30 Day Yaoi Challenge, Day 13: Kiss Blue vol 1-2

Posted on March 22, 2013 by Daniella Orihuela-Gruber

My first two whole volumes other than Kizuna!

Kiss Blue Volumes 1 and 2 by Keiko Kinoshita

Okay, so Kiss Blue is a bit more BL with touches of yaoi, but that’s fine. (I kind of just lump them both together in my head because they use a lot of the same tropes and plots.)

Tomosaka and Noda are now in college, but they’ve been good friends since middle school. Noda is a bit of a player, while Tomosaka’s never been in love and can’t understand why Noda bothers.

As Tomosaka struggles with sexual harassment at work and people taking advantage of him, he begins to realize that his feelings for Noda are more than just friendship. He tries to keep it from Noda, he becomes very depressed at the thought of losing his friendship. Of course, Noda notices and tries to get to the bottom of Tomosaka’s issues. In the process, Noda discovers Tomosaka’s feelings and winds up offering to sleep with him to help ease his pain.

This, unfortunately, only hurts Tomosaka more as he realizes that even sleeping with Noda won’t give him what he really wants: Noda’s love. Even his manager at work (the one who had been sexually harassing him) tries to give Tomosaka some support. Noda tries his best to rekindle their friendship and be there for Tomosaka, but in the middle of it all, Noda discovers that one of their female friends has a crush on Tomosaka. He lets Tomosaka know, but in turn, he gets a little jealous of the woman and begins to question his own feelings for Tomosaka.

Meanwhile Noda and Tomosaka’s friendship wavers, Tomosaka begins hanging out with his manager and even goes on a date with the gal who has a crush on him. He finally realizes that he has to full confess his feelings to Noda before he can move on. As he moves to do so, Noda breaks up with a girl he had been seeing, allowing him to be with Tomosaka. They get together and everyone’s happy. (Except the manager, who’d be secretly hoping that Tomosaka would get over Noda and date him.)

The second volume ends with a short story about Tomosaka’s manager and the unrequited love he has for a friend who is married with kids. Even though the two never get together, it becomes clear to the manager that his friend cares for him very deeply on a level that he doesn’t even care for his pregnant wife. It’s a little sad, but touching at the same time.

Yay! More BL/yaoi with no rape or sexual assault! :D Yes, there’s the harassment from the manager, but it’s more come ons and slaps on the ass than anything rape-y.

I really enjoyed Kiss Blue (as sad as it was.) It was the kind of slow burn, but with serious character development that I think yaoi and BL could use more often. I thought the art style was really familiar and it turns out that I’ve read Kinoshita’s Honey Colored Pancakes too! Plus she has a lot of stuff on DMG and a few more from June. There was one manga of her’s on Jmanga, so I’ve purchased it so I can read it before they go down. I’m glad. If a lot of Kinoshita’s manga is like Kiss Blue and Honey Colored Pancakes, then there’s more BL/yaoi out there that isn’t awful and rape-y.

This manga actually brings me back to the “totally straight, but turned gay by a friend” trope. With Tomosaka, it’s a matter of him not realizing his true sexuality earlier. He might not even be gay (I’m debating whether or not he was asexual originally,) but only interested in Noda. There should be (or might already be) a word for when you’re only with someone opposite your usual sexuality because your love for them is that intense. I’ve heard stories from a few people who have gone through this in real life, so it may seem implausible for those who are less fluid with their sexuality, but I believe it to exist. Noda however…

Normally I would have problems with Noda becoming gay for Tomosaka, but the way his dramatic change of sexuality comes about is done well. You see him take extra special interest in Tomosaka, wanting to help him out of his depression, to the point of sleeping with Tomosaka. (Which, I think is the only way Noda knew how to comfort Tomosaka at the time.) Then he thinks about how he feels Tomosaka, but doesn’t immediately come to the conclusion that he’s also in love with Tomosaka. It takes him time to realize it and I feel it’s way more believable because Kinoshita gave him time to develop these feelings.

Perhaps this all was only possible thanks to Kinoshita getting two volumes for this series. It seems like she’s popular enough to go beyond the usual one-shot or short story collection, which is nice.

Kinoshita’s art is solid, but readers who dislike artists with sketchy styles should steer clear.

As you can already tell, I’m interested in keeping Kiss Blue and definitely interested in pursuing more of Kinoshita’s work.

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30 Day Yaoi Challenge, Day 12: Finder vol 2

Posted on March 21, 2013 by Daniella Orihuela-Gruber

Volume two?

Yeah, I’ve read the first volume already.

Oh, did you like it? Doesn’t seem like your type of thing.

I hated it.

Huh? Why’d you buy volume two then?

It was cheap? I don’t know!

Finder: Cage in the Viewfinder by Ayano Yamane

As much as I hated volume one ofFinder, I found myself picking up volume two. I almost picked up more volumes because it was almost worth it at that price, but I made myself put them down. (So glad I did too.)

The first chapter of this manga is about Akihito running into Asami again, quite on purpose.  A detective gets in contact with Akihito and uses him to get in touch with Asami by taking Akihito to one of Asami’s exclusive clubs. There, Asami corners him and rapes him before freeing him.

The story then turns to Fei Long, and how he first meets Asami. Fei Long comes from a prestigious Hong Kong mafia family, but plays second fiddle to his older brother. They hit a major snag trying to secure smuggling routes to Japan, which is where Asami comes in. The two become a bit entangled as Asami tries to show Fei Long his worth as a person. Fei Long winds up running away from home and trying to prove himself on his own. In the process Asami jacks him off, sort of against Fei Long’s will, to try and keep Fei Long out of trouble for a bit. It doesn’t really work, and Fei Long’s father ends up dying in the ensuing. But before he does, he acknowledges and praises Fei Long, something he had been longing to hear from his father for a long time. Asami and Fei Long then find themselves at odds and don’t meet again until the events of volume one.

The last chapter is another reoccurring story about two classmates who find out that their fathers are having an affair with each other. As a result, they kind of get sexually involved. One of the boys gets sick, and his father uses it as an excuse to see his lover while the wife is out of town. Unsurprisingly, the two boys wind up jacking each other off again.

I don’t know if I liked Finder volume 2 any better. There was some better storytelling going on in Fei Long’s arc, but it doesn’t really set up much except Fei Long’s character and his past with Asami. Akihito and Asami get zero character development. This volume just really drives home that Asami’s a scruple-less rapist.

The short story is just as bad. One boy pressures the other into doing something sexual. Sure, it might actually happen to some folks because there are some seriously sex-crazy high school boys out there, but to see it as erotic art is kind of weird.

One thing I will note about Finder volume one is that Asami used some bondage paraphernalia and sex toys on Akihito, and I sort of wish we saw that more often in yaoi. A lot of yaoi is so vanilla, it gets boring. Sex can be so much more interesting than just the usual vanilla stuff, surely there must be more interesting (and hopefully consensual) yaoi out there that take advantage of the full spectrum of sex toys/accessories/what have you.

I mean, there’s always some character out there going on about how his partner’s a perv… I just refuse to believe it when all that’s happening is no-frills, plain ol’ sex. That’s not pervy-ness, that’s just his sex drive being higher than the complainer’s.

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30 Day Yaoi Challenge, Day 11: Kizuna volume 2

Posted on March 20, 2013 by Daniella Orihuela-Gruber

Kizuna volume 2 by Kazuma Kodaka

In this volume of Kizuna, we see a lot more of Ranmaru and Kei’s current relationship dynamic. Kei is rather confident in his love for Ranmaru, but Ranmaru is more anxious than that.

This all comes to a head when Ranmaru thinks Kei is cheating on him with a woman. It turns out to be a transvestite friend that Kei was drinking with, but it brings out other subconscious issues to the battleground like: Wouldn’t it be easier for them both to just get girlfriends and not come out to their families? Is Ranmaru only a replacement for a woman?

Unfortunately, Kei’s reaction to all this is to get so mad that he violently rapes Ranmaru to teach him the difference between Kei mindlessly banging him and Kei making love to him. It was pretty cringe-worthy. Thankfully it was the only actual assault in the book. (There was an attempted assault on a female character, but it was stopped before it got anywhere.)

Then the story shifts back in time to how and when Masa got his scar (protecting Kai during a fight with a rival gang) and how Kai reacted to it. The two *almost* have sex. I actually find it quite funny how much the two deny their super-obvious feelings for each other. The current story then becomes about Kai, Masa and their yakuza clan as they become embroiled in some serious trouble with a rival group. Kai gets arrested by police who think that he attacked a woman with a knife, but it turns out she was looking for someone who was impersonating him. Kai then goes into hiding, but Kei winds up getting dragged into the fray by accident before the volume ends.

There was a big change of art style in this book. Volume one was old-school, almost more like Fist of the North Star than boy’s love. But volume two was much more modern, and reminded me of a more polished Banana Fish at times. (Also, if you like Kizuna, you should definitely read Banana Fish. Do it.) I do like the change, but I’m beginning to wonder if the artist redrew a lot of the manga later on. Either way both Ranmaru and Kei are supposed to be very handsome, and the second volume convinced me of that whereas the first volume failed to do so. There is still a problem with facial proportions, but perhaps that will change with time too.

So back to the rape. On the one hand, I’m glad there was less rape in this volume. On the other, holy shit, that was not the rape I was expecting. I figured I’d be in for more “someone getting kidnapped by yakuza and getting raped,” not domestic abuse! I’m very disappointed in Kei, as a character for this, and for some things he did in volume one. I’m also starting to get disappointed in Ranmaru for putting up with this bullshit, then turning around and allowing Kei to make love to him afterward. (C’mon! If your ass hurt as bad as you said it did, you wouldn’t be able to have anal sex again that quickly!) And Kodaka for writing this bullshit! Swear to goodness, sometimes I wonder if these creators just don’t know any better or just don’t care.

There’s also a conversation where Kai proclaims himself to be a gentleman who would never force someone to have sex with him. LIES! You totally did that in volume one, Kai! It’s just that no one in the story is going to argue otherwise because what you did moved the story along and you’re a main protagonist! Arrrrggggh!

You know, every day of this challenge, I’ve been thanking my lucky stars that I fell in love with manga via shoujo manga. It may have its own problems, but it’s far less rape-tastic…

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30 Day Yaoi Challenge, Day 10: Hot Steamy Glasses

Posted on March 19, 2013 by Daniella Orihuela-Gruber

Hot Steamy Glasses by Tatsumi Kaiya

We continue our rape-free streak!  This time there isn’t even any sexual assault! Woot!

The main story is about two long-time friends, Takeo and Fumi. Takeo has been deeply in love with Fumi since junior high, but Fumi’s just not interested. In fact, he finds Takeo, a successful CEO and serious otaku, to be rather annoying. (Especially when faced with Takeo’s moe girl collection.) Fumi’s brother, Shogo, and others push Fumi to get together with Takeo, but he won’t budge.

Takeo begins to spiral into depression over his unrequited love, causing Shogo and others to take desperate measures. Finally, Fumi gives in and begins dating  Takeo. Unfortunately, Takeo likes taking things slow and Fumi begins to get frustrated by their lack of intimacy. It takes a trip to New York City to make Fumi realize that Takeo is actually quite passionate in bed!

To top it all off, Shogo suddenly announces he’s getting married to Fumi’s nemesis, Reiko Kawahara! This forces Fumi to move with Takeo. Three years later, and the two are lovey-dovey and doting on Fumi’s adorable niece.

Then there’s one final story about a young writer and his long-time, glasses-wearing crush who have finally started dating. The only problem is the writer has with his new boyfriend is that he’s more interested in his work than he is interested in the writer! But, of course, it  gets resolved in the end.

I appreciated this volume’s lack of sexual assault, but unfortunately it should really be called “Tepid Steamy Glasses.” Takeo and Fumi’s romance was forced, drawn out and rather boring. The short story about the two of them babysitting Fumi’s niece was more exciting than the rest of their courtship.

Fumi had little character development going on. Repeatedly, people coerced him to turn gay and start dating Takeo, which made Fumi feel cornered and defensive. Normally, this is where most creators would introduce moments (or non-consensual sex) where Fumi would realize his true feelings, but there’s none of that here. When Fumi does decide to get with Takeo, it feels like Fumi is giving in to other people’s demands rather than his authentic feelings. It’s only after they get together that Fumi starts showing some romantic interest in Takeo, but, again, it feels like someone flipped a switch rather than natural progression. Thankfully, the short story about the young writer was a little bit more satisfying.

I feel rather meh about the art style. While it’s perfectly fine, I don’t think the angular eyes that Tatsumi Kaiya draws are expressive enough. She even makes up for this by often drawing Takeo’s face “eyeless,” where his glasses imply the existence of his eyes and his expression relies on his other features.

The “straight man turned suddenly gay” trope is another bad habit of BL/yaoi creators. I think that it is mostly untrue to life, though I realize that this genre is fantastical in many ways. But even if BL and yaoi are pure fantasy, the stories often occur in the real world. This just sets up gay men to be objectified by BL/yaoi readers, which I would think is quite annoying for a group of people who are already discriminated against. It’s kind of like the otaku equivalent of thinking every gay man will be your sassy gay friend.

I just find it more satisfying when creators work in actual issues gay men face into their stories instead of creating a gay utopia. It shows respect for the people we are fantasizing about and it can add an element of drama that falls outside the usual, overworked BL/yaoi tropes.

Hot Steamy Glasses is especially bad when it comes to this trope. There is nothing to show readers that Fumi is gay, it’s more like he suddenly decides to cave to the pressure he’s feeling to be with Takeo. Considering how so many LGBTQ people feel the pressure to pretend to be straight because they’re afraid of discrimination or violent retaliation…Well, it just doesn’t feel right.

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30 Day Yaoi Challenge, Day 9: The Man I Picked Up

Posted on March 18, 2013 by Daniella Orihuela-Gruber

The Man I Picked Up by CJ Michalski

……….I was not prepared for CJ Michalski.

Actually, that’s not quite true. I was very much prepared for the first four chapters of this manga, which focus on the romances that blossom in a gay host club called Boy’s Club Garçon. I was not prepared for the last four chapters that focus on three friends in what seems to be a high school oendan squad, one of whom is being courted by a very cute boy with a lot of talent for cooking. Let’s start off with the host club…

First off is the story of Michiya, a recently divorced man, who is spending some time with his college friend Tamaki, a gay man who owns Boy’s Club Garçon. Tamaki keeps teasing Michiya and asking him if he’s sure he isn’t gay, but Michiya vehemently denies any feelings for men. In fact, he’s so hung up on his ex-wife, he still carries his wedding ring around.

Despite Tamaki’s teasing, Michiya decides to join him at his luxurious mountain cabin for a weekend. But when he gets there, the only other person there is Sumio. Michiya turns in for the night, but awakes to find Sumio giving him some unwanted blowjob action in bed. Uncomfortable, Michiya tries to leave, but finds that they’re completely snowed in. Over the course of the blizzard, however, Michiya begins to have some feelings for Sumio and vice versa. Michiya comes back to the Boy’s Club to tell Tamaki that he was right all along and that he’s fallen for Sumio, thus foiling Tamaki’s plans to snag Michiya for himself. Then there’s a short story about a young man working at Garçon who reunites with his high school crush through the club before we get to the main story.

One night Tamaki is closing up when he finds a man badly beaten lying on the street next to the club’s sign. He takes him in and nurses him back to health, but this causes the man, named Kouta, to fall for Tamaki. Tamaki isn’t having it, but he keeps Kouta around because the less-beefy club workers like having the muscular Kouta there to protect them from the sudden surge of creepy clients.

Kouta realizes that the surge of creepers is coming from his old gang, so he prepares himself to confront them, and possibly get killed in the process, by surprising Tamaki in his bathrobe and doing some double dick handjob before running off. I have to pause here to mention the ridiculous baseball cap that Kouta puts on between these two scenes that says, (Lord, help me) “Drink My Milk.” This should have been my first clue, but I just thought it was a funny easter egg-type thing.

Of course, Kouta gets beaten up within an inch of his life, forcing Tamaki to let Kouta live in his apartment until he’s fully healed. After a few shenanigans, they unsurprisingly fall in love.

This brings us to the next four chapters… Oh lord.

Hanazono is the captain of the ultra-manly oendan squad at his high school, with strict rules about being manly and not dating girls. So, of course, he’s not too happy when the little Takeo confesses to him and hands him a cute lunchbox. Still, he winds up eating the lunch box (it’s environmentally conscious of him to do so), and accepting more lunch boxes from Takeo every day until Hanazono confronts his feelings.  They then bang each other happily in the club room with Hanazono proclaiming, “this isn’t some meaningless fling with a girl! This is pure man love!” (Their emphasis, not mine.)

The next chapter sees Takeo and Hanazono having some intimacy problems, and a rival from another school who mistakenly kidnaps Takeo. (He meant to kidnap Hanazono, beat the crap out of him and steal Takeo, but he mixed up their names so his friends kidnap the wrong person.) Takeo thinks that Hanazono won’t rescue him and thus beats up his kidnapper instead. Hanazono then bursts in to save the day, and the two wind up having a lot of sex in front of the kidnapper, which leads to some serious nose-bleeding.

The story then switches to Hanazono’s two cohorts, Chin and Kitou. Chin clearly has a thing for Kitou, so when he gets injured in a big fight, Kitou takes care of him. They wind up at Chin’s house, which has a huge bath, and Chin winds up jerking off Kitou. Annnnnnnnnd this is when CJ Michalski starts using turtles as visual metaphors for penises and sex. (Yup, you read that right.) A few days later, muses aloud about his feelings in his school’s restroom when Chin pops out of a stall and the two consummate their relationship. Loudly enough that Takeo and Hanazono think there’s a ghost haunting the bathroom, and start throwing toilet paper into the stall.

I really cannot properly describe all the crack that Michalski unleashes upon her readers here. You’d really have to get a copy and read it yourself to do that.

I did like her art style.  There were different body types and different types of men showcased here, even a bald guy, which is a nice change from yaoi manga where everyone’s gorgeous, but the same.

I’m not too happy about the three instances where there is either outright sexual assault, but I don’t have time to talk about it much today. In one instance, consent was shown a few panels later, so I’ll let that one slide. The first assault, in Michiya’s story, Sumio didn’t continue to assault Michiya after he pushed him away, so I think I can let that one slide too. The last instance was in the crack-filled oendan squad chapters, so I was too distracted by the sex turtle metaphors to react properly. I’m beginning to feel desensitized to all this. Urgh.

Finally, I would like to say that The Man I Picked Up is a horrible title for a book. It sounds like a story that leads to everyone getting venereal diseases. Til next time, folks…

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30 Day Yaoi Challenge, Day 8: Same Difference

Posted on March 17, 2013 by Daniella Orihuela-Gruber

Some of you have expressed (what seems like) interest in me reading yaoi manga that does not come from my original 30 Day Challenge pile. I don’t know if I could honestly continue the challenge past the original 30 days, or if I could handle reading more than planned, but I don’t mind continuing to do occasional BL/yaoi reviews.

So, if you are interested in seeing me continue this in some form after the challenge, I would suggest clicking on and buying from my Amazon Associates links (you’ll see one below before my review of Same Difference starts and also on my sidebar.) Once I get enough money from your purchases, I will allow all my readers to suggest titles for me to read and review, then let you vote on the final pick. If this is something you might want to see me do, click away!

Same Difference by Nozomu Hiiragi

Finally! I have come upon it! The yaoi manga in my large DMP pile that breaks the rape-y streak! I knew it couldn’t be all bad! :D

Same Difference is about two elite businessmen in the same corporation. Not only are they the top of the tops, they dominate one tower each of their company’s building. But they’ve never met.

When they finally do cross paths (in what looks like a really cool men’s room with a nice view,) Ozaki decides to come on to the seemingly meek Tsuburaya. Unfortunately for Ozaki, Tsuburaya decides to turn the tables on him and they end up playing a cat-and-mouse game where the winner gets to be the top.

Ozaki thinks he’s about to win when Tsuburaya breaks his cock. It’s then that Ozaki starts to think that he might have feelings for his competitor, but he tries to ignore them. They make a deal for round two, once Ozaki heals, but Ozaki breaks his promise to meet up. This causes Tsuburaya to get a little more desperate, leading to them ultimately confessing their feelings and getting together. Then Tsuburaya admits that he’s been totally sadistic the entire time in order to draw out Ozaki’s true feelings. (Mwahahhaha!)

The second to last story (the final story goes back to Ozaki and Tsuburaya’s romance) is an adorable BL story about a high school kid befriending a set of twins, then falling in love with one despite the other wanting to get with him as well. And there’s glasses! It’s nice to see a little pocket of a different fetish/trope/moe/whatever you call it. I feel like the US just gets a lot of pretty boy yaoi manga and not much else sometimes.

Since I don’t have to talk about rape (Yaaaaaaaay!), I don’t have much else to say about the manga other than that I enjoyed it and the art style was really cute! Everyone has fluffy hair and their mouths look like bird mouths when they go chibi. In case my review didn’t make it clear, this yaoi is kind of comedic (Tsuburaya just *tortures* Ozaki and really makes him squirm!)

There is one thing that I don’t fully understand: the whole “elite” thing. It seems like most of Ozaki and Tsuburaya’s elite status comes from a) their looks and b) talents that have almost nothing to do with their job performance. Tsuburaya is supposedly an interpreter, but we only see him hanging around the office or the company president. It just seems odd that a company’s elite group of workers is determined by attractiveness instead of high-level positions or performance.

Either way, I really liked Same Difference and I hope more work by Hiiragi comes out in the near future.

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30 Day Yaoi Challenge, Day 7: Kizuna vol. 1

Posted on March 16, 2013 by Daniella Orihuela-Gruber

Kizuna volume 1 by Kazuma Kodaka

Ahhhh, Kizuna. This manga is not entirely what I was expecting in so many ways. The cover art is so pretty. Even though I knew it was new cover art, I thought the insides would be more modern… But they’re so 90′s! Everything’s kind of masculine and line-shaded, with real tones! That really surprised me for some reason. I also wasn’t sure what Kizuna was about. I could tell by the covers of all the volumes I bought that there was something to do with yakuza, but the back cover copy on the first volume showed absolutely no indication of this. Ah, well.

Kizuna is about a young kendo player named Ranmaru and a young yakuza heir named Kei who fall in love, despite something of a rivalry between them. They wind up moving in together during college, but their peaceful, domestic life is shattered when Kei’s estranged half-brother, Kai, runs away from home and ends up moving in with them. To make matters worse, Kai is hell bent on stealing Ranmaru away from Kei.

After an incident where Ranmaru gets drugged by a professor who wants to rape him, Kai saves him and winds up rapes him instead, thinking that Ranmaru wants it because the drug is also an aphrodisiac. But when Ranmaru starts calling out for Kei in the midst of it all, Kai realizes that he’ll never win Ranmaru’s heart. And so, he gives up and winds up going home shortly afterward. Then the story starts to shift back in time. Kai in elementary school forming a deep bond with one of his father’s underbosses, Masa. How Ranmaru and Kei met and became lovers. Kei struggling through the death of his mother, Ranmaru struggling through injuries that prevent him from ever playing kendo again and finally, Kai getting kidnapped and raped by a jealous man who wants to have Masa all to himself.

Obviously I haven’t escaped yaoi rape. This time I’m less pissed off by it though, but only because things are trickier The three big problems I have with the rape depicted in this volume is that a) the scene where Kai rapes Ranmaru is pretty gratuitous (the other scene isn’t played to get the readers excited); b) Kai doesn’t pay for his actions like the other rapists do because it was “consensual” thanks to the aphrodisiac/date-rape drug; and c) Kei kind of starts of his relationship with Ranmaru by raping him. I don’t think I have to explain my first problem, but I do need to talk about the other two.

Ranmaru’s professor/would-be rapist gets beat up by Kai before the guy can do anything except drug him, kiss him and start fondling him. Kai then goes back to kill the guy (or at least seriously maim him) and sticks a knife in at least one of the guy’s hands before Kei shows up, stops Kai and then proceeds to beat the crap out of the professor himself. Fast forward to when Kai gets raped, Masa stabs Kai’s rapist, then rips his guts out with a knife before pushing him out the window to his death. And what punishment does Kai get for raping Ranmaru, though he knew that Ranmaru was drugged and helpless, under the pretext that it was “consensual”? Kei makes him walk home from Shinjuku. *sigh*

Mostly, Kei is a very supportive boyfriend and for that I can applaud him. Kei just wants Ranmaru to be okay, he isn’t mad at Ranmaru for “sleeping with” his brother (their words, not mine) and he’s happy that Ranmaru loves him. He bends over backward to give Ranmaru emotional support during Ranmaru’s rehabilitation. BUT, and this is a very important but, before all this good stuff happens, Kei confesses his feelings for Ranmaru by grabbing him and forcing him down. Ranmaru protests, then decides he’s okay with it. He even thinks about how he could fight back, but is choosing not to do so because Kei is saying his name “sweetly.” Had Kei not said “I love you,” during this intercourse, Ranmaru would have broken Kei’s arms. Kei even begs forgiveness and apologizes as he’s doing it, which begs the question: Is this rape? Is Ranmaru’s silence a form of consent?

I feel hesitant to answer that last question, as silence as consent will be argued by the defense in the upcoming Steubenville rape trial, where a number of high school boys assaulted a girl who was extremely drunk, to the point where she was vomiting and blacking out. I won’t even bother to use the word “allegedly” because these kids were dumb enough to take photos and videos, then post a number them up on social media websites. The question won’t be whether or not they are found guilty, as much as on how many charges will they be found guilty.

Back to Kizuna, I think that Kei was (unfortunately) raping Ranmaru. Ranmaru was initially trying to get Kei to stop, but he did not. If he had, he would have only assaulted Ranmaru. That Ranmaru became quiet, did not clearly imply consent for me, especially because he was just not fighting back instead of silently participating. What did imply consent for me was when Ranmaru threw his arms around Kei and said “Too bad. If you hadn’t said that…I would have beat you up and broken both your arms.” (A funny way to consent, I know.) But by then, Kei had already crossed the line into what I am considering non-consensual intercourse. As Ranmaru said next, “there’s supposed to be an order for these things, idiot.”

And this, folks, is why I really hate rape in yaoi. Even if the lines are fuzzy, even if it actually moves the story forward, rape is a crutch in this genre. It is rarely treated in a way that is respectful to the victims. Instead, it is more often used to show the readers a steamy sex scene between two people who we’re then forced to accept as lovers, in spite of the somewhat heinous act just committed. It is used in lieu of learning how to properly write up the beginnings of a healthy, but passionate relationship. It’s just far easier to blur the lines of what is consensual and put in something steamy. I hate it.

What makes it even worse is that Kizuna did not escape this trap because, even though it spans multiple volumes, it had to start off as a one-shot like many yaoi manga are forced to do. It is probably cheaper for yaoi publishers to just do one-shots, but it stifles the creators and forces them to be tawdry in a bad way instead of creative. Frankly, I don’t really want to spend much of my money on bad, tawdry comics. So when we get down to it, this is why I usually don’t buy BL and yaoi.

Despite all this, I do think Kizuna is well-written in every other part and I do enjoy reading it. I am hoping that the next four volumes are not as rape-tastic.

 

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