Archive for the Yuri Manga Category


Yuri Manga: Watashi no Sekai o Kousei Suru Chiri no You na Nanika, Volume 2 (私の世界を構成する塵のような何か)

September 5th, 2013

Volume 2 of Amano Shuninta’s Yuri soap opera Watashi no Sekai o Kousei Suru Chiri no You na Nanika (私の世界を構成する塵のような何か) was…excellent.

Having established that Ruki and Sachi are interested in each other, we set them aside as main players and turn our sights towards what appeared to be the single stable couple among the two groups – Asuna and Fueko.

As the volume opens, we “meet” Asuna, as she learns about sex with women and about herself, and then jump to post-breakup, when Asuna and Fueko meet again. Although they cannot resolve what lays between them, they come to a place where they can part without regret. We then back up to get to know Fueko a little better. Finally, we see the both of them moving on. Last, wee see the root of their breakup.

The reordering of their story worked incredibly well. I had fooled myself into thinking they were a better couple than they were. This volume really brought home how wrong I was. Asuna was not nearly as sensitive as I (and the characters) had convinced myself that she was and Fueko was more selfish than I had realized. Breaking up was probably the most mature decision she’d made so far.

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Tucked into the background of this volume, we’re getting more detail about the other characters, as well. Ma-asa as Asuna’s tutor kind of blew my mind. The revelation about Meru’s past was sobering, upsetting and a little frustrating. But it made me see the cast as one complete unit, with friends that pull each other up, rather than just pairs to be watched and they couple and decouple. There is so much thought going into the storytelling here. It’s not a Story A, it’s about lives lived by characters that could be real. If you’re reading this series, pay attention to what you are looking at. Amano-sensei is a master craftsman.

Ratings:

Art – 9
Characters – 9
Story – 9
Yuri – 9
Service – 3 Mostly tasteful nudity

Overall – 9

I joked in my review of Volume 1 that this series was a Yuri The L Word. There is no doubt in my mind now that Watashi no Sekai o Kousei Suru Chiri no You na Nanika would make a *fantastic* live-action drama series.





Yuri Manga: Zenryaku, Yuri no Sono Yori Volume 2 (前略、百合の園より)

September 1st, 2013

Last December, I reviewed Volume 1 of Sugawa Tokushi’s  Zenryaku, Yuri no Sono Yori.  I never honestly expected we’d be discussing it once again. Earlier this month, Tsubomi discontinued publishing comics online, and their series have been absorbed by the Mangatime Kirara family of magazines. Some of the series will continue at least into 2014.

But in the meantime, we have a few series that began in Tsubomi that are wrapping up now – among them, this one. Volume 1 was more of a collection of mini-series, but Volume 2 sticks with the titular series.

Yuri is one-quarter foreign, so she has blonde hair, and she is a loner and little prickly, so she has no friends in school.  Fujiwara is the Nadesico beauty type who breaks through Yuri’s defenses – ostensibly to help the other girl make friends. But, as we see the story from Fujiwara’s point of view this time, there is way more than just being nice on her side. Fujiwara is attracted to Yuri. Once she breaks the ice for Yuri to make new friends, she feels cut off from the other girl and reacts by putting more distance between them. Yuri realizes that she has more friends – but they aren’t Fujiwara. After some minor emotional conflict, they finally break past the wall they’ve built between them and admit they “like” like one another. The ending looks rosy – especially with the addition of a few very light-hearted gags in the extra chapters.

Another extra chapter turns to Shinobu, Yuri’s only friend – and the woman who writes the BL manga Yuri draws. Shinobu is able to see the result of Yuri’s and Fujiwara’s make-up and is inspired to write a Yuri manga, called…”Zenryaku, Yuri no Sono Yori.” Obviously. ^_^ Another extra was the utterly absurd and very cute meeting of Fujiwara, Yuri and Shinobu and her girlfriend, the admiring underclassman from the first volume.

Here’s the thing. I read this book in one sitting. It may not sound compelling, but it was actually a real page turner. Sat down last night late for some before-bed reading and the next thing I knew – I was done.  That almost never happens. So while it was another “Story A”, another girl meets girl, girl likes girl, they like each other, the end book – it grabbed me and ran. For that alone I’d give it a good score.

But…I don’t have to do that for that alone. The final omake shows Yuri at home, drawing a manuscript and chopping vegetables, while Fujiwara is at college, then wraps up her classwork and heads home. The final page of the volume shows Yuri opening the door to Fujiwara.

“I’m home, Yuri” says Fujiwara.

“Welcome home, Misono,” Yuri replies.

Ratings:

Art – So many inconsistencies, Sugawa’s got a long way to go. Sometimes pages look more like a doujinshi than a professionally published work –  Variable, from 5-8
Story – 9
Characters – 8
Yuri – 9
Service – 1

Overall – 9

There is a girl, she likes another girl. The other girl likes her back. They like each other. And they live happily ever after. The end.





Yuri Manga: Hajimete, Kanojo to. (初めて、彼女と。)

August 28th, 2013

Hajimete, Kanojo to. (初めて、彼女と。), by Morishima Akiko-sensei, takes a look back at the origins of some of our favorite couples from her previous works.

First we look back at Rakuen no Joken. For Sarina and Sumi  we learn how they got together and why they’ve never really been a steady item. The series ends as Sarina realizes that Sumi moving in isn’t the life she wants, but travelling the world together with her is.

Shinobu and Lalaa have been living together for a while and Lalaa is inexpressibly happy. But, as she reminisces about how they got together, she misses, just a little, the crybaby Shinobu of her youth.

We then move on to Sayaka and Ruri from Ruri-iro Yume. Sayaka’s dream has changed since we first met her, but she thinks it’s okay – and so do we.

And last, we meet up once again with Mitsuki and Kaoru from Renai Joshika (Volume 1 and Volume 2). With them, we travel back into their school years,  how they met, became friends, became lovers and what went on between them during their first time dating. We can kind of see how they ended up the way they were when we met them originally – and I’m pleased that we know they end up together in a more mature version of the same relationship.

As always, Morishima-sensei’s art is cute, rather than cool. Her stories this time mean to – and do – evoke a sense of nostalgia. How did we get where we are? What paths did we take to get here?  For all of us, it is a long road, and one day we look back and think, really? My hair looked like that?

1981 Me and my wife, in 1981 or so at band camp.





Yuri Manga: Material Candy (マテリアルキャンディ)

August 26th, 2013

Material Candy (マテリアルキャンディ) by Kurokiri Misao, is a collection of stories from Comic Yuri Hime that is definitely a mixed bag of treats.

The first story, “In Mold Girl” is something I think many manga fans and other introverts can probably identify with. Growing up, Aiko never seemed to get with the zeitgeist. She always had the wrong answer for the other girls’ questions, or didn’t really understand what they were interested in. So, she created “the manual”  a scrapbook of notes on relating to the girls around her. When Sena confesses to her, Aiko has nothing in “the manual” that can tell her how to handle the situation. She agrees, but when the relationship threatens to turn serious, she has to decide between the manual and Sena.

“Metamornoise” is a story about a girl who rejects growing up in order to keep her relationship intact, only, she needn’t have worried at all.

In “Sange no Kizuato” the loss of a half sister/lover is too much to bear. For many reasons, this was the weakest story in the collection.

Three girls are inseparable, but a death separates them, in “Higan no Kyoukai.” It’s up to Mao to save Ruka from a non-life that will fade into a lonely death. Of the stories in the collection, this one is arguably my favorite. Ruka’s clinging to death and Hazuki’s memory was off-putting, but Mao was not insensitive nor clueless. The way she drew Ruka back into life was touching and it turned what might have been a cloying story into a good read.

In “Chip-n-Candy”, the final story, we turn back towards Sena and Aiko, with a focus on Sena’s past and an assurance that they are moving forward, together.

About halfway through the book, if you had asked me if I was enjoying it, I might have prevaricated. But now that I’ve completed it, it was more satisfying than I expected.

Ratings:

Art – 7
Story – Variable, say 7
Characters – Let’s go 8 on this
Yuri – 8
Service – 2

Overall – 7

Live. Move forward. Think for yourself. Make your own decisions. Don’t be afraid of the future – all excellent morals of the story and all told, a collection of ideas I can get behind.





Yuri Manga: Steps

August 19th, 2013

A-chan and Riyoko are neighbors, Riyoko has always had a crush on A-chan, from the time she was a small girl. Now, as a high school student, her feelings are much more than a mere crush. But what about A-chan? How does she feel? Well..she feels the same, but she’s a teacher in Riyoko’s school and it’s just kind of complicated.

In “Step Forward” and “Step Up”, the first two stories of Takemiya Jin‘s collected Steps, we follow A-chan, as she learns to take Riyoko and her own feelings seriously and how to deal with it not all being a secret. Riyoko learns that true love doesn’t have to be said – but it’s awfully nice when it is. More importantly she learns that her friend Kimura has a girlfriend of her own.

In “Leave hickey?” we take a look at Kimu and her girlfriend, who is the art teacher at school. Kimu wants to mark up – or be marked by – a hickey, but Miyano doesn’t like the idea of a bruise as a mark of possession, and they opt for a small work of art on Kimu’s inner thigh.

In “step by step” A-chan and Miyano team up for a very gay wedding dress shoot, and A-chan struggles with the idea of coming out. Riyoko helps by kissing her soundly in public.

The next two chapters “Mekakushi no Koi” are, quite possibly, my favorite Takemiya Jin story. Satomi looks down at her phone at a picture of her kissing another girl. When she was in school, Satomi wasn’t able to hang around with the other girls – she had an avocation as a novelist. So she wasn’t really able to make too many friends, nor find a lover. So when Ayuna says that’s she’s bi and interested, then kisses Satomi, poor Satomi falls hard. But. Ayuna is not a kind person. She’s willing to have sex, but has no respect for gay people, finding them pathetic, since they’ll have to give up marriage and children. Satomi is not satisfied. She asks her editor, Moriyama, what to do. Ultimately, Satomi finds the relationship untenable and tells Ayuna off. Ayuna does not take it well and confirms Satomi’s suspicions that she is really not a nice person. Satomi walks away. Moriyama congratulates Satomi for taking control of her life…and assures her that Ayuna was a bad example of a bisexual. We circle around to the beginning of the story to see Satomi meet up with Nana, her current girlfriend. (In fact, their story continues in Comic Yuri Hime.) I loved the takedown of the whole “gays can never have a family BS” which is the standard Japanese trope for not coming out as gay. Even more, if Takemiya-sensei had left it with Ayuna just being bi, it would have left a bad taste in my mouth. As it was, Moriyama-sempai gets to explain to Satomi that “bi” doesn’t mean selfish and manipulative and that Ayuna was mostly just a jerk.

In “Secret Love” the entire story ties up. We learn that Satomi is now a successful novelist who writes under the name “Hime Yuri,” Moriyama’s girlfriend is Youko. Youko and Nana’s story was told in Takemiya’s Kila Kila. It’s Youko that realizes that the two circles are intertwined as they talk about going out to get drinks together. “Sensei’s girlfriend is my ex!” Woops. Well, that’s pretty realistic, isn’t it?

I turned the last page and there in the afterword, Takemiya-sensei places a helpful relationship chart. I think we’re in for another “The ‘L’ Word, manga style. Cool.

At which Takemiya Jin becomes the first lesbian manga artist to do a Yuri manga with all-lesbian content. Bam. We have a winner.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 8-10
Characters – 9
Yuri – 10
Service – 3

Overall – 10

Folks, the game has officially changed.