Archive for the Yuri Manga Category


Yuri Manga: Blue

May 20th, 2004

Before I write today’s review, I just want to let you know that I’ve changed the “Comments” field below so anyone can comment – you no longer have to be registered.

Now, today’s review:

Blue, by Nananan Kiriko, was published by MAG Comics in 1997. Stuck as it was in the limbo space between the tough girl epics of the 1980’s and the new wave of yuri in the early twenty first century (that would be now…), this manga reads like a tentative probe into a sensitive spot.

Blue has a simple storyline – Kayako is a recent transfer student to a seaside school, still tentatively making friends. She becomes interested in the girl who sits in front of her and never really interacts with anyone. One day, on a whim, Kayako invites the girl, Masami, to join her and her classmates for lunch and a new friendship is born. Masami seems nice enough and she and Kayako start spending more and more time together.

One night, Kayako goes out with a few friends to an arranged drinking party with some guys. She ends up at a hotel with one of the guys, but afterwards, she realizes that it was pretty pathetic of her, because she’s fallen in love with Masami. Shortly therafter, she and Masami share their first kiss.

Their relationship becomes a little more exclusive, so when Kayako’s friend who had set up the drinking party comes in screaming at Kayako, she’s really taken aback. The friend is appalled at Kayako for sleeping with the guy *she* liked…for sleeping with him at all, really. In the following days, Kayako is quietly shunned by her circle of friends, but she and Masami become closer than ever – they decide to move to Tokyo together when they graduate, etc, etc.

But summer vacation comes and Masami disappears with no word to either her mother or Kayako. As Kayako’s happiness collapses around her, she’s forced to learn more about the Masami she didn’t know, and face her own fears and jealousies…and be more honest with her other friends.

In the end, Masami and Kayako do not stay together – there really is never any reason to believe they might, to be honest. If either one of them were male, this entire story would simply be a “first love” story and disappear into oblivion. The entire manga seems to be balanced on a pinhead of tension. There just isn’t much there, except the usual day-to-day stuff of adolescence. From my lofty perspective (adolescence was a *long* time ago now) it’s sweet, but not compelling, stuff.

In 2002, a live-action version of Blue was made. I haven’t managed to see it, yet, but I would like to, despite the fact that the movie seems like a slightly blander version of an already bland story. Despite the fact that I strongly believe that the movie-viewing audience is more than ready for a more robust story than this one. Nonetheless…Blue is not a hateful story, just sort of a nondescript, bittersweet “first love” story.

The one thing the does stand out about this manga is the art. To call it stark would be an understatement. There are no screentones, almost no shading and the characters are drawn realistically – not manga realistically, but actually realistically. This makes the story feel more real, but it makes it damn hard to tell some of the characters apart, if they have similar hair styles. Let’s face it, most mangaka can only draw one face and they stick different color hair and eyes on everyone, so we can see who is who. Take away weird hairstyles or distinct physical attributes, and all colors and most of the shading and all you have left is a bunch of nearly identical shapes. This makes Blue a little tougher than usual to follow, unless you can actually read the conversations. I was able to follow it alot better this time than I was the last time I attempted it. Assumably, one day I will actually be able to read every word with ease and it’ll all make sense. ;-)

So, Blue is only okay, but if you’re a completist and are trying to build a collection of all the Yuri manga ever, you’ll want this one too. ^_^





Yuri Manga: Futtemo Harettemo (降っても晴れっても)

May 19th, 2004

futtemoharetemoWay back, when I was writing about things I didn’t want to write about, I wrote about Futtemo Harettemo. (降っても晴れっても)

Well, recently I revisted this old, “miserable classic” of Yuri by Fujimura Mari, which was published by Margaret Comics back in 1993. And I decided that it deserved a review of its own, not because it’s happy or unique, but because it’s neither. Unlike Pieta, Futtemo Harettemo, does not end with the girl getting the girl, but these two stories have more in common that you’d think at first glance.

Futtemo Harettemo is the story of Nagi and Hiro, two classmates who have instant and almost obsessively deep feelings for one another. This five-volume manga details their encounter, friendship, and the painful things that they do to each other to try and convince themselves that they don’t, in fact, love one another, or wait, maybe they do. This is a really ugly story at times, as Nagi and Hiro are hurtful, sometimes destructive and even homicidal at each other. Hiro ends up being cast as the more emotionally unstable of the two, while Nagi gets the award for being the more selfish. Despite this, or perhaps because of it, there are some genuinely tender moments between the two girls. The internalized homophobia is all too real at times.

Since one of the storylines is Nagi’s conflict at being torn between Hiro (who is admittedly not a very dependable person) and a guy who is clearly and committedly in love with her, you can expect that these two will not get together any time soon. Hiro does get some credit for calling it love first and kissing Nagi several times, trying with increasing desperation to hold onto a girl with whom she is “more than friends, but less than lovers.” (This quote is from a short Japanese movie about lesbian romance entitled 3 Second Melancholy, and a very common Japanese phrase about intense relationships without commitment.)

So, given the fact that Nagi and Hiro do *not* end up together, unlike Rio and Sahako, and the fact that their relation is tumultuous and sometimes violent, why do I say that it has anything to do with Pieta? Because both of these manga, and many of the shorts that are currently being published in Yuri Shimai pair lesbianism with mental illness.

It wasn’t until I re-read Pieta and Futtemo Harettemo in the same week that I realized that both include characters that inflict violence on themselves and, in the case of Futtemo Harettemo, others as well. Which led me to notice that there are several stories in the three volumes of Yuri Shimai that pair lesbian love with a suicidal desire…and it dawned on me that we’re *still* reading the same damn stories from the early twentieth century, when lesbianism itself was considered pathological, and frequently paired with other mental diseases, especially depression. (Although Hiro acts more like a person who is bipolar, IMHO.)

And while I’m marginally annoyed, Pieta at least offers very reasonable and believable explanations for Rio’s behavior, while Futtemo Harettemo simply expects us to care about Hiro and Nagi while they duke it out on the battlefield of unhealthy attraction. If I were one of these girls’ mother, even I’d call this relationship unhealthy and try to put an end to it.

Nonetheless, Futtemo Harettemo was, in the end, a kind of a bittersweet story (as so many Japanese manga were until recently, when the audience began to demand this thing called a “happy ending”). In the last chapter, Hiro and Nagi meet up at a class reunion years later. Both are married and happy, and now, at last, able to be happy for each other. Hiro introduces Nagi to her husband as her “first love,” which was kind of sweet and, at the same time, massively irritating.

Would this story be any different if it were written in 2004, as opposed to in 1993? I think not that much. Nagi, at least would still be married in the end. Maybe, maybe, Hiro might be with another woman, or perhaps she might have been portrayed as less emotionally unstable, but I think that these two could never have gotten together and lived happily ever after. Perhaps it was better that they just moved on. ^_^

In any case, Futtemo Harettemo turned out to be a lot more provocative this time, than when I read it the last time and if you’re the kind of person who is interested in historical Yuri manga, you might want to look for this series in a used manga bookstore.

Ratings:

Overall – It’s complicated to rate something like this, since it is so much a product of its time, but…

Art – 7
Characters – 5
Story – 6
Yuri – 7
Service – 0

Overall – 6





Yuri Manga: Pieta

May 18th, 2004

Today I want to go over a few of the classic Yuri manga titles once again – a few that I already mentioned briefly, but have revisited recently, and a few that deserve revisiting for one reason or another. I’d like to start with Pieta, a surprisingly well-done little classic, by Haruno Nanae, published by Young You comics way back in 2000. (It seems a lot older than that, really.)

Pieta tells the story of Rio and Sahako, two girls in high school together. Rio seems cool and aloof and is the subject of many rumors in the school. Even though the girl’s uniform includes a tie, she wears it like a boy and is very boyish in looks and manner. Rio very overtly is dating one of the girls in her school and doesn’t seem to care what people think of her.

Sahako finds herself fascinated by Rio, and is very quickly drawn in by her charismatic, yet enigmatic, personality. For her part, Rio makes no bones about the fact that she’s interested in, and attracted to, Sahako, even going so far as to break up with her current girlfriend.

We learn that Rio, for all her external coolness, is actually a seriously emotionally fragile individual, with very painful memories of abandonment and rejection – and a classically evil, hurtful stepmother.

Very much because of this situation, Sahako is drawn closer and closer to Rio, until it becomes obvious to both themselves and everyone around them, that they belong together. The climax is not the final crisis, but in the end, there is a happy ending for them – and the girl does get the girl, which sets this story up among the few and far between.

On the whole, Pieta a slow-moving and sometimes painful story, but it is undeniably sweet and romantic – and in places genuinely touching. Watching Sahako watch Rio is so sweet and a little heart-rending. The plot is not earth-shatteringly new or unique, but it is tight and well-constructed, with a fair amount of tension.

While Rio is given a lot of depth, as a character Sahako is left a little fuzzy. Her family seem to disappear by the end, and there’s no conflict in her life, as there is in Rio’s…I keep wondering how her family reacted to what’s going on with her (remembering that my completely functional family certainly had a reaction to when I was falling in love the first time…), but we never see any of that.

The art is smooth and slow and very open, with white space and implications of motion and position, which goes well with the feel of the story.

All in all, you could do way worse than Pieta as a solid Yuri story.

I recommend that you get an actual hard copy, even though it’s out of print. You can usually find it wherever used manga is sold. Pieta would make *great* beach reading. ^_^

Ratings:

Art – 8
Characters – 8
Story – 8
Yuri -8

Overall – 8





Yuri Manga: Yuri Tengoku 2

May 5th, 2004

YT2Yuri Tengoku is an anthology of all-girl’s love stories. It sits somewhere between a doujinshi and a magazine and a – that is, it’s not *quite* a fan work, but it’s not really a professional magazine, either.

The first Yuri Tengoku was released in 2003, and I reviewed it on January 22, 2004. Looking back at that post, frankly *nothing* has changed from the first volume to the second. Yuri Tengoku still looks like a slick doujinshi, with a color slipcover and color pages of indifferent art. It seems such a waste to blow color pages on what are, IMHO, pictures of 7-year olds in school uniform not doing anything that any two girls might do at lunch – like lay next or sit next to each other. No sense of “love” there.

The preponderance of lolicon – characters that are supposed to be in junior high or high school that look 6 years old at most – still sets my teeth on edge. In fact, even more than the last issue, this felt more like a loli fetish manga than a yuri one. I mean, can we *really* conisder it “love,” much less a lesbian romance, when the character is a little kid?

And with only one exception, every single story is exactly the same. Here is the plot:

I am in love with my classmate, but I can’t tell her. I remember the day we met . Wait, maybe she feels the same way! (Something occurs to make characters realize they like each other.) Hug. I’m so happy.

By the fourth or fifth story I was beginning to feel caught in a loop!

There are two stories that are *clearly* anime fan art – one a Michiru x Haruka high school crush thing that has different names, but jeez guys, we’re not stupid! And a R.O.D. The TV parody that simply removed any names at all, but there was no other attempt to make the characters look like anything other than Anita and Hisa. To be fair, the Michiru and Haruka types are pretty common in all anime and manga, so it could be coincidence, but not so the ROD thing. Of the two, the Michiru/Haruka stand-ins were at least a semi-decent rendition of the same story as always.

Only the final story in the anthology managed to escape almost all the conventions of the rest of the magazine. I’m not saying it was *good*, but it was different. For one thing, the characters are actually post-high school. Phew! Three years after graduation, in fact. And the story is hardly like the others, since it includes a violent pimp, a beating and a large knife. Sadly, it also has absurdly misplaced breast-groping and two fairly unrealistic characters, but who cares? It’s different, at least.

I’m can’t recommend this volume of Yuri Tengoku unless you are extremely hard up for something resembling girl’s love, or you are absolutely stricken dumb with joy at cute little girls who are impossibly young-looking for their purported ages.

Ratings:
Art – Varies, but nothing better than a 7
Story – 4
Characters – 4
Yuri – 7

Overall – 5

You can definitely do better than Yuri Tengoku 2.





Weather Woman Anime and Manga

March 22nd, 2004

wwHow Low Can You Go?

Today I want to tell you about one of my all-time favorite series. Let me warn you first – this series is not for the faint of heart…it starts low and just keeps getting lower and lower and lower. In fact, that’s one of its great appeals; no matter how repulsive it gets, you just have to keep reading to see if it can get any *more* repulsive…and it always does. ^_^

Weather Woman/Weather Report Girl/Tenki Oneesama – Tetsu Adachi

The reason for so many titles is that each version of this, manga, anime, and live-action film have a different name. Isn’t that helpful?

The anime is cute – I’ve traumatized many a person by making them watch it. It’s a two-episode OVA that follows the manga pretty closely, so I’ll just talk about that. The live-action film is similar, but not the same – also not nearly as fun.

The first chapter of Tenki Oneesama introduces anti-heroine Nakadai Keiko. Never has manga seen a more sadistic, power-mad, conniving, shameless, scheming bitch on wheels. I love her. ^_^

Keiko’s dream is to be the star weather woman on television and she will do anything to accomplish that dream. She starts by putting super-strong laxative in the current weather woman’s lunch, causing her to, erm, have an accident, on television. Keiko steps in as the fill-in and immediately shakes up the station by flashing her underwear to the TV audience. Instantly, she’s a hit. Keiko makes the former weather reporter her personal slave, forcing Michiko to lick her underwear clean, and use her tongue to wipe the shaving cream from her body, among other, more evil, things.

When a new, very prim news announcer, Kaori, shows up, she thinks she can tame Keiko’s mad power trip. Their rivalry is hysterical – a bathing suit pulling fight in a public pool turns into a perfect synchronized swimming routine, for example – but after Keiko uses the recording devices in her own apartment to tape Michiko and Kaori having sex, Kaori becomes a reluctant ally.

To say that this story is insane is understating the case. A wrestling deathmatch between Keiko and policewoman “Hentai Hunter” Natsumi, becomes an evening of sex at a gentlemen’s club owned by….who else but everyone’s favorite weather woman! This arc also includes some serious Yuri goings on between Natsumi and her assistant Ritsuko. About time, too.

Sadly, the manga kind of just…ends. Keiko turns to us and says its been fun, but she’s got to go. Worst of all, she gets married to the yutzy guy in the story. But between the repulsive beginning and the inadequate ending, there’s a ton of Yuri and Yuri innuendo and just wacky and head-shakingly freaky chapters. I strongly recommend this manga if you like the horrible and unremittingly tacky, or you’re a bottom-feeding perv. Either way, you’ll love Weather Woman. If you like romance and sweetness, and things like scat, panties, sexual perversion, and emotional sadism bother you – stay as far away as possible from this series. ^_^;

The first volume of the manga is available in English, and the anime and live-action film, both have licensed subtitled versions. Links to these can be found at the top of this entry.

But if you read Japanese, or like looking at pervy Yuri pictures, Vol. 7 of the manga is the one you want.