Archive for the Yuri Anime Category


Yuri Anime: Aria

November 4th, 2005

Aria the anime is well underway and there are some excellent things about it – and also some less excellent things. But it is *definitely* worth watching.

As I’ve mentioned in my various reviews, Aria as a manga is not about anything in particular, it’s just about being in the moment. The storyline is always that, around an given corner an adventure, or a moment of breathtaking beauty can be waiting for you to discover it.

Aria the anime is more about the people and less about the place. In the manga the canals of Neo-Venezia are narrow, echoing the real Venice, while in the anime, the girls ply their gondolas on broad seas and wide rivers, rather than claustrophobic canals. The advantage is, of course, that wide stretches of blue are way easier to animate than crowded populated areas. :-) It’s pleasant enough to see, and easy on the eyes, but sort of makes the point of gondolas seems silly – who needs tours of nothing?

The focus on the characters in the anime is different from the manga – but its a nice difference. We’re introduced to a new character, a young girl named Ai, to explian the letters that Akari is always writing. And we’re introduced to Alice very early on in the series. Alice’s personality is “niced” a bit. In the manga she remained grumpy way longer – but I suppose a short anime wouldn’t have time for two grumpy characters, and Akira is overwhelming. She totally wins on grumpy.

They’ve simplified the characters a bit – Akari is always simple, Aika survives as the most complex, but Akira and Alicia are rendered a bit, to be one-line machines. Here’s hoping we get to see them fluffed up a bit. Alicia *does* get moments of uber-cool which are lovely and serve to notch up the yuri a tad. But the voice acting is good and Minogawa Junko is perfect as Akira.

The number one thing about this anime that makes it worth watching is the art. Clean, favoring pastels and a hand-done water colour looks, it’s not *quite* as sublime as Yokohama Shopping Log, but it’s in the same general region of your brain. The “ahhhh” region. And the music fits the art perfectly.

In terms of Yuri, well, it’s mostly Yuri goggles, but really, you just cannot see Akira and Alicia together without seeing the vibe between them. And Aika’s open admiration and desire to snuggle with Alicia, (which Akari and Aika both call “rabu-rabu”, lovey-dovey) isn’t played down at all. In fact, it’s quite open. Aika’s all bummed because she wanted to sleep with Alicia, but had to settle for Akari. So it’s not like we see Alicia leaving Akira naked in bed or anything….but you know she did and got back to Aria Company before the girls woke up, which is why Akira asks, “When did you get here?” when she arrives. ^_^

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 8
Characters – 7
Music – 7
Yuri – 4

Overall – 8

As I say, definitely worth watching. No mecha, no rape, just nice.





Yuri Anime: Crimson Climax

October 22nd, 2005

It’s not like Crimson Climax is *good* hentai, but as hentai goes, it’s not the worst I’ve ever seen, either.

The sex is split between lesbian scenes, which are almost always cut short, and straight sex which is not entirely non-consensual. If you skip the non-con stuff, what’s left is a weirdly touching tale of a family curse and the devoted female servants who sacrifice all for their mistresses.

Did I mention that this anime is a horror hentai? Guess not. Well, it is. So that means there’s a lot of blood, and some pretty gruesome and pointlessly wasteful deaths, and the main character appears to be a cyborg doll thing with bits of humans holding her together. It’s all confusing and since I didn’t actually care, I have no idea how or why or, in fact, even what.

Did I mention the reasonably decent lesbian sex scenes? Yes? Well, then. There’s your review.

***

 Nov 22, 2010: Of interest,  this review was served today with a takedown order based on infringing copyrighted material. Since the *only* thing I had on this post was a picture of the cover of the anime, which was linked to a place where people could legitimately buy the thing if they wanted, I have removed it. I can see that this review got caught in a net of sites that stream the whole anime.

I actually *looked* at the takedown order. It was clear that this was an issue with an automated tool and/or a person who couldn’t tell the difference between a review and a stream. Instead of throwing a hissy fit or posting all over the planet, I contacted the copyright holder. It helps that I know they are not insane. ^_^ They grokked the situation immediately and are going to contact the copyright/takedown org to explain the issue.

The moral of the story is – don’t panic. Not every copyright holder is THE MAN.

Nov. 23, 2010: Everyone in the matter has been as pleasant and apologetic as possible. Not only has the copyright holder apologized, and sent a number of follow-up emails explaining what happened, the takedown company has also contacted me with apologies and assurance that my domain is on their whitelist and that they have informed Google that the takedown order has been retracted.

My gut feeling is that since I am in a small industry contacting the copyright holder was the way to go. Had I sent a counter-claim through Google’s DCMA counter-claim process it would be lost in a pile of thousands of other claims in *their* legal department. Still, for those of us who review anime and manga – it is a small industry. Don’t Panic. If you’re not distributing material you have no right to distribute, then you are not doing anything wrong. Don’t throw a hissy fit. Contact the copyright holder and LOOK at the takedown. Don’t be afraid to push back.

Once more for good measure- not every copyright holder is THE MAN. And in the end, there’s the picture back where it belongs.





Yuri Anime: Noir, Volume 4

October 19th, 2005

Get Noir, Volume 4 on the Yuricon Shop!I rewatched Volume 4 of Noir in the post-Onna! “marathon of watching and reading things non-stop so I don’t have to talk to people” fest. It’s quite good. And remarkably bad.

Let’s get the plot complication stuff over quickly…the first two episodes are designed to make Mirielle and Kirika seem more human. I think. In the first episode of the volume Kirika befriends an ex-mercenary turned painter and takes up painting herself. Mirielle warns her away from befriending anyone, but Kirika persists, with tragic results. In the second episode, we learn yet another little piece about Mirielle’s past and, if we are not entirely clueless, will come to realize that this is not just “making Mirielle seem more human” but really a hint that her past is quite relevant to the story. Think about it – Kirika has no past and we never, not really, try and figure out who she is. But little by little Mirielle’s family, and their fate, keep popping up, over and over and over….

In any case, this attempt by Mirielle to recreate an old relationship fails in a slightly more tragic way than Kirika’s attempt to make friends. In Kirika’s case, the guy is killed more by circumstance than anything else; in Mirielle’s case, she actually pulls the trigger and kills her beloved uncle.

The second two episodes are ridiculous. I love them, but if they were disappeared the story as a whole would not suffer one iota. A Chinese Tong sends a irresistably goofy assassin to take out Noir, (she kills with poison nails…and wears a fashionable leather jacket, all at the same time!) with predictable results. This is the mini-arc in which we see Kirika’s magic bullet shield on full – she kills about 40 people and not one of them manages to so much as graze her with a scathing look.

But, let’s let that all go and talk about the Yuri. In Volume 4, where Kirika obsesses about a guy and Mirielle about her uncle? Why, yes, now that you mention it.

This one was easy – watch Mirielle react to Kirika’s new hobby. Neutral, a little amused. Then watch Mirielle react to the cause of the new hobby…open jealousy, baby. I never noticed it the first time, but Mirielle spends the entire rest of the episode *bristling* when she thinks about Kirika spending time with that guy. Great voice acting from Mitsuishi Kotono there – she sounds deeply irked and bitchy. ^_^

Then we have the other half of the equation – Mirielle returns with the news that her uncle is in town, yay! Kirika would, assumably, be annoyed, yes? Something to take away from the well-oiled machine that is Noir? Nope. She’s pleased as punch that Mirielle has regained this link to her past. Why – because she can see how happy this has made Mirielle.

Now add those two little things up. They equal a relationship. Not, perhaps one between lovers, but certainly one between people who care, a lot, for each other.

Now, Bee Train has already said about Noir that if you see Yuri, it’s there. I choose to see a relationship that is beginning to leak past professional into personal.

And because, for some reason I cannot fathom, some people like Chloe, I’ll also mention her stalking Kirika to Hong Kong as a sign of her obsession about the other girl. But I strongly feel that the vibe is one-way. While it’s clear that Chloe sees Kirika as her perfect future partner, I don’t get the sense that Kirika even sees Chloe as a an existence, really. Her mind is on her partner *now*. And from my perspective, it stays there…except in the bits where they brainwash her. But I’m getting ahead of myself. ^_^

Ratings:
Art – 6, it’s horribly inconsistent from scene to scene
Story – 7
Characters – 7
Music – 9
Yuri – 5

Overall – 7 and a great way to pass a gloomy Sunday afternoon. On par with a decent kungfu flick. ^_^ There was something terribly important I wanted to say here, but now I’ve forgotten what it was. Oh well.





Yuri Anime: Ichigo Mashimaro

October 13th, 2005

Why on earth do I find Ichigo Mashimaro so appealing?

It could be the talented voice cast, or the sheer insanity of the non-plots, or Miu’s pleasantly sociopathic worldview, or the goofball situations, or even the incredibly sticky opening theme. Any of those things is enough.

But I think ultimately,that its just that its so darn *cute* that really wins. And don’t think that that doesn’t irk the daylights out of me! It does – I hate being swayed by cute. I maintain myself as the anti-cute reader, a single point of pessimistic darkness in the world of moe/loli Yuri fandom who think two cute girls snuggling equals Yuri.

And yet…

As much as I don’t want to think about it, this series *does* have Yuri. Miu is clearly crushing on Nobue. I don’t see Nobue actually having desire for any of the kids, but this series is probably the best example (certainly the least gross) of moe, I’ve ever seen. Nobue’s affection for Matsuri and Ana has all the qualities of moe. She clearly has a need to protect, and desire to snuggle, them like a kid with stuffed animals.

But for me, the real attraction is Miu. She’s barking mad and happy to be it. Nobue and she have enough in common that the resulting tension moves the story zippily along and is darned fun while doing so.

Ratings:
Art – 7
Story – 8
Characters – 8
Music – 7
Yuri – 7

Overall – 7.5

Really, talking about this series doesn’t cut it. Just watch it and laugh. There, that was easy.





Yuri Anime: Stellvia. Volume 5

September 16th, 2005

The reason this review took so long to get to was simply that I had a really hard time finding this volume! Amazon had it on backorder and at Otakon, not a single vendor had a copy by the time I got to go shopping. It was really irksome. (Amusingly, at the Geneon booth, the sales guy tried to sell me Vol.6, but I kept saying I wouldn’t get it until after I had Volume 5. He was like, “But you’ll need it eventually.” ^_^)

Let’s get right to it, shall we? This volume has a lot of good things, but I’m about to start with the bad.

The art. Where do noses go when they aren’t on faces? Is there a graveyard of lost anime noses? The art is *so* inconsistant in this volume. The older characters are fairly treated, but the main characters…ecch. It definitely looks like we had more than one group doing the art – and one of them sucked. Specifically the group handling Shima and Arisa.

There’s a scene in the second episode (which otherwise has better art than the first) on the volume where the girls are teasing Shima about Kouta. Shima and Arisa are all over the room, while the background characters are all stock still for nearly the entire scene, with fixed faces. Obviously, they didn’t bother animating anyone who wasn’t absolutely necessary. And it looks it. Awful, awful, awful.

The other major bad thing is Kouta. He’s heading into major idiot savant mode and from this point on, I really don’t like him. He’s so…removed…about people, and about Shima in particular. So while she’s growing, and trying harder and harder to reach him, he’s just being a nothing. But he’s a main character, so we have to watch him being a nothing all the freakin’ time! It’s downright distressing.

But that’s about it for really, really bad.

On the good side, all the little relationships are starting to mature – there’s a fair amount of time given over to taciturn Akira and runty Jojo. The volume starts them off on a rough foot, but they really get to spend some quality time onscreen. And along the way, they have a couple of short, but quite meaningful and interesting, scenes. With really good dialogue and everything.

There are some moments in this volume that approach excellent – particularly the political fragmenting of the humans involved in the different aspects of this “war.” People who feel its necessary vs people who feel its a plot by the military, vs people who think its a hoax, vs people who think war would be fun. With our current situation here in the US, it reads as quite realistic.

The most well-executed scene is towards the very end, when the war becomes a reality for our young characters. Seeing a battle, in which “our” forces take a thorough and fatal beating, through Shima’s eyes is quite painful, even as it is exceptionally well-executed.

For our Yuri couple, Yayoi and Ayaka, there is only one scene towards the beginning – but it’s a good one. ;-) With a short, fanservicey, flashback to when they originally met, we get a tearful and emotional reunion between them. Otherwise they are never seen together…but later when Arisa teases Yayoi about Pierre (who has a openly-acknowledged crush on her) Yayoi basically says that he has no chance. Everyone laughs and moves on. They know he has no chance – they just think it’s cause he’s a doofus and Yayoi is a lady.

Ratings:
Art – yucky to not too bad
Story – fun, interesting, emo
Characters – real
Music – doo-doo-doo

Overall – just watch it

In general, this volume is good, solid space opera fare. The aliens are bugs, humans are torn over what to do, and the kids…are kids. All in all, a good story that stays good with ocassional moments of excellent and awful.