Yuri Network News – (百合ネットワークニュース) – October 26, 2019

October 26th, 2019

Yuri Manga and Novels

Big news this week is that The Rose of Versailles, Volume 1, by Riyoko Ikeda, from Udon Entertainment, is now available for pre-order! It’s real…and it’s gorgeous. I can’t wait to hold it in my hands. (As an added bonus, check out these photos by Yuri photographer Takahashi Minori on Twitter which are a Berubara collaboration.)

Seven Seas announced in September that they licensed Syrup Yuri Anthology. Futabasha has announced a third Syrup anthology volume, Syrup NIGHT, First Night Yuri Anthology, (シロップ NIGHT 初夜百合アンソロジー ).

More new anthologies are on the way from Kadokawa. Aoharu Band Yuri Anthology ( 青春バンド百合アンソロジー) looks fun. ^_^

Viz is putting out Makoto Hagino’s charming aquarium-focused  A Tropical Fish Years for Snow, and we’ve got Volume 1 and Volume 2 up on the Yuricon Store.

I’m reading Hara Yuriko’s Mayu, Matou, Volume 2 (繭、纏う) ahead of Cocoon, Entwined, Volume 2 from Yen coming in spring 2020.

Hayakawa Publishing, having decided that Yuri is a growth market in science fiction (from which J-Novel Club is drawing its so-far excellent Yuri novel choices,) is branching out into Yuri mystery with the collection Yuki ga Shiroi Toki, Katsu Sono Toki Kagiri (雪が白いとき、かつそのときに限り). If their mystery is as good as their sci-fi, this should be great.

In related, but not specifically Yuri, news, Seven Seas has previously licensed the Penguindrum manga, and this week they announced the license of both the Penguindrum novels and a Sarazanmai spin-off manga. ANN has the details.

 

LGBTQ Cartoons

SheRa and the Princesses of Power, Season 4 is on the way! Check out the trailer. This season will see the introduction of a nonbinary character, voiced by a nonbinary voice actor.

 

Yuri Events

Via Twitter, Animate has announced a Nakatani Nio-sensei autograph session in Akihabara in December to celebrate the 8th and final volume of Yagate Kimi ni Naru (やがて君になる,) which will be released in Japan in November.

Via James Welker, we have a couple of pictures from Comic Horizon 7, a Yuri comic market held in Taipei, Taiwan this month. If we’re lucky we’ll get a short write up of the event, as well. It certainly seemed very well-attended.

 

 

Don’t miss learning about 100 Years of Yuri at AnimeNYC, November 15, at Javits Convention Center in New York City.

There’s just about a month in 2019 left to book me at your school, university, organization, or convention to celebrate 100 years of Yuri, so feel free to contact me and we’ll make it happen!

 

Yuri Live-Action

Check out this Korean short film call Family Plan on Youtube. Once again, the camera is way, way too close, making it nearly impossible for me to watch it, but despite the absurdly pandering YT headline, the movie is interesting and full of ambiguity.

 

Yuri Visual Novel

This news popped into my email box literally JUST as I was about to hit Publish on today’s report!
Studio Élan Announces that their charming Yuri Visual Novel, Highway Blossoms will be getting a DLC coming in early 2020 called Highway Blossoms: Next Exit! This DLC will be fully voiced by the original cast. It’ll all ages, with art from moekki and kamifish.

 

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! Write me with any questions you have, and I’ll do my best to answer them on my YNN podcast, when I revive it this winter!

Special thanks to all of our Okazu Patrons on Patreon, who make this report possible!

Posted in Yuri Network News | 1 Comment »


Sailor Moon SuperS Anime, Part 1, Disk 3 (English)

October 25th, 2019

Disk 1 gave us the SuperS Special, with it’s Yuri lovefest. Disk 2 turned a little dark, but was deeply queer.  With Sailor Moon SuperS, Part 1, Disk 3, we find ourselves deep into the middle of the 4th season of the original anime, with virtually no more information about the plot than we had in the first disk. Less, because this disk devolved into a a kind of pissing match between Hawk’s Eye and Tiger’s Eye about how many women they can seduce while Fish Eye seeks to seduce men, during which they occasionally remember they have a specific mission to discover Pegasus hiding in a human’s dream.

Because the mission has largely been forgotten, there are a number of things that draw our attention in this season which are problematic. Even setting aside Chibi-Usa’s crush on a talking horse, which reads more “fantasy” than creepy, and some of the earlier, quite creep lolicon, there is the frankly sexually violent way in which the Amazoness Trio immobilize their victims, rip people’s dream mirrors out of their chests, open them, thrust themselves in and out while digging around, as their victims scream. This violent act is horrific on it’s own, but that it keeps being conflated with seduction…I find myself at a loss for words.

This season adds shotacon to the pile of things to be made uncomfortable by, if you’re keeping a record, with Fisheye’s lame attempt as seduction/assault/mirror rape of a young boy and…Shingo and Ami. This is an equal-opportunity fetish series.

As I contemplated writing this review, I struggled with this disk. SuperS is my least favorite season for any number of reasons, the above paragraphs among them. I was considering skipping this disk in fact, as it seemed to me aggressively straight, until I began to really watch it, through the lens of my 21st century understanding. All three of the Amazon Trio are gender non-conforming and Fish Eye is, to my eye, trans. Minako’s “two-timing” episode is a poorly constructed episode that I would rewrite into her being poly and pansexual, except that of course, the Amazons are an alien enemy, not two genderfluid humans. ^_^;

I used to feel sympathetic to the Amazon Trio, but I’m not feeling it this time. I find myself actually looking forward to the theatrical release of the first Sailor Moon Eternal movie (functionally the 4th season of Sailor Moon Crystal) in which we blow through them to get to the Amazoness Quartet (whose story is sadly abbreviated in manga as well as anime and also needs a rewrite.)  The manga also has the much better powerup of the Inner Senshi than the one on this disk, which strips the agency from the Outers and gives it to Pegasus…which was just annoying.

Technically, this disk looks amazing and I only picked up the DVD, not feeling enough love for it to get the BD. While the art is retro as always, the quality of the reproduction and sound is absolutely stellar, as if it had been made for digital. Great job with the remaster and no over-saturation of the color needed. Extras on this disk are trailers only.

SuperS is never going to my favorite season, but my favorite episode of this season is coming up on the next disk, so that’s something to look forward to!

Ratings:

Art – 7 It’s noticeably improved on this disk
Story – 2 So much screaming
Characters – 4
Service – This disk adds shota to the pile.
LGBTQ – 6 For an aggressively heterosexual season, SuperS is really queer

Overall – 6

This disk leaves me with three questions:

1) Where does Mamoru get his money? He doesn’t work, goes to med school, lives in a huge apartment and has a European sports car in late 90’s Japan.

2) Do the Inners get tired of buying clothes in the same colors as their Senshi fuku? Because this season they are all-in on the matching color scheme.

3) What lessons is this season supposed to be teaching us? Because I don’t think those are the ones we’re learning. ^_^

Posted in English Anime, Sailor Moon | 3 Comments »


Yuri Manga: Luminous= Blue, Volume 1 (ルミナス=ブルー )

October 24th, 2019

In Luminous= Blue, Volume 1 (ルミナス=ブルー ), Tarumizu Kou loves photography. She loves taking pictures of landscapes and buildings, but most especially, of people. On her way to her new school, she discovers two girls from the same school who immediately become her favorite subjects to photograph.  She’s come to this high school specifically to join the renowned Photography Club…only to learn that its been dissolved. Unfazed, Kou accepts a challenge from  the former club president to reform it if she wins a competition. 

More importantly, Kou meets her new muses, Amane and Nene. As she spends time with these two close friends, Kou find herself inspired artistically, and moved emotionally. After a photo shoot with amateur model Nene, in which Kou learns Nene’s secret and her pain,  in time-honored fashion, Kou finds herself falling for her muse.

Meanwhile, we can see the club president and Amane also have some kind of relationship. Amane is modeling, but is it something more?

This series has now completed in the magazine, but this beginning was a so strong that I had a hard time purchasing this volume, as it kept being sold out! I can understand why, too, as this is an unusually compelling story for which I honestly could not imagine a good resolution. (Spoiler: it had a great resolution.)

Ratings:

Art – 8
Character – 8
Story – 8
Service – 4 The visuals are occasionally erotic, whether they read as salacious is up to you.
Yuri – 6

Overall – 8

Iwami Kyouko’s work is already familiar to us, Transparent Light Blue was licensed early this year. I’m hoping that we’ll see this series, which is vastly superior in both art and story telling.

 

Posted in Yuri Manga | 13 Comments »


Yuri Doujinshi: Siren to Rosebud (サイレンとローズバッド) and Yuricon Travel (ユリコン Travel)

October 23rd, 2019

Back in the early 2000s, when Yuri was more of a feature of various manga than a genre of its own, Yuri doujinshi and anthologies were the main ways fans could access Yuri created by the people we now think of as “Yuri artists.” As more of those artists have gone professional, more magazines have given Yuri artists a chance to publish work (and have run contests to attract new artists,) and as more manga has been released in English, it is not that hard to ignore doujinshi as an important area of Yuri creativity. But, we shouldn’t.

Doujinshi are still a terrific medium through which both aspiring and established writers and artists, can play with their own and other people’s styles and ideas to create amazing works. Comic shows foster collaboration and creativity. For instance, I picked up some Riddle Story of a Devil collaborations that paired series artist Sunao Minakata with Yuri Bear Storm artist Akiko Morishima. ^_^

While in Tokyo for the 100 Years of Yuri Tour, I took some time to visit Akihabara and dig through the shelves at Comic Zin and Melonbooks, specifically to get the books I am reviewing today. Both are Yuri doujinshi by artists we know and love here at Okazu.

Siren to Rosebud (サイレンとローズバッド) is the first new original work in a while by Jesus Drug, aka Hayashiya Shizuru. (Her more recent doujinshi have been wrapping up the Strawberry Shake series.)

On a desert island, a teacher and her student wash up after a shipwreck. They survive and, ultimately fall in love. Although Shiho promises Suzu-chan that they’ll be together forever, when they are rescued, she disappears. 8 years later, Suzu-chan, now 22, finds Shiho hiding from the world in a small seaside home in Okinawa, having become an author and shut-in.

Suzuka tries to rekindle their relationship, but Shiho rejects her, claiming to be lolicon. Suzu leaves the next morning, but as she walks the beach, Shiho runs up, saying that she lied, she was just scared of how she felt then and how she feels now. Its happy ending for the two, as Suzu teases Shiho.

This doujinshi does a couple of fun things, including the use of QR codes for random objects, specifically mangoes, jackfruit and paracord bracelets which were popular a few years ago. And there’s a MP3 link that I have not been able to get to work. All in good fun.  The art is better than ever, and her comedic beats are just as solid as always. Despite the gags, this may well be one of the sweetest, most romantic doujinshi I have by Hayashiya-sensei.

Melonbooks is always an education in how badly anatomy lessons are needed for artists, but it has a fairly interesting Yuri section and  it was worth it to get Siren to Rosebud. ^_^;

 

While at Girls Love Fes,while browsing the Comic Zin bins, I was able to pick up the next book in the Yuricon series, Yuricon Tabi-joshiben (ユリコン旅女子編 ), which is available in Japan from Booth. I reviewed the Jimoto Hougenhen volume in 2018, which you can read digitally on Bookwalker.

There are two additional volumes out this year, Yuricon Otakuben (ユリコン オタク女子編), also available on Bookwalker, and Otona Yuricon 2019 (大人のユリコン2019 which I have thus far only found on JP Kindle, and therefore not obtainable by me. ^_^; But here are some sample pages.

The Yuricon Tabi-joshiben collection includes stories by Ajiichi, Kitao Taki, Takemiya JIn and Riru all of which center on travel.

Ajiichi’s follow two women who are deeply in love. And also sisters.

Takemiya Jin’s “Sentimental Journey” was an entertaining story about a rather mopey woman looking for the worst in people and finding someone good.

“Onsen ha Ikou e” by Kitao Taki follows women on a company trip to an onsen who have to actually share their true feelings or hurt one another.

And Riru’s “Torikago Ryoukan” follows a model and her manager on a hunt through the woods for a natural hot spring. This story was very silly, but I loved the art.

Ratings:

Art – 9
Story 9
Characters – 9
Service – Occasional nudity
Yuri – 10

Buying original Yuri doujinshi is still one of my favorite things to do in Japan. And because I liked Siren to Rosebud so much, I bought an extra for the next Premium Lucky Box, so you too can look at the QR codes. ^_^ Lucky Boxes will be happening soon, so keep an eye out!

It is extra fun to me to realize that I picked up two doujinshi that focus on travel (and unintended adventure,) on my wildly adventurous 100 Years of Yuri Tour!) How…fitting.

Posted in Hayashiya Shizuru, Kitao Taki, Takemiya Jin, Yuri Doujinshi | 9 Comments »


LGBTQ Manga: Our Dreams at Dusk: Shimanami Tasogare, Volume 3 (English)

October 21st, 2019

In Volume 1, we met Tasuku, a high school student who was being bullied for being gay, finally admitting to himself he is gay. In Volume 2, Tasuku reaches out to a young trans kid and ends up hurting and being hurt, depite good intentions.

In Our Dreams at Dusk: Shimanami Tasogare, Volume 3 Tasuku must deal with real-world consequences of “being gay” in public. As Tasuku starts to to parse his feelings about a classmate whose erratic behavior leaves him constantly unsure of the intent, he also watches as association with the Cat Clutter group gives him a reputation for being one of the queers. Every time things get ugly, Tasuku has to figure out how to respond in a way that causes himself the least pain without betraying himself and others. In the end, it’s Utsumi-kun who provides him with a role model who understands what he’s supposed to be, and knows that sometimes, as a human, he’s not that.

When things come to a crisis in his own life, Tasuku takes an important step forward, carving  his own space out of his world. He takes a stand with Tsubaki-kun, demanding respect for himself and the other members of the group. Once again, accompanied by magnificent art that blows the borders of the page wide open, Tasuku takes a forceful step out of the closet.

In the final pages, Tasuku finally decides on a direction for himself, and the others of the group. When Volume 4 hit shelves in December, we’re getting a wedding! ^_^

I’ve praised this series so much, but haven’t really managed to convey just how profound and intentional it has been. There’s a lot of emotion uncovered in this series:; from the isolation of queer kids,  to confusion at an unfair society and anger at and pity for homophobic assholes. The art is epic in ways that are usually occupied by music in visual media, forcing us to sing songs inside our heads of discovery, of epiphany…and, ultimately, of joy.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 9
Characters- 8
LGBTQ – 10
Service – 2 Things that might be considered service exist

Overall – 10

This was and remains one of the most compelling series I have ever read. I keep trying to put it down and failing to do so.

As a tangent on my review of Sexiled last week, one of the things I like in this volume particularly is how it addresses the anger of queer folks at the aggressive cluelessness of  people who just will not listen to them.  The anger of queer people and the anger of women and people of color and religious minorities in every nation and the anger of any marginalized group in any environment is real. We’re being given a chance to hear that anger expressed. Next up is to change the systems that are responsible for that anger.  Onward, friends. Let us dismantle the master’s house with our own tools of art and words and music and protest and turn that into law and policy that creates a more welcoming world.

 

Posted in English Manga, LGBTQ | 4 Comments »