X/1999 by Clamp Volumes 1-9 review Part 1
October 2016
If you have ever read a CLAMP manga, chances are you're a cynical romantic masochist. And yes, that's a thing and if you have ever fallen in love with any CLAMP work, you know deep inside that you fucking are a cynical romantic masochist. It'd be easier to just blow past it now and accept facts. This particular manga series known as X, and then changed to X/1999 because there was also a Western series with the same name, is the famed 'unfinished' work by CLAMP that is more or less a magnus opei. It went on a very, very long-term hiatus since 2003 and in doing so, left the story lacking any real conclusion TO THIS DAY. Concerns about its increasingly violent scenes have been the issue why the series has been discontinued by the magazine it was published in because they're a bunch of sissies. In any case, X/1999 definitely deserved better because it was simply brilliant with layers that would make this possible for several readings. Also, this has to be the most confounding, sophisticated and emotionally stressful series CLAMP had ever produced, and they have a long line of other emotionally stressful stories after this because they are dicks--and I say that with loving affection as a fan.
Due to time constrictions, I was only able to finish the nine volumes collected.
Now, I would have pushed through it and found a way to binge everything in one sitting, but that is not an advisable route when it comes to any CLAMP series. I repeat: DO NOT BINGE A CLAMP SERIES because reading any CLAMP work in one sitting is not good for your mental and emotional health especially with this one. I'll try to give you a semi-spoiler-ish look at why you might want to read this--and why you must brace yourselves. Essentially my reaction as I progressed through each volume is WHAT---WHY---WHAT THE FUCK?
Genre-wise, X/1999 is an apocalyptic fiction combining several elements of the story's own mythology with that of other secular elements, particularly Christian themes. At the heart of its plot is an ontological argument regarding Fate vs. Free Will. The very tagline of this series testifies to it, and serves as the main conflict for the protagonist Kamui who must choose between two fates; one that leads him to a path of goodness and redemption--and the other towards destruction and mayhem. The choice should be simple enough, of course, but X/1999 certainly draws it out to stress the weight and importance of making such a choice because it's not only a matter of doing the right thing but also coming to terms of one's capacity for both good and evil, depending on which part you nurture. Kamui, this story's protagonist, is a surly teenage boy supposedly destined to either be the world's salvation or damnation when Armageddon hits in the year 1999. He is brash, immensely powerful and haunted; having witnessed the very detailed and brutal murder of someone at a young age. He has two childhood friends whom he considers the ones he loves the most, but had to cut off ties with them because he doesn't want them to get involved in the supernatural drama that is a prophecy about his life as the chosen 'Kamui'.
The conflict sounds predictable and comparable to other works focusing on the power of choice, and the possibility of how the end of the world hangs in a balance with said choice. There would be nothing particularly special about X/1999 in this regard, except that CLAMP also created an interesting mythos to make its own version of an apocalypse that not only concerns the utter devastation of the world as we know it, but also an intimate portrait of how the burden of making choices can truly be a matter of life and death. Kamui is not the only one who has to decide; the ensemble of intriguing characters that would also play vital roles in the 1999 End of the World. These are the collective seven seals and seven minions who more or less brought up to what their destines would be like once Kamui decides his fate, and theirs for that matter. They all have their own personal motives, tragic backstories and wish fulfillments that certainly allows readers to feel that this isn't just a one-man Kamui show but one that touches upon other players' own choices that could influence a smaller narrative against the backdrop of a much bigger and overwhelming one.
To see their lives unfold and unravel alongside Kamui's is where the emotional chord is being wrapped around the readers' hearts. The way these fourteen characters would act whether through their own accord or for some higher, preordained plan is a compelling and gratingly frustrating thing to read about because it would definitely make readers question about how much of their life they do control, or if they were ever in control about it in the first place. I would not be spoiling and discussing these characters individually because no introduction about them here would suffice, and discovering who they are for yourselves would be a more satisfying experience because one of CLAMP's strengths is creating memorable characters with nuanced personal histories and conflicts that move you to root for them no matter how hopeless the situations they find themselves in.
You think loving characters in Game of Thrones only to watch them fail and die is painful? Well, CLAMP characters will make you experience a different kind of pain that could be called 'cruel' if it wasn't also persistently bittersweet and ultimately an inevitable end.
On a lighter topic, since this is CLAMP, some unintended/ambiguous scenes of boy-love are ever present. This is mostly prominently featured in the relationship between Kamui and his childhood friend Fuuma who has a sister named Kotori whom Kamui also loves. It's probably the most painful relationship rendered on paper which may only be rivaled by other CLAMP pairings like Sakura and Syaoran of Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle and motherfucking Subaru and Seishirou from Tokyo Babylon WHO ALSO MAKE AN APPEARANCE IN THIS SERIES AS THE ULTIMATE QUEER VERSIONS OF ROMEO AND JULIET, ONLY MUCH MORE TRAGIC! Anyway, here's some ambiguously gay moments:
Amidst the vividly drawn dream sequences, perplexing symbolism weaved into these sequences, and the brutal depictions of killings that would definitely jump out the page, there are also separate chapters focusing on a particular character's story at the end of each volume. The most enjoyable aspect of this series are definitely the gorgeous illustrations of even the most mundane scenes. Aside from Tsubasa, X/1999 has to have the most detailed visual work and exceptionally so, considering the bulk of the plot alone and how two or three volumes usually delved on many pages of dream sequence and symbolism that would make readers head spin as they try to interpret them. I would show them but that would be spoiling a lot of important elements in the prophecy so I won't. Instead, let me show a touching spread when Kamui decides to save the world so he can preserve the home of his childhood friends/sweethearts Fuuma and Kotori, and the love these three have for one another WILL TOTALLY NOT BECOME A WASTELAND OF ANGST LATER ON. Nope. Not at all.
It's only been nine volumes so I can't have that much strong opinion about Kamui as a lead protagonist of this story. He started out rather unrelatable and even annoying, being quite stubborn and hotheaded, but as readers follow him in his quest for self-knowledge, it becomes pretty difficult to keep thinking he's just some whiny teenager, given the extent of his trauma and his losses along the way that just kept getting worse and worse. His arc in this story as the main one to follow can be very depressing and hopeless, but I would like to see how he fares once his character development progresses along. He's in a very vulnerable place where pain and despair mostly define it. However, the ninth volume changes that with his interaction with one Subaru Sumeragi, the protagonist for Tokyo Babylon which I reviewed earlier this year and subsequently unraveled from. READ THE UNRAVELING HERE.
There are so many things I want to reveal in this review to get you to read it, but I will abstain because it would just spoil too much of what CLAMP has accomplished in this series, as far as I've read in the volumes I got to finish. So, I will just leave you guys with Sumeragi rehashing the painful experiences he had from Tokyo Babylon to give Kamui some context and perspective that there might be a way to survive the worst of heartbreaks no matter how impossible it may seem. And it's not like they have a choice--they're in a CLAMP story!
There are so many things I want to reveal in this review to get you to read it, but I will abstain because it would just spoil too much of what CLAMP has accomplished in this series, as far as I've read in the volumes I got to finish. So, I will just leave you guys with Sumeragi rehashing the painful experiences he had from Tokyo Babylon to give Kamui some context and perspective that there might be a way to survive the worst of heartbreaks no matter how impossible it may seem. And it's not like they have a choice--they're in a CLAMP story!
Once I finish the required readings for this year, I'm going to read more of X/1999. I'll be taking it slow, considering there is no resolution of this series and I don't want to rush to its non-ending just yet, being discontinued and all, but from what I have seen so far, I really do believe it's worth the trouble.
Hana Wa Saku Ka (Does the Flower Bloom) by Shoko Hidaka
July 2016
Hana wa Saku ka or Does the Flower Bloom is definitely one of the more mature and reflective yaoi mangas out there, and one I was very happy to encounter. Spanning for over five volumes, the story tackles not only a relationship between two men but also that of two people with differences in experience because of a twenty-year age gap. It opens with a man named Sakurai who is a thirty-seven year old senior manager at an advertisement agency who seemed burned out by a career he used to have so much passion for in his younger years. He has also gone through the motions of a few uninteresting relationships with women, and had for a time believed he could never find fulfillment in his personal life. One night he crossed paths with a college student named Youichi Minagawa whom he had what seemed to be a humdrum interaction with at first while both on their way home. Two more encounters later and Sakurai was intrigued though initially uncomfortable with Youichi especially since Sakurai perceived him as rather dismissive and rude, typical of a privileged nineteen-year-old student.
The realization that they are attracted to each other was not nearly as momentous as one might hope; it didn't take a while at all for Sakurai to acknowledge that he might be interested in Youichi romantically which had shocked him since he had only been with women before meeting the younger man. Youichi, meanwhile, is a closed-off, tortured artist who could not flourish under the shadow of his late father who was a renowned painter. He lived with cousins in an old yet elegant house which was located in the outskirts of town, and has never had friends let alone romantic relationships before, given that he was only nineteen, and a very peculiar person who doesn't express himself outside of his art.
It was only by hanging around with Sakurai that he realized that he was actually interested in getting to know someone, and since he was naive in a lot of ways, he couldn't understand why he was drawn to the older man, other than he thought Sakurai was not like most adults that surrounded him, who all cling to the ghost of his late father and therefore expect so much from Youichi. The moments leading for both men to recognize that there is a strong attraction shared between them was nerve-wracking yet ultimately sweet and hot especially whenever they can't help themselves and just start making out! For all you fujoshis out there, here is a sample of such a scene:
Ovary-melting make-out sessions between two cute men aside, Does the Flower Bloom does have a wonderful plot in itself, and the characterizations for both Sakurai and Youichi were layered and meaningful. After all, the more serious conflict about their relationship has less to do with the fact that they are of the same sex but more about the fact that Sakurai is twenty years older than Youichi. That age gap is definitely something much more worth discussing and exploring especially in the context of a romantic relationship. Mangaka Hidaka does a terrific job examining the repercussions and obstacles to overcome. The most notable of which had to be their reticent personalities. Sakurai is withdrawn due to his passivity on things but after meeting Youichi, he started showing more interest and dedication to his work again, much to the joy of his co-workers who had so much respect for him. Meanwhile, Youichi learned that people do genuinely want to get to know him and not just because he was his father's son, and it's up to him to open up and communicate his feelings to other people especially those who already care about him.
This is a highly recommended yaoi manga because it has depth and real character development but not at the expense of some really sensual moments that do happen with the couple, or vice-versa. It has the perfect balance of substance and showmanship if you're both into great storytelling and really sexy-hot moments. The simplicity of Hidaka's writing is a good foundation for genuinely poignant moments in between, where Sakurai does care about how their age gap could be detrimental to Youichi's future, and where Youichi does grow up and acknowledge that his cold ambivalence has to change if he ever hoped to become more than just friends with his first love. There are other important events that transpired in this manga, particularly Youichi dealing with his parents' death, and his friendship with a certain classmate from the university whose intentions are not as innocent after the first glance.
And don't worry, hardcore fujoshi fans! The build-up and drama would definitely reward you with hot action at the last volume when Sakurai and Youichi finally do consummate their love affair. It was made all the more intense by the fact that you see them truly falling in love and finding a way to make it work in spite of the initial struggles. There is a lot of grueling conversations about the difficulty in their communication styles, but with Sakurai's patience and Youichi's openness, they both do decide together that they are willing to endure a lot for each other if it meant staying together. It's not going to be easy, however, because Youichi still had decades of his life ahead of him while Sakurai doesn't and that experience gap is a challenge they're going to have to keep weathering together as their relationship hopefully continues thriving. Unfortunately, Hidaka only kept the story to a minimum of five volumes and I would definitely like to see this get picked up again.
Does the Flower Bloom by Shoko Hidaka is a true gem and one that you must read if you ever claimed to be a fujoshi. And if you are a hardcore one, chances are you have already encountered this and loved it to pieces. I can say that there is a slow burn aspect to this manga series that proves to ignite very hot once you get the engines running! Sakurai and Youichi's chemistry is undeniable, and it shows whenever Hidaka gets them in a scene or in a secluded room together. Her depictions of their amorous scenes are so wickedly sexy! But the selling point for me is that these scenes are not just there for fanservice. These love scenes were pivotal for the progress in their relationship, and as a reader I did feel like I was falling in love alongside them!
Indigo Blue by Ebine Yamaji
July 2016
After I finished reading this 200-paged girl-love manga written once again by Ebine Yamaji (whose Free Soul I also reviewed last month), I was also able to read her Afterword of the work. She revealed that her editor wanted her to write a lesbian story where men still have a role to play in the dynamic, and Yamaji found this a challenge she was eager to write about. The result is Indigo Blue which definitely involved a male perspective into a manga that is also still about two women being in love, and I have to say that Yamaji had done it justice. Indigo Blue is about a writer named Rutsu Nakagawa who is in the process of publishing a novel after her debut anthology. Her editor is also her lover named Ryuji, a man she had great admiration for since they were in a creative writing seminar years before and she always thought he should have also been a novelist. Through the artist of her upcoming novel, she was introduced to another editor from a magazine named Tamaki Yano. Their meeting left an impression all because Tamaki asserted that in one of Rutsu's short stories entitled A Brief Moment, the character named Y had never been given gender-specific pronouns, leading her to theorize that Y could have been another woman whom the protagonist had sexual relations with. Rutsu was intrigued by Tamaki and tried to form a friendlier acquaintance. Tamaki was hesitant at first but she gave in and revealed to Rutsu that she had been attracted to her since that first meeting, and the fact that Rutsu was also her favorite author was a happy coincidence. The two women gradually enter into a passionate relationship.
Rutsu began to question her sexuality and its awakening is the premise of Indigo Blue. The consequences and fall-outs of her newfound identity are the integral elements of the manga. Rutsu's dishonesty about her situation is given more weight with the fact that she was cheating on her boyfriend-editor, and never disclosing to Tamaki about her relationship with a man in the first place. Afraid of actually rejecting Ryuji, this caused said man to believe that their relationship can now be taken to the next step which is marriage. Ryuji was devoted to her not just as her boyfriend but also as her editor who believed in her talent, and was hoping that by getting intimately acquainted with her literature, he would also be privy to her girlfriend's inner life and private thoughts. Rutsu had always been distant towards Ryuji, but he perceived this as something that he can work on if he made her feel loved enough by him. Meanwhile, after Tamaki became aware of Rutsu cheating on her and the boyfriend, she immediately ends the affair with a rather efficient and sensible explanation that made her character so dignified and secure in her own identity as a lesbian woman.
What was notable about this manga was that it was infused with Yamaji's thoughtful retrospection as well as rhetoric about lesbian sexuality, which was also present in her other work Free Soul. Comparably, I much enjoyed and approved of the romance found in this manga rather than the latter, but Free Soul had a more definitive conclusion while Indigo Blue sort of meandered by the ending, unable to give the readers a satisfying ending to all the characters. Going back to Yamaji's literary approach to lesbianism, this manga had insightful discussions about it that I agreed with. Rutsu's own confusion about her feelings for both Tamaki and Ryuji was also heftily explored where both relationships are valid dimensions of her personal growth. As Yamaji disclosed in her Afterword, her own editor wanted men to play some importance in this manga, and it showed with the way she examined how Ryuji had to deal with Rutsu's alienating treatment as his girlfriend, and the subsequent reality where he was spurned when he realized that she never wanted him as a person at all because he was a man and she essentially led him on over the course of their involvement.
Another thing worth pointing out was the artist-friend that Rutsu had conversations with all throughout the manga. He was a father in his mid-thirties with a daughter, and he became Rutsu's confidant while she struggled about her infidelity with Rutsu and finally coming to terms that she wanted to be with women after all, especially with Tamaki. This artist-friend expressed that he has sympathy for what Rutsu was going through but asked her to consider Ryuji's feelings as a man for being rejected by her. In Free Soul, the protagonist had the same conversation with her father who blamed himself for her becoming gay. Said protagonist made sure he understood that her lesbianism is no one's fault, and that it's who she is. Yamaji provided the same conversation but under a different context, and I appreciated her for touching upon what a male lover might feel if ever found out that the woman he loved turned out to not only be cheating with him but also devoid of any kind of romantic and sexual desire towards him. It's understandably damaging.
Tamaki Yano is the real star of this manga even if she was simply Rutsu's lesbian love interest. Her confidence about her identity and uncompromising ways were admirable, and I loved her after she never diminished Rutsu's feelings for Ryuji. She claimed that a part of her did love that man; but those feelings are just different from what Ryuji had for her. It was a touching moment, marked by Yamaji's understanding that sexuality has gray areas, leading me to believe that perhaps Rutsu may be more homoflexible or even bisexual. The downside is that we will never learn which because Yamaji never resolved it. I would have loved to learn more about Ryuji's life after it, and how Rutsu and Tamaki's relationship progressed after the cheating.
That being said, Indigo Blue was yet another great installment from Ebine Yamaji-sensei. Its take on a male perspective regarding a lesbian relationship was respectable for both parties involved. I'll definitely read her other two works after this.
PRINCESS JELLYFISH by Akiko Higashimura
July 2016
It just occurred to me as I start writing this review that Princess Jellyfish (Kuragehime) is a josei manga that I feel was sort of what The Big Bang Theory would be like if the genders were reverse, and the group of scientist geeks were instead female otakus, while the hot girl next door is a cross-dressing pretty boy and a son of a politician. Basically: IT'S A ZILLION TIMES NERDIER AND MORE AWESOME. That's guaranteed. Spanning for fifteen volumes, this josei manga is incredibly entertaining as it is endearingly eccentric filled with balls-out fun as it both pokes fun and celebrates otaku culture through a female perspective. If Tina Fey was a Japanese otaku, this would be something she would have written, and the lead heroine Tsukumi Kurashita has the kind of social awkwardness and geeky passions that are as oddly charming and sweet as Geek and Sundry founder and gamer Felicia Day's.
When I first encountered this manga, I was so pumped up to get to it but I had to schedule it for this year instead of the last. The wait was more than worth it! I thought it was going to be a more mature version of the Perfect Girl Evolution: The Wallflower series by Tomoko Hayakawa which was my favorite shoujo manga as a teen; I wasn't wrong. I eventually got over PGE since IT WENT ON FOR SO LONG WITHOUT THE SHIPPABLE TWO CHARACTERS OF THE SERIES EVER BECOMING AN ACTUAL FUCKING COUPLE, DAMMIT! At this point in my life, I would trade my collected hard copies of Perfect Girl for copies of Princess Jellyfish instead because the latter is better written and has less slapstick comedy and ship tease.
The plot revolves around a group of otaku women living in a place called the Amamizukan which is an apartment that prohibits men. They even fancied it to be a nunnery of some sort because these women (who call themselves Amars which means 'nuns') don't interact socially with people who don't share their hobbies and interests that lean on odd fixations of varying degrees. One of these women is the our protagonist Tsukimi Kurashita who looks exactly as the trope of what the token geek girl is supposed to be; average-looking with glasses and who only wears plain sweats as her daily clothing. She lives with fiveother women who all preoccupy themselves with interests that may be perceived too niche. I don't want to give away too much details of their said interests, but they are definitely a wacky bunch, and their quirks are the source of this manga's hilarity and conflict.
The sixth housemate in particular is a mangaka who never even shows herself in the story, but is more or less the only one who has an actual professional job. But because of social anxiety, this mangaka is confined in her room, and the other women communicate with her by writing a message on a piece of paper and slipping it on her door. The Amamizukan women are also uncomfortable interacting with people who are 'fashionable' and 'beautiful' while also avoiding formal work, wasting their allowance from parents on their weird preoccupations.
Tsukumi's own fixation is that of the many species of jellyfish which she also draws almost daily. She meets a very pretty girl one night who helped her buy a jellyfish she later named Clara. This pretty girl just inserts herself into Tsukumi's apartment and her life--but not before the shocking revelation that she is a he and a certain politician and his mistress' youngest son named Kuranosuke Koibuchi. He identifies as a straight man who is just very, very, very fond of women's fashion, and dresses up as one because it has something to do with his abandonment issues with his mother. Tsukumi was at first adamant not to be involved with him since her apartment prohibits men after all.
That being said, these two unlikely friends certainly clicked especially when Kuranosuke later discovers Tsukumi's hidden talents in making unique and enthralling dresses via use of her jellyfish designs. Soon, Kuranosuke involves everyone, the Amars, to help him and Tsukumi make dresses for his friends at a theatre troupe. What started as a spur-in-the-moment group activity slowly and surely turned into an aspiring clothing line/empire which Kuronosuke hopes to bring into fruition with Tsukumi as the designer and him as the model while the rest of the Amars women as the seamstresses.
Much of the manga's plot shows the process of how Kuronosuke and Tsukimi struggle to sew the high-fashion dresses and advertise them to potential clients, all the while to earn enough money to buy their apartment back which is under redevelopment; a project approved by Kuronusuke's own father as facilitated by her older half-brother Shu. Mangaka Higashimura knows her fashion stuff to a fascinating tee, and we get chapter breaks about her daily life as a mangaka and fashion trend lover as she illustrates tales of her adventures through amusing anecdotes. She is absolute gem when she does this!
Princess Jellyfish's cast is amazing! They are all memorable characters with depth and humor. From the kimono-wearing Chieko who collects dolls, Mayaya who is an avid history buff obsessed with Records of Three Kingdoms and often quotes and reenacts the text, Banba with her natural afro, predilection to trains and food quality, and to Jiji who is sexually attracted to older men and anything associated with classic and antique things. Tsukimi is also the adorkable introvert who is really quite pretty whenever she is forced to wear make-up and nice clothes (even Mayaya who actually is transformed into a model for their spontaneous clothing line fashion shows even though she's quite stressed about it whenever it happens). I really adored these characters because, hey, I'm one of them. I obsess about my geekeries and I'm very passionate about them to the point that I'd rather lock myself up and just read books, watch shows and write stories all day long.
Kuronosuke and Tsukumi are definitely great in their leading roles and both have unresolved issues with their mothers. Kuronosuke's mom had to give him up and send him away to live in Japan, and his love for women's clothing is just an extension of his mother's own interest in fashion. Meanwhile, Tsukumi's mother passed away and left her only with memories of their time at the aquarium where she fell in love withthe jellyfish for the first time. Both of them are so lonely but are creative in their own ways. Kuronosuke is very intriguing as a crossdresser because he has no shame about it even if he is still a heterosexual man. Tsukumi meanwhile definitely lacked confidence but through Kuronosuke's vision and fiery ambitions, her potentials as a designer were brought out. Kuronosuke was also able to bring out the other Amars women from their shells by giving them the opportunities to do professional work, inspiring them to dedicate themselves to something that could be both enjoyable and profitable all at once. Kuronosuke became a positive force for these other women.
The Amars women don't even care about fashion or doing actual work but thanks to Kuronosuke always driving them to be better, and Tsukumi's amazing talent, they all start to achieve things together as a unit. Tsukimi herself immerses herself in her creativity too, as inspired by Kuronosuke who just looks so damn good in the jellyfish dresses Tsukumi makes. I cannot for the life of me fathom that a boy could truly be mistaken for a woman.
The great thing about this series is that the romance is more or less a subplot that isn't always utilized to move the story forward. The author herself seemed to be very fond of fashion trends and its industry both local to her homeland Japan and foreign, and that's what this manga covers eighty percent of the time especially starting from volume 6.
That being said, the romantic subplot was well-written enough to hold interest especially since it involves a love triangle between Tsukumi and the brother, Kuronusuke and Shu. His older half-brother is a 30-year old aspiring politician who also happened to be a virgin. He is conservative yet surprisingly sweet, romantic and thoughtful. He initially doesn't recognize Tsukumi without her make-up which made me think he only liked her because of physical reasons but then when he did find out what Tsukimi normally looks like, he still found her alluring and it's so funny how much he tried to pursue and court her which often lead to disastrous misunderstandings. Tsukimi definitely likes him back but is so burdened with low self-esteem and experience that she hardly shows her reciprocation; at least until Kuronosuke and Shu's personal driver/friend/ladies' man push them both forward to admit that they have feelings for one another and would like to be in a relationship.
Kuronosuke's unrequited side of things is complicated. For one thing, he was more driven to pursue a career in fashion, and he only wants what is best for both his brother and Tsukimi. It took him time to admit he even likes Tsukumi and it was probably too late since it was also around the same time Tsukimi realized she has feelings for Shu. I personally ship her and Shu a lot even if Kurosuke an Tsukimi have more interactions. The conclusion to this romantic subplot has yet to be seen, considering this manga is still ongoing and had just released its 16th volume which I have yet to read. Tsukimi still has plenty of stuff to accomplish, and her relationship with both brothers has a lot of room to grow from.
Princess Jellyfish is not really a coming-of-age story about self-acceptance but more about the pressures and choices that women like Tsukimi have to face every day just because society deemed their hobbies and interests as abnormal or inappropriate. The Amars women are actually comfortable with their lifestyle and only avoid other people because such people have no appeal to them whether for conversation or a long-term relationship. The portrayal and representation of gender fluidity in Kuronosuke's character were also commendable. Higashimura shows great understanding and acceptance for people who cross-dress or have unusual hobbies, whether male or female, and she demonstrates it deftly and sincerely in her writing of this cast. Higashimura also respects the Amars women enough to showcase their quirks as something that don't necessarily have to exist for comedic effect.
I could tell as a reader that she is neither pandering nor cynical about how she portrays both the otaku and the fashionable people, considering that she's a combination of both worlds in real life, going by her autobiographical chapter breaks. This is definitely the manga's selling point. It doesn't try too hard to be edgy and charming, but rather it oozes with both qualities in earnest amounts because Higashimura speaks from the heart as someone who is passionate about her interests and is not afraid for the world to know just how much and how far she would go pursuing them. My enjoyment of Princess Jellyfish isn't over yet! The manga is still ongoing after all, and there is both an anime series and a live-action film that I could watch, and I'm certainly looking forward to doing that soon enough!
In a nutshell, Akiko Higashimura's Princess Jellyfish has my seal of approval!
FRUITS BASKET by Natsuki Takaya (Volumes 1-12) Part I
July 01, 2016
It was last year when I realized that I am so done with shoujo manga stories (especially in a school setting). It wasn't as if it was a constant presence in my life growing up or anything, but after a while I realized that its formulaic sweetness and often predictable climactic moments just doesn't appeal to me anymore. In fact, there are only three shoujo manga stories I was really into and two of them were adapted to anime which I preferred (Ouran Kouko Hostabu and Kimi ni Todoke), and one was a manga series I followed and read because I related to the heroine (Yamato Nadeshiko Shichi Henge).
But last year I read a fairly recent and popular one alongside a josei manga (Sakamichi no Apollon, baby!). I even forgot its title and NO, I'm not even going to bother googling it. The fact on the matter is that I'm a twenty-six year old woman and, as much as my nerdy inclinations make it seem like I'm not an adult functioning in my fullest capacity, there are just some stories about teenage relationships that don't click with me at this point in my life. I'm a sucker for coming-of-age stories, true, but the ones that get to me were usually the ones I've come across back when I was also a teenager on the verge of self-discovery and sexuality. So reading a shoujo manga series now at my age presented problems.
That's never to say the shoujo romance genre isn't producing good stuff anymore. In fact, there are two series right now which I adore, but were more or less a parody of the genre (Gekkan Shoujo Nozaki-kun), or a change in perspective where the male love interest is the protagonist (Ore Monogatari). Those two for me were exceptions. Others are the same formula of girl-meets-boy (girl is bland/clumsy/pure-hearted while boy is popular/bad-boy/pretty-boy/emotionally closed-off) and the entire volumes would stretch out their will-they-won't-they as they get into shenanigans with their oddball friends and the run-in-the-mill bully, etc. You know, that formula. Anyway, enough about me and let's talk about Fruits Basket.
Much like any shoujo romance in a school setting, Fruits Basket has those same elements that adhere to its genre's conventions. If you've been reading manga long enough, you'd catch my drift. The reason I chose to read this series was because it was commercially successful and received rave reviews and praises for its story and characterizations of its ensemble cast. It ran for twenty-three volumes, though, and since I have other material to read and review for this month of July, I have to cut down to finishing only twelve of them. I'm probably going to pick up this series again...next year. I have plenty of things scheduled for 2016 and this wasn't that much of a priority. So please keep in mind that my official review for this series is based on the first 12 volumes and only those.
Let's keep it simple: I thoroughly recommend this series. If you're a teen looking for something sweet, earnest and heartbreaking, then Fruits Basket fits the criteria to the tee. If you're my age, and you could look past genre conventions or don't even have my personal bias, then this manga will tug at your heart-strings as well. Let me break it down for you:
THE STORY
Tohru Honda is your average nice girl whose mother just passed away so she had to live on her own. She became neighbors with a mysterious family who has a dark secret they keep under wraps. This family belonged to the Souma clan whose members were apparently cursed to transform into the 12 animals of the Chinese Zodiac every time someone of the opposite sex hugs them. It's a pretty quirky premise that could be potentially wacky and entertainingly disastrous which was why you will never see coming the underlying poignancy and emotionally stirring revelations that Fruits Basket impressively tackles.
The story is at its most heartfelt whenever it focuses on a character's struggle with self-love, pursuit of acceptance from his or her peers, and courage to stand up for themselves in the face of diversity. As much as there are moments in the volumes that annoy me because it still has those shoujo romance antics that I find grating by now, Fruits Basket can be an immense tear-jerker too. I find that it's when I underestimate the series that it finds a way to shine. Sure, a few volumes out of the twelves ones I read made me skim the pages a bit, but there were four or six of them that were solid in both content and substance.
Those were the volumes that got high ratings either because they touched upon a delicate topic and handled with maturity, or they focused on a particularly favorite character and made them evolve as better people. This is definitely one shoujo manga series that may not be always interesting but when it drives home a point, that resonates with a reader, even with someone who can be a tad cynical about PG-13 romances.
Hey, I told you I don't like this genre anymore, so the fact that I'm singing praises for a manga that is beholden to said grating genre should say something!
The story is at its most heartfelt whenever it focuses on a character's struggle with self-love, pursuit of acceptance from his or her peers, and courage to stand up for themselves in the face of diversity. As much as there are moments in the volumes that annoy me because it still has those shoujo romance antics that I find grating by now, Fruits Basket can be an immense tear-jerker too. I find that it's when I underestimate the series that it finds a way to shine. Sure, a few volumes out of the twelves ones I read made me skim the pages a bit, but there were four or six of them that were solid in both content and substance.
Those were the volumes that got high ratings either because they touched upon a delicate topic and handled with maturity, or they focused on a particularly favorite character and made them evolve as better people. This is definitely one shoujo manga series that may not be always interesting but when it drives home a point, that resonates with a reader, even with someone who can be a tad cynical about PG-13 romances.
Hey, I told you I don't like this genre anymore, so the fact that I'm singing praises for a manga that is beholden to said grating genre should say something!
THE CHARACTERS
In the course of the series, Tohru Honda gets introduced to each new relative from the Souma clan, all the while there are three core male characters she interacts with on a daily basis after she moved in with them. They're the dog, mouse and cat signs of the zodiac: Shigure, Yuki and Kyo respectively. The last two were the ones she has a love triangle with. Tohru is also surrounded by two close female friends whose backstories will be revealed as the manga progresses. Meanwhile, each chapter would feature a new relative from the Souma clan who were also cursed, and their characters and conflicts will be then explored if not resolved just a little through their key interactions with the lead heroine Tohru.
In a sense, there is definitely an established formula to how the stories is framed and patterned. It could get a little worn-out in some chapters; even Tohru with her bleeding heart and good intentions can be such a cliché (if not altogether bland), and the pacing and main conflict with the antagonist were both drawn out since that's just how the genre works.
However, they say that the strength of an ensemble cast can make or break the plot of a book or show, and Fruits Basket was able to accomplish the former because each secondary character introduced is well-developed with core weaknesses, issues and surprising warmth and humanity. These characters have been cursed to live with shameful secret of transforming into animals, and while the manga does play up on the cuteness factor of those transformations, the trauma and alienation that it entails with were still addressed and explored.
I believe what made Fruits Basket such an awesome series and why it got such an acclaimed reception is the way the mangaka lovingly crafted each character that instantly makes them personable, sympathetic and gosh-darn endearing. The manga series has 23 volumes, so it does take its time weaving plots and progressing through meaningful climactic moments, but the slow-burn quality of the journey has fantastic moments of character insights in between that more than makes up for whatever flaws its narrative has. This is still a slice-of-life manga after all. I can't count all the ways so many moments between or among characters have made me tear up, especially when the mangaka delivers emotionally resonant themes about family politic, friendships, self-acceptance and bereavement.
Tohru's role as the protagonist does make it seem like she's often standing still, serving more as an anchor or as someone who merely reacts with a new character in a way that makes it accessible to readers. That being said, she eventually gets some depth and character development later on. Kyo and Yuuki, the lead males, also grow and evolve alongside her. I have a strong preference over the tortured and hot-headed Kyo as her love interest than Yuuki, mostly because I like getting to know Kyo better, and Yuuki just came off flat to me at times (but he's beginning to change too, and that's great).
FAVORITE QUOTES
In a nutshell, Fruits Basket is a splendid shoujo manga series that almost breaks the formula every now and then, starring a beautiful and relatable ensemble cast you will easily love, and tackles real-life issues in an earnest way that doesn't pander to the readers, or diminish said issues' seriousness by belittling their message.
Copernicus No Kokyuu by Asumiko Nakamura
June 2016
"Eventually I'll break off from the swing,
and become a constellation."
A truly magnificent and perplexing yaoi manga, The Breath of Copernicus (Coponicus No Kokyuu) written and illustrated by Asumiko Nakamura is both dark and enchanting, something of a fairy-tale in its trance-like pacing and gothic appeal. This isn't your average yaoi story at all. Nothing about it is for the sake of fanservice, which was a most thrilling shock for me. Of the finalized list of BL-GL mangas I plan to read this 2016, Coponicus is something I only stumbled upon by chance during downloads of certified recommended yaoi online.
I didn't know what to expect when I first skimmed through the pages, but the visuals did stand out immediately upon browsing. I think Nakamura's artistic style is what really made reading this manga particularly hypnotic. There are many amazing character composition and landscape in her visuals that are just damn impressive. With a sparse total of only two volumes, The Breath of Copernicus is a worthwhile read filled with symbolic significance that someone with a morbid fascination for dark fairy-tales can't possibly resist.
In fact, the boy-love element of this manga isn't nearly as pivotal, and more or less focuses on themes of personal liberation, quest for identity and community, and recovery from sexual and emotional trauma. Each of these elements have a hefty serving in the story itself, and worth paying attention to. Story-wise, it's an imperfect one. As intriguing as the sum of all its parts ultimately produce, certain aspects of the narrative are weak and baffling. That being said, it's been an incredible reading experience for me, and it could be for you too.
Without giving away too much, the basic premise is this: A traveling circus owned by a deranged ringmaster sells his employees for purposes of sexual exploitation. The protagonist is named Bird's Nest, an eighteen-year-old pretty boy who used to be an acrobat but has now retired to your average clown. He was terribly introverted and fragile, mostly consumed by memories of his brother's death during a performance in the tightrope, and haunted by delusions of said late brother who would often even serve as his alter-ego.
Later on, Bird's Nest became the center of attention for a rich elderly man who bought him off from the circus to become his in-house lover. There he encounters the rich man's sadistic wife hired to be his tutor, and then falls in love with the wife's younger brother who looked so much like Bird's Nest own sibling whom he lost long ago. The story unfolds as a fascinating, topsy-turvy experience that follows Bird's Nest and his struggle for identity, absolution and independence. Whatever flaws Nakamura may have in her plot, it was more than made up by her atrociously splendid artwork. Here are some pages I loved:
This was a gothic fairy-tale at its core, both haunting and haunted depending on the point of view and perspective the reader would take. I thoroughly enjoyed the metaphors used to impart the author's message. It's very easy to immerse yourself in its characters and setting because Nakamura knows how to capture atmosphere and mood with the art. The story may dwindle every now and then because of some panels that are often hard to figure out, but Nakamura will maintain reader's interest because the themes about sexual exploitation and destruction of self are powerful and striking enough to warrant your undivided attention. The Breath of Copernicus is almost like the yaoi manga version of the recent movie Black Swan, particularly on how Nakamura depicted one's obsession with one's unrequited passion like Bird's Nest and his desire to become an acrobat again and transcend that. He has to destroy and recreate himself in the process, as well as lose the ones who tie him down.
I could call this manga as a story about the victory of individualism over external controls, but it's also a cautionary tale about what pushing yourself to the limits could do to you both in the best and worst of circumstances. As a yaoi manga, there are sex scenes included in the pages but they were mostly vaguely or symbolically illustrated as oppose to something concretely rendered. In fact, I think all of the characters here are pansexual since they mostly engage with each other frequently regardless if they are male or female or something in between. Nothing about the sexual encounters is drawn for fanservice, and are mostly likely there to serve as a plot devices that reveal something hidden or nasty about the characters themselves. Most of these sexual scenes also lean on deviancy and depravity, placing characters in stressful situations that either break their spirit, or allow them to contemplate about higher ideals in a moment of utter despair.
This could be something one can enjoy and consume for leisurely reading, but be warned that it's rather disturbing and off-putting in a lot of places too. There is happy ending of sorts near the end of the story, and maybe it's even enough to undo the permeating darkness and pain that The Breath of Copernicus has cast upon in the earlier issues. Reading Bird's Nest and his calvary is very much like walking on a tightrope yourself where gravity is inevitable and crash-landing is probably the only way out of it. I can very much recommend this not just to yaoi enthusiasts looking for something daring, but also to anyone who likes fucked-up stories that focus on sexual savagery with a bittersweet twist.
"Blue Sky Complex" by Kei Ichikawa
May 13, 2016
Reading shounen-ai/yaoi manga is an acquired taste for a good reason. Its demographic is primarily female, and so you can't expect to read a realistic queer story from these titles because a lot of 'boy-love' manga don't exactly tackle real issues and struggles concerning romantic relationships between men. Most of them tend to be about cutesy, overblown and ridiculously steamy moments between 'pretty boys' where one boy gets to become unavoidably feminine, especially when he is the 'bottom' or 'uke' in the sexual dynamics of the coupling. It's entertaining and adorable as all fuck though, so I tend to ignore whatever real-life implications are being distorted here all for the sake of fanservice. I'd like to think that most female readers are self-aware enough to acknowledge that this isn't how gay relationships work. Authors write these formulaic scenarios because they are female-centered fantasies that cater to what women think happens when two men get it on; much like what men think happens when women get it on when they watch lesbian scenes in porn. It's not to say all BL mangas are construed this way because there are a few and far between that can still appeal to its demographic while at the same time able to develop the queer relationship within the story in terms more attuned with what happens in real life. Kei's Ichikawa Blue Sky Complex is definitely one of them. |
There were no big moments of fireworks explosion in this boy-love manga. In fact, the plot and setting themselves are pretty ordinary; the kind of coming-of-age and coming-out story that had been a familiar concept in fiction. Hell, even the characters themselves can be easily dismissed as stereotypes of high school romance. We have the studious and bespectacled Narasaki who is trying to find some peace and quiet so he can just read books and do his assignments while at school. After a series of misunderstandings and awkward conversations with a teacher, he was tasked to stay after classes as a volunteer in the library. There he was accompanied by the school's delinquent and social recluse Terashima. It's as straightforward as they come, and one can pretty much predict what would happen next for these two opposites who seem to be a mismatch on the surface. They'll fall for one another and--since this is a BL manga--they'll unceremoniously fuck anally.
'Them gonna fuck, aight? I mean, 'the hell am I reading this for?' -the average fujoshi
So what makes Blue Sky Complex special and worth browsing through? It's the fact that it's more earnest than gimmicky when it came to how these two teenage boys developed an attraction towards each other. There is believable chemistry between the two as each chapter moves forward, making readers care enough about these characters despite the lack of immediate boy-on-boy sexy-times action. That's why we're reading this, ain't it so, ladies? We want to see these boys to get down to business. But this is not the central point of Blue Sky Complex. The relationship that occurs later on between Narasaki and Terashima happen not just because the author wants them to hook up, but rather because it felt organic and convincing.
Truth be told, the first volume of this manga was supposed to end without any kind of sexual pay-off, focusing more on the two boys admitting to themselves and one another that they simply cannot be platonic. However, due to its slow burn and the palpable tension between the two that wasn't resolved physically at all, readers were really desperate for more so the author had to write a sequel to it which had a different tonality than the first but still just as riveting. But before we get to that, let me show you some sweet, sweet, sweet kisses shared by these dorks. It's the only physical interaction that readers get to witness, and they're so unbelievably charming that it's almost like the author is punishing readers because of how chaste everything continues to be for Narasaki and Terashima especially when neither of them would acknowledge the incidents. These moments are gratingly hot too!
There is also a real discussion regarding their sexual identification during the chapters. The delinquent Terashima admitted in a chapter which reveals his past that he does not find girls attractive at all, and was afraid to be judged for it so he hides in his closet, forcing himself to uphold his masculinity even through destructive ways. Narasaki, on the other hand, didn't think gender ever mattered when it came to sexual and romantic attraction, so he dealt with his feelings for Terashima without any kind of insecurity or prejudice He believed it's the person you fall for that is important, regardless whether he is of the same sex or of the opposite sex. You can really tell that the author has taken time to craft characters who didn't just exist in her story just so they can have lots of gay sex with each other. She didn't rush to get them to confess their feelings for one another just so readers can get to the steamy parts. Readers actually were happier that it remained chaste.
Still, the steamy parts do happen eventually, but not for the first volume. This is what the second volume tackles; the physical aspect of Narasaki and Terashima's relationship after they have been dating for three months. No spoilers, of course, because y'all gonna have to read it yourselves. What I will say about the sex scenes was how realistically they are because it wasn't just a simple matter of putting it in (like most BL mangas would portray anal sex between men); there is a lot of work and preparation that entails in this kind of lovemaking, and Ichikawa made the most of these scenes in the second volume by making the awkward foreplay itself incredulously titillating as well. Conflicts about inadequacy and jealousy were also tackled in that volume. With only eleven chapters so far, it has quite a strong readership so it's possible that Ichikawa might give us more and that is certainly something to look forward to! YOU CAN READ THE MANGA HERE!
DOUBLE HOUSE by Haruno Nanae
February 2016
This is my second shoujo ai for the year, and it's a rather promising story that was disappointingly only three chapters long! This was published in 2008 so there is no way this can have any more chapters which is really frustrating, considering how intriguing and layered the characters and themes are for this manga. To be honest, I believe this may have been discontinued because it wasn't providing enough sexy fanservice about ladies going at it and that's just sad! This has so much potential to be a very riveting, emotionally stirring story about women and their gender roles and sexuality but I suppose the author wasn't commissioned for any more chapters. I don't want to think she has lost interest, let alone stopped writing but I can't find any more of her works online. And this is the dilemma I am facing right now as I write this review: I'm not even sure if I can recommend it. The reason for my hesitation to recommend this has nothing to do with the writing itself. In fact, if I will purely based my reasoning on that, then Double House will get a stellar rating and rec from me! However, since this manga has only three measly chapters that are just building up to what would have been an immensely intricate storyline, then I can't encourage more readers to give it a try because it will only lead to the disappointment that this was such a short-lived piece. Still, let me talk about it. |
Double House centered around two characters: Maho, a male-to-female transsexual who works as a club hostess, who rescued a young girl named Fujiko from an attempted assault one late night on her way home. They turned out to be living in the same apartment complex so Fujiko began hanging around Maho who didn't mind her company. Pretty soon, Maho finds out certain truths about Fujiko who turned out to be a runaway heiress. She left home to get away from the pressures of her wealthy family who used to control every decision she makes. Meanwhile, we also get scenes about Maho's life as a hostess with other transgendered men. The atmosphere of this manga is light and leisure with a few comedic moments, but the writing mostly contemplates certain important issues like women's roles in Japanese society, discussions on the binary exclusion of gender, and the pursuit of individual happiness free of judgment.
Here are some interesting dialogues that Fujiko and Maho have in the first chapter of the manga. Fujiko sagely imparts her belief about the wrongness of pigeonholing people for their gender, race or social status (don't forget to read the panels from left to right):
I enjoyed the depth of insights that deceptively youthful Fujiko has discussed here, and in the presence of Maho whose sympathies lie on a less conservative route as well. Both women--one who is biologically female and one who identifies as one--form a bond because they both dislike being labeled as a fixed thing. Fujiko left her stifling old-fashioned family upbringing because she wanted to discover more about herself without having to depend on other people to tell her who she is. As the second chapter rolls around, we see Fujiko cutting her hair shorter than what was expected from a young girl her age who also happens to be very attractive. Maho points out that it's as if Fujiko is purposefully downplaying whatever sexual appeal she may have. Meanwhile, Maho as a transgender person tends to dress up since it's also a part of her night job ritual, but we see her shedding her glamorous clothing for something more casual whenever she's doing chores with Fujiko. This is when we see her in a more masculine appearance but Maho is quietly displeased if people would point it out since he identifies as a 'she'. Luckily, Fujiko believes that Maho is already a 'complete picture' and admires her for choosing not to trapped in a 'frame'.
Fujiko casually also confesses that she is in love with Maho which the latter disbelieves, dismissing Fujiko's attraction nd infatuation to her to be nothing but sisterly. Maho never really discloses if she is attracted to men or women, or perhaps neither. As a transgendered male-to-female, Maho is more concerned making a livelihood and being left alone to live her life peacefully. She accepts Fujiko into her life because she is intrigued by the young girl, and perhaps she is also a little lonely and having an open-minded youngster like Fujiko engages her into becoming more aware of her own choices. The relationship between them that was established in these three installments of the manga is already nuanced enough and I'm sorely disappointed that this is how their story ends.
There are a lot of possible plots that could be explored here. We were only allowed to get snippets of Fujiko's family life when her fiancée, a man she was arranged to be married with, made an appearance and immediately judges the friendship between Maho and Fujiko. What I liked about Fujiko's reasons for dumping him is because of his arrogance and complete disregard of her personhood when they're together. She pointed out that he wouldn't listen to her when she shares her opinions and that's why their conversations are limited and oppressive. The fact that Fujiko would stand up for herself because she wants to be heard and respected for having her own mind is very brave, and I'm so very interested to see how she even became so wise at such a young age.
In the last installment of this manga, we were introduced to another male-to-female transgender character (named Koko) who happens to be more on the obese side physically, has problems with her self-worth that she is unable to hold onto relationships because the men tend to leave her or not reciprocate the intensity of her feelings. One day she discovered an abandoned baby in the park and decided to adopt it. Maho was against this, and so were the other colleagues, and so they asked Maho to advice Koko otherwise. Eventually, Koko saw the error of her ways after also resolving her issues about herself and how she often gives too much to people that she is left with nothing for herself. It's an uplifting story of self-love and Fujiko gets to share another grain of precious insight:
Overall, Double House was such a wasted opportunity to tackle gender and sexuality in a Japanese yuri/shoujo ai manga. It's so disheartening that writer Haruno Nanae was able to write such interesting and multi-faceted characters in such a short span of chapters, but never got to further develop and explore their problems and issues. I wanted to give this a higher rating but I have to be objective because the story is just really lacking a more definitive pay-off and conclusion. I can still recommend this but I would warn you of its disappointing brevity.
TEN COUNT by Rihito Takarai
February 2016
The first time I read this manga, I was reading another shounen-ai story which is more engrossing and oh-so beautiful (I'll be re-reading that series again and posting a review some time in the coming months), so I easily put this down since it's only a casual read, especially when I reached at least ten chapters or so and I found the sudden shift into the sex a bit jarring and admittedly quite offensive. This is still an ongoing work, mind you, so I'm careful not to have a very definitive opinion about the narrative just yet although I must say that this has a very promising premise and it might have been a more compelling, emotionally mature read if it was published as a josei work and not simply a yaoi material.
Sadly, the intended purpose for this manga was for some sexy times to commence, and therein lies the problem because I get the sense that author Takarai-sensei must really want to expand on the inner conflict his protagonist is struggling with but since this is published as a yaoi, he had to comply to the demands of editors to put some sexy stuff already because who wants to read about believable character development dealing with a phobia anyway? Well, as it turns out, I do.
Upon my second reading this week, I think that it's worth noting that Takarai eventually got to the point in this manga where he has provided readers with a very intriguing backstory that personally made me hope that he can recitify the unpleasant situation that his two leads got caught up in because of the early (and dubiously consented) sexual scenarios that happened between them. But I'm getting ahead of myself. There is a reason why I still re-read this work and that's because I want to give my insights on the direction of the writing and the portrayal of the characters' struggles concerning his phobia. I'm not sure I can recommend it just yet, however. Hopefully the author will publish more installments and that the story would improve along the way. I actually do want it to because I am intrigued with the conflict. So here we go then.
THE PLOT: A man in his thirties suffers with acute mysophobia (a fear of dirt and filth) and meets a therapist from a mental health clinic who volunteered to help him with his crippling affliction. The therapist puts him under what is known as 'exposure therapy'. To do so, the therapist had him write down his Top 10 things he is not comfortable doing and brings him the most anxiety; with 1 being the lowest and 10 being the highest. Item 10 was left blank, and this is where the patient's trauma stems from which we will later find out more as the story progresses.
An attraction develops between them which stemmed from said mysophobe's dependence on the therapist (also known as transference), and said therapist also begins to reciprocate the patient's feelings (also known as countertransference) because these things tend to happen in psychotheraphy. This manga examines the complexities of such a circumstance but also fails to address as of yet the serious repercussions of such an unhealthy relationship.
THE CHARACTERS: Shirotani is the mysophobe and Kurose is his therapist, a much younger man who has questionable ethics. From the very beginning, we see Shirotani has to wear gloves to counter his fear of touching dirty things, and he also obsessively washes his hands to the point that his skin is badly scarring and peeling in some place. He meets Kurose during a chance encounter, and the latter offered his services as a therapist. Things were going well for a while because Kurose seems dedicated to help Shirotani to overcome his phobia little by little, and he was patient enough to stay by his side even when Shirotani once broke down in the middle of a public transit because of a panic attack after being sneezed upon by accident. I thought Shirotani's characterization is well-written. I can sympathize with his struggle, and I'm also curious about the flashbacks from his past when he was a child which later on has a key importance as to why he developed his phobia in the first place.
On the other hand, I was already suspicious of Kurose which gradually faded when he made the wise, assertive decision to distance himself from Shirotani after he realizes that he is becoming attracted to his patient. Unfortunately, suddenly cutting ties from Shirotani (INSTEAD OF RECOMMENDING HIM TO ANOTEHR DOCTOR, HOW IRRESPONSIBLE COULD YOU BE?) was ill-advised because all the progress that Shirotani has made only regressed, and he became more withdrawn to the point where he stopped going to work. Kurose came to his aid, and finally admitted why he had to stay away from Shirotani. That pivotal scene where he wrapped a jacket around Shirotani so he can hug him was heartfelt in a way and made me forget for a while that what Kurose has done to Shirotani was already reckless, and I probably shouldn't trust him at this point. AND I HAVE NEVER BEEN SO RIGHT!
THE CONFLICT: Good-looking therapist in his late twenties and a hot mess of a man in his thirties with a crippling phobia as his deal-breaker baggage find themselves sexually attracted to each other. It's a delicious premise that would allow a more conscientious writer to explore issues concerning physical and emotional intimacy and co-dependence, all the while cautioning readers with the fall-outs and problems that could arise when a person such as Shirotani engages in a relationship that could only harm his progress and recovery, considering it's with a mental health physician who really should know better than to reciprocate his patient's feelings.
THE GOOD: Let me discuss my favorite part of this manga that was enough reason for me to re-read, review and look forward to the conclusion of its story. In a chapter that illustrated Shirotani's childhood, it was revealed that he was raised by a single father who is a high school teacher. They were close and his father was very sweet and affectionate to him. However, a student of his started lingering around the pair and it was implied that she was his lover. During a conversation at Shirotani's home, the girl asked if he wants to have a new mother, but Shirotani said he doesn't need one because he already has his dad. The girl pressed on that his dad needs someone special in his life aside from his son, and Shirotani--an innocent ten-year-old--casually remarked that he would marry his dad instead because he knows he can make his dad happy. It was a very naive comment from a child who didn't know better, but the girl--THIS HORRIBLE CUNT OF A HUMAN BEING--got angry and told Shirotani that he is a filthy boy for wanting to marry his father. Normally, someone who has a more compassionate heart would have laughed it off and just explain to the boy why the father would need to remarry. I could think of a dozen better ways to react than how that cunt did.
But that's not the worst thing that she did, and the reason why I maintain that she deserves to be called the mightiest cunt of cunts (while being stoned to death) is because of the extremes she went through in order to prove to Shirotani--again, A TEN-YEAR-OLD BOY--that she is the only one who can make the father happy. Are you guys ready to read about it? It's sickening, I tell you. But here we go: One night in his father's office, the girl had Shirotani hide in one of the lockers. When the father arrived, she started seducing him until they ended up having sex RIGHT THERE AND THEN WITH SHIROTANI STILL HIDING IN THE CLOSET. Shirotani, shockingly witnessing his own parent engaging in sexual congress, was immediately unable to process and cope because he started getting aroused too and it terrified him. To relive himself, he started masturbating for the first time because he remembered one of his classmates telling him that if his penis starts to hurt then he should rub it. After the cunt got what she wanted, the father leaves because he thought he heard some noise in one of the classrooms. Smug with her new breed of malice, the girl then addresses Shirotani in the closet, bragging that he could never have sex with his father the way she just had and therefore she should be the one that gets married to the father. When he didn't answer, she opens the closet and finds him trembling with his pants down around his ankles, crying and very much stupefied about what just happened. And her reaction. She screams at him that HE IS DISGUSTING.
How does this affect the young Shirotani? TREMENDOUSLY. He was unable to speak to his father about it, of course, and his innocent familial affection for his own parent was tainted to the point where he outright refuses to be touched by him later on. IT WAS PAINFUL AND WRONG AND ALL KINDS OF HEARTBREAKING! What happened to Shirotani was definitely A SEXUAL TRAUMA. The worst thing is that his father might have gotten married to that selfish cunt which would explain why I never really get to see the father again now that Shirotani is an adult. As horrible as this part of the story was, I thought it was an interesting facet and a meaningful backstory that explained effectively why Shirotani is both simultaneously repulsed and aroused by sex, and why he thinks sexy is a dirty, dirty act. It's really sad to see him deny himself intimacy with his own father. This scene broke my heart:
THE BAD: So now we have established that Shirotani--even now as a man in his thirties--is still traumatized by the pain and loss that cost him the relationship he used to have with his father, and has suffered a gross violation pertaining to his childhood innocence. As a result, he developed an inability to get physically close with anyone without going through torturous bouts of self-loathing and disgust. And then here comes Kurose who at first was a positive influence in his life who aimed to help him overcome his phobia. For a while, Shirotani was making some progress but then he develops attraction for his therapist which does happen but there are fail-safes that must be in place when such scenarios do happen such as being referred to another doctor. However, this is a yaoi manga so the solution was still based on the fantasy of sexual dominance and submission where Kurose--blatantly expressing his interest and desire for Shirotani--gets close to Shirotani physically in spite of the dangerous effect that could have on the man. Shirotani has sexual trauma and mental anguish and badly needs the behavorial therapy and what does Kurose do instead?
Yeah, this fucking thing
THE UGLY: He proceeds to engage in increasingly sexual scenarios with him where Shirotani explicitly verbalized so many times that he is uncomfortable of the physical intimacy that Kurose initiates. Sure, he gives in anyway because his body craves physical enjoyment but that doesn't mean he is mentally prepared for it. AND IT DOESN'T GIVE KUROSE THE RIGHT TO TAKE ADVANTAGE OF SHIROTANI'S TRUST. The dubious consent scenarios are on high alert for this manga but much like most yaoi, this is fetishize instead of being addressed as a serious problem that definitely almost crosses that thin line between consent and rape. I am appalled that Kurose even declared at some point that he wants to degrade Shirotani by making him feel the pleasurable agony of sexual arousal and completion. I also have a problem with the softening resolve that Shirotani displays every time Kurose outright rapes him. It's like he would fight back at first but his will starts to deflate as soon as his body starts feeling good. THAT IS STILL CONSIDERED RAPE because if the person receiving the pleasure feels guilty and disgusted of himself afterwards then there is a lack of true consent in the first place.
And it will continue to become a systematic abuse in the later chapters
Shirotani is not a normal person who can be held completely responsible for his decisions especially when he is at the mercy of the one person who should take a moral obligation to respect his boundaries and help him get better. Shirotani is vulnerable and damaged goods and Kurose is an absolute prick to have sex with him nilly-willy. And to do it as his therapist! It would have been less...evil if he gave up his professional relationship with Shirotani and just be some asshole who is taking advantage of someone else than be a care specialist and do this kind of things to said patient. Honestly, this has yet to be tackled in the story and that is why I have hopes that Shirotani will assert his agency and seek out help (probably from his boss and co-worker Mikami who are both genuinely concerned about him) because Kurose is not at all the person he should associate himself with regardless whether or not he is attracted to him, and especially then. I'M NOT EVEN GOING TO TALK ABOUT KUROSE PROCLAIMING HE LOVES SHIROTANI BECAUSE CLEARLY THIS IS NOT HOW YOU SHOW THAT YOU LOVE SOMEONE!
Just a normal heart-to-heart between a victim and his rapist
TOKYO BABYLON Volumes 1-7 by CLAMP
February 2016
Full disclosure: Slowly yet surely, I'm now reading most of CLAMP's manga since I've been an avid fan of their works in anime (Magic Knight Rayearth, Cardcaptor Sakura, Chobits and Kobato), not failing to mention that my all-time favorite manga (and certainly one that is close to my heart and soul) is probably the frustratingly tragic and punishingly intricate series xxxHoLic. I'm also finally completing my readings for Tsubasa Chronicle on the side because this is supposedly CLAMP's magnus opei and with its flexible narrative concerning alternate worlds, many characters from CLAMP's other works have made appearances in every volume--and the most unforgettable of them is probably Seishirou who was first introduced as Syaoran's mentor from childhood who then stole one of Sakura's memory feathers so he can use it to find a certain pair of vampire twins. In any case, I was curious about him so I asked some friends in fandom who can help me find more about this character and I was then directed to this manga--and experience the pairing of Seishirou and Subaru which caused the very devastation that left a permanent mark on CLAMP's subsequent shounen-ai inclinations in other pairings like my personal favorite Doumeki and Watanuki of xxxHoLic.
SeiSub (their fandom-agreed portmanteau) also makes a final appearance in X/1999, an apocalyptic urban fantasy manga that essentially broke apart every SS shipper's heart due to that confrontation between the said men which concluded their very unhealthy yet intense and powerful connection/non-relationship. I was spoiled early on before I even started reading this manga, and I was glad I was because I most definitely need all kinds of preparation to endure what is to come once I do start reading X/1999. Look, I'm a Charles/Erik (Professor X/Magneto) fanatic so intricately depressing pairings between stubborn yet admirable men are my cup of tea already, so I know I am more than equipped to handle Seishirou and Subaru's own sadomasochistic tango, but I never could have anticipated the level in which their own music plays. It's so unbelievably hurtful because on one hand, this is a 'non-relationship' (Oh, CLAMP is the motherfucker of such pairings, trust me) that is ill-advised and unhealthy and yet on the other hand it's also rendered so consummate and beautifully broken that it's unavoidable not to wish that circumstances were different for these two.
I will make this review as spoiler-free as possible for anyone interested in picking it up but I would also like to touch upon its selling points which make it worth reading enough to follow through with the indirect sequel X/1999 once a reader becomes invested in SeiSub as characters and a pairing. I will indicate where the spoilers are though which I must warn all of you NOT TO READ if you really want to pick up this manga. If not--and you are curious of the situation and why I'm nearly frothing in the mouth about it--then do read through. I'll be discussing HOW THE STORY ENDS for SeiSub in the spoilers because it is a necessary evil, for the sake of any pedantic completist attitude that I have.
WHAT IS TOKYO BABYLON: This is a story about a sixteen-year-old onmyoji (Ying Yang Master) named Subaru Sumeragi who is thirteenth in the line of his clan. He investigates supernatural cases while also balancing school work. He has an outgoing and fashionable twin sister named Hokuto who also happens to actively ship him (I shit you not) with a kind and handsome veterinarian named Seishirou Sakurazuka who is gosh-darned smitten with said sixteen-year-old even though Seishirou is nine years his senior. As Subaru unravels the underlying pain and suffering in Tokyo where hauntings are more symbolic than simply paranormal, he also has to deal with Seishirou's affections which he does not necessarily discourage, as well as uncover a repressed memory from childhood concerning a mysterious stranger which turns out to be a key event that will change his life from then on.
WHO ARE THE CHARACTERS: The aforementioned three characters themselves have enough personality to keep readers interested and there is fluff and sweetness shared among them in the beginning volumes--that was until we reach the inevitable despair and heartbreak by the later installments which will shock readers because it's almost a dissonance to what was established in their dynamics. However, there are some clues regarding to Seishirou's apparently questionable persona where he would swoop in during moments when Subaru is in danger and would cast a spell to render him unconscious so he can deal with the case of the week using his own methods that are not as, shall we say, compassionate as Subaru's. Basically, readers will pretty much take the hint that they should NOT TRUST SEISHIROU.
Individually speaking: Hokuto at first would strike readers as someone who is shallow and bubbly and sort of aggressive and controlling because she always picks Subaru's outfit to match with her sense of fashion, and would keep pushing her brother to hook up with the twenty-five year old hot vet who is lurking around the twins very suspiciously. It's creepy yet also endearing because Hokuto cares deeply about Subaru that she overcompensates for his sake. More intuitive and courageous, Hokuto feels protective about Subaru even though she is worried that he rarely comes out of his shell that he barely has any real friendships and relationships outside his calling as an onmyoji. She acts as the big sister in their siblingship, and her constant fawning over a possible romantic relationship between her brother and Seishirou stemmed from an insecurity that she will one day lose Subaru to their family's occupation; that one day he will find no comfort or consolation being in her company and leave her. Matchmaking him with Seishirou has her believing it would anchor Subaru to a normal life because her brother is honestly living a life rife with extraordinary moments that normalcy is not something readily available to him. What she fears the most is that she may be right after all.
Meanwhile, Subaru as the main protagonist is just goddamn adorbs. At first I found him a little naive and innocent but this was actually an unsettling contrast to the kind of second life he lives as a dutiful exorcist at the ripe age of sixteen. He is filled with kindness and brimming with compassion, yes, but he also has very strong convictions that are somewhat surprising because I initially mistook his seeming naivety as a fixed thing when he is clearly more mature than he lets on, considering the kind of vices and cruelty that he is exposed to daily, and that is bound to mess up someone to a degree. We only see this later on when he uncovered his memory from childhood.
My favorite moment from Subaru has to be in volume 4 where he stood up against a school teacher/cult leader who advises her followers to accomplish things using the power of prayer (which does not work when said follower in question is being brutally bullied). Subaru definitely shows his maturity when he claimed: "No one can understand someone else's pain. You can never pretend to know what they are going through, or imagine their suffering. You cannot save anyone." This was a revelatory moment about his character because he is not deluded at all by idealism and school-boy heroics. Subaru knows what he is getting into and he acknowledges that there are limitations to what he can do for other people. I find it such an admirable quality that he would not judge, condemn or pretend to understand someone's experiences with the simple acknowledgement that everyone is different and perhaps no one will ever truly understand anyone. This will serve as his unraveling later on.
And then there is Seishirou Sakurazuka. How do I even begin to describe the hot, hot, HOT and complex Seishirou Sakurazuka? You know what, I won't. I'll discuss about him in the spoiler-y parts instead and let your imagination run wild in this portion of the review instead.
WHAT ARE THE WEAKNESSES OF THE MANGA: With a monster of the week scenario, this manga is composed of a set of stories where Subaru solves mysteries and exorcises evil spirits. I'm going to be perfectly honest with you: I didn't think there was anything special to this manga until the last two volumes which is finally centered on the conflict between SeiSub (and their stupid and heartbreaking 'Bet') and the revelation of Seishirou's real identity plus betrayal. I will maintain that as I read through the first three volumes, Tokyo Babylon struck me as an unrefined nineties version of xxxHoLic, since both deal with social pathologies metaphorically represented by a supernatural element. That being said, their difference is that Tokyo Babylon tends to be uneven in tonality, shifting from light-hearted shounen-ai material to disturbing paranormal cases that relate to the metropolitan lifestyle of Tokyo and its harmful effects. Meanwhile, xxxHoLic has a more consistent narrative, perfectly mixing the horrific and mundane seamlessly into characterizations and dialogue. But I digress. The best way I can summarize its weak points is that it tends to be a slow burn during the first two or three volumes. The cases are interesting themselves but sometimes feel too drawn out and uncomfortably dark. There are notable ones that really appeal to me, however, mostly because they serve to reveal facets about Subaru and Seishirou respectively. It's deceptively cheesy sometimes but if you keep reading long enough, the pay-off regarding SeiSub will be worth it.
WHAT ARE THE STRENGTHS: Tokyo Babylon does have its merits, though. For one thing, like most CLAMP works, it gets better with each installment. From something completely formulaic where we get a series of unrelated cases, the manga finally divulges from that into something more character-driven, providing us with important backstories for Subaru and Seishirou. This happens somewhere between the fifth volume and continues to get exciting by the sixth and seventh. These two characters, after all, are the heart and guts of Tokyo Babylon. As I've mentioned, there are shounen-ai elements. CLAMP operates on a pansexual level where characters in their works tend to fall in love with one another regardless of age and gender. With TB, there is a small acknowledgment, however, that Subaru is feeling self-conscious about the affection Seishirou shows simply because they are both males which Seishirou casually and deliberately brushes off (and hilariously at that, I may add). Hokuto doesn't mind trying to matchmake them although she did threaten Seishirou one time that if he hurts her brother, she will kill him. So when you pick up this manga, expect some shounen-ai moments sprinkled between pages for comic relief, which are still mild compared to anything else. What was so interesting about this pairing was that there is more to Seichirou's constant pining over Subaru (something...dark), and Subaru's very late realization that he has feelings for Seishirou himself has to be one of the most badly-timed epiphany ever with the most shockingly disheartening consequences!
WHY YOU MUST READ: This is an indirect prequel to the more compelling manga X/1999 where Seishirou and Subaru reprise their roles once more. When X/1999 started, nine years have already passed since Tokyo Babylon, and a Subaru in his mid-twenties has found himself on the opposing side against Seichirou. The mythos for X/1999 is interesting so I think my recommendation for Tokyo Babylon is closely tied to the sequel that it spawns later on, and this manga is simply a required reading if you want to get into X/1999 afterwards. As for its own series, TB has interesting cases of the paranormal and insights regarding the cosmopolitan side of Tokyo which include its vices, indulgences and corruption. Last but not the least, the selling point is SeiSub as characters and as a 'non-relationship' because TB reveals the history they have with one another whereas X/1999 is its inevitably painful conclusion.
SPOILER ALERT! DON'T READ FORWARD UNLESS YOU WANT THE SPOILERS
TURNING POINT: Tokyo Babylon explores a rather complicated 'love story' between its protagonist and antagonist where there is a romantic angle that somewhat drives the main conflict. We never really get to see how the Sumeragi twins met Seishirou who was masquerading as a veterinarian but he easily injects himself into their lives, most probably by faking a romantic interest on Subaru which made him seem harmless and even cute. I don't know how in the world does a twenty-five year old man get away with trying to court a sixteen-year-old boy but maybe it helps that he is hot, and that the twin sister approves, and that Subaru is pretty much allowing it because he can't take it seriously? The blatant infatuation is creepy at first especially when readers become privy to the fact that Seishirou has disguised himself as a kind animal doctor to accomplish an endgame that reveals itself in the last volume, so his so-called courtship has a nasty tinge of deception to it.
For some context, here is how Hokuto describes Subaru as a person:
"He's always had this bad habit of making other people's emotions his own. When they're sad. Subaru's sad. When they suffer, Subaru suffers, too. He's not trying to be a saint. That's just how he is. But because of his job as an onmyouji... He's seen so many people's bad sides, and experienced so many unpleasant things... and he's never been able to get used to it. I'm sure that Subaru remembers all the emotions of every person he's ever dealt with. Even if they themselves forget, Subaru never will. He carries them with him. He can't let them go."
This is a noteworthy characterization. Subaru, as it turns out, does not own up to his emotions because he has experienced so much residual feelings of other people that his own emotions tend to be hidden to him. Now, keeping that in mind, when a breaking point happens for SeiSub in which Seishirou places himself in physical danger when he gets stabbed in the eye to protect Subaru from an attack, this was also the beginning of the sudden shift in their dynamics.
It was a delicate situation because this is when Subaru's feelings began to express themselves unconsciously. Hokuto was there to put him back together and ease his guilt because of what Seishirou has done for his sake. Ultimately Subaru only learned about the truth of how he feels about Seishirou when he conversed with a blind man. This blind man was someone he helped before, and they got to talk about Seishirou after a while and it was in that scene that the blind man pointed out that he can hear the love in Subaru's voice when he talks about Seishirou. Subaru was shocked and as he walked away to go visit Seishirou in his room at the hospital, we get this inner monologue.
"I was afraid... you would hate me. That's right... I was... afraid Seishirou-san would hate me. I've met many people in my life. And I've had many happy moments and sad times. But I never thought about... what I wanted them to do, or how I wanted them to feel about me. It's impossible to control another person's feelings. But in the end, if someone hates me or I cause them trouble... I have no one to blame but myself. I may be useless, and there isn't much to like about me... but still, I... That day, as I was banging on Seishirou's operating room door... I was crying... because I was afraid. I was so afraid that he would hate me... and that I might never see him again. I--"
This was so...heartbreaking in so many levels. Take note of how Subaru admitted that he never even thought about how people could feel about him because, as mentioned before, he doesn't believe people can understand one another fully and know their pain and suffering so Subaru, as a result, has never bothered to get emotionally close with someone and aspire for someone to feel something special for him. He reasoned that another person's feelings are out of his control anyway which is true in itself. But now Subaru realized that for the first time in his life he wants something for himself--someone--and it was a terrifying realization. It has made him suddenly vulnerable and exposed, so aware that with such a desire comes the possibility of rejection and pain. But Subaru soldiers on after tearfully admitting that he is in love with Seishirou and so opens the door--only to come face-to-face with the real Seishirou: a man who belongs to the infamous Sakurazukamori assassin clan--and he is determined to win the 'bet' and kill Subaru. And so begins their abusive tango.
When he was a child, Subaru stumbles upon one of Seishirou's assassination assignments. This fateful meeting happened under the sakura tree. The Sakurazukamori's method of killing requires them to bury their victims under an evil, ancient Sakura tree and that they must kill any witness in sight. It was indeed peculiar then for Seishirou to spare Subaru's life with this ominous promise:
"If you and I should ever meet again... let us live together for one year. My heart is the direct inverse of yours. You are kind, and pure, and honest. And I'm sure that is how you will continue to grow up. Your heart will remain pure. So, if we should ever meet again... I will try my hardest to learn to love you. Just for one year. And after that year... if I can consider you "special"... you will have won and I will not kill you. But if I decide... that I cannot consider you special to me... if I cannot distinguish between you and that corpse... then... I will kill you. And so today I will let you go."
After injecting himself in the twins' lives, Seishirou played a convincing role of the starry-eyed suitor to Subaru, only to eventually reveal that his intention was to test the possibility he could develop feelings for the younger man. The betrayal only deepened when SEISHIROU MURDERS SUBARU'S SISTER HOKUTO. That should have been how it ended, right there as Seishirou carries Hokuto's lifeless body away from a devastated Subaru who was powerless to prevent it. Subaru should have hated him and never forgave him. He never did forgive Seishirou for ripping away the one person Subaru cares about, but this crime was not enough to make Subaru STOP LOVING SEISHIROU. In fact, loving Seishirou has caused Subaru to question everything he knew about himself to the point where he becomes just as pathologically obsessed with the prospect of winning the bet.
In Subaru's fragile mind, this was the first time he ever loved someone aside from his sister, and since it's Subaru he believes he could never love anyone as intensely again. The trouble is Seishirou is a heartless sociopathic killer who deceived him and destroyed a part of himself Subaru will never get to restore. So, instead of moving on, Subaru decided to walk an extra mile and offer himself TO BE KILLED BY SEICHIROU. The logic behind this shitfuckery is that if Seichirou is incapable of loving him back then at least he can be a WORTHY KILL for the older man. It's the stupidest idea ever but also the most hurtful sentiment I have ever read in fiction. Desperate to mean something more to Seichirou than just some boy he played mind games with, Subaru aspired to die by Seichirou's hand because he essentially has nothing AND NO ONE ELSE to live for--not when his twin sister is dead and the love of his life turned out to be a worthless piece of shit who murdered said sister.
Why would people ship it, you ask? That answer is in the events that followed for the manga, X/1999.
HOW IT ENDS: We have established that Subaru is irrevocably in love with Seishirou and that if he can't be loved back by said man, then he would rather be killed by said man because at least in death, he becomes significant to Seishirou. It's gruesomely irrational so I have no way of justifying this mindset of his, okay? Nine years later, Subaru puts this plan in place all the while in the backdrop of an apocalyptic battle for the survival of Earth hanging in the balance.
SeiSub's small personal drama in the midst of such a major catastrophic event still feels very significant because one thing that CLAMP is so good at is creating characters with such strong connections with each other AND THEN PROCEED TO DESTROY THE FUCK OUT OF IT. Sakura and Syaoran are the soulmates of the Clampverse but they never really get to be together for good when Tsubasa ends. Kurogane and Fai--yet another non-relationship coded with shounen-ai--are more or less semi-canon already but they never really DTR-ed even if it's so obvious that the feelings they share is more than platonic. Meanwhile, only Cardcaptor Sakura's Touya and Yukito are outed as a gay couple in a fulfilling relationship, and all the other ones (such as my OTP Doumeki and Watanuki from xxxHoLic) are open to debated interpretation and ship tease.
Shipping CLAMP couples is very much like playing an extended game of 'Why are you hitting yourself?' with the writers
The second pairing to be spelled out as romantic in context is SeiSub but theirs ends up in shambles. In a climactic event, Seishirou and Subaru fight to the death. I won't discuss the actual details of the fight but what I will say is that SEISHIROU DIES BY SUBARU'S HAND which was not how Subaru intended. But as it turns out, Hokuto, his late sister, cast a spell that will prevent Seichirou from killing Subaru. If Seichirou tries to kill him via a chest blow, the attack will bounce back and kill Seichirou instead. So Subaru sits there with his hand lodged inside Seichirou's chest, close to where his heart is, and as Seichirou bleeds to death, Subaru has this fucking speech that was too much:
“I tried to kill you, inside my heart; to erase your existence there. But I couldn’t do it. Even if I meant no more than a grain of sand to you. Even if you felt no more for me than a twig you’d snap under foot. I thought . . . I wanted to be killed by you. So that my heart would at least be free.”
That wasn't even the worst part...the part was SEISHIROU'S LAST WORDS:
"Subaru-kun...I hope you know...how much I..."
And yes, CLAMP intentionally NEVER REVEALED WHAT HE SAID TO SUBARU. Instead, Subaru was the only one who heard it and with tears in his eyes, he only remarked, "I never thought that you could say those words to me," as he clutches Seishirou's lifeless body close right there as the world was supposed to end around them. It's been debated for a long time that Seishirou's last words are a confession of his real feelings after all; that he did LOSE THE BET BECAUSE HE DID FALL IN LOVE WITH SUBARU.
What else could it be? What else would have reduced Subaru into a mess of regrets and later on into a catatonic state after hearing the very words he longed to hear from the only man he had ever loved, but never dreamed he would receive, and only when it was very much too late?
What else could it be? What else would have reduced Subaru into a mess of regrets and later on into a catatonic state after hearing the very words he longed to hear from the only man he had ever loved, but never dreamed he would receive, and only when it was very much too late?
This theory was reinforced by the fact that when you kill a Sakurazukamori assassin, you will have to take his or her place and become one yourself. Seichirou has murdered his own mother because it was a necessary stepping stone into suceeding her. During her last breaths, Seichirou's mother told him that there is no greater death than to die by the hand of your beloved. Also, Seishirou knows about the spell Hokuto cast upon Subaru. This means that when Seishirou attacked Subaru, he knew it will bounce back and Subaru would be the one who kills him. THAT MEANS HE WAS MERELY MIRRORING THE DEATH OF HIS MOTHER. Seishirou's death was meaningful because it was committed by his beloved (Subaru). That's how fucked up Seishirou is; his ultimate expression of love is his death. So even if we never get to confirm if he did confess his love for Subaru during his last moments, we have this interesting parallel with his mother that can reinforce the idea that yes, GODDAMMIT YES, Seishirou was in love with Subaru and all he can offer to him is his death.
And--tragically--Subaru did become a Sakurazukamori in his stead which is all kinds of misery because Subaru is now branded a killer who belongs to the rival clan. And you know what, HE SEEMED HAPPY ABOUT IT. To Subaru, becoming a Sakurazukamori sustains him with a connection to the late Seishirou even if meant giving up his magnanimous vocation as a onmyoji. See, I told you it's fucked up.
WHY DO PEOPLE SHIP THEM AGAIN? D:
Mainly because the story of Seishirou and Subaru is: "Twisted as it may be, there is no denying that there is love between Seishirou and Subaru. Sure, it's not normal or healthy, but it's there. This isn't a relationship where love conquers all — on the contrary, love is the worst thing that ever happened to them."
B L U E by Kiriko Nananan
January 2016
As enjoyable and exciting as I find shounen ai/yaoi no matter how ridiculous the lack of real character development or plot are just to make way of what I deem 'sexy times' between pretty boys, my views are a lot more critical when it comes to its counterpart, shoujo ai/yuri. I think it stems from the fact that I have been in relationships with women, both romantic and sexual. In fact, it was only two years ago that I came out as bisexual (and it's been grueling to even admit it). For the longest time, I've identified as a lesbian but my sexual preference for partners is not something I consider as a social or political statement. I'm also not easily offended. That being said, I'm slightly uncomfortable with how pop culture in shows (and porn, but then again, it is porn) tend to 'fetishize' sexual/romantic relationships between women, mostly when it's geared towards the male gaze. Shoujo ai/yuri's readership and demographic are mostly men too, as much as the demographic for yaoi is female. That is why I avoided reading yuri for some time because I feel that it provides either a somewhat idealized or false concept and depiction of lesbian relationships. |
Every time I read yaoi, I already have a good amount of suspension of belief because know I'm only indulging in some fantasy scenario, and some circumstances in yaoi are not necessarily something I would expect in how gay relationships with men really work. Shounen ai, on the other hand, at least shows believable development and characterization in the context of romance. The same thing goes for shoujo ai. So I want to balance my BL reads with GL so I ventured on and researched the most popular yuri as well as the most recent, preferably with ones that portray lesbian relationships in a positive light, if not always accurately. I found at least ten or so, and the first one I chose is a Kiriko Nananan piece. From the looks of the reviews of her works, her shoujo ai seemed well-written so I was interested and after finishing BLUE, I wasn't disappointed. This is an impressive work but not without its flaws.
BLUE is a story about two high school girls and their friendship. This friendship is at times natural and at times uneasy, punctuated by unspoken words and meaningful gestures. Kayako Kirishima is inexplicably drawn to the confident and outgoing Masako Endo and this magnetic attraction is borne out of romantic interest as well. She was self-aware about it which in turn made her guilty enough to attempt having casual sex with a boy from another school. To Kirishima, losing her virginity was also a way to feel intrinsically closer to Endo. The latter was kicked out of her previous school for having an abortion. Kirishima's desire to be intimate with Endo is so confusing especially when she has no emotional maturity to help her understand it fully so she makes rash decisions all in hopes to earn Endo's attention and affection. And Endo gave her all these things plenty but she was also always unobtainable to Kirishima. Blue has a leisurely pace as writer Nananan unfolds this aching story about the consequences and unknowable truths about young love, regardless if it's queer and probably more so that it's queer at the same time. Kirishima wants Endo and punishes herself for wanting someone of her own sex while Endo is more or less heterosexual but allows a more than platonic closeness with Kirishima because she doesn't have the strength or foresight to break the other girl's heart.
Ultimately, Endo breaks Kirishima's heart but not because she has directly rejected a real committed relationship with her. In fact, Endo is more than okay encouraging Kirishima's girlish fantasies of moving in together in Tokyo after graduation. It's not like that. Endo breaks Kirishima's heart by denying her friendship which was what I think these two girls struggled to maintain with each other. Kirishima wants to be understood and accepted and Endo provides that easily because of her giving, sweet-tempered nature, but she's also closed off when it came to private matters, most especially about her ex-boyfriend who impregnated her. Kirishima had to find out about it through another classmate and this was a betrayal to her because she wanted Endo to be straightforward with her, to tell her all her secrets as much as return her desires. Blue is riveting this way. Its meaninglessness about character motivations and actions are so attuned with what happens in real-life scenarios and the people that perpetuate them that I can't help but contemplate about my own experiences in high school about a girl I had such an intense feeling of anguish and desire for.
When I read and finished Blue within two hours last week, I sat down in front of my laptop and began typing the first part of this review then I put it off for a couple of days. I just came back from a reunion with high school friends last night where the girl I spoke of was also there, and I was able to clear up any lingering misunderstandings between us from years ago. In the back of my mind, I was thinking about Kirishima and Endo, and all the emotions they never got to properly say and those that never really needed words to begin with. Blue has made me realize strong emotions often need to be felt more than spoken aloud and it's a great testament to her skill as a writer of immense depth and experience that Nananan was able to capture this within such a simple, minimalistic yet agonizingly accurate story about teenage girls and their struggles with identity and sexual attraction; shame and jealousy; and growing up too soon and having to deal with that as it comes.
In the end, it occurred to Endo and Kirishima that they're both at fault for a idealizing whatever connection they have for one another, and this was why Kirishima's resentment over Endo's reticence, and Endo's lackadaisical neglect of Kirishima's attachment to her almost threatened to end their friendship for good. What I like about Nananan's writing in exploring such a delicate story and the portrayal of these characters are the ambiguous moments. There is no definitive way of describing or labeling Endo's feelings for Kirishima. We know she's heterosexual because she was devastatingly in love with a man who only wounded her in a way she was almost unable to recover, but she may be bisexual too because she didn't mind being affectionate with Kirishima and passionately kissing her. We know Kirishima might possibly be coming to terms of her homosexuality and is terrified, so she is projecting all her self-hate and dreams on Endo because she was the only person who knew of her inner conflict and never judged her for it. But as for the nature of their relationship in a romantic context, it's not something absolute. Maybe they really were in love or maybe they weren't. Maybe Endo was flattered and liked Kirishima enough and was afraid that rejecting her advances would cause her to abandon her. And maybe Kirishima was just looking for a true friend as oppose to a lover as she undergoes the painful transition of coming out of the closet.
Maybe we're not supposed to know completely because in real life, a lot of people in our lives do remain hidden from us, putting on masks and costumes and we do encourage this masquerade because it feels safe. It makes us feel connected. We expose ourselves more by hiding in plain sight and Blue captures that poignancy and that need to be concealed until we are ready to make ourselves known to the rest of the world; to create homes out of people we feel such a kinship for even with the dangerous risk of co-dependence and a refusal to grow up and learn. For Kirishima, it's not easy to love someone whom she feels society will reject her for, most likely starting with her family and friends. For Endo, it's all to easy to allow people in her life to expect things from her, and blame only herself when she feels she has failed to meet them all.
In any case, Nananan does these girls a justice in her writing for Blue. Her insights regarding these two girls are so honest in a very searing, unforgettable way that often it's not something one can enjoy for casual reading. I wanted to give this an 8 out of 10 rating but settled for a 7, objectively speaking. I related so powerfully to the story and the situations of the girls since I have something in my high school years I can contextualized it with. But, at the same time, I think this story is not something anyone can read and find beautiful and moving. Its ambiguity and lack of a complete resolution at the last chapter may prove disappointing to most readers. It's also such a slow burn of a narrative where character interactions are limited and often open to interpretation.
In that way, Blue is not a crowd pleaser which is the enchantment of it. And I liked it a lot. It made me nostalgic. It made me hurt. I'm going to read more of Kiriko Nananan's works after this one. So far, her depiction of romantic/sexual relationships between girls intrigue me. Suddenly, I didn't feel so alone anymore about my own inadequate expression of feelings from long ago with a girl I should have been better friends with especially when I knew deep in my soul that I used to be in love with her, and perhaps for the wrong reasons all this time.
BLUE is a story about two high school girls and their friendship. This friendship is at times natural and at times uneasy, punctuated by unspoken words and meaningful gestures. Kayako Kirishima is inexplicably drawn to the confident and outgoing Masako Endo and this magnetic attraction is borne out of romantic interest as well. She was self-aware about it which in turn made her guilty enough to attempt having casual sex with a boy from another school. To Kirishima, losing her virginity was also a way to feel intrinsically closer to Endo. The latter was kicked out of her previous school for having an abortion. Kirishima's desire to be intimate with Endo is so confusing especially when she has no emotional maturity to help her understand it fully so she makes rash decisions all in hopes to earn Endo's attention and affection. And Endo gave her all these things plenty but she was also always unobtainable to Kirishima. Blue has a leisurely pace as writer Nananan unfolds this aching story about the consequences and unknowable truths about young love, regardless if it's queer and probably more so that it's queer at the same time. Kirishima wants Endo and punishes herself for wanting someone of her own sex while Endo is more or less heterosexual but allows a more than platonic closeness with Kirishima because she doesn't have the strength or foresight to break the other girl's heart.
Ultimately, Endo breaks Kirishima's heart but not because she has directly rejected a real committed relationship with her. In fact, Endo is more than okay encouraging Kirishima's girlish fantasies of moving in together in Tokyo after graduation. It's not like that. Endo breaks Kirishima's heart by denying her friendship which was what I think these two girls struggled to maintain with each other. Kirishima wants to be understood and accepted and Endo provides that easily because of her giving, sweet-tempered nature, but she's also closed off when it came to private matters, most especially about her ex-boyfriend who impregnated her. Kirishima had to find out about it through another classmate and this was a betrayal to her because she wanted Endo to be straightforward with her, to tell her all her secrets as much as return her desires. Blue is riveting this way. Its meaninglessness about character motivations and actions are so attuned with what happens in real-life scenarios and the people that perpetuate them that I can't help but contemplate about my own experiences in high school about a girl I had such an intense feeling of anguish and desire for.
When I read and finished Blue within two hours last week, I sat down in front of my laptop and began typing the first part of this review then I put it off for a couple of days. I just came back from a reunion with high school friends last night where the girl I spoke of was also there, and I was able to clear up any lingering misunderstandings between us from years ago. In the back of my mind, I was thinking about Kirishima and Endo, and all the emotions they never got to properly say and those that never really needed words to begin with. Blue has made me realize strong emotions often need to be felt more than spoken aloud and it's a great testament to her skill as a writer of immense depth and experience that Nananan was able to capture this within such a simple, minimalistic yet agonizingly accurate story about teenage girls and their struggles with identity and sexual attraction; shame and jealousy; and growing up too soon and having to deal with that as it comes.
In the end, it occurred to Endo and Kirishima that they're both at fault for a idealizing whatever connection they have for one another, and this was why Kirishima's resentment over Endo's reticence, and Endo's lackadaisical neglect of Kirishima's attachment to her almost threatened to end their friendship for good. What I like about Nananan's writing in exploring such a delicate story and the portrayal of these characters are the ambiguous moments. There is no definitive way of describing or labeling Endo's feelings for Kirishima. We know she's heterosexual because she was devastatingly in love with a man who only wounded her in a way she was almost unable to recover, but she may be bisexual too because she didn't mind being affectionate with Kirishima and passionately kissing her. We know Kirishima might possibly be coming to terms of her homosexuality and is terrified, so she is projecting all her self-hate and dreams on Endo because she was the only person who knew of her inner conflict and never judged her for it. But as for the nature of their relationship in a romantic context, it's not something absolute. Maybe they really were in love or maybe they weren't. Maybe Endo was flattered and liked Kirishima enough and was afraid that rejecting her advances would cause her to abandon her. And maybe Kirishima was just looking for a true friend as oppose to a lover as she undergoes the painful transition of coming out of the closet.
Maybe we're not supposed to know completely because in real life, a lot of people in our lives do remain hidden from us, putting on masks and costumes and we do encourage this masquerade because it feels safe. It makes us feel connected. We expose ourselves more by hiding in plain sight and Blue captures that poignancy and that need to be concealed until we are ready to make ourselves known to the rest of the world; to create homes out of people we feel such a kinship for even with the dangerous risk of co-dependence and a refusal to grow up and learn. For Kirishima, it's not easy to love someone whom she feels society will reject her for, most likely starting with her family and friends. For Endo, it's all to easy to allow people in her life to expect things from her, and blame only herself when she feels she has failed to meet them all.
In any case, Nananan does these girls a justice in her writing for Blue. Her insights regarding these two girls are so honest in a very searing, unforgettable way that often it's not something one can enjoy for casual reading. I wanted to give this an 8 out of 10 rating but settled for a 7, objectively speaking. I related so powerfully to the story and the situations of the girls since I have something in my high school years I can contextualized it with. But, at the same time, I think this story is not something anyone can read and find beautiful and moving. Its ambiguity and lack of a complete resolution at the last chapter may prove disappointing to most readers. It's also such a slow burn of a narrative where character interactions are limited and often open to interpretation.
In that way, Blue is not a crowd pleaser which is the enchantment of it. And I liked it a lot. It made me nostalgic. It made me hurt. I'm going to read more of Kiriko Nananan's works after this one. So far, her depiction of romantic/sexual relationships between girls intrigue me. Suddenly, I didn't feel so alone anymore about my own inadequate expression of feelings from long ago with a girl I should have been better friends with especially when I knew deep in my soul that I used to be in love with her, and perhaps for the wrong reasons all this time.
A Blessing On Your House by Kotetsuko Yamamoto
January 2016
Listen: two men going at it is HOT, okay? It sizzles. It pops. It makes me salivate and get a lady boner. DEAL. WITH. IT. Now I've only been a 'fujoshi' for a short while (since 2014, if you can believe it), and my sudden emotional investment on queer relationships or slash pairings in fandoms (anime, manga or otherwise) is all thanks to Charles and Erik of X-Men: First Class. Since I started rabidly shipping those gorgeous idiots both in film and in real life as the actors themselves, I also did a critical examination of other male friendships that I admired in the past in fiction and a few of them did stand out as ship-worthy. I'm not going to tell you specifically which are these but rest assured that I have been more or less converted to the fujoshi lifestyle. I'm not exactly ashamed of it but I won't advertise it in public during a random conversation with a new acquaintance. OR MAYBE I WILL. Actually, I ALREADY DID. I was hanging out with some guys from an indie band and we got to talking about superheroes, particularly Marvel. So the Avengers. And then the X-Men. And, naturally, Professor X and Magneto. And, yes, because it came or organically NOT I essentially proclaimed "Guys, I totes ship Cherik and want to see them be lovey-dovey and fuck!" which is me just volunteering that preference without asking, much to the abject horror and amusement of the other parties.
I got a kick out of proudly embracing that I just get so goddamn wet for two guys doing it that I decided hey, why should I be selfish and keep this all to myself like a weird person with a guilty fetish? Only serial killers would do that and in spite of any online tests that categorize me as a sociopath, I'm pretty normal and nothing is more normal than posting my thoughts about sexy stuff concerning pretty boys in the cyberspace. I had a lot of great boy-love and girl-love mangas down the pipeline to read and review this year and December 2016 (please note your calendars) is when I plan to bombard everyone with Bl/GL reads and reviews. For now, I have the next two months to read four BL/GL stories and I start with Omairi desu yo (A Blessing on the House).
For the sake of jargon formality, let me define terms:
SHOUNEN AI or "boy-love" features stories about boys in tame and fluffy romantic situations that may or may not get increasingly erotic as chapters progress. Most BL are mild and generally consist of character-centered school-romance or plot-centered ones that have two male characters bonding in a non-platonic manner whilst subjected to the genre the plot is written in (say, fantasy or action-adventure). You may have to squint hard to really see the gay. Often, it even slaps you in the face because it's that obviously gay. Nevertheless, a lot of shounen ai don't necessarily have to depict the gay couple doing raunchy things. They can be cheesy all throughout as they hold hands, kiss and proclaim unending confessions of love and devotion. You know, like any teen-rated het out there.
YAOI is the more explicit one. Mostly oneshot stories without any overreaching arc--OR A PLOT AT ALL--yaoi stories always play on coupling archetypes (bad boy + nerd; dom (seme) + sub (uke); boy-next-door + clumsy guy; macho guy + pretty boy, etc.) and the progression (which is often convoluted or rushed) always leads to the endgame of sexy anal times. Most real-life gay sex between men don't always involve anal sex but somehow for yaoi, if the male characters simply frot or blow each other, it's not considered as 'going all the way'. Penile penetration is necessary so if that's your deal (as it is mine) then yaoi will deliver. Oh, it delivers--sometimes to an uncomfortable and hilarious degree. Anal sex is a process but most yaoi stories seem to have these lead men (90% of whom had never had that type of sex before, maybe half of that percentage even identify as straight before having same-sex dalliance) easily handle getting into it. That's not realistic but YOU'RE A DIPSHIT IF YOU TRY TO APPLY REALISM IN FICTION SEXY-TIMES. Just enjoy the sexy times, grandma and grandpa!
Shoujo Ai (girl-love) is the lesbian/sapphic counterpart for the mild stuff and YURI is the counterpart for the explicit one. If yaoi has penetrative sex, yuri's signature I guess has plenty of weird 'scissoring' sex act. It's basically distressing me. There are a handful of accurately portrayed lesbian sex in yuri manga, sure (uh, maybe?) but the ones that really turn me off are the ones with 'scissoring'. I have--I had sex with women on a fairly regular basis way, waaaay back and I have never scissored the fuck out of another female. But who knows, maybe I have been sexing up other women wrong all this time. Oh my god, how can I live with that kind of grief now?!
Anyway, enough of this introduction. Let's talk about Omairi desu yo.
A Blessing on Your House has the distinction of rendering its readers with a bad case of getting sensory overload with the adorbs. Written and illustrated by Kotetsuko Yamamoto whose visual art is very much eye-candy, this manga is the brilliant cross between the mild and the wild stuff. It stars a twenty-two-year-old Buddhist monk named Yuuji who is admired by all because of his kind demeanor and beautiful features. He swore celibacy and a life of religious devotion (at freaking 22) but harbors an intense crush on a childhood friend, Saburou, since their middle school days. The first chapter doesn't agonize over this and immediately has our sensitive young monk drunk on his ass and has to be carried by said love interest back to his place. Drunk-on-his-ass Yuuji in slur speech confesses his feelings to Saburou whilst on piggyback. The next chapter immediately has Saburou confront Yuuji about that confession and, because he is such a swell fellow, was not only NOT disgusted that his childhood friend came on to him but he was also VERY OPEN to the idea of them getting it on. He kisses him without preamble and Yuuji gets all his theoretical fragile man-tubes on a twist. It got awkward on the next few days with Sabu seemingly avoiding him WHEN HE INITIATED THE KISS IN THE FIRST PLACE. Brokenhearted and puffy-eyed, Yuuji decided he should give up on Sabu but then Sabu practically drags him to a corner and admit that right after their first kiss, he jerked off to the thought of being with Yuuji WHICH IS AWESOME, OF COURSE. |
For a guy who has never been with another guy and who doesn't seem like he ever wanted to be until his friend expressed interest, Sabu is...AGGRESSIVE. The next few chapters display his abrasive and straightforward attitude and pursuit to screw the living lights out of Yuuji, much to the latter's demure and embarrassed delight. The almost-sex scenes themselves (a.k.a uninterrupted foreplays, a.k.a un-happy endings, a.k.a Sabu's-mother-is-a-vicious-cockblocker) are intense. I mean, INTENSSSSSSSSe like the sound of a sizzling butter on the pan.
With the promise of sex between Yuuji and Saburou being dangled repeatedly in the chapters, readers will never be able to keep themselves from growling in frustration when the two never get to consummate their love through a much-awaited fuck session. BUT THE BABIES DO TRY and it's almost sad. And sweet and fluffy and oh-so unintelligibly cutesy. And then sad again because both do eventually admit that they are so fixed on the physicality of their relationship that they never actually go on real dates. Their first real date was pretty dorky because Yuuji insisted on visiting some shrine or some shit, and then he fell into a pond because he's a klutz but hey, they actually rented a room in a hotel AND ALMOST SEXY-TIMES IT UP but then Yuuji couldn't adjust to the penetration so they had to try again next time, preferably with Sabu's mom preoccupied in watching her soaps or some shit so she'd stop cock-blocking the kids all the time.
Jesus, woman, just let them fuck! It's almost cosmically unfair that the farthest they have ever gone is some Oxford-style van sex in the middle of the night in some abandoned street somewhere. I'm a romantic so I want a proper mattress with fluffy pillows and some mood music in the background and some classy champagne as rose petals are strewn across the blankets. It's both extremes for me, yo. Either something traditionally sweet like that scenario I just vividly painted for you--or some back-alley doggy-style quickie under a full moon. Either way, the nation has spoken: Yuuji and Sabu just need to get their freak on.
But this wouldn't be a great rom-com raunchy fest without the beta couple stealing the spotlight every now and then. Yuuji has an older, more experienced tsundere of a brother who is also a monk named Kenji. The guy has a temper and whose emotions are pretty much haywire and hard to read. He's also an irrresitible bishounen with a spiciness to him so only admirers of the creepiest kind are drawn to him, much to his anger and exasperation. Good thing he knows self-defense because oh boy, he's gonna need it. Much to his justified chagrin, he's being linked with the guy who does their family's laundry named Yochan whom he vehemently (and fondly) calls Mr. Clean.
Love-sick creepster Yochan doesn't even bother with false pretenses. He is in love and hot for Kenji and it's a sadomasochistic dance of will between the two. Ultimately, tsundere-Kenji gives in anyway and makes out with Yochan whenever the mood suits him, much to his own personal contempt. He can't understand why he's letting someone he adamantly despises service him with sexual favors. It's a rather unhealthy combination but Kenji and Yochan are HOT together so shut up. While Yuuji and Sabu worry about getting it on (REALLY JUST GO GET IT ON DAMN YOU), Kenji and Yochan would probably go farther than they ever would have in the next chapter. If stupid assholes like Christian Grey and Ana are allowed to have poorly written sex scenes then hot bishie men like Yuuji, Sabu, Kenji and Yochan should have fun too. What kind of world do we live in if we deprive them that?
Yuuji, especially, is such a doll. Poor dude would get a cardiovascular heart arrest every time he's getting sexy with Sabu. What appeases him is by chanting his prayers after which is really funny. A high point for me in the manga was him shouting "I WANNA PUT YOU IN MY MOUTH" while they are naked in the hot springs. And when he did put Sabu in his mouth, he used teeth so Sabu had to put a stop to it. HE USED TEETH DURING ORAL SEX, GUYS. Gosh, what a noob! In any case, he is as cute as a bunny and he deserves to get some with Sabu! I CANNOT STRESS THIS ENOUGH---
DID I FAIL TO MENTION THIS IS AN ONGOING SERIES? Oh yes, it is. So what are you waiting for? You know you want to search this title online and read it by yourself in the most secret place of your house like the closeted-fujoshi bitch that you are. If you're going to waste your time, blow your load all over this manga because it's a guaranteed high. Keep your cigarettes or chewing gums (or whatever afterglow ritual you may have) close to your person because you're gonna need some when you're done. Never get cerebral or critical about yaoi because we're all here for the fluff and sex and you're a dipshit if you deny it otherwise or kill everyone's buzz with whatever gripe you may have about manga dudes fucking. Srsly, what is wrong with you? Get off this bandwagon if you're not going to swoon with us!
Fushigi Yuugi: Genbu Kaiden by Yuu Watase
August 2015
Back in sixth grade, the entire class almost religiously watched the anime Fushigi Yuugi every Friday night and then talk about it in groups come school day. The classroom would be filled with lively chatter about what happened in a recent episode, most especially when my best friend at that time would bring along merchandise such as posters, action figures and copies of the English translated manga itself she tirelessly looked for so she can share them with me. At first it started with the girls but pretty soon the boys joined in, mostly because the anime is scandalous in itself, featuring semi-nude and acceptably sensual scenarios that are not that aggresively sexual.
It's a love story about the star-crossed lovers Miaka and Tamahome that got the girls hooked while it's an action-adventure fantasy that the boys could enjoy. Three years ago, I re-watched the anime again and the nostalgic charm was still there. I was compelled to read the manga and also pick up the other spin-off series and I was glad I did because Yuu Watase creates really riveting female-centered stories. Though the very first Fushigi Yuugi is my first love, the third and final installment of the series Genbu Kaiden was ultimately the greatest love of my life, shoujo manga-wise.
I could compare the first FY to a high school boyfriend. He was your sweetheart and you grew up together but he will always belong in the past. Genbu Kaiden is the man you eventually settle down with and marry, and together you are partners celebrating and honoring your sacred union no matter the difficulties of every day life and obligation. This is resonant in the deeply contrasting ways Yuu Watase wrote the love stories between Miaka and Tamahome, and Takiko and Rimudo; the former was the definitive young love that often consumes itself and burns quickly while the latter is the kind of love that knows there are worlds outside its scope that are just as meaningful and so the lovers become mature enough to accept their relationship should not be codependent and they don't end up entiterly losing themselves in each other. They have other important relationships outside one another, and decisions to make where their love for each other sometimes don't have to be the only priority.
Takiko is the very first maiden to be whisked away during the 1920's in Japan, transported by the magical Book of the Four Gods into ancient China. According to an old legend, a woman from another world will appear as a prophecy foretold where she will become the priestess of a certain country, a representative of one of the four gods, depending on the geography she will make her appearance in. In the first FY, high schoolers Miaka Yuuki and her best friend Yui Hongo took the mantle as priestesses for Suzaku and Seiryuu of the South and East Kingdoms respectively. For Takiko, she became priestess for the West, representing Genbu. The storyline for this manga follows the same formula as its predecessors Fushigi Yuugi and Ayashi no Ceres where the young, impressionable maiden gathers the seven warriors of the god they are aiming to summon. The story dictates that the priestess is allowed a wish if she successfully gathers all warriors and summons the god. It's a premise as predictable and universal as any hero's journey, only this time making the hero in question a heroine and she always develops romantic feelings for one of her warriors, almost always the first one she encountered the moment she gets transported. The central conflict lies in how they endure the varied tests and threats to their blooming romance.
The same thing happens to Takiko in this manga, much like Miaka was with Tamahome. The glaring difference, however, is the characterization and development of their individual arcs and as a couple's relationship. I would like to believe that Watase has learned from her mistakes with handling Miaka and Tamahome's love story which was essentially a really flawed and superfluous one.
As a supposed prequel to the original FY but written much later on, Genbu Kaiden retains a freshness and vitality to it most likely because of its lead character Takiko. Unlike the unassuming Aya, clumsy and fickle Miaka and the vengeful Yui, Takiko was instantly likable and admirable in her courage and purity of the spirit. I think it's her family situation that enabled her to deal with things more maturely. Her mother has consumption while her father has always been neglectful of her, always buried in his work. Her unrequited love for a childhood friend remained unfulfilled after he married another woman, leaving Takiko generally all alone and ignored. After her mother fully succumbs to her illness and dies, Takiko's father returns but was more concerned with publishing his latest translation on an old story about the Four Gods of Ancient China than attend to the funeral arrangements. Angry and betrayed, Takiko takes away the copy of the book from her father and boldly questions him if he wished she was a son and if she was indeed male, perhaps he may have paid attention to her; even love her. Her father acquiesces that this was true which forever devastated Takiko beyond words so she tries to rip the book in two but ends up getting magically transported within its pages.
In ancient China, she encounters a strange man who can control the winds and even turn physiologically into a woman. She then meets one of the bounty hunters looking for this person and was caught up between their rivalry immediately. Later on, she discovers the purpose of her coming to this land; about being a prietess foretold to save the kingdom from destruction and ruin. Unlike Miaka who agreed so she can wish herself home or Yui who wanted to take revenge, Takiko readily accepted the prophesy as her calling because of the most heartbreaking motivation ever: SHE WANTED TO FEEL NEEDED AND BE OF USE TO PEOPLE. She cared for her sick mother as a young girl and never felt like her father wanted her (which she had confirmed before coming to China) and was relieved--joyous, even--to feel like she can help people if she took the role of the priestess, not fully aware of the consequences and repercussions of such a role. It's all because Takiko's inherent brokenness lies in her desperation to give love and hopefully, mercifully, receive a piece of it in return.
In spite of such a sad and seemingly defective trait, this is actually what makes Takiko such a well-developed and compelling heroine to root for. This girl is unafraid to pick up a weapon and fight. She has some training in kendo so she is capable enough to hold herself during duels which is great to see because she never has to be a helpless damsel in distress all the time. Most of all, what I believe is the most amazing thing about Takiko is her compassion that enables her to identify with people's suffering and spiritually heal them. In Genbu Kaiden, people consider the priestess prophesy to be a bad omen. Anyone they discovered to be one of the potential seven warriors of Genbu was shunned, ostracized, exploited or driven away from their homes. This is the greatest challenge of Takiko's journey in finding them: some of these warriors already hate Takiko because of her priestess role and would never join her cause…until Takiko finds a way to touch their soul and make them believe they have a place in the world, that they do belong and they matter.
I get so choked up in every encounter she has with a Genbu warrior who all have tragic tales to tell about being outcasts and victims of their fates. Reading Takiko reaching out to them and earning their trust and devotion is so wondrously thrilling and emotionally resonant, further strengthening my admiration for Takiko. She is a person who knew rejection so well and has become loving and patient because of it. Each Genbu warrior knew rejection themselves firsthand; either through their own families or at the hands of their own clan/community. Takiko finds them and saves them, gives their lives meaning and urges them to fight not for glory or reward but merely for the sake of their countrymen even though many of them despise the Genbu warriors for what they are.
Takiko is never discouraged. She continues to thrive and serve her role faithfully…even if it meant never having a proper relationship with Rimudo, the first warrior she encountered and who gradually captured her heart and made it soar heights she never would have fathomed possible. Much like Takiko, Rimudo has upsetting daddy issues; his own father is having him hunt down to be killed all because of the prophesy that guarantees Rimudo will be his undoing. This is what initially drew the two together other than the usual physical attraction. Rimudo likes Takiko's ferociousness in accomplishing her tasks and the passion imbued in every selfless act of hers. Takiko likes Rimudo because he is burdened with a tragedy he constantly tries to overcome, and surprises her every time he puts aside his self-interest to lend her a hand in her calvary. Pretty soon these feelings deepened until they could no longer hide from their respective masks and costumes as renegade crowned prince on-the-run and savior priestess for long and they professed their love as they make a promise every day to stay in love even if duty and the upcomig civil wars have to be prioritized. I love the fact that they are both of independent will; they don't get so obsessed with each other that nothing else matters. Takiko and Rimudo were never selfish people that sometimes when they do get a little selfish, I encourage it because both deserve some kind of happiness as young lovers.
Genbu Kaiden is understandably not a happy ending in the romance side of things, at least not in a conventional sense. Takiko and Rimudo may love each other so much but have accepted that they could never be together at least not in body. The priestess after all has to be virginal. They could never be wholly together in heart and spirit either because Takiko is steadfast in fulfilling her role as priestess of Genbu and securing peace for the country. And, because Rimudo loves her for her unique courage, he decides to fight by her side for the good of all even if it meant losing her in an ultimate twist: if you have seen FY anime before then you know the price of summoning Genbu. Once Takiko discovers it, she never wavered from her obligation. She readily accepts its steep price and gives herself to the fate awaiting her to save her friends and the country and its people she has learned to love and be fiercely protective of.
Overall, Genbu Kaiden is intricate, heartfelt and engrossing with well-rounded characterizations composed of sensible conflicts and small yet satisfying resolutions in between. It has an empowered lead female character who is unafraid to define her relationships and not the other way around. It has an elegantly resonant and moving love story as its centerpiece but in spite of its love-story trappings, Genbu Kaiden is also a story about rejection and acceptance both from self and others as well as the transformative powers of friendship and community.
You can start reading the manga HERE and I hope this review will convince you. It's such a spellbinding tale about love in all its beautiful and often painfully cathartic forms. I guarantee that you will fall in love with Takiko as a person and root for her and Rimudo because they are inspiring individuals who luckily happen to be a romantic couple. The other Genbu warriors are also endearing and special in their own ways and their separate relationships with Takiko enhance the magic and poignancy of the narrative.
Kodama Yuki's KIDS ON THE SLOPE (Sakamichi no Apollon)
August 2015
"Unlike love affairs, friendship is for life."
[NOTE: This review encompasses the entire series]
I'm a twenty-five year old woman who just finished the ten volumes of the shoujo manga Strobe Edge last month and realized it just wasn't my cup of tea anymore at this point in my life. It was cute, sure, but I felt like I wasted a good five hours reading through it. I think that's mostly because I read this series a few weeks prior to that (and the more riveting shoujo piece Orange as well) and, ultimately, Sakamichi no Apollon resonated with me in all the right places. First of all, it's a josei manga so the maturity level of the storytelling is already guaranteed but I don’t really have any strong expectations once I started reading this which was why it managed to take me for a breathless ride out of nowhere, and gave me a frightfully emotional spin.
Much like the manga Nana, this is a story about friendship and music. While the former is about two women who share the same name and one of them is a rock musician then they started living together, this one is about two high school boys back in the late sixties who develop a deep connection when one of them introduced the other to jazz music. Kaoru Nishimi is a reclusive and intelligent boy who comes from a wealthy family with an absentee father. He is very skilled in classical piano but has moved around a lot growing up that he became rather cynical about meeting new people let alone establishing ties with them. This has all changed when he meets the class delinquent Sentarou Kawabuchi whose cheerful and aggressive dispostion undermines a comparably lonely childhood. He spends his days playing drums in his childhood friend's basement and his encounters with Kaoru later increased especially when Kaoru expressed interest in playing jazz and soon both boys began to bond in ways that also allowed them to explore tender spots in themselves they have previously never been privy of.
On the surface, this is a slice of life high school drama that has familiar genre elements of said narrative but Sakamichi no Apollon has a self-awareness and range of depth to its storytelling and characters that make it just as eagerly readable to an older and more experienced audience looking to re-live their own teen years plagued by crises, heartbreak and family conflicts. In addition, the set-up of Kaoru and Sentarou's story, and the development of their relationship, was highly romanticized much like in Nana with the two titular protagonists spending copious amounts of time seemingly in courtship. This same style of characterization applies to Kaoru ane Sentarou. In Western perspective, one can characterize this as a "bromance". It certainly has the right pieces for a more blatant 'boy love' story; shy and quiet nerd meets the bad boy of the class (only the situation is a same-gendered romance piece, like a formulaic yaoi story waiting to happen any moment. I'm not gonna lie--that's how it often feels while reading this series).
I bring this up because I believe this is the selling point for Sakamichi no Apollon; its lead men have an intensely emotional connection that can sometimes translate to some accidental (if not intentional) homoerotic subtext. The manga does not shy away from treating them like a young couple navigating the first-time highs and lows of their relationship and the writing for this is excellently conveyed and never cheapened. Their existing level of intimacy and tension was not created solely for underhanded yaoi fanservice. Theirs is a genuine budding friendship that just happens to be more romantic than people are used to when reading about men and their friendships with each other. In spite of the mixed signals readers might get from Kaoru and Sentarou's feelings and outright possessiveness for each other, the two are indeed heterosexual and Kaoru even has a female love interest (Ritsuko) who is an important character in her own right and helps enhance the relationship between the two boys since she both cares about them and believes they have something worth perserving. There are the standard love triangles in the mix but the series easily absolves these geometric complications in a mature way without needlessly drawing out the conflicts unlike in the typical fashion of most shoujo mangas.
Sakamichi no Apollon is primarily about Kaoru Nishimi's growth as an individual through his friendship with Sentarou and romantic pursuit of Ritsuko. Both of these things are equally explored although Kaoru's undeniable bond with his best friend is the front-and-center piece while the rest are often consequential of this. There's something to be said about the power and magnetic force that draw these boys together in spite of how different their personalities are. Their affinity for jazz music is joyous in a way it completes them and expresses the multitude of emotions they have that cannot be verbalized in any other way. When all is said and done, Kaoru and Sentarou's friendship is the best and most riveting aspect of Sakamichi no Apollon, and the symbolic "slope" in this series is a metaphor for how much they have climbed and overcome their insecurities and respective conflicts outside of each other in order to stay together, stronger than ever.
Theirs is a story of platonic relationship that is universal and timeless and will no doubt move readers in the best possible ways. In their alienation and regrets, Kaoru and Sentarou found each other and made each other feel unconditionally loved. It was never an easy climb but they always reach the top as long as they have each other. Basically, they are each other's "true love", just not in a queer, sexual way no matter I sometimes wish they just get together already. That's how strong their connection is and often frustratingly so. I just adore how refreshingly literate this manga series had been, able to tackle mature issues with earnest and well-informed insights that may even help readers deal with their own problems. Ultimately, Sakamichi no Apollon changed my life too.
Like most manga, this also has an anime adaptation that has twelve episodes that managed to summarize the highlights of the fifty chapters of the manga and I was able to watch that after reading this and I also highly recommend that if not only so you can listen and appreciate the popular jazz pieces incorporated within the expanse of the story. The wonderfully resolved ending of this series never fails to move me to tears. It's just fucking beautiful, okay? Everything about Sakamichi no Apollon is worth the heartache and pain and you should be reading this now. There are available online copies here so you don't have any excuses to procrastinate. Trust me on this and read the damn thing already! Heads-up: The best chapter of this manga will always be Chapter 12. That's when it starts to break your heart.
ORANGE by Ichigo Takano
August 2015
In the midst of the usual shoujo manga varieties that cater to the many shades and conflicts of school-girl infatuation and romance, Ichigo Takano's ongoing series ORANGE easily stands out. This manga's central romantic development, though more or less integral to the tale being told, is not Orange's real selling point let alone its primary focus. Instead, Orange is a rather earnest and at times painfully realistic story concerning a teenager's clinical depression told in the perspectives of his high school friends. In a bittersweet fashion with an understanding and depth of how mental illness truly affects a person and his social ties, Orange produced such a nuanced examination of depression in the character of Kakeru Naruse. It's not just a mere plot device to get two people in a relationship or for the lead heroine to go on a journey and fix the guy with tender love and care. It started out with that premise but progressed into a more meaningful and even darker path where lead girl Naho Takamiya along with four other friends discover that often times love and friendship is not enough to help an individual so fundamentally damaged.
There's also a science fiction element to Orange's premise, however. The story opens with Naho Takamiya who received a letter from her twenty-six-year-old self, informing her of the future ten years from now. She disbelieved it at first until each entry acccurately described a specific day and the notable events that transpired, especially when it concerns the new boy in class whom she eventually develops feelings for. The chapters alternate between showing the present in high school and the future where Naho is now a wife and mother but continues to reminisce her deepest regrets about the boy she loved at sixteen. Right from the very first chapter the readers become privy to the devastating fact that Kakeru had passed away ten years later and how Naho felt as if she could have done something about it. The truly moving parts of the manga, of course, happen every time any of these young people would make an effort to make their friend feel loved and accepted, hoping it would be enough to prevent the inevitable. The most heatbreaking thing is when it doesn't seem enough. That's when Orange chokes you up. Every single chapter has left me misty-eyed. I was always in the verge of tears when reading this manga.
It was only when we keep reading that it was revealed that, according to Naho's letters, Kakeru is increasingly becoming more reticent and withdrawn without his classmates' knowledge until one night he got ran over by a car as he was riding his bike. There were also small revelations in between where Naho's group of friends find out about Kakeru's mother committing suicide on their first day of school and how deeply he had blamed himself since and that it had also driven him to attempt to take his own life once. These details were revealed to the present Naho via letters and whose actions since learning these things gradually improved Kakeru's perspective about himself and others. She now has a personal mission to save her friend. With only letters from her future self to aid her, Naho is determine to create an alternate world where Kakeru could live happily and still be with her and their friends a decade later. It sounds like a noble plan but Orange was inquisitive enough to show that depression is an ongoing battle that a bunch of well-meaning teenagers can't absolve by themselves.
You can't just tell someone who is clinically depressed to "get over it" or do everything in your power and sacrifice so many things for the betterment of that person's life and believe that's all it takes for him to shake it off. Personally, I think Kakeru needs serious counselling and professional therapy and I certainly hope that the manga will deal with that in the upcoming later chapters. If you're interested to read Orange right at this moment then you are in luck! The online site kissmanga has amazingly translated pages of the story that's ready for your enjoyment. I personally also read the comments and discussion among the readers below each chapter, and their insights and their arguments among themselves also happen to increase my emotional investment on the story and the struggles of the characters. It's interesting to read about what fans think of certain scenes and how easy it is to misunderstand Kakeru himself whom some readers feel is too much of a downer and who cannot appreciate his friends's efforts to make him happy.
There are readers, who know enough about depression either through personal experiences with loved ones or as people who suffered from it themselves, who quickly come to Kakeru's defense, citing that he is not fully in control of his emotions and that, really, these are all a bunch of kids during puberty which only adds to their helplessness and confusion. If the writer finally updates with a new chapter, I could only hope it will touch upon about the more complicated issues and dangers of trying to help someone with depression when you yourself don't have enough experience or maturity such as Naho and her friends, in spite of their good intentions.
Nevertheless, I myself would gladly buy and wear a shirt that says SAVE KAKERU because I want the best outcome from his story because I've also learned to care about what happens to him and whether or not he can survive. We all want happy endings, or at least a manageable life for Kakeru who has tons of adjustment to cope for, and years of therapy ahead of him. But at least he will live.
Here are some sample pages:
There's also a science fiction element to Orange's premise, however. The story opens with Naho Takamiya who received a letter from her twenty-six-year-old self, informing her of the future ten years from now. She disbelieved it at first until each entry acccurately described a specific day and the notable events that transpired, especially when it concerns the new boy in class whom she eventually develops feelings for. The chapters alternate between showing the present in high school and the future where Naho is now a wife and mother but continues to reminisce her deepest regrets about the boy she loved at sixteen. Right from the very first chapter the readers become privy to the devastating fact that Kakeru had passed away ten years later and how Naho felt as if she could have done something about it. The truly moving parts of the manga, of course, happen every time any of these young people would make an effort to make their friend feel loved and accepted, hoping it would be enough to prevent the inevitable. The most heatbreaking thing is when it doesn't seem enough. That's when Orange chokes you up. Every single chapter has left me misty-eyed. I was always in the verge of tears when reading this manga.
It was only when we keep reading that it was revealed that, according to Naho's letters, Kakeru is increasingly becoming more reticent and withdrawn without his classmates' knowledge until one night he got ran over by a car as he was riding his bike. There were also small revelations in between where Naho's group of friends find out about Kakeru's mother committing suicide on their first day of school and how deeply he had blamed himself since and that it had also driven him to attempt to take his own life once. These details were revealed to the present Naho via letters and whose actions since learning these things gradually improved Kakeru's perspective about himself and others. She now has a personal mission to save her friend. With only letters from her future self to aid her, Naho is determine to create an alternate world where Kakeru could live happily and still be with her and their friends a decade later. It sounds like a noble plan but Orange was inquisitive enough to show that depression is an ongoing battle that a bunch of well-meaning teenagers can't absolve by themselves.
You can't just tell someone who is clinically depressed to "get over it" or do everything in your power and sacrifice so many things for the betterment of that person's life and believe that's all it takes for him to shake it off. Personally, I think Kakeru needs serious counselling and professional therapy and I certainly hope that the manga will deal with that in the upcoming later chapters. If you're interested to read Orange right at this moment then you are in luck! The online site kissmanga has amazingly translated pages of the story that's ready for your enjoyment. I personally also read the comments and discussion among the readers below each chapter, and their insights and their arguments among themselves also happen to increase my emotional investment on the story and the struggles of the characters. It's interesting to read about what fans think of certain scenes and how easy it is to misunderstand Kakeru himself whom some readers feel is too much of a downer and who cannot appreciate his friends's efforts to make him happy.
There are readers, who know enough about depression either through personal experiences with loved ones or as people who suffered from it themselves, who quickly come to Kakeru's defense, citing that he is not fully in control of his emotions and that, really, these are all a bunch of kids during puberty which only adds to their helplessness and confusion. If the writer finally updates with a new chapter, I could only hope it will touch upon about the more complicated issues and dangers of trying to help someone with depression when you yourself don't have enough experience or maturity such as Naho and her friends, in spite of their good intentions.
Nevertheless, I myself would gladly buy and wear a shirt that says SAVE KAKERU because I want the best outcome from his story because I've also learned to care about what happens to him and whether or not he can survive. We all want happy endings, or at least a manageable life for Kakeru who has tons of adjustment to cope for, and years of therapy ahead of him. But at least he will live.
Here are some sample pages:
Orange is a splendid, humane tale about friendships and self-love and I can hardly wait to read where the author intends to take this story next and how the pursuit to save Kakeru Naruse's life will be resolved. IMPORTANT: As I post this, a new chapter is out and there's only one last chapter to go!