Wednesday, August 22, 2007

This is getting posted a little late because I had to watch the season finale of "America's Got Talent." (The right person won, yay!)

Day three of my Manga-a-day project and I've decided to do two volumes at once, the first two volumes of the yaoi series Junjo Romantica by Shungiku Nakamura. My yaoi manga collection has steadily been growing over the past year or so. For people who don't see the attraction to the genre (boys love) it's hard to explain.Most yaoi titles are solidly in the realm reserved for Romance novels, not at all realistic or high art but a good, smutty and escapist way to spend an afternoon.

Junjo Romantica is a very standard, if explicit, example of the genre. There are actually two separate stories within this title. Junjo Romantica, about a relationship between Misaki, high school senior and award-winning novelist Usami Akihiko and Junjo Egotist, the story of college student Hiroki and the four year younger Nowaki. In the first book the storylines share about equal space. In the second it's weighted slightly towards Junjo Egoist, and since I liked that storyline better that was fine by me.

The first volume had a lot of "surprise sex." There is no rape in yaoi, just surprise! Sex! Because when a man says no-no, really, he means "yes, please." The story starts off with Misaki trying to get into M university and going to his brother's best friend Akihiko for tutoring. It doesn't start off well when he discovers among Akihiko's newly published books a yaoi novel starring Akihiko and Misaki's older brother! In a rage, Misaki confronts Akihiko. Akihiko treats Misaki to some surprise sex. For some reason, Misaki, while claiming to be straight, not gay and not interested in Akihiko, comes back for more surprise sex... er I mean tutoring. And even after he gets into school agrees to live with him while he goes to school. It's not until the second volume that he even starts to suspect that he might like Akihiko that way.

The story in Junjo Egoist is loosely related to Junjo Romantica. Junjo Egoist seems to take place about 10 years before. Hiroki had a crush on Akihiko while they were both in school and Akihiko was still crushing on Misaki's older brother. After a disastrous sexual encounter with his crush Hiroki is wallowing in self-pity when he's discovered by Nowaki. Nowaki follows him home like a stray cat and forces his way into Hiroki's life and apartment. Hiroki agrees to tutor Nowaki to get into college since Nowaki only has a middle school degree (he is an orphan and started working early.)The main conflict in this story is Hiroki battling with his ego. Nowaki is four years younger, but he's taller, seems much more emotionally mature and is even the aggressor in their relationship. It's am much more realistic (as realistic as yaoi gets anyway) storyline and I like it better then title story. I find it more romantic.

I honestly can't decide if I like the artwork in this book. The author goes for comedy a lot so the expressions are often deformed and expressive instead of realistic. She has some extreme problems with proportion. Akihiko's hands are like dinner plates. They're huge! But the weirdest thing is they grow and shrink. He'll have perfectly normal hands while smoking a cigarette but once he starts going after Misaki they swell up until they look like they could completely engulf Misaki's head. However, despite the flaws, the artwork has a really good flow and energy and expresses the characters emotions well. I think her sex scenes look awkward but the more romantic scenes often give a very sweet feel. The nicest thing about these books is that each one has an end of finality. You can read just one and not be left on a cliffhanger waiting for the next. (I'm not sure how many volumes there are, but I know there is at least one more.) They're good self-contained stories to spend an afternoon with.

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