This series will debut in the March issue of Comic Flapper. Links aren’t available for that yet, but I’ll add the Bookwalker links when it goes live.

Also from Comic Natalie, they polled the editors-in-chief of 26 manga magazines to come up with a list of their suggested manga. This 2021 Recommended Manga List includes dark Yuri fantasy Watashi o Tabetai, Hito de Nashi (私を喰べたい、ひとでなし).

Anime News

Bodacious Space Pirates is getting a 10th anniversary Blu-Ray set in Japan. Humberto Saabedra has the info on Crunchyroll News.

The Zombieland Saga live event in 2021 now has a digest video up for your enjoyment. Check out Kim Morrisey’s article on ANN for details!

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Other News

Shueisha’s Manga Plus app is releasing ALL of their English language chapters for free for the next year. Download the app on on your iOS or Android device and read away it really is that easy. The only catch is that you must read a full chapter at once, because when you close the app, that chapter is marked “read.” and you may only read it once. It’s a stellar way to catch up on manga you’ve been meaning to read but never had a chance. I’m finally reading Spy x Family now and it is as good as everyone says. ^_^

I’m running a translation workshop with the fine folks of Michigan State University right now and, therefore have localization on my mind. This Twitter thread by localizer Cassiel really struck home how many moving parts there are to a translated work. Translation is an art, not a science and there are many stakeholders who have input.

Last up this week, here’s an interesting piece of news, via the Comics Beat, Graphic Novel sales were up overall 65% in 2021. This, even with a logistics and supply chain nightmare scenario. But here’s the wow moment. Manga, which is up 171%, accounts for more then 3/4ths of all comic sales.

Check out this whole article. It’s interesting reading. LGBTQ+ comics were up 40%, which is outstanding.

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