Shoujo is a
very difficult genre, meseems. ‘twas simply ‘shoujo’ long ago, but modern girls
are no longer satisfacted with ‘simple’ things. Well, a lot of them are not
Many of
recent shoujo mangas tend to be short, much shorter than ‘twas usual for the
pieces of 90s-00s. they include from 4 to 20 chapter, and there are a lot of
one shots as well. Serialization which lasts for a long time already seems to
be an obsolete thing
However,
‘tis not the problem that bothers me. What I can state after reading so many
short shoujos, is that there are two major kinds of them
The first
one is completely boring and devoid of any possible elements which could
attract me as a reader. It simply describes a situation when a couple falls in
love and usually tends to introduce a moment when the girl realises her beloved
is not true to her and starts doubting, or discovers that they cannot be
together. Of course, we have the guy come to her and assure her that he loves
her. The circumstances and characters may be different, but the concept is
always the same
This time I
read a manga like this. ‘tis called
‘Koi no Uta’
by Akira Shouko, and contains
4 short stories, none of which, however, impressed me or showed something new
The other
kind of shoujo pretends to be different in plot, but is only different in
‘instruments’. Its main instrument to capture the hearts of young female
readers is obvious romance present in such an amount that it verges on smut, or
is smut from the very beginning. It might be great that the characters do a lot
of exciting things every two or three pages, but looking closely makes me only
think that there is nothing else beyond this. No interesting plot developments,
no inner thoughts explained properly, no great ideas illustrated – well, there
might be some, but all of them are subject to the need of frequent drawing
images of the characters in quite sexappealing scenes
This time I
read manga like this, too. ‘tis called
‘Kiss Hug’
by Kako Mitsuki, though
kissing and hugging is not the only things which the characters did. The most
interesting thing in this manga is that, many scenes resemble ‘Kaichou’ too
much, the same situations and same details are present. Still, what a great
difference…
The difference
is pretty simple. ‘Kaichou’ is not trying to add more ‘romantic scenes’
sacrificing every other opportunity. Therefore, we have much more profound
analyses of everyone’s feelings, situations and relationship. ‘Kiss Hug’ only
turns round the main couple trying to proceed to the final stage of love, and
something preventing them from it. That something is mainly shyness and
inexperience of the girl. And ‘tis supposed to impress me somehow…
If only
‘Kaichou’ maintains its level the same way it was doing through these almost 6
dozens of chapters, it would be one of the greatest shoujo every
Well, the
situation is not that awful, as there are still some very nice pieces which are
not that ‘flat’.
This time I
read manga like that, too. ‘tis called
‘himegimi no tsukurikata’
by Izumi Asuka.
The name speaks for itself, so I expected to see a girl who did not want to
behave like princess, but was supposed to, and thus is trained. I also
remembered vaguely that there would be two guys acting as her butlers. To my
surprise, it turned out to be more complicated, and reminded me much of ‘Hyakkiyakou
Juliet’ and ‘Kuroneko Guardian’, Izumi-sensei’s masterpieces I have already
read, which provide a pretty similar characters and storyline
The process
of trying to become a proper princess was not described at all. ‘twas
mentioned, but was never displayed for us. Instead, the process of becoming a
family was present. I am not a person to complain of lack of romance, when I
see such a sincere thing. Both the girl trying her best and the guys who
abandoned their previous life were utterly cute. Their feelings were conveyed
with an overwhelming effect. Their conversations were much more touching than
conversations of the couple whom I mentioned above. Moreover, I was pleased and
delighted to see people who cherish their relationship more than anything else.
I am fed up with stories about couples or members of family parting to have
separate ways. Therefore, I was so happy that I could cry when I saw those
three promising to never leave each other, and especially the last chapter
where the girl refused to hide the truth about the guys, and asked them to stop
pretending being her relatives who already leave, and honestly told the teacher
that she is not going to let them go, provided that her living with two guys
was seen as indecent behaviour
This manga
proved to me that there are people who think the same as me, that love should
not necessarily be portrayed as a problem of when and how to ‘make love’, but
can be between three people as well, and between two elder guys and one young
girl, and it can exceed everything, even the social disapproval. What else
could be expected from Izumi-sensei!
Another
manga I just read is called
‘hoshiyomi no yogensha’
by Kawase Natsuna, and it
deals with pretty similar issues. Though the circumstances differ a lot, we
have the same two guys and a hard-working girl, who is afraid of losing them,
who became her family, though she did not belong to them. Another important
problem is whether the person wishing to receive gratitude for his hard work
has the right to do so. I was especially happy to see that the mangaka did not
disapprove of the girl feeling that way, and showed that there are situations
when the person whom you help will thank you as well and would not abandon you
in any trouble. In other words, you sincerely want to do support someone,
without any striving for benefit, and because of this, you receive the same
support in response. I should agree that this is a rare case, and the girl was
quite lucky to encounter with such people, but this is just what I wanted to
read – a story which does not happen a lot in the real life
I was
initially searching for a romance, but I found something more impressing.
Feeling that I am not the only one to think that way makes me happy as I never
was during a very long period of time. The only thing I am not happy with is
that the manga has only 7 chapters, and I would be happy to read some dozens
more
Well, there
are also some mangas which lack the depth and sometimes they even reveal a low
level of graphic skills of a mangaka, but at least they have some good humour
This time I
read a manga like this, too. ‘tis called
‘himitsu no himegimi, uwasa no ouji’
by
Kauta Mato, and though my eyes were not pleased with the pictures, and the plot
did not present anything interesting either, ‘twas nice to read and the funny
situations the characters were involved in were really rescuing the manga
well, I am glad to see there are still some mangakas who write pure shoujo, not smut-shoujo-close-to-josei-and-even-farther
