Stretch Manga, Volume 4 (ストレッチ)

December 19th, 2016

For about two years, I’ve been following Akili’s wecomic-turned-manga, Stretch. For two years I’ve watched Keiko and Ran, two adults who are clearly close friends and roommates act like close friends and roommates. This of course doesn’t stop some fans from seeing more. ^_^

Volume 4 of Stretch (ストレッチ), the final volume, begins with Ran telling Keiko that she’s getting married and moving out. Half of this is true. Her time relying on her old school sempai is coming to a close. In between suggestions for “dynamic stretching,” Ran and Keiko spend their last days together as roommates.

Their relationship never changes. It remains friendly, intimate and snarky right to the end. Two close friends who had fun as roommates and have every intention of keeping in touch. It’s anticlimactic in it’s normality. 

And, really, that was what Stretch always was. It was never a romance, or a Yuri manga. It was always a manga about two adult women who were friends. Had it been written for a female audience  it might have had less service, but probably would not have been otherwise much different.  

Ratings:
Art – 9
Story – 7
Characters – 7
Yuri – 1
Service – 6  Some perfunctory bath groping.

As a vehicle for getting readers to do some stretching, Stretch was pretty fun.

Posted in Miscellaneous | 2 Comments »


Western Comic: Hilda and the Stone Forest

December 18th, 2016

I spend a lot of time here on Okazu discussing role models. Not always in those terms, but realistically, I am speaking of women and girls who I consider to be (or not to be) suitable to rely on for lessons on how to handle life situations. From my fantasy faves of psychotic murderers who violently remove obstacles in their way to characters who triumph over conflict through wits and with the help of friends, Okazu is filled to the brim with praise for role models for women and girls. (In fact, most of the books I’ve liked least provide very poor lessons on women in relationships and show characters making bad decisions for bad reasons.)

But. For many reasons there is one especially important role model that is mostly-absent from my pages. In many cases, the first role model and the most important person in our early lives is our mothers. LGBTQ people often have difficult relationships with parents, but some of us are lucky enough to find acceptance. It’s even a cliche’ of LGBTQ literature and comics that mothers are more accepting than fathers.

So, while today’s book is not LGBTQ, I thought it was a good time of year to read a story of a mother who accepts that her daughter is unlike other children. And, lo and behold! the kind folks at Nobrow Press sent me a copy of Hilda and The Stone Forest. I’ve written about Hilda before. In Hilda and the Midnight Giant,  Hilda uses negotiation to manage her way through bureaucracy and prejudice and allow two races to co-exist peacefully. But Hilda doesn’t live alone. She has a mother and who taught Hilda to be the person she is, anyway? Mom, of course.

Hilda’s Mom is mostly cool, although she doesn’t like Hilda sneaking off. I mean, who would? But, in Hilda and The Stone Forest when Hilda and her mother are embroiled in an impossible adventure, this time it’s Mom who figures out how to get  home. Mom comes through where Hilda just could not. Mom’s the hero! And in doing so, Mom shows Hilda how, even in desperate times, there’s always something that you can do…even if it’s not going to magically fix things.

The book ends with a surprise twist that will lead into the next book.

Once again, I heartily recommend the Hildafolk stories for young readers – especially those who love fairytales and myths – and for whom you would like to provide strong role models who don’t just slay the dragon and leave.

Ratings:

Art – 6
Story – 9
Character – 9

This would make a great gift choice for a child in your life!

Many thanks to Tucker at Nobrow Press for the review copy. You always know what will pick my spirits right up. ^_^ And you guys do the best kid’s books.

Posted in Western Comic/Comix | No Comments »


Yuri Network News – (百合ネットワークニュース) – December 17, 2016

December 17th, 2016

Yuri Manga

At last, the second volume of Collectors by Nishi UKO is up for pre-order!  Yahoo!

Also headed our way is Renai Log (恋愛ログ) by Takemiya Jin and Momono Moto’s Akaneiro no Kiss ha Okujou de (茜色のキスは屋上で).

Ichijinsha has several collections on the way – Sekihar’, Akumu no Rakuen (悪夢の楽園) and Numachi’s Kakinzumi Girlfriend (課金済ガールフレンド).

Online,  Cycomi presents a new Yuri manga by Nou Natsumi, Futari Monologue. You can read chapters for free online, in Japanese.

ANN has the news that this year’s Kono Manga ga Sugoi! listing for female readers included My Lesbian Experience with Loneliness, by Nagata Kabi, which was licensed for release next year by Seven Seas, so you too can see if this manga is amazing!

From YNN Correspondent Ary,  comes the news that Complex Age has been licensed by Kodansha. Ary says it is “a nice, unexpectedly accurate look at nerd girls on the cosplay and lolita scene as they approach those dreaded mid-late twenties and thirties.” 

Not Yuri, but super fun, from YNN Correspondent Brendan B, the French edition of  Otouto no Otto (which has been licensed by Gay Manga as My Brother’s Husband), Le Mari de mon frère has been nominated for an award at Angouleme, the French comics awards event.

According to Komatsu-san over at Crunchyroll News, manga artist Matsumoto Hidekichi drew a serial announcement of the ending of the Sabagebu! manga  on Twitter.

 

Yuri Anime

I’m told there’s some service-y Yuri in the manga A Centaur’s Life, and now an anime for the series has been announced.

Viz is hosting a Sailor Moon R Movie Event on January 13th in Los Angeles, according to ANN. If anyone can make that, do let us know how it is!

 

Live Action News

ANN also has the news that the Live-action Saki movie has released a 60-second trailer for your viewing pleasure. 

 

Yuri Games

Today we’ll wrap up with news that was both surprising and pleasing. A while back I reported on a Japanese Yuri game that was being worked on called Hanaemi ni Kuchizuke (花笑みにくちづけを), set at an all girls’ school. The company releasing it made a big deal of recruiting character designs, then we didn’t hear anything again for some time. In fact, just a few months ago I took the link off my “to check” links, as it hadn’t been updated since 2015. Well, Yurinavi reports that the game has launched at last, as a cell phone game in Japan. Yurinavi has some screenshots for us, I’m reading it right now on my cel, so it looks like you’ll be able to play it (in Japanese) on western phones. Click here to play. I’m playing this as I write. It’s unintentionally hilarious (to me.)

And from YNN correspondent Elizabeth F, we have the game Fight or Flirt, a dating sim originally developed for the Yuri Game Jam, which is clearly Utena inspired. Check it out and let us know what you think of it!

 

Know some cool Yuri News you want people to know about? Become a Yuri Network Correspondent by sending me any Yuri-related news you find. Emails go to anilesbocon01 at hotmail dot com. Not to the comments here, please, or they might be forgotten or missed. There’s a reason for this madness. This way I know you are a real human, not Anonymous (which I do not encourage – stand by your words with your name!) and I can send you a YNN correspondent’s badge.

Thanks to all of you – you make this a great Yuri Network!

Posted in Yuri Network News | 4 Comments »


Yuri Manga: Pulse, Volume 1 (English)

December 15th, 2016

One of the greatest pleasures I have as a Yuri manga fan is seeing the development and growth of an artist I like. In 2015, I had the chance to introduce you to Ratana Satis, a talented Thai artist, who had put together Lily Love, a story of two college students who fall in love. Earlier this year, I was able to review the English translation of the story. As with Godley Malabanan’s Tagalog Yuri comic World Canvas, my only criticism was in the typicality of it. Lily Love is a classic “Story A” without much to differentiate it from the many others of it’s sort.

Still, I loved Ratis’ art and her characters, I was thrilled to be able to pre-order her newest series, Pulse. Volume 1, which arrived as a gorgeous hardcover volume that is now sold out. I hope that it will be re-released as a softcover, but it can be read online for now.

The hardcover is large, like a bande dessinée, with a color cover wrap, and a one-color image on the book itself. The pages are full-color, each with two strips down the page lengthwise, as one reads online. The pre-order came with a color postcard of the leads, a pin and the book includes a color fold-out poster.  It pretty much pulls out all the stops. ^_^

Pulse is, in short, the story of a heart surgeon  who has no heart. Mel is a successful heart surgeon and a playgirl. She has her pick of the nurses and other lovers, but has no interest in a relationship. When she meets Lynn, a college student who needs a heart transplant but will not get one, Mel feels an unsual, for her, sense of attraction.

Lynn recognizes Mel’s interest but also can see that Mel herself is isolated from others – by choice, but still.., so she comes up with a ridiculous idea. If Lynn can make Mel fall in love with her, she’ll get the surgery, and only if Mel will do the surgery. Well, Mel refuses to commit to the last bit, but takes Lynn’s bet. As the volume comes to a close Lynn has moved in with Mel, in order to better push her case.

There’s a lot to like in this story. Mel is kind of cold, but not a jerk. That is to say, she’s not unkind, or rude, she’s simply uninterested in other people. The sex is nice and always consensual. In fact, that’s one of Mel’s two additions to Lynn’s contract. Sex, should it happen, will be consensual and Mel is not changing her life at all for Lynn’s benefit. Seemed perfectly reasonable to me.

The attraction between them is instant and by forcing them and us to give it time, we can enjoy the tension instead of rushing them to a conclusion. 

The fact that both Lynn and Mel are adults appeals to me, just as Donut and Pew were, but with the added layer of an adult not in school. This is something we really have to grasp, in a scene where Mel and Lynn are present when a car accident occurs and Mel jumps into caring for the victims. 

The last thing that really made the story stand out was that men exist in this world, as relatives and colleagues. It’s not one of the all-women-all-the-time worlds. This world is the world.

Once again, I have nothing but praise for Satis’ art. Mel is sexy and adult and competent and a little aloof, and Lynn is cute and we want her to win so she’ll get a new heart. 

I also want to shout out to the Three Musqueerteers translators, who continue to put out excellent work.

Ratings:

Art – 10
Story – 9
Character – 8
Yuri – 10
Service – 6

Overall – 9

Pulse is an excellent story, and a beautiful book, and I look forward to reading more.

Posted in Yuri Manga | 6 Comments »


Halloween Trip to Japan – Guest Post by Bruce P.

December 14th, 2016

Hello and welcome to Guest Review Wednesday! Today we have an extra-special report  by our dear friend and co-conspirator, Bruce P, who ran off to Japan without me. :-( Settle for what always promises to be a good time, in the company of a great writer! Take it away Bruce! 

 

On a trip to Japan this Halloween I was able to attend a couple of events that might be of interest to Okazu readers. The highlight of which was an exhibit of artwork by Yamagishi Ryoko, the exceptionally talented shoujo mangaka who authored Shiroi Heya no Futari, one of the earliest Yuri manga.

But first – a visit to the Akasaka Red Theater, venue for the live performance of Grand Stage, the Takarazuka-esque CD voice drama series that Erica has been reviewing. The final show was already in progress as I arrived in Tokyo, so it was a race from the plane to the bus to the hotel to the subway to Akasaka. Sweating, stumbling (long flight), I arrived in time, if I could just find the theater. Everything was working out so well. It really was a lovely autumn evening, and the Akasaka streets, sparkling with neon and echoing with gentle laughter, had a delicate nocturnal beauty, pole dancing places glowing softly in the night.

Problem was, I had real trouble locating the venue.  As it turned out I wasn’t looking low enough. Descending from the sidewalk, behind some outdoor tables with pumpkin candles, the theater entrance looked a bit like an access to a storage cellar. Grand stage indeed. But the display posters were colorful. It’s interesting that the title graphic includes both a lily and a rose, a wink at the spectrum of gender/orientation conflation possibilities.

 

Less than a minute after I found the theater the show let out, and that’s timing. The audience numbered half a dozen or so, mostly women in floppy hats and clunky shoes.

They all seemed pleased with the show and there was much picture taking as an earnest theater employee (left), with over-caffeinated efficiency, immediately began pulling down the posters.

It really was a nice night-before-Halloween, and I was happy to see that the nearby Akasaka Toyokawa Inari Betsuin had put up their pumpkin lanterns (or maybe not).

On Halloween itself the new Mayor of Tokyo had fun dressing up as Princess Knight.

In Shibuya a lot of other folks had fun dressing up too. Those having the most fun were shown repeatedly on the news being carted away in ambulances and police cars.

The Yamagishi Ryoko exhibit was in the Yayoi Museum near Tokyo University. The Yayoi is dedicated to exhibiting print illustrations and manga art from the Taisho and Showa eras – essentially the 20th century. I had been to this museum some years back for an exhibit of works by the illustrator Takabatake Kashou, at which I snapped up the poster below.

Happy to get reacquainted I headed out to the Museum:

Sign on chair: Closed Today. Improvising on a trip (‘blundering about Japan’) is enjoyable, and takes less work than planning, but I do see a lot of these signs.

I returned a couple of days later. The exhibit was absolutely worth the extra trip. Yamagishi-sensei was part of the talented group of female shoujo mangaka known as the Year 24 Group, which also included Ikeda Riyoko (Rose of Versailles), Hagio Moto (Heart of Thomas), and other exceptional artists. The exhibit was on display in two large rooms, with walls and center display cases in both lined with a tremendous selection of Yamagishi-sensei’s work. About a dozen people were there enjoying the art.

Here are just a few of many examples that caught my eye, imaged from a book that was essentially the exhibition catalogue. Photography was not permitted in the exhibit.

Dream (1978). 1930’s cool.

Left and Right (1969), debut manga.

 

Hi Izuru Tokoro no Tenshi (1982), artwork for a record cover.

 

Secret Love (1986). Columbine and Camelia.

While I was busy taking notes (who knew there was a catalogue?) an older Japanese couple approached in curiosity and introduced themselves. Long-time Yamagishi fans, they had made the trip down from Sendai just for the exhibit. They were pleased, if puzzled, to find a westerner so interested in her work that he would take notes, when there was such a nice catalogue, and we had a lovely chat. They really wanted to make sure I knew that Yamagishi-sensei wasn’t just a manga artist, she was a real artist. While I believe the line to be a lot more elastic than that, there is no doubt that she is an artist in every sense of the word. Here is a link to the exhibition poster.

My only regret was that the original cover art for Shiroi Heya no Futari was not on display. There was too much art for the space, so the display items changed, and that one wasn’t up at the time. But the exhibit was absolutely worthwhile (and is running through Dec 25, so if you hurry…). Definitely the highlight of a great trip.

Well, um, that and the Perfume concert in the Nagoya Dome. If you’re partial to music with your lasers.

E here: Thank you Bruce for the report (and the copy of the catalogue. I’ve drooled over it many times already). It’s always great to hear your travel stories!

Posted in Guest Review, Tokyo Journal | 3 Comments »