Yuri Anime: Yuru Yuri (English)

I would like to begin this review with a sincere apology to the fine people at Ichijinsha. I know that a lot of work and energy went into the making of Yuru Yuri and I wish, I truly do, that I could have liked it. But, I did not. If you habitually like the kinds of anime and manga I dislike, If you love series like Lucky Star and A Channel, then do not read this review, just hurry over to Crunchyroll and watch Yuru Yuri - you'll love it.

I have spent more than a decade promoting Yuri, highlighting series that focus on women in love with one another, pointing out over and over that "Yuri" is not, really, anything like the fantasies creepy loser guys have about girls. Yet with Yuru Yuri, the creators go right to LFB territory, then crawl slowly steadily down to wallow in the most banal, most creepy possible tropes. I'm genuinely frustrated by the choices made here.

Yuri Yuri is the story of four girls who hang around and do nothing. These four are all very typical moe types, so forget having any kind of personality. Less than 5 minutes into the anime, there were already 4 underwear gags, the main character had forgotten that school started that day (which is totally likely if you have no family or friends, live in a box and have no media access, I suppose.)  The entirety of the second half of the episode is a systematic destruction of the protagonist's ego. As a *joke*. Because making fun of a friend until they cry is absolutely hilarious, as we all know.

At 8 minutes in, I had a crisis and almost gave up watching altogether. It was so horrible, so tedious, so completely un-fun. My number one criteria for entertainment is that it ought to, you know, entertain me. Watching Yuru Yuri was the anime equivalent of a dentist's appointment.

There is "Yuri" of course. Of the most excruciating LFB kind. Kyoko likes to look at panties and wants to possess the cute loli. Chinatsu, the loli, crushes on Yui, the moe equivalent of the cool princely character. And let's not forget the implication of a deep, pathological, stalking sister complex Akari's sister appears to have for her. That's always good for a laugh.

The one thing that really wasn't terrible was Crunchyroll's subtitling. It's not perfect, but it was definitely one of the least objectionable jobs I've ever seen from them. So that, at least, is something positive to note.

I'm sorry, Namori-sensei. I'm sorry, editors of Comic Yuri Hime. I'm sure that Yuru Yuri will be very successful, but I won't be watching. As much as I want it to succeed, I actually like the anime less than I do the manga. And I don't like the manga very much at all. I came into the anime with very, very low expectations and this managed to not meet any of them.

In the end, Kyoko described this series best when she described the protagonist Akari with "A lack of outstanding qualities is your most outstanding quality."

Ratings:

Art - 5 If you like moe you will probably think it a 6 or 7
Characters - 4 See above
Story - 3 See above
Yuri - There is no real affection, love or desire here. Just gags.
Loser FanBoy - 10

Overall - 4

Pain upon realizing that Comic Yuri Hime's first "Yuri" anime ever is everything I have fought to get rid of, in order to be able to tell stories of women in love with one another - 100

Breaking News: Yuru Yuri to Simulcast on Crunchyroll

Anime Expo continues with more Yuri-friendly news, as YNN Correspondent Bruce McF points out, with Crunchyroll's announcement that namori's slice-of-life with some slight Yuri flavoring series, Yuru Yuri,  has been added to their simulcast line-up.

Bruce suggests one and a half Hip, Hip, Hoo...rays. ^_^

Breaking News: Yuru Yuri Anime

Namori-sensei's Yuru Yuri from Comic Yuri Hime has been officially given the go for an anime series.

On the one hand, I'm happy for Comic Yuri Hime editors, who have been working for this for a while. And I'm happy for fans of Yuru Yuri. But on the other hand, it is quite possibly the least interesting series running in Comic Yuri Hime in my opinion and I can't feel especially excited about it. It's a very formulaic, moe schoolgirl story with a bare veneer of Yuri, so that should cement its popularity with fans of Hidamari Sketch, K-ON! and other cute girls being cute, cutely-type series.

I am glad because this is the first Yuri Hime anime and I hope desperately and probably pointlessly that if this does well, they will then try to animate something I like better. But in reality, anything I like is going to be less ambiguous and therefore probably less popular/successful. ^_^

In any case, congrats to Namori-sensei and the folks at Ichijinsha!

3/27 Update: Yuri Yuri anime website is live.

Houkago no Preadesu Anime

When I first started writing about anime, I can absolutely guarantee that I never expected to be writing about an anime created by the company Subaru. But here I am, doing that very thing.

Subaru (the car company, yes) has teamed up with Gainax to create a short 4-part anime called Houkago no Preadesu (放課後のプレアデス). All four episodes are available on Youtube. The channel design is cute and astronomical in theme, which fits the anime and the sponsor. Subaru is Japanese for what we call the Pleiades.

The story is a simple one - a schoolgirl named Subaru uses a key to get into a rooftop garden where she meets Minato, a boyish girl. The run-down garden has been magically transformed into a paradise.

The same magic accompanies Subaru when she finds her best friend Aoi with a number of other girls, all in "magical" attire, in a sumptuous club room - with an alien creature as club president.

Subaru joins the club, has her magical transformation, but flubs her first mission and gives up the star they gathered to the baddy...who is clearly Minato. Subaru and Aoi have an argument about Subaru's membership in the group, but they make up with confessions of like.

In a final confrontation, Subaru defeats Minato, but promises to look for her. Minato bequeaths her ugly grey cardigan (c.p., Panic, Strawberry; Shizuma's ugly grey cardigan) to Subaru who we later see wearing it.

The final credits include still art from a variety of artists that really drive the point home that the club is composed of one of each "type" required by moe fans these days. ^_^ And Subaru is color-coded pink so the girls watching will naturally like it, as we all know girls react on a cellular level to pink.

I want to thank 16_nikki on Twitter for the heads up about this series. I was told that it is 60% Yuri in order to motivate me to watch it - I think that might be a fair estimate. It's short, but there's still plenty of space to fill in a relationship between Subaru and Minato and a best-friend-y thing with Aoi. I'm sure at least *one* doujinshi circle will pair them all up, since we all know that twin-tail tsunderes and Nadesico beauties can't resist the competent leader and the genki forward.

As a magical girl series, Houkago no Preadesu hits all the typical notes. The costume and accouterments designs by Gainax are cute, familiar and ever so slightly innovative. There's nothing in the series a little kid couldn't watch, but the lingering looks at thighs reminds one that Gainax is still a male gaze kind of shop. Aside from the shot of the Pleiades at the beginning of each episode and the car key Subaru uses to unlock the garden, the company has kept themselves out of the way of the story.

Ratings:

Art - 8
Story - 7
Characters - 7
Yuri - 4
Loser FanBoy  - 1

Overall - 7

This anime isn't going to ring chimes all over the world, but I'm betting you're gonna see more of this kind of thing as time goes on. If two of Japan's major exports - anime and cars - team up, we could see a whole new "soft power" wave headed at us in the days ahead.

Top Ten Yuri Anime of 2010

Making this list this year was hard. Really hard. Not a lot of good Yuri anime was released this year, heck, not a lot of good anime was released this year. As a result, I am drawing on Fandom interests for a number of these...so don't be surprised to see stuff on here where the Yuri primarily exists in Fans' heads.

I'm combining Japanese and English titles once again, because this is me flailing to put together ten titles at all.

Honorable Mention)  K-ON! (Japanese) - I almost wish this series actually had some Yuri in the anime other than fan obsession, because it was, honestly, one of the two best anime I watched all year and I cannot wait to get it in 2011. So, let it be known that if this had genuinely had Yuri, this would be my #2 choice for the year.

10) So Ra No Wo To/Strike Witches 2nd Season (Japanese/English) - Again, most of the Yuri in these series is in fans' heads, with a teeny weeny little bit of "hint" here and there through the animes. Neither of these held any appeal to me, but the folks that liked them liked the *lots.* Fans are still popping out work based on these two series which combine military and moe fetishes for a successful campaign to gain fans' discretionary income.

9) Shattered Angels (English) - Kaishaku's a lame-ass, but Kaon and Himiko get the ending Chikane and Himeko don't. QED. I still wish we had the extras, though.

8) Rin: Daughters of Mnemosyne (English) - I loved this series, despite (or perhaps because of) the ridiculously intense levels of violence and ill-conceived plot. I just loved everything about it. From the BDSM motif, to the forays into the metaphysical and religious imagery and being able to watch Rin com back from death over and over again, I just loved it.

7) Hidamari Sketch 365 (English)  - I still would have been happier if Hiro and Sae were presented as an actual couple, so poor Hiro didn't have to suffer in silence at Sae's cluelessness, but oh well. In every other way, this is another cute, moe series.

6) Ikkitousen Dragon Destiny/Shin Koihime Musou Otome Tairan (English) - Both these series do something idiotic - they turn the great heroes of the Chinese epic Romance of the Three Kingdoms into buxom women, then basically wallow in service with occasional nods to the original. In a lot of ways, I prefer Ikkitousen to Otome Tairan. Although Otome Tairan had more actual straightforward Yuri, Ikkitousen has more actual straightforward people beating the crap out of one another, which I prefer. But they both had some Yuri and both had busty Kanu Unchous, and so for that reason I've lumped them together.

5) Maria Watches Over Us, Season 4 (English) - Again, low on Yuri, except in Fan's heads, but because I love Yumi and Yumi loves Touko, I love Touko. And I love Touko and Yumi as soeur. So, #5.

4) Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha Movie the 1st (Japanese and English) -  I haven't even seen it yet, but Fate x Nanoha = win. Even if that 'x' stands for "colorful fights where they beat the crap out of each other."

3) CANAAN (English) - Maria and Canaan love each other, but they aren't going to live happily ever after in an action story like this. Nonetheless, totally worth any Yuri fan's time, unless all you like is romance.

2) Blue Drop (English) -  Oh, look, a series with actual Yuri on this list! Sentai Filmworks put this out in a season set just so we could get a single freaking kiss on this list, I swear. ^_^; This series of lesbian aliens and Japanese schoolgilrs scratches a whole lotta itches, from CGI spaceship fetishes to us fanfic writers. It's a great story in what was probably the last good series Yoshitomo Akihito will ever do.

How well do you know me? Do you know what I'm going to name the best Yuri Anime of 2010? Can you guess?

If you've talked to me any time in the last 40+ weeks, you'll know the answer.

My vote for the best anime overall this year is....

1) Heartcatch PreCure (Japanese) -  Yes, the Yuri is mostly in fans' heads. I am one of those fans and in my head Tsubomi still has a crush on Itsuki and Tsukikage Yuri is seeing Erika's sister Momoko during the day and had a torrid affair with Dark Cure as Cure Moonlight. And there is nothing you can say to make me think otherwise. :-) Aside from that, this delightful magical girl series has girls that punch and kick the bad guys and are not any less feminine for doing so. Yuri (the character) is cool and competent, the team has no one leader - they all have their strengths and weaknesses - and in general, this has been an amazingly fun series, with great characters, sticky music and all the things I look for in a magical girl series.

So there we are - once again, no matter how much the boys' series load up on Yuri, it's the series for girls' that capture my heart. ^_^

Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha The Movie 1st BluRay (English)

 Today is Wednesday and you know what that means - a special guest review treat! Richard B. has been a commenter here several times and, as I will not get to see this BD until the new year, I thought I'd let him give us his two Canadian cents before I have a go at it. Take it away, Miwa!

Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha the Movie 1st is a retelling of the events of the first Nanoha TV series. While this may not seem like a good thing, it does pay to remember that back in 2004 the first Nanoha TV season was a scattered mess. As a spinoff from the Triangle Hearts adult game series the first few episodes were nothing more than a bad Card Captor Sakura clone. With a few unsavoury elements left over from its source material.

It wasn’t until later on in the series when Fate was introduced, that the things became interesting. She was a dark, mysterious magical girl with a troubled past, fighting our main character. So the first thing fandom did was pair them together as a couple. Add in the fact the battles in the final few episodes were done in more of a shounen giant robot style (complete with giant beam attacks) and the series took a complete 180-degree turn.

With all that and seeing how the later series were more popular and sold better in Japan, you could see why the makers wanted to redo the original material. And, for the most part, Nanoha the Movie is a superior retelling of the 1st chapter in the Nanoha universe.

The movie creators know what the fans in the series want - action and Nanoha/Fate. Luckily we get both fairly quickly into the movie. Fate is introduced much sooner in this version, and set up as the central conflict of the movie (with the Jewel seeds relegated to being a plot McGuffin). The movie handles the two becoming friends through fighting better than the TV series, both with better action scenes and better introspection. The pacing is tighter than original season, which dragged on at the beginning until pace picked up in the last 4 episodes.

The action is more like the later episode of the series, and here is where the movie shows off its big animation budget. The final battle between Fate and Nanoha in particular is well done and I had a big smile on my face while watching it.

There are some new original scenes, including some nice bits showing Fate’s past and training. But the character most benefiting from the new material is Precia, whose motivations are  given more detail as is the accident she had her in past. It fleshes her out greatly and makes for a much better character over all.

Most of the more unsavoury stuff from the original is gone, too. Except for the transformation scenes which were pretty ick. Thankfully, they only appear once for each of the leads.

The Blu-Ray version of the movie comes with an English subtitle track that is fairly well done. Except for a few nits (Arf is called Alf and the TSAB is called the DAB) it’s well written and easy to understand. The subtitle font is middle of the road, readable but I would have rather had either a bigger black outline or a non-white font color. The picture and sound quality is amazing though, as colors stand out and the animation quality never dips for the battle scenes, showing what BluRay can do for animation.

Nanoha the Movie fixes a lot of the problems I had with the first season, keeps the elements I liked and adds even more of what I wanted. It reminded me why Nanoha/Fate became the first Yuri couple I really liked. I hope we see the same budget and care given to StrikerS when it gets a movie. Highly recommended to Nanoha fans.

Art - 8
Story – 7 (Better than the TV but still the weaker of the 3 series)
Characters – 8
Yuri – 7 (Alot more than the first TV series)
Loser FanBoy – 8 –

Overall - 8


I'm told that the 2nd movie has been greenlit (presumably because this movie is doing well in DVD/BD sales, so good!) Next up is As, where we'll be treated to the reimagined Knights and Hayate. Let's keep our fingers crossed that it's as good a reboot as this appears to be!

Shin Koihime Musou Otome Tairan Anime (English)

Koihime Musou, and Shin Koihime Musou were evidently popular enough to spawn another sequel, Shin Koihime Musou Otome Tairan.

In this third season, the main players of Ryuubi's camp take to the roads once more, traveling around, taking lots of baths, fighting, eating, performing in plays, meeting random challenges and misunderstanding basic bodily functions in ways that give rise to seedy, embarrassing innuendo. Just like the other two seasons.

It's almost amazing when the story bothers to actually take on a chapter of the Romance of the Three Kingdoms because it so much prefers to be doing something else. Anything else. However, where the second season and the OVA pretty much threw out the original formula of a mix of service and Romance for all service and little story, this third season has recaptured three of the qualities that made the original not intolerable.

1) The sense of humor. In many senses there are two senses of humor on display during this season - the sophomoric, isn't it *hi-larious* when girls trip and we see their underwear kind and the "god, this is so dumb that I might as well throw myself into it and make it work" kind. The former is on display with every episode, and the latter shows through every once in a while and usually makes me laugh out loud.

2) Fighting. It's hard to remember, in the middle of all those baths and breast jokes that these characters are meant to be the great military heroes of the age. (I weep for Zhang Fe every time Rin-Rin talks.) We're getting a bit more fighting in this series than I remember in the last one and I, for one, approve. 

3) Yuri. You knew that had to be here, or why would I bother writing this review, right? In Season 1, Chou'un/Sei was very gay and Sousou/Karin had a thing for Kan'u/Aisha. In Season 2, I think there was a teeny bit of Sousou and not much of of anything else.  

This season we had a nice episode of Sonken x Ryomou (approved) and also a very silly reason for Gien having feelings for Ryuubi. Chou'un seems to care more about bamboo shoots than girls this season, but there's always time. And Koukin and Sonsaku are an item, which is less awful than it sounds. :-)

What amuses me most about this season is that it pretty obviously has been altered for a broadcast, non-DVD release. Bathing suits are drawn on, as are fog, steam, bright lights and other clever but obvious ploys to cover the nekkid women. This amuses me and annoys.  It reminded me of the last Tenchi series showed on Cartoon Network, where they sat in a bath and drank, like orange juice, with painted on clothes. It was so lame and obvious.


Because this is Koihime Musou, for every scene in which there is a fight, there are three where they bathe and two where they sing or dance or play dress up; you have to watch this with pretty low expectations. Do that, and you'll find that this anime is basically ice cream sundae level of bad for you - not so bad every once in a while, but you wouldn't want too much at once.


Ratings: 


Art - 6
Story - 6
Characters - 6
Yuri - as high as 7 from time to time
Loser FanBoy - 9


Overall - 6

What actually galls me about this kind of series is not that the girls get naked all the time, but that it's always played so coyly. If we're going to look at breasts and crotches fine, but does it *have* to be so peeping tom-ish? Can't we just looks at breasts and crotches and have done with it?

Yuri Anime: Heartcatch PreCure

Okay, okay, calling Heartcatch PreCure "Yuri" is just wishful thinking at this point, but 13 weeks into it, this classic magical girl anime leads the pack for this season.

First of all, I must give a shout out to Komatsu-san, who has been gently trying to get me to love PreCure as much as he does for some time now. I watched the original PreCure (free on Crunchyroll!) which was fine, and liked what I read of Splash Star, but Max Heart and GoGo 5! were unwatchable in my opinion, and Fresh PreCure was...okay. Nothing really hooked me. Because of Komatsu-san, I checked out the website for the new series, but wasn't very impressed with the art. But when he gave me a few of the episodes to watch, I found myself humming the opening theme for about a week. That's *usually* a good sign that I enjoy an anime series.

And then Yuri popped on the screen and I was officially hooked. I mean that literally and figuratively, by the way. One half of the Yuri couple is cleverly named Yuri. The naming sense in this series is a nailbat of obviousness, as you will see.

The stars of Heartcatch are Hanasaki Tsubomi, whose parents run a flower shop and who becomes Cure Blossom. (Ow!) Her next door neighbor, best friend and partner in Precure, is Kurumi Erika, whose mother designs clothes and whose father is a famous photographer and whose sister, Momoka, is a famous fashion model. Erika becomes Cure Marine.

They are opposed by monkey-like mooks, tools of the Desert something-somethings. No one watches PreCure for the bad guys. They are totally forgettable...until Dark Cure, with her gothy one tattered batwing and one laser-beam eye and angst enough for a gaggle o'preteens shows up.

By herself Dark Cure is moderately amusing. So end-of-the-world and all that. But the screen heats up when, while facing down Cure Blossom and Cure Marine, Dark catches sight of...a girl. This girl is slightly older than the current PreCure, totally untransformed - and the two of them stare fixedly over PreCure's head for a long time. The girl is Tsukikage Yuri (Ow! Watch that name bat, will you?!) voiced by Hisakawa Aya, which I think is a knowing nod to the adult portion of the audience for this series. (Dark is voiced by Takayama Minami, who you might remember as the former Rosa Gigantea, Sei's onee-sama, in Marimite.)

So, okay, I was watching this scene thinking, "yeah, I can get into this." But it was really icing on the cake.

There were a number of things that set this series apart from other PreCure and from other magical girl series. Firstly, Tsubomi's grandmother had formerly been a Cure, which I think is a great touch. It gives Tsubomi a mentor and a source of info that isn't passing for a stuffed animal during school hours. And both Erika and Tsubomi have dreams of the epic battle between Dark and a previous guardian, Cure Moonlight. Because I am not 4, it was instantly obvious that Yuri is/was Moonlight and that there's a whole arc in whatever lay between her and Dark. I am tempted to write a fanfic of what *I* think that story is, before the series goes and ruins it for all of us. lol

Did I mention that Dark carries around half of Moonlight's gem that broke during their epic battle? Well she does. Yuri carries the other half, of course, which means we'll get a double redemption at some point.

Oh, and I completely forgot, the Student Council President is a cross-dressing girl. This is covered early on and it was pretty obvious that she was a girl (well, obvious to me, but I am not 4).

Yuri is also, just to make sure the doujinshi artists have a multitude of choices, best friends with Momoka, Erika's sister.

Taken as a whole, I'm still making up about 97% of the Yuri in my head, but for a kiddy show, there's enough to keep me watching for the rest of the season.

Ratings:

Art - 7 It took me a while to get used to it, but when you get into the right headspace, Yuri is attractive enough.
Story - Monster of the Day, blah blah.
Characters - 8
Yuri - 5 as long as there's ambiguity
Loser FanBoy - 1

Overall - 7

I'll never love PreCure as much as I do Sailor Moon, but Heartcatch is at least in the same folder in my head now.

Yuri Anime: Blue Drop, The Complete Collection

Man, does this series have one of everything. It's got an alien race of women and a Japanese schoolgirl and a loyal crewmember and a vengeful crewmember who lost her lover in an accident that couldn't have been prevented. It's got a character who writes fanfic and a character who is not what she seems. There's one complicated family situation and one set of deceased parents who were killed by the unstoppable accident. And the alien and the girl have met before as a result of the unstoppble accident.

It has a sneering bad guy who can take the blame for everything.

It's got noble sacrifice, and tragedy and drama and a play within a play and a school play that eerily echoes the real situation and comedy and fun and friendship and love.

It has moe 2-D animation and the ships are in 3-D CGI which give them a sort of cool unworldliness.

It has thoroughly likable characters and a story that ends ironically, but it definitely ends.

It has good and bad and moral ambiguity and questionable decision-making and two women who fall in love, so it doesn't really matter if it all makes sense. But for the most part - it all makes sense.

Blue Drop: Tenshitachi no Gikyoku is a fun watch from beginning to end. It's well presented, complete in one box and with no significant extras. Totally worth a watch whether you've read the original Blue Drop manga or not.

Ratings:

Art - 7
Story - 7
Characters - 8
Yuri - 5
Loser FanBoy - 1

Overall - 8

Given the watchability of this story, I'm even more bummed by creator Yoshitomi Akihito's decent into mediocrity in his recent manga work. I think he needs to return to this world once more and have a little fun.

My sincere gratitude is once again directed at Okazu Superhero Daniel P. for his sponsorship of today's review and his ongoing support of Yuri. :-)

Yuri Anime: Rin: Daughters of Mnemosyne, Volume 2 (English)

To fully enjoy Rin: Daughters of Mnemosyne, it might be useful to prepare yourself with a few simple steps:

1) Spend a few moments speaking with someone under the age of 17. Preferably female and preferably Goth and very weary of the world.

2) Read something insanely trashy.

3) Watch a 10-hour marathon of any sitcom that pairs a slobby guy with an attractive wife.

Or, failing that,

Take your brain out of your head for safekeeping.

Once you've done this simple - but crucial - bit of preparation, you're almost ready to watch this series.

Let me give you one warning before you start to watch Volume 2: Do Not Try To Make Sense Of This Story

Sure, you can make sense of it, but the story is *so* much better if you don't try. Just go with it.

There, now you're ready to watch Rin: Daughters of Mnemosyne.

Where in the first volume time moved slowly, it fairly flies in the second volume. We're no longer moving a year or a few at a time. Now we are taking decade-long leaps into a futuristic landscape which may seem silly on the face of it (Aquarium floors and ceilings? Really?) but makes a lot of sense if you pay the slightest attention to human nature. (Yes, because we *can*.)

Maeno Kouki has passed out of Rin and Mimi's timestream, but his descendants are still in their care. Kouki's son Teruki starts off as an ass, but turns out to be a dependable guy in the end. It's his daughter, Mishio, who caps off the series and in doing so, changes everything. Rin and Mimi saved Kouki, and saved and protected Teruki, but Mishio is in fact the one who saves and protects Rin and Mimi, repeatedly. When Rin, who has lost her memory as a result of a rather extreme death, is attacked by Laura, it's Mishio that provides a distraction. Mimi leans on Mishio when she cannot control herself when in the vicinity of Angels.

As the climax approaches (a word that is eminently suitable for this series, don't you think?) Apos finally reveals all the pieces of the puzzle we were missing and we learn that the puzzle is pretty stupid. lol But that's okay, because we know this: Rin is the good guy and will win.

And she does, of course.

In the end, we see Rin, Mimi and Mishio as an alternate family of three women bound by thousands of years of fate and who all care deeply for one another.

Yuri in this volume is mostly on Mimi, which annoyed the Rin fans, but I thought it made more sense, really. We've known since the first episode that Rin had a man in her life, and we knew that she saw lesbian sex only as a form of payment. Mimi's relationships with her informers appear a bit more ambiguous. For a moment or two, she even seemed like she may have liked one of them - although since Kugamiya Rie played the role, her reaction was typically passive-aggressive.

Which brings us to the extra on this volume. The four main female voice actors were gathered together to discuss this series and they were surprisingly frank about how working in such an "adult" horror worked for them. This interview took place at the end of Episode 2, I would have dearly loved to see them interviewed again after the final episode. I have a feeling that their opinions might have been a little different. Or not. :-)

I guess the question has to be - was it good?

The story is silly, it panders to a dozen fetishes, it's violent and gross and sometimes plain old dumb. The art was alright, but was not stellar, even the music was overwrought. But. I think it was entertaining and had characters that exceeded their surroundings. Rin was admirable, Mimi was likeable, Apos was unbearable, Laura was...persistent. Kouki and his descendants didn't suck.

Ratings:

Art - 7
Story - 4
Characters - 9
Yuri - 8
Loser Fans - 23.8

Overall - 8

Yes, it was good.

It is once again my sincere pleasure to thank Okazu Superhero Eric P. for his sponsorship of today's review (and the review of Volume 1, which I belatedly realize did not credit him. That has been corrected.)

If you would like to be added to the Okazu Hero's Roll, just pop over to the Yuri Wish List and purchase something for review! The you too will be my Hero. :-)

Yuri Anime: Rin: Daughters of Mnemosyne, Volume 1 (English)

2010 continues to be a year of wonder for Yuri fans, as we now have an inordinate amount of good and bad Yuri and Yuri-ish anime to watch in English.

Inexplicably among them, Funimation picked up Rin: Daughters of Mnemosyne which has one of my top 2 most favorite opening themes ever right now. "Retsu no Matataki" from Air Master is the eternal winner, but "Alsatia" just cracks me up every time I listen to it.

Let's get the most important thing out of the way first: Mnemosyne, greek goddess of memory, pronounced: \ni-ˈmä-sə-nē. Thank you, Merriam-Webster.

In Rin: Daughters of Mnemosyne we meet Rin, an investigator of things as small as missing cats and as large as international terrorism and her sidekick Mimi. Rin and Mimi can die, but they can't stay dead and are, therefore, immortal.

The first episode covers their meeting with Maeno Kouki, a young man with no memory. Their adventure brings them into contact with a corrupt pharmaceutical company, enemies in advanced stages of psychosis and zombie-like test subjects. And a missing cat.

This leads into an episode about a missing stamp and a missing brother who is actually an angel and an episode about a military cover-up and a lethal disease.

Time passes quickly in this series. We jump years from episode to episode. Rin, Mimi and their dog Genta, don't change, but Maeno ages and technology changes, which are cues for the passing of time that are far more powerful than the opening marquee telling us what year it is.

In every case, the story is deeply strange, full of intensely bloody violence and physical and emotional sadism the likes of which I have never seen before in anime. This is not a series for the light-hearted or light-stomached. It's not graphically represented. It's just...obvious.

I know it probably makes me a terrible person, but I love how Rin is tracked over the years by Laura, who single-mindedly kills her over and over and over. I also like how Rin's deaths become progressively more extreme. You think they can't beat blowing her up with a bomb but...you're wrong. Of course, Laura isn't the real enemy - the real enemy is Apos, voiced perfectly by Ishida Akira.

Apos is a source of much confusion and consternation for viewers....personally, I view almost all the plot complications as handwaves that must be accepted in what is not exactly the most logical or well-constructed plot ever written. Since the story is largely a vehicle for pandering of about 70 kinds, if you're gonna stress about Apos, then you probably shouldn't watch this series.

Personally, I loved hearing Noto Mamiko voice Rin. This is probably as close as fans will ever get to hearing her actual speaking voice in a role. And Kagamiya Rie probably broke a few brains as Mimi. She was awesome.

The DVD comes with an extra commentary for episode 2, in which the American director and voice actors are just about as infantile as you'd expect. The word "boobs" is bandied about frequently and references to lesbianism are almost all in the "girls gone wild" sense. Despite that, I laughed once or twice anyway. :-)

There is BDSM and violence and sexual violence, straight sex and lesbian sex and more violence in this series. It's not for the kiddies and probably not for most normal people. I liked it. :-)

Ratings:

Art - this series is a good reminder that not everything looks better on a large screen - 6
Story - Oh, come *on!* It's a 4, maybe 5, but if you're watching it for the story, you have completely missed the point.
Characters - 9
Yuri - 8
Loser Fans - 23.8

Overall - 8

Yes, I know my ratings make no sense. Neither did this anime.

Many, many thanks to Okazu Superhero Eric P. for making today's review possible!