Archive for the Yuri Manga Category


Yuri Manga: Yozora no Ouji to Asayake no Hime

March 10th, 2008

 Yozora no Ouji to Asayake no Hime (The Prince Night Sky and the Princess of the Sunrise) isn’t bad at all. For what it is. Which is another collection of stories from Yuri Hime magazine. Almost every story takes place in school, with the exception of the one Lady and her loyal ninja story. There are a few kisses and even the implication of more once or twice.

It’s not like this collection is bad – it isn’t. And there’s a general cheerful tenor. Nothing particular connects the stories – they remain exactly what they always were – Yuri one-shots. I didn’t dislike this collection – in fact, preferred the collection to the individual stories, as I am wont to do – but nothing really stands out here as exceptional. There’s happy Yuri, sad Yuri, slightly disturbing Yuri, funny Yuri, but it’s all much of a muchness. (Like Otome Cake, I mostly picked this volume up while I was in Tokyo because I was in Tokyo and it was there.) Like Last Uniform I don’t hate Hakamada’s work, but I can’t quite like it, either.

If you love her art or stories, then definitely get this book – I think it’s a damn sight better than Last Uniform. If you’re on the fence, save your money for something better like Rakuen no Jouken.

Ratings:

Art – 5
Characters – 5
Stories – 5
Yuri – 7
Service – 2

Overall – 5

As I glance over the collection I’m struck by an alternate opening to this review – “There are eight million stories in the Yuri City. These are a few of them.” I know very, very few of my readers will get that reference. I apologize. But it did strike me that way. ^_^





Yuri Manga: Gunjou

March 6th, 2008

A few months ago, I mentioned that I created a page on the Japanese social networking site Mixi. It’s been a very good exercise so far. For one thing, I have to be semi-coherent in Japanese when I post there, so I’m forced to practice my appalling communication skills. Because I am a shameless American, I’ve been wandering around the Mixi communities, introducing myself and pimping Yuricon & ALC Publishing where it seems to fit.

Well, one day I got a message – always an occasion of entertainment, (I’m not afraid of rare hunters who just want me for my strangeness.) This message, however was a very polite comment from someone named Nakamura who thought that since I seem to like Yuri manga, I might be interested in their new manga series. The post they linked me to starts “A non-moe Yuri manga.” My cute little ears pricked up because, of course, I *long* for non-moe Yuri stories.

Let me side-step a second. The day before I received this message I was trawling the Yuri board at 2chan and saw a picture which interested me greatly. I didn’t read the post, because I was in a rush. But the art really stuck out because it was two adult women, looking decidedly grim and I liked it instantly.

So, when I popped onto Nakamura-san’s page and find myself staring at the same exact picture, I think my heart rate increased a little. Probably got a little color in my sallow cheeks as well. After reading the description of the series, I fearlessly added Morning 2 magazine to my last order from Amazon JP.

Friends, I just want to say this, Gunjou is awesome and Nakamura Ching is da BOMB. Thank you, thank you, Nakamura-san for pointing out your new series to me!

As I reported in my Yuri News report a few weeks ago, Gunjou by Nakamura Ching is the story of a woman who asks the lesbian who is in love with her to kill her husband, and their life on the road after the deed is done.

The woman, whom I will refer to as “BN” for “brunette,” because she as yet has no name, is not a nice person. If I was her husband, I’d probably be abusive too. She’s manipulative, self-absorbed and nasty. Her friend, who is also nameless, so will be referred to as “BL” for “blonde,” is a lesbian who has been in love with BN for some time. She identifies as a lesbian and she’s prone to fits of violence. Needless to say, as I read Gunjou I practically shuddered with ecstasy. A nasty woman and the EPL who loves her. Sounds like my household. LOL

In chapter 4, which is where I picked the story up, they are casually discussing how they would want to kill themselves. BL suggest self-immolation with gasoline – and buys some just in case they want to try it. They return to BN’s childhood home, since her parents are safely dead. She tells BL how much they and her husband trapped her for her entire life. She heads off to have a cigarette and take a walk – we later see her at the public phone. BL finds some ero-magazines and picks one up, only to find that the girl in the story being schtupped looks scarily like BN. They find a game of LIFE and start to play, but in a fit of nasty, BN trash talks BL, then tells BL that she called the police on her. BL beats the bejeebus out of BN, then threatens her life with a broken bottle. BN begs for her life, they drink, they eat some sushi and go outside for a walk. Whereupon BL douses herself in the gasoline. But then worries when BN takes out a cigarette. The chapter ends with them both sitting on the ground outside the car, BN’s hand on BL’s thigh and BL carefully holding BN’s lighter.

Chapter 5 starts with some color pages, and BL with wounds that look like knife marks on her chest. No hospital, she says, in her near dementia. BN has no clue what to do, but she remembers BL talking about an older cousin she used to visit in the area where they went to school, so BN heads there. They park, BL saying she doesn’t want to go to a hospital, and BN saying that she isn’t – they are at her cousin’s place. “I don’t have a cousin,” BL says, just as her (obviously) ex-lover walks up. Woops. LOL

BN is laying on a futon on the floor when BL starts to gag and vomit. The lover comes in and comforts her, and in case we were very stupid, she holds her close, they have a lover’s reunion right there, while BN eats her own liver out. The whole thing is massively awkward. As BL recovers, the lover takes BN out to dinner, blames her for the failure of their (BL x lover’s) relationship, and the current state of things. After gently tipping her dinner over BN’s head, the lover proceeds to try to strangle her to death, saying she won’t give BL back now that she has her again.

BN drops the car keys into the car and starts to walk away, but BL leaves her lover with an apology. As the chapter ends, the two of them walk off arm in arm.

The art is a bit unusual, josei meets action drama – but don’t get me wrong, this is NOT a josei manga. Morning is a guy’s magazine and this is a manga for an adult, male, audience. The characters aren’t attractive, but that’s more because their expressions are often distorted by rage, frustration and bile, than anything else. Every once in a while they soften and you instantly begin to like them.

While I’ve focused on the major drama in the synopsis, there’s actually quite a bit of softer character development going on. And despite the dysfunction and manipulation, the relationship between BN and BL has some moments that are really quite tender. Since Nakamura-san describes this series as a Yuri series, I’m very interested to see how their relationship develops. I don’t see a *happy* end in the future, but I bet it’s interesting. I’ll definitely be following the series as it comes out in Morning – hopefully a tankoubon will be out soon.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 8
Characters – 6 for anyone sane, 9 for me
Yuri – 4
Loser FanErica – 10

I cannot *wait* until the next chapter. I might just die from anticipation!





Yuri Manga Anthology: Maria’s Wink

March 4th, 2008

Long day today – short review. One of the more charming gray areas of Japanese copyright law is the existence of parody doujinshi anthologies. These are found in the same stores where manga and anime are sold. They usually have an anthology section, sometimes two, one for gag comics and the other for “adult.”

When I was in Japan last year, I picked up a pile of Maria-sama ga Miteru anthologies, some of which I have already reviewed. Feel free to read my reviews of Soeur Sengen and Gokigenyou anytime. At the time, I also picked up the second book in a series called Maria’s Wink. This past trip I found Maria’s Wink, Volume 1.

Maria’s Wink is primarily a gag anthology, but there’s plenty of Yuri love-love for readers, mostly of the major pairings. Lots of Sei-ism, of course. Two circles included in this collection are Bebe, who did the Creole series, and Raku-Gun, one of my current favorite circles.

I enjoy doujinshi anthologies. They are a fun, easy way to get a bead on the kind of stories that you, as a fan of a series, like. You get such a wide variety of circles, art, story, feel and tone, that you’re likely to find *something* that appeals to you. I always recommend these books as a great way to dip a toe into the vast and intimidating world of doujinshi. Once you have a few circles you know you like, you can start looking for their work, and slowly, slowly find yourself drowning in thousands of doujinshi which threaten to overrun your house.

…Maybe that’s just me.

In any case, if you like Maria-sama ga Miteru, and you want to read doujinshi that is *not* full of gouting bodily fluids, Maria’s Wink is a good place to start.

Ratings:

Art – Averaging at about 6
Characters – 8
Story – 7
Yuri – 6
Service – 2

Overall – 7





Yuri Manga: Eternal Alice Rondo, Volume 2 (English)

March 3rd, 2008

Long-time readers of Okazu (all of whom are clearly intelligent, discriminating people) will certainly have looked at the title of today’s review and asked “Why, Erica, why? Why do you continue to torture both us and yourself by continuing to review this and other Kaishaku series?”

The answer is three-fold: 1) Because their work has Yuri; 2) Because it amuses me to do so and mostly importantly; 3) I don’t know, I can’t stop myself. ^_^;

In any case, today we are looking at Eternal Alice Rondo Key Princess Story Volume 2, rendered for the English-speaking audience by the brave women and men at DrMaster.

Volume 1 set up the story in which obsessed Lewis Carrol otaku Aruto finds himself able to enter marvielleux space and observe and affect “Alice” fights between a host of girls who represent a host of fetishes. Aruto finds himself the subject of a rivalry between his obsessively adoring little sister Kiraha and Arisu, who is the very picture of Aruto’s idea of what an “Alice” should be.

Volume 2 starts in the middle of a fight with Akane, a mentally disturbed pryomaniac, segueing bizarrely (I was going to write “smoothly” there, but realized that the sarcasm would probably go unnoticed,) into a chapter about Kiraha and her obsessively adoring best friend Kisa making cookies. *Magic* cookies. Cookies that will make the person who eats them fall in love with you. Kisa wants Kiraha to fall in love with her, Kiraha wants Aruto to fall in love with her, and in the end the cookies make the person who makes them fall in love with the person who they made them for. In other words, nothing changes.

This is followed by the shocking revelation that the author of the Alice books is still alive – oh wait, not, he’s a descendant that looks, acts, sounds and dresses exactly the same. Of course. He offers Aruto a chance to be play a part in the creation of the third, unwritten Alice book. Clearly he is holding something back. Like his insanity.

Another smooth segue into a ghost story, followed by a pool episode. Kisa spends the entire time thinking about, fantasizing about and focusing on Kiraha, who only has eyes for Aruto. Who, if he wasn’t such a loser, would only have eyes for Alice.

Suddenly, we are wallowing around in the most painful memories of our various Alices, set off by an unnamed enemy, who uses those painful thoughts to defeat her opponents. Haha on her, Arisu has no memories, so she wins that round.

But Suwa has no intention of giving up, so she releases crazy Akane, and immediately regrets it, because she can’t keep her under any kind of control. Suwa manages to get a hold of Kirika and forces her to be her slave.

We’re introduced to a handful of other Alices, all of whom realize that they are actually in the series Rozen Maiden. A battle royale is about to begin, presided over by the Alice Master who, in another shocking revelation, turns out to be not a descendant of Alternate L. Takion, the author of the Alice books, but the man himself.

Suwa meets up with Arisu and decides that one slave isn’t enough.

We close the book with a sigh of relief.

DrMaster does as good a job as one can do with this series. The translation is as coherent as it can possibly be within the context of an incoherent storyline, and it is not the reproduction’s fault that it’s hard to see what’s going on in the action scenes.

If you are a fan of any of the various fetishes represented in the series, especially incest, which is the predominant meme, and plot, character and internal consistency don’t mean much to you, this series is certainly worth a look. For fans of previous Kaishaku works who watched or read for the Yuri storylines, I’d recommend sticking with Kannazuki and Kyoshiro both of which have much more satisfying Yuri couples than Kisa’s unrequited – and rather tedious- love for Kiraha.

Ratings:

Art – 5 sometimes I could even make out what was going on…
Story – 5 – this volume started to make sense, which worried me
Characters – Averaging out at 5, but I liked Akane for being completely bugfucked
Yuri – 4
Service – 8
Overall – 5

I almost feel like reviewing something else tonight, just to get this out of my brain…. ^_^





Yuri Manga: Voiceful (English)

February 27th, 2008

Books like Voiceful are exactly the reason the Yuricon definition of Yuri includes “intense emotional connections” between women. Because sometimes it’s not “love” yet, and hasn’t gotten anywhere near “desire” but it’s still some seriously intense bond that could easily become something more. (Another good example of that is Haibane Renmei, in which the circumstances preclude a love affair, but don’t stop Reki and Rakka from being intensely attracted to one another.)

Before I forget, thanks to Eric for sponsoring today’s review!

The creator, nawoko, says in her endnote that Voiceful is pretty far from Yuri. In one sense she is correct, but I think anyone who reads Kanae and Hina’s story will be able to see the Yuri, without the need for Yuri goggles.

For a summation of the content of the book, and my first impressions, please read my review of the Japanese edition. As I have been doing, today’s review will cover the adaptation by Seven Seas.

I think this is one of the best in Seven Seas’ Strawberry Line so far. The color page, the cover and the tones are clearer than usual. Towards the end of the volume, the stories get a little darker. The stories at the end of the volume are the earlier Yuri Shimai stories – I have no idea if that is related or not.

The translation is quite good. I know I wasn’t the only one who had some trouble with “Opening,” the final story (how ironic, huh?) and the translator did a very good job of making it make sense. The emotion between Kanae and Hina comes across beautifully, as well.

As always the editing and adaptation are smooth as silk and the honorifics remain in place. Nice job, everyone. ^_^

The book also contains some preview pages for First Love Sisters, as an “extra.” Since FSL is the other Ichijinsha book in the Strawberry Line so far, that seems like a natural fit. I’m interested to see if Seven Seas is able to (or wants to) pick up any further Yuri Hime comics – and which ones they might get.

Ratings:

Art – 7
Characters – 7
Story – 7
Yuri – 4
Service – 1, some slight undressedness

Overall – 7

While not the absolute best Yuri Hime collection Ichijinsha has put out, Voiceful is a nice way to ease into the genre. If you have a friend who isn’t really a big fan, or you know a young babydyke whose parents would object to Strawberry Panic (and what sane person wouldn’t? ^_^) Voiceful makes a gentle point of entry into the Yuri world.