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piranhawarning: yaoi|boys love|gay|men x men manga. do not read review if that sort of thing offends.
japanese title: どうせ、めろめろ (douse, meromero), english title: melted love;
1 volume 8 chapters (complete), not scanlated. published by kaiousha under GUSH COMICS, licensed in english by DMP, juné imprint, translated by sachiko sato.
japanese ISBN4-87724-475-1
english ISBN-10: 156970760X, ISBN-13: 978-1569707609
but onward. this is the first english BL manga for which i hadn't seen a scanlation or japanese raws first. and it wasn't a terrible buy, even though i am not all that much into short manga. there's quite the range of stories here.
there are 6 stories total. quick run-through:
melted love & melty people: model yuzo is lovers with mitsuya, a cosmetic surgeon. mitsuya spoils yuzo, but does find lots of other boys cute. this is starting to get to yuzo who's himself playing the field a bit. seme to his other lovers, he's uke to take-charge mitsuya, and not certain whether he really matters to him.
lonely stubbornness: tetsu and kazusa started going out 3 months ago, but haven't really seen each other since, when tetsu comes across kazusa with a girl. tetsu, being a workoholic, hadn't really noticed 3 months had passed, but that girl with kazusa, that gives him pause, and he seeks advice from his female friend machi, who is also kazusa's ex. (notable for having a female character who's not a bitch.)
the agony and ecstasy of dentist nakazawa: nakazawa gets off on the faces people make when they're scared. wataru was traumatized by a dentist when he was a child. a match made in heaven, eh?
false rumour started? or not? & False rumour started: for 20 years kimura has always taken care of tachibana, from the time they were in school together until now, when tachibana is the company director and kimura is his counsel. kimura considers tachibana to be an imbecile, albeit an endearing one. tachibana adores kimura. but the time has come for tachibana to get married. he's dead set against it, but kimura apparently doesn't have a problem with it. yet when tachibana agrees to the marriage and tries to rely less on kimura, he isn't as sanguine about that as he should be.
unparalleled service: morio works as a concierge in a hotel. kamiya is a frequent guest who makes a habit out of hitting on morio, which morio always turns down with great tact and discretion. but this time kamiya asks him instead to prepare an elegant dinner for him and a special guest.
tattoo: seiji is a tattoo artist, yu is from a family of samurai who've been ruined by the fall of the tokugawa shogunate. he knows the past is gone, but he can see no future for himself. seiji is looking for a canvas to create a tattoo that will let everybody see what an artist he is.
the stories are decently plotted, not PWP. there's some sex, not terrifically explicit or exciting. the art is pleasant enough, but nothing special. overall this is middle-of-the-road stuff, more suited for people who like diverting fluff than for those looking for depth, drama, and hot action. i'd like to see a longer manga from this artist.
i probably liked tattoo best, but not really for its innate story value, but for what it allowed my imagination to do with it. none of the other stories inspired me to think about the characters any further. the dentist story creeped me out -- it's meant to be funny, but hey, i _have_ that phobia, and really, people who get off on others' pain -- even if indirectly -- give me the willies. but, wonder of wonders, not a single rape in this entire anthology, not even any non-con!
DMP's production values are decent, with a separate dust cover, but no colour inserts. the translation seems alright, except for the clunkiness of replacing japanese honorifics -- "sir kamiya" is _not_ the correct translation for (what i presume is) kamiya-sama, sorry, it has a much more specific meaning in english. just keep the bloody honorifics already and give us a page of culture notes (there are none here). there are very few typoes. some SFX are replaced, some have the english printed next to the kana -- that is well done in this volume; good font choices, good placement, and excellent editing. the paper isn't as good as dramaqueen's, but the one thing i like about DMPs manga is that the format is slightly larger (23.5 x 33 cm) -- to better ogle the graphics.
oh, almost forgot: the fraktur typeface they picked is not a font in which one should set all-cap titles. it looks terrible and is very hard to read. the title on the cover is notably not using any caps at all -- i bet somebody ixnayed the all-cap version. for good reason. should have recommended the chapter titles be changed too.
this is probably the best piece of art in the entire manga; the layout is interesting and hey, dragon tattoo. the rest of the art is so run-of-the-mill that i had trouble picking something representative and just decided not to bother. it's ok, not ugly. just not inspired either, and the page layout itself is generally much more boring than on this page.
japanese title: どうせ、めろめろ (douse, meromero), english title: melted love;
1 volume 8 chapters (complete), not scanlated. published by kaiousha under GUSH COMICS, licensed in english by DMP, juné imprint, translated by sachiko sato.
japanese ISBN4-87724-475-1
english ISBN-10: 156970760X, ISBN-13: 978-1569707609
 |
single-author anthology. about the title -- oy. "melted love"? the original title means (literally) either something like "anyhow, madly in love" or "after all, falling down drunk". um, yeah. not a great start, but couldn't it have become at least "melting love"? |
but onward. this is the first english BL manga for which i hadn't seen a scanlation or japanese raws first. and it wasn't a terrible buy, even though i am not all that much into short manga. there's quite the range of stories here.
there are 6 stories total. quick run-through:
melted love & melty people: model yuzo is lovers with mitsuya, a cosmetic surgeon. mitsuya spoils yuzo, but does find lots of other boys cute. this is starting to get to yuzo who's himself playing the field a bit. seme to his other lovers, he's uke to take-charge mitsuya, and not certain whether he really matters to him.
lonely stubbornness: tetsu and kazusa started going out 3 months ago, but haven't really seen each other since, when tetsu comes across kazusa with a girl. tetsu, being a workoholic, hadn't really noticed 3 months had passed, but that girl with kazusa, that gives him pause, and he seeks advice from his female friend machi, who is also kazusa's ex. (notable for having a female character who's not a bitch.)
the agony and ecstasy of dentist nakazawa: nakazawa gets off on the faces people make when they're scared. wataru was traumatized by a dentist when he was a child. a match made in heaven, eh?
false rumour started? or not? & False rumour started: for 20 years kimura has always taken care of tachibana, from the time they were in school together until now, when tachibana is the company director and kimura is his counsel. kimura considers tachibana to be an imbecile, albeit an endearing one. tachibana adores kimura. but the time has come for tachibana to get married. he's dead set against it, but kimura apparently doesn't have a problem with it. yet when tachibana agrees to the marriage and tries to rely less on kimura, he isn't as sanguine about that as he should be.
unparalleled service: morio works as a concierge in a hotel. kamiya is a frequent guest who makes a habit out of hitting on morio, which morio always turns down with great tact and discretion. but this time kamiya asks him instead to prepare an elegant dinner for him and a special guest.
tattoo: seiji is a tattoo artist, yu is from a family of samurai who've been ruined by the fall of the tokugawa shogunate. he knows the past is gone, but he can see no future for himself. seiji is looking for a canvas to create a tattoo that will let everybody see what an artist he is.
the stories are decently plotted, not PWP. there's some sex, not terrifically explicit or exciting. the art is pleasant enough, but nothing special. overall this is middle-of-the-road stuff, more suited for people who like diverting fluff than for those looking for depth, drama, and hot action. i'd like to see a longer manga from this artist.
i probably liked tattoo best, but not really for its innate story value, but for what it allowed my imagination to do with it. none of the other stories inspired me to think about the characters any further. the dentist story creeped me out -- it's meant to be funny, but hey, i _have_ that phobia, and really, people who get off on others' pain -- even if indirectly -- give me the willies. but, wonder of wonders, not a single rape in this entire anthology, not even any non-con!
DMP's production values are decent, with a separate dust cover, but no colour inserts. the translation seems alright, except for the clunkiness of replacing japanese honorifics -- "sir kamiya" is _not_ the correct translation for (what i presume is) kamiya-sama, sorry, it has a much more specific meaning in english. just keep the bloody honorifics already and give us a page of culture notes (there are none here). there are very few typoes. some SFX are replaced, some have the english printed next to the kana -- that is well done in this volume; good font choices, good placement, and excellent editing. the paper isn't as good as dramaqueen's, but the one thing i like about DMPs manga is that the format is slightly larger (23.5 x 33 cm) -- to better ogle the graphics.
oh, almost forgot: the fraktur typeface they picked is not a font in which one should set all-cap titles. it looks terrible and is very hard to read. the title on the cover is notably not using any caps at all -- i bet somebody ixnayed the all-cap version. for good reason. should have recommended the chapter titles be changed too.
this is probably the best piece of art in the entire manga; the layout is interesting and hey, dragon tattoo. the rest of the art is so run-of-the-mill that i had trouble picking something representative and just decided not to bother. it's ok, not ugly. just not inspired either, and the page layout itself is generally much more boring than on this page.
no subject
on 2007-10-20 16:00 (UTC)I have this on order, so don't want to spoil anything, but after I read it I'm definitely going to come back and see how our thoughts agree/differ.
melted love by takumi you
on 2007-10-20 17:29 (UTC)do let me know what you think after you've read it!
indirectly related
on 2007-10-24 12:22 (UTC)Re: indirectly related
on 2007-10-24 23:23 (UTC)but i think he's just harbouring wishful thinking when it comes to the west. if anything, copyright is getting tighter and tighter (IMO violating its original spirit more and more), and let's not even talk about trademark. also, fan fiction / fan art seem to me much less widely spread; most people are simply consumers and don't ever make their own, so there's less read/write culture to begin with, which makes a similar triangle with beneficial effects less likely. manga is much more integrated in japanese culture, and there isn't this artificial distinction that "comics are for kids; you'll grow out of it" that puts such a huge damper on western comics development and sales.