AniFem Round-Up
Embracing darkness and exploring the female gaze in After God
Busra Mutlu celebrates a battle shounen that centers a female lead and a varied cast of women without sidelining or turning them into objects.
Press Start to Begin Again: Mental Illness, Adulthood, and Recovery of an MMO Junkie
Cy shares some very personal musings about their struggles with illness, employment, and how MMO Junkie speaks to the hope of healing and reclaiming your life.
The landing page for all of our winter premieres.
Beheneko: The Elf-Girl’s Cat is Secretly an S-Ranked Monster! – Episode 1
It’s not well made, which leaves only the pivotal question: do you want to watch a girl who’s horny for her cat?
What’s the best anime you watched this year that DIDN’T air in 2024?
Cause sometimes keeping up with the seasonal grind is exhausting, y’all.
Beyond AniFem
Shoujosei of the Year Award Voting (Colleen’s Manga Recs)
A google doc that will let you vote on your favorites for the year across multiple categories.
Love and Beauty on the Battlefield: Transcultural Influence and Transformation from Naoko Takeuchi’s Sailor Moon to Anglophone Young Adult Fantasy (International Journal of Young Adult Literature, Emily Booth)
An open-access academic article on the beloved shoujo.
To understand the success of the series and, in particular, how Takeuchi’s innovations with the adolescent female heroine and her narrative journey resonated with young female readers globally, a comparison can be made between Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon and Takeuchi’s lesser-known companion work, Codename: Sailor V (1991-1997). This often-forgotten series was initially written as a one-chapter short story, whose success inspired Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon, and was later developed into a prequel for the more successful work. In the extended version of Codename: Sailor V, Takeuchi’s original heroine undergoes a unique process of reversal, being progressively undermined until she is appropriate to serve as a secondary character in Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon. Examining the two texts with a particular eye to each protagonist’s personal characteristics, supernatural abilities, social connections, and narrative arcs provides insight into the attributes of the heroine’s journey that Takeuchi considered essential for a true ‘chosen one’. These features persist in present-day magical girl stories, as well as related works produced around the world, including popular Anglophone YA fiction, and examining their origins can provide a richer understanding of the transnational connections between stories for girls around the world.
“Set My Heart on Fire” by Izumi Suzuki (Asian Review of Books, Alison Fincher)
A recent translation of a semi-autobiographical novel by an influential 70s/80s sci-fi author.
Ultimately, Izumi’s high school prediction of marriage as psychological warfare turns out to be as accurate in Izumi’s life as it was in Suzuki’s. Soon after they wed, Izumi loses the ability to eat and drops to 38 kilos (just under 84 pounds) with a 50 cm waist (just under 20 inches; too small for the smallest off-the-rack pants sold in Japan in 2024). The real-life Suzuki also cut off her own toe while Abe looked on. (The event doesn’t appear directly in Set My Heart on Fire, but Izumi later blames Jun for the amputation.)
Those English-language readers who pick up Set My Heart on Fire because they are already familiar with her science fiction short stories might be surprised or disappointed to discover that the book makes only the briefest reference to Suzuki’s writing career. The real-life Izumi Suzuki published “Trial Witch” (translated in Hit Parade of Tears) in Japan’s SF magazine in 1975, while pregnant with her only child. The story went on to become her breakout hit. Like many of Suzuki’s stories, it’s a supernatural story about a flawed woman dealing with her oafish male romantic partner.
Set My Heart on Fire stands on its own as a work of autobiographical fiction, but Suzuki fans of longer standing may also find echoes of the themes Suzuki takes up in her science fiction. For example, in a conversation with a gay friend in Set My Heart on Fire, Izumi ultimately concludes she is a female drag queen—“the bad parts of a woman distilled”. Izumi positions herself as both a female and a female impersonator at the same time, calling to mind the unstable gender boundaries of Suzuki stories like “Night Picnic” (in Terminal Boredom), in which one character goes from being the family’s younger son to younger daughter almost without comment.
Hayao Miyazaki criticizes Japan wartime past in award speech (The Asahi Shimbun, Takahiro Ogawa)
Miyazaki received the Ramon Magsaysay Award, aka “Asia’s Nobel Prize.”
Miyazaki, 83, co-founder of Studio Ghibli Inc., contributed a message to the event, which was read by Studio Ghibli executive Kenichi Yoda.
“Being honored with this award made me think of the Philippines once again,” the message said.
After mentioning how the emperor and empress of Japan visited Manila in 2016 to pay their respects to the thousands killed in “urban warfare” there during World War II, the filmmaker continued:
“The Japanese did a lot of terrible things during the war. They killed many civilians. The Japanese people must not forget this. It will always remain. Given this history, I solemnly accept the Ramon Magsaysay Award from the Philippines.”
Miyazaki’s message garnered widespread support on social media.
However, some posts also expressed confusion or surprise upon hearing about this history for the first time.
Okazu Top Yuri Series of 2024 (Okazu)
The site staff shares their favorite yuri works from the year past.
The Moon on a Rainy Night by Kuzushiro, published by Kodansha. Four volumes of this series came out in 2024, and while I haven’t gotten a chance yet to read the volume that just came out in mid-December, I can safely comment on what a realistic and affecting series this is.
A major trend in this story is people noticing and recognizing other people who are dealing with something heavy, and the different ways in which they offer to help lift some of that heaviness. Sometimes it’s clunky and offensive, other times it’s blunt and constructive. Sometimes it’s an older queer-coded character reaching out to someone who they suspect is struggling with coming out, and other times it’s one single parent reaching out to another. While background characters in romance comics often end up being one-dimensional plot devices, every character in The Moon on a Rainy Night is important. Watching how characters impact each other and help each other grow, even if it’s by adding to their heaviness, leads to a seriously compelling story with well-earned emotional beats.
80% of female inmates in Japan convicted on theft, drug charges (The Mainichi)
Women over 65 make up 22.7% of Japan’s current population of women in prison.
The ministry conducted a special survey covering around 900 male and female inmates serving prison terms for theft or drug-related crimes.
Among those convicted of theft, 95.9 percent of female inmates aged 60 or older had shoplifted, far above 48.3 percent among the males in the same age group, the survey showed.
Of the women aged 60 or older convicted of theft, 38.7 percent were living alone, while the most common motive for stealing was “having trouble making ends meet” at 37.4 percent, lower than among the other age groups.
As for inmates convicted of drug-related crimes, more female than male inmates had experienced physical and psychological abuse by their spouses or partners, the survey showed.
Why Do Video Game Subtitles Suck? (J-En Translations, Jennifer O’Donnell)
Some best practices for subtitling using examples that miss the mark.
I’m going to pick on Square Enix for this one again. In Final Fantasy VII Remake There were several segments of story when background characters were talking about important events that just happened, but there were no subtitles for them!
This was particularly bad for gamers who chose to play the game with Japanese audio and translated subtitles. Unless they understood Japanese, they missed out on a lot of the world building.
Generic enemies that have spoken lines don’t always have subtitles either. This can be a major problem when certain attacks are signaled by voice triggers.
Saying that, Final Fantasy XVI improved a lot adding subtitles for background characters to the sides of the screen as you walk past them.
VIDEO: Discussion between an animator and director doing layout corrections.
VIDEO: Manga discussion of the second half of Mars.
SKEET: A fundraising call from the folks over at Anime Herald.
Hi everyone, I need to get serious today. As many of you know, we're a 100% reader-supported e-zine, and we do our best to deliver quality work and pay everyone fairly without ads. Consider backing us on Patreon or Ko-fi. $3/month gets all our articles in your inbox early. 💖
— Anime Herald (@animeherald.com) December 28, 2024 at 4:00 PM
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AniFem Community
A reminder that even if you didn’t watch it the second it dropped, something lovely is still waiting to be discovered.
I'm so glad I got into Pretty Cure.
— PrettyUltraRider 💛🤍💜🖤 (@prettyultrarider.bsky.social) December 31, 2024 at 7:58 AM
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This was the year I finally finished Sk8, and it was great. After trudging my way through Bucchigiri, I needed some affirmation of what Hiromi Utsumi could do with the right crew.
— Brainchild129 (@brainchild129.bsky.social) December 31, 2024 at 1:26 PM
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I finished Gintama and my life is better for it (but also worse because I don't have any more Gintama to watch)
— Seibaa Having a Wonderful Christmastime (@seibaa.bsky.social) December 30, 2024 at 11:15 PM
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