The final "free" Crunchyroll sponsored episode. I'm seriously debating putting up episode's 6 and 7 that are on here as well, though they are on personal accounts. That always makes me feel weird and awkward and bad, but here's the thing...if there episodes considered most important and most ground-breaking in this anime, it would be episodes 6 and 7, especially episode 7. But episode 6 leads to the groundbreakingness of episode 7, so let me wrestle with my conscience a bit more before deciding... Episode 5 is on YT also, under a user's account, and it is a cute episode showing that Yuri K. already has somebody on the Japanese skating circuit, a younger talented skater named Minami, who is also has the hots for him. I will at least make a post of clips of 6 and 7 and other eps that show the continuation of this dramatic and powerful change in anime direction in anime in Japan (and the dramatic and powerful evolution of "eros" in the character Yuri Katsuki as he awakens to the sexuality within him and the love he has for Victor). This Eros Evolution is only shown on the ice and in one censored moment on the ice in that groundbreaking episode 7...a moment that caused fujoshi and fudanshi yaoi fans (women and men fans of male gay anime and manga, respectively) to scream everywhere when it happened. I refer to this as the "Fan-Squeeing Heard 'Round theWorld." Just search for any review of this episode. You'll see). So we have the face-off at Yu-Topia. Yuri Katsuki versus Yuri Plisetsky. On the line, Victor's unwavering attention for training (perhaps love as well...I always thought that Yuri P. was a bit smitten with Victor too, who the hell isn't in this series? But Yuri P. meets someone later who is more his type of partner...no spoiler, but...it's just perfect all around and leaves open a chance for the Yuri's to become better friends than rivals). Here in this episode, we see something I HAVE NEVER BEFORE SEEN in anime or real life. In real life and in anime, we often we male and female characters in sports trying to become stronger, more masculine, to complete with rivals in their sports. Here in this episode (and in later episodes with Yuri P. when his coach's ex-wife gets involved in his training) we see male characters aiming to become more graceful and feminine with their approaches to their ice skating. That was something altogether new and different for Japanese sports anime and it was a breath of fresh air to see male characters (especially later on a hothead like Yuri P.) embracing the feminine side of their natures. If you know and believe in the philosophy of yin and yang, we all apparently have the masculine and feminine natures within us. This episode shows it well. Yuri K's getting in touch with his divine feminine performing the beginning of the Eros skate causes the Japanese announcer to stutter in a future episode. Same, dude. Same.
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The older, self-conscious Yuri Katsuki faces his rival: the younger, swaggering, arrogant edge-lord Yuri Plisetsky in a battle for Victor's attention and one-on-one training at stake. Which Yuri will win? Will Victor be able to change the two Yuri's with the wildly different pieces of music he has chosen for each of them, music that contrasts their personalities? On Love: Agape, (charitable, unconditional love) for hot-tempered Russian Yuri, and On Love: Eros, (erotic, passionate, sexual love) for the shy and demure Japanese Yuri? Is Yuri Katsuki Victor's Pygmalion? Can he turn a little Japanese piggy into a prince? Watch it and see. My only regret is that Crunchyroll has only one more free episode of this up on YouTube. But you can always watch the rest with ads on Crunchyroll if you don't want to be a paying member. There are bootleg vids on YT of some of the other episodes but I don't roll like that. I will try and find some of the best scenes after the third episode...to show in continuing posts. And there are some really great scenes, especially of the Grand Prix final and other skaters, and Victor and Yuri's growing relationship. Someone pointed out to me that Funimation also has the English voiced version of this (dubbed) . I am not generally a fan of dubbed anime, preferring to watch most of my shows in the original language with subtitles. I have exceptions to this...anime that I consider so great in English voice that I prefer to watch them that way (Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood, Soul Eater, xxxHolic, Black Butler) but they are the exceptions to the rule. A fun fact...the English voice actor for Victor is NOT the character who voices Gru in Despicable Me, though fans will often meme that shit and it pisses me off. They sound remarkably similar though, and maybe that is why they do it. Fans are funny like that. Now, episode two of Yuri on Ice!!!: Two Yuri's?! Drama at Yu-topia! I am generally not a manga reader, but I do read a few of them. I haven't read this one, but I know it must be good going on how heavily hyped this anime was before it was released in 2019 by fans of the manga. They weren't wrong. Itadori Yuji is a high school student who excels at sports but he doesn't want to be an athlete. The sports clubs at his new high school would keep him attending too late to visit his grandfather (his only family) in th hospital, and his grandfather is very ill. So the only club he wants to be a part of is the Occult Club which lets him come and go as he pleases...because he keeps their club going, being the member they need to make the final number cut. He likes the other two members, though. Enough so that he got the school's cursed object for them...and that was probably not a good idea. It sets into motion the events that changes Yuji's life and gets him transferred to sorcerer's school. Because now he has a curse living inside of him...one of the most evil curses imaginable. Following this episode is the best gold-darn ending song I've heard in awhile. "Lost in Paradise" performed by ALI—a multinational Hip Hop/funk outfit from Shibuya (Tokyo), featuring AKLO on vocals. Honest to goddess, it's all I can do to stop myself from getting up and dancing (very badly) to this song every time it comes on. My girlfriend laughs at me enough as it is. Also...whenever someone in anime has their eyes closed via bandages or blindfolds, etcetera, it's a dead damn giveaway that that person is 1) EXTREMELY OVERPOWERED, and 2) has weird-ass, freaky-ass looking eyes. Well, in Gojo's case, it's one out of two. When I first saw Gojo's eyes, I almost forgot how gay I am, and fell once again in love with an anime character. If you're curious, watch the rest of the damn show. It's not too long (episode five maybe) before they're revealed. Or just search on YouTube for the opening song with Gojo's blindfold off. There are two opening songs: one where he teases taking the blindfold off, and then after the episode where he does do it, they start showing the second opening song. Anime openings are (sometimes) pretty good about not giving too many spoilers. They give enough as it is. Anyway, this anime is one of my favorite new anime and I'm trying to get caught up with season one right now, because season 2 will be airing soon. This has themes of blood and gore and violence. Probably not for little kids. There's also the occasional dirty joke. Enjoy. AND... I forgot the ending song doesn't appear in the first episode. My bad. Here ya go: Comfession: I like professional and Olympic ice-skating, gymnastics, all that kind of stuff...as well as gay anime and manga. Gay anime and manga is called yaoi, for for characters that are male and queer and yuri for female characters that are queer. There are a few transgender series out there and honestly, Japan is kind of backwards and awkward about this stuff, even though they are more open about creating comics and animation that are gay. So I'm not sure what the names of those are yet...I have one on my to-watch list and I'll let ya'll know when I watch it what the Japanese word for the genre is, if they have one. I like both yaoi and yuri depending on the subject matter and how the couples get together. I'm not a big fan of "non-con' yaoi or yuri. That's fan slang for "non-consent" and you know what that entails. Though it seems a lot of Japanese gay anime has it, even the less erotic stuff. I've read several literary essays about how it began to be a thing ("non-con" yaoi) because Japanese woman (in a repressed society, yaoi has been around awhile now) enjoyed the idea of a man being...well...raped. Disturbing...and so not cool. IMO. Well. Enough of that cringy talk. I will cover more "consensual" anime in the future. That doesn't happen in THIS anime. In fact, you only get teasers of relationships going on, basically because this anime is a SPORTS anime, first and foremost. Yuri Katsuki is a complicated character. The first episode sees him as a 23 year old, down-on-his-luck, seemingly washed up skater, while his idol, a bit older, Russian superstar Viktor Nikiforov is still winning gold medals. He returns home to Japan from the US after losing the nationals and finishing college and dismissing his coach, only to have is former ballet teacher reprimand him. He escapes to the skating rink rather than watch ice skating with her, where he meets with his old friends (a girl he used to crush on) and skates a famous routine by Viktor (gorgeous overlay scenes of Viktor skating the same routine at Grand Championship Finals on television as Yuri's mentor watches at Yuri's family's business—a hot springs/inn). Wait! You say? A girl he used to crush on? Yes. Yuri is a character that not only seems to be gay later on, but also seems to be "demisexual." People who identify as demisexual only feel sexual attraction to another person if they form a strong emotional bond or connection with them first. He confesses to Viktor in a later episode that he had a girl come on to him in Detroit but he didn't know how to deal with it, because he did not feel that way toward her and he was awkward. As the show progresses, even within the first three episodes, you will see that Yuri Katsuki begins to develop feelings for Viktor. And while Viktor is at first teasing...eventually he returns those feelings...even beginning to by episode three. As luck would have it...Crumchyroll has uploaded the first three entire episodes of this wonderful series on its YouTube site. And I don't call it ground-breaking lightly. This is the first time ever, in the history of Japanese anime, that an anime mainly labeled as a sports anime, features characters that even hint at queerness. Unfortunately, due to Japan's strict censorship guidelines, hint is all they really can do. But...they push that envelope to the very extremity. And queer anime fans all over the world loved it. I can only imagine what joy Japanese queer kids and young adults (and adults) felt with such representation, albeit not completely "open" representation. I will upload all three of the videos in due time. In the meantime, enjoy episode one. With a bit of..ahem.."fan service" at the end for you ladies, if you enjoy that. I know I do. Here's Yuri on Ice!!! Ep 1: Easy as Pirozhki!! The Grand Prix Final of Tears. As a member of Crunchyroll, I get to watch some really cool anime Really, really cool. Like this one. Yeah, it's another romantic one like Fruits Basket but like Fruits Basket its also a fantasy that's got some dark moments. I'm telling you...wayyy darker than Fruits Basket. In FruBa, the main character falls for a boy whose cute cat form may become a monster under certain circumstances. In TAMB, Chise Hatori sells herself to be the bride of an actual monster. A possible man-eating monster, a magus named Elias Ainsworth (nicknames: Pilum Muralis (lit. "Wall Spear"), the Child of Thorns, and the Thorn Mage, and other less pleasant names others in the series call him). His head is a skull with horns, eerily reminding one of the Wendigo of American legend. A half-man/half beast that was once human, the Wendigo is cursed because as a human it resorted to cannibalism. And there's cannibalism hinted at in Elias' past. Yes, this anime has some disturbing moments. But it has some remarkable moments as well. It is an anime with a theme of struggling to overcome your inner demons. Elias struggles to overcome his beastly nature. Chise struggles to overcome her depression, the fact that she is cursed to see monsters, and that her mother committed suicide because of that same curse. Both Elias and Chise struggle to learn to love and live with one another while trying to find a way to keep Chise from dying from her condition at a young age. She is a Sleigh Beggy, a human mage that can draw magic from her surroundings. Sleigh Beggies are worth a lot of money, so there's always a subplot of someone trying to get to her, but they also die young. This is a great anime. It has some of my favorite Japanese voice actors in it, coupled with the rich animation of English countrysides and English, Welsh, Scottish and Irish mythologies. And there are dragons. And the cryptid Wendigo mystery behind who Elias really is. The Ancient Magus' Bride is another anime that ranks very high on my recommended anime list. There are two seasons, so far...and some OVAs. Fans of The Ancient Magus' Bride or Mahoutsukai no Yome, as it is called in Japanese, are eagerly awaiting the 3rd season...when Chise attends the Magus Academy in London. I don't imagine it will be anything at all like Harry Potter. |
anime n' mangaI blog about a lot of regular, harmless sci-fi and fantasy anime n' manga, but I'll throw the occasional yaoi n' yuri (gay) posts in here. 'Cus I like that shit too. archives
December 2021
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