Archive for the English Anime Category


Strawberry Marshmallow, Volume 3 (English)

June 18th, 2007

Sorry to be away so long. Life exploded again.

In a desperate attempt to find some balm for my harried soul, I watched the third and final volume of the Strawberry Marshmallow series. For the time it lasted, it was just the thing. ^_^ (And somewhat belatedly, and sheepishly for forgetting initially, my deepest thanks to Ted for once again making a review possible. Thank you Ted!)

In this volume, we continue to watch Itou Nobue, her sister Chika, Chika’s sociopath friend Miu and two younger girls, Matsuri and Ana do basically nothing. But they do nothing very amusingly. They sit around watching a hypnotist, play soccer, go to a public bath and talk about Santa Claus. Amusingly.

Miu is, as always, the highlight of the show. Having decided to “hypnotize” Chika, Miu says that she will turn Chika into her dog, Satake. When Chika leaves the room, Miu runs off, and returns accompanied by the pup. Matsuri, always the perfect straight man, believes that Miu has succeeded until Chika shows up in person. Miu comments that she’s a little worried about Matsuri’s future to which Chika rebuts, “I’m worried about yours.”

There is less Yuri tension in this volume than in the others. Miu continues to vie for Nobue’s attention, but that’s about it. What this volume does have is Miu actively seeking out situations to screw the rest of them up, and even better, signs that despite her protests, Miu absolutely cracks Chika up. Chika is also not above some retaliation. I approve. ^_^

The extras with this volume are nice. There’s a reversible DVD case cover that has more than one picture.  (See my review of Shinobuden for context.) Also a pencil board of the girls, with Miu featured on the other side. There’s a really nice video feature, as well – music videos of the characters accompanied by their image songs sung, of course, by their voice actresses. That was awfully pleasant.

Ratings:

Art – 7
Story – 8
Characters – 9
Yuri – 2
Service – 4 (bath, cosplay….)

Overall – 8

In fact, for her efforts in this volume, I think I’ll bump Miu up from Evil Psycho Lesbian-in-training to full EPL status. ^_^ For the gag at the bathhouse as they all drink milk, she deserves the promotion.





Ninja Nonsense Anime, Volume 3

June 6th, 2007

Wacky hijinks continue at Ninja Academy, news at six. ^_^

Thanks to our sponsor for today’s review, the mighty Serge. (If you’d like to sponsor a review, please feel free to purchase something from my Yuri Wishlist and become the hero of the day! Don’t want to buy something for me? Buy something for yourself through the Yuricon Shop and still be able to claim that you support Yuri with some level of accuracy!)

In Ninja Nonsense, Volume 3, we get to spend a little bit more time exploring the nature of  fanboyishness and its affect on innocent ninja girls. The resulting case of fangirlishness isn’t that surprising.

The anime begins with something that any Yuri fan will recognize – a clear parody of Maria-sama ga Miteru, the explanation of which, by the way, the liner notes got correct. So yay, no letter campaign needed. ^_^ And from there, we’re treated to not only wacky hijinks that involve Onsokamaru pretty much ruining everything, we also get bits of Shinobu playing dress up, the female Ninja Academy’s hypercompetence and continued, but mercifully brief, appearances by Shinobu’s otaku tendencies.

Which leads me to this thought – there has been some discussion on why, exactly, Shinobu does not attend the female Ninja Academy. She’d received better training and not have to live with a bunch of nose-bleeding pervy boys. But I think this volume answers that question, in a way. I’m fairly certain after having watched this that Shinobu is a natural fangirl. Sure, she’s picked up extra bad habits from living with the fanboy ninjas, but her cosplay obsession isn’t something she got from them – not *that* level of obsession, anyway. As stupid as this idea is – I think she belongs with the fanboys, as much *because* she’s a lesbian fangirl as for any other reason. Also, her natural incompetence at ninja skills would make her stand out in a bad way in the girls’ school. ^_^

What else does this volume contain? Onsokomaru inexplicably gets stuck in/on Shinobu’s little sister, Miyabi. A wacky baseball game, a visit to a hot springs (didn’t we do this one already?) and a suggestive moment as Kaede gets one of those “colds” that involves a fever and everyone “helping” her to get better. Which leads us to another gag – the “Shinobu tries to seduce Kaede, but it a totally fail way” gag which is kind of funny and also immensely pathetic. ^_^ Clearly one of the offshoots of her living with all the boys is that she has developed zero skills at picking up girls. I can’t help but wonder if she might at least have mastered *that* at the Girl’s Academy. ^_^

The anime, in other words, is more of the amusing same.

This volume comes with some very decent translation/liner notes, which I enjoyed reading. It also had a terrific extra – a group interview with some of the seiyuu. I love those. So that was nice. But there’s one totally “huh?” thing: One of the “extras” with this volume is supposed to be a “reversible” DVD case cover. I took a look, and well, sure, it’s reversible…but it’s the same picture on both sides. I still can’t quite figure that one out. It’s like a reversible coat that looks the same either way. Sure it’s reversible, but short of a ketchup stain on one side, why would you ever turn it to the other?

But anyway, this volume is silly, random and has short bursts of all sorts of fetishes, among them, Yuri. Another great Sunday afternoon, god-my-hand-hurts-from-being-on-the-computer-for-a-week-straight-I-need-a break anime.

Ratings:

Art – 7
Story – 6
Characters – 7
Yuri – 4
Service – 6

Overall – 7

Hey look! This blank white sheet of paper is *reversible!*





Yuri Anime: Best Student Council, Volume 2 (English)

June 1st, 2007

I, for one, am very, very glad that there is anime in the world like Best Student Council, Volume 2. It’s not particularly well-drawn, or well-written. The main themes aren’t deep and the plot ranges from silly to ridiculous. But the characters are cute and it never once takes itself too seriously. Which makes it just the thing to watch when one wants to take one’s brain off-line for a while. Many thanks to Ted for providing me with this few hours of low-toxicity relaxation! Our hero, Ted!

In this volume we get to enjoy various crises:

As final exams draw near it becomes apparent that several members of the Gokujou Seitokai are complete dunces

Council treasurer Mayura gets a (gasp!) boyfriend

An accusation against Rino for being an evil ventriloquist becomes a tale of Pucchan’s revenge against members of the council that doubt his puppet power

Sayuri’s past as a young master of her family sword style comes back to kick her ass

And, of course, the inevitable bathing suit episode, as the Student Council tries to keep the lovely women of Miyagami out of camera range of the boys from the surrounding areas.

It’s all amusing, fun to watch and entertaining, as Rein might say.

Yuri in this volume is about as Yuri as this series gets. By which I mean, it’s mostly in the eye of the beholder. Early on, we have scenes of Rino and Kanade spending happy time together, when a spot of fortune telling reveals the word “love” to the pair. There’s also the usual Kaori scenes of admiration/desire for Kanade.

But the most Yurified episode is Sayuri’s backstory episode in which Rein touches her – embraces her even – so gosh they must be together. And the girl who comes to take her revenge against Sayuri has massive Yuri vibes coming off her in waves. Must be the motorcycle.

Ratings:

Art – 6
Story – 7
Characters – 7
Yuri – 4
Service – 3

Overall – 7

Nothing revolutionary here, but if you like girls, character pieces, absurdly rich school gags, self-willed puppets and some Yuri-ish sorts of things, take a look at Best Student Council, Volume 2.





Yuri Anime: Kashimashi Girl meets Girl, Volume 1

May 21st, 2007

Let me start with the important bit – many thanks to the folks at Media Blasters for sending me a review copy of this DVD! It was really nice of them. :-)

The anime for Kashimashi ~ Girl meets Girl may differ from the manga in some details (especially in the pacing – for the better) but the main plot remains the same: Hazumu the boy, after being rejected by Yasuna, the girl he loves, is accidentally killed when an alien space ship crashes into the earth atmosphere. He is revived, but because of the limitations of alien technology, he has now become a she. As with my review of the translated Volume 2 of the manga, it was suitable, I thought, to review this DVD as we continue “gender identity” week. (Got a couple more to go yet.)

As I have also mentioned several times already in this review series, while Hazumu’s gender is changed, one of the main points of this first volume is that he, now she, is essentially the same person. When his best friend Tomari finally comes to realize that, she also comes to realize that she has been in love with Hazumu for years. At the same time, Yasuna confesses that she has a stupid plot complication disorder (SPCD) – she cannot see men, only women, aka “yurivision”. (No, not really. It’s just a joke – I saw it called that on an image board and it made me laugh.) Now she has come to terms with the fact that alone of all men, she could *see* Hazumu and she loves, has always loved, him. In order to not regret anything, Yasuna kisses Hazumu, upon which scene Tomari enters, and a love rivalry is born.

Let me start, as I mostly do, with the negatives. This DVD volume had the same subtitle problem that I encounter with My HiME. I can’t run it on any of the many and various DVD players in the house, only on my laptop using the new DVD drive and the new software. I find this irksome, since of all the DVD playing software, while the most flexible, it is also the least easy to control and pausing for longer than a few moments means I have to close it down and start it back up. Since I watched this volume over a few days…let’s just say that it didn’t make me happy. There was one typo in the subtitles (one very small one) and in one case the translation did that thing which sends me into apoplectic fits: A character yells out “Kurusu-sempai!” and the translation reads, for reasons completely unknown to me, “Tomari!” Whah?

In general the translation is – okay. It has a tendency to make things smooth and seamless…and voiceless. Everyone sounds exactly the same. The honorifics are removed completely, which will never fail to annoy me. (Back to my, “who do you think watches this?” rant. No random off-the-street twelve year old is likely to pick this anime up. You got to figure it’ll mostly be fans and I swear, Media Blaster folks, fans *want* the honorifics! That’s why fansubbers use them! I promise. Beat the leading edge people on this – go for broke, be a trendsetter, leave in the honorifics!) And, most damning, “Onee-nii-sama” which nets a nice translator’s note in the manga is translated here as “Sister Brother,” which just made me sad. (In retrospect I absolutely should have watched the anime before reading the manga since, by comparison, the translation for the anime comes off as lackluster. But let me say that it is not a BAD translation – it just lacks voice. And honorifics. And pizazz. And I am hugely more picky about these three things than most people.)

On the positive side, the translation made sense through the whole volume and I found myself caught up, again, in both Yasuna’s and Tomari’s internal conflict.

The first volume has 5 episodes, something I highly approve of. I assume the next two will have 4 each, completing the series plus bonus episode in 3 DVDs, which is completely acceptable, should that actually be the case.

And the DVD actually has some extras, not just ads and creditless OP/EP animation! This volume contains interviews by Kana Ueda (Hzumu’s voice actress) with the VAs for both Yasuna (Horie Yui) and Tomari (Tamura Yukari.) As I’m a huge seiyuu otaku, these made me tail-wagglingly happy. For these alone, the DVD is worth getting. IMHO, of course.

Lastly, let’s talk about the gender issue. I couldn’t help but notice two major things while watching this anime. One – while Tomari herself is the perfect tomboy, she determines that she’ll be the one to teach Hazumu “how to be a girl.” Her focus is on completely stereotypical gender role issues and ironically, goes exactly against everything she herself does. “No jumping down the stairs” she remonstrates a Hazumu who has never been seen to do so, while that was Tomari’s first appearance in the anime. Hmmm. Cleverly ironic? I really can’t quite tell. I’d like to think so, though. In the anime Hazumu has clearly been provided with lingerie by her mother – going shopping with Tomari is more a way to affirm Hazumu’s femaleness (and by extension femininity?) than a necessity. Which just works better than the manga “woops, Mom somehow forget to buy me underwear when she was buying me 800 dresses.” – even if the “how to put on a bra” scene is still just pandering service.

Second, the translator continues to translate the Japanese gender non-specific pronouns as “he” or “his” in regards to Hazumu throughout this volume, long after he is now, clearly, a she. I felt that that was completely appropriate for Tomari, but it seemed wrong for the others and especially for Yasuna. I *really* hope (despite making myself a complete hypocrite, since I also tended to refer to Hazumu as “him” throughout the anime and as the manga continued) that the translator will consider transitioning the “him” to “her” in the upcoming volumes.

So, thumbs up overall, but there’s definitely room for improvement. And please fix the subtitles. Thanks!

Today’s question: How do you you think Hazumu should be referred to? (Especially if you have seen the end of the anime or read the end of the manga.)

Ratings:
Art – 7
Story – 7
Music – 6
Characters – 7
Yuri – 8
Service – 6

Overall – 7

 





Front Innocent Anime

May 16th, 2007

If you didn’t know better, just from the screencaps you might be tempted to think that Front Innocent, also known as Another Lady Innocent, is a Yuri hentai anime. Well, I’m here to let you know better.

Front Innocent is, in fact, one of the most plotless “Plot, What Plot” type of hentai I’ve ever seen. ^_^; In fact, thinking back on it, I’m hard pressed to remember what sheer veil of a plot it wore, except that it was “rich girls wait at home for Onii-sama to make women of them” or something similar. It was like a Harlequin romance, with all attempts at mood, tone, dialogue and character development removed.

So, why am I reviewing this anime at all? For three reasons. 1) The art has the distinct touch of Urushihara Satoshi (so you know there’ll be lesbians *somewhere* in it), 2) it does have a Yuri scene and 3) It’s been on my to-review list for almost a year and I’m sick of looking at it. ^_^;

So, yes, the art was done by Urushihara Satoshi, so everyone’s skin is shiny and sleek and the faces look like all his other faces. The Yuri sex scene is so much his art that it’s unmistakable. More notably, the lesbian sex in this anime is *not* okazu, that is, it is not the appetizer before the main course…it is the dessert afterwards. Having had Onii-sama make a woman out of her, the main character is visited by her maid, who convinces her that she is the one person who will always love her. And then she goes about proving it in time-honored fashion. The main part of the scene is an extended session of tribadism, complete with Urushihara-esque pubic hair, with close-ups. All very exciting, I assure you.

There was something else I wanted to point out, too…oh, right, this was it. Have you ever considered the irony that there is so *little* Yuri hentai anime at all, when so many people still assume that Yuri=lesbian porn? No one, to my knowledge has ever made an anime that was, in its entirety, woman x woman (that is, no androids, futanari, okazu, other tedious plot complications) hentai anime. Most Yuri hentai is no more than one or three scenes in what is essentially a straight hentai anime – or has one of the aforementioned plot complications. I have to admit, if I had the money, I’d change that. The world is ready for straight (as it were) Yuri hentai, I think. Heaven knows *I* am. 

2012 update: Someone finally did…and it wasn’t that good. Shoujo Sect anime was laughable. ^_^

Ratings:

Art – 7
Story – 0
Characters – 0
Yuri – 8
Service – 146

Overall – 4

Hardly stellar, but that’s not what we watch porn for. Nonetheless, not to my taste much, either. I had to fast forward through most of it, because I was having trouble staying awake.