What do you say about an artist who likes his women well-endowed, mostly or partially naked, and shiny, as if they have been simonized? I guess you say, “Oh, look it’s Urushihara Satoshi.” (And many thanks to alert reader Tatjana who noticed that I mistyped his name!)
Urushihara has a long history of drawing women with women, from random artbook pieces to full-blown manga stories. Chirality stands out as one of the strongest of his many Yuri-friendly works. Translated by CPM Manga, by 2010 this series wass out of print, but you can still find it, sometimes. It’s worth looking for! As you know, I strongly recommend you actually buy your Yuri and support it in the only way that is meaningful.
The story is shounen sci-fi stuff – in the future humans are being atttacked by GMs, a kind of virus machine produced by an uber-machine whose original job was to protect humanity. To fight (and hopefully reform/uncorrupt) Gaia, several beings were created with that contained all of the DNA of every living creature in the world. These beings were called Adam and Eve.
Of course, nothing is ever easy – Adam became corrupted by Gaia and Eve became bonded to a young human girl, Shiori, in her “immature” form. As “Carol Guardian,” Eve vows to protect Shiori at all costs. Time passes and Carol and Shiori meet once again.
Carol is able to transform into a male form at first to protect Shiori, but when a mishap occurs and Carol accidentally injurs Shiori, she finds herself unable to transform. Meanwhile, Shiori begins to remember their original meeting, and realizes that she is in love with Carol, in any form. In fact, more in her female form.
Yes, they do get together, in a very real sex-filled way. And Shiori and Carol not only protect each other and everyone they love, but they save the world while they’re at it. Plot-wise, the story is a little sketchy, the science is very bad (and mostly organized around the women wearing clothes that make them look naked) but as a fun sci-fi Yuri story, where the story is really a frame for the Yuri, Chirality is pretty good.
CPM published Chirality originally as a series of pamphlet comic books, but you can find it as a set of four graphic novels – unless you obsess about the cover art, the GNs are a better deal and a little easier to find. Despite its age, this particular GN holds up pretty well – the translation is fine, the cost is reasonable.
Ratings:
Art – 8
Story – 7
Characters – 9
Service – 8
Yuri – 10
Overall – 8
For hardcore Carol and Shiori fans, Urushihara did do a follow-up story about Rachel Shiori Guardian, Carol and Shiori’s daughter, and her sempai/lover Kaede, in a book called Ragnarock City (link totally Not Safe For Work). It’s mostly torso shots of naked girls – not much by way of story.
Once more, from alert reader Tatjana, Ragnarock City is available in a German language version, for all you Yuri fans who can read German. ^_^
I thought I’d end “live-action” week with one of my all-time favorite cheesy movies. Note the two different covers above. The one on the left is the original, the one on the right must be new packaging…but it doesn’t change the fact that this movie is cheeseball heaven. Here’s the original tagline for the movie: “There Are Two Things On Their Minds… One’s Killing!” ^_^
Sennen no Koi: Hikaru Genji Monogatari, (A Thousand Years of Love: The Tale of Genji,) pretty much came and went without anyone noticing it much. Which is a real shame, because as far as gender-bending and yuri go, this movie kind of rolls it all into one neat silly little fun package.
