Archive for the Anime Category


I’m in Love with the Villainess: Advocating Equality for Gender and Sexual Minorities Among Indonesian Audiences, Guest Review by Lena Tama

October 18th, 2023

We continue Reality in Anime Week with a fantastic guest review by Lena Tama, who takes a look at I’m In Love With The Villainess from a different cultural lens than I bring to the topic. Today’s review is an adaptation of an Indonesian-language review for Sukarita, I’m in Love with the Villainess: Mendorong Topik Kesetaraan Minoritas Gender dan Seksual Bagi Penggemar Anime Indonesia.

I hope you’ll read Lena’s review and offer her kind comments and thanks – and feel free to share this and the original review in your fandom spaces! I promise tomorrow to talk about a different series… ^_^

 

Source: Crunchyroll

Anime is a popular entertainment medium among Indonesian audiences who don’t necessarily watch them for a thorough discussion of gender and sexual orientation diversity, in spite of yuri and yaoi being some of the more popular genres.

However, with the advent of gender and sexual minorities acceptance within the anime industry, there are an ever increasing amount of titles that advocate said topics in a way that is treated with respect, including I’m in Love with the Villainess 「私の推しは悪役令嬢。」or ILTV for short.

Born from a novel series by Japanese author Inori-sensei which then received manga adaptation as well as anime adaptation in early October, ILTV quickly rises to popularity across the world thanks to its topics of social issues and queer advocacy which reflect the progress Japanese people has made in accepting minority rights, which is something Indonesian audiences should also begin to accept, moreso among the average anime fans.

 

How the story of I’m in Love with the Villainess begins

ILTV adopts the isekai fantasy theme that may be a bit oversaturated among anime fans at this point. However, it adopts an interesting spin to the format which not only makes it fresh for existing fans but also the common audiences who aren’t necessarily into anime.

The story begins with an office lady worker Oohashi Rei, an avid otome gamer who’s also a victim of Japan’s overwork culture. During one night she plays her favorite otome game, “Revolution,” Rei collapses only to wake up in another world which happens to be the world of Revolution, the game she just played last night, complete with the story and characters intact.

Oohashi Rei, who’s now called Rae Taylor in this world, must live her life in accordance to the world settings and rules dictated by the game: Date one of the three male love interests and overthrow the game’s protagonist who’s a stereotypical noble villainess named Claire François. 

However, right off the bat, Rae makes her point clear by ignoring the world’s three male love interests and instead sets her eyes on the world’s villainess. Her passion and love towards Claire isn’t even subtle since the first episode, more often than not with comedy undertone much to the villainess’ dismay.

Apart from its romcom element, ILTV also provides the classic Renaissance world building with hierarchy and social status disparity between the nobles and commoners as one of its core themes. But with Rae driving the story, ILTV manages to present its heavy storytelling in a lighthearted way which helps the audiences to ingest the themes and world building. Naturally, this also helps pave the way to the discussion of its other core theme which is social acceptance of gender and sexual identity.

As early as the third episode, which is in itself a strong achievement in the anime industry, Misha Jur and Lene Aurousseau have a conversation with Rae and Claire about whether Rae’s gay due to her affection to Claire despite both of them being female. No cap, no censorship.

 

And to make the discussion even more open, Rae indeed says that she’s lesbian with no  interest in men at all. Although Misha and Lene accept Rae, Claire immediately distances herself from Rae due to her prejudice and association of gay people as predators, something which Misha and Lene criticize and she reflects upon.

 

A huge step for anime industry

For a lot of people, excluding Indonesians unfortunately, this deep conversation between those four characters is nothing extraordinary. However, what makes it special among anime fans is that it doesn’t hold back via a more subtle message or downplay it with comedy. It’s an open, honest discussion about Rae’s sexuality.

Indeed, it’s all thanks to the way ILTV portrays the characters, both the major and minor ones, by bringing new perspectives to the table and subverting people’s expectations towards female characters in anime.

For a start, Rae Taylor openly says she’s lesbian to her friends but not to anyone else, and more often than not she would fool around for comedic purposes and to hide her fears and insecurity towards the people around her. Based on her previous life as Oohashi Rei, the prejudices and fears she experienced developed a particular defense mechanism by downplaying herself through her antics.

 

This poignant character portrayal is realistic to a fault, especially for people living in a hostile environment or a country like Indonesia where being queer is subject to discrimination by the people and authorities, and that developing a defense mechanism is mandatory to survive in the society. This makes every safe space and good friends, which allow us to express ourselves more freely in the same way that Rae does, all the more precious.

The same also goes for Claire François, the story’s supposed antagonist who openly mocks commoners and initially sees Rae as a predator for being openly gay. However, Claire manages to become humble, admit to her own faults and insecurity, and even willing to slowly open up about things previously unknown to her. This leads to her slowly acknowledging her bisexuality as she develops feelings for Rae and her antics throughout the story.

This way of presenting such a deep conversation in a respectful yet casual manner is something that I consider a success by Inori-sensei and the team production, among other social issues ILTV is about to deliver in future episodes. And as mentioned before, an open discussion about gender and sexual minorities in anime is still a rare thing to savor amid a sea of anime titles who typically pander to the cisgender heterosexual male’s fantasy along with their female characters portrayal that, more often than not, undermine gender equality in the cheapest ways possible.

That said, Inori-sensei’s portrayal of gender and sexual minorities is an early indication of her experiments in discussing many heavy social issues and political intricacies. This can be a good and bad thing depending on the theme and how the team delivers them, as I notice that fans of ILTV on the internet frequently mention a particularly taboo social issue which the story is going to unfold in the future (but not here because spoiler).

While I’m personally looking forward to ILTV as someone who only has access to the anime, I’m holding my breath towards any discussion of a universally taboo social issue in this series that might ruin its reputation among casual audiences and anime fans.

 

Acknowledging Indonesian anime fans’ perception towards gender and sexual minorities

Admittedly, anime as a medium is still perceived as nothing more than a childish show among Indonesian people in general, especially knowing that there hasn’t been any thought-provoking  anime being broadcasted on local television channels since Indonesia first broadcasted anime on TVRI TV station in 1970 with the title Wanpaku Omukashi Kum Kum.

Adding to that is the broadcast of anime with elements of gender and sexual minorities, or the lack thereof. For decades, the nation’s most frequent anime on local television have been simply a repeat of Doraemon, Dragon Ball, Naruto, and the likes without adding anything new to the table.

The closest thing to an anime with gender and sexual minorities theme broadcasted in the country was Sailor Moon which aired on Indosiar TV station in the 90s. However, the Indonesian localization team downplayed the sapphic relationship  between Sailor Uranus (Haruka Tenou) and Sailor Neptunus (Michiru Kaiou) in the same way the Western localization altered their relationship into one of familial between cousins.

This leads to the discovery of anime through the internet with people’s knowledge toward anime and its vast genre spreading wide via international TV stations, official DVD releases, and illegal streaming sites. And yet, yuri and yaoi anime retain a negative perception among Indonesian people who are openly hostile toward gender and sexual minorities, all while also perceiving a general consensus that the aforementioned genres are nothing more than a form of fanservice in its full hypocrisy.

In spite of this, the anime industry continues to evolve. Amid the hoard of fantasy harem anime that pander to the male audiences, there are also plenty of new anime titles that bring a thorough discussion of gender and sexual minorities to the table with respect such as Gundam – Witch from Mercury (but curses be upon Bandai), Adachi & Shimamura, Bloom Into You, MagiRevo, and I’m in Love with the Villainess. Even the more popular anime such as One Piece begins to portray a diverse gender expression that is neither a satire nor a parody in the form of Yamato, a trans man who quickly gets along with the Straw Hat crew.

I’m in Love with the Villainess and other similar titles mark a new step in advocating gender and sexual minorities rights within the anime industry. Not only does it make for an entertaining and relatable show which I extremely recommend  for my fellow Indonesian queer friends, but it also helps showcase the medium which the average anime audiences consume aren’t letting up. 

With this, I hope Indonesian anime fans begin to accept the advocate for  gender  and sexual minorities as well as other social issues that Rae and Claire are about to tackle in the future.

 

*About author

Lena Tama is an Indonesian trans woman, as well as a translator and freelance writer since 2016. Lena began indulging in the world of journalism in 2020 by joining The Jakarta Post. Aside from writing articles, Lena is also involved in advocating LGBTIQ+ rights and other groups of minorities in Indonesia





I’m In Love With the Villainess and ‘The Talk’

October 17th, 2023

Welcome back to Reality in Anime Week. ^_^

We’ve already discussed The Power of Hope ~ Precure in Full Bloom~‘s honest look at adult life. Today we turn once again back to I’m In Love With the Villainess, for an episode that many people hope will change anime for the better. (And some people threw tantrums about, but that’s a different conversation.)

In Episode 3, Misha turns to Rae and says, “Are you what they call ‘gay’?” In Japanese, the word used is douseiai (同性愛), homosexual. Rae then answers this with honesty. At which Lene mentions that gender isn’t really the issue and Rae explains that gender does matter for her. The English dub is radiant here, with a line about “love is love” is not wrong, but gender does matter for those people for whom it matters. Ironically, we had had this very conversation the night before on the Okazu Discord. ^_^

I’m going to take a second to digress here and say that the English dub for this series is absolutely outstanding and I recommend watching either or both. Hannah Alyea as Rae is brilliant and Lindsay Shepphard is incandescent as Claire.

I spent most of yesterday reading the comments for the sub and dub (which turn out to be different! Why, Crunchyroll?) and people were positively glowing with praise for the frankness of the conversation. A few people were moved, many were surprised (I guess they haven’t been reading my reviews. ^_^;). Some folks inevitably mentioned that this has never been done before in anime – that is not 100% true, but this scene definitely broke some walls and of course anime fandom memory doesn’t go very far back as new fans never know what they missed.) I want to assure people that these walls were broken with intention – this series is not done providing realistic commentary about both queer lives and social and financial inequality. This is a show that I expected to knock people’s socks off and so far it has not disappointed.

Given that King Records thinks this series Blu-ray will sell well enough that they already have opened pre-orders, I think this may be a real moment of changing tides in an industry that has regularly utilized queer content, without accepting the people whose stories it tells. Media companies in general are conservative, and otaku are often, weirdly, also very conservative.

In a year where Kadokawa (a company that regularly profits from fannish pairings of same-sex characters and manga that portrays queer stories) backtracked on the relationship between Suletta and Miorine …a relationship witnessed by viewers worldwide, no less… this is a story that Ichijinsha is giving room to be exactly as queer as it wants and needs to be.

That’s worth celebrating.





First Look at I’m In Love With The Villainess Anime

October 2nd, 2023

Today was the day we’ve been waiting for! I’m In Love With The Villainess anime has premiered on Crunchyroll. With an English dub, as well as the Japanese audio track.

As I said in a comment on the first episode, this is the Yuriest anime that has ever been made, since it is literally centered around the romantic relationship of two women right from the first moments. As those of us  who have read the novels know, it also becomes progressively queerer as it unfolds. We should find out next episode how much of that is retained. For these things alone, I would love this anime.

The narrative  – especially in these early scenes – are wholly character-driven, so it’s a pleasure to know that the voice cast really made it all work. I actually laughed out loud twice watching this first episode, even though I anticipated the gags. inori-sensei commented on her Pixiv Fanbox that at the live premier event in Japan, she was worried that people might not react to the jokes, but there was plenty of laughter. The funny bits were, genuinely, funny. I’m going to rewatch the episode later this week as a dub and see how the jokes land.

Serizawa Yuu as Rae and Nanami Karen as Claire have really dug deep on these characters and made them come to life. Of course the supporting cast is also terrific and it felt very comfortable to hear the three Princes, Pipi, Loretta and Misha all sound, well, like they sounded in my head, honestly.  Kenn’s Rod Bauer was so full of bonhomie, I kinda sympathized with Rae’s dislike of him. ^_^

The one real weak spot of this anime is the animation. I have a number of thoughts about that. First, let’s just acknowledge that there’s a good chance that it simply was given a limited budget. That happens and I would not hold it against them any more than usual. I’d rather the animators get more time and money every time, but no one asks me. That said, we can do some justification …and projection…without too many mental calisthenics.

To begin with, this story begins in the world of an otome game, so the animation might be reflective of that. Otome games are, like other sims, usually pretty flatly animated in a puppet show kind of way. The backgrounds here are often ignored for sound effects and other gimmicks, which are, yes, money savers, but also give this early phase a gag manga feel. It would be kind of cool if, as the story developed, so did the animation. I don’t think that’s going to happen, but I’d love to see it.

We can see a little bit of the initial arc of the story from the opening credits. At the very least we can see that the Commoner Movement arc will be included and, with the addition of Mizuki Nana to the cast as Manaria, it’s a good bet that it will go through the Scales of Love arc. That means we’re definitely getting into more serious territory before the season ends. And here, I am going to digress, but I will be back to conjecture further.

Today on Twitter, the official wataoshi account announced that Blu-Ray Box pre-orders are available at various Japanese anime outlets. (That link will take you direct to King Records to pre-order.) Different stores have different extras, as usual, and folks who pre-order will get a special copy of “Rae’s doujinshi” story that she wrote for Revolution, of course, written by inori.-sensei herself. The BD box is slated for a February 2024 release, so that’s an extremely early pre-order period. inori.-sensei commented on Twitter that expectations for success were very high so the BD Box was arranged even though the anime had not yet aired.

So, back to conjecture. I think that pre-orders for the box set may well be used to determine if a second season will bring it to the end of the Revolution arc. Sales for that could determine whether we ever see a Nur or DQ arc – highly unlikely, but not wholly impossible. Sure, the anime also may exist in part to bump up sales of the ongoing manga and the print volumes of the novel and I hope they do! There’s nothing wrong with that. Ichijinsha’s done a decent job extending the life of several series that way.

Definitely give the series a watch. It’s fun and goofy and deep and serious and very queer and we’ve never seen an anime like this before, really. As we discussed on the Okazu Discord as I typed, if you want to get someone into Yuri, this would be a good place to start! Like isekai? We have series for you! How about high fantasy?  We got you covered. Looking for LGBTQ+ anime – it’s here. Oh…you like Sci-fi….well, sit down and let me tell you….  Looking for something with social consciousness? This is what you’re looking for !

So grab your friends and get them aboard the Yuri train with I’m in Love With the Villainess, streaming now on Crunchyroll.

Ratings:

Art – 6
Story – 9
Characters – 100
Yuri – 8
Service  – This is a complicated question… Let’s take a look at it again later

Overall – 9

A fun start to what I hope will be a story that takes audiences to very gay places they have never been before. ^_^

Next up for us, would be to pressure Crunchyroll to provide us with premium BD box sets so we can get that doujinshi, too!  I mean, I can see myself pre-ordering the JP set just for that….please don’t make me do that, Crunchyroll.