Archive for the Christian LeBlanc Category


High-Rise Invasion on Netflix, Guest Review by Christian LeBlanc

May 26th, 2021

Welcome to Guest Review Wednesday on Okazu! Today’s review is a gift to me as much as to you. ^_^ I was thinking about watching this anime on Netflix when Christian said he had just watched it and needless to say, I was delighted to invite him to bring us all this review! Please welcome Chris back once again, and thank him for taking one for the team. ^_^ The floor is yours, Chris!

When I first read the description for High-Rise Invasion on Netflix (based on the manga Tenkuu Shinpan by Tsuina Miura and Takahiro Oba), I wrote it off as silly, violent edgelord fare, along the lines of what I thought those Purge movies must be like. Fortunately, I gave those movies a chance and found a suspenseful string of films that turn a critical eye on society, capitalism and marginalisation, with a cynical view of where America’s current darker impulses are leading it. Unfortunately, I also watched all 12 episodes of High-Rise Invasion.

Well, I say that, but I’m honestly of two minds about this show. The first time I watched it, I could practically hear the writers coming up with the plot: “Wouldn’t it be fuXXed if you got transported to this alternate realm where you have to go from high-rise to high-rise across rope bridges, and there’s brainwashed people in smiley-face masks trying to kill you by making it so you’ll throw yourself off the buildings, because that’s the only way down to the ground anyway, and if the masks get damaged then they have to kill themselves, and there’s all different ones so there’s like a butcher Mask, and a baseball player Mask, masked everything right, and there’s like a ton of blood whenever anyone dies, and it turns out this is all a way to create God, like how fuXXed would that be.” (dramatic pause while writer takes a long drag off a smoke to let these ideas sink in)

I mentioned to Erica that I watched it because I’d heard the main characters described as Yuri and wanted to find out for myself, and before I knew what happened I’d agreed to write a review for her. I hadn’t taken any notes the first time around, so I watched it all again and, while I’m not proud to admit this, I started to enjoy it.

To start with: is this a Yuri anime? Well, the high-school aged main character’s name is Yuri Honjo, so there’s that. Yuri quickly meets high-schooler Mayuko Nise, and unsuccessfully tries to stop her from stabbing an innocent man in the throat. After their little meet-cute, Mayuko becomes ride-or-die for Yuri, blushing and looking away whenever Yuri does something cool, gives her a compliment, hugs her, flashes her panties, bathes or changes in front of her, kisses her while she’s unconscious and struggling for her life, etc. You know, the same way we all secretly showed our feelings for that girl we liked back in high school; for her part, Yuri pretty much feels the same way about Mayuko.

Is this a Yuri romance? Definitely not. This is grindhouse action/suspense through and through, but that doesn’t mean it can’t also be Yuri, of course, and whether it qualifies or not. depends on your own feelings. Mayuko blushes her heart out at Yuri constantly, but it never goes beyond hand-holding, even though they are intimately acquainted enough that Mayuko can recognize her crush by just a quick glimpse of her posterior (which actually happens more than once). Mayuko’s first love, however, is stabbing people in the throat. If there’s ever a second season we’ll see if she has to choose between her two devotions, but for now, we’ll see her face redden either from sweet emotion, or other peoples’ sweet, sweet neck blood. (And to be fair, this is a Shounen anime, which means that the straights don’t get any further than getting exaggeratedly flustered and denying any interest in each other.)

So what’s this all about again, anyway? Well, Yuri’s main goal is to find her brother, who’s also trapped here. Mayuko’s goal is to help Yuri find her brother (and, on a personal level, stab so many throats). Kuon Shinzaki has pink and blue hair, and an app on her phone that lets her use a giant building to shoot down other buildings; she wants to become God so she can bring peace to this realm. She also has a crush on Sniper Mask, an amnesiac, self-aware Mask whose goal is to recover his memories.

Aside from that, the show tends to abandon plot points, theories and objectives almost as soon as they’re thought up. Yuri rebelliously declares to Mayuko early on “I’m not going to kill any humans. I refuse to follow this world’s rules.” A minute later and she’s enthusiastically doing her best to shoot down a helicopter with just her handgun, and she’s unloaded a full clip into an assailant ten minutes later (before he commits suicide by biting off his own tongue, naturally.)

Various exposition-dumps throughout the show explain the different types of masks and how their programming bestows powers/constraints on the wearers. There is a consistent, if convoluted, logic to the masks, but the rapidly-shifting goals and theories the main characters have obfuscate this logic, making it feel inconsistent initially. Still, trying to puzzle out these mysteries helps hold the viewers’ interest in between gory fights with the Masks (or Angels, as the antagonists refer to themselves…Angels to some, Masks to others, I guess).

Trigger warnings? This show has geysers of blood, flying eyeballs, severed fingers and limbs, decapitations, and crazy amounts of stabbing and shooting. The violence in the show doesn’t bother me all that much because it’s expected for the genre, and even gleeful in its execution. There’s a ton of violence, but very little of it feels truly horrific; it’s all in good fun.

On a sexual note, however, Yuri is forced to strip at sword-point for a rogue cop (ACAB) in the first episode, but she’s managed to set his corpse on fire before things go much further. Happily, I don’t remember any further sexual threats to anyone after this.

Is this show dumb? Oh, it is so dumb. Yuri’s brother tells her over the phone that she should immediately murder her new friend Mayuko, because “In this world, there are no such things as allies.” (This very same brother is shown leading his own litter of new pals minutes later.) Sniper Mask’s main personality trait is smoking and looking cool in his stylish suit, and is so good at shooting guns that he can shoot a knife on the ground forcing the bullet to ricochet 90 degrees towards a target hiding around a corner. Yuri happily hands a firearm to a small child because he’s excited and would really like to see it. Mayuko’s shirt gets ripped open in the second episode, and until she replaces it with a slightly darker shirt in episode 11, she’s just walking around with her chest and bra completely exposed. Yuri never fixes the revealing rip in her skirt; characters change their priorities far more often than they change their clothes. Yuri can shoot ballistics out of the sky. Someone says the name of the show out loud. Characters gain new abilities as soon as the plot requires them, and the entire raison d’être is to simply show Masks looking creepy and cool in a wide variety of cosplay and violence. No, seriously; when it looks like one character is about to die, he at least comforts himself with how cool he’s going to look.

“Tasteless” is probably the best way to describe a show with this much blood, this many panty shots, suggestively-posed corpses, and a villain who calms himself by plunging his face into a Mask’s fully-clothed chest (she’s wearing one of those anime suits where the fabric acts like it’s painted on, you see).

I’ve given you plenty of reasons not to watch this show, and yet, depending where you find your bliss, I’ve also given you plenty of reasons to watch this show. If you’re in the mood for senseless, bloody violence and you’d like to see some ladies being badass and causing most of it for once, and you can dim your brain just to the point where you can buy in and enjoy the spectacle, then you might enjoy the bright, stylized, creepy bloodshed and mystery contained in these 12 episodes.

 

Ratings

Art – 6 There’s a very ‘basic’ quality, but it’s also stylized, and there’s no denying the care that went into animating the many sprays of blood.

Story – 6 There’s enough of a plot that it might keep your brain entertained by trying to puzzle out what’s going on, at least.

Character – 7 Nobody’s too complex, but it can be a joy watching Yuri flip her internal ‘cold as hell badass’ switch when she goes into action, ambidextrously shooting with both hands.

Yuri – 3 There’s a cute scene near the end where, separately, Mayuko and Kuon are each helping Yuri and Sniper Mask dress for battle, both wearing the same blushy, besotted grins as they think the world of their champions. Some viewers may need Yuri goggles to find any representation, but I don’t think you’ll need a very strong prescription.

Service – 8 Panty shots, bras, stripping, bathing, changing, anatomical impossibilities, and skinny-dipping into dream-states (my number refers to quantity, not quality). Conspicuously absent is a ton of boob-jiggle; I suspect the budget for that animation all went towards depicting the copious blood-letting instead.

 

Overall – 7 And I’m recommending this to nobody.

Erica here: /standing ovation/ Absolutely splendid review! You may have convinced me to watch it…after all, grindhouse violence, cute blushes and throat stabbing…it reminds me of my youth. /nostalgic sigh/  LOL

One point of order, The manga is released on Shueisha’s Manga Box app, and I’m inclined to think it’s Seinen, with that amount of blood.

Spectacular review, Chris!

 




Yuri Manga: Kiss & White Lily For My Dearest Girl, Volume 9 (English) Guest Review by Christian LeBlanc

May 29th, 2019

Hello and welcome to Guest Review….Thursday. Yeah, I dropped the ball yesterday and simply forgot to post this. But I didn’t want you to miss this terrific review by Senior Kiss & White Lily Correspondent, Christian LeBlanc of 3DComics! So please welcome Chris back and give him your kind attention as he breaks it all down once again for us.

Let’s cut right to the chase: this penultimate Volume 9 of Canno’s high school “Yuritopia” Kiss & White Lily For My Dearest Girl (translation by Leighann Harvey, lettering by Alexis Eckerman) is a better end to the series than Volume 10, and if you enjoy these books well enough but happen to only own a few volumes, you owe it to yourself to add this one to your collection, because s*** gets real.

How real? Well, one girl forgets her toothbrush after sleeping over at her girlfriend’s house, someone else gets so angry at the world that they turn to cosplay to cope with it all, and in the climax of the series, another girl tells off their mom and then makes out with the girl she likes! (Suggested listening for this scene: your favourite pump-up music, be it something from Sailor Moon, Kill La Kill, or, if you want to get real campy, the opening 27 seconds of “Everything Louder Than Everything Else” by Meat Loaf.)<

With that out of the way, let’s back up a little and talk about our final new pair of characters. Asuka Sakurada finds herself repeating her final year of high school due to a basketball injury that made her miss too many days (it must have been a concussion or something, because she’s only shown with a broken leg in flashbacks, and I assume the poor girl would have had access to crutches). As a senpai forced to join her kōhai, she gets a *huge* chip on her shoulder about it, attending only the bare minimum of classes, refusing to integrate or socialize with anyone, etc. Her self-destructive attitude becomes extreme enough that she turns to that most delinquent form of rebellion, cosplay, which is how she meets Mikaze Hagimoto. Asuka cosplays a character who has a lot in common with Mikaze and vice-versa, the two hit it off, and we quickly see them making out on school benches, fashion wigs and all.

All of this is framed as a tragic romance, by the way – the first two words in the book are “It’s over.” If you’re like me and have a predilection for the melancholy, it means good times all around: put on your favourite gloomy Cure record and enjoy the tearful scenes that are to come. (I joke slightly, but it does get dark for poor Mikaze, who takes the break-up very hard indeed: the color has gone out of her world, she can’t concentrate in school, she starts skipping classes…we see later on in flashbacks that she spent at least one night alone with Asuka, which perhaps sheds light on why she’s having such a tough time, if things had gotten that intense between them.)

I think a much stronger ending would have seen these two making peace with each other as friends, but, you’ve already seen the cover, and you’ve probably read at least a few volumes of this series before, so you’ll just have to put on a different Cure record, I guess (one of their happy ones, that make you want to live). This is why Volume 2 will always be my favorite, by the way – Chiharu is rejected, but we get to see her *move on*, and she gets the entire volume in which to do so. Here, it feels like Canno wanted to explore a good break-up story, but had to wrap things up in order to get her characters posed happily for the cover shot; Asuka’s sudden change of heart even feels more like a plot requirement than anything sincere.

As for flagship characters Ayaka and Yurine, both characters get the plot resolution that the entire series has been building towards. Both of their chapters start with the same event (viewing exam results, the only thing that makes Ayaka feel alive…I worry about how she’s going to cope after high school, actually), and then follows either Ayaka or Yurine for the rest of their respective chapters as they resolve their plots in a neat bit of parallel story-telling. Yurine even gets a call-back to the very first chapter of the series, which makes it feel like a better ending than Vol.10, even without things “officially” wrapping up.

For analysis, let’s back things up again a bit. Ok, a lot: having lived and died centuries before Yuri began 100 years ago, René Descartes likely did not anticipate getting the opening quotation, “Conquer yourself rather than the world!” In this book, this means bringing about change through internal, rather than external, factors. Ayaka can’t change how her mom feels, but she can change how she accepts and internalizes the support she gets from others. Yurine doesn’t stop feeling alienated because of how she performed on any external exams, but by realizing she’s been gradually becoming a “normal girl” with her own community of friends all along. Mikaze tries to become someone “special” enough to win back her ex-girlfriend, but realizes it’s much healthier to try and accept the break-up, who she is, and that neither partner should have to change to suit the other. And Asuka stops cutting herself off from everything, after realizing she’s gone too far in cutting Mikaze out of her life. To drive the point home, Asuka’s pocket mirror keeps getting passed back and forth between her and Mikaze, further reflecting (sorry) this focus on the self and internal change.

In all, it’s a wonderful volume of Kiss & White Lily – we get closure for plots that have been in motion since the very first chapter (along with some related tender scenes), Ai Uehara and Kaoru Machida each get some good scenes to help lighten the mood (Ai could be one of Yuri’s best supporting characters ever, if we only got to see her more often), Asuka and Mikaze bring some enjoyably melancholy drama, characters in Kiss Theater flit in and out of cameos as always, and anyone who’s ever been on a cover of K&WL appears in at least one panel.

Canno’s Continuity Corner: there’s an incidental panel of Ayaka and Yurine starting Year 2 from Volume 3 (this time drawn as background characters); Lyrical Seira, which Asuka and Mikaze are cosplaying as, is the anime from their childhood that Sawa and Itsuki went on a movie date to see in Volume 5; there’s some bonus Valentine’s Day vignettes at the end featuring our cover-stars from Volumes 5, 6 and 7; we briefly see Yurine’s little sister again (poor Sumire – this marks her last appearance in the series, and she only gets the one panel, just like in Vol.7). In one of my favourite tiny details, the exam results show Nagisa and Hikari from last volume placing in the top 10, consistent with their characterization as high achievers – not only that, but Nagisa is even 4 places higher, which fits with how she had complained “Why does everyone always put Hikari and me on the same level? I have better grades!” while a visual of their test results shows her getting 98 vs Hikari’s 97.

Ratings:

Art – 9 The thicker blacks compared to the Japanese edition aren’t as destructive this time around; I looked, but couldn’t find any tell-tale moiré patterns. A point is still taken away for how much art gets trimmed off the edges, though. Canno’s art is gorgeous, expressions are delightful, and backgrounds really contribute to the atmosphere in a few key scenes.
Story – 9 Plot resolution, dramatic tension, sweetness, cosplay…this one has a lot going for it.
Characters – 10 Ayaka and Yurine have grown a lot as characters, and their relationship has evolved over time to reflect that. Asuka and Mikaze with their cosplay were a fun change of pace as well.
Yuri – 8
Service – 3 As Erica said in her review of the Japanese edition: “I’m not gonna lie, that kiss was pretty hot”

Overall – 10

I still remember back in April 2018, how excited I was when the 2-page colour illustration from the opening was teased on Twitter, showing Ayaka and Yurine holding hands while they emerge from a cold, snowy winter and walk off into the warm spring-like foreground together; I immediately retweeted it stating “THEY ARE HOLDINGS HANDS THIS IS HUGE THIS IS NOT A TEST” in all caps. It’s still one of my favorite illustrations from the series.

And, you don’t have to be a genius like Yurine to know how things will end up, but you’ll still want to see how it all happens in the final Volume 10, which is set to come out on October 29, 2019 from Yen Press.

Erica here: “anyone who’s ever been on a a cover of K&WL appears in at least one panel.” Foreshadowing the entirety of Volume 10, frankly.
Christian, you deserve an award for this review. It was absolutely brilliant and got both laughs and thumbs up from both members of the household here at Okazu Central. Well done.





Yuri Manga: Kiss & White Lily for My Dearest Girl Volume 8 (English) Guest Review by Christian Le Blanc

April 17th, 2019

Welcome back to Guest Review Wednesday here on Okazu! Today we have a special Guest Review by Christian Le Blanc of 3DComics! His love for Kiss & White Lily is infectious. Let’s all be whisked away by his enthusiasm!

“Love is not gazing at each other, but looking in the same direction together.”

So opens Volume 8 of Canno’s Kiss & White Lily for My Dearest Girl from Yen Press (translation by Leighann Harvey, lettering by Alexis Eckerman), and it’s as romantic a spin as can possibly be put on this volume’s tsundere vs. tsundere cover stars. Hikari Torayama (reddish-brown hair, Tiger type, Ayaka analogue with her long hair and headband) and Nagisa Tatsumi (silver hair, Dragon type, Yurine analogue with her cool personality) are rivals for the position of Student Council President. Who can’t stand each other. And who also, as luck would have it, live together – a twist of fate has landed Hikari as a guest in Nagisa’s house. We need this plot device to force them to spend time together, because otherwise they’d avoid each other like the plague and we’d have a different pair of girls on the cover. Which would be a shame, because once I got over the fact that these two are not going to be acting lovey-dovey and give me anything to swoon over, I started to enjoy their relationship, which exists as a mirror for Ayaka and Yurine. Ayaka and Yurine are rivals who want to be more than just that, while Hikari and Nagisa can’t think of anything they’d rather be than rivals with each other. “Even if we stop being rivals someday…we might eventually see eye-to-eye,” Ayaka tells Hikari…”But just as classmates, of course!” she adds, still in denial.

The Tao of Canno

It’s easy to suppose how Canno came up with Hikari and Nagisa – start with the idea of tsundere vs tsundere, and then inform their personalities and rivalry with Tiger vs. Dragon, the eternally-opposed yin and yang of Taoist mythology (the kanji in Hikari’s last name means “tiger” and “mountain,” while Nagisa’s means “dragon” and “sea”). Both are symbols of strength, of course, and both girls dominate over the rest of Seiran High School: they excel in academics, they’re in competition for Student Council President, and they feel ‘larger than life’ compared to everyone else; they’re the boss characters, if Kiss & White Lily were a video game brawler (now there’s a thought!). Of Tiger traits, Hikari demonstrates protection: “She’s good at taking care of people.” She’s concerned about the smaller, more vulnerable clubs, and picks up after Nagisa at home. Of the Dragon traits, Nagisa demonstrates prosperity: she favors the larger clubs, and acknowledges that “My family is relatively well off.” They hang out on the forbidden school roof a lot (the heavens); naturally, the little white cat they’re looking after together adores Hikari and hates Nagisa. Maybe they complement each other, maybe they even need each other, but it’s no accident that we don’t see them exchanging chocolates in next volume’s Valentine’s Day back-up story. All the same, through their three chapters together, it’s fun not only watching them bicker, but also seeing how they react whenever something threatens to send them in different directions.

Our Returning Champions, Ayaka and Yurine

The book opens with Ayaka considering her own run at the presidency, which organically introduces our cover stars who go on to enjoy the spotlight in the next three chapters. Yurine has started to act goofy and awkward around Ayaka, a result of her growing and changing feelings towards her, especially after Ayaka helped her out of her depressive episode last volume. She’s torn between wanting to support her friend, knowing she could help the school as much as she helped her, but also knowing she won’t get to see as much of her if she wins. When Ayaka tells her her decision concerning the elections, it helps Yurine realize her true feelings for her, and grow out of her selfish and simplistic ‘deredere’ (constantly, clingingly affectionate) archetype. She can finally be honest with herself, something Ayaka is still struggling with when we see them again in the fifth and final chapter.

Speaking of this last chapter, Ayaka’s cousin and roommate Mizuki has had just about enough of Ayaka’s blitheness. She’s graduating soon, and, having been her emotional support for the past several years, wants to make sure Ayaka will have someone she can talk to after she’s gone. When she realizes that Ayaka still doesn’t even have so much as Yurine’s phone number, she demands that she asks her for it first thing in the morning, later hinting that she needs to be way more honest with herself.

It isn’t until the walk home from school that day that Ayaka finally does clumsily take the next step, managing to ask Yurine for her number. She tells her “Sorry. I kept you waiting too long” when she makes her miss her crosswalk light, but I think it’s meant to apply to more than just that.

This entire chapter, Yurine has been the model example of supportive. She knows Ayaka’s been trying to tell her something, and gently gives her the opportunity. Instead of making a huge embarassing deal out of getting her number, she just lets her know that she can call her anytime. Which is good, because Ayaka’s mom phones her that very night, triggering one of those depressive episodes that Mizuki was so worried about. Yurine handles it like a frigging champ, though. She didn’t really know what she was doing when she helped her out of a similar episode in vol.5 (we see an allusion to this episode on this chapter’s title page), but between that experience, and the help she got from Ayaka last volume, she’s become the epitome of everything you’d want in a friend helping you out when you’re at your lowest.

Lastly, we’re treated to two bonus stories at the end of the book. I didn’t really need an origin story for how Nagisa was recruited into the student council, but it did at least give Canno an excuse to bring back the eternally beleagured treasurer from vol.3 (who Yukina kept butting heads with…she even gets a name in this volume!). The other story brings back Amane, Ryou and Nina, the cover stars from vol.6, to show where the little white cat came from.

In fact, there’s a ton of returning characters this volume, obscure and otherwise: Rika “not good with her hands” Kouno is in one panel, who was only ever in two pages in vol.4. Tsubasa and Karin appear in one panel at the dorm, who likewise were only ever on two pages from vol.2 (Tsubasa was the one who accidentally locked Chiharu and Maya in the dorm’s storeroom together). We see members of the public relations committee again from vol.5, and, charmingly, their club sign that’s still only taped up over the more permanent “science” placard underneath. Characters who had leading roles in previous volumes play supporting roles here as well (we only get the back of Izumi’s head in one panel, but she’s there!). Not only does this provide more of an ensemble feel for the book, but it’s a good bit of world-building that makes Seiran High School feel more ‘real’ and lived-in. Further realism is established via small details like how Nagisa has a ‘lazy’ version of her hairstyle when she’s lounging at home, and how she and Hikari are on a first-name basis, sans honorifics, when noone else is around. This all makes re-reads a lot more interesting for me, because it always feels like I’m catching some small detail or other that I hadn’t noticed before. We’ll be seeing more adherence to continuity, as well as progress on Ayaka and Yurine’s relationship, in the penultimate Volume 9, due out very soon on May 21st, 2019 from Yen Press.

Ratings

Art – 7 I feel so petty bringing this up, but the English edition again uses significantly thicker blacks than the Japanese version, which causes tones and shading to suffer on occasion. Worse, however, are the jpeg compression artifacts visible on the front and back covers. As for the art itself, it is as detailed and charming as ever. Hair in particular has a great deal of definition and shading, rendering it with a great deal of volume and depth, and the snow and moon in the last chapter are rendered beautifully. (I’ll admit that maybe…in the right light…Canno isn’t all that great at drawing cats, but that just adds to the charm for me)

Story – 9 I average an 8 for Hikari and Nagisa, and a 10 for Ayaka and Yurine. We’re nearing their endgame, and watching Yurine be there for Ayaka was one of my favorite chapters in the series. Leighann Harvey has done a wonderful job translating every word, barring a weird side note concerning the quotation at the start of the book: my wife recognized the quotation, which is from Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s Le Petit Prince (uncredited here). The quotation at the start of the Japanese edition is already in English, and is closer to the more proper quotation “Love does not consist in gazing at each other but in looking outward together in the same direction.” I think Leighann Harvey must have translated the Japanese version of the quote into English, ignoring the English version that was already there, all of which says nothing of the original French version of the quotation (!). Not a big deal, just a neat peek behind the curtains of translation.

Characters – 9 There’s a ton of character development going on in this volume.

Yuri – 7 That might seem like a high number considering three out of four main characters are tsundere, but you have to keep in mind that nearly everyone at Seiran is in some form of Yuri relationship.

Service – 1, by default. (I thought it was a cute touch when Nagisa’s mom told her to stop laying around in her underwear, but Canno withheld such salaciousness from the visuals)

Overall – 9





Ms. Vampire Who Lives in my Neighborhood Anime (English) Guest Review by Christian Le Blanc

April 10th, 2019

Welcome back to Guest Review Wednesday! Today we have a special Guest Review by Christian Le Blanc of 3DComics! Christian has kindly watched an anime so I don’t have to, freeing me to finish up Princess Principal instead. ^_^ (About which I quite probably will do a review one day. ) So let’s please welcome Christian back and  give him our full attention. The floor is yours, Chris!

Sophie Twilight is, let me assure ya,
An anime fangirl vampira.
At the end of each night
In her coffin sleeps tight
With a bishoujo dakimakura.

Ms. Vampire Who Lives in my Neighbourhood (Tonari no Kyūketsuki-san), which is streaming on Crunchyroll, is a 12-episode comedic slice-of-life anime series based on the 4koma manga by Amatou serialized in Comic Cune magazine. Ms. Vampire herself, Sophie Twilight, is a centuries-old vampire who is practically the poster-girl for “Non-Threatening Vampires” magazine – she doesn’t drink blood straight from humans (she orders bottles of it online instead), and she enjoys manga, anime, and ordering anime statues and body pillows off the web. When she first meets our other main character, Amano Akari, she tells her “Don’t be afraid. I’m just your run-of-the-mill vampire passing by. Nobody suspicious.”

Akari is a normal…well, human, anyway…high school student obsessed with dolls, and becomes infatuated with the doll-like Sophie Twilight at their first meeting – so much so that, by the end of the first episode, she’s moved herself into Sophie’s house, much to her parents’ puzzling beatific indifference. Akari’s friend Hinata starts hanging out with them, as does Sophie’s vampire friend Ellie. Most of the humour comes from the culture clash of vampires and humans as they all spend time together – Ellie prescribes treatments for the human cold based on outdated concepts of the four humours, Sophie tries feeding nails to Akari because she doesn’t understand ‘food’, Akari makes a cold, bloody treat for Sophie which results in her penguin-shaped shaved ice maker looking like something removed from Silent Hill for being too disturbing, etc. Our cast enjoys each other’s company at Sophie’s house, the mall, high school, the beach, Akihabara, etc. Obscure bits of vampire lore come into play, but always in a cute manner, of course.

This being a moe comedy, almost everything about this show is light. The faux-baroque score is very whimsical and cute; nothing you’ll likely remember (aside from the opening and ending songs), everything just seems to fit the scene, and nothing really stands out as distracting. The color scheme is light as well – bright, pastel colors that suit the tone of the show and make it pleasant to watch. Any quarrels that *do* appear get resolved by the end of each segment; the first episode makes it look like Akari is going to become a constant harasser to a Sophie who just wants to be left alone (see: Ms. Koizumi Loves Ramen Noodles), but Sophie quickly realizes she misses Akari when she’s not around. Even the fact that it’s based on a 4koma means that the pacing is generally quick and light, jumping from beat to beat.

Naturally, any Yuri in this show is light, as well – the four main characters are all just friends, although Akari plainly crushes on / lusts after Sophie – just like in Ms. Koizumi Loves Ramen Noodles, our pursuer pictures herself and the pursued together in wedding dresses. Ellie, for her part, crushes on / lusts after almost any young girl she sees. Hinata also has a mild crush on Akari, just to round things out.

All in all, it’s mostly just a cute show to relax with if you want some light comedy and pleasant, fun character interactions without angst or drama, and just a smidgen of the supernatural with Yuri elements.

That said – when I first approached Erica about writing this review, there were only 3 or 4 episodes up. I could choose to review whatever episodes were already released, or, wait for the series to end and report back. While the chances were pretty slim, I decided to hold back and wait just in case any problematic issues came up that I should address. As you’ve probably guessed, I did find a little something.

Ellie (Sophie’s vampire friend), as I mentioned above, is the thirstiest character on the show. She’s also the youngest-looking character on the show – in fact, they spend time addressing the fact that she was turned into a vampire right around the onset of puberty, so she laments that she never got to grow more mature-looking. Akari’s human friend Hinata even mistakes her for a child at first, prompting Ellie to grope Hinata’s chest in anger before storming off, which makes poor Hinata depart in tears (wait, wasn’t this a comedy?). Ellie’s portrayed as a sex-positive 400-year-old vampire, who looks and acts like a child most of the time…which makes it ultra-gross when she gropes Akari’s butt at the hot springs, wears a revealing succubus costume for Halloween, suggests Sophie buy Akari a thong for Christmas, etc. It’s not that the characters are being flirty and suggestive from time to time that bugs me, it’s that they’re doing this while looking and acting like little kids who are drawn, and written, much younger than they are. It’s creepy enough seeing the camera pan slowly across Akari’s butt dimples at the beach, but watching her play with her dolls later in the same episode encreepens it that much more.

Ratings:

Art – 6
Story – 4 (not necessarily bad, just nothing really eventful happens)
Characters – 4
Yuri – 3
Service – yes, unfortunately.

Overall – 5

If you’ve read all this and it still mostly sounds like something you’d enjoy if it didn’t have the problematic bits, then give it a try and, depending on your tolerance, you may want to just skip past the first halves of episodes 5 & 7, the post-credits scene of episode 9, and episode 10 in general. You might even watch this and feel that I’m overreacting, and, that’s ok; I’m not out to spoil your fun, but I definitely want you to understand why this show might not be someone else’s idea of fun.

Erica here: Comic Cune is, of course, the home of moe, creepy characters, creepy not-quite Yuri and cake. If the service of the anime irks, but you like the premise, take a look at the magazine. The fan service tends more towards what cake are we eating today?

I also want to shoot a stern look at Disney for forcing this absurd title on the anime when clearly “My Neighbor the Vampire” should have been the translation. This translation absolutely ruins the flow.

Thanks Christian for taking a look at this for us!





Yuri Manga: Kiss & White Lily for My Dearest Girl, Volume 7 (English), Guest Review by Christian LeBlanc

November 28th, 2018

Hello and welcome to Guest Review Wednesday on Okazu! Yay! Today we welcome Christian LeBlanc of 3Dcomics.weebly.com to our loving embrace. Or, was that deadly clutches…I can never remember. ^_^ In any case please give Christian your full attention…as we head out together on today’s review.

By Volume 7 of Kiss & White Lily for My Dearest Girl by Canno, (translation by Leighann Harvey, letters by Alexis Eckerman) we’ve firmly settled into the template for a K&WL book: several chapters will showcase the new characters shown on the cover, and the remainder will focus on a ‘legacy couple’ (more than likely Ayaka Shiramine and Yurine Kurosawa, as is the case in this volume).

Our newest cast members are piano-playing junior-high student Haine Aoi (who has recently joined the gardening club so she can get closer to Yurine), and her supportive aunt Aika Yukimura, a senior at Seiran. (scratchy noise of a record skipping) Yes, I did say aunt, so let’s address this elephant in the room right away before it knocks over something valuable.

Canno portrays many different types of relationships in her work. Countless micro-stories fill the “Kiss Theater” bonus pages at the end of each chapter. Her story in Éclair: A Girls’ Love Anthology That Resonates in Your Heart follows a 28-year-old rogue and the 16-year-old girl who pursues her, and she’s even explored monster girls in a MONSTAR doujinshi (along with circle mates Nega and Kawauchi).

Non-romantic friendships are also valid story fodder, as we’ve seen in Volume 4 with Kaoru, Kohagi and Momiji. Here, then, Canno continues exploring different relationships between women by focusing on an aunt and niece, close in age, who were brought up as siblings. Canno even makes it explicit in one scene that they will never be paired romantically, when one character momentarily considers the possibility and is put off by it. I think Canno felt this was necessary given the expectations of romance set up by the cover (and genre) (and by contemporary stories such as Citrus, coughcough), but it still feels a little strange that they consider it at all. The alternative, I guess, is to not show this scene, and leave the reader with a seed of doubt: “but . . . are we supposed to think of them as a couple?” Better to just nip that question in the bud.

This all being said, Haine and her aunt Aika end up being a delightful pair to read about.  Their affection for each other is sincere and touching, rendered even more so by Leighann Harvey’s thoughtful and expressive translation. They both suffer anxiety over the idea that siblings are supposed to drift apart to some degree in adulthood, but Aika receives advice from a returning character on this. There’s also some tension between the two early on concerning piano skills (something they once bonded over nearly drives them apart!) and Haine needing her space and independence (I know she’s just at that age, but oh boy does she act like a brat!), so in all, we still get our ‘romantic conflict’ for our cover stars to work through.

As for our returning players, we see some major growth in effortless-genius Yurine and her relationship with hard-working honors-student Ayaka. We’ve already seen hints throughout the series that Yurine’s advantages over her classmates have caused her some alienation. This comes to a head when Haine triggers a depressive episode in Yurine by telling her she has an empty life for failing to find a passion for anything. Ayaka gamely tries to help her recover, still grateful for Yurine’s help back in Volume 5 when Ayaka was at her lowest.

Contrasted with this, however, is Ayaka’s negative reaction when Yurine later suggests throwing the exams to let Ayaka take back first place. Ayaka has always been comically tsundere before, but there’s nothing funny about her reaction this time – her words are cold and mean, with no underlying hint of “but I really like you!” at all. It feels especially shocking given how much Ayaka was earnestly trying to help Yurine in this book, and speaks volumes about her unresolved hang-ups concerning perfection.

This is also the first volume to end on a cliff-hanger, incidentally: as their relationship evolves, Yurine feels something different after one of her many kisses she’s forced on Ayaka, and it freaks her out – the next volume is about her sorting through what these new feelings mean, so stay tuned! Volume 8 is currently scheduled to be published by Yen Press on March 19, 2019.

Art – 7 Significant improvements: hair is given a lot more definition and shading, and there are more efforts to visually distinguish Yurine from Ayaka (their height difference feels more pronounced, for example). However, I have to knock two points off the English edition for being printed with significantly thicker blacks than the Japanese version, which destroys a great deal of subtlety in the tones and shading; scenes set in the dark particularly suffer from this. Additionally, Yen Press routinely trims off a fair bit of bleed art, and it was frustrating to see Ayaka’s and Yurine’s test results get cut off as well.
Story – 9 Again, Leighann Harvey has done a wonderful job translating this.
Characters – 9
Yuri – 5
Service – 3 My wife may or may not have uttered “Holy Bazongas!” when she happened to glance over my shoulder at the bath scene, and if you have a thing for Santa dresses, Canno’s got you covered with the introduction to the closing chapter.

Overall – 9

I really enjoyed this volume. There are many returning characters, giving the book a welcome ensemble feel for the first time, reinforced by four bonus chapters at the end. The two main stories connect quite seamlessly, and the Christmas backdrop leads to some very pretty scenery (the cover, with its snow-flecked poinsettia, pinecone and holly border sitting above a starry-looking field of snowflakes, is my favorite of the series for this reason). It’s also refreshing to see Yurine struggling for once – she’s come a long way from her one-dimensionally super-human portrayal in Volume 1.

Erica here: Thank you so much for your insight, Christian. If I wasn’t already reading this series, your enthusiasm and affection for it would surely convince me to pick it up! Thank you again for a wonderful review. ^_^