Archive for the Artists Category


Yuri Anime: Dear Brother, Set 3, Disk 2

July 30th, 2015

DearBrother3-275x390“The tears, they will not stop.”

We hear this sentence at the end of of every preview, but do we listen? The tears, all the tears which have not been shed by Rei, by Kaoru, by Fukiko, and by Nanako are going to come gushing out in the most horrible lancing of a wound possible. It takes a pointless, awful, stupid, tragic death for healing to begin.

Saint Just is dead. It’s not a suicide, and that helps, but it doesn’t change that she’s gone.

All along, we were thinking that Nanako was the mascot of this series, that the story was always about the beautiful people. But in the end, it turns out that Nanako, like Yumi many years later, is truly the protagonist and that she functions as a catalyst for the lives around her, is not entirely accident.

Misonoh Nanako, who can see the symbolic moments in her life, the rain, the wind, and the doves, has always been the center around which this tale orbits and Saint-Just was just everyone’s mascot after all.

Ratings:

Art – 9
Story – 9
Characters – 9
Yuri – 4
Service – 6 Bathing suits, nakedness

Overall – 9

It’s been a long time since this series ran on Japanese TV. Divorcing parents are no longer a scandal, breast cancer is no longer a death certificate. But, some things are timeless. Dear Brother is timeless.





Yuri Manga: Love Desu. ~Short Story Collection~ (ラブデス　ラブデス。~短期集中連載集~)

July 27th, 2015

lovedesuAt last, a Yuri manga that was written for me! I do not care if nobody else on the whole planet enjoyed this book, because I loved it.

Love Desu. ~Short Story Collection ~ (ラブデス　ラブデス。~短期集中連載集~) by Kuzushiro follows the bad kids in school. Bad girls, who are passionately in love with each other and beat the crap out of each other to prove it. This is not a manga about abusive relationships; in this manga, the violence is a form of affection.

We’ve talked about this before, but I’ll remind readers that I am not opposed to violence between equals. And, in “Love Desu,” – which　I would translate it as “It’s Love (Death).” –  Shouko and A-ki are equals, alright. Each with murderous intent and a fondness for violence, they hash out the details of their relationship through such heart-warming tactics as a needle in the eye, or a knife through a hand. But it’s only because they both want to be the neko in bed. ^_^

In “Nikochuu,” Mai-sempai smokes and Aika has picked up her bad habit. Ultimately, what she really wants is to capture what Mai tastes like when they kiss. Yanki girls smoking on school property and being rude to the classmates around them, but  ridiculously cute in private is utter squee for me. I adore nasty women.

So, yeah, I know that this book isn’t going to appeal to everyone (maybe, anyone). But I love this manga with all my love.

Thank you, thank you Kuzushiro-sensei for this manga! It’s just about perfect. ^_^

Ratings:

Art – 9
Story – 10
Characters – 10
Yuri – 8
Service – For me, 10. YMMV

Overall – 10

Yuri needs more yankis.





Yuri Anime: Dear Brother, Set 3, Disk 1

July 3rd, 2015

DearBrother3-275x390It’s so fascinating, isn’t it, when something that was life-crushing 40 years ago is pretty normal now.

There is a movie, Stella Dallas. It is about a poor mother who has a child out of wedlock. She raises the child while working, but when a rich sophisticate falls in love with her daughter, the mother all but disowns her, driving her daughter into her fiancee’s arms and keeping herself out of the picture. She sees the wedding through the church windows from outside, in the rain, because of course. In 1937, this movie was a tearjerker. In 1990, when it was remade as Stella, it kind of didn’t really make any sense. Single, unwed mothers were no longer a life-ruining thing or something to be ashamed of.

In 1975, divorces were just starting to become common. I remember when, for the first time, I was in a class where more students had divorced parents than not. It was just about then that the stigma of a divorce was starting to fade.

Now, in 2015, it has no stigma at all. Like, say, being gay, having divorced parents will not completely trash most young lives. It’s not to say that the actual action of coming out or going through a divorce is not difficult, but…

So watching Mariko in the beginning of Dear Brother, Set 3, Disk 1, crying her heart out over – and worse, suffering bullying because of – her parents divorce is a Stella moment. It doesn’t have the impact it would have in the 1970s…it wouldn’t even all that much in the early 1990s when the anime was made. Times change.

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As Miya-sama will learn, as Kaoru-no-kimi proposes the dissolution of the sorority. Watching Miya-sama’s delusions being eroded, while she sits in denial, was fascinating.

The school drama is far more interesting than poor Mariko’s personal drama, until we learn that Mariko and Aya had once been friendly rivals and in the end, save each other just enough to face another day.

And finally, we come to the most amazing, heartbreaking scene, as Fukiko asks Rei flat out if she hates her and Saint Juste breaks down completely over her feelings of love and hate for her half-sister.

This volume is a rough ride. I think I ended every episode by saying, “Wow, this is a depressing series.” But for all that, it’s one of the most deep, complex and in many ways human, dramas I’ve ever watched. The characters by now are all so fully fleshed out that you can see them as humans, rather than ciphers. These were the days before one-issue/joke per character was the rule. Everyone has flaws, everyone has strengths.

My personal favorite scene is when Nanako notices that drama-signifying doves have all left and no one else notices that there were ever any doves at all.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 9
Characters – 9
Yuri – 2
Service – 4 Naked Rei.

Overall – 9

To the end, Miya-sama remains selfish and mean. And in our hearts we can never even imagine her as anything but.





Yuri Manga: Awajima Hyakkei (淡島百景)

July 2nd, 2015

I know this is going to sound a little strange, but I never really know what I’ll get with a new Shimura Takako series. I mean, yes, she has blown me out of the water with Aoi Hana/Sweet Blue Flowers, but she’s also left me cold in any number of other series. In fact, her work most resembles Melissa Scott‘s science-fiction to me. I love the characters, but find the almost-passionless storytelling hard to warm up to. I just wish I could feel her in her work.

In Awajima Hyakkei, Shimura takes on a topic of much interest to Yuri fans all over the world – the student body of a famous all-female musical revue school that is definitely not that other famous all-female musical revue troupe that might automatically come to mind.

Each chapter focuses on two of the people at the school, the relationship between then, the circumstances of their friendships or rivalries and what the connections in the school mean to them afterwards. This volume is not in any way tidy. The whole thing is non-linear and is easier to read if you stop looking for “the story” and start just letting the character profiles work on their own. Eventually they tie back to the beginning and eventually we start to feel the threads of fate that bind everyone in the school.

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There is a little bit of Yuri, in a story about first love. It is the kind of classic old 20th century retrospective, where the love the character feels is recognized mostly as she looks back as an adult.

Some of the best parts of the volume are those vignettes set in the past. My favorite chapter was towards the end when a new student uncovers the family history of one of her teachers and learns that she’s a third-generation star.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – Variable, averaging 7
Characters – 7
Yuri – 3
Service – 1 on principle

Overall – 7, but I think it will improve with a re-read.

As the title says, this series is “One Hundred Views” of a respected establishment, rather than a single tale. And, like a famous landmark seen for the first time, it will get better with a second viewing.





Yuri Manga: Strawberry Shake (ストロベリーシェイク)

June 28th, 2015

downloadIt was the beginning of 2004. The magazine was called Yuri Shimai. The comic was an actual comedy, with physical gags blown way out of proportion. There was an idiot and a doofus and they fell in love, but didn’t realize it. The comedy was manzai-style, with blood and tears and extreme over-reactions to silly jokes. It was Hayashiya Shizuru’s professional Yuri debut. She’d been drawing doujinshi in that same style for years, and made her pro debut previously, but for those of us who were or would become fans, Strawberry Shake Sweet was the first time she was a pro “Yuri” artist.

Yuri Shimai was cancelled and in 2005,  Yuri Hime picked up the series. In 2006, a collected Volume 1 was released, followed by Volume 2 in 2009. Hayashiya-sensei left Yuri Hime and has gone on to do great things with Shuiesha. And so it is with both delight and trepidation that I review Shueisha’s re-release of this series as a one-volume collection, Strawberry Shake (ストロベリーシェイク).

The story follows Tachibana Julia a young “Talent” in Japanese TV. (Which is to say she does everything and anything, from starring in TV dramas, to advertisements, to quiz shows.) She’s asked to mentor a newcomer to the agency, Asakawa Ran, but instead, falls in love with Ran.

Ran isn’t the brightest bulb in the box, and Julia isn’t much better. Between the two of them and very much despite the objections of their manager, they’ll have to figure it all out on their own.

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Strawberry Shake is very much played for the laughs. Touching or romantic moments are frequently marked by massive nosebleeds. If you’re not used to Hayashiya-sensei’s style, or classic manzai, the amount of violence might surprise you. The other thing that might surprise you is the ending. As I said when I reviewed Volume 2, “I absolutely refuse to spoil the rest of the chapter, except to say that you will probably be outraged and/or disappointed by the end.”

So, here we are over a decade after the comic was originally begun and a lot of things have changed. Yuri is a genre of it’s own. Hayashiya-sensei is a star among Yuri artists. And same-sex marriage is a thing that is discussed in the news, in the courts. Even in Japan, where Shibuya is the only part of the country that allows same-sex marriage, the conversation has begun.

What does that mean for a comic like Strawberry Shake? It means that some of the jokes just don’t hold up that well. Saeki Ryouko, Julia and Ran’s manager, in 2004 was a comedic figure. In 2015, she seems just like a closeted homophobe. Sorry Saeki-san, but you protest *way* too much. ^_^ Comedy is harder than tragedy. In Strawberry Shake, the comedy is vaudevillian, and so, a relic of the past, rather than a joke we’re all laughing at now.

The essential love story is still cute and maddening and adorable and sweet. ZLAY is still absolutely fucked up hilarious. The climax of the manga is still fantastic. And the new extra chapter? “I absolutely refuse to spoil the rest of the chapter, except to say that you will probably be outraged and/or disappointed by the end.” ^_^;

Should you get it? Yes. This is an important book for Yuri fans. Will you like it? Maybe. ^_^

Ratings:

Art – 9 It’s striking to see just how much better her art is now than it was in 2004. This volume has been touched up, but look at the first and final chapters to see a difference.
Story – 7 It has worn a little around the edges over time.
Characters – 8
Yuri – 8
Service – 2

Overall – 8

Again I will quote myself from 2009: “As funny as this manga is, I’m forced to conclude that this story is not *quite* as perfect for Hayashiya-sensei as Hayate x Blade. The action component just catapults that series to perfection.

But hey – this is a groundbreaking series. A Yuri series for Yuri magazine by a woman who has been drawing Yuri comedy for a long, long time. A must-have for any fan of Yuri.”