Why all the Yaoi manga? [Archive]

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09-26-2005, 11:07 PM

I just noticed from the front page that there are very few adult manga releases that are not shounen Ai/Yaoi. It seems all that is being released is Yaoi, mostly by CPM and DMD. Icarus publishing is the only company now releasing adult manga. This is fine with me as I order a lot of my ero manga from japan, but I would like to get some titles uncensored. Is not there a market for Ero Manga besides Yaoi in North America?

Collectonian

09-26-2005, 11:17 PM

I'd imagine there is. I'm certainly interested in that new title from Icarus. Maybe publishers were worried it would be more likely to run up against problems getting in regular stores? A lot of yaoi titles that have been released that I've seen are pretty tame, and even many of those are hard to find in the brick & morters.

bctaris

09-26-2005, 11:29 PM

Good point. Fantagraphics should fire up their Eros line again and reacquire unflipped Bondage Fairies, Spunky Knight and all the rest.

Though most of those did well not so much in the fledgling manga market but the existing adult comic and erotic mainstream markets. Today's manga scene being so dominated by teens, and female, (though it was a girl I knew who was the bigger fan of BF at the time. /images/graemlins/wink.gif) I wouldn't be surprised if that hasn't changed. But I wish Icarus well.

There are some purely erotic titles that are not overly explicit, things like Yukiko's Spinach and Mariko Parade from Fanfare.

pianocello

09-27-2005, 12:27 AM

The bigger question is: Where's the yuri manga?

Fencedude

09-27-2005, 01:21 AM

[ QUOTE ]
piano_cello_conducting said:
The bigger question is: Where's the yuri manga?

[/ QUOTE ]

Have you read Kasimasi ~Girl Meets Girl~?

Not adult, but definitely Shoujo-ai.

(and more than slightly insane...)

Nyanyaan

09-27-2005, 01:31 AM

[ QUOTE ]
Golthin said:
I just noticed from the front page that there are very few adult manga releases that are not shounen Ai/Yaoi. It seems all that is being released is Yaoi, mostly by CPM and DMD. Icarus publishing is the only company now releasing adult manga. This is fine with me as I order a lot of my ero manga from japan, but I would like to get some titles uncensored. Is not there a market for Ero Manga besides Yaoi in North America?

[/ QUOTE ]

The BL is trendy given the female market is the one clear new audience that has been developed with the manga boom. That is the target audience for the works in Japan to begin with and it has just carried over.

The few ero comic producers I have seen in the US (say a RedLight) are flipped and the titles are much less story oriented than much of the BL out here. Outside of TRSI, I am not sure of anywhere else some of them are even available.

I think part of things goes back to the issues covered yet again in the recent "has anime made you more interested in young girls" thread. For whatever reasons, our market and society is more willing to accept young looking boys in sexual situations than young looking girls.

09-27-2005, 07:14 AM

[ QUOTE ]
piano_cello_conducting said:
The bigger question is: Where's the yuri manga?

[/ QUOTE ]
there were a few Yuri titles released by redlight, but they have not released anymore lately.

Natsume_Maya

09-27-2005, 08:01 AM

[ QUOTE ]
Fencedude said:
[ QUOTE ]
piano_cello_conducting said:
The bigger question is: Where's the yuri manga?

[/ QUOTE ]

Have you read Kasimasi ~Girl Meets Girl~?

Not adult, but definitely Shoujo-ai.

[/ QUOTE ]

Sorry, the first part of my post is a rant...

I'm a pedantic person. I have to say it bothers me that different meanings have developed in the West of certain terms, like yuri and shoujo ai (or even shonen ai).

In Japan, yuri means stories about female-female relationships which are aimed at females, eg perhaps something like Utena. It does not (as far as I'm aware) mean or include stories featuring lesbian relationships which are aimed at males. There's no real specific term for the latter in Japanese fandom as far as I'm aware, other than just using the word "lesbian/rezubian/rezu", which does not indicate whether the work is aimed at males or females. In the West (or at least on these boards), "yuri" seems to have developed this meaning of more risque lesbian relationships whether the story is aimed at males or females.

In Japan, shoujo-ai is not used in fandom the way it's used in the West to mean less risque depictions of female-female relationships. In so far as it's used in general Japanese language, "shoujo ai" tends to mean lolicon, ie males loving shoujo. "Yuri" in Japanese encompasses both the Western concepts of yuri and shoujo ai, but limited to works aimed at females.

I don't think shonen ai is used in Japan generally either. Just "yaoi" and the English words "Boys love" or "BL".

Anyway, to me it's strange that people adopt/coin these Japanese words but then give it a non-Japanese meaning or implication. (Kinda like the way the Japanese use the word "pants" /images/graemlins/tongue.gif ) It can only lead to confusion as to whether a person is using the word in the Japanese sense or the Western sense.

Sorry for the rant. I understand that the manga forum has been the scene of a few arguments about definitions (I must have missed all of those.) I'm not trying to start another argument about definitions. Work is driving me crazy and I need to take a break, that's all /images/graemlins/tongue.gif

To respond to the questions "why all the yaoi manga?" and "where's the yuri (Western sense, I presume, coming from piano_cello_conducting /images/graemlins/tongue.gif ) manga?", I think in part it's as Collectonian said about the yaoi titles being released in the West being relatively tame. Ero manga aimed at males may often be more explicit, I think.

But my rant is actually on topic a bit as well. Another part of the answer may lie in the Japanese use of the term "yuri", ie the fact that there is no specific word in Japanese fandom for stories depicting lesbian relationships which are aimed at males. It's never developed as a discrete genre the way yaoi/BL has developed for females (or at least not enough to warrant its own name), and a corollary of this may be that perhaps there's less male oriented manga focusing specifically on female-female relationships than there is female oriented manga focusing specifically on male-male relationships.

Back to work...

michaelwb

09-27-2005, 08:12 AM

[ QUOTE ]
Natsume Maya said:
Anyway, to me it's strange that people adopt/coin these Japanese words but then give it a non-Japanese meaning or implication. (Kinda like the way the Japanese use the word "pants" /images/graemlins/tongue.gif ) It can only lead to confusion as to whether a person is using the word in the Japanese sense or the Western sense.

[/ QUOTE ]

Actually instead of being strange it is normal. Loan words often work like that. The word's meaning is frequently changed a bit in the language it is adopted to, versus the original language version.

Just sticking with similar examples with Japanese - anime, manga and otaku are exactly like that.

[ QUOTE ]

Sorry for the rant. I understand that the manga forum has been the scene of a few arguments about definitions (I must have missed all of those.) I'm not trying to start another argument about definitions.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yeah let's not go there and shift the thread off topic anymore.

quenelf

09-27-2005, 08:45 AM

[ QUOTE ]
Natsume Maya said:
Anyway, to me it's strange that people adopt/coin these Japanese words but then give it a non-Japanese meaning or implication. (Kinda like the way the Japanese use the word "pants" /images/graemlins/tongue.gif ) It can only lead to confusion as to whether a person is using the word in the Japanese sense or the Western sense.

[/ QUOTE ]

Unless there's some other meaning I'm unaware of, the Japanese use the word 'pants' in more or less the correct English sense - it means underwear. It's only you Americans who corrupted it to mean trousers. :> (*)

I don't really particularly mind the abuse of Japanese words, personally. As you point out, leaving pantsu aside, many words borrowed from English into Japanese are used with different meanings; I don't see a problem with that happening the other way around.

--quen

(*) OK, there's a bit of complicated etymology there which may mean I'm totally lying, but let's not get into that.

AmericanBeauty

09-27-2005, 08:52 AM

[ QUOTE ]
Collectonian said:
I'd imagine there is. I'm certainly interested in that new title from Icarus. Maybe publishers were worried it would be more likely to run up against problems getting in regular stores? A lot of yaoi titles that have been released that I've seen are pretty tame, and even many of those are hard to find in the brick & morters.

[/ QUOTE ]
Personally, I'm waiting until the really explicit stuff comes. /images/graemlins/devil.gif

09-27-2005, 02:43 PM

[ QUOTE ]
Natsume Maya said:
[ QUOTE ]
Fencedude said:
[ QUOTE ]
piano_cello_conducting said:
The bigger question is: Where's the yuri manga?

[/ QUOTE ]

Have you read Kasimasi ~Girl Meets Girl~?

Not adult, but definitely Shoujo-ai.

[/ QUOTE ]

Sorry, the first part of my post is a rant...

I'm a pedantic person. I have to say it bothers me that different meanings have developed in the West of certain terms, like yuri and shoujo ai (or even shonen ai).

In Japan, yuri means stories about female-female relationships which are aimed at females, eg perhaps something like Utena. It does not (as far as I'm aware) mean or include stories featuring lesbian relationships which are aimed at males. There's no real specific term for the latter in Japanese fandom as far as I'm aware, other than just using the word "lesbian/rezubian/rezu", which does not indicate whether the work is aimed at males or females. In the West (or at least on these boards), "yuri" seems to have developed this meaning of more risque lesbian relationships whether the story is aimed at males or females.

In Japan, shoujo-ai is not used in fandom the way it's used in the West to mean less risque depictions of female-female relationships. In so far as it's used in general Japanese language, "shoujo ai" tends to mean lolicon, ie males loving shoujo. "Yuri" in Japanese encompasses both the Western concepts of yuri and shoujo ai, but limited to works aimed at females.

I don't think shonen ai is used in Japan generally either. Just "yaoi" and the English words "Boys love" or "BL".

Anyway, to me it's strange that people adopt/coin these Japanese words but then give it a non-Japanese meaning or implication. (Kinda like the way the Japanese use the word "pants" /images/graemlins/tongue.gif ) It can only lead to confusion as to whether a person is using the word in the Japanese sense or the Western sense.

Sorry for the rant. I understand that the manga forum has been the scene of a few arguments about definitions (I must have missed all of those.) I'm not trying to start another argument about definitions. Work is driving me crazy and I need to take a break, that's all /images/graemlins/tongue.gif

To respond to the questions "why all the yaoi manga?" and "where's the yuri (Western sense, I presume, coming from piano_cello_conducting /images/graemlins/tongue.gif ) manga?", I think in part it's as Collectonian said about the yaoi titles being released in the West being relatively tame. Ero manga aimed at males may often be more explicit, I think.

But my rant is actually on topic a bit as well. Another part of the answer may lie in the Japanese use of the term "yuri", ie the fact that there is no specific word in Japanese fandom for stories depicting lesbian relationships which are aimed at males. It's never developed as a discrete genre the way yaoi/BL has developed for females (or at least not enough to warrant its own name), and a corollary of this may be that perhaps there's less male oriented manga focusing specifically on female-female relationships than there is female oriented manga focusing specifically on male-male relationships.

Back to work...

[/ QUOTE ]
I would agree with you about the terms, thus why I used the term Ero Manga which seem to be more correct. I am going by what the way that JAPANESE WEBSITES where I purchase this books call them. Jlist.com uses the term Yaoi and Yuri a lot, given that their website is aimed for american people.

Fencedude

09-27-2005, 06:44 PM

[ QUOTE ]
Natsume Maya said:
[ QUOTE ]
Fencedude said:
[ QUOTE ]
piano_cello_conducting said:
The bigger question is: Where's the yuri manga?

[/ QUOTE ]

Have you read Kasimasi ~Girl Meets Girl~?

Not adult, but definitely Shoujo-ai.

[/ QUOTE ]

Sorry, the first part of my post is a rant...

I'm a pedantic person. I have to say it bothers me that different meanings have developed in the West of certain terms, like yuri and shoujo ai (or even shonen ai).

In Japan, yuri means stories about female-female relationships which are aimed at females, eg perhaps something like Utena. It does not (as far as I'm aware) mean or include stories featuring lesbian relationships which are aimed at males. There's no real specific term for the latter in Japanese fandom as far as I'm aware, other than just using the word "lesbian/rezubian/rezu", which does not indicate whether the work is aimed at males or females. In the West (or at least on these boards), "yuri" seems to have developed this meaning of more risque lesbian relationships whether the story is aimed at males or females.

In Japan, shoujo-ai is not used in fandom the way it's used in the West to mean less risque depictions of female-female relationships. In so far as it's used in general Japanese language, "shoujo ai" tends to mean lolicon, ie males loving shoujo. "Yuri" in Japanese encompasses both the Western concepts of yuri and shoujo ai, but limited to works aimed at females.

I don't think shonen ai is used in Japan generally either. Just "yaoi" and the English words "Boys love" or "BL".

Anyway, to me it's strange that people adopt/coin these Japanese words but then give it a non-Japanese meaning or implication. (Kinda like the way the Japanese use the word "pants" /images/graemlins/tongue.gif ) It can only lead to confusion as to whether a person is using the word in the Japanese sense or the Western sense.

Sorry for the rant. I understand that the manga forum has been the scene of a few arguments about definitions (I must have missed all of those.) I'm not trying to start another argument about definitions. Work is driving me crazy and I need to take a break, that's all /images/graemlins/tongue.gif

To respond to the questions "why all the yaoi manga?" and "where's the yuri (Western sense, I presume, coming from piano_cello_conducting /images/graemlins/tongue.gif ) manga?", I think in part it's as Collectonian said about the yaoi titles being released in the West being relatively tame. Ero manga aimed at males may often be more explicit, I think.

But my rant is actually on topic a bit as well. Another part of the answer may lie in the Japanese use of the term "yuri", ie the fact that there is no specific word in Japanese fandom for stories depicting lesbian relationships which are aimed at males. It's never developed as a discrete genre the way yaoi/BL has developed for females (or at least not enough to warrant its own name), and a corollary of this may be that perhaps there's less male oriented manga focusing specifically on female-female relationships than there is female oriented manga focusing specifically on male-male relationships.

Back to work...

[/ QUOTE ]

*reads*

Interesting.

Unfortunately I really don't care, and will continue to use the terminology that has developed in the US Anime/Manga culture. Whether or not they are correct in Japan is totally meaningless to me, since I'm not Japanese, and I'm not in Japan.

I've never had ANYONE on a US board get confused by the difference between "Shoujo-ai" and "Yuri".

Is our use consistent with the Japanese? No, but so what?

pianocello

09-27-2005, 09:28 PM

Fencedude

09-27-2005, 10:13 PM

[ QUOTE ]
piano_cello_conducting said:
[ QUOTE ]
Fencedude said:
[ QUOTE ]
piano_cello_conducting said:
The bigger question is: Where's the yuri manga?

[/ QUOTE ]

Have you read Kasimasi ~Girl Meets Girl~?

Not adult, but definitely Shoujo-ai.

(and more than slightly insane...)

[/ QUOTE ]

Don't believe that's in English yet, right?

[/ QUOTE ]

No, not officially.

Ran

09-28-2005, 10:53 PM

Yaoi because there is a BIG market for it. Have you heard? In Japan, there are hundreds to thousands of yaoi manga being produced. It's a big big market there. There are alot of demand.

The Pirate Queen

09-29-2005, 07:11 AM

[ QUOTE ]
Ran said:
Yaoi because there is a BIG market for it. Have you heard? In Japan, there are hundreds to thousands of yaoi manga being produced. It's a big big market there. There are alot of demand.

[/ QUOTE ]

To be fair a big market in Japan does not necessarily translate into a big market in the US. Case Closed/Detective Conan is proof of that if any was needed.

That being said, there's a big market for yaoi manga in the US - girls buy manga. Girls want yaoi. Therefore, companies are licensing yaoi...and it appears to be selling.

simon_jones

09-30-2005, 07:41 PM

[ QUOTE ]
Angel Of Death said:
Personally, I'm waiting until the really explicit stuff comes. /images/graemlins/devil.gif

[/ QUOTE ]

Which titles/artists do you consider explicit enough? Just curious. =)

To affirm the suspicions already raised throughout...yes, it's nigh impossible for our (Icarus) publications to get into mainstream stores. In general, commercial boy's love manga do not approach the visual explicitness (or the moral banktrupcy) of the average ero manga. Given the current social climate, it's certainly no cake walk for the more adventurous shounen-ai publishers...but it's definitely harder for male-oriented adult comics, hands down.

We can't get shelf display space, so it takes a little extra effort to find our books. But they can be ordered from most comic book stores, and are also available from several major online retailers.

[ QUOTE ]
bctaris said:
Fantagraphics should fire up their Eros line again and reacquire unflipped Bondage Fairies, Spunky Knight and all the rest.

[/ QUOTE ]

We have been serializing new comics by Mashumaro Jyuubaori, the artist of Alice in Sexland and Voice of Submission from Eros...

dunno001

09-30-2005, 10:12 PM

[ QUOTE ]
simon_jones said:
Which titles/artists do you consider explicit enough? Just curious. =)

[/ QUOTE ]

I actually find that the most explicit stuff tends to be in the anthologies, and I don't know how feasible they would be to try to get. I can get a few names of the anthologies I like to read if you want. Just do note that... well, keep in mind this thread's topic...

simon_jones

09-30-2005, 11:35 PM

[ QUOTE ]
dunno001 said:
I actually find that the most explicit stuff tends to be in the anthologies, and I don't know how feasible they would be to try to get.

[/ QUOTE ]

If what you have in mind are commercial magazine anthologies, then it's probably not as big a problem as you may think. Most end up as tankoubon...for our magazine we simply license the tankoubon and break it down into chapters again. (Then we collect them into trade paperbacks yet again, thus mirroring the Japanese publishing cycle.)

Even though we don't publish boy's love manga we already work with publishers who do publish boy's love magazines such as Edge/Ovis and LoveX, so I'd be interested to hear your selections.

dunno001

09-30-2005, 11:50 PM

[ QUOTE ]
simon_jones said:
[ QUOTE ]
dunno001 said:
I actually find that the most explicit stuff tends to be in the anthologies, and I don't know how feasible they would be to try to get.

[/ QUOTE ]

If what you have in mind are commercial magazine anthologies, then it's probably not as big a problem as you may think. Most end up as tankoubon...for our magazine we simply license the tankoubon and break it down into chapters again. (Then we collect them into trade paperbacks yet again, thus mirroring the Japanese publishing cycle.)

Even though we don't publish boy's love manga we already work with publishers who do publish boy's love magazines such as Edge/Ovis and LoveX, so I'd be interested to hear your selections.

[/ QUOTE ]

Wow... I would think they would be a bitch to work with, but if they can be done, so be it! Now, lemme go over to my bookshelf...

*returns* Wow, I forgot how much of it wouldn't be touched by any publisher. But I'll still list them-

B-Boy lines
Shounen Ai no Bigaku
Koshoku Shounen no Susume
BL Liqueur
B's Anima (both prints)
Deep Aqua
D-Pri
Eros
Romeo
Secret Shounen
J-Kids
Pet Boys
Scandal
Shota King
Shota Mani
X Kids

And I'm sure there's more I don't have... but it's a start. (Yeah, I know... I don't have much space on my shelves, but I'd LOVE to know what they're saying...)

Jadawin

10-01-2005, 11:19 AM

Recently in France there are some real Yuri titles (female-female relationships aimed at female readers) coming out. I have to admit that a few months ago I also made the mistake to think about Urushihara mangas when someone mentioned Yuri manga.
btw. Urushihara mangas and other male oriented erotic titles like Futari Ecchi are selling like crazy in Europe. Too bad for the US readers that nobody tries to release these in the US.

SkinnyCat

10-01-2005, 09:28 PM

[ QUOTE ]
dunno001 said:
B-Boy lines
Shounen Ai no Bigaku
Koshoku Shounen no Susume
BL Liqueur
B's Anima (both prints)
Deep Aqua
D-Pri
Eros
Romeo
Secret Shounen
J-Kids
Pet Boys
Scandal
Shota King
Shota Mani
X Kids

[/ QUOTE ]

You don't like June's Boy's Pierce? I buy the magazine every month. Can't live without it. /images/graemlins/noseblef.gif /images/graemlins/noseblef.gif /images/graemlins/noseblef.gif

dunno001

10-01-2005, 10:43 PM

[ QUOTE ]
SkinnyCat said:
You don't like June's Boy's Pierce? I buy the magazine every month. Can't live without it. /images/graemlins/noseblef.gif /images/graemlins/noseblef.gif /images/graemlins/noseblef.gif

[/ QUOTE ]

Well, I don't have it, but I think now that it's something I'll have to look into. And with it being a magazine, I think it's time to talk to someone about a subscription...

ragnar

10-02-2005, 12:08 PM

[ QUOTE ]
simon_jones said:
[ QUOTE ]
Angel Of Death said:
Personally, I'm waiting until the really explicit stuff comes. /images/graemlins/devil.gif

[/ QUOTE ]

Which titles/artists do you consider explicit enough? Just curious. =)

To affirm the suspicions already raised throughout...yes, it's nigh impossible for our (Icarus) publications to get into mainstream stores. In general, commercial boy's love manga do not approach the visual explicitness (or the moral banktrupcy) of the average ero manga. Given the current social climate, it's certainly no cake walk for the more adventurous shounen-ai publishers...but it's definitely harder for male-oriented adult comics, hands down.

We can't get shelf display space, so it takes a little extra effort to find our books. But they can be ordered from most comic book stores, and are also available from several major online retailers.

[ QUOTE ]
bctaris said:
Fantagraphics should fire up their Eros line again and reacquire unflipped Bondage Fairies, Spunky Knight and all the rest.

[/ QUOTE ]

We have been serializing new comics by Mashumaro Jyuubaori, the artist of Alice in Sexland and Voice of Submission from Eros...

[/ QUOTE ]

Previews is a good source for ordering your titles. I know that jlist carries some of your titles, but do they carry all of them? I just want more pages in A G and more Blue Eyes. /images/graemlins/catgirl0.gif

simon_jones

10-02-2005, 06:04 PM

jigoku panda

04-08-2008, 01:10 PM

Yes, J-List carries all of our Comic AG and trade paperback titles (they are one of a few who do keep everything in stock.)

We've increased AG to 80 pages (about 70+ pages of comics per issue), without raising the price. Given the quality of the comics and the cost-per-page, I think AG is by far the best value in adult comics. But if our sales figures would increase by even just a couple thousand, then we could raise the page count to 96, or even higher...
If I'm not mistaken fantagraphics also carries comic a-g their the only other place I order from that carries monthly anthologies since AnimeNation & trsi do not.

Reikon

04-08-2008, 04:49 PM