Yuri Anime: Azumanga Daioh, Volume 5
More wacky fun,
yuri longing and Sakaki and Kagura looking incredibly cool. Plus a toy surprise!
Today's review will be a quicky - the story in Volume 5 of
Azumanga Daioh is pretty much the same kind of hijinks as in the first four volumes. Osaka is loopy, Chiyo-chan is adorable, Tomo's a moron, Yomi's pathetic, Sakaki's cool, etc, etc.
Notably on this DVD is the fateful trip to Okinawa, in which Osaka gets to make a gazillion mostly untranslatable puns, and Sakaki befriends a mountain cat, thus breaking her curse and violating all sorts of wildlife laws all at the same time.
Much more importantly, in their final sports festival, we (along with a still-besotted Kaorin,) get to enjoy both Kagura and Sakaki in an outfit known as
gakuran. The
gakuran is really just a traditional boy's school uniform, but it's often shown as a longer jacket and with baggy pants, like a zoot suit - a look favored by gangs in manga and anime and assumably, in real life. The
gakuran is often accompanied by bandages wrapped around the chest for both guys and girls, although of the top of my head I don't know why. In this case, the Red Racoon Dogs (the team name chosen by our intrepid athletes) wear sports bras. Amusingly I found a nice collection of pictures of Tomo, Kagura and (especially) Sakaki wearing said
gakuran here. If you care, I've found an old black & white
photo of a guy in the old style
gakuran with long jacket and baggy pants.
Anyway, this volume is the usual four episodes, good liner notes with explanations of the puns (which are very necessary, let me tell you!) and a cloisonne pin of, as I predicted, the Otou-san cat. Whee. Now I have two cat pins I don't want. Why can't we get Sakaki pins, for pity's sake!?!
But don't let me get you down. In reality, this volume is another excellent entry into this always excellent and very funny series.
Ratings:
Story - 8
Characters - 9
Art - 8
Music - 7
Yuri - 4
Overall - 8
Really, is it too much to ask to get a pin, or doll or something of Sakaki in the
gakuran? They made a
gashapon of Kagura in the darn thing!
Oh, but look what I found while searching for one. This must have made by taking Kagura's
gashapon body and adding Sakaki's head because I've never seen anything for sale like it. Now, why didn't *I* think of that? LOL
P.S. -
Gashapon are little dolls, like 4" or so, that come in pieces, usually from vending machines for 100 or 200 yen each. You stick 'em together and they really look good. "The word "Gashapon" is derived from the sound made by the machine when you operate it to win your prize (Gasha-Gasha)." Or so
Google informs me. :-)
Yuri Anime: Gakuen Alice
Think
Kodomo no Omocha meets
Psychic Academy, with a little yuri thrown in for seasoning and you have
Gakuen Alice.
I wasn't originally interested in watching this series because I've had enough of cute for a while (hence my recent huddling on the couch with not-cute series like
Otogizoushi and
Phantom Memory Kurau,) but after a strong recommendation from a regular on the
Yuricon Mailing List, this simply sounded to good to pass up. (And, see *this* is why you need to join the Mailing List - because there really is some excellent stuff out there, and no one, not even the dedicated seeker of yuri can find it all themselves!)
Gakuen Alice starts with a distinctly Sana-like main character, Sakura Mikan, energetically voiced by
Maria-sama ga Miteru's Ueda Kana, the voice actress for Yumi - proving once again that, like tatoos and piercings, once you've voiced a
yuri character, you'll be doing another and another... ;-)
Mikan is one of those hyper-energetic, loopy, yet irrationally likeable characters. In stark contrast stands Mikan's genius best friend, irascabile and grumpy already at 10, Imai Hotaru, aptly named after the proto-goth Hotaru from
Sailor Moon. Hotaru is delightfully mercenary and manipulative and, despite her obvious distate for displays of affection, she clearly cares deeply for Mikan. Which is why she doesn't tell Mikan that she's leaving for an "Alice" school in Tokyo.
"Alice" schools appear to be extremely elite private academies that take in only children with extraordinary abilities. In return, their families are given large sums of money, but the trade-off is that the students are cut of from friends and family completely. Mikan, devastated by the news, waits a few seasons, then heads off to find her friend, if only to see her for a moment, because life without Hotaru is simply intolerable.
For her part, Hotaru showed her affection for Mikan (and let me tell you I have a REALLY hard time stopping myself from calling her "Sana" every time) by giving her share of the "Alice" money to their school to keep it open...simply because it was important to Mikan. If *that's* not love...
So, Mikan arrives in the big city, is immediately almost kidnapped and saved in the nick of time by a pretty young man from the Alice school Hotaru attends. Inexplicably, his powers do not seem to affect Mikan, something which intrigues him enough that he invites Mikan to attend the school. Not having a clue what's going on at the school, but determined to be with Hotaru, Mikan agrees.
Future episodes look like they will be intermittently funny and painful, but I have to say that, even without the relationship between Hotaru and Mikan, this would probably be something I'd watch. In answer to the question "is it really yuri?" I'd have to say yes. Yes, they are young, and yes, it's a relationship that lacks desire (and thank heavens for *that*!) but the love between the two girls is quite obvious and profound.
Ratings:
Story - 8
Character - 9
Art - 8
Music - 8
Yuri - 7
Overall - 8.
The comment around my house after the first episode was, "Is there more?" Barring incredible suckitude in future episodes, I think this one will be a keeper.
Otogizoushi Anime
A cross-dressing noblewoman, Heian period magic, and Abe no Seimei as a total pretty boy, what's not to like?
(Okay, the above is not really a fair summation of this story at *all.* But it made a good tag line. lol)
In reality,
Otogizoushi is really a collection of many things rolled up into two distinct storylines. The Production I.G. link above is good for the first half of the story, while the
NTV site is good for the second (and, in my opinion, far more interesting) half of the series.
The tale begins, as all good magic/horror tales do, in the
Heian period. The Miyako, the capital city, is falling apart from corruption, over ritualizaton and political intrigue, all of which is true enough. A young scion of a noble household, Raikou, lays dying, even as he is given the task of going on a dangerous quest. So his sister, Hikaru, dresses as Raikou and heads off to find the five
magatama. These will assist the court sorceror, called an
onmyouji, to save the capital. The chief
Onmyouji,, Abe no Seimei (who is REALLY famous, or infamous, depending on how you first encountered him) seems to have his own agenda for the
magatama.
Raikou, that is, Hikaru, spends the first few episodes amassing her traveling companions, and running into a lot of Heian period legends, all the while collecting magatama and looking very somber about the fate of her brother and the capital. There's the *teeniest* hint of yuri flirtation at the beginning, when a few female inn maids try to schmooze "Raikou" (and I think that Urabe, the only other female in the group kind of has a little affection for "Raikou",) but that's dropped pretty fast in the reamining episodes. The crisis looms, the tension builds (not), until the final, wildly predictable conflict with the only possible character, GASP!
Obvious as it was, it was still a nice enough opening to the story. That is to say, ending to the first half and lead-in to the second.
The second half is FAR stronger, and the opening song and animation are quite catchy. (The characters are seen to be singing the song as it plays, which I find charming.) Set in modern Tokyo, there is, sadly, no cross-dressing, no yuri, no Hikaru wielding weapons, but the plot is now loosely based around a collection of *modern* urban legwends, ghost stories and myths, which fascinate me inutterably. The characters have all been reborn into modern times with the same names and personalities and they have, as of yet, no connection at all to their former lives, except in so far as they are all still clumped around Hikaru and her brother. Her brother has been missing for a year, but Hikaru has begun to see him in connection with some paranormal happenings around the city. The rest of the cast are renters in the building Hikaru runs in her brother's absence.
The animation for
Otogizoushi is not great, but it is original, which is something these days. The characters' eyes are drawn especially strangely. But they also look more like Japanese people than most anime bother with, which gives it an edgy, realistic feel - which, in turn heightens the magic/horror stuff when it arrives. Paranormal occurences in Heian Miyako, sure...but on a Tokyo subway line? Way more creepy.
Ratings:
Story - 9
Characters - 8
Art - 7
Music - 8
Yuri - 1
Overall - 7
All told,
Otogizoushi is a thoroughly enjoyable, slightly different take on the paranormal/magic genre. With, sadly, only the barest hint of yuri. :-(
Yuri Anime:I My Me Strawberry Egg
Thought-provoking and slightly disturbing,
I My Me Strawberry Egg deserves careful consideration from the discriminating
yuri fan.
I gotta tell you - it's been a really long time since I sat down and watched
IMMSE and I *still* don't know whether I like it or not.
The basic plot is not that different from the movie
Tootsie: that is, nice young up-and-coming teacher Amawa Hibiki is having a really hard time finding a job. He's perfect for this one gig, but...it's an all-girl school and the principal won't even consider a man for the position. So Hibiki dresses like a woman and lands the job.
Hibiki is an exceptional teacher, and he really connects with his students, in particular Kuzuha Fuko, a shy, clumsy girl that Hibiki really draws out of her shell. Not surprisingly Fuko develops a crush on her beautiful, sweet and kind teacher. The problem is that Hibiki falls for Fuko too. Aside from the issue of teacher-student relation taboos, there's the whole gender thing to contend with. Fuko is terrified of men (and Hibiki when he is a man,) but is in love with Hibiki the woman.
Rather than discuss the plot, let me outline *why* this is such a challenging anime to watch:
1) Hibiki is a better woman than the women. Not only is "she" unreasonably gorgeous and shapely, the school's principal and other teachers are harpy-esque man-haters who are mean and nasty and ugly, internally, and sometimes, externally as well.
2) Hibiki is honestly a decent person, the plot-driving deceit notwithstanding. He's a good teacher, but the essential lie about who and what he is colors all his actions - and worse, he *knows* it. It tears him up inside that he couldn't have just gotten the job as himself. He questions not only his own emotions for Fuko, but hers for him, wondering if her had been himself, would either of them felt even a glimmer of atttraction, or is it only because he is something else that he's let the situation get to this point.
3) The use of miserable pervert peeping toms as "comedic relief." It simply does not get more dreadful than this. There is and never has been *anything* remotely funny about peeping toms. (Socio-Political Rant Mode On: Peeping is a form of stalking, and we really need to get past thinking it's a "boys will be boys" thing, when in reality it is a "boys will be sociopaths" thing. I'm in favor of immediate and painful castration for anyone caught peeping as a reminder to young men that being a dickhead is NOT socially acceptable behavior...: Rant Mode Off)
4) Fuko's emotions. The absolutely hardest thing to watch in this anime is Fuko's love being turned into a side-show so that a jealous colleague can ruin Hibiki. It was painful in the extreme.
5) The pat ending. The problem is, Hibiki *is* a really nice guy, you just cannot hate him. He obviously can't stay at the school, but he really can't just up and leave, either, leaving Fuko to face it all alone - but that's what he does. And Hibiki's landlord turns out to be the ex-husband of the Principal of the school, who had a sex change (apparently to become a horrid crone, go figure) which is why Principal Harpy hates men. It was not only really obvious, but cloying and tedious. What lessons are we supposed to be learning here? That it's okay to fuck with a child's heartfelt emotions in order to teach someone else a lesson, and that having good intentions means it's okay to be selfish? I don't know, really, I just don't know.
In the end, the only truly sympathetic and honest character is Fuko. Her emotions are so real and so raw that they just make this anime that much harder to watch. Fuko really falls in love with Hibiki, but with the female Hibiki who is no more than a sham. So, who does she really fall in love with? We can't say with any conviction that she fell in love with another woman, nor can we say that she didn't. It all ends up kind of messy and up to personal opinion. Obviously, my opinion is that she fell in love with a woman, since she had no reason at all to believe Hibiki to be anything other than what she appeared to be.
In the end, in my opinion it's yuri. It's not a nice, clean story, but it is an interesting and difficult one. And for that reason, well worth watching.
I know that
IMMSE has been released on DVD for the US, so do make sure you buy or rent it legitimately. You'll can buy it through the
Yuricon Shop, of course. In the meantime, please join us on the
Yuricon Mailing List and let us know what *you* think of this story!
Ratings:
Story - 7
Characters - 7
Art - 6
Music - 6
Yuri - 9
Overall - 7
It's not happy, it's not satisfactory and it's not fun. But it *is* smart and it is well-done. Which is why it hurt so damn much.
"I Love Yuri" Gifts and T-shirts at the Yuricon Shop
Just in time for your holiday shopping,
Yuricon brings you gifts, t-shirts, baseball caps and more that tell the world that you love yuri!
Also new for fans of yuri - we're redoing the Manga page so that you can purchase yuri manga in English and Japanese from Amazon and Amazon Japan. Now, when you've heard about something as great as
Yokohama Shopping Log on the
Yuricon Mailing List, you'll be able to get a copy for your very own, right from your home for yuri and shoujoai, Yuricon.
Keep you eyes on the
Yuricon Shop as we update the pages, add new manga, gifts and a brand-new anime page. Buy your yuri anime, manga and gifts through Yuricon and show your support for yuri and shoujoai!
Phantom Memory Kurau Anime
One of the stand-out anime that I am watching at the moment has got to be today's entry,
Phantom Memory Kurau. I really cannot recommend it enough. In a season full of mostly-predictable, fanservice-filled retreads,
Kurau stands head and shoulders above the rest.
Technically
Kurau isn't really from this season - it began last season on Japanese TV and was licensed very quickly by
ADV, who saw a winner in it. And I agree wholeheartedly. Even watching this series raw has been a pleasure. In fact, I'm amazed at how much (other than the police lingo and scientific jargon) I can follow. Which says alot about how basic the idea of this series is.
The setup is presented neatly at the beginning of the anime as Dr. Amami, a scientist, is exploring a new form of energy, called Rynax energy. His daughter, Kurau, is invaded/attacked/infested by the Rynax and begins to show signs of mysterious and completely para-human abilities. After an accident in which Dr. Amami loses an arm, in an effort to protect her father from her unpredictable nature, Kurau leaves her father. When we encounter her, she is an adult, working as an "agent," a sort of free-range PI. Not surprisingly her powers make her very, very good at her job.
But life is not perfect for Kurau. She is awaiting the arrival of her "twin"," her Rynax partner. Shortly after her twin manifests, the two are pursued by a para-military police force called the GPO. Kurau's twin, Christmas, looks like a younger version of Kurau, but does not initially appear to be able to manifest Rynax powers.
The chase still goes on as the series approaches ep. 26, but the story has been consistently excellent. There has been the occasional threat of a predictable plot complication, but so far the writers have avoided any serious plot potholes.
As bad guys, the GPO seem pleasantly conspiracy-theory-ish, while the individual GPO members have developed really interesting personalities. Leading the pack is Ayaka Steiger, an angst-filled GPO career officer with many axes to grind. Her pursuit of Kurau and Christmas quickly becomes personal...but it's to Kurau that Ayaka reaches out when she needs to be understood.
Even the sidekick all-knowing smart guy and ex-GPO dude, Dag, isn't annoying. How is that possible? Ex-whatever guys are *always* annoying. Not Dag. He's just a really, really nice guy.
Yuri-wise you're not going to get anything blatant here. Kurau and Christmas are like sisters, but they definitely, genuinely love one another. Their connection is really deep and really touching. In fact, despite her age, Christmas is such a good character and so great with Kurau that even *I,* child-hater that I am, don't dislike her. Plenty of people are seeing yuri there, but I'm not a big fan of yuricest and I don't see anything physical between them, just sisters that share a major connection through the Rynax.
There is serious yuri potential between Ayaka and Kurau, however. As the recent episodes have played out, Ayaka has sought out Kurau, befriended her, opened up to her and, if you're a typical yuri fan, you're seeing sparks starting to build. I can totally see Ayaka x Kurau fanfic in the works. If the anime doesn't provide the actual bread, it's certainly handing us the grist. :-)
Even the science in
Kurau is interesting. Some of it is quite plausible, which gives the more hypothetical stuff a firm base. And I love the way the terraformed moon is drawn. It's too cool. :-)
Ratings:
Story - 9
Character - 9
Art - 8
Music - 8
Yuri - 5
Overall - 8.
Let's see - cool, competent older lead. Cool, competent potential love interest. Gee, you *think* it's my type of anime? LOL
And not a single school uniform to be seen. Happy sigh. :-)
Yuri Manga sale at Yuricon!
The
Yuricon Shop is celebrating its Grand Re-Opening with a sale on 100% yuri manga from ALC!
Get copies of
Rica 'tte Kanji!? by Rica Takashima,
WORKS by Eriko Tadeno and
Yuri Monogatari 2, ALC's original yuri anthology, at up to 20% off the cover price!
We have *finally* have found a stable replacement for the evil online payment system which shall remain nameless, in
Yow Cow. Yow Cow works exactly the same as that other online payment system, so it should be no trouble at all if you're familiar with online payment - and it allows you to pay by credit card, and from any of almost 200 countries.
Pre-order now, and get the 2nd edition of
Rica 'tte Kanji!? - with bonus "freetalk" pages - for 20% off. Share Rica's funny and heart warming adventures with a friend or two - or heck, *make* a friend or two, by introducing them to 100% yuri manga. :-)
Over the next few weeks, check out our new line of gifts, t-shirts and other items that we'll be adding just in time for the holidays!
Yuri Anime: Vandread-ful
An entire space ship full of lesbians, but "where's the
yuri?"
I sat through the first two seasons of
Vandread in a monster marathon. I figured, great - a space ship full of women, from a planet full of lesbians...I'll get my fill o'yuri from *this* series! Just goes to show you how wrong you can be.
Don't get me wrong - I like a space opera as much as the next guy. I was nursed on old school scifi novels and teethed on the original
Star Trek. When
Star Wars came out (the first time, before Lucas effed it up), I and my Dad saw it in the theater and were blown away. I love space ships and dogfights and end-of-the-world scenarios and all that good stuff. And yet I think that
Vandread may be one of the worst anime I have ever seen.
The plot is simple - once a unified culture, the women and men of the planets Tarak and Mejale have been engaged in a literal war of the sexes for centuries. Each has advanced mecha and retro policies and ne'er the twain shall meet, until...
The all-female pirate crew of the Nirvana, out of Mejale, find themselves confronted with the worst of all possible circumstances when their ship bizarrely (and inexplicably) merges with the all-male crewed Tarak battleship Ikazuchi. Now the Mejale pirates have to deal with male Tarak stowaways, and integrate themselves and their almost sentient ship together into one group. Or not. Because really, very little of any of this is explained...it's all just the vehicle to get three guys onto a spaceship full of women.
Of course, the first thing that happens is that many the women on the ship fall for the biggest loser of the bunch, Hibiki. And he, and the biggest loser among the female crew, Dita, spend the entire series having incredibly dull and tedious scenes of near emotional paralysis and over-tired sightgags. Honestly, if they lost Dita and Hibiki, the series would have been *significantly* more interesting.
The second of the three men, a doctor, is quite pleasant and professional...and competetent, so the series doesn't spend much time on him. He has a slow-burning and rather pleasantly sweet romance with Chief Engineer Parfet, voiced by
Maria-sama ga Miteru's Sei, Toyoguchi Megumi. This is the second-least horrible romance in the story.
The third man to end up on the Nirvana is a total loser named Bart. And of *all* the stories, it is Bart's that is the least horrible - actually it was the only interesting storyline in the series. The ship's second in command, BC, is a daunting and businesslike woman who (rightfully) terrifies Bart. For some reason (never explained) Bart has the ability to steer the ship, by merging with its near-sentient drive. So BC is forced to deal with Bart. And so are we. At first Bart is self-absorbed and tedious, but, as time goes on, he actually becomes a person and even tries to, in a cute but pathetic way, woo BC. BC keeps Bart at a distance but at the end of the first season, we learn that there was a *really* good reason why. BC is really....a guy. Bart, who has broken past all his culture's mores to fall in love with the enemy now finds that the object of his affection is not only a spy, but also not even a she. Bart has the most wonderful scene in the entire series when he confronts BC after "she" brings them to Tarak as prisoners.
So, in a weird gender-bendy way, the best love story is a gay male one.
But what about the lesbians, you may ask? Keep asking, because frankly, there's little enough about them.
To begin with, there's Barnette and Jura. Here's the official description of Barnette from Pioneer's official Vandread site - "She seems to like Jura." Isn't that brutal? They are the only long-term, stable couple on ship and all we get is, "She seems to like Jura." Excuse me while I spit. To add to the annoyance factor, Jura spends every waking moment trying to get into Hibiki's pants to make a perfect child - because she loves things of beauty and, inexplicably to anyone with eyes, she finds runty, loser, dorky Hibiki to be a perfect specimen of his gender. Yes, it becomes an issue between Barnette and Jura and yes, they have a few moments of togetherness and reconciliation, but nothing that made me like either of them very much.
And then there's Meia. The butchy, cool, unemotional, full-of-anger driven comptence type, Meia is the chief fighter pilot for the Nirvana. In the second season we get a short arc about her, with near-explicit lesbian references, if you don't blink and miss them. And at the VERY end, we get to see her reunite with her lover and gosh, they both look happy! Meia is about as good as it gets in
Vandread. As an added bonus, Meia is voiced by Orikasa Fumiko, who has also done such yuri notables as Ruki from
Digimon Tamers, Karin from
Stratos 4 and Yayoi from
Stellvia. In fact, Orikasa Fumiko has voiced *so* many characters on
"The List" at
Yuricon, it makes one wonder about her agent. Or her.
In any case, at the end of the second season, the bad guys are talked to death, Hibiki turns out to be the single most important person on both worlds and the war turns out to be a marital spat gone bad. And the season, and the series, ends without a single thing of merit or note. Whee.
Ratings:
Story - 4
Characters - 7 (To paraphrase an old rhyme, "the good ones are very good, the bad ones are horrid")
Music - 5
Art - 5
Yuri - should be 9, but instead limps in at a lame 3
Overall - 5, but only because of Bart and BC, otherwise it would be a 3.
Let's put it this way - I may be waffling over buying
Stratos 4 on DVD...I never ever *considered* buying
Vandread.
Live Action: Cutie Honey Movie
All hail Go Nagai!
Everything about the previews for the
Cutie Honey movie, had me squirming with embarrassment. It looked like it was going to be a travesty of immense proportion, much along the lines of the
Kekkou Kamen live action (if you can really call them that...) movies.
Instead, I was amazed at the translation of the cheesy, yet charming, anime into an equally cheesy and perhaps even more charming live action movie. Right off the bat, the bad guys rocked. Their costumes were amazing, they actually acted the parts like they cared, and the special effects were exactly the right level of screamingly bad/amusingly good.
Satou Eriko was stellar as Honey. She was cute, she was enthusiastic and
genki...she was an irritating bubble-head, and you couldn't help but smile at her antics. And while the opening scenes had a fair amount of Eriko in underwear fanservice, that was basically it for the movie. As the plot progessed the fanservice sort of tails off into dress-up scenes, and then completely disappears. Refreshing and a bit puzzling, since in the beginning there's so much energy, and by the end of the movie everyone looks ready to call it a day and go home.
The opening sequence was a *perfect* reproduction of the
Cutey Honey Flash anime, while the rest of the movie has more in common with the new
Re Cutie Honey anime that I reviewed last week. (Although, quite inexplicably Sister Jill has been turned into an ugly guy. In fact, the portrayal of Jill was significant in the lack of energy in the ending. Sister Jill wasn't just draining the people of Townsville's energy - she was sucking mine away too. But I digress.) Unlike the anime, we got to enjoy the wacky capers of the Panther Claw hench-dudes, who are always, erm, yeah.
Aki Natsuko was played to a tee by Ichikawa Mikako (who looks alot more like Na-chan than any real human should...). There was a bit too much Seiji - played with vim, vigor and the appropriate arrogance by Murakami Jun - especially at the end, where his exceptional competence annoyed the hell out of me.
The movie comes in at a lower yuri score than the anime, but still, the vibe between Na-chan and Honey was still recognizably there. If Seiji backed off for a second, I think you'd see some sparks flying. And in the end it was Na-chan and Honey who cry in each other's arms, while Seiji just sort of looks out of place. So there, Seiji - nyah. :-)
A few other nice touches - Go Nagai has a cameo as the driver of a car upon which Honey falls, butt first. He looks extra happy to be looking up at the view. LOL And the remix of the Cutey Honey theme by Koda Kumi absolutely *rocks.* Her voice is a little deeper and breathier than the anime versions. The video for the theme is refreshingly awful and I highly recommend everyone watch it until, you, like me, sing the damn theme for weeks on end, non-stop. Can you say "sticky"? I knew you could.
The movie did have some weak areas, especially the lackluster ending. I don't know why, but Japanese live-action movies really suck the life out of bad guys. The live action
Hana no Asuka-gumi movie had the same problem - Hibari was turned into the same kind of non-presence as Sister Jill in this movie. When the bad guy is supposed to be the motivation for the heroine's actions, you'd *think* they'd give us an energetic and charismatic baddie...but instead, we tend to get colorless non-entities who barely even move their mouths. Drives me crazy. Especially when Sister Jill was so great in the anime. Oh well.
In every other way, however, this movie is a must-see for fans of yuri, classic anime, inutterable cheesiness or all of the above. It looked like everyone on the set was having a really, really good time making this movie, something that they communicated through their acting. It left me with a really good feeling about the whole thing.
Ratings:
Story - 8
Character - 9
Cinematography - 8
Costumes - 9
Music - 9
Yuri - 5
Overall - A really strong 8.
This was one of the most enjoyable movies I've seen all year, bar none. I can't recommend it enough. If I had seen this in the theater I would have been shouting and cheering through the entire first half like a lunatic. :-)
Yuri Anime: Re Cutie Honey
Let us all get on our knees and worship at the deranged altar of Go Nagai. (Oh, mighty one, we worship you and your totally insane need to give us sweet, innocent, yet frequently naked, heroines.)
Back in July, I reviewed the
Cutey Honey manga and
Cutey Honey Flash anime, as collected in the
Anime Essential Collection. Today, it is my *great* pleasure to review what has been, to me, the most deeply satisfying anime I've seen all season.
Re Cutie Honey strikes a perfect balance between honestly good and enjoyably bad.
Produced by
Gainax In their 20th anniversary year, the animation for
Re Cutie Honey feels like Powerpuff Girls meets Batman. More angular than past incarnations, more action-filled (although with less violence, go figure) the new Cutie Honey has changed more than just the spelling of her name.
Like all incarnations of Honey, this OVA begins with an origin episode that establishes the bad science behind Honey's creation, and her blonde good-girl persona as Kusanagi Honey. In this incarnation, she appears to be an Office Lady in a city government office.
We are quickly introduced to Aki Natsuko ("Na-chan") a tough-as-nails female cop, who almost instantly dislikes Honey and everything she stands for. For Na-chan, justice is not about flashy costume changes and mass destruction, but grunt work and police procedure - and she resents the damage that Honey's "justice" leaves behind.
Complicating matters, Honey and Na-chan are next-door neighbors. Honey tries to make amends, and desperately wants to be liked by Na-chan, but the policewoman has worked too hard and long to see Honey's point of view.
Episode 1 passes with nary a shared look between the two, but in Episode 2, Na-chan and Honey have a blowup, as Na-chan totally rejects Honey's overture of friendship. The two spend a tearful, melancholic night separated by a single physical wall and a huge emotional one. Honey, rejected and distraught ,shuts down in the middle of her next battle, but Na-chan, realizing that Honey actually *needs* love to survive, strips down and brings her back to life in a spectacular use of fanservice.
Episode 3 concludes the highly charged arc between them, as baddie Sister Jill (we've lost the original Panther Claw and her gang of mask-wearing baddies) tries to take over the town. Sister Jill desires to possess Honey (as well as, of course, the rest of the world.) It turns out that Sister Jill was also created by Honey's father, and so is a kind of big sister to Honey, although Jill's desire for Honey doesn't seem particularly sisterly, if you know what I mean.
But, of course, love wins the day, as a super butched-up, bristling with weapons Na-chan takes on Sister Jill and with a faux-kiss that was pretty sweet, once again gives Honey the will to survive. The battle ends with a big bang, but I knew that the story wasn't over, because I'm an old hand at this, and Honey *never* dies.
The epilogue shows us the new improved butchy Na-chan and Honey have gone into business together and appear to be (to discerning eyes wearing their yuri goggles) a couple. As they ride off to the scene of the next attack, Na-chan in her Akio-red car and Honey on her motorcylce (we remember what *that* means,right?) we can sit back and bask in the knowledge that fanfic writers everywhere are working on their "Honey and Na-chan get it on" fics even as we smile.
Good, bad and indifferent all at once, Re Cutie Honey is a thumbs up for yuri fans would don't mind taking their yuri with a shaker or two of parody, perversion and pathos.
Ratings:
Story - 6
Characters - 9
Art - 8
Music - 9
Yuri - 9
Overall - 8.
"Hey, You got your Gainax in my Go Nagai!"
"Hey! Your Go Nagai's in my Gainax!"
"Mmmm, delicious."
Yuri Anime: 2x2 Shinobuden, the Nonsense Kunoichi Fiction
After nearly two weeks of turning the yuri goggles on full power and still having to squint, I need to write about something with *actual* yuri in it.
2x2 Shinobuden, the Nonsense Kunoichi Fiction, is just the thing to cure my "where's the yuri?" blues.
The plot of
Shinobuden can be summed up in two words - "Wackiness ensues." While this is not my favorite plot in the universe,
Shinobuden is a cute example of this very tired breed.
Shinobu is a young, well-endowed female ninja (the
Kunoichi of the title) in training. She lives in a compound with a host of male ninjas and their master, a yellow ball with the name of Onsokumaru. The combined intelligence and maturity of all the ninjas and Onsokumaru appears to be about that of a 12 years old boy. The guys are all typical incompetent peverts, Shinobu is the typical sweet, clueless innocent. Wackiness ensues.
The yuri interest is Shinobu's friend Kaede. For a change, Kaede is not engaged in a one-sided love for Shinobu, it's the other way around. Shinobu hopelessly tries to entice Kaede to, you know, get closer, so they can, you know, be better friends, but Kaede's a bit stuffy and doesn't seem to be even remotely interested. In fact, she seems downright turned off by the idea of snuggling with Shinobu. Kaede is, however, the only really intelligent and competent character in the show, so when she comes over, wackiness ensues.
(There is one other seemingly intelligent and competent character, the master of the female ninja school, but as we learn that she is in love with Onsokumaru, her "intellgent" score drops pretty low on my scale. And *why* Shinobu doens't go to the all-girl school is not really explained in the middle of all the wackiness ensuing.)
Poor Shinobu is really quite sweet and innocent so, although her desire for Kaede is apparent, it's not like she's going to come right out and be blunt. And, let's be real, this is all played for laughs anyway. If one watches this show hoping for the girl to get the girl, one is deluding one's self. :-)
This series gets filed under cute, sweet, goofy parody yuri.
Ratings:
Story - 7
Characters - 8
Art - 7
Music - 7, but highly sticky
Yuri - 8
Overall - 7. If you like farce and slapstick, this is a winner. Me, not so much.
My favorite bit of the entire show is the end credits which is done with puppet animation. I think that it's exceptionally well done and funnier than the rest of the show.
New Anime Season Autumn 2004 - Rozen Maiden
A series about an abusive goth lolita doll and her loser human servant. Need I say more?
I had actually picked up a copy of the
Rozen Maiden manga ages ago, flipped through it, then dropped it like the evil thing it is. LOL But when the anime came out, I found myself attracted to it in ways that make absolutely *no* sense to me whatsoever. For one thing - I hate dolls with a passion. They utterly creep me out. And the goth lolita look is utterly yawn-making for me. So, why then am I watching this with something approaching actual enjoyment?
Well, to be fair, the
anime for
Rozen Maiden is really well done, for one thing. The art is clean, the voice acting excellent and the opening and ending themes are done by
Ali Project, those darlings of Bee Train anime and also the folks who gave life to
Pastel Pure - the opening theme of
Maria-sama ga Miteru. (I strongly suggest a visit to AP's website now, btw...just for the "wtf?" factor. LOL I didn't know my eyebrows went that far up my forehead.)
The story is simple - creepy doll Shinku finds her way to the house of Jun, a boy who is a classic
otaku, in the sense that he is *so* socially retarded (and, we are led to believe, genuinely phobic) that he is terrified to leave the house. Jun's sister Nori seems happy enough to take care of Jun even while she hopes that he will one day go back to school.
Shortly after Shinku's arrival another doll (a clown...of course,) arrives to kill Jun. Shinku informs Jun that she can save him, but he must swear to be her servant. The word she uses has more of the implication of "slave" so, naturally, Jun is reluctant. However, he is more reluctant to die, so, he kisses her ring and now lives as indentured servant to a doll. A doll with impeccable manners, but still...
The next several episodes involves introducing many more dolls, some good, some bad, and one seriously annoying little girl doll who makes my teeth clench everytime she speaks. Each doll has her own issues and powers. At least one of the dolls is *evil* - you can tell, she's all in black and leaves raven feathers everywhere she's been...oh, and she says something about destroying Shinku somewhere in there too. See? Evil.
Okay, I admit it, I have no sense of tension, urgency or passion about this series - in fact, when questioned, I admit it's stupid with a capital "stoo," but I like it anyway. Where else but in anime can one see a creepy loser kid get the stuffing beaten out of him by a doll and still like the doll better than the human?
So, yeah, yuri. Well...I don't got my hopes up, but I'm willing to be wrong. I think the sister would make good crush fodder, but as has already been pointed out to me, she *does* have a serious brother complex, so maybe not. Yuri between the dolls somehow holds no appeal for me...but then, I hate dolls. If there is any, I'm betting we see
akogare by at least one of the dolls for Shinku who is, honestly, quite cool if you like physically abusive goth lolita dolls. :-)
Ratings:
Story - 7
Character - 8
Art - 8
Music - 8
Yuri - 0
Loser FanBoy - 7
Overall - A strong 6. I'm willing to give it time and see where it goes.
Watching Shinku beat the crap out of Jun makes me happy, what can I say? Apparently my admiration for women who aren't above a little physical violence extends to dolls. Great.
