I don’t know about you, but I really can’t get enough of the atrocities perpetrated upon Romance of the Three Kingdoms in anime and manga. Unlike, say, Alice in Wonderland – which is already seriously WTF, Romance is staid and serious and political. So when anime/game/manga people rework it, it’s like dyeing Guan Gong’s beard hot pink.

In Dragon Sister, Volume 1 the story is pretty much left alone, except for one small thing…all the great heroes are turned into women. Unlike Koihime Musou or Ikkitousen however, we’re actually given a reason for this. To wit, the three Zhang brothers, leaders of Huang Jin rebels, are given magic that they decide they will use to save their land. In the course of their deep meditation upon this magic, one of the brothers decides that the best thing would be to turn all the heroes into women. Of course this backfires, turning them into women.

From there, the story remains surprisingly true to the original. Guan Yu and Zhang Fei, both of whom are female, meet an uncommon common guy named Liu Bei and the three swear brotherhood under the peach tree.

But, in order to gain status for Liu Bei, whose leadership of an irregular force is dissed by the loyalist army, Zhang Fei and Guan Yu sell themselves out to Dong Zhou, who plots to kill Liu Bei in the middle of the battle so that she can keep them.

The art is very person-focused. There’s little background art and the action is a bit hard to follow, but the approach is soap opera like, anyway – lots of people talking about things, and little happening. Everyone is cute as opposed to cool and there’s a lot of posing going on.

Yuri is mostly in Dong Zhou’s open, lustful, desire for Guan Yu and Zhang Fei. Lust for power, lust for women, 6 to one, half dozen to the other.

And yet again, Guan Yu is shown with a interest in Liu Bei that’s less like sibling and more like love. I am so going to have to re-read this epic, because the idea of making Guan Yu have a thing for Liu Bei makes me laugh. It’s almost enough to make me want to write a BL Romance fanfiction. Almost. Don’t get your hopes up. lol

Ratings:

Art – 7 The cover is worse than the interior art
Story – 8
Characters – 8, even if they are caricatures of themselves
Yuri – 4 Predatory lesbian could have been *way* more predatory.
Service – 4-ish The heroes all have breasts, yes, but it’s not like they are flashing them.

Overall – 7

It’s not like this is *good* really, but compared to other Romance versions where the heroes are large-breasted women, it at least keeps close to the original story!

Many, many thanks to Okazu Hero Martin S. for sponsoring today’s review. I’m always happy to see what nonsense can be done with the Romance.

There are two crucial qualities for a “Love Comedy” (as opposed to a ‘romantic comedy,’ which is something else entirely.)

First, there ought to be Love. Almost without exception, both Japanese manga and Korean manhwa fail at this part. (I don’t know if Chinese manhua does, since I have read very little of it, but I suspect so.) Instead of characters who love one another, they are filled with characters who barely tolerate each other and are, from time to to time actively violent both verbally and physically. This, we are meant to understand is because they *care deeply* about one another.

It’s not that this is particularly unrealistic. There are many couples who show their love by sniping incessantly at one another. But it’s less fun than a barrel of monkeys for people caught on the sidelines. (I’m saying this with complete awareness that my wife and I have a strong tendency to be that kind of couple.)

Translated to a story, it makes the characters really unlikable. If you don’t like him, we think, why not just walk away? Love is not some overwhelming magnetic force that means you *have* to stay with her.

The second thing a Love Comedy needs is Comedy. This is also something that manga and manhwa are pretty slipshod on. Flipping up a girl’s skirt is neither romantic nor funny, for instance. “Accidentally” grabbing a girl’s breast is simply not as hilarious as manga editors seem to think. And manic-depression in the form of denial, even when you call it tsundere isn’t really all that charmingly fun.

The problem with Click, Volume 4 is that it completely fails to have much Love or much Comedy.

There is *some* love. Joonha is “in love with” her idea of Jinhoo, but it’s not Love. It’s more like an obsession, or an itch. They would even make an okay couple since Jinhoo knows from years of experience what an ass Joonha is, but Joonha’s gender change is as much an obstacle to their being together as her original gender was.

Since we all know men and women absolutely, positively cannot be friends without sexual feelings for one another, a perfectly good friendship between perfectly good equals is ruined by Taehyun’s feelings for Joonha. On the one hand, it’s exhausting, on the other, Taehyun’s interest in Joonha is pretty much the only honest affection there is in the story.

And then there’s Heewon. She has no Love in her, for Joonha, for herself, for anyone. She’s wounded and angry and lashing out. And as a joke, she’s tired. Her verbal and physical abuse of everyone around her is exhausting, and the fact that Taehyun’s lackey friend is a perfect partner for her dominatrix side isn’t really satisfying on any level.

Every one of these characters has gobs of talent and money and not an ounce of Love or Comedy in them. It makes for a constipated read, something you watch like a train wreck, waiting for the inevitable crash.

However, I can’t find it in my heart to hate these characters. They, like Jessica Rabbit, were drawn this way. I can’t *quite* stop reading this series until Heewon gives up Joonha for good and then everyone will be tucked neatly in proper little heterosexual boxes, except for the Jinhoo x Joonha thing, which will be strung along as a fake BL story as long as the author can manage.

Ratings:

Art – 6
Story – 6
Characters – 6
Yuri – .5
Service – 1

Overall – 6

Thanks kindly to the sponsor of today’s review, Dan P. I feel bad for you, my heroes, that better stuff is not being translated, but your support is nonetheless very much appreciated!

Oh, and a Love Comedy that does work? Strawberry Shake Sweet. Funny, and actually about love.

I want you all to know that I REALLY tried. I took a deep breath, smiled and prepared to do my very very best to approach Maria Holic Volume 1, with an open and cheerful mind. It is absolutely obvious that Maria Holic is meant to be read as broad parody of Yuri tropes. (Yes, yes, pun intended.) What it is, however, is broad and crude.

Kanako is attending a very elite all-girl’s school where she hopes to become closer to the memory of her late mother who was a student there, and to find a soulmate, because she is attracted to women. Kanako is portrayed as a typical “onnazuki,” a person who likes women, but is too hapless and hopeless to get a girlfriend. Kanako falls for practically every girl she sees, which is both cute and sad at the same time.

Because this is not a romance, but a “comedy,” Kanako immediately falls into the clutches of physically cute, but emotionally sadistic Mariya, who is really a boy cross-dressing for reasons not yet mentioned. (I know they will be. I’m reviewing *Volume 1*.)

Kanako blunders around the school both befriending and be-enemying various characters, and generally making a fool of herself for our “entertainment.” The people around her act in ways that make no sense, except that they are meant to be exceedingly broad parodies of typical Yuri tropes, and so act like those tropes unrestrained by sense or sensibility.

I want you to know that I did my best to not read more into this manga than was warranted. I will *not* rant about how Maria Holic is not only anti-Yuri but anti-woman. I squelched that pretty hard as I sat there gritting my teeth, feeling more and more cranky as I read.

I will not talk about how a feminist reading of this volume made me want to grab up my friends Mr. Knife and Mr, Hot Tar and take them trick-or-treating with me, because that would be me being ridiculous and you’d all take me seriously.

What I will say is this – I found the anti-lesbian “humor” painful. At one point, Mariya calls Kanako “lesbo girl” and it really, really upset me. It was meant to be hurtful to Kanako. We’re supposed to find humor in her reaction to this. But, when in a single panel she pleaded with her dead mother (or the Virgin Mary, it’s really moot which,) “why is everyone picking on me?” I lost it and started to cry. If you found that line funny, I hate you. It’s as simple as that. It wasn’t funny, it was cruel. Bullying is not amusing.

When I reviewed the Mariaholic anime, I said that the anime was, at it’s core, about the emotional torture of a young lesbian. I can see that the manga is not quite that – it’s colder, more dispassionate. Where Sasamekikoto plays with typical Yuri tropes in a goofy way, drawing on their faces, if you will, Maria Holic is more mean about it – flipping up skirts and then saying *we* overreacted.

Ratings:

Overall – For me, it’s in negative numbers. Too many tears, too many nosebleeds, too much pain.

The very worst thing about this series is knowing that, instead of finding love in a healthy relationship, Kanako will be fall prey to Stockholm Syndrome, and Mariya – who is loathesome – will become progressively more sympathetic until we can justify what will clearly be an unhealthy, unequal, unreasonable relationship. Once again, it is Mariya on the cover, not Kanako. And that says everything there is to say about this series.

Thanks to Okazu Superhero Dan P. for sponsoring today’s review!