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juushikaTitle: Vassalord
Author: Nanae Chrono
Published: Tokyopop, 2008-2010 (2006-2013)
Rating: 3 of 5
Page Count: 1310 (192+192+192+176+174+180+204)
Total Page Count: 360,475
Text Number: 1304-1310
Read Because: reading more trashy BL/BL-adjacent manga, paperbacks borrowed from the Wilsonville Public Library
Review: It feels insincere to pick up a series about a cyborg-vampire and his troubled relationship with his "master," maker, and only food source and then turn around and call it very anime, but—this is! The style is excessive, the action is uninteresting and sometimes illegible, the humor doesn't always land, the intimacy fake-outs are tropey, and there's a lot of intentional doubling which is nonetheless ridiculous—the mess of Rayflo/Rayfell/Chris called Charley called Cherry/Cheryl/Berry is fun to say but points to flaws in the art, namely that the mangaka struggles with female bodies and Rayflo & Rayfell are weaker for it.
But it grew on me, in part because that excess is the point of a vampire manga, but also because there's surprising consistency in the central relationship—a consistency done disservice by the fake-outs and maybe even by the series's place as "mainstream"/nonexplicit/not BL. The feedings and sexual fake-outs as are framed as subtext, substitutions, or even baiting for a "real" relationship, but then the plot plays it all straight within the relationship's development: this is the intimacy that exists in this point in an evolving and complicated romantic relationship. It's fascinating in retrospect and makes for fun feeding scenes which go hog-wild with the sexual subtext but also feel like a convincing nonhuman intimacy. Come for the OTT gay vampire shenanigans; breeze through a plot that does interesting things with character backstories but uninteresting things with the central action; stay because the interpersonal mess of gay vampire shenanigans is pretty good actually, within the bounds of trashy manga.
Title: Loveless (1-13)
Author: Yun Kouga
Translator: Ray Yoshimoto
Published: TokyoPop 2006-2018 (2002-2018)
Rating: 4 of 5
Page Count: 2440 (200+200+200+190+192+200+200+194+176+176+176+176+160)
Total Page Count: 366,925
Text Number: 1329-1341
Read Because: recommended by Rosamund, paperbacks borrowed from the Wilsonville Public Library
Review: Review of volumes 1-13. I toss around the descriptor "id fic" a lot because it's a style I seek out, but almost nothing is as id as this: after his brother's mysterious violent death, a 12 year old boy with cat ears that denote his virginity-aka-youth inherits a college student who professes who love and serve him in magical battles where words become spells and injury is signified by BDSM gear. It's profoundly "problematic," in ways which aren't meant to be examined but function instead as romantic fantasy, and in (often overlapping) ways which confront subjects like child abuse, age and power differentials, virginity and intimacy, and consent. The art is a flowing shojo style, the covers are fluffy pastel dreams, and everyone and thing is—rather, appears to be—beautiful.
It's far from flawless. The episodic structure grows repetitive and introduces a mixed bag of supporting characters; I love most of them, they enrich the worldbuilding, but it makes for a cluttered cast. I'd prefer a tighter focus ... and a plot which were actually finished by now, because I doubt this ever will be. But it works on premise alone, which is to say that it's about what it means to be (or not be) a bonded fighting pair, exchanging power, ability, and consent; plot developments make for a much richer and more complex examination, but it doesn't require resolution to be satisfying. I came to this experience expecting something tropey, fanbaity, even cringy; it is! but it does good by those elements, fully indulging them but then rendering them well-characterized, provoking, and nuanced.
Title: Endless World
Author: Dokuro Jaryuu
Published: Marble Comics, 2008
Rating: 4 of 5
Page Count: 205
Total Page Count: 372,175
Text Number: 1368
Read Because: on this list of dark-themed BL
Review: I love how a posthumous narrative—two people connecting in the shadow of someone they knew and loved—allows for the depiction of complex, contradictory, deeply fucked up relationships and behavior without a narrative structure than condones it; it engages and progresses its genre conventions. I wouldn't call it subtle: it's intense and dark and dirty, a stylized and heightened experience; but nuanced, too, and packing a lot into a one-shot.
Author: Nanae Chrono
Published: Tokyopop, 2008-2010 (2006-2013)
Rating: 3 of 5
Page Count: 1310 (192+192+192+176+174+180+204)
Total Page Count: 360,475
Text Number: 1304-1310
Read Because: reading more trashy BL/BL-adjacent manga, paperbacks borrowed from the Wilsonville Public Library
Review: It feels insincere to pick up a series about a cyborg-vampire and his troubled relationship with his "master," maker, and only food source and then turn around and call it very anime, but—this is! The style is excessive, the action is uninteresting and sometimes illegible, the humor doesn't always land, the intimacy fake-outs are tropey, and there's a lot of intentional doubling which is nonetheless ridiculous—the mess of Rayflo/Rayfell/Chris called Charley called Cherry/Cheryl/Berry is fun to say but points to flaws in the art, namely that the mangaka struggles with female bodies and Rayflo & Rayfell are weaker for it.
But it grew on me, in part because that excess is the point of a vampire manga, but also because there's surprising consistency in the central relationship—a consistency done disservice by the fake-outs and maybe even by the series's place as "mainstream"/nonexplicit/not BL. The feedings and sexual fake-outs as are framed as subtext, substitutions, or even baiting for a "real" relationship, but then the plot plays it all straight within the relationship's development: this is the intimacy that exists in this point in an evolving and complicated romantic relationship. It's fascinating in retrospect and makes for fun feeding scenes which go hog-wild with the sexual subtext but also feel like a convincing nonhuman intimacy. Come for the OTT gay vampire shenanigans; breeze through a plot that does interesting things with character backstories but uninteresting things with the central action; stay because the interpersonal mess of gay vampire shenanigans is pretty good actually, within the bounds of trashy manga.
Title: Loveless (1-13)
Author: Yun Kouga
Translator: Ray Yoshimoto
Published: TokyoPop 2006-2018 (2002-2018)
Rating: 4 of 5
Page Count: 2440 (200+200+200+190+192+200+200+194+176+176+176+176+160)
Total Page Count: 366,925
Text Number: 1329-1341
Read Because: recommended by Rosamund, paperbacks borrowed from the Wilsonville Public Library
Review: Review of volumes 1-13. I toss around the descriptor "id fic" a lot because it's a style I seek out, but almost nothing is as id as this: after his brother's mysterious violent death, a 12 year old boy with cat ears that denote his virginity-aka-youth inherits a college student who professes who love and serve him in magical battles where words become spells and injury is signified by BDSM gear. It's profoundly "problematic," in ways which aren't meant to be examined but function instead as romantic fantasy, and in (often overlapping) ways which confront subjects like child abuse, age and power differentials, virginity and intimacy, and consent. The art is a flowing shojo style, the covers are fluffy pastel dreams, and everyone and thing is—rather, appears to be—beautiful.
It's far from flawless. The episodic structure grows repetitive and introduces a mixed bag of supporting characters; I love most of them, they enrich the worldbuilding, but it makes for a cluttered cast. I'd prefer a tighter focus ... and a plot which were actually finished by now, because I doubt this ever will be. But it works on premise alone, which is to say that it's about what it means to be (or not be) a bonded fighting pair, exchanging power, ability, and consent; plot developments make for a much richer and more complex examination, but it doesn't require resolution to be satisfying. I came to this experience expecting something tropey, fanbaity, even cringy; it is! but it does good by those elements, fully indulging them but then rendering them well-characterized, provoking, and nuanced.
Title: Endless World
Author: Dokuro Jaryuu
Published: Marble Comics, 2008
Rating: 4 of 5
Page Count: 205
Total Page Count: 372,175
Text Number: 1368
Read Because: on this list of dark-themed BL
Review: I love how a posthumous narrative—two people connecting in the shadow of someone they knew and loved—allows for the depiction of complex, contradictory, deeply fucked up relationships and behavior without a narrative structure than condones it; it engages and progresses its genre conventions. I wouldn't call it subtle: it's intense and dark and dirty, a stylized and heightened experience; but nuanced, too, and packing a lot into a one-shot.
