Yuri Network News – March 5, 2011

March 5th, 2011

Yuri Anime

Welcome to the “some series never die” edition of the YNN report! Top news this week is German licensing company m4e has re-licensed the Sailor Moon anime for the German market. It’s not that US companies don’t want to license Sailor Moon, we know that. Remember when Funimation looked into it? And I know two others that have, as well. And…it’s not happenin’ right now. I don’t know why it’s not. but I’m going to close my eyes and pray for a moment that we do get a re-release sometime soon. I really want a DVD set of the third season with sound that doesn’t suck. I like to crank it when the Outer Senshi transform. (I’m sitting here watching Sailor Moon S as a I type and *man* does it have lousy art! But I don’t care, I love it anyway and want to see it re-released.)

Also in keeping with our theme this week, Funimation has announced that the release date for the Noir Complete Collection has been pushed back to July.

Back in the 2010’s, Ain’t It Cool Anime News mentioned that a K-ON! movie has been announced with a release at the end of 2011.

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Yuri Events – Yuri Artists

If you’re in or near Kyoto, Japan on the 21st of the month, you might want to arrange your day so you can participate in the 5th Girls Love Fes, Yuri doujinshi market, being held from 11:30-4:30 at Plaza  Pio.

For those of you in or near New York on the 20th of the month, consider arranging your day to make a trip to the Bronx Academy of Arts and Dance (BAAD) where Rica Takashima (Rica ‘tte Kanji!?) will be joining Jennifer Camper (Juicy Mother), Diane DiMassa (Hothead Paisan) and Joah Hilty (Bitter Girl) for a slide show and discussion panel called “Dykes Draw the Line.” The tickets are free, but you must reserve in advance.

If you were on Twitter last night, around 11PM EST, you were able to catch Fujieda Miyabi-sensei drawing live on Ustream. It was fun and rather relaxing, to watch him create something before our eyes (and hear him sing along to his background music.) Those of us watching it decided that we desperately wanted to live in a world where he designed all the clothing. ^_^ (He’s on his stream still, as I type this morning, so quick go over and say hi!)

Nakamura Ching-sensei has been working like a madwoman and picking up a number of very interesting gigs, along with her work on GUNJO and Girl’s Jump. One of her recent jobs was to pen a Yuri story for a fashion magazine, commons & sense, issue 140. This appears to be a real fashion mag, full of stuff I find laughably poser-y, but people who read this kind of thing probably take quite seriously. Check out the gallery and decide for yourself. I’ve ordered the magazine and I’ll let you know how it is.

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That’s a wrap for this week.

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

Posted in Yuri Network News | 10 Comments »


Yuri Manga: Strawberry Panic Omnibus (English)

March 3rd, 2011

91Bt+QH8+zL It’s been practically an eon since I first encountered Strawberry Panic! in the pages of Dengeki G’s magazine as stand-alone scenarios of Yuri couples. Since then, both I and the series itself have changed a few times. The series underwent an adaptation to manga, in which the initial pairs were expanded to an entire cast, and adapted into an anime, which reached deep into Yuri memes and roots and pulled out a love story with a satisfactory ending. The Light Novels, with their melodramatic stylings, served to complete the unfinished manga in an over-the-top way.

For my part, I began with pretty much nothing but loathing for the series which wallowed and pandered in a way that completely turned me off. There was nothing in the original stories that was created with me in mind and the manga was decidedly shaped for the lowest common denominator. As the anime shifted from “stolen meme of the week, which we present with a straight face and no real desire to tell a story” to “stolen meme of the week, which we present with a wink and a nod and –  we can’t help ourselves –  a bit of character development and plot, too” my opinion began to change. (I consider this a positive quality in myself, even if fans have a somewhat difficult time accepting that. I still get angry letters about reviews I wrote 7 years ago.)  And then I read the novels.

I have to say, very frankly, anyone who cannot “hear” the overt campiness of the novels, the hyper-melodramatic tone in which they were written, is really, honestly missing the point. In my review of the first LN in English, I tried to illustrate this with a few of the quoted passages. My comments were not me being snarky, but me commenting on the snark embedded within the lines of the novel. Of these, this passage really stood out as a tell:

Of course, most of the young ladies used their judgment when they heard those legends. But there were some who really believed them. …And yet those same young ladies grew into fine women.

Really read that, please, and note the subtext which (for those of you who cannot see the flashing lights,) says, “DO NOT TAKE THIS STORY SERIOUSLY.”

At the moment I read that line in the Japanese edition of the Light Novel, I ceased to take any of Strawberry Panic seriously and was, at last, able to find affection for it in my heart.

This week I found myself re-reading the manga as the Strawberry Panic Omnibus, put out recently by Seven Seas (who are now more active on Twitter. Go say hello.). My primary emotion upon completing it was that I was a little sad that it ended so soon. There were so many good bits yet to come and at least one helicopter would surely have been included! But no, this story was terminated at the equivalent of the end of the first novel.

Technically, the omnibus looks good. The translation is as it was; the translation notes are short, but enough. I like the size of the book, which is A5 – this gives it the feel of a typical seinen manga. It feels good in my hand and isn’t going to break a foot if I drop it, as Cardcaptor Sakura might. The one thing I will continue to say about Seven Seas is that they really do a great job of giving us, the readers, an authentic manga reading experience.

The story is very Yuri. There is nothing else to be said about that – there are multiple pairings in this manga but, of them, there are two entirely romantic romances (which almost no fans cared about, instead focusing on the hopeless losers in the rivalries…which has got to be some kind of commentary on something, don’t you think?)

This we can say about Strawberry Panic in all its iterations: Shizuma is queen-like, a veritable goddess on earth who is inexplicably (even to herself) attracted to a humble, down-to-earth energetic, cheerful girl, Nagisa. And Amane is a Prince-like being who is inexplicably (especially to herself) attracted to humble, angelic, cry-baby Hikari. And those two romances fill the pages of this collection with melodrama, tears and kisses.

Love it or hate it, Strawberry Panic was a gateway Yuri series for a generation of fans last decade. If you have not already picked up a copy of this omnibus, please do. And get an extra for your library, to spread the love of Yuri love to the next generation.

Ratings:

Art – 6
Story – 7
Characters – 8
Yuri – 9
Service – 10

Overall – 8

Foreshadowing: I have had the opportunity to see the Strawberry Panic Light Novel Omnibus and it is also quite good. More than it being good, though, you need to read it to get the end of the story! If you liked/loved/tolerated the manga and 1) want to know what happened or 2) really, really want to read about the helicopters, get it! I have to say, I laughed through the novels all over again as I read them. The language is breathtakingly campy in places.

Postscript: Today we have the genuine pleasure of thanking our own candidate for Etoile, Okazu Superhero Eric P., for his sponsorship of today’s review! As always, Eric, thank you kindly for your generosity. If you’d like to become an Okazu Hero, just click on the Yuri Wish List links on Amazon and Amazon JP on the right-hand sidebar and purchase something for review and you’ll be a Hero to Okazu readers world-wide!

Posted in English Manga, Strawberry Panic, Yuri Manga | 10 Comments »


Light Novel: Maria-sama ga Miteru ~ Step

March 2nd, 2011

This week’s theme appears to be “some series never die.” We started off the week with a look back at Cardcaptor Sakura, Sailor Moon was just re-licensed in Germany, and I have another re-tread planned for later this week. And, today, we’re taking a look at one of the most recent volumes of a series that has lodged itself firmly in our hearts, Maria-sama ga Miteru. There is one massive spoiler ahead, be warned.

Maria-sama ga Miteru ~ Step (マリア様がみてる ステップ) tells the story of two girls, Katsuki and Ritsu. They are second-years in high school at Lillian and they are the very best of friends. They’ve been together so long that they are practically like sisters.

So, when Ritsu tells Katsuki that she’s seeing a boy, it comes as a shock – not because she’s seeing a boy so much, but because she’s *been* seeing him for a few weeks, and she never mentioned it. Katsuki is hurt, but honest about it, so they separate for a little while, then take it slow to repair the tears in their bonds carefully and neatly. But, as Katsuki points out in her interior monologue, once a person has taken that step up the stair of life, they can never really go back to being the person they were, even if they want to.

In the meantime, Katsuki has herself, through an accidental, somewhat silly, circumstance met a guy she thinks she might be interested in and, when she learns through another completely accidental circumstance that he is Ritsu’s brother, *she* keeps it secret from her best friend. Katsuki had somewhat complicated things a little by lying to “Ken-san,” the nickname she created for the guy she met, about her own name.

Then comes the day Katsuki encounters Ritsu’s boyfriend and her hurried confession the next day to Ritsu that it was another incredible coincidence and nothing else. But, Ritsu says, it doesn’t matter – she’s already broken up with Kouta. In fact, Ritsu knew that Katsuki had met her boyfriend…and the problem was not that she was jealous of Katsuki for being with Kouta, but that she was jealous of Kouta for being with Katsuki.

During the school trip, Ritsu “confesses” that her break-up with Kouta was because she likes Katsuki more. Katsuki thinks about it and asks if Ritsu would like to kiss her. Ritsu replies, “Sure, I guess,” to which Katsuki says, “Right – you guess.” She calmly points out that she really doesn’t think Ritsu’s gay and she’s fairly sure she might have noticed by now if she was and Ritsu pretty much agrees that she’s the same.But they agree that they love each other very much.

Katsuki is now sure that Ritsu does want to go out with Kouta (who she knows is a nice guy) and she kind of wants an excuse to see Isao, Ritsu’s brother, so she calls him to ask him to bring Kouta to the school festival. There is a little tension, but Kouta does come, and he and Ritsu head off to the Sakuratei cafe together. In the meantime, Katsuki meets and is instantly recognized by Isao as the girl he met in the park….despite her makeup and costume as a monster for the haunted house. Woops.

In the end, the two girls have frank talks with their prospective partners about their feelings for them and for each other. Kouta tells Ritsu that he also has a bosom buddy he feels that close too, Isao. And Katsuki comes to realize that Hasekura Isao is a genuinely nice guy.

The author’s note begins with the most obvious question ever – can you guess Kouta’s family name? I could and did. Can you?

One of the questions I’m asked most on #marimite_spoilers @rizon.net is “when” the book I’m discussing is. Yumi’s first-year or second or third? This one was impossible to peg until we were given that single hint. Once we got that, it was obvious “when” we were.

As with many of of Konno-sensei’s books, the plot here took a long time to develop. It was  a bit tiring at first, with all the “boyfriend this” and “boyfriend that” but, as the story developed it picked up some speed. And there were a number of small, but interesting features. Ritsu’s and Katsuki’s frank discussion about their affection for one another was one, Kouta’s admission of affection for Isao was another. But of all the interactions in the book, the most interesting to me was a conversation Katsuki had with another classmate, Watako.

Katsuki asks Watako if she had a lover, to which Watako replies, “not at the moment.” Katsuki and I both naturally interpreted that to mean that she had had one previously and expects to do so again. In this way, on top of the shocking idea Konno-sensei introduces in this novel that Lillian girls may have (*gasp!*) boyfriends, Konno-sensei introduces the even more shocking idea that some of them may have had lovers. Two steps out of the garden of maidens in one shot. You go Konno-sensei. ^_^

Ratings:

Overall – starts at a 5, but ends up an 8

The key thing to making this book work as well as it did was that both Kouta and Isao really are nice guys.

Posted in Light Novel, Light Novels, Maria-sama ga Miteru | 17 Comments »


Yuri Manga: Kyoumei Suru Echo

March 1st, 2011

Kyoumei Suru Echo (共鳴するエコー), by Kigi Tatsumi, is a collection of shorts from Tsubomi magazine,  that are intertwined by mutual acquaintance but otherwise don’t intersect. In this case, the connections have very little impact on the story and serve only as a thread that links them.

In “Runner’s High,” a horrible trauma turns out to be less of an issue than we might have expected, and once Yuki faces the truth, she’s able to move on.

Yuki’s coach Ayami deals with life and love when she was in high school in the second story. Nothing new, but cute nonetheless.

The third story covers a day in the life of the Yuki and her twin sister Hibiki, their older sister and the drama that makes a family a family.

It is the final, multi-part story that sets this collect a little apart from others of its kind. In “Lonesome Echo” Yuki and Hibiki’s older sister, Ritsuko joins the staff of a school as a new teacher. Ritsuko encounters a strange slacker student Yohko, who lounges around the music room and asks embarrassing questions of the new teacher.

As time passes, Yohko learns that some thing is not at all right with Ritsuko. She is being abused by her lover. A lover who, Yohko finds out, is female, older and Ritsuko’s former music teacher. Yohko stands up for Ritsuko, only to be brushed off by the arrogant, abusive lover. But Yohko is not a shrinking violet – she is the granddaughter of the school chancellor and has strings she can pull and the clout to protect Ritsuko. The end of the story is a handwave, but a perfectly acceptable one.

I thought this last story was interesting – if pat – because it illustrates a trend I notice in any maturing genre. Once every possible iteration of “Story A” is told, writers start to branch out. Depending on the genre, they may reach into more and more extreme perspectives, which why “suspense” novels are now filled with serial kidnappers/torturers/killers. In the case of Yuri, it means that along with some silly fantasy scenarios, we’re getting some looks at “lesbian life” outside the romance part. In the case of “Lonesome Echo” we got a glimpse of a real issue, abusive relationships. Yes, it’s true that the ending was not realistic, but the expression on Ritsuko’s face and the words she spoke about how her lover is really a good person, it’s her fault…those were real.

Ratings:

Art – 7 (I wish, in collections like these, that authors would include a cast of characters page, so I don’t have to guess at names and relationships)
Story – 7 overall, but 8 for Lonesome Echo
Characters – 7
Yuri – quite low, until Lonesome Echo, in which we see an actual couple in crisis – 6
Service  – 1

Overall – 7, Lonesome Echo – 8

If we want Yuri to mature as a genre, we must be willing to take a look at the bad along with the good.  This was a reasonably gentle entrée’ to a topic that would be distasteful to some and inexplicable to other readers of Yuri. The audience of Tsubomi magazine are used to their Yuri being dished up in palatably sweet flavors of schoolgirl crushes. A story like this would have a sour taste for many. And for that, I applaud it.

Posted in Tsubomi, Yuri Manga | 8 Comments »


Cardcaptor Sakura Manga Omnibus, Volume 1 (English)

February 28th, 2011

513FFeTeOrLIt was no real surprise to me that I have never before reviewed Cardcaptor Sakura here. By the time I was writing regular reviews, the English edition of the anime was out of print and so was Tokyopop’s manga edition. I’m sort of sorry for that, since this was a Gateway Yuri story for a lot of people in that post-Sailor Moon phase of Yuri audience development. Because I am revisiting this series, but some of you may not be, let me tell the story from the beginning.

Cardcaptor Sakura was one of the earliest CLAMP mega-hits. (Not *the* earliest, but right in the zone.) As a manga it ran from 1996 – 2000 in Nakayoshi magazine, which meant it was riding on the magical girl coattails of the massive popularity of Sailor Moon. It had…one of everything. There was Yuri, BL, it was chockful of intergenerational relationships (my first thought was that there was *some,* but then I started to think about it and the list got longer and longer….) It had cute girls and beautiful women and cute boys and beautiful boys and even some handsome men. It had arguably some of the best magical creatures ever to grace a magical girl series. (Admit it, ladies, how many of you swooned over Yue?) And, not coincidentally, the voice cast of the anime was stellar – also major crossover from Sailor Moon. I have not loved everything CLAMP has produced, but no one can tell me that they are not geniuses at their business. Cardcaptor Sakura was a milestone.

The story contained in this CCS Omnibus Volume 1 is a simple one – cute, athletic, cheerful Sakura finds a book which, when she opens the cover, proves to be a book full of cards. The cards immediately scatter to the four corners and the creature depicted on the cover of the book comes to life. His name is Cereberus (nicknamed Kero-chan); he is the Guardian of the Cards. Because she could open the book at all, he tells Sakura, she must have magical ability. It is her task to gather the cards once more because blah, blah, blah.

Sakura is not the only one in the family with magical ability. Her deeply odd older brother, the bishounen Touya (Toya in the English edition) also can “see” things. Toya’s best friend is the real reason we all watched/read the series – Yukito, who has a secret within him that makes him even *more* the reason we all read/watched this thing. Unashamedly, I hung on Yuki’s every word, as he was voiced by Ogata Megumi, whose voice still sends chills up my spine. Sakura’s father is perfect, her mother is deceased, and their story becomes increasingly relevant to the overall plot of this omnibus volume as it progresses.

Sakura’s exploits as the “Card Captor” are filmed and enabled by her filthy rich and extremely besotted best friend Tomoyo. For those of you who came to Yuri in later years, Tamao from Strawberry Panic! was specifically meant to be a Tomoyo clone.  Tomoyo is practically the *definition* of the best-friend in one-sided love – in the manga this is made quite plain…and given historical precedent.

Ultimately, Sakura develops a rival in the form of Li Syaoran, which added shota and, eventually, heterosexual romance into what is a really entertainingly bent series. (^_^);  And let’s not forget Kaho-sensei. No…we must not forget her. She is, in any case, unforgettable.

So many of the things that made Cardcaptor Sakura work were an effect of timing, CLAMP’s unerring ability to squeeze a genre until it bleeds money and their raw talent for telling character-driven, beautifully drawn series. Cardcaptor Sakura is beautifully drawn, the characters are likable and the story, which has become a cliche of itself, still works. How can I say this? Because I have read the original in Japanese several times and in English several times, I have watched the anime several times and, when I hit the last page of this Omnibus, I thought, “I want to see what happens next!” Seriously, I did. I KNOW what happens next, but I can’t wait to read it again.

Technically speaking, Dark Horse did a fine job. I don’t recall being irked by the translation, the S/Fx are translated inline most of the time, except in a few spots where they were easily replaceable. The addition of color pages was a delightful bonus, I’m very glad that they thought to add those. If I were *forced* to come up with an objection to this omnibus I would say that this nearly 600-page volume is not, perhaps, little kid friendly. But in this world where Harry Potter novels were devoured by tweens, perhaps even that is not an obstacle. If you know a tween who likes fantasy, or just needs the smallest push to becoming an otaku, consider buying this series for them.

For me, though, the true pleasure of this Omnibus was spending time with old friends. Seeing Yamazaki lie so cheerfully, Tomoyo kvelling over Sakura, Kero-chan obsessing about sweets and Yuki eating gigantic lunches…was just, so…nice.

If you have never before read this series, I really hope you will. It’s got significant Yuri cred; it was, in its time, a gateway series for a lot of GL and BL fans. It’s CLAMP doing a series that is unshockingly an excellent example of the genre and, if you like XXXHolic or, especially, Tsubasa Chronicles, *this* is where major players came from. It’s good to know your roots.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Characters –  9
Story – 8
Yuri – 4
Service – 4

Overall – 9

As I have said repeatedly, I am not a nostalgic person. Reading this volume, I came as close as I’ll ever get to it. Many, many thanks to Okazu Hero Eric P. for letting me wallow, just a bit, in pleasant nostalgia. ^_^

Dear Nozomi/Right Stuf, if you’re looking for another anime series to resuscitate, Cardcaptor Sakura would not be a bad choice. Hint hint

Posted in Card Captor Sakura, CLAMP, Classic Yuri | 6 Comments »