Today we’re looking at Oya ga Urusainode Kouhai  to Gizoukekkonshitemite (親がうるさいので後輩(♀) と偽装結婚してみた。) by Kodama Naoko. Compared to her last series, NTR: Netsozou Trap, this isn’t problematic at all, but that doesn’t meant there aren’t problems! ^_^;

Machi is a fairly typical office worker. She’s got a male co-worker who keeps regaling her with tales of domestic bliss with his girlfriend and questions about her own future. Doesn’t she want to get married? Machi doesn’t particularly want to get married, but her parents aren’t listening. They are pounding her with eligible men and demanding she do the right thing. Machi is painfully aware that her parents have always demanded she do what will embarrass them least and she’s always acquiesced. But not this time.

Machi’s roommate and kouhai, Hana, thinks she has a solution. Shibuya is now offering same-sex partnership certificates. If they sign up, then Machi’s parents will have to get off her back, right?  Unsurprisingly, Machi’s parents do not feel that this acceptable and they are instead very rude to Hana, which finally forces Machi to take a stand. She demands her parents apologize to Hana, and the two women leave. 

But if the idea of a fake same-sex marriage of convenience isn’t going to bother us, then the idea that the actual relationship between Hana and Machi is horribly unfair, is just fine. (-_-) 

Because Hana is actually in love with Machi. And Machi is, but has no idea she is. Yes, she likes that Hana is there when she gets home, that there’s food and companionship. She’s pleased that Hana’s design business is taking off, but she’s taking her time figuring out that Hana means more to her than just a roommate. 

It’s not until Hana goes out to drink and speak with a former girlfriend that Machi finally groks her own feelings. But now, she’s got to cope with the embarrassment she’s feeling. She’s legitimately embarrassed at how’s she treated Hana, BUT, because if Kodama-sensei can’t make us feel uncomfortable, she’s not doing her job, apparently, Machi’s even more embarrassed because she’s has no idea what a same-sex relationship should be like. When Hana starts to make love to her, Machi immediately reacts with detachment, so Hana backs off. Hana’s the real hero here – she understands Machi in a way that Machi herself has no clue about. And, unlike “nice” guys everywhere, she’s very clear right from the very beginning about her interest in Machi, so there’s no confusion AND she accepts Machi’s boundaries without question.

Slowly, Machi unravels her discomfort, her embarrassment, her emotional armor and Hana’s perfectly content to be there with supportive love. As the story ends, we can see them with a relationship that is no longer a sham.

A second story about an athlete in a slump and the best friend who is there for her is nice, and reinforced the problematic narrative of “just wait and eventually they’ll come around to noticing you.”

I enjoyed this volume, despite the fact that the plot drivers aren’t really appropriate in the real world. 

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 7
Characters – 9 for Hana
Service – 2 Some light romance/sexual discomfort
Yuri – 7
LGBTQ – 4 Mention of the real-world same-sex partnership certificates, but no discussion around it

Overall – 7

In comparison to her previous work it was a light-hearted gag, a comedy movie, a lark. 

Back in 2014, Kodama Naoko, in pre-NTR  days had two short series that had run in Comic Yuri Hime magazine, collected under the title Cocytus. (Cocytus is one of the five rivers that runs into Hades. Cocytus is the river of lamentation. Isn’t that a cheerful title? The other rivers are Styx, Lethe, Acheron and Phelegethon, because I know you know I care about such things. ^_^)

Now her work has been republished in a final format as Cocytus Perfect Edition (コキュートス 完全版). The two series follow couples so close to being identical that I had to keep reminding myself that it was two separate series.

In the first, a cheerful schoolgirl finds herself intrigued by, protective of, and eventually interested in a melancholic classmate.

The second and title series follows, again, two classmates, who are close and getting closer. Ultimately, they decide to remain together without a sexual relationship. We see them in the short original epilogue as adults who have established a life as a couple for themselves.

There’s nothing really bad about Cocytus, certainly nothing that lends itself to lamentation. The characters are pleasantly bland, with small moments of humanity that, should they have been developed, might really have led to a great story. But they weren’t.

I’m not particularly fond of Kodama’s tendency to draw her Nadesico-type character with deadish eyes, but that’s a fairly small quibble.

Ratings:

Art – YMMV, but for me it’s 6, tops
Story – Same
Characters – 5 They never really develop beyond quick flashes of “oh”
Yuri – 4 By default, rather than by intention
Service – The title story has some rather pointless nudity

Overall – 6

If you either like Kodama’s work generally, or would like to look back a bit at an earlier series, Cocytus is a nice enough read, if not particularly compelling.

In 2012, I read and was traumatized by Kodama Naoko’s Fujiyuu Sekai. It’s one of my most popular reviews, presumably because folks who read scanlations are equally as traumatized and want someone to tell them it’ll be alright.

Well, this hideous monster is back in a new collection, Fujiyuu Sekai Perfect Edition (不自由セカイ 完全版) and things are most definitely not alright.

Reo befriended Meiko back in high school when Meiko was not treated well by her classmates. Popular and attractive, Reo drew Meiko into society. Meiko joined the tennis club in order to be closer to Reo and, as a result, hurt her ankle during practice. One day not long after, Reo offered to walk Meiko home, but she refused because she was getting better. Reo went off and unknown to her, Meiko was attacked and raped.

Now, years later, Meiko is still making Reo pay for it. Meiko is abusive and neglectful, Reo is tortured, and the fact that they get a “happy” ending is only one of the many things wrong with the narrative.

I reluctantly coughed up for the Perfect Edition, hoping that any new chapters would have Meiko abjectly begging for forgiveness or, barring that, Reo walking away and getting a better life. But no. In all my many concerns about the wrongness of all the plot elements in this story, the one resolution Kodama-sensei went with hadn’t even occurred to me.  Because, god, no.  (I’m not saying that it might not work, I’m saying this story needs to die in fire.)

Ratings:

Overall – 3, down 2 points from the original.

In 2012, I said, “It really could have been good, but it wasn’t.” In 2016, I have to admit that this was just a shitty manga that had no chance of being good.

One last book for “low expectations” week but, in this case, to show that having low expectations isn’t always the same as expecting something to be bad.

In 2011, I reviewed a book called Renai Manga, by Kodama Naoko, that had been published by Tsubomi Comics. I gave it “a warm fuzzy, comfortable 8” as a score.

Now, Yuri Hime Comics has re-released Renai Manga (レンアイマンガ). And it is the same, all the way to the very end, where a new chapter is new, but not any different.

Haruka is a new editor at Sweets Magazine, where she is assigned to manage her favorite author – the one who inspired her to become an editor in the first place. Only, Kuroi-sensei is not the fashionable woman she imagined, but a hoody-wearing recluse. Haruka pulls Kuroi-sensei out of her shell just a bit and Kuroi-sensei gives Haruka the courage to stick to her guns and stay in Tokyo as an editor when her mother pressures her to marry.

The end of the book ends up eating it’s own tail as it turns out that Haruka’s fan letter to Kuroi-sensei was her first, ever, and a charm she’s kept all these years to keep her going.

Now, since I knew exactly what to expect from this manga, I was able to pay attention a little more to small details; how Haruka is manipulated by the editor-in-chief, who obviously knows both parts of the story, how Kuroi-sensei finds herself after a long slump because of Haruka. I was also able to enjoy the now almost-silly climax scene as Haruka runs around town looking for screentone. In a mere few years that has become significantly less of  crisis, as so much more of manga is done digitally, it’s almost hard to imagine that this might have been a thing.

The original manga ends with Kuroi-sensei being honored at a party for the new TV Drama of her series. A new chapter turns away from the tale of professional persistence to – for the first time, really – the couple of Haruka and Sensei, who I now think deserves to be referred to by her given name, Ritsu. Haruka and Ritsu are, clearly, already important to each other, but Ritsu takes a big step and asks Haruka to move in with her so they can be together all the time. Haruka agrees happily. In the final panels, we see the editor-in-chief being not at all surprised and thinking that the two of them ought to get married already. (Ironically, since, as we know, they still can not legally marry anywhere in Japan except Shibuya.)

My expectations were low, but not because I expected this to be bad, but I expected nothing significant to have changed. And so it hasn’t. This manga remains a warm, fuzzy slipper of a story – nothing surprising, nothing alarming. Just a nice story told nicely.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 8
Characters – 8
Yuri – 8
Service – 2 Kuroi-sensei still needs a better bra

Overall – Still an 8

No no no no no no no.

That is the bulk of my reaction to Kodama Naoko’s Fujiyuu Sekai (不自由セカイ).

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Reo befriended Meiko back in high school when Meiko was not treated well by her classmates. Popular and attractive, Reo drew Meiko into society. Meiko joined the tennis club in order to be closer to Reo and, as a result, hurt her ankle during practice. One day not long after, Reo offered to walk Meiko home, but she refused because she was getting better. Reo went off and unknown to her, Meiko was attacked and raped.

Now, years later, Meiko is still making Reo pay for it.

Meiko refers to Reo as her slave, emotionally manipulates Reo and forces the other woman to run when she calls, keeping her from completing her coursework or having a life.

Into this tightly wound relationship comes one of Reo’s classmates, Hayase, who Meiko sees as a rival. Reo and Hayase get enough time together for Reo to draw some courage and tell Meiko that she will no longer be at her beck and call. When Reo tries to get in touch with Meiko, she finds that she no longer can.

Up to this point I was okay with the story, then it just went horribly wrong. Instead of Reo moving on, realizing that Hayase was awesome and the two of them getting together, Reo goes running back to Meiko…who tells her she was not answering the phone, because she was trying to be independent. The two of them kiss and live …what? Happily ever after? I doubt it.

Ladies – particularly if you’re younger and have not yet found someone you think might be “the one” – under no circumstances should you follow the lesson of this manga. Do not choose a broken, controlling lover over the empowering one. This is the wrong lesson. You deserve better than that. Don’t be Reo.

Ratings:

Art – 8 (I had high hopes)
Story – Could have been an 8, instead 5
Characters – Hayase – 8, everyone else 5
Yuri – 7
Service – 4

Overall – 5

It really could have been good, but it wasn’t.