Forum › Posts by Looking East

45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

This looks cute, but I've never really liked these long strip comics. I find them hard to read for some reason.

Same here. They always strike me as an excuse to get away with not doing proper page layouts.

Just as with traditional manga the way the paneling and composition draw the eye in this vertical format is an art unto itself. When utilized properly it flows incredibly well, particularly for action sequences, but like with traditional manga, only a few artists have really mastered how to properly integrate the structure of the media into synergizing with the flow and impact of their work.

Unfortunately, the place I think the vertical medium is weakest, even when used well, is for depicting slow-paced slice of life manga and manhwa with a lot of dialogue. The ability to flow from one image to the next with the spin of a mouse wheel just does not lend itself to the flow of that type of reading-heavy storytelling. The mangaka that created this particular series actually understands and uses the format decently, but it's a genre that isn't very vertical format friendly.

The most annoying thing about the vertical format is all of the masterful art composition in the world is worth nothing if you can't get the thing to fit on your screen at the proper magnification that it's meant to be read at. I have a super widescreen laptop I use most of the time and I swear it fights me tooth and nail when it comes to trying to get these types of manhwa to display as the artist intended them to be read.

last edited at Apr 11, 2021 12:37AM

45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

The fact that Azurite is fucking ripped always manages to take by surprise when is shown.

No kidding. Beneath the adorkable exterior, Azurite is packing the physique of a professional kickboxer. Seriously, does this girl work out like 6 hours a day while marathoning anime or something?

Looking East
45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

Anyone who has lived this knows the strait-up nightmare of feeling something scrunch in your boot. It wasn't some evil spider in my case, but you will never again put your shoes on without checking them first for the rest of your life.

last edited at Apr 7, 2021 9:22AM

Looking East
45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

Neat story but I think it needed more visual distinctiveness between the characters in the story and the characters in reality.

I think the lack of distinctiveness is on purpose what with the MC's blatant denial of her own feelings/desires.

Funny you should say that. I just reread this a couple of years later and found my old comment and had this same exact thought as you. The symbolism and impact would be much weaker. There is a reason they look almost exactly the same as their real-life inspirations.

I would also like to add that the dramatic shadows and angling are way more prevalent ("cinematic" even) in the "Fiction" pages, vs the flatness of their regular conversations in the classroom. The only time the shading gets serious in "Reality" is during an internalization.

Even coming back and reading this again a second time I missed all the little visual clues.

This really is a great one-shot. This mangaka needs more recognition. Sadly, it looks like their cute romcom yuri light series are the more popular ones. Don't get me wrong, they are great too, but they lack the unique punch this artist's other work has.

last edited at Apr 7, 2021 9:17AM

45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

Just an FYI, I am currently working on chapter 20 (as well as new Neji, new Regret It extras, and rely on magic chap 8). Next week the series is on break, so I am going to take my time with this chapter, it has a boatload of redrawing, may take a few days.

Thank you. You're the reason I get to read this manga. 〈( ^.^)ノ

@Arcane dropping the science on us, respect.

I finally get it, Blues are fucking dorks. They're so cute lol

Except Lunarite, for some reason. Was she miscast or is it all just a big coincidence? Also, I really hoped that when asked about her sword's name, Azusa would manage to say something like "It's just a weapon to fight evil, it doesn't need a name", but I guess a chuuni name worked just as well to establish her rep. :-)

I totally thought she was going to go that direction as well, but instead, surrounded by her own kind, she doubled down and revealed her secret pet name for her sword which was even funnier.

last edited at Apr 7, 2021 1:12PM

45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

It's nice to see this return again.

Looking East
45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

that hoodie rules. these brats have no taste at all.

I'm glad I'm not the only one who thought this!

45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

I love the faces of this manga. Little background Ruby's face is adorable.

The art style really is one of this manga's strong points. The character's facial expressions and body language are super expressive and adorkable.

last edited at Mar 31, 2021 9:57AM

45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

If a straight male coworker of mine came into work tomorrow and told me he married his platonic female friend just cuz’ I would tell him that was the most insane shit I’d heard in my life

Also I don’t know if you live under a rock or at the Elvis themed chapel in Vegas but thats not how marriage usually works “these days”

There exist couples who get into amateur BDSM and need to call the police to get them out of handcuffs, people who take shits on each other every Sunday, people who get into heterosexual marriages to conceal their homosexual liaisons, people who use websites to track marriage partners or put ads in the paper so they don't end up single post-30 and people who get hitched because they had sex at midnight in a gas station bathroom, but live in a country where abortions are illegal. Surprise, surprise, diverse situations and individuals exist, and the planet doesn't end at the edges of your neighborhood.

Regardless, my original post explains the issue from an angle that examines and justifies the tropes put into use and acknowledges the way premises and demographics work for romantic fiction. Your post draws on your own hyper-subjective experience, which I'm guessing is not relevant here, and from a mildly condescending conclusion about how marriages work everywhere, which I'm assuming is also subjective. So maybe take a second to think carefully about you're what reading before lobbing rocks at people for not seeing 2-dimensional lesbians in the same way you do.

There exist people who cover themselves in mountain dew before taking a shit, who only fuck during full moons, who think a garbage bag will protect them covid.

This somehow justifies this stories leaps in logic which everyone in the story views as completely normal and is definitely not a total non sequitur, I am very wise

It's a bit like arguing how ridiculous it would be to write a story about a guy who got mauled by a bear because it is such an admittedly rare and improbable event. It doesn't change the fact people do in fact get mauled by bears and thus it's a perfectly logical premise for a story.

The one part of this story that is quite fictitious is the bit about there being a same-sex couple legally married in Japan because our real world is a bit more backward than the world this story takes place in. Aside from the legally married bit and the overall kinder attitude of society towards same-sex couples, the world of this fiction really isn't different than our own. That's a pretty low bar to clear for the necessary suspension of disbelief to make this story work. I imagine there are more real-world female partnerships out there involving a straight woman and lesbian than there are people who get mauled by bears. It probably isn't by a small margin either.

Basically, this is just two very close female friends living together long term where one is straight but mostly uninterested in sexual relationships and the other is a lesbian with a crush on her friend. I have seen WAY weirder real-world pairings than this.

last edited at Mar 2, 2021 11:47PM

Looking East
45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

I like to think that yuri is mostly made for women to women, but this seems like for men to men

Yuri as a genre tends to have a bit of both, but I definitely agree with you that this one seems to be more geared towards males. As a general rule of thumb the more pornographic the work is the more likely this is to be the case. Also, somewhat surprisingly, a lot of so called "yuri bait" CGDCT series also fall into that category.

Yuri by women for women tends to have a heavier focus on interpersonal relationships and character building. There certainly can be sex scenes or cute girls doing cute things, but they aren't the sole focus of the manga.

last edited at Feb 18, 2021 8:36AM

Looking East
45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

Lol at page 6-7 Tatsubon just loves finding some excuse to draw a hard boiled action panel!

Either as Valkyrie or herself, Nikaidou always looks so bad ass in scenes like that :)

This story is cute, but honestly what makes it special is the style and artwork. That last full page panel could stand toe to toe with an action scene taken out of most of the top Shonen manga.

last edited at Feb 16, 2021 3:13AM

Looking East
45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

"It 's alive!!!"

45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

I'm getting a bit tired of the "I can make you gay", I feel it kinda invalidates everything.
Showing her two girls can go out together? Yes, it's fine. Telling her you can turn her into a lesbian... uggghhhh

I'm pretty sure that's not what is going on here. Miss Popular blurting odd and somewhat homophobic remarks out of nowhere such as, "I don't see how two girls could ever date, etc." just hit the Blonde Beauty's gaydar like a 10 megaton bomb and she's both into the chick and wants to call her out on her bluff.

If it's one thing I've learned in life it's that most clichés have some basis in reality and one of the better bets is the most closeted gay person in the room is the screaming homophobe. Certainly not every bigot is gay, but I think most of us are pretty good at spotting the difference between the ones that are.

In this case we already know her gaydar pinged true since we get see all the MC's thoughts about how sexy she thinks this girl is. Chances are if you sit around thinking about how sexy people of the same sex are then you probably aren't completely strait.

Yeah, this is just an example from my own life, but in my Christian High School we had a group of girls that said tons of homophobic shit about lesbians in class openly in public all the time. I found out after the fact that they have had more sex with other women than they ever had with guys in high school, and during stagette one of them were apparently trying to find me (I didn't go), because there were rumors that I was gay.

Although it's certainly not always the case, this sort of thing happens quite often. I have a very unfortunate friend I've known since middle school who has always been very vocally homophobic. He's now a bitter middle aged man who has never had a lover and still maintains the sad façade. I always suspected, but the real tell was the one time a few years back when I was looking something up on his computer and let's just say he is not the sort to clear his browser history. I didn't go looking intentionally but you know how the search field pops up with a load of your recent searches...

last edited at Feb 10, 2021 2:06AM

Looking East
45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

Damn it's 2am and I already read 17 chapters and now I wonder if I should read more or just watch the anime. Hope I can buy the Light Novel (and I hope it's good). Definitely one of the better mangas here and this is the kind of yuri that i want to see

The light novel is the source material for this story and it's my favorite version although I have to give credit where its due when it comes to the manga adaption. The anime not so much. You can pick the LN up at Jnovel. The digital copies from them are DRM free which is always nice.

last edited at Feb 10, 2021 1:49AM

Looking East
45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

Lewdest hand holding ever.

45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

I'm getting a bit tired of the "I can make you gay", I feel it kinda invalidates everything.
Showing her two girls can go out together? Yes, it's fine. Telling her you can turn her into a lesbian... uggghhhh

I'm pretty sure that's not what is going on here. Miss Popular blurting odd and somewhat homophobic remarks out of nowhere such as, "I don't see how two girls could ever date, etc." just hit the Blonde Beauty's gaydar like a 10 megaton bomb and she's both into the chick and wants to call her out on her bluff.

If it's one thing I've learned in life it's that most clichés have some basis in reality and one of the better bets is the most closeted gay person in the room is the screaming homophobe. Certainly not every bigot is gay, but I think most of us are pretty good at spotting the difference between the ones that are.

In this case we already know her gaydar pinged true since we get to see all the MC's thoughts about how sexy she thinks this girl is. Chances are if you sit around thinking about how sexy people of the same sex are then you probably aren't completely strait.

last edited at Feb 9, 2021 5:27PM

45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

Thanks for translating this. It always warms my charred and blackened heart to see someone spreading some quality niche manga like this to new audiences. There is some amazing stuff out there that just never sees the light of day here in the west because it's not the sort of cliché isekai **** that draws in the masses.

It's one of the reasons I like Dynasty to begin with. Yuri is itself not a mainstream genre so it's nice to see a community like this where it gets some proper love.

45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

The definition of f*cking my way to the top. I’m rooting for you. How many more lesbians until she gets to the Boss level lesbian? Let’s stay tuned.

Plot twist: the boss level lesbian isn't Mai, it's senpai.

Senpai is no-holds-barred gunning for Asumi. It's pretty obvious with how she manipulated Asumi into getting that new job where the boss got her to do the lewd photoshoot just so senpai could get naughty pics of her, and the way she snuck a bunch of "research material" in her bag to judge her reaction and see what she was into, not to mention her intense interest in whether Asumi was a top or bottom.

last edited at Feb 3, 2021 3:19AM

Looking East
Anime season 29 Jan 01:50
45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

VLADLOVE has been a fun watch. It doesn't dance around the fact, it is strait up yuri. There is some serious old school directing and animation talent behind it and it's got a cute vampire girl in it so what's not to like?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2im3P4AiHc&t=13s&ab_channel=VLADLOVEOFFICIAL

last edited at Jan 29, 2021 1:55AM

Looking East
45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

Now it's like a mixture of Flip Flappers, Haibane Renmei and Girls Last Tour.

I hope this gets an animation some day.

I'm still crossing my fingers for the Girl's Last Tour anime adaption to be completed, but I would love to see this done justice in a proper adaption as well.

It's rare to see niche stuff get the love it deserves but every once in a while the stars align and it happens.

last edited at Jan 29, 2021 1:32AM

Looking East
Anime season 26 Jan 03:53
45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

It's the book series that established the basic concepts of the isekai genre, you know? Everything made later took its premises from there.

That's only kinda true? While plenty of later works did clearly pull from it, isekai as a genre was already established at the time. Youjo Senki, Log Horizon, and Isekai Cheat Magician, among others, all predate Mushoku Tensei

Personally, I didn't find it to have enough of a hook to keep watching

Isekai as a story archetype existed more than a century before the Japanese coined a term for it and we got our modern boom and codification of the genre. Stuff like Buck Rogers, Forbidden Planet or even old Jules Vern stories like Journey to the Center of the Earth are at their hearts isekai although the nature of the Other World and the means to get there were reflections of those times.

Even the whole trapped in a virtual world sub genre goes way back to the early 80s with the cult classic, Tron.

One sub genre that I believe was uniquely Japanese in origin is the reincarnation isekai. That brings up an interesting question. What was the first reincarnation isekai?

last edited at Jan 26, 2021 3:56AM

Looking East
VAMPEERZ discussion 22 Jan 22:01
45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

Damn, I have to give the mangaka credit where it is due. They know how to create one hell of a steamy kiss scene.

Looking East
45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

Humans, the OG murder hobos, crapping on everyone's good time yet again. Those nasty, evil creatures are even worse than demons. At least demons keep the pacts they make.

Looking East
45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

Can't wait for it to end abruptly like most of Neji's other work.

It sucks how often her work gets axed prematurely since she always writes these long form slow burn stories that really suffer for basically having to end mid arc.

Looking East
45b4e36d555ca184502130f8249354c2--flcl-furi-kuri2
joined Jul 19, 2018

For a rom com this series has crazy deep lore.