Oooh, so this author was the same one who did Just the Two of Us, huh? I didn't immediately notice the connection. I guess if I had to rank them, I liked Just the Two of Us a little bit better.
However, regardless, I hnnnghed all over the place. Very cute. As for what this series made me think of, it was http://dynasty-scans.com/chapters/sixth_year_class_3_by_suzuki by Kazuto Izumi, in it's commentary about "girls clinging to each other". For example, I found it frickin' adorable how closely Hinoko and Kaharu sat to each other in that panel of them on the train, while they were still feeling awkward/hadn't resolved anything about Hinoko's confession. The way that their natural closeness superceded any rational apprehension or boundaries...it's too overpowering for my heart, lol. I really love 'girls clinging to each other' too.
(Incidentally, wow, the tagging system is pretty awesome. I had completely forgotten the title of that oneshot or who its author was, but by scanning through the tag list and checking out "time skip" I was able to find it in one try. That was really impressive, it would have taken me forever to find it otherwise.)
Speaking of the rest of this piece, I did find the short "I don't want to die" section afterwards pretty random and weird. The dialogue/characterization was kind of awkward and it didn't seem very believable. However, on the concept of childhood friends in yuri versus the Westermarck effect in general...what do you guys think? I'm kinda undecided. There are childhood friend couplings which I just plain do not like, yet there are also other ones of which I am a massive fan.
Incidentally, the Westermarck effect is more of a psychological effect rather than a biological one. It has to do with imprinting. Being psychological, there are no clear explanations as to the mechanisms of how it works, but I guess it is possible for anyone to make an approach at explaining it via just introspecting their own experiences.
My own disgust at occasional childhood friend/incest pairings basically comes when it feels like the characters are just refusing to grow up/closing themselves off from reality and crippling their ability to interact with the outer world. It basically comes down to is the relationship healthy. I think, at adolescence, the mechanism of the Westermarck effect itself probably arises from the (generally dumb, but occasionally appropriate, I guess) teenage instinct to try to grow up and 'mature'. Adolescents instinctually reject things which make them feel childish or remind them of childhood (while also separately associating 'maturity' with sex), which probably leads to the rejection of childhood friends/parental figures who do not facilitate that sense of 'maturity'.
Along those lines, I guess my feelings toward childhood friend pairings are intermediate. I don't really like the dumb teenage mentality of completely changing yourself and rejecting all aspects of your former interests and relationships, but at the same time I do feel it is important for characters/people to grow during that stage and prepare themselves for reality. A lot of childhood friend relationships actually manage to even support the latter, which is why I do like them. The incestuous/childhood friend relationships which I don't approve of are really the ones which thrive on or even reinforce childish, unhealthy dependencies. In that sense, I don't really have a problem with the couple in this oneshot series. Although their characters are definitely still somewhat childish, their romantic awakening to each other could even arguably be perceived as growth.
Haha. Wall of text aside, I did really enjoy this oneshot. Mountain Pukuichi or Ponpon-O, their works really break my nutbladder. Many thanks to Omniscient0/the rest of Dynasty for scanlating it!
last edited at Apr 20, 2013 6:38AM
