Archive for the Staff Writer Category


She Makes My Heart Flutter

August 7th, 2024

Promotional poster for the South Korean live-action yuri series She Makes My Heart Flutter, showing Jung One (left) holding a clipboard and her niece Kang Seol (right), looking surprised.

By Frank Hecker, Staff Writer

I like to highlight yuri series from different countries (why should Thailand get all the attention?) and from new directors and studios. In that spirit, today’s pick is She Makes My Heart Flutter, a short web series (just over an hour in total running time) from South Korea’s SOO NOT SUE Studio. It’s not exactly new, having been released almost two years ago, but I wasn’t around these parts to review it then; please allow me to rectify that omission.

She Makes My Heart Flutter wastes no time in kicking off its plot, as “optimistic” 20-year-old Seol Kang (or Gang Seol—the subtitles have inconsistent romanization as well as name order) awakens to her girlfriend breaking up with her via text message. Meanwhile her aunt, “considerate” 33-year-old One Jung, posts a “help wanted” poster for Dickinson’s Room, her café and bar, which is frequented by Seol’s friends. (The series also doesn’t waste time introducing its characters: they each get an introductory graphic with name, age, and personal traits.) As she joins her friends for drinks, Seol is surprised to learn that her aunt is the cafe’s owner, and schemes her way into getting a part-time job.

This sets up the first of the show’s two plot threads: unlike Seol, who is proudly out, One is both closeted and very reserved, and wants herself and her café to have as low a profile as possible—the café has no exterior signage and its social media account is private. As Seol brashly points out to her, this strategy is not conducive to running a successful business, and Dickinson’s Room is often empty of patrons. Well, not completely empty: Re Lee, the woman who designed the café’s interior, now comes in every evening at 8 pm sharp to have a drink and talk with One. Seol’s friends think Re is straight, but it’s impossible to miss the sparks flying between the two. The two parallel subplots briskly play themselves out, with conflict between generations on the one hand and mature reticence on the other, but all is well in the end.

She Makes My Heart Flutter is a romantic comedy that separates the two aspects: Seol and her friends provide the comedy (along with Bin Yu, the café’s manager) and One and Re supply the romance. This works quite well from both a story and character perspective. Ji-Hyun Byun as Seol Kang is the very model of an extroverted young lesbian who’s come out at a time when that’s increasingly a normal thing to do, while So-Mi Park as One Jung gives a subtle and touching performance as a mature thirty-something who still fears the disapproval of her parents and society at large.

The director of She Makes My Heart Flutter, the pseudonymous Soo Not Sue, has released two other web series on YouTube, the 15-minute short Chalna: Enough Time to Fall in Love and the 3-episode series Out of Breath. In an interview, she’s expressed her desire to make more shows reflecting the reality of lesbian life in what is still a relatively conservative and hostile South Korean society. I hope she gets that chance.

Story — 8
Characters — 8
Production — 7 (director Soo makes maximum use of limited resources and locations)
Service — 2
LGBTQ — 10 (the series reflects the lesbian scene in Seoul’s Hongdae neighborhood)
Overall — 8

She Makes My Heart Flutter is a can’t miss combination of young adult lesbian comedy and mature adult lesbian romance, both wrapped up in an easy-to-watch one-hour package. If you missed it back then, consider checking it out now.

Erica here: This year there was finally some good news for same-sex couples in Korea, as a high court ruled that discrimination by national insurance is illegal, but Korea is generally far behind on rights for queer folks.





I Want To Be A Wall, Volumes 1-3

August 4th, 2024

by Eleanor Walker, Staff Writer

I Want To Be A Wall explores the fake marriage between Gakurouta, a closeted gay man with an unrequited crush on his childhood friend, and Yuriko, an asexual woman who’s a big BL fangirl. Can this odd couple find something in this unconventional relationship?

Volume 1 opens up with Yuriko and Gakurouta entering their new life as newlyweds and figuring out living together as a married couple. In an attempt to understand his new wife’s hobby, Gakurota starts exploring Yuriko’s BL collection, much to her embarassment. Our odd couple though, are better at communication than a lot of other married couples, and state their boundaries in a healthy way to each other. We then hear the stories of their respective childhoods and the origins of Gakurouta’s crush on his childhood friend Sousuke.

Volume 2 tells us the story of how our odd couple first met. Both sides were pressured into finding partners by their respective families, (arranged marriages are still relatively common in Japan compared to the West). The two of them get to know each other, gradually find themselves more comfortable with and opening up to each other, then Gakurouta proposes the marriage of convenience to Yuriko. The rest of the volume is devoted to them getting to know each other a little more, figuring out how to live together and going on a pilgrimage together to visit a limited exhibition of one of Yuriko’s favourite manga. The two of them are clearly happy with each other, but since that happiness isn’t conventional, is it real to anyone else in the story?

Volume 3 takes us to Gakurouta’s grandmother’s house (she raised him), Yuriko meeting her for the first time and the elephant in the room, grandchildren, comes up once again. It’s this volume which really asks the big questions, and challenges the assumption that a conventional heterosexual marriage and kids are the instant and only key to happiness.  One bit I really didn’t like about the series is the surprise introduction of Sousuke’s girlfriend at the end of the previous volume. I felt she created unnecessary and over the top drama which didn’t fit with the tone of the series. Other conflicts which come up, like the risk of Grandmother finding out that the marriage is fake seem much more plausible and fit into the story better.

Overall, this series is a good reminder that just because a relationship isn’t conventional, doesn’t mean it’s not happy. Everyone’s definition of happiness is different, and maybe society would do well to remember that rather than persecute those who live their lives outwith the expected social norms.

“What’s the point in having a system where people who actually need a marriage can’t have one?” It’s also great to see more positive asexual representation out there. At just 3 volumes, it’s a worthwhile addition to your queer manga collection.

Ratings:

Art – 6. Some faces and perspectives are a bit off, but not enough to detract from enjoying the story.
Story – 8  It’s enjoyable to see them care for each other in their own way, and a nice reminder that “normal” isn’t always best.
Characters – 7  All lovely except Sousuke’s girlfriend who just felt overly fake and melodramatic.
Service – Non existent
LGBTQ+ – 10. Two people who don’t fit into conventional society supporting and caring for each other as best they can.

Overall – 8





Throw Away The Suit Together, Volume 1

July 31st, 2024

Two women only wearing button down white shirts, sit on a house veranda under a blue sky, smiling.by Matt Marcus, Staff Writer

I have a morbid fascination with LinkedIn. I often peruse the site for a sort of black comedy, a satire where people are genuinely excited about how one divine moment of #leadership made their company infinitesimally more profitable. Even though I decided to willingly join this farce of productivity posturing, I pride myself on holding onto my skepticism of this bizarre forum. I am the man wearing the They Live shades, firm in my knowledge that I can play the game while acknowledging its hollowness. Yet, some days my confidence falters and I wonder if there’s a way to escape all this, to find some means of providing a life for my family that doesn’t require me to use phrases like “maximize stakeholder value”. But it’s a passing feeling, one I have become quite adept at swallowing.

When I go to my feed, what greets me is a deluge of banal job hunting advice, questionable claims about the current job market, rosy prognostications on the future of AI. Each post I scroll by fills me with more and more dread. Does my resumé have a snowball’s chance in hell of even making it through to human eyes anymore? And after that, can I prove myself to be skilled and savvy enough by answering inane questions through three, four, five-plus interview rounds? These days, it’s distressingly common to see desperate posts from strangers with the #OpenForWork badge added to their profile picture loudly shouting about their many, many months of failed job searching. I feel lucky that my current job is secure, but it’s not the kind of luck I can savor. I cannot imagine what the pressure might be like for those fresh to the job hunt.

In this first volume of Throw Away The Suit Together, college student Haru is one of those struggling job seekers. All she wants is some security for her and her long-time girlfriend, Hinoto, so they can live a comfortable life together. Unfortunately, she bombs her second-round interview at one company and proceeds to not pass the first round at several others. Under the pressure of these failures, she snaps, throws all her job applications out into the street, and decides that they should escape Tokyo on “Hii-chan”’s scooter. Hinoto, ever supportive of her partner, agrees to go along with her, abandoning her internship. They head off to Hinoto’s aunt’s summer house on an unnamed island.

Their plan, what little of it there is, doesn’t go smoothly. After falling asleep overnight on the beach, Hinoto’s bike, which held all of their belongings, is taken by a local who thought it was abandoned. They arrive at the house, only for its owner to call and tell them they are not welcome to live there (Hinoto had, of course, neglected to ask for permission). They have no idea what they are going to do for money. But they are in love, and their belief in that love is what will pull them through it.

Things do turn around, a little. Hinoto’s aunt gives the girls her blessing to use the house (all she wanted was some honesty). The bike and its contents are returned by the young woman, Naruko, who took it, and it turns out she’s a diving instructor who may have a job to offer. After an initially awkward proposal from Haru, the girls agreed to upgrade their relationship status to “engaged”. The volume ends as the two lovers begin writing up a marriage application, though they know that gay marriage isn’t fully legal in Japan.

Keyyang-sensei nailed the anxiety and feelings of futility in the job search. Hell, I’m nearly tempted to put a content warning for it. Given that, you’d expect this story to be a straightforward escapist fantasy: screw the rat race, let’s move to an island and live a good, simple life. But, there’s something here that gives me pause. So far, every step Haru and Hinoto have made has been messy and poorly thought out, though they have so far managed to overcome these unforced errors. Nevertheless, it is hard to shake the feeling that the specter of Tokyo and the world it represents still haunts them.

Haru in particular seems to keep pushing away facing the difficult questions and escapes into deeper and deeper fantasies. Hinoto is more pragmatic, but she is willing to do anything to make Haru happy right now, fuck the consequences. I should feel relieved by their adventure, but I’m not. The fears of failure have been merely tamped down, like when you decide yet again to binge YouTube videos instead of updating your years-old resumé. Haru has thrown a rug over the mess, expecting it to disappear. The escape doesn’t feel complete.

As for the art, it’s much like the protagonists: earnest but a bit sloppy. The characters don’t seem consistently drawn, particularly Hinoto whose hair inexplicitly develops a flat top with corners for a couple of panels. That said, there are two really solid two-page splashes which seems a bit excessive for how little happens in the plot, but I can’t begrudge it too much. It is a little odd just how much page space includes our protagonists in some state of semi-sexy undress, though I’m willing to give it a pass as a sign of the level of comfort and intimacy they share (they have been dating since before college, though we don’t know much else). Things don’t actually get spicy until a bonus comic near the end of the comic, the purpose of which I don’t quite understand. The only thing that I can come up with is that it reinforces the motif of Haru attempting something with good intentions and failing, with Hinoto brushing it off and showing her support.

I’m holding out hope that this trepidation I am feeling leaves me once the girls find some means of employment with Naruko, though we know that the jobs may only be seasonal. I’m rooting for these girls. They may not stay on the island forever but I’m hoping that this trip rebuilds Haru’s confidence, and maybe shifts her view on what her goal should be for what is only the very beginning of her career. If not, she could always consult LinkedIn.

Art – 6 Competent but a bit too sloppy for my liking
Story – 7 The road is there is there, but I’m nervous about the destination
Characters – 7 Haru’s avoidant tendencies and Hinoto’s blind support is a dangerous pairing
Service – 5 There’s sex, and the girls spend a lot of time in a state of undress
Yuri – 9 / LGBTQ – 5 There is a marriage proposal!

Overall – 6 Narrowly making it to the second interview round

Volume 2 of this island escape story hits shelves in October.

For all future prospective employers: all opinions expressed in this review are exaggerated for dramatic effect :)

Matt Marcus is a serial enthusiast whose range of appreciations include guitars, watches, and a particular genre of Japanese popular media named after a flower. Outside of writing for Okazu, he cohosts various projects on the Pitch Drop Podcast Network, where he frequently bloviates about video games, anime, and manga. He also hosts a blog Oh My God, They Were Bandmates analyzing How Do We Relationship in greater depth.





Omai Series

July 22nd, 2024

Promotional image for the TikTok version of Omai Series, showing Omai (left) and Mina (right) hugging her.Thailand’s next-door neighbor Vietnam is poorer and more socially conservative, and has a government more resistant to addressing its LGBTQ population’s concerns. Thus it’s understandable that Vietnamese bách hợp (“lily”) films and series are still few and far-between. One of the most recent and most interesting ones is Omai Series (no “the”) from Fimbé, filmmakers associated with Brave Films & Entertainment, a Ho Chi Minh City production house. Omai Series was originally released in the form of very short TikTok videos, in Vietnamese only. These were then combined and released as longer YouTube videos with English subtitles for international fans, and then combined again into a movie-length season 1 (with a season 2 compilation perhaps to follow in future).

Born on the internet and unconstrained by the strictures of broadcast TV, Omai Series (literally) shows its colors in the first scene: First-year university student Mai (nicknamed Omai after the Hanoi dried fruit snack) arrives at her new apartment in Ho Chi Minh City to find a strange flag on the door. “Is my roommate a foreigner?” she wonders. No, that’s the lesbian flag, and her roommate is the sultry and sophisticated Mina, a third-year student. Mina directs Omai to sit with her on the only bed (“no chairs in this room”) and teases Omai about her nickname (“Sour? Sweet? Or spicy?!”) while reassuring her, “Don’t worry, I won’t eat you.”

Indeed she doesn’t, at least not literally, but as time goes on Omai gradually finds herself succumbing to Mina’s charms. She’s cheered on by her two classmates and friends Watermelon and the gay-coded Loa Phường, and opposed by her rebellious twin sister Lili, who’s resentful of Omai’s status as the “good child.” Lili’s machinations, Omai’s relationship with her parents, and Mina’s relationship with her mother (who’s trying to match her up with a handsome doctor) drive most of the plot.

Live-action romances live and die based on the sparks that fly between the main couple, and Omai Series does not disappoint in that regard. The actor Omai is especially good at portraying both Omai and her polar opposite Lili — on my first watch I didn’t realize they were played by the same person — although she doesn’t make a truly convincing drunk. The actor Mina is a worthy foil to her. (In a promotional livestream the actors expressed a preference to be identified by their nicknames – which are the same as their character names — rather than by their full real names, and the show credits reflect that.) The acting for Omai’s best friends is broader and less professional — not surprising since Watermelon and Loa Phường are portrayed by the director/screenwriter and Brave’s PR manager respectively.

Omai Series is a relatively low budget show, but it’s a reasonably professional production with adequate English subtitles. However the vertical format sometimes forces odd choices in the cinematography, and for a good part of the show the subtitles are in small yellow text that can be difficult to read at times, especially on a smartphone. To my knowledge it’s the first yuri entry from Fimbé and Brave. I hope it won’t be the last.

Story – 7 (the addition of Lili livens the action)
Characters – 7
Production – 6
Service – 3 (a chaste first kiss leads to something more intense later)
Yuri – 10
LGBTQ — 7
Overall – 7

Omai Series is a sweet and savory Vietnamese treat, whether you snack on individual episodes during the day or make a full meal of it binge-watching in the evening.





Assorted Entanglements, Volume 5

July 19th, 2024

Two young women wearing jerseys sit back to back. One with the side of her head braided, smokes a cigarette, the other with multiple ear piercings. They both look off to the right.by Matt Marcus, Staff Writer

Have you ever been on a bad first date? Like, a really bad one? Maybe you neglected to vet the content of the movie you bought tickets for (“I’ve heard good things about The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo!”). Perhaps you chose a restaurant that doesn’t take reservations and you arrive to find a two hour wait for the next table (“Who knew this place was this popular?”). Or you somehow left your driver’s license at home so you cannot order any adult beverages (“Curse this babyface of mine!”). Maybe you let it slip that you did a hair too much “research” on your date’s social media profiles. Or what if…the two of you just don’t have any chemistry. Worse, what if that were true and—*gasp*—they were also your boss?

OK, so things don’t get that dire in Assorted Entanglements, Volume 5, but it isn’t far off.

Last time on Assorted Entanglements, we got some real, true character growth from the majority of our Sapphic menagerie. Iori and Minami are still as committed to each other as  ever, Shizuku and Saori are bonding, Heke-sensei and her editor Shinohara are very close to admitting their mutual interest, and Kujou’s obliviousness continues to helpfully shield her from making a serious mistake with her student Sugimoto, for now. Progress!

The large majority of the page-time in this volume, as it were, is dedicated to Best Not-Yet-Couple Heke-sensei and Shinohara-san. Editor-san, hearing Iori’s warning of missed opportunities ringing repeatedly in her ears, invites Heke-sensei to a meatspace date during one of their online meetups. Even though the event on paper was a slam dunk (a live gaming exhibition), the experience is horribly awkward. Heke-sensei was too nervous to speak to her gaming “idol”…but after the two get home and hop onto another gaming session, she admits that she was such a fan of Lala’s that she figured out Shinohara’s day job and intentionally submitted her manga at her company in order to meet her. Instead of a restraining order, Shinohara instead offers that they date—if Heke-sensei can get on her gaming level.

There are more extended chapters of the two awkwardly navigating this “not yet dating” situation, but now that their feelings are out in the open the gags have shifted from Shinohara deflecting her feelings (to Heke-sensei’s chagrin) to the mangaka being an awkward nerd with bizarre priorities that mildly exasperates her cantankerous would-be paramour. It’s an improvement from the “Oh thank god I hid my true feelings at the last second” tropes we’ve seen so far. There is also a nice moment where Iori invites Shinohara over for dinner, with Minami of course doing the cooking. It’s the longest stretch that the manga has gone without a sour note.

The bulk of the remainder are expanded backstories: one about Minami and Shizuku’s time in the childhood delinquent facility and one fleshing out Kujou’s college best friend/crush Akemi. Both are well told and add nuance to the stories we’ve heard the characters tell each other. I found Akemi’s ambiguous feelings toward Kujou to be a tasty morsel of melancholy that was more emotionally nourishing than I typically expect from this series. I half-expect her to reappear near the climax of the Kujou/Sugimoto arc, but I actually wish Mikanuji-sensei shows restraint and leaves her in the past.

The volume wraps with a summer vacation bonus story that reiterates that Iori and Minami are happy together, and that Saori and Shizuku are both miserable about it. Same as it ever was.

All and all, this volume breezes by and avoids nearly all of the pitfalls from the previous volumes. Somehow, online gaming has led to less toxicity; I guess that’s why this is fiction.

Art – 7 At least this time there are no new characters
Story – 8 There’s some actual, non-gratuitous pathos here
Characters – 8 The character-based humor between Shinohara and Heke-sensei earns an extra point
Service – 2 For a drunken college hookup
Yuri – 8 / LGBTQ – 8 Iori effectively comes out to Shinohara

Overall – 8 Feels like the story has moved up in the rankings

Volume 6 of this ensemble story of Sapphic misfits is coming our way in October.

Matt Marcus is a serial enthusiast whose range of appreciations include guitars, watches, and a particular genre of Japanese popular media named after a flower. Outside of writing for Okazu, he cohosts various projects on the Pitch Drop Podcast Network, where he frequently bloviates about video games, anime, and manga. He also hosts a blog Oh My God, They Were Bandmates analyzing How Do We Relationship in greater depth.