You may have noticed that almost all (if indeed, not all) of the gender-switch manga and manhwa that make into English are meant to be comedy. I have some theories about that, the chief of which is that for many, many people drag is, all by itself, utterly hilarious. Add to that the whole gender switch thing, and the joke is fall on the floor hysterical.

Not so much for me. I think I have yet to see a drag show that I thought was inherently funny. zOMG! Man in dress! is not enough for me to fall on the floor laughing. Even (especially) when it was Milton Berle. Monty Python did funny drag scenes, because the funny was in the writing, not just in the drag.

So, when I’m reading something like Your and My Secret, the story has to be funny for me to find it funny. The idea that Nanako and Akira switched bodies zOMG!, on it’s own, is just not enough.

Which brings me to today’s review.

Click, Volume 1 is, without rival, the least funny “comedy” gender-switch manga I have ever read. It beats out Yubisaki Milk Tea, which I found utterly without merit, for the position. Not because the gender switch itself is preposterous (it is, but it’s still miles better than being hit by an alien spaceship), but because the characters in this story are the most hideously unlikable, unsympathetic, cretinous characters it has ever been my experience to read.

The lead character, Joonha, is a medieval-minded sexist asshole. He believes that he is God’s gift to warthogs and acts accordingly. When it turns out that his family has a genetic predisposition to switching gender, he wakes suddenly female, but no less sexist, or one jot less an asshole.

Joonha continues to remain an asshole throughout, as she switches schools, deals with the important things like periods and skirt length (sigh) and other breath-robbingly comical situations.

The truth is, I so disliked Joonha that I found myself wishing her exceedingly painful cramps for her period. Stupid git deserves the worst nature can throw at her. Although mood swings would go completely unnoticed by the people around her.

Yuri is implied when we learn that Joonha’s father was once female and her mother fell in love with him then. If he had not switched, Dad and Mom laugh, they would have had to have been a lesbian couple. Ahahahah. And the girl that Joonha rejected with the most brutality and the least class possible, has vowed to track her down and be true to her – no matter what. zOMG. So, Yuri? Yeah, I guess. I’ll get back to you in Volume 2 to see if it gets any less miserable.

It dawned on me about 1/2way through the book that I will *never* understand straight women’s attraction to men who are loathsome and that no one ever smiles happily in a manhwa. I find it utterly depressing.

This is the first Netcomics book I’ve ever read. I have no quibbles about the reproduction, but I’m sure if I asked, I’d get straight-girl responses to the misery. (Last time I asked someone I know at a BL/Hetero publisher, I was told, “Isn’t it hysterical?” I looked at the respondant like an alien was bursting out of her head. No. It really isn’t hysterical.) I will give Click this – in comparison, Your and My Secret is much, much more entertaining.

Ratings:

Art – 6
Story – 4
Characters – 5 Joonha – 2
Yuri – 1
Service- 1

Overall – 4

Welcome *another* brand new Okazu hero, Gabrielle S. for sponsoring today’s review! Gabrielle – to receive your Okazu Hero badge, email me!

Akira and Nanako switch bodies with the help of a machine that then immediately breaks, leaving them stranded in each other. Akira likes Nanako and Nanako likes Nanako. Shiina is Nanako’s best friend and, now that Nanako is in Akira’s body, they are going out. Senbongi is Akira’s best friend and, now that Akira is in Nanako’s body – which Senbongi knows – he wants to go out with Akira. Because Shiina is cute and girly, Akira naturally likes her too, so all that’s left is Senbongi and Akira’s body liking each other to make a complete mess.

Which is exactly what we get in Volume 3 of Your and My Secret.

The bulk of the book is taken up by Akira (in Nanako’s body) playing Juliet to an extremely amorous Senbongi. Nanako (in Akira’s body) seems to be uncommonly jealous and rumors spring up about Akira and Senbongi as a result. When Senbongi attempts to actually kiss Akira (in Nanako’s body) at the climax of the play, Nanako (in Akira’s body) jumps in to break up the kiss, but ends up kissing Akira (in Nanako’s body)instead. Nanako (in Akira’s body) jumps up and, to cover her (his) behavior confesses his feelings for Senbongi. The girls of the school respond with doujinshi immediately.

While we all wallow in this crazy, wacky, unresolvable gender-bendy love quadrangle, there is one poor soul whose soul is not having any fun at all. Shiina, Nanako’s best friend now girlfriend, is confused, hurt and upset. In the very first sign of her thinking of someone other than herself, Nanako (in Akira’s body) apologizes to her (his) erstwhile girlfriend with a kiss. Whether you consider that Yuri or not is entirely personal.

The book ends with Senbongi once again trying to argue his case to Akira (in Nanako’s body.) He doesn’t care that the girl in front of him is really a boy, he likes Akira and thinks he’s cute as Nanako. End of story for him. But Akira states plainly that, despite everything, he likes Nanako. Senbongi apologizes for being difficult and leaves the room. Where can this possibly lead? I have no idea. I can see Akira (in Nanako’s body) competing with Shiina for his own body with Nanako inside. But I guess we’ll find out next time, won’t we? ^_^

So, Yuri is in the eye of the beholder once again. If a girl in a boy’s body kissing a girl is Yuri or if a boy in a girl’s body liking a girl is Yuri for you, then you will see this as Yuri. I’m more inclined to weight emotional intent higher than physical aspect, myself. And of course, there’s apparent – and amusing – BL too, for those of you who like that.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Characters – 6
Story – 6
Yuri – 3
Service – 5

Overall – 7

Today we welcome a brand new Okazu hero Elaine B. for sponsoring this review! Thank you very much, Elaine – email me at your convenience to receive your Okazu Hero badge!

Every fan of kitsch knows that there are essentially two categories of good crap. The first is the most common – so awful that it’s funny. The second is much rarer – purposefully dumb parody by smart people.

The problem with the former is that it is completely subjective. What you find hilariously tacky may be someone else’s treasured item. The fact that it is someone else’s treasured item is, of course, what makes it hilarious to you. A hilariously awful movie/show/book usually means someone, somewhere, on the production side, was taking themselves way too seriously.

The problem with the latter is that it is open to misterpretation by people on the audience side who miss the joke completely and take the show/art way too seriously.

Tantric Stripfighter Trina is in the third category – neither bad enough to be funny, nor smart enough to be dumb. It’s a painful reminder that someone else has had their manga published and you haven’t. ^_^

(Before I pull out the review scythe I want to be be very clear with short words, so you all – most importantly, neither writer nor author – don’t jump on my bacon and accuse me of taking this book too seriously. I did not take this book seriously at *all.*. Nor, I hope, did anyone involved with it, because the title is *Tantric Stripfighter Trina* and if you are taking that seriously, you don’t have issues – you have whole subscriptions.)

Okay, so, let’s begin at the beginning. In the first few pages, we are introduced to a culture that is so advanced that they’re clueless idiots and, despite their mad skillz in every cool-esoteric-Asian-sounding thing evar, were completely taken unawares when the loud, brutish bad guys flattened their planet. I feel obliged to warn any suggestible 14-year olds that read this book that not only should Tantric Yoga and Shaolin martial arts not be combined in your practice – they are almost impossible to combine, as they are completely opposite in nearly every form of external, internal and energetic discipline. I’m just saying. It’s a good thing the bad guys killed everyone, or their mixed energy arts would have made them all go insane.

The naming sense showed throughout this manga rivals Marimite’s Yumi’s. Tantric Yoga devotees from the planet Rama, bad guys named “Curse” and “The Legion,” and to top it all off, the cleverly titled government – “Crown” and it’s religious arm, “Cog.” But the names aren’t really what make this book – it’s the writing, which appears to be cobbled together from a lot of other stories without discrimination. I’m going to give the writer credit and assume he was going for trite and amusing. But the poor grasp of timing and sense show in lines like, “If you lose…well, let’s just say that you’ll be in no condition to experience the bitter taste of defeat.” Really? Well…that’s a good thing, right?

The art is similarly challenged. The characters are, as they are described in the back of the book, “boobalicious.” That should be an indicator that this book was written for and will appeal primarily to barely post-pubescent males who have not yet had the chance to enjoy actual boobs, which look – and act – nothing like the ones portrayed here. I do have to wonder where they found a 12-year old editor, though.

So, aside from the not-quite-laughably-bad story and the not-quite-giggle-making art, how was the book? After the initial setup, you find yourself sort of settling into a pattern – reading a few pages, then forgetting that you were reading and doing something else, then picking the book back up and being surprised that you’re reading it all over again, then reading a few more pages. By midway, you feel you have established a rhythm which is sustainable until the end of the book, where the tedium of the fighting vies for with the silly dialogue for fail. And then you are done, and you think – not really good. Not bad enough to be funny.

So, why am I reviewing this? Because happily – and predictably – there is fake Yuri in it. Trina’s reluctant, then annoyingly devoted “cybernetic sidekick” (I have no idea what that means, or how it relates to anything in the book,) Abbey, first encounters Trina in battle. When the Tantrika master (three languages cry every time that word is used) Trina “stimulates all of her pleasure centers” to take her out of the fight, Abbey decides to follow her. Totally original, I know. Abbey does manage to save Trina and later has a dream in which Trina thanks her for saving her ass by climbing on Abbey’s lap and kissing her. Abbey gets touchy with Trina, who is an advanced master of many advanced sexual energy techniques, but can’t recognize a crush when she sees one.

As a webcomic, assuming that both artist and writer knew that it was meant to be funny, this story has some potential. As a manga published by Tokyopop, for which real money was spent, I just have to wonder what they were thinking.

Ratings:

Art – 6 Good for webcomic art
Story – 3
Characters – 4
Yuri – 3
Service – 6 Pasties!

Overall – 3

My very real gratitude to Brigid Alverson of Mangablog, who nobly sacrificed her copy on this review pyre.