Archive for the Yuri Manga Category


Yuri Manga: Gokujou Drops, Volume 3

January 20th, 2010

In Volume 3 of Gokujou Drops (極上ドロップス) Komari is sexually harrassed by every human being she interacts with, and is suddenly parted from Yukio with no communication between them for the 437th time.

This time, it’s serious. Yukio’s mother is disgusted by the news that she’s living – and sleeping – with some nobody at school. She determined to force Yukio to transfer and marry her off as soon as possible. But Komari braves the labyrinth once again and saves Yukio – with the deus ex machina of an aunt that had been a former resident of the Haraizo Dorm and letter from Yukio’s off-scene father.

I am so done with this series. There’s nothing even remotely interesting in Volume 3, it’s a tired rehash of everything from the first two volumes. Komari being forcibly undressed by just about anyone who walks by was always tedious – now its plain old, old and tired. The art is the same, the sex (consensual and non-consensual) is the same; the crying, the non-secrets, the snuggling – its all the exact same.

As I mentioned, the cell phone manga collections from Ichijinshi weren’t great this time around. This wasn’t the worst of them, however – that’s still to come. ^_^

Rather than spend your money on Volume 3, you can just re-read Volume 1 and Volume 2 over and save your money for something better.

Ratings:

Art – 6
Story – 5
Characters – 5
Yuri – 8
Service – 8

Overall – 5

Sexual harassment isn’t a particularly good plot complication, much less an entire *plot.*

But hey – here’s an opportunity for a enthusiastic fan, if Vol. 4 comes out, I won’t be getting it, so we’ll need a guest review!





Yuri Manga: Kimochi no Katachi, Volume 1

January 18th, 2010

You know the old stereotype of an old person crying tears of joy, saying something like, “I’m so glad to have lived to see this day”? I am that old person. ^_^

Almost all of my favorite original doujinshi artists have been discovered, their stories collected, their work recognized for its innate value.

Today’s review is a collection of a series I talked about five years ago. Sakuraike was one of the first original Yuri doujinshi circles I began collecting, and we had the incredible pleasure of being able to include some of their work in our Yuri Monogatari 5 anthology.

Kimochi no Katachi (きもちのかたち) is the collection of all the Tact doujinshi series in two volumes.

The first arc of the volume is by Kitao Taki and introduces us to Mako, a boyish, athletic, but sweet and kind and soft-hearted girl. Her best friend Takemi is protective of her, but not grasping. When another female student falls for Mako, Mako resists primarily because she’s already been burned for having feelings for another girl. But Rina is nothing if not persistent. Mako’s relationship with Takemi suffers because she can’t find it in herself to tell her best friend what’s obviously going on. Takemi knows – she’s not an idiot – but she needs Mako to be the one to say it. Takemi’s right, too. Mako needs to be able to be honest with herself.

Rina is fighting to get Mako to say her name, when Mako’s former love interest shows up to complicate things. Mako has to move past her old unrequited love, her fear of her own feelings and plain old embarrassment. But she does, and by the end of the arc captured in this volume, Makoto and Rina are finally able to be a couple.

The second arc, by Mitou Kana tells the story of Satsuki, who falls for her sempai in the Library club, Kano. Satsuki is very well aware of how people perceive women who love women, and she carefully draws an imaginary line between behaviors that are acceptable and those that are not. By accident, she meets a lizard who teaches her the meaning of “being gross” and “being different” and learns to accept her own feelings.

Satsuki is assisted in this by her friend Mana, who sees immediately what’s going on and – like Takemi in the first arc – demands that Satsuki be honest with herself. At the end of the first volume Satsuki admits to Mana that, yes, she does like Kano. Since the very first 4-koma of the arc shows the two of them as a couple, we can relax…a little bit. ^_^

When I first discovered Sakuraike, I was enchanted by their characters. They were doing what everyone else wasn’t. Their characters were talking about, thinking about and dealing with the reality of being in love with another girl – territory that’s *still* pretty rare in Yuri. Thanks to the leveling up of artists and circles like Sakuraike, UKOZ, Morinaga, Takashima, Tadeno and Morishima, we’re getting more and more realistic situations in our Yuri.

Artistically speaking, there’s some good and some less good in Kimochi no Katachi. Remember, Tact is pretty old now (I started collecting it in 2004 and it had already been a round for a while), so as artists, both Taki and Kana have improved since then. Taki’s art tends towards a loose playing-free-with-proportions style, and Kana’s style is more 4-koma cute.

For me, it’s the characters that rule here. Satsuki is instantly likeable, Kano is fun and you know, when Rina’s aching because Mako’s so cute…you feel it, you really do. The story lines might appear to be paths that have been well-trod, but they weren’t – not when these stories were first written. And they still hold up today, I think.

If I wanted to give a good Yuri manga to a young woman who was questioning her right to love another woman and worried that people might think she was weird, this is the manga I would give her.

Ratings:

Because this volume is a collection of doujinshi that were released over years, the ratings are amost all variable.

Art – From 3-7
Story – From 6-8
Characters – 8-9
Yuri – 9
Service – 1

Overall – 9

I am so glad to have lived to see this day. I mean that. Holding this book in my hand was like a gift from heaven. 18 days into it, 2010 is still the best year of my life (so far!)





Yuri Manga: Otome Ouji ~ Joshikou Manken Host Club

January 14th, 2010

When I first came across Otome Ouji ~ Joshikou Manken Host Club (乙女王子~女子高漫研ホストクラブ~), I laughed. After all, when you buy a series called “Maiden Prince – Girls’ High School Manga Research Society Host Club” you pretty much have to know what you’re getting in to. Unfortunately, the heroine, Hinoya, doesn’t. ^_^

Hinoya enters Momohana Girls’ High School looking forward to joining the manga club, because she was very active in her middle school club and enjoyed it quite a lot. To her disappointment, she finds that the Momohana Manga Research Society meets in a dilapidated (and possibly toxic) shed on the roof. The club is run by a sempai named Kondou; Utagawa-sempai and Akira-sempai are the sole members. They have no materials, no ambition and, as the story opens, they learn that they have no budget. The VP of the student council arrives to let them know, and soundly denounces them for sucking.

Kondou reacts with cleverness – if they find out her weak point, maybe they can convince the VP to come around. They learn that she loves boy idols and decide to open the manga club up as a host club.

Their first attempt fails so horribly that the VP decides to disband them utterly but, after some research, they transform themselves and their shed. Utagawa-sempai is transformed into Marcello, Hinoya is the cute boyish Michel and Akira, whose silence seemed off-putting as a girl becomes the enchantingly silent Rodriguez. The shed is likewise transformed into an intimate and luxurious setting. Their efforts pay off as the Council VP announces that she’s secured them funding – as long as she has exclusive rights to time with Rodriguez.

As the Host Club becomes more and more popular, the VP is having major issues. She’s starting to get jealous of the girls paying attention to Akira. Eventually she confesses that she wants to go out with her. With the others as shadow chaperones, Akira and the VP have a date together that ends with the VP confessing her feelings for Akira. Akira accepts the feelings but says that she doesn’t want to be lovers – she’d really like to be friends, though. The VP and she embrace and head off – as friends – to finish their date.

The Manken Host Club celebrates a successful school festival, but find themselves called to the Student Council’s office immediately after. Nervous, they get ready to be told they are being disbanded after all. The Council President shows her true colors when she tells them that they can continue…but they have to let her join, she says, wearing a decidely Rose of Versailles-esque uniform. Insert silly noise of your choice here.

This one-shot volume was fun. It was funny, a teeny little bit touching and overall extremely goofy – exactly what one would expect from a manga with such a silly title. The whole thing felt like exactly what it was – a tapenade made from popular memes du jour, tossed in the blender with a few handwaves, mixed on “wtf” setting, taken with a grain of salt.

Ratings:

Art – 7
Story – 8
Characters – 8
Yuri – 6
Service – 2

Overall – 8

You get exactly what you pay for with this manga – so if what you want is a revisit of everything that’s popular all together at once, executed with some smarts and nerve, then this is a great choice for some light comic reading.





Yuri Manga: Sora-iro Girlfriend

January 11th, 2010

Hiromi is a tomboy. She prefers pants to skirts, likes to be physically active and, as a child watching Ribon no Kishi, she wanted to be that Princess Knight.

When a beautiful, but somewhat brusque, new student transfers into her class, Hiromi finds herself defending, then befriending Juli. Juli calls Hiromi “Romeo” and casts herself as Hiromi’s Juliette.

Hiromi is disturbed to find that she is on the one hand, caught up in Juli’s apparent delusion about them as a couple, while on the other, having actual feelings for the other girl. Juli’s behavior is not in any way helping as she alternately voids Hiromi’s boundaries while simultaneously drawing clear battle lines around the two of them, cutting Hiromi off from the rest of her friends.

When the school festival rolls around, it’s no surprise that Hiromi is Romeo and Juli is Juliette in their class play. Hiromi finds herself increasingly uncomfortable being cast as a “prince” by the people around her, even though that was what she wanted for herself as a child. She does want to be with and protect Juli, but she also wants to be seen as Hiromi and not some construct, “Romeo.”

During the death scene in the play, Juli kisses Hiromi, who reacts wth surprised violence. Mortified, Hiromi stays home from school until her best friend Maki comes to collect her some days later. She finds Juli has become the center of a storm of harassment and abuse in her absence. When Hiromi shows up, Juli’s emotional damn breaks and Hiromi rushes to hold and comfort her. The rest of the class can only watch as Hiromi and Juli become an actual couple, despite the rumor and innuendo.

Juli’s behavior is no less delusional, but now Hiromi is willing to give in more, since she’s decided that she definitely wants Juli. After Juli tearfully admits that she’ll be moving away at the end of the year, Hiromi and she spend the night together.

After graduation, Hiromi transfers into a new school – a traditional private girls’ school. Her boyishness is no less popular that it was, but she’s resigned to it. She’s told that a new student is transferring in but when she hears a shout of annoyance, disbelievingly, she runs into the next classroom to see Juli sitting there, her hair shorn – a way to keep Hiromi with her while they were apart. They go running out of the room to find a quiet place where they reuinite with a kiss.

So, yes, this had a happy ending, but it wasn’t all that enjoyable. Juli’s lack of respect for Hiromi’s boundaries and manipulative behavior made it hard for me to ever really believe she was in love with Hiromi. Instead, I kept feeling as though she never really saw the real Hiromi at all and was only in love with the Romeo she’d made up in her head. Hiromi’s feelings were equally as difficult to accept, because I can’t be really happy about her falling in love with someone so high maintenance and, well, crazy. I’ve seen this in real life and yes, the relationship can go on for decades, but it isn’t going to be pretty…and everyone around it is *doomed.*

Just about the only thing I really liked was the balance in the beginning scene, as Hiromi is told of a cool new transfer student by her friend Maki and the final scene in which her new henchgirl in the new school tells her about the cool new transfer student.

Sora-iro Girlfriend (空色ガールフレンド) is another collection of a Yuri Hime cell phone comic. Unlike the others, it’s low on the sex, but makes up for it with no-less-creepy-for-being-realistic Lesbian Drama.

Ratings:

Art – 6
Story – 5
Characters – 5
Yuri – 8
Service – 2

I’m not loving this batch of the cell phone comics. This manga was the best of them…. /sob/





Poor Poor Lips, (プアプアLIPS), Volume 2

January 10th, 2010

In Volume 1 of Poor Poor Lips (プアプアLIPS), we met Okashi Nako, a young woman who is struggling with crippling poverty and Otsuka Ren, the Lesbian owner of a crystal shop at which Nako is employed.

Volume 2 starts with a slightly tiresome series of gags in which we reaffirm that Nako is so poor she has no phone, has never seen a computer and, with no TV or radio has no knowledge of the Internet. But this is not just random wallowing as we learn, because it shows us that despite her poverty, Nako is endlessly positive and is a little worried that Ren spoiling her will lead to her no longer being able to live happily.

Things come to a head when Ren invites Nako to accompany her to Nagoya for a crystal show. They stay at a top hotel and Nako really starts to worry about being able to remain comfortable with her real life. She asks Ren to stop spoiling her, which precipitates a horrible misunderstanding during which Nako goes missing. When they are reunited, Ren embraces Nako tearfully and begs her to allow her to spoil her, because she really likes Nako. Nako, finding an unexpected warmth and comfort in Ren’s arms, gives in.

Nako starts to worry about her feelings for Ren, but Ren is glad to offer whatever would make Nako happy, and so they begin to embrace in public.

In Volume 1, we also met one of Nako’s former classmates, Fukui, who runs a cake shop down the street. He likes Nako and worries that she’s being seduced by the evil lesbian. He makes himself tiresome and insulting, but Nako defends her relationship with Ren and, in any case, only likes Fukui for his cakes.

All of this becomes really important when Ren’s mother invites her home to attend a O-miai. Ren tells Nako that her mother knows that she is a lesbian but, frankly, doesn’t care. Nako offers to come with Ren and pretend to be her lover to convince her mother to back off.

Ren’s mother quizzes Nako and eventually says that, if Nako is truly a good lover for Ren, she’ll stop asking her to get married. They continue their play acting – which for Ren is getting closer and closer to being truth. Nako won’t back down even when a private eye follows her, and when Ren’s mother offers to pay off the enormous debt the death of her parents left her with (thus explaining her ongoing poverty.) When Nako remains steadfast, Ren’s mother sends them a message that she can see that they mean a lot to one another, but she really doesn’t buy that Nako’s not in it for the money – so she cuts Ren off.

Ren closes the store and moves in with Nako, and learns just what it means to be poor. What she would have fed her cat as a snack is suddenly dinner for both of them. But she also learns about Nako’s life and all the people in town who help her by saving the ends of vegetables and the crusts of bread for her.

Fukui continues to be annoying but he relents enough to hire both Nako, as a chef, and Ren, as a salesperson. And, as much as he blusters and carries on, it’s Ren that Nako looks at when she’s happy.

And it looks like we’re going to get a Volume 3.

Sorry for the long synopsis – but I think it’s really worth taking time to talk about this manga. It was a series I was very opposed to, because of the loli look to it, but the first volume very much surprised me – and Volume 2 has really blown me away.

Ren is portrayed realistically. Yes, she likes Nako, no she is not jumping her. Her feelings are real, are complex and for her, her friendship with Nako is more important than any fictitious relationship she might wish for.

Nako’s poverty explained (pretty much what I guessed) was one thing, but the whole storyline with her asking not to be spoiled, then accepting Ren when she was cut off into her life was…well, really good.

Fukui is horrible, but he represents the everyman perspective, spewing every nasty, tedious thing there is to say about lesbians, only to be shut down by Nako’s support of Ren. By the time he repeats himself the thirtieth time, he’s starting to look pretty obnoxious in the face of Ren and Nako’s friendship.

Will Volume 3 bring Mom around and put Ren and Nako back into their real lives? I really hope so. I will certainly get it because wherever the story goes, it’s sure to be surprisingly good.

Ratings:

Art – 6 for me, 8 for people who like the style
Story – 9
Characters – 9
Yuri – 7
Service – 3

Overall – 9

This makes my third license request for the year – Yen, *this* is a good 4-koma. Please bring it over now, thanks.