Yamada's internal monologue on pg 16 seems weird to me. It starts with "Wait, I know him! I know who that is!!" Which makes it sound like she recognizes Seki from some context outside of being an actor. However, her next thought is "In fact ... He's just like he is on TV!," which swings it back to her recognizing him for his role on the show.

On its own, that would be pretty normal, but those thoughts immediately follow him introducing himself, which immediately followed a discussion about how he'd be the guest celebrity. It feels a bit like going to a Niel Gaiman book signing and thinking "Oh Wow! I recognize that guy at the table, signing books! It's Niel Gaiman!" That shouldn't be shocking or a realization, right?

Am I missing something here?

To be fair, this is Gensokyo, Tewi, and Reisen. I'm not convinced it would be at all unlikely for them to wind up in this situation for "reasons".

Also, Tewi's expression is the best.

Also I mean when it comes to Scars, I'll always stand by that Balalaika in Black Lagoon is hot as hell.

True, but a lot of that is her swagger and not many characters can carry brass balls of that much mass.

Just one more to go...

Really? Seems like she got them all to me?

Aside from Nanoha and Madoka, isn't there yuri in Yuki Yuna? Also, does Flip Flappers count? They're magical (I think), they transform (sometimes), they fight an evil secret organization, and they have a mascot.

Now, you might think she's hunched over and blushing because the popular girls are being mean to her and she's embarrassed, but no, it turns out her girlfriends are just idiots.

She still embarrassed.

A cowboy from hell and a dragon mobster having rough lesbian sex? This might just be the one ship that unites every segment of humanity.

Ok. Clearly I need to learn more about these characters. I'd say it's unfortunate that I'm not a fan of bullet-hells, but I'm pretty sure roughly 90% of touhou is in fan works.

So is my reading off, or is dark-haired girl actually somewhat earnest and wanting to get along, do things well, while light-haired girl has a ton of internalized misogyny and is projecting on her?

I’m not sure still exactly how to place these characters, or what we’re supposed to think of them.

At the same time, she also spouts lines like "Letting his guard down just because we're friends ... His fate was sealed." Admittedly, the guy was an idiot and his corruption was about to cause her a lot of trouble, but I'd still be rather cautious about trusting her or treating a relationship with her as anything but adversarial.

Tfw you were an Xbox kid and never even knew this existed in the Definitive Edition...Thanks so much for sharing! Really made my day. I guess you can tell it's quite late in the game, given how chill Rita is when Estelle is flirting with her...

There's also a skit where Rita takes Estelle for a flight and Yuri calls them Ristelle. I swear the actual couples in that game are Yuri/Flynn, Rita/Estelle, and maybe Raven/Judith, but that one is more of a stretch than either of the others.

Also, Yuri has a male Yandere stalker because Vesperia's about as strait as Steven Universe.

Yuri logic is being married but not romantically together and eating bread together in the morning is extremely romantic.

Non-romantic marriages have been a thing for a long time, even outside of yuri, same with little gestures being extremely romantic.

Estelle's smart. I feel like there's this misconception in the community that she's a dumb noble with zero intelligence.

She's definitely presented that way at the start of the game, which is why I couldn't stand her at first, but there's definitely a lot more to her than initial impressions and even the early scenes show off more than you'd think, if you know what to look for.

That said, the whole thing with the vase was a bit weird, given her training.

I relate to Sera far too much. Now if only I was half as effective at actually getting things done. She's like someone with ADHD who's actually managed to get a handle on her life, so this series probably deserves a supernatural tag.

Also, the info at the end about bread was quite interesting. It seemed odd to me that they'd bother selling things of bread with only four slices, because I'd just assumed the slice sizes were standardized, not the loaf sizes.

This bring the term "useless lesbian" to the whole new level xD

Slander! She's not a useless lesbian at all.

She remembered the bread. See? Totally useful.

No wonder lots of Japanese dont do bread much if half the country tries to eat it in 2 to 3 cm thick slices- yuck!

Actually, that sounds just about perfect for making toast in a pan. The extra thickness lets you get a crispy exterior and a chewy center, which is miles better than the pieces of cardboard normal sliced bread turns into.

That said, you still want to use actually good bread and I doubt anything that comes already sliced is going to be worth your time, regardless of the thickness. Better to just buy a whole loaf of good bread and slice it yourself.

last edited at Nov 24, 2020 12:42AM

Oh so older sister is indeed gay, poor thing is being made to pretend to be gay with the actual person she likes.

I was reading this statement rather differently than everyone else seems to be. It's not that there's any force or coercion involved, it's just that if she's going to be with the person she likes, she needs to pretend she's gay (when she's actually gay). So she's being "made" to do it only by the circumstances, not by anyone else.

After all, when the other girl says, "I know--let's get publicity by pretending to be a gay couple!" her options were either to agree or to give a reason for refusing, which would be:

• "I'm uncomfortable pretending to be gay," which sends the message that she's not OK with gayness, or

• "It would be too painful because I'm actually gay and in love with you," which she's obviously not prepared to do.

So the reasonable thing (from her POV) is to play along and hope to someday somehow turn "kidding" into "not kidding."

She could have also said something along the lines of "It's rude to treat homosexuality as a costume you can put on when convenient, since actual lesbians can't just turn it off and face actual persecution for it."

Wait, so Scathach is the Celtic version of Skadi?

I don't believe so. It's more that in FGO, Skadi was summoned in Sca's body ... sort-of ... for reasons.

Huh. The art on this one reminds me of another, ultimately, het series about a witch that I'm pretty sure was on dynasty. The main character had a tendency to make her self look older via magic, but that's all I can really remember about it. I initially thought this series was by the same artist, but that doesn't seem to be the case.

Edit: Never mind, I found it: Ran and the Grey World. ... I may have been misremembering the art though. I think some of the later stuff and some of the covers might be similar, but the first chapter, at least, is very different.

last edited at Nov 12, 2020 9:01PM

One of these days I'll get to playing through Umineko (probably after I figure out how I want to handle the fan patch), but do these witches not know how to fly?

Lin seems to go with a slightly older look on her Touhou characters than a lot of other artists and she often draws Reimu with darker skin, so they're definitely unusual, but I think they're still recognizable and I really like the artstyle.

I am getting some serious Blame! vibes from that last page.

The portrayal of kids being terrible and the general gas-lighting, in the beginning, was pretty good, but the ending felt too abrupt. She decided not to accept their halfhearted apology and she got over her infatuation with the one girl, but that felt like it was only the start of conclusion, not the end. It's not like she doesn't have to deal with them any more and she hasn't gained any actual friends or really found a way to deal with her loneliness.

Ultimately, I would have liked at least one more chapter, so we could have gotten a bit more of her character arc, or at least some idea of how everyone else reacted to her rejection.

A little dark, but cute regardless, also my shit glitched so idk if I said this before but doesn't that technically mean she's bound to her for eternity seeing how the girl is so obsessed with her and would literally kill herself if she gets broken up with?

They're both mortal, so not for eternity, no. That said, 70 years with someone who's that ... attached might be hard.

creepy obsessive friend? cute if so

Straight up yandare.

I'm actually not a big fan of the way Chapter 31, page 01 makes it relatively obvious that Mom saw them in the act. The "surprise" a few chapters later (in the webcomic version) was a lot more fun when it was more ambiguous if she had seen anything.

Keep in mind that knowing about what happens in the webcomic version makes things like that a lot more clear. For example, the end of 30 should also make it clear that she caught them in the act, because they're being startled apart by her voice, not the opening of the door. It's also identical in both versions and yet you were still taken by the "surprise" in the original.

I was hoping that in the 21st century we'd finally get over the need to categorize and label everyone's identity and sexuality and just let people be unique individuals who don't fit into little boxes, but I guess it's still too soon for that.

Eh? When it comes you how you treat people individuals, that ideal makes a lot of sense. However, when talking about broad swaths of people, it helps to have at least somewhat decent ways to subdivide them, both to make it clearer what you're talking about and to allow conversations that are narrower in scope then the whole of humanity and wider in scope than specific individuals.

As a somewhat unfortunate analog, consider ADHD. ADHD sounds relatively simple — Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, a disorder that makes people hyper and prevents them from paying attention, right? Well, no. Not really. ADHD actually encompasses a pretty broad range of symptoms that include executive dysfunction, time blindness, impulsivity, and difficulty controlling attention. What's more, not everyone who has ADHD will express all of those symptoms or express them in the same way. That means, it's really important to consider an individuals unique mix of symptoms when discussing how the condition effects their life and the what what strategies might help mitigate that. However, being able to discuss ADHD as a whole is also really helpful, since it helps you recognize broader trends or connect with people who have similar experiences.

Other human labels are similar. Most people aren't going to approach gender, sexuality, religion, ethnicity, nationality, or just about anything else through neatly predefined packages. If you really want to deal with any given individual, then you're going to have to do a lot of unpacking. At the same time, there are recognizable trends within various groups that make talking about them as groups helpful. If I say I'm attracted to women, that covers an incredibly broad range of people who will each have different relations to that word, most of whom probably aren't well defined by it, but at the same time it's also pretty clear that I wouldn't be attracted to someone like Macho Man Randy Savage.

For now, I’m just praying that they decided to pick up the pace for this short section, but it feels way faster than anything we’ve previously gotten. Chapters feel shorter too. Gaaah, I’m so worried!

It's 28 pages long, which seems to be in keeping for the rest of the series and fairly long compared to many other chapters on this site. I suspect it feels short because it's mostly action sequences, which means there's a lot of detail the artists need to get through, but they're very quick for readers to parse.

Woooooow Is it really weird to greet with a kiss on the cheek for Japanese people?? I literally do that every day lol

I can't speak for the Japanese, but that would be pretty unusual in America, or at least the part I live in. I don't think it would throw people off too much (baring COVID related concerns), but it definitely wouldn't be the norm.