Yuri Manga: Hana ni Arashi, Volume 2 (はなにあらし)

November 21st, 2019

In Volume 1, we met Nanoha and Chidori, two high school students who are keeping a secret from their friends – they are going out with each other.

In Hana ni Arashi, Volume 2 (はなにあらし) they keep that secret while their friends talk about their futures, about boys, about what they want for themselves. They share umbrellas in the rain and Chidori comforts Nanoha when thunder upsets her. And they tell each other how they feel.

There is little to no conflict. Shogakukan’s Shonen Sunday magazine isn’t ready for nuance in their Yuri, yet, apparently. Kobachi Ruka’s school life story is relaxing and gentle. Little to no conflict arises and most of the emotions are rooted in sentimentality for a simpler time of life. But, through all this Chidori and Nanoha are, and remain, a couple.

I have no idea yet if this story will evolve, but I can tell you that it continues. It’s already up to volume 6 in Japan!

Ratings:

Art – 6
Story – 6
Characters – 6
Yuri – 3
Service – 1, mostly on principle

Overall – 6

Volume 3 is in my cart and I’ll give it at least one more chance to do something. I have no objection to nice kids being nice, but this relationship not developing is not super riveting.

Posted in Yuri Manga | 2 Comments »


Yuri Manga: Still Sick, Volume 1 (English)

November 20th, 2019

We are edging ever closer to the event horizon where Yuri manga in English is coming out at the same time as in Japanese. It was only March of this year when I reviewed this book in Japanese. Here we are, a mere 7 months later and we’re looking at Akashi’s Still Sick, Volume 1 in English, from Tokyopop.

Shimizu Makoto is a hard-working team leader for an engineering group. She’s also an otaku, with a hobby of drawing Yuri fanzines for comic markets. When she’s discovered by her coworker, Shimizu is desperately afraid that Maekawa will use the knowledge against her. Instead, Maekawa turns out to have a secret of her own. The two of them grow closer almost against their will. It’s not a bad relationship, but it isn’t a good one either. Maekawa uses Shimizu’s emotions against her to protect herself, Shimizu is hiding from everything to protect herself. It’ll take some serious work for the two of them to move forward. In the meantime, they are becoming more of a team and closer as friends…it’s all very messy and human.

There are a number of translation choices that are worth noting. “Fan comics” and “fanzine” for doujinshi are spot on, and I laughed at the use of “headcannon” because…yes. ^_^ The definition of “onee-sama” as being used by bottoms to address tops is a bit dodgy. It’s not wholly incorrect, but not really correct, either. In any case, I probably wouldn’t have described it that way. ^_^; The discussion of Yuri in between chapters was solid, no complaints here. Overall, Katie Kimura did a decent job translating. Tokyopop’s technicals are solid, all the visuals and the font are comfortab;ly legible, even in digital format.

Of all the working society Yuri manga I have been reading, this is one of my favorites. The characters are slightly broken, in a very human way, and the outcomes of their exchanges are not at all predictable. Still Sick gives us a very otaku view of office relationships, and a very human perspective on Yuri.

Ratings:

Art – 7 Solid, not outstanding
Characters – 8
Story – 8
Yuri – 3, with a lot of potential
Service – 0 so far

Overall – 8

This is not girl meets girl, girl falls in love, the end. This is broken woman meets broken woman, they don’t fall in love, but they kind do, only not really, and there’s some other stuff they need to work on, not the end.

Thanks very much to Tokyopop for the review copy.

Posted in English Manga, Yuri Manga | 2 Comments »


Yuri Anime: Fragtime (English)

November 19th, 2019

The two most-hated posts here on Okazu are, to-date, my reviews for Candy Boy and Mariaholic. In both cases, my reviews say something like, “sexual harassment and assault against women is gross and if you find it entertaining, you are a terrible person.”

I am prepared for today’s review to join those ranks because sexual assault as entertainment is gross and if you enjoy it, you are a terrible person.

Fragtime, animated by Tear Studio, directed by Takuya Satō, produced by Terada Yusuke, is based on a manga by Sato that ran on Akita Shoten’s Manga Cross website from 2013-2014. The OVA premiered in North America by Pony Canyon at AnimeNYC 2019, with guest Producer Terada and voice actress Ito Miku, who played lead Moritani Mizusu.

The Fragtime OVA has been licensed by Sentai Filmworks and the manga has been licensed by Seven Seas.

Moritani Misuzu (played by Ito-san) is a high school student who has the ability to stop time for three minutes. She stops time in order to look at classmate Murakami Haruka’s (played by Miyamoto Yume) underwear, only to find that Murakami is not affected by the time stoppage. In response to learning that Moritani likes Murakami, Murakami agrees to go out with her…as long as Moritani does whatever she wants. By this, she means that Moritani will stop time only at her request.  As the film progresses, we learn that both girls have problems relating to people around them and, as they become closer, they work through those problems. Moritani gains confidence and stops running away from human contact, however, this causes her to lose her ability to stop time. But, as the end of the film approaches, it is clear that this is not a tragedy, and marks a new beginning for both Moritani and Murakami.

The overall plot of Fragtime is not bad, and both acting and animation are adequate. The overwhelming problem with Fragtime is the super-creepy male gaziness of it. (Learn about Male Gaze here and here.) Obsession with women’s underwear is centered as more important than the girls’ narratives. Moritani commits sexual assault because she “likes’ Murakami. Murakami is manipulative and exploitative, Moritani is manipulated and exploited. All of this – every last unhealthy, over-sexualized, underwear-obsessive thing in the story is presented to us as either an expression of “like” or as comedy. The sound of juicy male laughter as Moritani buys a pair of underwear just like Murakami’s made me so upset I stood and almost left.  And again, in response to Murakami threatening to break up after misunderstanding why Moritani stops time not by her command, (which Moritani had done to save a friend from mockery) Moritani does not tell her why she stopped time, but instead lifts up her skirt to show the matching underwear. As if that is, in any way, a meaningful act. Or something a woman might do. This time when there was laughter I came close to tears, as a woman’s humiliation is presented as a comedic beat.

The behavior of the lead characters makes no sense. Yes, they both have emotional issues, but nothing they do is sensible. Their behaviors do not fit their pathologies. Their behavior does fit the desire of men to endlessly stare up women’s skirts in the most grotesque way.

When the anime began, the crowd was slightly less big than for the Kase-san premier, occupying just over half the room. No one left at the first upskirt, as we mostly knew that that was inevitable. Apparently I was not the only one who hoped it would improve, because with every subsequent underwear scene, people got up and left. The audience was hovering around half-way filling the room when it ended.

Questions were…not good. It was clear that most people lined up to ask questions without a question in mind. When they got to the mic, it was apparent no real question had come to them. The translators struggled to make sense of the unformed ideas to which they were being subjected.

Most damning was the relative silence of the audience as they left the room. After Kase-san, there was a buzz of conversation as people stood around and talked about how good it was. After Fragtime, there was…nothing. People just left. Fragtime was especially disappointing as Pony Canyon attempted to sell this as another sweet love story, a worthy successor to Kase-san, when it is the opposite. Where Kase-san is a lovely female-gaze story about two nice kids, this is a creepy male gaze story about two broken kids.

Let me be clear – women do not upskirt other women as an expression of “like”. Every woman understands that it is a violation of her privacy and is a form of sexual assault. Women may upskirt themselves as a form of sex work. And, yes, abusive women act abusively. Moritani presumed Murakami could not consent and did it anyway. That is an assault. This was not cute, nor fun nor, gods help us, funny. It is not an expression of like. Almost every scene that involves the time-stoppage is a scene in which someone is humiliated, mostly (although not completely) without any consent.

Because I feel so strongly about the fact that Fragtime is not just an unpleasant depiction of two young women in love, but is actually objectionable, I am going to do something I have never done: No dissent will be tolerated. Do not attempt to defend upskirting or endless humiliating underwear shots (or otherwise whine that I was mean in this post.) Your input in that regard is not welcome. Should you feel that you can discuss Fragtime for other qualities (there were some brief decent moments) please feel free. Under no circumstances will I put up with any defense of upskirting. It is a repulsive act and ought to be subject to jail time.

To sum up, Fragtime is a really shitty premise wrapped around the dark kernel of a completely different story that the creator didn’t want to write.

Ratings:

Art – 7
Story – 2
Characters – 4 but had they been treated with any respect they could have been better
Service – 10 all creepy service
Yuri – 6

Overall – 2 I was hoping it’d at least be a 5, but…nope.

There are two things that really upset me in this life. Exploitation of children and sexual harassment and assault of anyone. This series had both, but did not deal with either. It didn’t discuss anything important and presented the assault as comedy.

I am very sorry for Sentai and Seven Seas, but I cannot and will not endorse Fragtime, it will not go up on the Yuricon Store. It won’t affect their sales, but it I won’t be assisting anyone to buy it. I won’t be linking to it, or reviewing it further upon release.

Chika Anzai plays Kobayashi Yukari, the only other character with more than dialogue in passing and the Kase-san voice actresses have cameos. The best part of the entire premiere was the MC, whose name I missed, who was fabulous. When it came time for questions, she said of Ito-san, “No personal questions, please, I am her mother.” I think I’m the only one who laughed.

Posted in English Anime, Yuri Anime | 23 Comments »


AnimeNYC Event Report, Pt. 2 – And the Winner is…!

November 18th, 2019

Have I mentioned that AnimeNYC 2019 was fabulous? It was, genuinely, fabulous. I’ve written a post about the event for The Comics Beat which sums up my feelings from a “professional” point of view: NYC’s Anime Con Wars Are Over & AnimeNYC Is The Clear Winner.

Today I want to tell you how much fun  *I* had. ^_^

My con began on Thursday with meeting my dear friend and periodic roommate, Sean Gaffney. Sean’s blog A Case Suitable for Treatment covers everything in English. I go there when I need to figure out if I need to read something that’s out in English and he loves to talk about what he’s reading. I trust him with recommendations, and this time he recommended that I read JK Haru is a Sex Worker in Another World. I read and loved the cold clinical approach to Edo-period sex work in Moyoco Anno’s Sakuran,so… but I get ahead of myself.

Sean and I went to the industry party where we chatted with folks from Yen and Kodansha, among others. We’re all sort of professionally awkward and goofy, so I’ve gotten better at faking social skills. ^_^ I caught up with translator Mari Morimoto just long enough to give her all the stuff I’d bought her in Japan over the last three trips. ^_^;  She was doing interpretation for the Guest of Honor, so had to hustle all weekend long.

Last year, you may remember, it snowed the Thursday befoere AnimeNYC. This year we were able to get the view from the rooftop garden.

Friday began late. The panels at AnimeNYC opened at 10:30, but the DR wasn’t open until 1PM. So Sean and I caught up with comics and manga writer Brigid Alverson. We bummed around until the DR opened then went our separate ways. I wasn’t paneling until 3, so I had some time to introduce myself to some of the folks at Sentai Filmworks. One of my complaints about Sentai has always been that they are good on license announcements and bad about letting people know when stuff is available. They’ve got a new marketing person, Hannah and she has been changing that. I picked up The Bloom Into You Premium Box set and was given a spiffy Revue Starlight lanyard which I’m keeping and plan on using at other events! They licensed Fragtime which was announced right before the anime premiered.

I dropped by the Yen booth, too for a quick hello. They were doing crafts – you could make a teruterubouzu. It was all very cute.

While walking around before panels, I ran into these lovely ladies cosplaying Bloom Into You‘s Yuu and Touko. This picture is being used with permission.

Eventually it was time for me to head to panels to present 100 Years of Yuri one last time this year. The crowd was amazing! Great questions. As usual, I gave out prizes for good questions. Masha gave me a couple of adorable pins (you can see her table with pins here) which I just love. Thanks Masha!

One of the questions asked about terms for fans of Yuri, the way fujoshi and fudanshi were used for BL fans. In response I went on a rant about why the women were “rotten” in that term. They were rotten for having a hobby that had to do with sex that didn’t involve their husbands or boyfriends. Effectively the reason the women are rotten is for having any space of their own that isn’t about the men they give all their time and energy to. Have I never explained how much I hate that? Well. I hate it.  The terms Himejoshi and Himedanshi are stupid. Just flat out idiotic. For one thing, why are fandoms gendered at all, I asked. Why we are not all just…people.

And then I decided that we need a new word. So, I have officially announced that “Yuri fans” are to be hereafter known as “Yurijin,” (百合人) – Yuri People.

Like the word “Yuri,” I did not coin that, but I am endorsing it. It is not gendered, includes no age, sexuality or any other limits. Yuri is for anyone who enjoys Yuri. Yurijin are anyone who enjoys Yuri.

A new, queerer Yuri genre deserves a new, more inclusive word. ^_^

After that I talked with some folks, including translator and editor Kristi Fernandez of Vertical, who runs the Japanese Translators of NYC group. We had a fantastic conversation.

At last it was time for my final panel, “!? vs ?! The Great Debate” in which translator Zack Davisson and I argue loudly and vociferously about whatever random topics. It’s always fun. Especially when I win. Poor Zack took a beating. ^_^

I was off the clock after this, since all the things I wanted to do were against something else I had to do, so I wasn’t doing any coverage of panels.

Erik Ko of Udon Entertainment and a bunch of us went out to dinner where we had a lovely time until they closed the restaurant around us. Erik was so vexed…he was going to bring a copy of The Rose of Versailles, Volume 1, but they didn’t arrive at the office until he was in NYC. 

Saturday started early because people who are not me had panels to get to! I basically finished up my wandering the DR, where I saw really fun stuff. There’s a ton of VR games including, inexplicably, a Spice and Wolf VR game. It’s the anime, but you go through it as the lead character. (YMMV of course, but economics in first-person is no more interesting to me than in third person. ^_^;)

I played slot cars for the first time in decades at the 5-Hour Energy booth.

The folks at J-Novel Club and I had a great conversation about Sexiled (Volume 1 is currently available in digital and will be released in print. Volume 2 is coming in December!) and they light-heartedly bullied me into buying JK Haru after all. ^_^

And, at last, it was time to line up for Fragtime. The line was pretty long and I kind of felt bad about that, because its being sold as another Kase-san … when it is the pretty much the opposite.

 

It’s totally male gaze, creepy sexual assault behavior being passed off as “like.” So I watched. And tweeted. I will review it, but the bottom line is that it will not get my endorsement.

After Fragtime, I hung out with lovely cosplayer Abby Murphy and longtime fellow con grunt Hyo Moon, two of the only people beside my wife I know who saw the Sailor Moon Super Live in NYC. So we had a brilliant time together, talking Sailor Moon, Utena, Sexiled and existential rage.

Finally, it was time to go shopping! The Sailor Uranus and Sailor Neptune Chouette figurines were sold out (phew, because how I would have gotten them home, I have no idea), so I headed over to Viz‘ booth, where I bought Sailor Moon Stars, Part 1 and Part 2. Everything old is new again – the premium set boxes are coming with space for part 2 in the box, just the way they used to do, back in the early days of DVDs. The bag they were giving away at Viz was, IMHO the best of the bunch with Eternal Sailor Moon’s locket on one side and her silhouette on the other, in a fetching purple.

As I was making my final rounds I hit up the artist alley. I picked up Afroseeds by Jojo at Mastermind Comics. Set in NYC, a boy named Amehotep meets a man named Maut and learns he has the power of the Afroseed in him. I’m looking forward to this so much. Jojo was a blast and we were hugging each other like we were long-lost friends when I left. Go read his book – you can download free comic samples at their site.

Before I left I found this lovely pair who have given their permission to use this photo.

From there, I headed to the Yen Press panel where I was just in time for their Yuri manga license. I caught up with Brigid again and then my boss at Comics Beat, Heidi MacDonald. All three of us when out for an amazing meal and some little light shopping at Uniqlo, because Brigid had lost her jacket

My time at AnimeNYC had come to an end, but as I said yesterday, I’m bumping this up to must-attend. I had more fun at this con than I had had at an anime con for years. I look forward to being a part of it next year if I can! 9 out of 10.

Next up…I’ll review Fragtime. Buckle up.

 

Posted in Events | 8 Comments »


AnimeNYC Event Report, Pt. 1 Yuri Licenses

November 17th, 2019

I have returned from AnimeNYC, which was fabulous. I am moving this event up to the No. 1 must-attend anime/manga event in North America, along with TCAF, which is my recommendation for  No. 1 must-attend comics event.  This event has it all. If Javits wasn’t the worst convention center in America it would be perfect. (The fact that it is the worst is because of its design, which was meant to host several smaller events, not one gigantic pop culture event that needs lots of space for free movement and spaces to stand in costumes with wings that don’t block stairs and escalators. Also, people, do NOT stand in front of or on stairs and escalators for photos. Take them to the side. Please.)

Because the event was so good, I’m going to break the event report up into two pieces. Today, we’ll talk about some of the licenses that were announced and a few other Yuri tidbits. To begin with, let me remind you that  every single major western manga (and light novel) publisher currently is now putting out Yuri. Seven Seas, Viz, Yen, Kodansha, Tokyopop and J-Novel Club have really embraced Yuri. Sentai Filmworks is on our side as well, snapping up all the Yuri anime.  Going to an event like AnimeNYC once upon a time, would have netted us a list of one or two things of interest, but this event, I could not go anywhere without seeing Yuri represented. It was…really nice.

Part 1 of the report is something I have *never* done before – a round up of just Yuri licenses announced at this event!

On Viz‘s plate this week saw the release of Makoto Hagino’s A Tropical Fish Yearns For Snow, a slow-burning romance in a seaside school’s aquarium club. You can read a preview of the English volume on their website!

The Yuri OVA Fragtime premiered at AnimeNYC and, at the beginning of the showing, Pony Canyon read a statement from Sentai announcing that they had licensed the anime. Seven Seas followed up with an online announcement that they have acquired the Fragtime manga for digital and print release. I will do a review of Fragtime later this week. I did not enjoy it.

Square Enix announced a manga adaptation of Wandering Witch. Yen Press will be localizing the light novels next year. I know absolutely nothing about this series, but trust Yurimother’s reporting.

Speaking of Yen Press, they announced Nikurashii Hodo, Aishiteru, as  which I genuinely enjoyed, as I Love You So Much, I Hate You.

J-Novel Club revealed that Sexiled will be getting a print release! I am genuinely thrilled about that. I spent all  weekend proselytizing it. This is an absolutely must-read book for any woman and all men. Someone called it a “power fantasy” novel for women and I absolutely wholeheartedly agreed. Fabulous, fabulous book. Second volume will be released digitally next month.

And this morning Kodansha rounded out the announcements with….I’m super excited for this, Sasayakuyouni Koi wo Utau, which I just reviewed, as Whisper Me a Love Song!

It was a really great event for me as a person, as a comics journalist, as an otaku and, most especially as a Yurinin, a Yuri fan!

Posted in Events | 3 Comments »