Doujin Review: Kyonko to Issho

Doujin Review: Kyonko to Issho

I have never been a fan of the Haruhi Suzumiya franchise. Sure, I’ve heard of it – but more like I had been bombarded with it. Mostly with second-hand accounts from everyone else who had actually watched the series. That was why when given the chance to watch the anime I just said “No”, since I’ve already learned enough to know what’s going on and had grown too desensitized to want to know more.

     That’s why I was surprised when I actually liked this little number.

     This doujin features a gender-flipped version of the cast but mostly it focuses on the two main characters. A male Haruhi (Haruhiko) and a female Kyon (Kyonko) looked more adorable than the original couple, especially when the latter seemed to have the last say in the relationship.

Believe that.

     The sex scenes are decent and sweet enough for a vanilla, but what really sells this story is the back and forth banter of the two leads. Most especially Kyonko, probably the only character I’ve seen in any doujin works that can still snark during foreplay.

    Another good thing about this doujin is that even if you do remove any connection and semblance it has to the Haruhi Suzumiya franchise, it can still be a worthwhile read even as an original work. The dialogue is funny on its own and is enough to tell its own story independent of the source material. For fans of the series, the story gives us a good look into the relationship of its gender-flipped leads. By itself, the script shows us a decent slice-of-life portrayal of middle-school club members who are interesting themselves.

     As an added bonus, near the end we’re treated to the sight of a female Itsuki. Still the same personality-wise, it looked like the artist gave this gender-flipped version a bit of Mikuru’s hairstyle and outfit. And speaking of Mikuru, her gender-flipped version never did show up here. Not even mentioned once at all.

     I thought that was all it is to the story when I got to the afterword. Then I saw the last panel.

 Who knew a male Nagato looked so solidly built?

     Cheers to vlad, Nagexe, Altereggo and masamune of Circle Credit and littlewhitebutterflies.net for giving us this. As well as the author Akikan for this stroke of brilliance. I did some liberty on rearranging some of the panels for the sake of presentation. In case anyone minds, I invoke the right to disclaimership.

One-Shot Manga Review: Koe no Katachi (The Shape of the Voice)

 One-Shot Manga Review: Koe no Katachi (The Shape of the Voice)

Be nice kids...

A would-be doujin was the last place I expected a story like this.

    Here I was browsing through the latest uploads in my favorite hentai doujin site (read: porn), and I come across this little entry that stood out from the rest. There's no sex in it, no innuendo, not even nudity. All it had was the story of a deaf girl suffering from the teasing and bullying of her grade-school classmates.

    That was all it took to reel me in.

    Koe no Katchi (trans: The Shape of the Voice) is a one-shot manga that had one the 80th Newbie Best Mangaka Award and, after some difficulty, ran in the February edition of Bessatsu Shounen Magazine and in Weekly Shounen Magazine. The reason it was difficult to publish was because of its content, which showed a bitter and unabashed look at bullying in schools.

    The abuse was hard to stomach, and at some points hard to believe. Your mileage might vary on this one, but readers are guaranteed to be either surprised or shocked (maybe both) at the unfettered display of annoyance and outright disdain for the girl. Even more so when you see them brush off all responsibility of it and took their frustrations on the one person who tried to point out their hypocrisy. Said person, who was the narrator, was also the only one who apparently had grown guilty of their teasing and had just started standing up for the poor girl.

     The portrayal of children as bastards and adults as irresponsible have never been portrayed so vividly. This was only a 60-page work but there was a goddamn boatload of emotions evoked here.

    The last seven to eight pages gives us what maybe the only sense of relief in the story. A chance for closure, redemption, and an open-ended development for a pairing. And, according to some forums online, the chance for some serialization.

    Koe no Katachi was a recent scanlation released by the Futari Wa Pretty Anon translator group. The author Ooima Yoshitoki is a new name in the manga community and, personally, someone I've added to my list of favorite up-and-coming authors.

A New Blog, New Shenanigans

Hi!
     This new blog started off as musings in my head after having seen one too many fanfics. Got too much to think about, got to much to say, had to write them down. Got too many of them crammed somewhere and it was a waste of thoughts to hide them all away. Then, I decided to go along with this.
     Sturgeon's Law states that majority (about 90%) of everything is shit, and that applies even to stories. And I've spent a long while going through them looking for the remaining few that's worthwhile. The one's featured here are some of those worthwhile stuff and I write my thoughts on why and what about.
     Will post links to them along with the articles, so go ahead and read them at your leisure as well.

Pokemon Fanfic Review: The Sound of Falling Rain by DOTMW

Artwork by 清順(春コミむ３９a）

Pokemon Fanfic Review: The Sound of Falling Rain by DOTMW

I was feeling nostalgic one day that I was in the mood for browsing some Ash/Misty fanart. Ever since that ship was indefinitely sunk by canon and no signs of it ever coming back afloat, I had to rely on anything made by the fans just to see those two together. Who wouldn’t? Anyone who had grown up with the classic series way back in the beginning had actually hoped for these two to hit it off. And I’ve slaked my interest with what few doujins, fanart and half-decent fanfics the net has to offer.

I’ve found this little gem just recently. It was listed in the Fanfic Recs portion of TVTropes, recommended by Troper Sagacious Zu (thank you VERY much, by the way), and the story might as well be the best thing ever done for this pairing in a long time.

Set ten years after the start of the series (chronological time finally affecting the cast that they do grow up) and a year after the events of the Diamond & Pearl series of the anime, the cast had moved on with their lives. Gary Oak had taken over his grandpa’s research, May and Drew (along with a character import from the games) travel together participating in coordinator contests around the world, Drew had been doing the same thing on her own and has settled down in Sunsyhore, Brock’s still a Gym Leader, and as is Misty (who, by the way, had upgraded the Cerulean Gym to penultimate boss levels). While Ash…

Ash had been travelling alone the past few years, preparing for the Sinnoh Cup where he has to face Regional Champion Cynthia and that unholy beast of a GARchomp she calls a Pokemon. Only, just an hour or so before the event, he disappears. No warning, no explanation, no clue where he’s gone to or where he is. He just left, walked away. Of course, everyone else in the cast starts worrying because… Well, this is Ash. This is the kid who goes charging into things (under-leveled or not), challenging Legendaries, bringing down criminal organizations, and saving the world every big damn movie. If those things can’t break him down, then what was it that caused him to walk out like that?

And why was it that wound up on Misty’s front porch looking, by all means, broken.

I like how this fic explores not just the romance between a twenty-something Ash and Misty but also how much they and the rest of the cast mean to each other. There’s a kind of dynamic you find in a bunch of people who had traveled and gotten close together adventure after adventure, region after region, that makes it feel like they’ve developed into one big family. Though most of them are done with their adventuring days and have settled down into their own lives, they still care enough for boy and electric mouse who had brought them all together in the first place.

The fic also explores one particular topic that had the fandom theorizing and inspiring fanfics ever since the earlier seasons: Ash. Ketchum’s. Father. I won’t spoil it here, but I will admit that it isn’t the guy’s identity that’s important in this story. It’s more like his influence on the young Ash that’s more drawn on. Just what kind of guy would abandon his wife and kid, and still travels the world on a Pokemon journey? And how hard would that be on the poor kid, living with the knowledge that his dad’s out there and never came back. Plenty of issues there.

And it’s from this kind of drama that this story draws its strength from. Because other than giving us a few laughs and the excuse to have Ash and Misty together, this story explores the importance of finding closure. Disappeared dad suddenly back in your life? Old childhood crush affecting you even after all these years? Not knowing what to do when life had hit you so hard? Yeah, these things definitely need some closure.

This also provides closure for us old-time fans who had grown up pairing these two together, and I’m not kidding – not even exaggerating – that this might as well be the best thing that has ever happened to the Ash/Misty pairing. The kind of treatment we’d never get from a kid’s show. It might not be canon, sure, but hey, this is the reason why fanfics are read. Heck, this is why fanfics are even made.

Here’s the link:

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5859927/1/The-Sound-of-Falling-Rain

Enjoy :)