“In manga, no one can hear you scream….”

Or not scream, as in the case of Hitohira, Volume 1.

The manga follows almost exactly the same (non-)plot as the anime of the same name (reviewed last year by guest reviewer Hafl.) In short, a girl named Asai Mugi, who suffers from debilitating shyness, is coerced into joining one of two Drama clubs in the school, thus thrusting herself both literally and figuratively on to both dramatic and political stages.

Also like the anime, Mugi’s problems almost immediately take back seat to those of the charismatic and dedicated – perhaps too dedicated – club leader, Ichinose Nono and her intense love/hate relationship with the leader of the other Drama club, Mirei Sakaki.

Because this is manga, we are not forced to listen to Mugi’s protracted mumbling, or ineffective stutterings. Unfortunately, it also means that we aren’t able to listen to Nono’s wonderful voice. But we’ll take the bad with the good, I guess.

I was underwhelmed by this manga, but only because I find the story to be as thin as Mugi’s voice. The reproduction of the book is quite good, and the art is pretty much exactly what we have come to expect from the anime. Interestingly, although the book was published at the original Japanese size and reads right-to-left, Aurora has chosen to not use honorifics and reversed the names into Western name order…. It seems a bit haphazard, but doesn’t particularly affect the story.

Perhaps future volumes will be more Yuri-riffic, but this series relies mostly on Yuri goggles in any case. Nono and Mirei are a solid “best friends gone bad” with a frisson of maybe…if we squint hard…a little bit more than just that.

Ratings:

Art – 6
Characters – 7
Story – 6
Yuri – 2
Service – 1

Overall – 6

Much thanks to Okazu hero Dean C. (who is clearly angling for superhero status ^_^) for sponsoring today’s review!

In Volume 2 of Sunshine Sketch, Yuuno is settling into life at the Hidamari dorms. School life is filled with quizzes no one studies for, class trips, midterms no one studies for, festivals, lunchtimes, final exams no one studies for, waking up late and falling asleep in class, eating food, taking baths and other minutiae of happy school life. Just like in Volume 1.

Here was my freshman high school year schedule:

5AM Wake up
5-7 – commute to school, then to the YMCA
7-8AM Swim team practice
9:00 arrive at school late, exhausted and with red, puffy eyes so the junkie who sat next to me wondered what I’m on (totally a true story)
2:50 PM – class gets out, go to German Club/Trivia Team/Marching Band depending on day of the week
5:30-6:00 PM eat dinner
7PM-10:00 PM Swim team meet/football game/band competition

When I think about it, I cannot imagine how I passed. When the heck did I do my homework? (Well…I know how I passed geometry. A belated thank you to Suzanne for turning the pages in my book, and nudging me when I snored, and Edmund for doing all of my homework, except the stuff I cribbed off Barbara and Celeste.)

Anyway….

Yuuno’s life is about that level of busy too. She is joined in these daily hijinks by Sae and Hiro, who really would make a great couple if they were left to it, and punchline-girl Miyako, without whom all the setup would be wasted.

Yuri is pretty much on one page – two related gags that pair Hiro and Sae up and make the unneccessary extra point that Sae=Yuri, in case we managed to suddenly look away from the page at the key moment – something that is later negated for no reason whatsoever. It makes me wish I could see the continuing adventures (alternate fanfic version) where Hiro pursues Sae and they live happily ever after.

Ratings:

Art – 7
Story – 7
Characters – 7
Yuri – 1
Service – 2

Overall – 7

Another amusing 4-koma comic strip that makes pleasant reading, but leaves no lingering flavor.

Thanks be to Dean C’s sponsorship of this moment of nostalgia! Dean – email me and get your “Okazu hero” badge for display on website, blog, email or wherever fine digital badges are displayed. ^_^

Nanako is…a jerk. If she were a guy, no one would hesitate to tell her so. But she’s not. She’s a girl – and a cute one at that, if she keeps her mouth shut. Akira is…a wimp. He’s quiet to the point of being the creepy guy in the corner that you’re sure will be the one with bodies in the freezer.

The plot is…a handwave. For no reason at all, really, Nanako and Akira switch bodies. Nanako is relieved to be free of the stifling behavior code for girls and proceeds to be a jerk, but since now she’s a guy, everyone kinds of expects it. And since Akira’s face is a handsome one, she’s got the girls oohing and ahhing after her. Akira, too wimpy to say no, finds himself thrust in the role of caretaker to Nanako’s annoying grandfather. It’s no suprise that he makes a “better” (i.e., gentler and meeker) girl than Nanako.

Nanako in Akira’s body finds herself attracted to her best friend. Akira in Nanako’s body finds himself fighting off the advances of his best friend. It’s a big ole gender-bending comedy fest in Volume 1 of Your and My Secret.

Like mostly every other transgender manga that’s made it into English (indeed, like most of what’s been wrtitten for the mainstream market in any language) Your and My Secret is a comedy. The gender switch is played for laughs and shocked giggles of titillated outrage as each finds themselves dealing with a same-sex relationship via proxy body.

The down side to this plot is that the comedy resides in the most banal gender role issues, again. For instance, I learned that a girl’s greatest weapon is to look teary-eyed and weak. Call me a bitchy lesbian feminist, but, uh, NO. Unless, as a woman you bring nothing else to the table. If you are a woman who is dumber than toast, denser than a bag of doorknobs and have absolutely nothing else other than your looks, then yes, I’ll grant you that looking like a baby seal is probably your best bet. Good luck with that when you get old. Otherwise, as Akira’s supposed to be a brilliant student, you’d think he’d attempt to *think* his way out of a problem. Clearly his girl body has sucked all the brains right out of him.

The only other problem with this plot is that it goes on for volume after volume after volume. I really hope something happens to create a real plot in the next two or three volumes, because I’m not sure how much more of Akira not even looking at his own body, because it’s that of a girl, I can take. But given that this manga ran in Comic Blade, we have to allow all the “zOMG girl’s bodies have breasts!” thing. Both the wife (who liked it) and I are up for Volume 2, anyway. ^_^

As a short “ha-ha” funny take on unwanted body switching, Secret is a typical situation comedy set-up. I kept expecting Kate or Ally to walk in at any moment and explain in a sensitive voice why switching bodies is okay. ^_^; 

Ratings:

Art – 8
Characters – 6
Story – 6
Yuri – 2
Service- 6

Overall – 7

It just dawned on me that I saw the live-action version of this while I was in Tokyo. The acting was pretty damn good, actually.

Special thanks to Grace E. for sponsoring today’s review! Email me and get your “Okazu hero” badge to proudly display or shamefully hide. ^_^

Ah, those lesbians. Always unstable and lascivious, usually murderous, they are just like sociopathic male stalkers, but with breasts. Thanks to Frederick D, today’s sponsor, we can wallow in their perverted behaviors and unnatural urges!

The “lesbians” in this manga remind me of a vividly remembered “lesbian” character from a Tom Clancy novel who comforted a married woman when her husband went missing, but it was all a ruse to get into her pants. Excuse, me, skirt. Because real women wear dresses, you know. Only lezbos wear pants.

And so it is here in Lady Snowblood, Volume 4, in which Syurayuki approaches the end of her lifelong vendetta. In order to fulfill her vengeance, Lady Snowblood must bear the seduction of the overweight, sweaty and altogether unappealing head nurse at a hospital for children and, later, she uncovers the deception of a cross-dressing blackmailing murderer.

The best part of all this is the lip-smacking. I know, as do you, that us lesbians walk around eyeballing every straight woman, barely containing our drool. (I can’t even type that without rolling my eyes.)

After getting past the evil lesbian bosses, and after receiving a healing spell from her surrogate father, Syurayuki faces her final confrontation, which ends in a very traditional turn for the ironic.

Lady Snowblood has both gained her revenge and her salvation, as the story comes to a beautiful, ambiguous, melancholy end.

However. Somewhere, a new lip-smacking, evil psycho lesbian boss is chortling like Ming the Merciless, as she picks up the thread of perversion and carries it into the future. (That’s not in the book, I just made it up. It just amuses me to imagine this alternate ending. )

Ratings:

Art – 6
Story – 7
Characters – 7
Yuri – 5
Service – 5

Overall – 7

Frederick – email me and get your “Okazu hero” badge!