Okazu

Yuri Manga: Morita-san no Mukuchi

July 17th, 2009

There are *so* many ways Morita-san ha Mukuchi (森田さんは無口) could have been annoying. But it isn’t annoying. Not at all. It’s very funny and very enjoyable.

Morita Mayu is, compared with other people, more silent. It’s not that she can’t talk, or that she doesn’t want to talk, it’s just that she thinks before she speaks – she thinks a lot before she speaks and sometimes misses the chance altogether. Or the mood isn’t right, or her timing is off. Honestly, she’d like to speak more, it just never seems to work out.

At home, her mother tries to coach Mayu, but between Mom yelling at Dad or them being really lovey-dovey at each other, Mayu feels the mood is rarely conducive to her saying anything.

Despite her silence, Mayu is not at all ostracized by the kids at school. Once the girls get used to it, they tell her all their secrets because they know she won’t tell anyone. They trust Mayu and like her and she likes them back. There’s one or two girls that find her a little odd at first, but when they realize she’s really nice, and it’s just that she isn’t great at jumping in and talking, they are fine.

Yuri is in dribs and drabs throughout the book. At first, there’s a girl who is a little scared of Mayu, but they quickly become friendly enough to develop a pleasant skinship – mostly playing with each other’s hair. Another girl stalks Mayu throughout the book, and although we never learn her name, when she overhears one of the other girls saying that she “likes” Mayu, she comes down with a case of raging jealousy. And lastly, towards the end of the book, Mayu overhears a confession from one girl to the class president in the Library. The class president thinks she and Mayu are actually very similar – they both hate mess and are always picking stray hairs off people’s school uniforms and retacking falling posters up. She assures Mayu that this thing is pretty common for her, she’s used to dealing with it. Smiling, because she *knows* Mayu isn’t going to say anything, she asks Mayu to not tell anyone for the other girl’s sake. :-)

This manga is a typical 4-koma with a few gags repeated over and over, but it never gets tedious. It never cloys, never irks. And, from time to time, it’s absolutely laugh out loud hysterical. In mostly every way, Mayu is perfectly normal. She likes sweets, she laughs (silently) and she enjoys time with friends. Other than the fact that she rarely speaks, she’s just another girl. So, the laugh out loud moments are less about her silence and more about just something silly. For instance… (Click on the picture below for the full size image)

Do not worry about what is being said in these panels, they don’t appreciably add to to gag. Just notice that the two girls in the foreground are laughing already, *before* we see the gag. Mayu is the girl with dark hair. This strip made me giggle like a child for a good ten minutes.

*This* is the kind of thing that made Morita-san ha Mukuchi work for me. It’s a good example of a 4-koma that is just the right blend of everyday minutiae and silly weirdness. Sure, there’s basically one gag per character, but the story doesn’t ask ridiculous amounts of handwave allowance from us. One handwave and everything else just fits in place neatly.

Ratings:

Art – 6
Story – 6
Characters – 8, closing in on 9 by the end
Yuri – 4
Service – 1

Overall – 8

If Mayu had been ostracized, if she had been full of self-loathing, if the boys and girls in school had been creepy about it, it could have been a really bad manga. Instead, it was a totally fun read and a good example of a 4-koma that makes the format work.

Posted in Yuri Manga | 4 Comments »

Yuri Manga: Butterfly Kiss Blade, Volume 1

July 16th, 2009

In the beginning, there were the Inklings. From the Inklings were born Lord of the Rings and the Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe. These misbegot such things as the Sword of Shannara and the Belgeriad and from these were, ultimately, begot Harry Potter. From Harry Potter came Negima! and now, here we are at the seventh bastard of the seventh bastard, Butterfly Kiss Blade, Volume 1 (バタフライキス).

Homura and Sakurako (who are NOTHING like Setsuna and Konoka, let me assure you,) attend Prinpikia Academy, which is one syllable shift away from being a pretty great name. It is a school of magic, of course. And there are fights, of course. With giant weapons. There is also a nadesico-type classic beauty, complete with henchchicks and political and magical power who is in love with Homura’s partner, the sweet, kind, passive, frontally lobotomized Sakurako. There are also panty shots, but I’ll come back to them later.

The bulk of the first volume is Shizuka’s ever more pathetic attempts at defeating Homura in order to make Sakurako her own partner in the “shiki.” (Shiki means “ceremony” among other things in Japanese, and it is always surrounded by quotes in this manga. 「式」)

And, um, that’s about it. Every chapter, a fight. Every chapter Homura wins with her ginormous Butterfly Knife. And Sakurako kisses things alot, because that’s how she uses her magic. She doesn’t just kiss other people, she kisses random passing objects, dolls, magic sigils floating in the air.

The art goes from inconsistent to downright horrible. At some point I actually entertained the thought that maybe this was an anthology, because the art changed so much from chapter to chapter, but nope, it was just bad art.

And then there are the panty shots. These are so forced and so intrusive that whole scenes have to be constructed around them and they are given their own panels so we can’t possible accidently miss them. They are pointedly pointless. I genuinely can’t believe that panty shots would significantly up the appeal of this manga. It’s so second-rate in every way, there’s no way you’d buy it just for the service like you might Needless or a similar fightin’ magic schoolgirls loli underwear action thing. (The Wife retorts, “You don’t know me at all.”)

Yuri is fanservice, of course, but there is no doubt that Homura and Sakurako genuinely love, adore and desire one another. Their liasons don’t ever get past foreplay, but it’s no less bodily fluid and voyeurism filled.

If you really like fightin’ magic schoolgirls, Needless and Negima! are way better than this. But if you really, really REALLY like fightin’ magic schoolgirls, then Butterfly Kiss Blade will appeal. Also, if you loved KimiKiss, as this is the same artist.

Ratings:

Art – 6 at best, often not even that
Story – 6
Characters – 6 It’s not their fault they are caught in a derivative of a derivative
Yuri – 8
Service – 7

Overall – 6 And, yes, I *am* being generous.

Posted in Yuri Manga | 3 Comments »

Gin Tama Manga (English)

July 15th, 2009

Welcome to Wednesday on Okazu, the day I crash and burn and pass the baton to whomever is standing closest and doesn’t think to run away. Today’s victim Guest Reviewer is the much beloved, admired and bewildered Sean Gaffney! Let’s welcome Sean with this Laurel and Hearty handshake.

Gin Tama is a very successful Shonen Jump series that has been running in Japan since 2004. It’s being released by Viz 6 times a year in their ‘Shonen Jump Advanced’ line (where it is less than successful, but hey, they can’t all be Naruto), and Vol. 13 just came out this month.

The basic premise combines a gag comedy with a samurai action manga. The manga is not afraid to veer wildly back and forth between these – 2/3 of the time it’s stupid self-referential gag manga (Gin frequently can be found reading Shonen Jump, and a recent chapter arc has the characters fighting each other after seeing their rankings in the new popularity poll), but when it gets serious it can be almost Kenshin-esque in its dealings with samurai honor and how one should go about getting revenge.

The main characters are our hero, Gin, a silver-haired samurai (the title Gin Tama is a naughty pun in Japanese); the ‘straight man’ bespectacled Japanese guy, Shinpachi; and Kagura, a superstrong alien who acts like an obnoxious Chinese girl most of the time. Shinpachi also has a sister, Tae (or Otae, depending how formal people are), who is usually sweet and very Japanese until anyone crosses her at all, whereupon she’ll happily throw them into walls – usually while smiling sweetly.

Now, by now I’m sure you’re asking where the Yuri is. This is an Okazu review, after all. In the newest volume out from Viz, Tae is kidnapped by a bishie eyepatched ninja, who we see from flashbacks has known her since childhood. The ninja is Yagyu Kyubei (you may groan here), Tae’s childhood friend. She’s supposed to be confused for male by everyone, but frankly, she’s not drawn in any way that I didn’t immediately think she was female. She has, however, been raised as a male, and has returned after years of rigorous training to fulfill her childhood promise – marry Tae.

Our heroes rush to her rescue, and a huge battle ensues (which continues well into Vol. 14, out in September). This is the usual Gintama battle, being filled with swords and silliness. Kyubei’s gender is noted, as is her being raised as a male, which seems to solve the whole I want to marry Tae thing. However, Kyubei is quite aware that she is female, and is in love with Tae anyway. Further volumes show she tries occasionally to be more feminine (wearing a flower as her eyepatch, for example), but her one-sided love remains true. (Tae thinks of her as a very good friend, mostly, with occasional tease, but as this is a comedy action manga, there aren’t any real pairings anyway). Gin Tama is not really a series to read for the Yuri, as the two characters don’t appear that much. But if you like silly comedy with lots of hard-to-translate Japanese puns and toilet humor, also veering into serious action angst, and frankly not caring if folks break their neck going between the two poles, then there’s some Yuri here for you.

Ratings:

Art – 7. Nice balance between bishie swordsmen and completely idiotic expressions.
Story – 6. As noted, the series veers wildly, but mostly sits in the ‘stupid comedy’ end of things.
Characters – 8. Lots of likeable, fun characters who are enjoyably insane.
Yuri – 4. Kyubei’s feelings are real, in my opinion, but this isn’t going to go anywhere.
Service – 4. There really isn’t much here for Fanboys, as Gintama doesn’t do a lot of fanservice at all.

Overall – 7. A fun Jump manga that caters to fans who wanted to see Kenshin on the toilet reading manga more often. With added Yuri eyepatch ninja girls.

–SG

As usual, Sean manages to make it sound good. I tend to pare things down to the problematic core, worry it a bit, then spit it back out. These are complementary skills, I think. ^_^ Thanks Sean! You’ve made me all happy now. Which is good, considering what my next review is on…. ^_^

Posted in English Manga | 5 Comments »

New Anime Season Summer 2009: Yuri Anime: Kanamemo (English)

July 13th, 2009

We’ve talked about how similar 4-koma comics are to each other many times. They are usually slice of life, perhaps at a school, in a club, a bunch of friends, all hangingoutandbeingsilly. Life, you know.

Well, Kanamemo isn’t like that. It has a rather depressing set up, as it happens. Kana’s parents had passed away when she was young and she was living with her grandmother until she also passed away, leaving Kana alone. So alone, in fact, that not a single adult, government agency or busybody neighbor even notices that she’s got to go somewhere. As the movers begin to take her grandmother’s items, it struck me as odd that whoever was in charge of the funeral thought to get the old lady’s personal items cleaned up, but somehow forgot to find somewhere to put her *granddaughter.*

When Kana panics and runs off with only a rucksack, she finds, after much travail, a live-in position with a newspaper delivery office populated by 4 adults, an elementary school girl for an office chief and I started to realize that this was going to be a problematic series for me. Specifically – there are too many handwaves.

At the Fanfic Revolution, we had a few rules for writers. One of them, coined by Adam Jones, was the “one handwave” rule. Every author gets one “handwave” – one thing that can just be passed off ’cause. If you are writing a story in which aliens land in your house, then that is the handwave. Everything after that ought to be internally consistent with that and everyone’s actions ought to make sense given their personalities. If people can fly – fine. But if people can fly, then suddenly some of them also have telepathy and, oh, didn’t I mention the Morlocks? Well, there are Morlocks. ….No.

Kana’s grandmother dying and her being completely, utterly forgotten and forlorn was the one handwave. Then she finds a live-in position at Fuushin Newspaper. Okay. Not *quite* a handwave. Acceptable.

The other staff members are a lesbian couple, a drunken pervert, a 3rd year ronin. Acceptable. Stupid, but acceptable. Not a handwave as such.

The office chief is an elementary school girl. No.

But then, above and beyond all that, I am being asked to believe that Kana, who I must remind myself is only 13, is also an idiot. And that was it. When she failed to ride a bicycle – failed to even let go when she repeatedly fell(!) – I developed a deep dislike for her. She’s hopeless, I thought, throw her in the river in a box and have done with it.

And then there’s the pervert. She is the Japanese male audience, wrapped in a sexy woman suit. She behaves the way the viewers would want to, if they were dressed in a sexy woman suit and had any cojones at all. Which is the final handwave. When I am reading a manga, I can skip over things that bore, irritate or annoy me – I can make distasteful scenes last microseconds. To have to sit and linger lasciviously on every violation perpetrated by Haruka on the underage characters makes me stabby.

By the second episode the depressing premise is pushed into the position of “tool used to provide Kana with a means of narration,” we can move on. Setting aside the issue of Haruka, let’s turn to Yume and Yuuki, the resident lesbians.

They are, in fact, a lesbian couple. No one will say that – no one will even imply it in conversation, but they are. The first time we see them, they are giving each other a goodbye kiss and while it is not lasciviously lingered upon, it cannot be denied or passed off as anything else. They continue on in this vein, as the provider of silly, eminently undeniable “they are a couple” humor. Yume is cheerful, energetic and studying to be a pastry chef, Yuuki is clingy and passive-aggressive, so clearly, she’s a lesbian. They are quite cute together.

Saki, the aforementioned elementary school office chief is wise and competent beyond her years. Basically she’s a 40 year old woman in a loli-bait body. I don’t pretend to get why the hell that is, but she’s hardly the first such and will hardly be the last.

And Hinata is the only character that seems in any way realistic. A student who has failed the university exam three times, she is working and, one hopes, studying. She is the other cipher for the viewing audience – the Dr. Jekyll to Haruka’s Hyde.

It’s not a godawful tear-my-eyes-out series, but it makes me depressed. It’s not a fun 4-koma, it’s a miserable drudgery of a 4-koma inside a decent 4-koma suit. I’d like to watch the suit, without the creature inside it, plskthx.

Ratings:

Art – 4 to me, but rather typical for 4-koma, so 6
Story – 4 to me, 7 to people who like that kind of thing or can not see the obvious
Characters – same as above
Yuri – 8
Service – 7

Overall – 5 to me, maybe to climb higher if it gets rid of that thing inside it.

I think there are some cute elements. They just happen to not be the things that the Japanese audience thinks are cute elements.

Posted in English Anime, Yuri Anime | 14 Comments »

Passion Art Show

July 12th, 2009

Friday night I was honored to be able to attend the opening of the “Passion” Lesbian group art show, which was part of the Fresh Fruit Festival at the Leslie/Lohman Gallery at 26 Wooster St., NYC. It runs through July 25, Tue-Sat, 12 Noon – 6:00 PM and if you are in or around the NYC area, please do stop by. I spent some time that night talking with people about Rica’s art and taking pictures of them interacting with it. I invited them to visit this blog and see those pictures and copy them for themselves. Hopefully, we will be able to print them off and post them around the art itself in the gallery. Thanks to everyone who let me take a picture of them!

Rica’s art is about fluidity of identity, of gender and race. It’s about how people treat us certain ways because of what is on our outside and sometimes we can only show a little about who truly are inside. She invites everyone to be someone new, something new, with her energetic and cheerful interactive art. Her exhibit consists of three pieces – two that hang and are double sided, and one stationary on the wall. The hanging pieces depict a black woman/white man, an asian intersexed person/white intersexed person and the wall piece is a black intersexed person. The two hanging pieces were carried in this year’s Heritage Pride parade. The pieces are all for sale.

Please click the photos below to see a larger version