Archive for the Yuri Manga Category


Yuri Manga: Utahime Fight

March 23rd, 2005

Obscure Yuri Manga
Part 3

One more really obscure Yuri manga you’ve never seen or heard of before. ^_^

Utahime Fight is a collection of short stories drawn and written by Kakunouchi Narumi, creator of Vampire Princess Miyu and Juline (and many, many others…). Her oeuvre is shoujo manga fantasy and martial arts, frequently at the same time.

Utahime Fight includes three stories, all of which are about magical, mysteriously attractive girls and they effect they have on the people around them. In the first story, a girl and her two friends (one male, one female) are really magical fighters for something – probably love and justice. The third story is about a magical creature that enchants a young man and brings love into his life.

But the story that concerns us is the second in the collection, entitled “Keep Trust.” It’s a fairly trite set-up, standoffish cool girl rebuffs cute passionate girl’s overtures of friendship at school. They find themselves locked in the library one night and poof! they find themselves in the plot of a movie, in which a prince strives to save his mother and his land. (The movie had been the topic of much discussion at school, and the heroine, whose name escapes me at the moment, is totally agog over the idol who stars as the prince.)

Our cute, blonde “warm” heroine becomes the Prince’s confidant and encourages him to persevere, while the “cool” brunette falls in love with her from a distance. To make matters worse, as they say, warm girl likes to touch cool girl, snuggle with her in bed and, worst of all, cry in her arms. Cool girl is quietly dying inside the entire time until something happens to threaten their lives, and she admits, finally, that she loves warm girl.

At which they wake up in the library in school. They have a final scene in which they admit that they love each other and story ends.

Not groundbreaking, but quietly sweet. Drawn in Kakunouchi’s usual sweeping, loose-lined art, it’s a little hard to follow any action, but that’s her signature style and it doesn’t bother me.

Ratings:

Art -8
Story – 7
Characters – 7
Yuri – 7

Overall – 7

For yet another random find in a used manga store, this little collection was quite enjoyable.





Yuri Manga: Onegai Suzune-chan

March 22nd, 2005

Obscure Yuri Manga
Part 2

This time, blowing the dust off the cover was totally worth it. Onegai Suzune-chan is the kind of dire crap that I really enjoy.

Not to be confused with Onegai Teacher/Twins/Friends, and brought to you by Wani Comics, the same folks who also ran Ikkitousen, you can expect a ton of fanservice and sex, with a soupcon of plot thrown in for good measure.

Amagi Suzune is the 23rd Onmyouji of the Misora Shrine, the scion of a long line of court wizards, if you will. Her ardent, and often horny, girlfriend Karen and she make love just about every freaking place they can.

That’s the plot, so don’t expect much else.

Oh, there’s some demons and spirits and the like, and some of them have sex with Karen and/or Suzune too, but mostly this manga is a gigantic fanservice-y lesbo lovefest. I quite like it, if only because Suzune and Karen absolutely totally love each other to pieces. There’s no assumption that the lesbian sex is the appetizer for either of them – they are totally, 100% a couple.

There’s another lesbian in school, who is a bit over-the-top with her “I like to have sex with girls” attitude, but I’m probably just jealous that she’s so open and annoying at so young an age. She and her girlfriend, and (Karen and two straight female friends) are bewitched by a horny old shrine spirit into having a lesbian pileup, but Suzune beats the crap out of the spirit and everyone has a good laugh and moves on.

Even the inevitable hermaphrodite chapter is fun. A sakura tree/sex spirit that had been previously captured by Suzune makes a deal with Karen – she gets a male appendage for the evening, he gets to go home to his tree. It was a really sweet moment, even if it was utter filth. ^_^

As you can see, literature this ain’t. But for an utterly meritless trashy roll-in-the-hay manga, it’s brilliant. One more reason why trawling used manga stores is, indeed, worth the time and effort. ^_^

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – Ha. Ha.
Characters – 8
Yuri – 10

Overall- 9

An excellent piece of crap. Yay!





Yuri Manga: Vaelber Saga

March 21st, 2005

When I say I have *a lot* of Yuri manga, I mean, I have so much, I’ve forgotten half of what I own. So this weekend I was crawling through some of the older, obscurer of my collection and thought I’d write a few reviews, because how else will you learn about these gems…and the not-so-gem-like, too.

Cleaning Out The Obscure Yuri Manga Closet
Part 1

Today, we’ll start with Vaelber Saga, a story that I believe richly derserves its obscurity. I have volumes 1 and 2 and have never been motivated to get 3. If anything good happens in 3, someone tell me and I’ll go get it. ^_^

The world of Vaelber Saga is an over-drawn monster-infested post-apocalyptic Earth. The action is full of movement and violence that one can barely make out past all the heavy black ink lines…I’m sure you know the sort.

Our heroine Jum has a talking cat/fox kind of animal, really long hair and a mission that has something to do with the “Vaelber,” the nature of which I never really figured out. She wears an outfit that I can only describe as “a really dumb choice for an post-apocalyptic world” and swings an overlong sword without cutting her overlong hair.

Can you tell I love this story?

Jum discovers and, after a really prolonged battle with one of those monster guys that never dies no matter how many body parts you remove, she saves our damsel-in-distress, Mina. Their eyes lock and their hearts pound, and…yeah, so that’s about it for them. Later, Jum watches Mina bathe, contemplating why her heart is beating so loudly and, after saving Mina from one of those monster guys that never dies no matter how many body parts you remove, they find themselves naked and well within touching distance. The look into each others’ eyes and move closer and then pull away, beet red and as horny as hell. But of course, nothing happens.

Thank GOD for the reigning Evil Queen-type character, Maria. At least she just goes ahead and sleeps with her chief henchchick, Freya. I quite like both of them – too bad they will be defeated. Why is that? Maria looks completely competent to rule this dismal little planet…and we’re supposed to be happy that Jum will eventually defeat her and replace her with a blushing, simpering child? Ugh. No thanks, count me in on the side of the baddies here, kids. For one thing – they have much nicer clothes.

There’s also a questionably uber-butch character, Giselle, who is a friend of Jum’s from waaaay back who will invariably betray her. If only it leads to her finding solace in Mina’s arms, it might be worth it. Wanna take bets?

So, yeah, this series has genuine Yuri, of two kinds – the “why do I feel this way around you?” kind and the “get over here wench” kind. And yet, it’s a boring, boring manga.

If you like post-apocalyptic demonfests with unrealistically drawn swords and a strong D&D feel, you might like Vaelber Saga more than I do. Or not. Whatever.





Yuri Anime: Hayate Cross Blade, Volume 2

March 18th, 2005

Could Hayate Cross Blade get any better? I can’t imagine how. Unless Hayate grows up suddenly and she and Ayana kiss passionately…but even without that, this manga still rocks. (And you know, thinking about it…I’m not sure they really work as a couple…)

At the end of Volume 1, we leave Ayana and Hayate, our newly paired shinyuu having just fought off 18 other teams to move up an entire rank in one huge, embarrasingly amusing randori. Hayate is speaking to her friend, fellow first year Momoka, one of the very few unpaired swordswomen in school, about just why she remains without soeur…woops, I mean shinyuu. ;-)

Momoka tells Hayate that she has a person with whom she wants be paired – her old sempai from her kendo dojo, Riona. Rio-‘nee is a year older and entered the school first. When Momoka entered, she relates in a heart-rending tale, she found Riona paired with an abusive older classman. At that *very* instant, the two appear and we see Riona’s partner haul off and belt her across the face! Shock! Momoka challenges the upperclassman to a duel, to rescue her beloved Rio-‘nee. Hayate is moved to tears…

In the meantime, since Hayate is helping Momoka train, Ayana is left in peaceful bliss to fend off her randy roommate Jun. Jun is our resident openly desirous best friend type, who makes no bones about wanting to jump this particular sempai, but Ayana isn’t interested. (Of course, she’s still pining away a little for Yukari, her former shinyuu. You can tell by her reactions everytime she runs into Yukari.)

Does Momoka win the challenge? What do you think…of course she does! But the outcome is nothing like Momoka expects, as Riona opts to stay with her current partner, since she’s really not as abusive as she seems and in fact, being slapped upside the head every once in a while refreshes her. Erm, yeah. (And man, Momoka was so kewl and princely as she fights for the woman she loves…sigh…stupid Riona.)

Which is where the fun *really* begins, because the only other unpaired girl in the school (not every student is a fighter, but if you are, you can’t fight without a partner) has been haunting Momoka trying to get her to team up. I use the word “haunting” quite literally. Inugami Isuzu is the CREEPIEST girl ever. The art for her is brilliantly funny, drawing on alot of current horror movies and standard traditional horror tropes that you will recognize immediately. She’s got an evil black aura around her head and even the way she moves and talks are creepy. To top it all off, Isuzu is clearly a witch. I adore Isuzu…she’s so skin-twitchingly awful. ^_^

After resigning herself to losing Riona, Momoka makes Isuzu’s physical appearance a little more friendly looking, which actually on serves to make her *more* creepy. Hayate dubs Isuzu “Wanko” (puppy girl, a play on her family name.) At last, Momoka and her new shinyuu can join the battle.

I cannot *wait* for Volume 3.

I mean, chicks with weapons, tons of yuri fun, almost no fanservice….no, really, I can’t think of any! Can you believe it? Hayate Cross Blade is a strong favorite so far for best manga of 2005. It’ll be damned hard to beat, anyway….





Yuri Manga: Hayate Cross Blade, Volume 1

March 14th, 2005

From Hayashiya Shizuru, the author of Strawberry Shake, Yuri Shimai‘s Yuri love comedy, comes Hayate Cross Blade, a delightful mixture of whimsy, action and lots of lovely Yuri.

(07/28/07: If you have come to this review after reading that Seven Seas has licensed the manga, please feel free to click Hayate x Blade for all my reviews of this series!)

*Special thanks to Touko_no_doriru-san, who told me about this terrific series! Thank you so much for the heads up!*

I probably shouldn’t even be writing this review yet, as I haven’t had a proper read-through of this manga – but it really is so wonderful, I wanted to rave a little. I promise to read it more thoroughly before I review Volume 2. ^_^

To put it simply, Hayate (the redhead on the left of the above cover) is a heroine of the uber-genki, out-of-control sort. (Readers familiar with Strawberry Shake can easily liken her to Julia.) Hayate’s sister was supposed to have attended a special elite school, but is unable to attend, so Hayate decides to masquerade as her. Of course, this ruse is quickly uncovered, but she is allowed to stay…on a few conditions.

The school is the sort that, had it ever truly existed, I would have moved heaven and earth to attend. ^_^ The girls all carry swords and rank at the school is attained by joining the “Star Taking” Hoshitori which basically means sword-fighting with the other girls to move up in rank. There appears to be compensation for high ranks – with a large prize at the very top.

Hayate lives with a young woman Chiharu, who runs an orphanage and who continually insists, quite forcefully at times, that she will marry Hayate. Hayate doesn’t seem to think there’s anything wrong with this – she acts very father-like to the orphans. As it turns out, Hayate and her sister were raised there.

When she attends school, she immediately she runs into several problems. She falls foul of intemperate upperclassmen, of course. And the house she lives in is trashed by a greedy real estate agent. Along with the special circumstances of her being allowed to stay at the school, she now *needs* money and rank, so she joins the Hoshitori to attain both. In order to participate in the Way of the Sword, one needs a partner, so Hayate picks the most aloof, least attainable and easily the most skilled girl at school…a girl who was once the highest ranked ever who, for reasons that have many rumors attached to them, but no hard facts, has stopped being an active fighter.

Through sheer insanity, Hayate convinces this girl, Mudoh Ayana, to be her partner – but the Council makes one condition. Since Hayate is a beginner, they must both start from the very bottom of the ranks.

We learn very quickly that Hayate has some genuine innate hand-to-hand skills, even though her sword technique is rough, and that Ayana’s past history includes a deeply painful break-up with her former partner, now the highest ranked sword fighter in the middle school.

As you can imagine, this manga is filled with all *sorts* of hints about the relationships between the various partners, and there is overt akogare on Hayate’s part for her new uber-cool partner (which makes for a cute rivalry with Chiharu.)

Basically, you got the whole soeur thing going, with the addition of swords and fighting. This is very good thing, IMHO.  ^_^ In this case, the relationship is referred to as “shinyuu” which can be translated as both, “close friends” and “sisters-in-arms”.

The art is, again, familiar to anyone who has read Strawberry Shake, and the characters are all instantly likable. I definitely give this series a whopping big thumbs up.

Ratings

Art – 8
Story – 8
Characters – 8
Yuri – 7
Overall – 8

A solid entry to the Yuri lists, and one that I will follow with great enjoyment!