Wynnona Earp on Netflix

July 26th, 2020

Wynonna Earp is ridiculous, it’s gross and violent (the very first scene involves someone’s tongue being cut out), it frequently makes no sense, it piles one plot complication on top of another, without resolving it, or the three previous plot complications before it. Worse, when 99% of the characters are undead, undying or unreal, no bad guy ever just…goes away.  It’s a modern paranormal western with absurd shootouts and some of the most godawful fight choreography I’ve ever seen.

But I kinda like it anyway. ^_^

It helps that several of the characters are openly queer and others are probably queer given the right circumstances. Queerable, if you will.

It also helps that this series, developed by Syfy, now also on Netflix, is so stupendously absurd that I can comfortably watch it with almost no real concern, since by the end of Season 3, at least, pretty much all of the main characters have died at least once and are still with us. It’ll get harder and harder to believe anyone is actually dead and out of the show until Twitter tells me so. ^_^

Descendant of Wyatt Earp, Wynnona, has her whole life struggled under a family curse that, (among other things,) ended up with her killing her father and, later, being sent away to an asylum. The curse is real, and so are all the hellish demons plaguing her family and Wynnona’s only real problem, it turns out, is that she’s perfectly sane and is the Heir of Wyatt’s curse. Wynnona and her sister, Waverly, are joined in their fight by the immortal Doc Holliday, and eventually by a host of adorable misfits and weirdos.

Waverly, a bubbly young woman who taught herself ancient languages in order to be worthy of being the Heir, falls in love with new cop in town, redheaded Nicole Haught. In Season 3, the team gets gay researchers/scientist/whatever they need him to be/generic lab guy Jeremy and then he gets a boyfriend who is also a total whatever they need him to be for that arc, forest ranger, lost boy, twink, Robin.

Ultimately what’s keeping me watching is the vulgarity and the fact that the all the characters, female characters especially, are written with depth, with variety and with skill. Even the bad characters have depth and not just tragic “evil person sad story” depth…although every character does indeed have a tragic backstory.

I was not blown away by this show at first, but I find that it has seriously grown on me and not just because it hasn’t given in to Bury Your Gays. That is to say, it has killed most of the gay characters at least once, but all of the characters have been killed at least once, so that’s not an issue.

Ratings:

Cinematography – 6  CGI effects, batman angles, too close on kisses, horrible fights
Story – Goes from ridiculous to laughable
Character – 8 Inconsistent, but fun
LGBTQ – 9
Service – 3 Some, but fairly sprinkled about

Overall – 8

I’m always on the lookout for a series to half-assedly pay attention to as I work and Wynnona Earp is perfectly suited to mostly ignore. ^_^ But when I do look up, the people are pretty, the gays get to have sex, too, and everyone is permanently not-dead. So, that’s good. The actress playing Waverly, Dominique Provost-Chalkley, has recently come out, which is sweet.

It’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer the western, in 2020.

Posted in Live Action, Yuri Monogatari | No Comments »


Yuri Network News – (百合ネットワークニュース) – July 25, 2020

July 25th, 2020

Industry News

This week, we need to start with news that is broader than the Yuri Network, specifically, as a number of important industry issues have come to light.

Both Yen Press and J-Novel Club have announced that several of their light novel titles have been delisted from Amazon Kindle.

In 2009, you might remember the cascade where hundreds, then thousands of LGBTQ titles were delisted over a holiday weekend. There were a lot of weird things about that situation, and a hacker eventually claimed credit, but I did and still think it was a organizational failure created by a contractor with no one above them who cared to actually understand. This situation does seem a lot more targeted. But I’m going to tell you that tweeting and hashtags and online outrage is not how this gets fixed. How this gets fixed is that you as a consumer – especially if you are a Prime member – call them at 1 (888) 280-4331 and write them and let Amazon know that this decision is not appropriate and you object. I called this morning. Of course the rep I spoke with has no idea what I am talking about but she took my concerns down very politely. Don’t be outraged…do something to help.

YuriMother broke some interesting news this week as writers for LGBTQ story app Lovestruck attempted to unionize and were initially rumored to have been fired in retaliation. Follow ups indicate that the Voltage Organized Workers Association (which does not identify as a union) have not been fired and still hope to negotiate with Voltage management.

Udon Entertainment is celebrating a 20th anniversary and for their Comic-Con @ Home panel, they posted a bunch of folks talking about their experience with Udon. At 31:47, founder Erik Ko talks about The Rose of Versailles in a segment that includes translators Mari Morimoto, Jocelyne Allen and myself as editor. (And Mari is right, we did meet Erik at karaoke in Akihabara, but I remember what I sang. It was Alsatia by Galneryus. It was also the very last time I will ever do Karaoke for the rest of my life. I can’t sing at all any more, not even badly. ^_^;)

In case you missed it, I rounded up the current landscape of where to stream Yuri anime for free and legally in the USA.

 

Okazu News

We have some *amazing* things to report here at Okazu and I have been dying to share them with you!

Firstly, thanks to our Okazu Patrons, we’ve made it to the first of our Microgoals on Patreon!  This is a huge breakthrough for us, the first new high point we’ve hit since the loss of our biggest supporter, when my friend Bruce died. The Okazu family is always proud to support queer creators and with your help we’ve added two new folks to our list:

Okazu is now a supporter of YuriMother, whose work in Yuri news and reviews has been fantastic, as you can see above. I’m thrilled that Okazu is now a patron.

And we are now supporting creator Mieri Hiranashi, who draws a charming autobiographical Yuri manga about being a butch lesbian. ^_^

For every $50 mark we hit from here on, we’ll support another queer creator. But that’s not all – when we hit our next Microgoal mark, $600/month we’ll also institute a raise for Guest Writers here on on Okazu.

We’re also working on making our videos more accessible. With everyone’s help I was able to get enough subscribers to Yuri Studio to enable automatic closed captioning. Well, now we’ve hired the amazing Meru Clewis (who has also been  a guest writer here) to handle the subtitles for our Online Yuri Panel. So if you missed it this spring, you’ll now get 90 minutes of accessible accurate captioning for it.

One more “and” – AND just this week, I’ve hired someone to do Japanese-language subtitles for the Why Are There So Many Schoolgirls in Yuri? video. All our videos going forward will have accurate bilingual captioning.

All of this is possible because of our Okazu patrons. So thank you! If you’d like to be part of the team,
please support us on Patreon! 

Yuri Anime

The Premium Box Set for Revue Starlight from Sentai Filmworks is up for pre-order and it looks really nice. ^_^

RightStuf has a huge deal on the Bloom Into You Premium Box Set.

Netflix announced the arrival of The Legend of Korra on August 14th in the USA. I recently rewatched this and thought it held up really well. Faster pacing than I had remembered, and Asami and Korra’s relationship develops pretty organically, even if it is in the background.

The British Film Institute (BFI)’s magazine Sight & Sound put out a special feature on 50 Key Anime Films. It was my pleasure to write #33 on the list. (There were two others I had wanted, but they were already taken. Feel free to guess which ones!)

Matthew Rose talks about Serial Experiments Lain on ANN. He’s not discussing it explicitly as a Yuri anime, but we all considered it one back in the day. On rewatch, I found the series to be prescient.)

Mikikazu Komatsu on Crunchyroll has the news about a new, original 15th anniversary Aria movie, ARIA The Crepsucolo, which will feature the ladies of Orange Planet. This movie is currently slated for a spring 2021 release.

 

Yuri Manga

Jennifer Sherman on ANN has the news that Yuru Yuri creator namori has teased a new series on Twitter which is to be revealed on July 31!

Lilyka has released a new interview, this time with creator Ruri Hazuki, whose manga and doujinshi work I really, honestly like.

 

Cool Queer Stuff

Naomi Schalit writes Queer young adult fiction isn’t all gloomy realism. Here are 5 uplifting books to get you started on The Conversation.

I’m going to remind you all again that Harrow the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir is coming out on August 4th and you do not want to miss it!

Comic-Con @ Home had a panel dedicated to the life and work of Howard Cruse: The Godfather of Queer Comics

Pallabi Munsi has a short, pithy look at the life and work of Yoshiya Nobuko on Ozy, The Daring Feminist Writer Who Inspired Manga.

Become a YNN Correspondent by reporting any Yuri-related news with your name and an email I can reply to – thanks to all of you – you make this a great Yuri Network! Special thanks to Okazu Patrons for being an important part of the Okazu family. I couldn’t do it without you!

Posted in Yuri Network News | 10 Comments »


Isekai ni Saku ha Yuri no Hana ~Konnyaku Hakisareta node Honmei no Akuyaku Reijou to Onna Futari (異世界に咲くは百合の花～婚約破棄されたので本命の悪役令嬢と女ふたりで楽しく暮らします！～)

July 24th, 2020

Kareuda Ameco’s Isekai ni Saku ha Yuri no Hana ~Konnyaku Hakisareta node Honmei no Akuyaku Oeijou to Onna Futari de Tanoshiku Kurashimasu!~ (異世界に咲くは百合の花～婚約破棄されたので本命の悪役令嬢と女ふたりで楽しく暮らします！～) is the first Yuri webnovel I am reviewing as a web novel.

This is a multiple breakthrough on Okazu….this is the first overwhelmingly absurdly overlong Light Novel title for this blog. ^_^ It literally takes up two lines on the editor. It also marks the first time I’ve read the web novel not in final published for before buying the book.  GL Bunko has released it in digital for Japanese Kindle and J-Novel Club has licensed it for release in English as A Lily Blooms In Another World, (with a preview up now on the J-Novel Club website) but I have had this sucker bookmarked for *months* on Syosetuka ni Narou!, the webnovel website quite a lot of recently licensed work has come from.

Miyako Florence is affianced to the powerful Klaus Reinhardt, but she has no interest in him. Having been born into this world from our own, she is familiar with the players of this new world and Miyako knows exactly what she wants…who she wants…and she wants the villainess Fuuka Hamilton, of the Hamilton family. Taking Fuuka’s hand, Miyako runs away with Fuuka, until a pandemic brings them in direct conflict with both their families.

This was a story written, as I like to joke, to be weeb-nip, as if Kaeruda-sensei wrote it with a big ole’ grin on her face. It’s charmingly silly. And, buried under all its goofiness is something breathtaking and magnificent.

In Sexiled, Kaeruda-sensei created a world where women were systemically undervalued. Isekai ni Saku ha Yuri no Hana exists in that same world, but among the noble classes where daughters are used as marriageable chattel and nothing else. Fuuka is repeatedly called a villainess, but her only true crime appears to have been being born to a villainous family. Fuuka is herself an intelligent, accomplished, talented high-born beauty, whose family treats her horribly.

Fuuka and Miyako met and have their lives changed by another lesbian couple, but other than the fact that they are commoners, I will tell you absolutely nothing about them, so you get to enjoy the reveal.

The webnovel has no illustrations, but the published edition does. I am not at all fond of the cover art, so I expect to not at all enjoy the art when I read it, but I don’t mind. It will be a fast and endearing read in every other way.  This series is also set up nicely to be illustrated or animated in a way that Sexiled was not, complete with magical sea beast who takes the form of a cat. ^_^

In the way that Sexiled creates a female revenge scenario in which the man is merely made to be seen as foolish as he actually is, and the women’s skills and power appreciated for what they actually are…in Isekai ni Saku ha Yuri no Hana the woman is finally seen and appreciated for what she can and does do. In a lot of ways, I found this story, as gobsmackingly silly as it is, to be more touching and personal.

Ratings:

Art – N/A for the webnovel
Story – A delicious confection of a story
Characters – Competent adult women being appreciated and loved for their selves, yes please!
Service – Competent adult women being appreciated and loved for their selves, yes, please!
Yuri – 9

Overall – 9

This was a delightful story.

I really wish, however, that GL Bunko illustrated beautiful accomplished adult noble women not like 8 year olds. It is very tiresome, especially given the entire context of the story hinging on the intrinsic value of women.

Posted in Light Novel, Novel | 3 Comments »


Kimi no tame ni Sekai ha Aru (きみのために世界はある)

July 23rd, 2020

As you may remember, I’m a huge fan of Usui Shio’s series Kaketa Tsuki to Donuts. So when a collection of Usui-sensei’s work came out from Ichijinsha, I scooped it right up!

Today I’m looking at Kimi no tame ni Sekai ha Aru (きみのために世界はある). This single-volume collection contains six short stories that range in character age and setting. None of these are unique and, at first read, I felt like I had read all of them somewhere else, but…I probably had. A few of the setups are pretty well-used even now, like an ex-lover getting married in “Jewel of You,” or a boyish girl who actually likes girly things, in “Secret Closet.”

Scenario staleness notwithstanding, I genuinely enjoyed this collection. I like Usui-sensei’s art, the gentleness with which the characters are treated, even when they are processing hurt or anger. This is not emotional torture porn, it’s situations we are supposed to know, and have felt inside ourselves. And forgiven ourselves for.

The women in this collection learn to accept the parts of themselves they have been denying and I do not mean just their sexuality when I say this. In some cases, that’s not the issue at all.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – Variable
Characters – 8
Yuri – 8
Service – 1 mostly on principle, there’s nothing really

Overall – 8

Just learning to love one’s self is still a powerful story and Usui-sensei understands that.

Posted in Yuri Manga | No Comments »


Where to Watch Yuri in English Online, Free and Legally – 2020

July 21st, 2020

So you want to know where and how to watch Yuri anime free and legally. That’s not a bad thing, but we’re in 2020, a year that has been outrageously written by crazed Albanian monks. The last time we did this round up, in 2017, there were a number of new services and a lot of companies were getting in on anime. Quite a number of previously free services have gone out of business, others have been simply absorbed by not-free services.  That 2017 post remains one of the most popular I’ve ever done, and it’s long past time it gets an update. ^_^

Before we begin, let’s set some ground rules:

My focus is on US-based or accessible services, because while I am dedicated to bringing you good information, my dedication still does not extend to working with proxies or VPNs in every major market to see if these services work in your hometown. Assume there are regional restrictions in place for some or all of these services. But feel free to use proxies or VPNs on your own. ^_^ If you use a regionally legal, free streaming site in a non-US country, by all means, please let folks know in comments!

Today we’re focusing on services that are legitimate and free. To be very honest, there are far fewer of them than there used to be. I will also touch upon a few that are not free, because they allow for extended trial periods and, if you and your friends pitch in, you can enjoy them for a very reasonable amount. And because without them, you’ll miss a lot of Yuri. I will not suggest illicit services and all comments suggesting them will be removed instantly. This is for legal services only.

 All streaming services have shifting catalogs. Video licensing contracts go in and out of use and every single IP holder is always on the lookout for a better deal and major ones are launching their own god-forsaken channels.  In fact, between 2017 and now, Funimation pulled all of it’s IP from other services and went on their own.  Another good reason to update this list periodically. I am checking to make sure things I mention are actually on the service where I mention them. Some of these channels can be accessed on channel-aggregation services like VRV or Hulu or Amazon Prime. I’m not touching any of those. Netflix also has a lot of anime and is both licensing and making more, so if you have a subscription to that, or any of the above, yes, there’s more stuff you can watch legally.

Region-blocks are still an issue, but less than it used to be. Streaming has had an impact on this stupid relic of the 20th century, but it still does exist, and licensing companies do usually not have much say on the issue. With all that in mind, here we go.

 

Crunchyroll

Crunchyroll is pretty much the industry standard now,  with a good chunk of anime from multiple companies, which is it’s main appeal. Crunchyroll is my go-to, because their catalog is one of the most comprehensive, from Aoi Hana/Sweet Blue Flowers to to Yuru Yuri. (There wasn’t a good ‘Z’ title, but come on A to Y isn’t bad! ^_^) They often have simulcasts for subscribers and they are still honest-to-goodness free on a delay. They are partnering with Japanese anime companies directly to create their own content these days, which just means your money goes back into the greater anime ecosystem, which is exactly where you want it.

There’s no “Yuri” tag in search, nor is it listed as a genre (and I sympathize with that and agree as long as BL is likewise not included.)

Rating: A- It’s not an all-in-one place for everything anymore, especially as Sentai and Funimation have chosen other options, but they still have the largest and most varied catalog.

 

Tubi TV

Tubi has – to my genuine surprise – survived a few years now. They’ve still got a mostly random smattering of anime and a lot of it isn’t new or, sometimes, good. They have Valkyrie Drive, but they also have Vampire Princess Miyu.  They’ve also got a few other notable series, like Bubblegum Crisis and .hack/Sign. (This was a decade pre-Sword Art Online massive media franchise about a MMOPRG that didn’t exist.) Their catalog is worth a look, if you’ve got some time to kill and want to watch older, maybe less well-known stuff from before Yuri was its own genre. ^_^

Rating: B It’s worth looking at, but I probably wouldn’t subscribe. Their catalog still seems random, They have Bubblegum Crisis, and AD Police, but not Bubblegum Crash. No idea why.

There is no Yuri tag in search. Their search isn’t really good, generally.

 

RetroCrushTV

RetroCrushTV is new since the last update and I haven’t watched it at all. But is it is genuinely free, ad-supported anime and RetroCrushTV has Bubblegum Crisis and Bubblegum Crash, as well as Project A-ko, which is nuts and you should watch it.  It has Devil Lady dubbed, which I should point out is a thing you ought to note – some of the series are dubbed, others subbed; they do seem to be labeled appropriately.

RetroCrushTV specializes in older stuff, obviously and it has a “random” button which will give you some random title. I found it charming as heck and I will totally use this!

There’s no “Yuri” tag in search. Their search is meh generally.

Rating: A-  I really like the “love for classic everything” that shows through here. For free, it’s an absolute delight.

 

Viz

Viz doesn’t have much Yuri anime, but you can still watch all of Sailor Moon here, for free. While you are there, you can watch all the big Shonen Jump series and read sample chapters of manga for free, or get new chapters as simulpub – this includes Yuri titles like How Do We .Relationship and Tropical Fish Yearns for Snow.

There’s no “Yuri” tag in search. Their search is meh generally.

Rating: B Obviously, they only carry their own titles, but those are some of the biggest titles in the world and they make it pretty damn easy for you to watch and read for free and even get simulpubbed new manga chapters for free.

 

Funimation 

Funimation has Funimation anime exclusively – overwhelmingly I think that is for the birds. But, then, my antipathy towards Funimation’s attempts at streaming go back a decade and at least their website works, even if I think it gets in its own way all the time. Which is actually a huge improvement over previous years of barely functioning nonsense. I will never forgive them for their mobile app zippering open. Gawd.

Funimation offers a free trial and most series have the first few and most recent episodes streaming free so you can watch a whole series as it comes out with, predictably, ads suggesting you subscribe to Funimation’s service. They’ve got recent favorites like If My Favorite Pop Idol Made It to the Budokan, I Would Die and they’ve got Revolutionary Girl Utena, which surprised the heck out of me.

There’s no “Yuri” tag in search.

Ratings: B+ No complaints, honestly. You don’t even have to register anymore to watch stuff for free. And if Funimation’s titles are your jam, it’s competitively priced.

 

HIDIVE

HIDIVE is Sentai Filmworks’ and Section23’s streaming service. Since Sentai historically licenses a lot of Yuri, you’ll be able to see Bloom Into You and Kase-san and Morning Glories here, along with older titles like Flip Flappers and the amazing fantabulous live-action movie Arch Angels (!!! You should all go watch this immediately!!!). They’ve got a pretty amazing selection of queer-friendly and queer-adjacent stuff. I do like that their trial is 30 days long, not a week. They offer subs and dubs pretty clearly labeled.

I don’t much care for the fact that they don’t make at least some of their episodes free, especially as some of their titles are also available on Crunchyroll (just not the ones we want.) It seems a wasted opportunity. (Update, they have pulled their titles from Crunchyroll, so that’s that.)

There’s no “Yuri” tag in search.

Rating: B I hated their fullscreen mode when I was watching anime on their site. Why should I have to exit fullscreen to increase/decrease the volume?!? I remember bitching about it every time. Their search is sort of organized by topic, but I still cannot find what I want easily.

 

2020 Takeaways:

1) Overall, the sites where you can stream Yuri anime are good, they are simple to use and, if you know what you’re looking for, it’s easy enough to find stuff.

2) The search on these sites are crap.  If you’re looking for “Yuri” welcome to 2000, because none of these sites know what you’re talking about. All these services have bleh search, which focus mostly on searching by title. A few attempt genre or topic, but tags are inadequately and inconsistently applied. For instance Crunchyroll has shojo, shonen and seinen, but not josei. Go figure. Hire a librarian, folks. Your taxonomy is terrible, series aren’t tagged appropriately and there are a lot of catalogers out of work right now. Quick, someone build a decent anime search engine taxonomy and sell it to all the streaming sites.  Or, heck, let viewers suggest tags and just have someone clean up the messiness. User-generated taxonomy would at least give viewers a chance.

3) Fullscreen mode is crap. I want a fullscreen mode with a disappearing toolbar that comes back up with mouse movement that includes volume, etc, and a click-start click-stop. It’s shocking how few of these sites have this.

4) Episodes should be free to watch on your site, especially if they are free to watch elsewhere…Sentai. Go ahead, pound us over the head with “subscribe now” ads and make some money on my eyeballs with other advertising.

5) There is no reasonable excuse for fansubs or scanlations at this point and should you encounter anyone who is arguing that the companies in the industry are damaging the industry, quick, block and report them because that is – at best – nonsensical.

6) There is an industry-wide problem of poor pay for folks doing translation, subtitles and all production work. This needs to stop. Fans, pay for services you use and companies…pay people who do the work.

Last, we’re in such an amazing place regarding streaming anime so my last thought for this update is this…

Look how much free stuff you can try out! Watch a different episode 1 every night, hit that “random” button and watch Twilight of the Cockroaches. Sit down and crank through Haikyuu!, finish that series you meant to get to. Find out why I rant endless about how amazing Devilman Lady is.

What are you waiting for?  Go watch a lot of anime!

 

 

Posted in Miscellaneous, Now This Is Only My Opinion, Yuri Anime | 13 Comments »