Archive for the Guest Review Category


My Idol Sits The Next Desk Over Volume 4, Guest Review by Luce

October 12th, 2022
Welcome to another Guest Review Wednesday here on Okazu, featuring the perspective of Luce!
 
Over the course of the first three volumes, we’ve come to know Sakiko, a devoted fan of her favourite idol group Spring Sunshine; Maaya, a possessive fan of the same group; and Chihiro, the favourite idol of both Sakiko and Maaya. We’ve seen Sakiko come out of her shell, Maaya become… well, stay very Maaya, and Chihiro staying on the path of an idol with the support of the other two. Last time, we left on a cliffhanger of sorts, with Sakiko seeing one of the girls who had been somewhat unkind about Chihiro and her boyfriend at a festival at which Spring Sunshine are performing. 
 
In volume 4 of My Idol Sits the Next Seat Over, Sakiko encourages her disparaging classmate to give Spring Shine a watch, and while not converted, she can see that they put a lot of effort in. Chihiro and the group practice for the summer concert, held in an even bigger venue then normal – meaning tough dance routines to learn. We find out a little of Maaya’s home life, and maybe why she’s so… focused on the things she is. Finally, Chihiro and Sakiko plan a surprise for Maaya’s birthday, and Chihiro lands an acting role! 
 
I really liked the storyline with the classmate, and the ending of that – that you can recognise the work that goes into something and respect that without it necessarily being your thing. Her boyfriend was adorable as well. Again, we see that having friends who know and appreciate her idol work is very comforting to Chihiro, who is struggling with the dance routines. This manga is fairly light on the negative aspects of being an idol (although it certainly doesn’t completely shy away from them) but it’s nice to see the background, the hard work that goes into the routines and the staging. I also like how it’s balanced – Chihiro loves her work, but finds some of it difficult and has to work harder at it. 
 
The big thing covered in this volume was Sakiko and Maaya’s relationship. Maybe not when Chihiro is around, but we see Maaya feeling more conflicted about shrugging Sakiko off, and with her backstory, you start to understand somewhat where she’s coming from with her obsessional love of Chihiro. One thing is for sure, and it’s that Maaya needs a better mother than the one she has. She is mellowing a bit though, even though she’d hate anyone to point it out.  
 
This volume also ends on an cliffhanger – a pretty yuri-ish one! Genuinely wasn’t sure how it was going to go, but if you want to find out, volume five is already out! Review upcoming… Eventually. I felt like the Yuri quotient was upped here – Sakiko and Maaya certainly got closer in some aspects. I’m not sure it will actually end up in a romance, but it feels like it’s edging closer that way. We’ll have to see! 
 
Story: 7
Art: 8, it’s bright and sunny, like the subjects
Yuri: a cliffhanger 7…
Overall: 8 
 

If you can forgive Maaya’s worse antics in the first few volumes, especially if you like idols, this is worth getting into.  

Erica here: Thank you Luce for taking the time to keep our attention on this series. I know I appreciate your perspective of the characters dynamics a great deal!





Yoru to Umi, Volume 3 French Edition, Guest Review by Laurent Lignon

September 21st, 2022

Welcome back to Guest Review Wednesday on Okazu, where we welcome back our French language Journaliste/Chroniqueur, Laurent Lignon. Laurent is finishing up this series for u s – don’t miss his reviews of Volume 1 and Volume 2. Please give him your kind attention – the floor is yours, Laurent!

NOTE : this review is based on the French translation of the third and final volume of the series, Yoru to Umi, Plongée dans la nuit, released in stores by Taifu Comics http://www.taifu-comics.com/

“I learned the secret to let it go a long while back. If everything I held had to disappear at some point, then I’d be better if I’ve never cherished them in the first place.”

A third year has passed for Tsukiko and Aya, and both girls starts to think about what the future will hold for them and their relationship. Aya is sure they’ll keep some sort of contact, despite going to different universities, but has no ideas of what to do with her future life. Tsukiko feels the same, unsure of what she want to do but having already assumed that their relationship will stop when both of them will leave college.

This pushes the story in three different directions.

Aya understands what was already revealed to the reader in the previous volume: the swimming pool in which she spent most of her time is representing her teenage years, and she needs to go out of it and face newer swimming challenges to actually move on in her life. Having understood that, she’ll try to confront her greatest fear: swim into the ocean. And while that first ‘confrontation’ goes as humorously badly as expected, it helps Aya understand that it is time for her to enter adult life and carve her own path. However, she is not ready yet to leave Tsukiko behind.

On the other hand, Tsukiko finally unlocks from her memories the reasons behind her attraction to Aya. And, most importantly, why there is nothing more that she loves than to see Aya swimming. Having understood that, she also finds what her purpose in life will be but comes to the conclusion that her presence will prevent Aya from moving on with a life of her own. Thus, she takes the hard decision to cut the ties gently with Aya.

The third path is, once again, a vision of their relationship through the eyes of a secondary character. This time it is Jûmonji, a friend of Maihara who hides her own aromanticism behind her only hobby : otome video games. Thus, she is quick to understand the dynamics between Tsukiko and Aya, comparing their roles to characters found in her favorite games while not understanding why none of them goes any further in their relationship.

Goumoto-sensei likes to play with the expectations of her readers. When the separation finally comes, it is with a soft wind and not a storm. This is done with the perfect level of emotional writing, and Tsukiko is clearly written as aromantic despite liking the time she spends with Aya. This looks like a bittersweet ending, but then the epilogue (with its brilliant humorous double plot twist) gives us everything we hoped to see while respecting the personality of each of the characters. This is complemented by a bonus chapter, which takes place after the epilogue, and which shows how much each of them has matured, with Tsukiko doing something she has never done before for anyone else.

This is the story of a different type of love, one that isn’t based on romantic or sexual elements. An aromantic story ? Perhaps, at least from Tsukiko’s point of view. But as Aya said as the final word in the book, finally acknowledging and understanding how each woman feels about the other :

“This distance between us is our bond.”

ART – 9 : as usual, some magnificent backgrounds especially in the epilogue
STORY – 8 : a different Yuri, yet a beautiful if unusual story
CHARACTERS – 8 : this is good to see both girls mature and understand what must be done to move on. But once again, there are barely any secondary characters save Jûmonji.
SERVICE – 1 : swimsuits, mostly
YURI – 8

OVERALL – 8

Erica here: Well, that ending sounds like it’s worth reading! I’ll have to take a look at this. This manga IS licensed in English as The Evening and the Sea by Houbunsha through the MangaPlaza manga platform.Maybe I’ll give this a chance to test out the platform. ^_^

Thanks so much Laurent!

 
 




Otherside Picnic Manga, Volume 2 Guest Review by Sandy F

August 31st, 2022

Welcome to another Guest Review Wednesday on Okazu! Today we welcome back Sandy F, for continuing coverage on the Otherside Picnic manga from Square Enix. Please give him your kind attention and take it away, Sandy!

After quite a wait we have Volume 2 of the manga version of Otherside Picnic, with the conclusion of ‘Surviving the Eight-Foot-Tall Lady’, a large chunk of ‘Station February’ and a bonus original story ‘Late-night Chicken and a Gorilla’. It is worth the wait. I wonder if it this volume should have been titled ‘Out of the Frying Pan into the Fire’ as we follow Sorawo and Toriko surviving by the skin of their teeth. They celebrate their survival but afterwards wander into more trouble where they confront different Otherside Entities and just as dangerous, stranded US marines.

In ‘Late-night Chicken and a Gorilla’ Kozakura muses on how the mirror cube offers a different perspective on how to perceive the world, and I find that the manga does something similar in how it tells the story of the Otherside when compared with the novels. For example, in the novels everything is told from Sorawo’s perspective and her responses to what is happening around her. However, in the manga although Sorawo is the narrator, through the artwork we don’t have to rely upon her perception of what is going on. So, we witness Toriko’s growing feelings for Sorawo that challenges Sorawo’s ‘why would Toriko want to be with me’ mode.

The artwork continues to be effective in conveying why I enjoy this series so much. The ability to shift from the goofiness that is Toriko, the sullenness that is Sorawo to the insanity inducing visions of the Otherside is amazing. The artist does a wonderful job of conveying the ‘bloody hell’ moment when Sorawo and Toriko realise that they have unexpectedly arrived in the Otherside at night-time.There are some neat moments when we see Sorawo and Toriko strengthen their bonds as accomplices both in enjoying a drinking party and the terrors of the Otherside.

With ‘Late-night Chicken and a Gorilla’ we hear Kozakura’s voice. From wondering why she ate so much KFC, to an analysis of her thoughts on the nature of the mirror cube and what can she do about those meddlesome kids Toriko and Sorawo who are intruding in her life. With this story we see glimpses of Kozakura as a more complicated person than, for the most part, we see in the main novels.
All in all, a great read and now the wait begins for the next volume.

Story – 9
Artwork 9
Character – 8
Service – 4
Yuri – 5

Overall – 9

Erica here: Thank you Sandy! From my perspective what makes the manga so worth my time is that the art is quite good at capturing the qualities that make the Otherside creepy or scary, while also showing us the still-inexplicable, (sometimes less terrifying, occasionally more,) things that Sorawo can see with her blue eye. This adds an extra layer of confusion and fear to every story without being gross or, as the anime played it, boo!-scary.

I especially like the conclusion to the Eight-Foot Tall Lady story. That has stuck with me since I read it the first time. It’s going to have repercussions for volumes to come. The art here really captures the sights and feel of the Otherside in a way the LN art really had no chance to do. Looking forward to Volume 3, which will be heading our way in December!





Project A-ko **Perfect Edition** Blu-ray, Guest Review by Matt Marcus

August 17th, 2022

Welcome back to another Okazu Guest Review Wednesday! Today we welcome back Matt Marcus once again. Matt is a cohost of various projects on the Pitch Drop Podcast Network, such as the JRPG games club podcast Lightning Strikes Thrice that is currently covering Final Fantasy VIII.

Back in March 2021, Discotek Media’s official Twitter account posted that they were canceling their planned digital restoration of the first Project A-ko film for their upcoming Blu-ray release. In its place, they announced that the Blu-ray would instead be based on an upscaling of an original 35mm master, all copies of which were once thought to be lost to time. It was both a stroke of good luck for classic anime fans and a cautionary tale about proper filing procedures (said copy of the film had been filed under the wrong name and had been hiding for years). Project A-ko **Perfect Edition** released in December of 2021.

It is hard to feel the need to introduce this film, given its historical significance and how Erica has previously covered it on the site, but here is a brief overview: Project A-ko is a 1986 theatrical film produced by APPP, the creators of the Cream Lemon series of adult OVAs. It is a wacky screwball action comedy that is lavishly animated and stuffed to the gills with parody and references to other media (including but not limited to Fist of the North Star, Super Dimension Fortress Macross, Super Dimension Cavalry Southern Cross, Creamy Mami, Harmadeggon, Captain Harlock, Starship Troopers, Megazone 23, The Flying Phantom Ship, Wheels on Meals, The Long Goodbye, and a couple of famous American comic book characters).

The premise is simple: head–and body–strong teenager A-ko and her childhood friend C-ko start their first year of high school in a posh girls school and run afoul of B-ko, the resident queen bee, who falls head-over-heels for C-ko. Oh and there is a crew of female aliens who are looking for their lost princess. Also B-ko is a mecha engineering genius? Look, the film opens with a “meteor” decimating a major city and then immediately cuts to sixteen years in the future where the city has been rebuilt inside the impact crater. Wild stuff all around.

Watching this film for the first time in 2022, I found a lot to like and a few things to side-eye. The mecha and spaceship design is gorgeous. The music is the perfectly aged flavor of ‘80s cheese. The detail put into the destruction of many, many bits of the environment is something to behold. Nevertheless, this is the Cream Lemon team, so even though the content is not R18 there are still a couple scenes of teen nudity and countless panty shots. A few other gripes: B-ko is a psycho lesbian trope (even though I love her); there is a surprising amount of murder happening being treated as slapstick; and I have no idea who finds C-ko’s wailing anything other than incredibly grating. I try to imagine an ‘80s salaryman watching this film in theaters, chuckling to himself as he thinks, “Oh ho ho, that C-ko is crying again! What mirth this bestows upon me!”

What really interested me the most with this release is the plethora of extra features, the standout being the 30 minute mini-documentary aptly titled The Music of Project A-ko. It is centered around interviews with the writing and composing duo of Richie Zito and Joey Carbone, as well as singers Annie Livingstone and Samantha Newark. (Sadly, Valerie Stevenson, who sang lead on C-ko’s theme song “Follow Your Dreams”, passed away in 2015.) As a music production nerd, it was very fun to hear the history of how the music made it to the film. I would also highlight the small featurette on the scrapped CD-ROM game, which is especially entertaining if you experienced PC gaming in the ‘90s.

It’s clear that Discotek had a lot of love for this film. As a newcomer to it, I appreciate it more than I like it. If you love Project A-ko, you’ve already bought this. For those who have yet to check it out, there is fun to be had if you allow it some grace for its vintage.

Art – 9 This is what you are here for, seeing lots of things crumble, shatter, tear, and explode
Story – 6 The story is just an excuse for gags and action, which it does well enough
Characters – 5 There’s some fun rapport but this is not a character-focused vehicle
Service – 7 Yes, definitely
Yuri – 5 / LGBTQ – 0 To quote one of the extra features, “B-ko’s obsession with C-ko seems to border on the homosexual”

Overall – 8 The currently best way to enjoy a classic

I would like to give a shoutout to my podcast cohost Sibyl (you can find her projects here). She and I covered this film in detail on a bonus episode of Boku No Stop, available only for Pitch Drop Patrons.

Erica here: Thanks for a great review Matt and a couple of guffaws! The key news about this release of Project A-ko was when Diskotek found the original 35mm masters literally in someone’s closet. The animation for this has never looked so good. Not even when it was originally animated. ^_^

 





How Do We Relationship, Volume 6, Guest Review by Matt Marcus

August 3rd, 2022

Matt Marcus is a cohost of various projects on the Pitch Drop Podcast Network, such as the anime watchalong podcast Boku No Stop, which is currently covering the yuri anime Flip Flappers.

Well, here we are: How Do We Relationship, Volume 6. Miwa had her heart crushed, Saeko is trying to move on past their previous relationship, but the two are entangled yet again in a physical relationship but in an even more messy guise.

In the role reversal of the century, Saeko immediately apologizes to Miwa for treating her like a piece of meat–but much to her chagrin, Miwa is happy to be used because it means that she is still wanted. This time, it is Miwa who is using sex to escape how terrible she feels about herself, and the two end up in an ambiguous relationship. Over time though, Saeko helps bring Miwa back out of her depressive slump and back to school life. Eventually, Saeko shuts down their arrangement because for her, the love is gone.

Meanwhile, Saeko continues to slowly show more of her vulnerability to Yuria. In fact, she’s come to the realization that she is way more transparent about her feelings than she realized. When the inevitable happens and the two start dating, Saeko treats her with true kindness and consideration. It’s an incredible turnaround from the end of the previous volume, yet it feels completely earned. It seems bizarre to say, but, perhaps for the first time in the series, there are moments that are truly heartwarming.

Miwa is now forced to move on, and this is where things get a little…odd. With Shiho’s words still lingering in her head, she wonders if it would be easier to just date men instead. Weirdly, Saeko encourages this, which leads to a plot thread involving a handsome manager of a cafe where Miwa works. Now, sexuality is a fluid thing, but to my mind it would be very strange for the story, and for Miwa as a character in particular, if she fully explored this direction, even if only to reject it later. (Remember her turning down Tsurata in Volume 3?) Miwa admits to herself that she has some kind of abstract attraction to the “kind of guy” the manager is, but she isn’t convinced that she is really attracted to him.

This thought experiment doesn’t leave the hypothesis phase when she meets a new first year named Tamaki who bears a striking resemblance to Shiho. I would say this is another strange twist. In a way, it feels like falling back on old habits, especially when Miwa–before detecting any interest from the painfully blunt first year–states to Saeko that she might end up getting a girlfriend again after all. The volume ends hinting that the two may become closer very shortly.

Really, Saeko steals the show here. She shows an amazing amount of growth as a character. That said, I would have liked to see her at least take some responsibility for shutting out Miwa when her past came up. In fact, even after Miwa finally gave her the whole story on her Okinawa trip, Saeko did not fully reciprocate with Miwa by telling her about her middle school. I am hoping that her relationship with Yuria will give her the comfort she needs to address those issues head-on because they still feel unresolved. Nevertheless, this is the best version of her we see so far and it feels fantastic to see it on the page.

Miwa, on the other hand, acts really terribly in the early chapters by pushing on Saeko’s boundaries in a way that is quite uncomfortable to read in a couple of instances. Even after her recovery, she feels a bit unmoored in the second half of the volume. I trust that Tamifull will pull off her arc, but the path towards it is not entirely clear. Oh, and Shiho doesn’t make an appearance in this volume at all, which was disappointing to me.

I mentioned back in my review of Volume 4 that this manga captures the tumultuousness of college. Part of what contributes to that feeling is how the story tends to slip forward in large chunks of time. That becomes the most jarring in this volume, because Miwa’s rapport with Saeko changes seemingly on a dime. One chapter, she’s crying her eyes out realizing that any chance of dating Saeko again is truly gone, and the very next scene opens with her beaming to hear about Saeko’s first date with Yuria. It is nice to see that they are still friends and can openly discuss such things without hurt feelings simmering underneath like in the past, but it just feels too soon for the reader.

All in all, this volume felt a little more uneven than past volumes but improved greatly on later rereads. Its biggest flaw is lacking some narrative connective tissue that would have made certain plot turns feel more natural. Perhaps Tamifull felt that we had wallowed enough in the Bad Feels Zone and that it was time to kickstart the next phase. At any rate, with a new school term starting, there are still plenty of credits to earn.

Art – 8 Continues to carry the story well
Story – 7 More of a mixed bag than previous volumes, but with really high highs
Characters – 8 Finally, some serious growth for Saeko and some forward momentum for Miwa
Service – 2 The sex is the least “appealing” that it’s been so far
Yuri – 8 / LGBTQ – 7 docking it one yuri point for Mr. Cafe Man

Overall – 8

Tamifull loves a good callback, and this time he “swung” for the fences. See if you can spot it.

Erica here: Thank you so much Matt! I’ve got Volume 8 on my plate in Japanese and I have to say, I’m actually really interested in where this is going. ^_^