Reads title: panics
Reads tags: calms down

Yeah the diversity of gender stuff is a little contrived, but so is the Breakfast Club for having characters from different cliques, or how characters in stories usually don't have the same first name, or any of the other coincidences that authors use to help tell the story. Having a diverse cast helps explore different topics, so that's not a weakness, it's a feature.

That said, I'm transgender so I'm obviously biased, but I hope I make sense.

It's not even really all that contrived, because of the setting, it makes sense that a lot of queer ppl would work there. Especially sense, based off the first chapter, they seem to be intentionally looking to hire queer kids. It seems to me that at least part of Sa-chans motivation for opening the place was to create a place these kids could feel accepted.

And now I hate the protagonist

Yeah, it's a bit early to put on the yuri goggles. The way she seems to respond favorably to cute, "feminine" appearances and clothing (as shown by her reaction to Mogu's borrowed clothes and... Mei in general) suggests it's a possibility, but I don't see enough clues to say it decisively yet. It's a path the story could take, and there's suggestions, but it's far from certain at this point.

I was talking about Mei, specifically when she gets all blushy and has like hearts and stuff. And I agree it's not certain, I was just pointing out that there very well could be some Yuri in the future.

I was talking about Mei, she is clearly shown attached to childhood friend-chan and there's nothing fuzzy about her gender

This most recent chapter literally just showed a girl being attracted to another girl but whatever

Look how happy big sis is now that Tetsu is finally gonna stop calling her "bro". Tetsu is kind of a crappy brother.

Oh a new manga... I hate it

Finally read the anthology. All of the stories were great in their own way, but my favorite was probably "Let's Write a Script", about the early ideas for the play. Everyone ends up doing their shipping fanfic while Koyomi is like "Yeah, maybe I should write this alone."

My other favorites would be "Bitter Coffee Time" about Riko and Miyako (because any scene with these two is gold) and "Let's Play with Senpai!" although sadly we don't get to see maid!Touko.

And also Canno outing herself as a Touko × Sayaka × Yuu shipper. :þ

Who woulda thunk that Canno would be for polyamory, eh? :P

One of the stories in her manga is poly

AND STILL, assuming the manga ends in vol 8, that's hardly enough for 12 chapters... But who knows! maybe if they adapt all the specials and the spin off novel for the second season, things will be fine.

I mean two of the episodes were single chapter adaptations and they both turned out excellent.

Whoa, I was expecting some complaints on the forum about Kurokawa ditching her glasses but that teacher scene was A+++ and completely overtook that. I'm honestly not sure where the story's going to go from here.

I will, I freaking hate the ditching the glasses trope so freaking much. Glasses are a medical device, ppl need them to see. Most ppl who need to correct the vision still wear them, not everyone can, or even wants to wear contacts. Also glasses are freaking cute, any one who says otherwise is a cop

I really hate this manga

I can already see where this is going since the page 2 and yep it really is going as I expected. So I guess she will continue to feel more of them sister sex and it's fun to think it's gonna applies in reverse too (^∇^)

She did say that the synching faded over time. Maybe the synching is based on experience, so the more they experience something the weaker the synching becomes

homophobia was brought in by the west into the east

That's a reductive take, yes Western puritanism absolutely made homophobia the world over worse, but homophobia is as old as homosexuality itself. No one culture invented it.

if i can pull off a cross dress that attracts every guy on the streets and i keep doing it after almost getting raped, am i not asking for it?

Please don't make light of rape in the comment section

As expected from the LGBT cover, Asa is the L(esbian), Seiji s the G(ay), Yuki is the B(isexual) and Sumon is the T(ransgender). The remark about the cuteness of the skirt is probably to give a hint that he's a FTM.

And I knew from the beginning that Seiji was gay for Gin. Now that he has seen him in drag, he's going to come at him.

But... what is Gin, beside a crossdresser? Het? Bi-curious?

Dramaaaa, here you come...

Gin is Q(uestioning)

I don't trust anyone who was defending Botan in this comment section

Nakatani: It could be said that YagaKimi is approaching the climax, or the last arc. To follow along until the end... eh, is it okay to say something that makes it sound like "it's about to end"? (laugh).

Anyways the serialization in Dengeki Daioh is heading towards the climax. Those who have read up to volume 6 may be worried and thinking "is it going to be alright?" but I believe that I'll be able to show everyone what they want to see, so please follow along!

This could mean anything from a few months to over a year.

I can only come to the conclusion Nakatani was writing it with 'what would be most interesting' rather than 'how can I best represent a particular orientation' in mind.

Nobody was arguing otherwise

This means that she is not making a deliberate statement and that trying to guess Yuu's orientation is futile considering neither Nakatani or Yuu are aware of it.

How do you know Nakatani isn't aware of it? Are you a mind reader?

last edited at Dec 9, 2018 6:17AM

This episode has made me glad that they didn't do three chapters per episode for the rest of it. The episode isn't bad, but it does feel a bit more rushed than other episodes

last edited at Dec 7, 2018 2:35PM

This is beginning to feel futile. Y'all seem to think I'm saying something that I'm not. Anyway I gotta go to bed.

No it's not. That is ludicrous. If I portray a realistic fight scene, do I make a statement on fights in general? Nope. Replicating things as they are in reality can stir conversation by itself and often that is done with the intend of conveying a message, but it's not a necessity. Nakatani tells a story of a person in that particular situation, but if she wanted to make a statement on lesbians then she completely failed. She barely addresses any lesbian issues aside from some people thinking it's a phase or it being looked at as weird (which is the most basic of all yuri tropes).

If you make a realistic fight scene, it does send some messages to the audience actually. It tells me that you have some knowledge of what real fights look like, it tells me that you wanted to make a realistic fight. I could even infer some things that may not be entirely correct but aren't inconsistent with what I saw. I could infer that you like realistic fight scenes, heck I could even infer that you think realistic fight scenes are superior (I could be wrong in that case but that really isn't the point). Besides gathering author intent is only the least interesting, but still important, part of interpreting a work of art
anyway. Any good work of art leaves room for the audience to interact with it, and Bloom into You is a good work of art.
As an aside I, once again, wasn't saying Nakatani is some scholar of LGBT issues. Yes, the actual LGBT discussion in the manga is pretty bare bones, but I wasn't making a point about that. Literally all I was saying is that it is there.

Writing realistic characters is just good writing. If you can provide a link to something pro LGBT Nakatani has said, then you can have a stronger argument.

How about that time she wrote a Yuri manga? On a more serious note, she has an interview were she mentioned including male characters specifically to emphasize how the feelings between the girls are real.

Beyond that writing a story IS making a statement. Every decision an author makes in their story says something about how they think. Sayaka's subplot to me says that Nakatani thinks love between two girls is just as valid as love between a girl and a boy.

Now to be fair, I'm ambivalent towards the idea of Nakatani trying to send a message about lesbians in this story, that might be the case. It's definitiely not the point of the story though.

PS: Physical attraction in Yuri is far from rare these days.

Where did I say it was the point of the story? I'll say it again. I'm simply disagreeing with the claim that she isn't conscious of LGBT issues, I think there is more than enough evidence to suggest that she is at least a little aware of them. I think it'd be pretty hard for a Yuri writer not to be nowadays. Yes, Yuri leads are often shown physically attracted to each other nowadays, but I haven't seen too many of them were a girl is shown to fall for another girl based on appearance alone and have it be taken seriously.

P.S Writing realistic lesbians is absolutely making a statement.

last edited at Dec 7, 2018 7:48AM

Look, the plain fact is that there is no evidence for Yuu being aromantic or asexual. Especially not after the more recent chapters. You can believe what you want, but the opposite is always more likely and at least aromanticism is debunked.

This is first and foremost a story about misconceptions about love, not representation of anything specific.

Who are you responding to? If you are responding to me, I don't think Yuu is aro or ace. I'm simply disagreeing with the idea that Nakatani isn't LGBT conscious at all. I think the manga presents plenty of evidence contrary to this.

last edited at Dec 7, 2018 7:15AM