The Garden of Discordia

Finally! We've got the homepage up ^_^

B.L.Y.G
Boy's Love Yaoi Gakkai 2011 ~ 17-19 June, Skogås (Stockholm)

It's time again for Sweden's one and only yaoi/BL/slash convention and, since third time's the charm, we're going for the largest and bestest BLYG ever!

The homepage can be found at blyg.eu and is rather sparse at the moment. We have a bunch of stuff just waiting to be typed down, tho, and I really think this years BLYG has the potential to be amazing

If anyone is interested in holding a panel/round-table discussion/lecture on something yaoi, slash, yuri or otherwise fandom related, gimme a shout - I'm the one booking events =D

Arranging this year are by the by the non-profits Geikai (Anime/manga inspired crafts) and Raison d'être (Jrock/Jpop)

See, there is yaoi which does contain complex characters and more-or-less realistic view of what a gay relationship might entail - see for instance Fumi Yoshinagas Ichigenme.. The First Class is Civil Law for instance. There are plenty of manga that pick apart and consider gender roles, expectations and queerness - See Setona Mizushiro and her work. They're mostly untranslated, alas, but I am reliably informed that After School Nightmare is along those lines

Aaaand then there's the stuff like today's haul: Stay Close to Me by Yaya Sakuragi and Target in the Viewfinder by Ayano Yamane....

The first one is pure fluff. Cute and really funny fluff, tho! Which, lemme tell you, is amaaaazingly hard to find, since most yaoi authors are completely unable to write comedy to save their lives and think that two guys moping about due to silly misunderstandings for 40 pages = drama.
I was not very surprised when I got home and checked the author name against the shelf, finding that it was the same creator as Tea for Two - the drawing style is similar and they're both genuinly funny. While there is still one top and one bottom, Sakuragi prefers to play around a bit with the seme/uke conventions.
Here, we have the childhood friends, one of which has grown into an ~otomen~, that is a maidenly lad who loves cooking and dreams of becoming a housewife, while the other is a strict, martial arts practitioner. Alas, the otomen has grown TALLER than his crush-for-years, oh noes!! But it's okay, because they've been together and love each other, even though the uke didn't quite realize that until another guy started hitting on him and everyone thinks they're both so cute together

This is the mental equivalent of eating chocolate cake with whipped cream for dinner /grabs spoon/
What can I say? Om nom nom, I love my chocolate cake!

And Viewfinder, does that really need an introduction these days...? Oh, all right. ( The one redeeming feature of this manga is that the smut is pretty well-done. )

In conclusion: My reward to myself for acing my exam & having worked my arse off this week: One heaping of ♥ fluff ♥ and one kinky smut-collection, thx!

(On a finishing note, if you're turned off yaoi because the overwhelming amount of non-con themes, I can really recommend Stay Close to Me. They're both very obviously in love with each other and though the uke is shy and whatnot, he does react with enthusiasm every time they have sex)

Koji Nanjo

Totally tired right now. But the TVTropes Yandere entry (The "I am c-r-a-z-y for you" stereotype) lists Koji Nanjo from Zetsuai as an example.

Or, well, to put it plainly most of the people who feel love/lust/obesssion in Zetsuai and Zetsuai Bronze fit this trope...

You won't understand what I like if you watch that old OAV, btw. The animation is rather horrid, though I liked the music. (Watch the music videos on youtube)

However, if you enjoy a tragic boy's love story with a plot of near operatic proportions (Especially in the sequel, Bronze. Put it like this, there are arms cut off - as an expression of devotion) the Zetsuai mangas are good. I like the art style too, very messy and just on the edge of scribbly but much more dynamic and, well, artistic than most of the bland drivel produced today. Alright, the first books are pretty choppy in style (especially the forehead of the women, holy beehive, Izumi's sis!!)

Koji Nanjo is a rock singer. Interesting tidbit: His visual performance borrows in part from the band BUCK-TICK, who were pretty big back then. Minami Ozaki and Kaori Yuki are among the few manga artists I know that have specifically mentioned visual kei (and related styles) artists as inspirations for their characters.

Anyway, Koji sees Takuto Izumi, a young football player traumatized by having witnessed his mother murdering his father in a fit of jealous passion, and falls into... obession? They do actually begin to love each other after a while, even share a rather cozy apartment for a while (then it all goes to hell - again) but it definitely doesn't start out in a healthy way.


Takuto Izumi

The problem with the love in Zetsuai is, I'd say, that both the protagonists are so horribly damaged by their families and that they can both be incredibly stubborn. Izumi cares for his little sister, Koji for nobody at all. They act self destructively (Koji smoking, drinking, fighting and driving with a death wish, Izumi not taking care of his body despite grueling football practice) and when they fall together it begins a spiral of obsession, violence, self-hatred and burning passion. That Koji has two plain crazy brothers and that their fans and the media aren't exactly welcoming the (after a while) prominent gay couple doesn't make things better.

Make no mistake, Zetsuai is melodromatic and tragic. But it's still very gripping and the art grows into something absolutely fascinating. Abstract, almost breaking free of the pages in violent b/w smudges to then fade away in rare, sunlit scenes of tenderness.

I (lazily) collect the Zetsuai artbooks and soundtracks. Own three so far, Zodiac, Puff and God as well as some doujinshi. Ozaki started out in the amateur scene and she kept doing (might still be for all I know?) doujinshi to her own work for quite a while.

Fyi, if you ever offer me one of Minami Ozaki's Sailor Moon doujinshi, I might just pay you with my soul.

( oh, one more pic... )

Entire anime meme here