My Little Pony Friendship is Magic – Season 1 (English)

September 29th, 2013

mlpfim1Due to the kindness and generosity of my Okazu Heroes, I have very much been enjoying capping off a day’s hard anime watching with the whipped cream and cherries of this ridiculously pleasant series. If you’re the Hero who made this possible, please let me know so I can thank you properly!

My Little Pony ~ Friendship is Magic, Season 1 takes what is a well-known and well-worn toy franchise and has imbued it with new life. Several of my friends suggested I watch it, culminating in a passionate plea from one friend, and so, I acquiesced. Not surprisingly, I fell for the charm of Twilight Sparkle and her friends…and the sugar-sweet morality plays about friendship and love. I’m a sucker, I admit it. ^_^ But there’s plenty to like.

MLP ~ FiM has easter eggs for fans of all sorts of pop culture media. The first arc climaxes with something that feels awfully Sailor Moon-like, but it was the Pinky and Brain reference that hooked me. Seeded in the episodes are  many and varied references and part of the fun of watching and rewatching the series is catching them all.

Ultimately what MLP ~ FiM is about is the very same thing Hayate x Blade is “about” – deep, abiding friendship with the kinds of friends you call on in the worst of times. This is probably lost on the under-12 audience, but those of us who know who our shinyuu are, who we want at our back, know that friends are friends, whether online or off.

Decent animation, excellent writing and morals of the story that don’t make one gag. Totally worth watching.

Ratings:

Art – Clever and silly
Story – Variable, but mostly smile-making
Characters – I can’t decide who my favorite is, (much like the Senshi, in fact). I consider that a good sign.

Overall – 9

So, thank you, my friends in Yuri. And thank you my friend who  bought me this entertaining Season 1 set! And all my friends who made me watch this in the first place. ^_^ In return I give you this awesome piece of fan art.

pony girls

 

Update: While in Japan, I was able to see an episode of this. It was fun, as expected. I’ve now seen this cartoon in three languages. But most interestingly, I note that they did not attempt to Localize Applejack’s country twang to some kind of regional accent. ]

Posted in English Anime | 5 Comments »


Yuri Network News (百合ネットワークニュース) – September 29, 2013

September 28th, 2013

YNN_Lissa

Yuri Manga 

Via a ton of YNN Correspondents (thanks Shannon, Jin, Jst and everyone!) Scott Green from Crunchyroll noticed that One Peace Books’ has solicited Sasameki Koto on Amazon for a May 2014 release. The English title will be Whispered Words. I’ve already spoken with the publisher and I hope to have some more details from them in days ahead!

For those of you who liked Oshima Towa’s High School Girls/Joshi Kousei, by which I mean Sean, her new series, Joshikou Seifuku Biyori Shunka Haru Natsu (女子高制服日和 春夏), looks similar.

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Other Comic News

From YNN Correspondent Erin S. here is a lovely little comic allegory about gender diversity, Gender Tapas.

Brigid Alverson has a nice piece on the relaunch of the comic Princeless, “a kid-friendly tale of a strong girl who defies authority and has swashbuckling adventures.”

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Anime News

Diskotek Media is putting out the original Cutie Honey TV Series. Marvel at the first anime superheroine to not need a man (and who would have been more effective if the guys stayed out of the way, honestly. ^_^;)

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Other News

Here’s all the Sailor Moon/My Little Pony mashups from HeyLookASign. Notice Uranus and Neptune snuggly close. ^_^

Today’s Sailor Moon-themed makeup is “Miracle Romance” Eyeliner and Moon Wand lipstick. And stick-on nails.

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That’s a wrap for this week! 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 | 2 Comments »


Live Action: Shiroyuki Gakuen/Innocent Lilies (English)

September 27th, 2013

When I finished this series, my wife asked me – as she so often does, “Was it good?” Dissolved in laughter on the couch, I squeaked out “It was great!” She stopped doing what she was doing and said “Really?” To which I replied, still laughing so hard I was crying, “No, it was *dreadful*!”

I tell you this now, because if you really liked Shiroyuki Gakuen/Innocent Lilies, you’ll want to understand that I did not “like” it as such, but found it to be highly amusing. ^_^

The story begins with Moga, a young woman who enters an exclusive private school (vaguely Catholic school-ish in style, but with no actual religious imagery,) after her younger sister apparently took her own life. Note, I say “apparently”. Moga meets and befriends the other newbies in the school. We learn that they are all there to become a White Witch…for which they will have to undergo hard training and endure pain and suffering. Their three creepy upperclassman are cruel in a totally not really-cruel-at-all way and the girls chew up the scenes with their overacting with pain and suffering.

It turns out that, in fact, only one of them can truly become a White Witch, and to do that, she will have to increase her emotional wounds by killing the others! Oh Noes!

Then stuff happens, there’s lots of tears and deaths and more stuff and Moga becomes a White Witch. Amazing, right? ^_^ Who’dathunk it? But it turns out there’s a final boss and if you think about it for a second you’ll guess who it is.

The service is a checklist of skanky things, which makes the whole series a tad cringe-making, from bust and butt shots to milk bukkake, with long lingering moments for the service. It makes me sad that this is not done ironically, but very, very seriously so it’s important to someone, somewhere.

The cinematography is excruciating, with tons of lens flares and nauseating use of in-and-out-of-focus constantly, but since the whole thing feels utterly low budget, it’s perfectly okay. The fight choreography is shockingly decent considering everything. The script is, of course, B-movie bad, but I really think that was done on purpose and the actresses, members of the otaku idol group Denpagumi, do their very best to overact it just perfectly. And the s/fx are really quite good, but there’s kind of no excuse anymore for bad s/fx, even with low budgets.

There is Yuri-service and even a quite sincere kiss late in the series, but don’t expect Yuri to equal good things. Yuri is just another in the list of “service” along with school-assigned negligees, milk baths and bathing suits.

Overall, Innocent Lilies is a slightly painful, slightly hysterically funny, all awkward live action fantasy series. I’m a little worried that I might actually be the target audience for this kind of thing, but then again, if I were, we would have way more fighting and way less service. Phew. ^_^;

Innocent Lillies is available free, legally on Viki.com. The translations are crowdsourced – Episode 1 is up to 21 languages, which I have to admit, amazes me. Good on you, creepy fans of the world.  ^_^

Ratings:

Story – 6 Hee hee hee
Characters – 6 Awkwardly conceived and acted, but kind of likable anyway
Acting – All the hallmarks of 25 year olds pretending to be 14, but they did their best
Cinematography – 5 Enough with the out of focus and cut-scenes
Yuri – 3
Service – 10

Overall – 6

I can’t say I hated it, and I’m laughing just thinking about it, but I can’t say it’s good. “2chan bad” is my best description of it.

I just learned that Denpagumi will be performing at KawaiiFest in Harajuku. Gosh, I hope I get to see them.

Posted in Live Action | 14 Comments »


Hyakko Complete TV Series Anime, Disk 2 (English) Guest Review by Matt W.

September 25th, 2013

HyakkoCTS

A few weeks ago, I reviewed Disk 1 of this series and at the time, I gave away a copy of the complete set, thanks to TRSI. The winner had to write a review of Disk 2. And so, with great pleasure and appreciation, I welcome brand new Guest Reviewer Matt W. to Okazu on this Guest Review Wednesday. ^_^

Hello there, I am Matt W.

Based on a 4-koma gag manga, like most school slice of life shows these days have as their basis. Hyakko is the adventures in the life of four high school girls (Ayumi, Suzume, Tatsuki and Torako) and a school with a bunch of rather eccentric students. It’s like a slightly wacky version of Azumanga Daioh.

Disc 2 is about all about introducing more side characters and developing the main girl quartet.

Episode 5: Torako gains a love interest/hopeless romantic Shishimaru. It also introduces the Photo Club: Koma-chan the girl in Torako’s class and her boss Yanagi who is a rather obsessive photographer and gains a rival/buddy in the punk girl Ushio as they spend a lively afternoon together.

Episode 6: Tatsuki is dealing with being left out one day but then surprise Torako, Ayumi and Suzume show up at her house one afternoon. We also get a look into her home life involving her absentee parents and therefore her need for a live-in house maid Toshiko.

Episode 7: We are introduced to Kitsune-san, a sly fellow (as his name suggests) who starts to hang out with the Photo Club. Later he is revealed to be Torako’s aniki (big brother); he’s also a skirt flipper which leads to a slight bump of fanservice certainly.

Episode 8: Proper introduction of the scary girl/Sadako lookalike Inori; easily shunned and avoided by her classmates; Torako tries to get Inori to open up and be friendly; ‘hair-ality’ ensues.

Focus goes towards other characters, so they grow and the show’s story can develop in interesting directions, exploring them beyond the school setting. Though most of the humor amounts to “School Shenanigans”, but since this is slice of life series that isn’t a bad thing. The plot seems a bit more grounded on this set of four episodes, but the characters and their interactions are still very zany and funny. There isn’t so much a story, but a string of interconnected vignettes again tying it back to its 4-koma origins. Nene Andou is the main draw for potential yuri still in this series, although her appearances are more sparse then in the first four episodes. Granted, one can discern some form of yuri subtext when wearing the ‘yuri googles’ to be sure. This disc also contains an extended preview (between episodes 6 and 7) made after the series aired on TV which is only mildly entertaining and yet superfluous at best. I also like how the episode portions are marked by which manga chapter they are based on, as if to say ‘hey remember this?’ to the part of the audience that read the manga. Of course, this doesn’t mean much as the manga has yet to be licensed much less released over in the USA.

Bits of Beethoven music used during the scenes of Shishimaru and Torako interacting which was comically effective I must say. In addition, Liner notes on the DVD are very nice addition as they help to explain some of the more esoteric details/references in the show.

Ratings:

Art-6
Story-4
Characters-6
Yuri-2
Service-6

Overall-6

Far from being a laugh out loud show, like Azumanga Daioh or Nichijou, Hyakko is certainly chuckle-worthy at the best of times.The thing to keep in mind about slice of life anime is that they are gimmick-based: for example, K-On! has music, Kiniro Mosaic has foreigner humor/cultural misunderstandings, etc. Hyakko‘s gimmick lies in pure eccentricity and the nice thing about it is that the show nearly revels in being eccentric and totally wacky without an ounce of shame or regret.

On a final note, I shall plug my own blog for anime reviews: http://eclecticdudesanimereviews.blogspot.com/ as well as an article I wrote for Animation Revelation, another anime/animation review website (a 3 Reasons article on Bodacious Space Pirates).

E: Thank you Matt, for your perspective! We’ll be getting a third opinion for Disk 3. ^_^

Posted in English Anime, Guest Review | No Comments »


Rira to Shion by Yamaji Ebine

September 23rd, 2013

I have this really weird, tenuous relationship with FEEL YOUNG (フィールヤング) magazine . I’m not subscribing to it, but apart from an off issue or three, I’ve been reading it regularly for years, probably around a decade. First, it brought back Hana no Asuka-gumi, then it kept running Yamaji Ebine’s work. On and off, it had Yuri/lesbian stories, on and off it had something else I wanted to be reading. Now that Ohana Holoholo is winding down, I wondered if it was going to find a way to keep me coming back. Well…yup. The September issue had another one-shot by Yamaji Ebine that I like a gazillion times more than most of her recent stuff.

In a on-going series of “Lyrical” manga, Yamaji Ebine’s contribution is kind of sadly sweet. “Rira to Shion: Story of the contrastive girls” [sic] tells the story of Shion, a young woman who wants to be a photographer and Rira, a girl she meets by accident when Rira comes into Shion’s aunt’s doll shop.

Shion, it turns out, has not quite embraced adult life. She was betrayed by an adult when she was young – a man who used her photographs without her permission or credit. She’s been hovering on the edge of life, not graduating, not moving on, working with her aunt.

Rira also has not moved into adult life. After being traumatized by the sight of her older brother and girlfriend having sex, Rira is clinging to childhood. She only feels like her “true self” when she dresses like a doll among her dolls.

Shion and Rira recognize something similar in each other. And, as Shion puts it plainly, Rira becomes her Muse, bringing her photography to a whole new level. Motivated by Rira, Shion applies for graduation – but only if Rira is credited properly for her role.

The two women step forward into a new, adult life ready to support each other’s true selves.

Overall, this was a really feel-good story. There’s nothing Yuri or lesbian about it, but watching the two help each other to grow and embrace their own lives,  was just really nice.

I’ll hope that this is a swing back for Yamaji-sensei away from exploring they way people hide from the world and towards how they grow in it.

And I guess I’ll still be picking up Feel Young a little while longer. ^_^

Posted in Yamaji Ebine | 2 Comments »