Archive for the Yuri Manga Category


Yuri Manga: Bousou Girlsteki Mousou Renaiteki Suteki Project, Volume 1 (ボウソウガールズテキモウソウレンアイテキステキプロジェクト(B・G・M・R・S・P))

February 21st, 2014

When I read the first chapter of Kawai Roh’s  Bousou Girlsteki Mousou Renaiteki Suteki Project (ボウソウガールズテキモウソウレンアイテキステキプロジェクト(B・G・M・R・S・P)) in Comic Yuri Hime, I actually was pretty excited for the series. It was an all-girl harem battle! The uber-cool boyish girl versus the feminine girl. It sounded like it was going to be a lot of fun.

And indeed, the premise starts off well enough. Unfortunately, the story handicaps itself right from the start. Beniko, the apparent ojou-sama type, likes one of the underclassmen, but she seems to have become attached to Aoi, the otokoyaku type. Instead of charming Shino away from Aoi, Beniko has hysterical fits and Aoi appears the type of person to trip someone in the cafeteria.

Instead of putting cool, athletic Aoi and beautiful honor student Beniko on equal footing, the two start, continue and end by making snarky asides, trying to cheat and accusing each other of cheating. By the end of the second chapter you sort of desperately flail around looking for someone to like. Shino, the first-year they fight over, is nice, but one-dimensional, a human-shaped stuffed animal. Their mutual friend Kimi seems to have her head on straight, so you sort of glom on to her as a bright point.

The second half of the book completely loses coherence. The student council president is, apparently, the character I expected Beniko to be, but she’s underhanded and manipulative. She coerces Beniko and Aoi to run for the council then makes Beniko be part of her harem through the misuse of a beauty contest.

By then end of the volume, I wanted to go back in time and whisper in the creator’s and editor’s ears to throw all of this out and write a good story.

Ratings:

Art – 5
Story – 4
Characters – 3
Yuri – 7
Service – 1

Overall – 4 and I’m being nice about it.

Seriously disappointing. Of course I had been reading the chapters as they were run in Comic Yuri Hime and have been progressively more disappointed, but I kept hoping that when I read them in a volume, it would all gel, as it so often does. The months in between me reading chapters means I lose threads so, often the stories hold together better when I read them in volume form.  This story was the opposite, it worked worse all together, when I couldn’t forget how nasty Aoi had been or how hysterical Beniko was last chapter.

The best part of this story is the title.





Yuri Manga: Shuden Niwa Kaeshimasu (終電にはかえします)

February 14th, 2014

Amagakure Gido’s Shuden Niwa Kaeshimasu (終電にはかえします) is a collection of shorts from Pure Yuri Anthology Hirari magazine.

The first story is a lovely two-part ‘Story A.’ Asaki rides the train every day and everyday she sees a tough-looking first-year student. Boyish, with dyed hair and wearing a mask (allergies, she says, when asked) the first-year turns out to be a sincere, awkward girl with the old-fashioned name Tsune.

Tsune and Asaki become close and each comes to the unnerving conclusion that she likes the other. In the second chapter they go out on a date and find that they like each other a lot. The story takes on a bittersweet feel when they realize that Asaki will graduate soon, but they kiss anyway, trusting that the future will be bright enough for them.

“Shoujo Planetarium” is a slightly unsettling story of two girls who meet in a fantasy setting. The story kept edging towards the creepy, then veering away, leaving me with the idea that it originally was meant to be something else entirely.

A like triangle is impossibly resolved by all three people agreeing to keep their relationships as is in “Isshun no Asterism”. A ghost waits a lifetime to get the girl in “Eien no Shoujo”.

The final story is also a strong entry. A younger sister has to completely rethink her opinion of her older sister, when she falls for what turns out to be her older sister’s lover. In the end, she decides that she had it all wrong all along.

The collection has no unifying theme (with the exception of the two astronomically themed titles), but it made the book perfect for short reads before bed. Not every story is happy, but the collection as a whole left me feeling good…which is a nice feeling.

Shinsokan has moved to a smaller format than they were using previously, away from the A4 size to a more common A5 size, which makes the book smaller, lighter and more portable.  I like the tighter new look…and I note that the volumes cost a little less than they did previously (although not on the same scale as larger publishers.) Hopefully Hirari won’t be forced out of print by costs. (Readers who insist on print really have no idea how much money print costs and what pressure it puts the publisher under.)

Ratings are variable, but averages are:

Art – 8
Story –  7
Characters – 8
Yuri – 9
Service – 3

Overall – 8

An enjoyable little collection of Yuri manga shorts.





Yuri Manga: Ashita Mata Kimi no Uchi e (明日また君の家へ)

January 27th, 2014

The obi of Ashita Mata Kimi no Uchi e (明日また君の家へ), tells you in English and Japanese that the stories inside are about childhood friends, a student and teacher, sisters, and classmates, all neatly pre-packaged in pairs for your non-thinking pleasure.

What the obi doesn’t indicate that the art will make it awkward to tell which character is which and that all of them look like the prototypical blobby-headed moe face that looks vaguely 4-year oldish on account of having no facial features.  The combined affect of phoned-in story telling and art left me with the impression that I had just read a volume of “blow-up doll theater.” (Which, now that I think about it, could be a very funny idea, but even if someone did it, it probably wouldn’t be all that funny, really.)

I remember vaguely not minding the classmates story, trying to read the teacher/student thing, but not finishing it,  and finally giving up and paging through the interminably long sisters story. By the time we got to the childhood friends, I was unable to identify which character was which and decided to read the next volume of Drops of God (神の雫), in which the adult cast look and act like an adults, and the lead female is smart, not at all blobby-headed and much more my idea of attractive manga art. ^_^

Ratings:

Art – 3 at best
Characters – None, all characters were “types”
Story – None, it’s a PWP anthology
Yuri – I didn’t get the sense anyone like each other much, but, 9
Service – 10

Overall – N/A

This book had all the appeal of an actuarial audit. ^_^;

Thank you to the man who reminds me to sink to the depths in order to rise to the heights, Okazu Superheo Dan P. for his brave sponsorship of today’s review!





Yuri Manga: Yuri☆Koi Girls Love Story, Volume 2 (百合☆恋)

January 24th, 2014

A few weeks ago, I reviewed  Yuri☆Koi Girls Love Story, Volume 1 , a Yuri anthology in which I found basically one good story. Today, we take a look at Yuri☆Koi Girls Love Story, Volume 2 (百合☆恋), in which there is only one good story….and it becomes substantially less good.

In the second chapter of “Yuri ni Tanpopo” we learn more about Mizuho – how she’s a good girl, honor student, reliable and all those other horribly burdensome qualities that society praises, but does not reward. We also learn that Mizuho and Ena have been going out since Ena confessed her feelings. Inexplicably, this becomes a crisis. Kanae reacts as if Mizuho had said they were going out since Ena killed Mizuho’s dog or something. Mizuho acts like it’s a shameful secret and Ena overhears this conversation. It’s all awkward tension that night between the three of them and the next morning, Ena’s gone. I’m left with a story revolving around a plot complication that seems of no importance to me whatsoever and I have no idea why. Everyone’s unhappy, me and the characters…

There were, surprisingly, a few other readable stories, most of which stayed in that “discovering love” phase so beloved of doujinshi artists and fanfic writers.

The rest of the stories were the more typical unrealistic fetishtry one excepts from a Yuri anthology.

Now I’m in a quandry. Do I get get Volume 3, knowing that 1) I am only getting it for one story that 2) will probably suck, or do I give up on the series completely? I guess I’ll just punt like I did on the last two volumes and stick it on my Yuri Wish List on Amazon JP and feel like  failure for not being able to just stop.  ^_^;

Ratings:

Overall –  Frustrating, with moments of okay.

My very sincere thank to Okazu Superhero Dan P. for facilitating my passive-aggressive relationship with this series by sponsoring today’s review!





Yuri Manga: Comic Yuri Hime, January 2014 (コミック百合姫)

January 9th, 2014

While the cover of the January 2014 issue of Comic Yuri Hime (コミック百合姫) was much discussed for about 15 seconds when the art was released, the K-ON! clone art is pretty much the least notable thing about this issue. ^_^

The lead story is…well, it’s different. Loner girl find her alone time on the roof interrupted by the Student Council President who is there to stuff her face with junk food.  They get locked up there and end up having to jump the fence and drop two stories into the school pool. Love? I have no idea. ^_^

Love between sempai and kouhai in school and in adult life fill the next few pages. Chisako, having finished up her Dark Cherry to Shoujo A series, starts with another story about a boyish girl and her femme lover. Mio is a top-notch pro soccer player and is admired by many. Sakura, her lover is.,.just not satisfied. She couldn’t even tell herself why, so she splits from Mio. Time passes and she sees Mio again, and learns that her ex now has a boyfriend. Now that she can’t have what she had and threw away, Sakura desires it. Can you tell I’d like Mio to tell Sakura to get lost? I would. ^_^

Minamoto Hisanari is back with a fun story about the night-time shenanigans of the school’s 7 mysteries, which brings the girl who comes out of the picture on the stair in one wing together with Toilet Hanako in the other. and gives rise to a new mystery in the courtyard. This one was too adorable.

Amano Shuninta’s “Watashi no Sekai o Kousei Suru Chiri no You na” comes to an end…and I panicked. I was all “what if they don’t bring Amano-sensei back? Argh! Augh! (They will, next issue. New series. Phew.) The end was as perfect as the rest. No one goes off happily every after, but there’s real possibilities, and a number of lost chances. I really want Asuna to have a spin-off where she finds someone nice. Maasa’s new career is the big reveal and I totally approve.

“Game” by Takemiya Jin continues with an excellent, painful, sexy, uncomfortable chapter. Moriko’s sister turns out to be a Yuri fan and discovers ‘Riko’s stash of Yuri doujinshi by Becky. Becky wants to meet this sister and, of course they, sharing an interest, fall right in. Moriko feels left out and abandoned. To make up with Becky, she offers to wear cosplay of Becky’s fave character. When Moriko speaks like the character, Becky jumps her. It’s a hot kiss and Moriko is powerless to stop, even as she knows that it’s not her Becky is kissing. “Awkward” doesn’t begin to cover it.

“Love Gene Double XX”  by Zaou Taishi and Eiki Eiki also comes to an end. It is a better end then than I expected, back when I reviewed the first volume, not as good as I would have insisted if I were the editor. ^_^ Aoi and Sakura are forced to fight one another and the loser will be “demoted” to the position of Eve. The obvious issue here is that why the flying fuck is being an Eve a demotion? Setting aside the fact that that is still sexism, in a one-sex world, the thing is, neither Aoi nor Sakura are particularly inclined to become an Eve. More importantly they want to show how much each other means to them by fighting as hard as they can against one another, a conclusion that seems silly, but makes perfect sense if you’ve ever competed in anything. The effort you put into winning is your show of respect.

In the climactic moment, Sakura decides that she’d rather just be with Aoi, and lays down her sword as Aoi attacks. (A pretty important act, as she admits that becoming an Eve is acceptable.)  Sakura’s sister, the head of the school, scoops up Aoi and Sakura and has them seen to. In her office, Sumire tells Aoi that she is not alone in thinking separating Adams and Eves is a really fucking stupid, insulting idea and forbidding love between Adams and Eves is adding insult to injury. (She actually mentions same-sex couples existed before the men all died.) Sumire tells Aoi that she has every intention of becoming Prime Minister and changing the laws, before we see her leap into Matsuri’s arms. Aoi and Sakura are reunited, secure that they can, at least while at Kingdom, be together. In a Dark Horse pairing, Erika actually comforts Momiji and for a moment, we like them both, although realistically, they’ll be a terrible couple. ^_^

I would have liked to see the series actually address the changing of the rules, but at least it acknowledged that the rules were fucking stupid.

As always, there were other stories, but these were this issue’s heavy hitters for me. Morishima Akiko-sensei’s “Yuripchu” and Tanaka Minoru-sensei’s “Rock It Girl” return next volume and, phew!, a new series by Amano-sensei, new work by Minamoto-sensei and other continuing series, so I don’t have to panic. ~Breathe~

Ratings:

Overall – 8

I was on pins and needles reading the end of “Love Gene Double XX.” There were just so many things wrong with the set up, it could have gone very badly.