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Jun 1

let's go to fanime. pt. 1: limited reader's viewpoint

This was originally going to be in the same post as my reflections on attending Fanime, but then I thought, you know what, I don't think it's fair to make people suffer through my maudlin ramblings if they're just interested in knowing how the doujin were.

So here are some reading notes on the doujin I bought at Manga Ichiba, loosely arranged by time slot! (The little red fujoshi octopus sometimes appears in pictures to hold a cover down. You can buy your own here.)

"Smoke," by kan and ico

I struggled at kan and ico's table for so long because I wanted to buy ico's beautiful Neon Genesis Evangelion artbook but was reminded by my friend that I should stick with what i came for (doujin and original art). Having seen an example of their upcoming Persona artbook, I can only say, you MUST buy their goods if you love paper. I tweeted a while back that American readers simply do not have the appreciation for paper that we should, and when I saw kan and ico's work I was reduced to repeatedly saying "this is so fucking cool" because I was clearly standing in the presence of people who do appreciate paper. The Persona artbook has special translucent pages with foil accents!! The cover of the Eva artbook is lightly textured around the character outlines!! You just have to touch their books to get it. There is so much care and attention to detail.

"Smoke" is an OC oneshot and is relatively short, with very little background given about the characters (except in the profiles at the end). But it has the air of a fanfic from a practiced writer, with a conceit about deaths from cigarette smoking (one of the characters is a forensic pathologist) and withdrawal symptoms that is classic bl fare. It's moody and atmospheric, clearly calling out for a longer work, and of course the bonus photocards are unexpectedly delightful paper products, featuring a luxurious matte finish that you'll want to run your hand over.

As of this writing, "Smoke" is not available online or for purchase.

Two doujin from halveablock.

"Beacon" (Gundam Witch from Mercury, SuleMio)

Reading this made me realize I don't remember as much of the anime as I thought I did, but I was so thrilled to see any Witch of Mercury doujin at all…! The opening pages, with a wordless dream sequence that starts with Suletta floating in space before waking up in her hospital bed are particularly memorable. It is neither a requirement or even always desirable for a doujinshi to hew closely to the canon designs, but here I was impressed with how close Xed kept the art to what you see in Witch from Mercury's anime. No small feat given that Suletta and Miorine both have frankly unreasonable amount of Anime Hair.

"Happiness" (Land of the Lustrous, with sketches from Elien/@_neile)

Xed's comic shows that they have a really strong grasp on the shoujo paneling tradition, with lots of organic movement that carries you across the page, and it makes the moments when they return to square/rectangular panels particularly powerful. The whole fancomic portion is an ode to Houseki no Kuni's complicated and deeply conceptual ending. It feels like a prayer for a kinder world, one that doesn't exist, that may never exist, that we nevertheless want to exist, if not for ourselves, then for others, except a dream like this always contains in it a kernel of selfishness, a desire that the better world we worked hard for had existed for us too, so that we need not have ever learned the importance of striving for that better world. That's what Phosphophyllite's happiness means to me and, I think, to Xed too.

You can order physical copies of Xed's doujinshi from their website!

Three original comics/doujins/zines.

"When the tide returns," by vivinhun

Caught me instantly with the vision test imagery in the opening, so i knew I had to have a copy. What awaited me inside is a wonderful exercise in elision. Minh, a memory worker, is told that he has been "processing too many memories" and should see a specialist, Dr. Rivera, who lives in a lighthouse. He brings along two kids (Kamon and Luka), whose relationship to Minh is never explained. The comic depicts a simple outing: collecting shells by the water, making a meal with friends, a quiet conversation, but there's a sense of something disquieting just outside the four corners of this oneshot. What is a memory worker? What is Dr. Rivera a specialist of? Is it so bad for our memories to soften over time, so that it is hard to tell what are our real memories and what are stories others have told us? Even the art hides mysteries. Though the images look at first like loose pencil sketches, the more you read the more you realize they aren't the first draft of a storyboard but rather fully formed and planned panels that are then re-rendered in pencil (a suspicion collaborated by the artist in the afterword).

Incidentally, prior to this trip to San Jose, I had just finished a video essay exploring the origins of the images used in the autorefractor machines, including the red barn image with which vivi opens "When the tide returns." The video essay creator talks about having bad eyesight all his life and developing a personal connection with the red barn test image. When he discovers that it was based on a real, still-standing structure, he makes a pilgrimage to the farm on which it is located. Everything about it is different now. There are no fences, and the barn isn't even red (it's likely the red was added to the photograph for the autorefractor image). But he is still excited to be there. "It's real," he keeps saying. "It's a crazy feeling to be here."

I don't know if vivi has watched this video too, or if they, the video essayist, and I all have bad eyesight and an affinity for this red barn image, if this is all just a coincidence, random threads I am tying together to make meaning. But I can't stop thinking about how photographs are like a memory someone else has of you which you then internalize as your own memory, that every image is real, and not real (just like the pencil sketches in this comic are real, but not real), that a place can be "realer" in your memory than in reality, that sometimes we have to live and breathe and feel in the present to be able to properly "see" the past, that every reality is reconstructed. When I read vivi's afterword, many things fell into place: this is a story about navigating transience, how to make peace with becoming a cracked vessel for the experiences and memories we accumulate and, inevitably, lose hold of.

You can preorder this comic from vivi's website.

"Transient Solids," sketches from ketsal

In case you can't read it from the picture, the blurb on the front says:

drawings from sketchbooks (physical) that were edited (digitally) and then printed (physically)

… which really felt like a sign of the times! So many works at Manga Ichiba feel like they exist in that in between space of paper and digital. These days, digital distribution is easy, and we could technically have a digital only doujin event (and you do in fact see this all the time, both in the English-speaking and non-English speaking spaces), which would cut out all the issues that go into printing and flying into a physical space and tabling. But that friction is part of the appeal, isn't it? Picking up a book, feeling the weight of cardstock, commiserating about ordinary home printers that aren't up to the task, the thrill of getting something that may only be printed and available physically this one time—I understand this appeal now!

Anyway, I picked this book up because the first page I flipped to was a doodle of a bowl of chazuke, which ketsal mentions they first tried because it came up in "Run with the Wind." I do that too, making food because it comes up in a series I am reading, so it made me feel great kinship to them. Imagine my surprise when later that evening, I turned the page only to find that ketsal had also doodled some characters from Sugiura Shiho's "Silver Diamond," which is their #1 manga and one of my all-time favorites as well! It's these little moments that made Manga Ichiba so fulfilling to me. ketsal, if you are reading this, I hope you know there are dozen of us Sugiura fans! Dozens of us!!

"I will teach you how to fish." by halveablock

My absolute favorite of the halveablock doujins I bought, and weirdly in dialogue with vivinhun's "When the tide returns," with themes of memory and disorientation... the letting go of something you were trying to grasp of the past so that you can be the "you" of the present... and fishing.... Most of the action focuses on main character Mael trying to gut a fish that has been infected with something called barnacle sickness, which causes it to grow eyes all over its body.

This doujin is beautifully produced, with a striking cover that has a cutout window so you can see the risograph page inside. The limited uses of red and blue, sometimes purposefully offset from the black outlines, add to the sense of unease. There's a feeling in the story like you are clearing your head after being punched, and you know you have a few screws knocked loose in your head, but you don't know where they are and what they used to hold together. The style, both art and paneling, feels more like "western" comics, maybe a little touch of the Vertical imprint, and I say this as a compliment. You know I love a metaphor that's all about fish death, and this delivered in spades. Fantastic execution — creepy, murky, kind of "Blue Submarine No. 6"-ish.

You can, as mentioned above, get physical copies of Xed's doujinshi from their website, but a digital version of this comic is also available for purchase!

Collection of doujins from durian soda / Lina.

I'm lucky enough to claim Lina as a personal friend whose art I have always admired, so naturally I am biased when it comes to talking about her work. She is not only enormously talented but also prolific and had so many books (and fans!!) at her table that visiting her during the Friday night session felt like being in the presence of a minor celebrity. She draws so much, it's disgusting (I say this with a beatific smile). I already purchased "Bad Luck Angel" when Lina first released it on her website, and I bought the Haikevah artbook for a friend, so I'm really only reviewing two of the works below.

"Lucky": I am the only fujoshi in the world for whom "Heated Rivalry" did not hit (or at least that's what it sometimes feels like), but I love Lina's continued dedication to pushing out multiple storyboards where all the characters do is fuck, beautifully and a little athletically. Ilya's voice here is very good, punchable but sweet, and I love her super hot anime-boy rendition of Shane, who is so extremely uke-coded in this that you are tempted to join in with Hudson's deranged fantasies of a sex scene where he tops his own character. My favorite detail is how large and round Lina drew Shane's thighs during the blowjob, which are exactly the kind of quads that made specialty tailors for hockey players a real thing. The only thing that could make this better is if Shane also got a beautifully rendered sparkling asshole, a la nocori. Next time!

"Hot New Thing": If you know Lina irl you know that she is a raucous tumbleweed of irreverent humor, so it's no surprise that I love this doujin so much because it is outrageously funny. There is a sequence here where one of the characters has a cinematic daydream about his Labubu avatar getting cucked and it may be my favorite two pages from this haul. Shun, the main character, is such a devilish virgin(?) bottom who accidentally sows enormous chaos in the heart and mind of his best friend Take who has had the misfortune of being in love with him. They are idiots and I wish them a happy life together. Side note: Shun's idol is an Ayer-senpai who I think maybe a crossover from Lina's other original doujinshi, "Bad Luck Angel!"

You can get ALL of the doujinshi pictured and more!! from Lina's website.

"Craving," by juliegg

I love Julie carrying on the great doujin tradition of writing a special issue for a doujin event that's just their own OCs fucking. This is a very important ritual and with it, we baptize Manga Ichiba properly. Breeze once wrote in their report that there is a characteristic "fujo-grin" that one sees on the face of a reader who is enjoying something very perverted. If someone had seen me after I finished reading "Craving," I suspect I would have had just such a wicked fujo-grin on my face. To be honest, I am not a cat boy aficionado, but I bought this on the strength of Julie's own enthusiasm, and I loved flipping to the author's notes afterwards, because all of her favorite parts were my favorite parts, including and ESPECIALLY the part where Rui rubbed his tail on Kouta's tip. Julie… perhaps you are a genius…..

You can buy "Craving" online at Julie's website.

"Possession Session," by faiell

Vincent is a shaman with a crush on an influencer (?) named Sydney, whose girlfriend Mira died in a freak car accident. Vincent offers to take Sydney on as a client and let Mira possess his body, nominally under the banner of grief counseling, but Sydney (and Mira-in-Vincent's-body) choose to use that time to have a marathon sex session.

This doujin features my hands down favorite cover—the color combination, the striking placement of the title, the placement of the earring across Vincent's face suggesting that he is perhaps levitating sidewise, the hands (his own? Sydney's?) by his neck as if threatening strangulation. I love that Vincent's tongue is almost split by one of the letters and I am exercising great restraint into trying not to read too deeply into that design choice. Sydney is such an unrepentant scumbag that of course he's also a livestreamer, like bro please stop streaming your girlfriend's funeral?! His utter indifference to showing any care or decorum for Vincent is tragic, and flipping to the end where Fai writes that Vincent is "the type of guy who mistakes lust for love" felt like the sudden sense of doom when you realize you've accidentally eaten expired food. Poor Vincent, you are too gorgeous and slutty and lovingly designed by your creator to suffer this asshole, no matter how much his appearance may remind me of a Gen Z Char Aznable!!

You can preorder a copy of "Possession Session" at Fai's website!

"forever and always" by arestinnia (Jujutsu Kaisen, Fushiguro/Itadori)

This is a post-canon/Modulo!era Megumi/Yuji doujinshi and one of the ones I was most looking forward to buying from Manga Ichiba when the circle cuts came out. Arestinnia's style is so accurate to Akutami's own, especially in the very opening page where Maki is scolding Yuji for not accepting a compliment and a fabulous middle sequence where Yuji is eradicating cursed spirits but is caught by Megumi, who has come in his child form to fetch Yuji. It's of course a wonderful tribute to the sequence in the manga where Yuji tells child!Megumi that it is lonely without him, but with a bittersweet twist (Megumi accepts that he cannot bring Yuji with him, as Yuji is determined to remain on earth and do good). I'm always sad when I think about Modulo!Yuji, who will have to experience the death of everyone he has ever loved, but I wonder if in arestinnia's world, spirit!Megumi will come and sit with Yuji occasionally, get ice cream with him and get scolded by Maki with him and just be not alone. It might make the many years Yuji has left go down more easily.

As of this writing, "forever and always" is not available for purchase, but arestinnia has indicated they will put it up on pixiv!

"Sorcery Fuck", by Some Mollusk (Jujutsu Kaisen, Todo/Itadori)

Incredible premise that is based on the artist's own fanfic (!!): Todo and Yuji are sent to Tokyo Bigsight where they have to get rid of some cursed spirits, among which is the Comiket Curse, which immediately traps them in a fujoshi domain expansion where they can only leave if they have—and this Yuji and Todo test exhaustively—fully penetrative penis-in-asshole sex.

Y'all this doujin is HUGE in size (and surprisingly lengthy in page count too!). I know there was some discussion about the expectation of how big a doujin "should" be, but "Sorcery Fuck" is the largest of all the books I bought, so big that I was able to fold up my "Happy Birthday Kim Dokja" poster from BeAl2O4EA08 in it. I love the concept of a Comiket curse that instantly traps any two hot men standing five feet apart (and thus, of course, gay) into a "fuck or die" room, and I love Some Mollusk understanding the assignment and bringing that as their Manga Ichiba offering.

I also enjoyed comparing these two JJK doujins, because it shows that there are as many approaches to doujinshi as there are creators and fans in the world. "forever and always" hews closely to Akutami's style, down to the lettering, and feels like such a natural extension of the canon, while "Sorcery Fuck" has the romp-like energy of a digital extra at the end of a two-volume bl. Some Mollusk's art style and panelling feels more western and has the miles-of-jokes-per-second rhythm of a very well-edited commentary video. I don't know how to explain, but there are pages where you almost can hear the Vine boom sound effect. I mean this all extremely positively—it's very hard to keep up a constant level of humor and hijinks in a story that's almost entirely porn. Every time I revisit this doujin to write about it, I notice a new punch-line worthy joke that Some Mollusk throws in there like it's no big deal at all: the Comiket Curse dropping an anal plug when it's fighting Yuji, Sukuna giving Yuji the middle finger from beyond the grave, a doodle of Takada-chan in a lab coat explaining time dilation. This time around, my favorite joke is Yuji wringing the neck of a fleshlight and picturing a hamster trying to deep-throat a banana when he sees Todo's, ahem, assets for the first time.

As of this writing, "Sorcery Fuck" is not available online or for purchase.

"Making Peace," by banditry (Metal Gear Solid V)

Val is another personal friend, so again my effusive praise may lack objectivity, but I sincerely believe their work, as shown in this edition of "Making Peace," is on another style level. That they printed and bound the comic on their own, so that they could use kraft paper and Acco fasteners that would be thematically in line with the aesthetics of MGS, is just the beginning. "Making Peace" is for sure more "graphic novel" than it is "manga": each double-page spread features a different wash of color and central image, around which Val has positioned text (sometimes in dialogue bubbles, but usually not). You can take in the comic casually and quickly, letting the artful touches of color, bold images, and measured prose wash over you, or you can scour each page desperately, picking it apart for hidden meaning: the diagetic section numbers, the recurring circle-and-intersecting-line imagery that echoes the individual elements of the peace sign (another meaning to "making" "peace"), the obsession with eyes and glasses. "There's layers," Val writes in the afterword about MGSV, which is the same thing I'd say about their comic.

I am not a MGS fan (for reasons that are too boring to get into, I have basically only played about five video games in my life), and I'm only vaguely familiar with the characters in "Making Peace," but I think there is in both the comic and the making of the comic (and my own experience reading it) something about the theme of having to make peace with one's own limitations, and how our lives are shaped as much by what we cannot do as it is by what we end up doing. To make peace is, inherently, positive: to lay a conflict down to rest, to cast off one's dissatisfaction, to be able to move on. But it is also, inherently, a surrender, an admission that there is nothing more that you can do—if, indeed, there was ever at all. But that struggle may only be legible to ourselves. When we look too closely at ourselves we often only see the flaws. From the outside, one only sees the success of a turmoil ending, an achievement obtained. Just like I from the outside can only see how ambitious, how beautiful, how perfectly formed "Making Peace" is.

As of this writing, "Making Peace" is not available for purchase, but I believe Val might make it available online at some point, so please watch their socials!

"Hitchhiker," by yiyuehua (My S-Class Heroes, guideverse AU, HJYJ)

"Hitchhiker" is an illustrated doujin version of a previously published fanfic, with a special bonus at the end that is in more traditional manga form. The story opens on Yoojin driving in the rain and coming across Sung Hyunje, who derails Yoojin's car and forces himself inside. Hyunje is an S-class esper and injured, and of course Yoojin is an S-class guide (masquerading as an F-class guide and undertaker), and of course they end up fucking, though one could hardly call it good, giving, or game.

To be honest, I was at a loss for a while about what to write about "Hitchhiker," but that is because it is just plain delicious, the kind of old-fashioned meat-and-potatoes slash content on which I grew up and to which I still gravitate. Yiyuehua's writing and art are perfectly tuned to bl novel or webtoon sensibilities. You would, I think, believe me in a second if I told you this was on Publang or Tappytoon, and if it were, I would have subscribed in a heartbeat. Alas, "Hitchhiker" remains regrettably only a snapshot from a much larger story that exists as of now only in Yiyuehua's mind, though there are so many tasty details that I feel like a dying man being drip-fed a mirage. How did Yoohyun die, and is Yoojin capable of necromancy, and oh my god, is his dead brother's body really rotting—or reanimating—in the trunk of his car while he and Sung Hyunje fuck? Many questions that I hope against hope Yiyuehua will one day answer.

As of this writing, "Hitchhiker" is not available for purchase, but with some simple Googling, you can find the fanfic online.

"As You Wish," by saltcheee

"As You Wish" stars Cain, a royal magician, and his pet demon Yohan (Johann, maybe?). One of them has made a pact with a demon for great, perhaps unbearable power, in return for a promise, though who and what that promise is remains a mystery to the reader until the end.

I am not exaggerating when I say that reading this (at times through Google Translate) made me feel like I was dying. Salt, I think you need to get serialized… I think you need to go pro… I think you need to make that your number one priority because every aspect of this doujin fooled me into thinking I was reading the second chapter of a bl manga in a commercial magazine. The sequences with the demon and the promise felt like moments from episode 8 of Sonny Boy, the one with Yamabiko the talking dog, and the overall feel of "As You Wish" reminded me of Bikke's "Shinkuu Yuusetsu," also about two magical not-quite-lovers and not-quite-friends. Though the pages tend to be sparse, lots of white and implied backgrounds with screentones, it's the same kind of movement through space and panels that you'd see in any professional work. Like I truly cannot emphasize enough how much this felt so beholden and in harmony with the technical aspects of Japanese bl!! I also want to give a special shoutout to the character designs. Though a lot of the story feels vaguely fantasy Europe, with vaulted ceilings and tympanums along with the very European names, all the characters are wearing cheongsam-inspired robes inside their hooded coats. A very fun detail!

As of this writing, "As You Wish" is not available for purchase, but you can read a lengthy preview of it on pixiv.

"Game Show," by yanyan46e20 and BeAl2O4EA08 (ORV x MSCH crossover)

I'm sure both artists do not want to hear this from me, but unfortunately I would eat up 20 pages of this. No, 25 pages. No, 50!! Every page had a little something that made me laugh, from Yoo Joonghyuk immediately saying "KIM DOKJA" in an irritated voice when the game show starts (with a footnote that he says it as if this whole thing is somehow automatically Dokja's fault) to Uriel and Yoohyun in the audience cheering on their respective faves to the bonus cute off at the end (PRECIOUS. AMAZING. 10/10). This is short, and silly, and full of warmth for both canons. It is no exaggeration that I wanted to make sure I was early in line for Saturday's evening session just to make sure I could get a copy, and I do not regret it at all. I think the authors should consider letting Bihyung and Newcomer brainstorm more Situations to put our characters in. I think that would bring about world peace, really.

As of this writing, "Game Show" is not available online or for purchase.

"Daydream," by BeAl2O4EA08 (ORV, Joongdak)

The side benefit of having been almost first in line at BeAl2O4EA08's table is that I got to buy a copy of "Daydream." Saturday PM session of Manga Ichiba was perhaps not the bloodbath that Sunday PM became, but it was still busy enough that I didn't linger at the table, so I wasn't able to tell BeAl2O4EA08 how extremely legit everything about "Daydream" is. The binding, the design, the colored end pages, the heft. It is so luxurious and, yes, dreamy. I don't know if BeAl2O4EA08 ever intends to reprint it, but if you get a chance to buy it, please do.

As for the story itself, it is genuinely one of my favorite tropes, the dream that is not a dream, two lives intersecting at cross purposes, two people who can only meet in a place that operates on dream logic (extra special because it is ORV, of course) and desperately trying to grab onto each other. I know the Mandarin text ("Daydream" is presented bilingually!) is skewing the feeling, but "Daydream" reminds me a lot of Korean webtoons and Chinese manhua, with big panels that move almost exclusively vertically down the page and the frequent use of full-page images to break up the rhythm. My favorite sequence is when Joonghyuk and Dokja kiss in a subway car filling up with water, but, well, I am an "Adolescence of Utena" superfan after all. Reading "Daydream" made me think of the ways Utena and ORV are similar, about the ways we create our heroes and then desire our own created heroes only for them to in turn desire us, the idea of the End of the World as both an ending and the beginning, and the soft spaces in our subconscious where desire reigns, where we cannot turn away from our desire, where we are exposed by our desire, and how harrowing that can be.

As of this writing, I think "Daydream" is no longer available for purchase, though there was a reprint interest check previously. Perhaps there will be a re-reprint interest check!

"Merry Bad End Boy," by mousouhousou/Convenience Store Pudding

So, a confession: when I made a note to buy this, I didn't realize it would be het/NL. That said, this was such uproarious fun that I am very happy I own a copy. Mosouhousou presents most of this story as a series of 4-koma, and it's good to see that The Traditions Are Still Alive. I often joke that a lot of modern tropes I see in bl manga are actually expressions of our desire to escape capitalism (like for instance when a character you pick up off the street turns out to be your perfect housewife who heals your body and soul and that allows you to get promoted and/or escape from your toxic work environment). Here, mousouhousou quite explicitly explores that fantasy in the context of a yandere boyfriend. Naturally, my favorite sequence is "Do you do taxes, too?" where the yandere boyfriend helps the main character get a reimbursement for a client dinner because he knows where all her receipts and bank statements are.

There is a kind of "twist" ending which I will not spoil, but suffice to say, this is such a fun and unintentionally biting look into modern romance. What do today's heterosexual women want their partners to provide? It is not the fantasy of romance, which the main character (and many other heterosexual women like me!) finds in fiction. It is not the trappings of material luxury, like a house or money or a car, which we often can provide for ourselves. Instead, what we long for is a partner who is curious and attentive to us, who sees us both in our public and most unguarded private moments, who is willing to get a little silly with us, who takes initiative and does not wait for our direction or approval. The yandere is the crooked interpretation of that desire, but it is still nevertheless a manifestation of that desire, and "Merry Bad End Boy" understands that perfectly.

As of this writing, "Merry Bad End Boy" is not available, but a digital version of it will be available for purchase soon!

Three "Ace of Diamond" doujinshi by hongslice/tigrbalm.

I hope I did not embarrass/overwhelm Steph at her table by asking for copies of all three doujinshi as well as sticker sheets and a keychain. But it is so unusual to see a KuraMiyu shipper in the wild! Actually while I was at her table, one attendee was explaining to their friend that "usually people ship him (pointing to Miyuki) and him (pointing to Sawamura) together" and I wanted to butt in and shout BUT THAT'S WHY YOU NEED TO SUPPORT HONGSLICE, DON'T YOU SEE? But I am a fake fan who still hasn't fully finished Daiya Act I. Perhaps next year, Steph will come back, and I will act as a proper missionary!

"Where You Are": This is the KuraMiyu doujin hongslice wrote special for Manga Ichiba, featuring university student Kuramochi who is making new friends and professional player Miyuki who is learning that he gets jealous. This is one of my favorite happy-sad sports pairing scenarios too, because I am a sicko and this is essentially forcing a pairing to live through an ersatz breakup. "I am waiting for the day we can play together again" is "Even if you move on, I'll always love you," and "I'll always be cheering you on fron the sidelines" is "it's not you, it's me," but in sports anime/manga terms. I wish for nothing but delicious bittersweet happiness for these two forever.

"A Cat's Interlude": Sawamura fosters a stray cat, and Furuya gets involved, because he loves cats and also he loves Sawamura. I actually put my hand to my mouth when I got to the end of this doujinshi, because Furuya??? Are you OK???? I felt extremely Sawamura-kin at that moment, wanting to yell and hug Furuya in equal measures. You know, maybe only Sawamura could put up with this Furuya's silliness. Congratulations on your marriage.

"A Show of Love": Sawamura and Furuya have been dating on the down low for a while, so as not to impact their professional careers. Furuya wants to go public with their relationship, despite Sawamura's concerns, so Sawamura makes a bet with him: if he can hit a homer off of Narumiya in their next game, then they can announce they're dating. This has the same kind of story beat as the Scott and Kip subplot in "Heated Rivalry" and, well, that formula works for a reason and it works here! As a person who has adopted Narumiya Mei as her patron saint, I too felt bad for him being the unwitting and unwilling catalyst for this bakappuru but some sacrifices must be made. I also feel like this is the most artistically ambitious of the three doujins, with actual!! scenes of baseball!

As of this writing, I don't believe any of these doujin are available online or for purchase, but Steph does have a storefront.

"Quod Ames," by tomatobird

I have been so thankful to Tomato for their continued promotion of Manga Ichiba and unofficial guides to the event which predated the Fanime info dumps for weeks. It is because of them that I was prepared to attend the event at all, and undoubtedly one of the highlights from that weekend was getting to meet them in person and briefly monopolizing their time at the help desk. I had told them previously that I unfortunately was flying out of San Jose before the Sunday PM session and would miss getting a chance to buy their doujin in person, and they surprised me by bringing a copy of "Quod Ames" to the Saturday day session so I could buy an advance copy!

The minute I opened "Quod Ames," I was reminded of a zine I had read a while back, "Best Yaoi Movies of the 20th Century," and I was going to message Tomato about it. But then I did the diligent thing of checking the bylines on "Best Yaoi Movies" and wouldn't you know it? Tomato was a co-author, and was the author of the blurb on "The Lion in Winter." I love when a person has a cohesive aesthetic sense, a throughline of interests and influences which they telegraph loudly, and what little I know of tomato, they seem just such a person.

I too am a fan of "The Lion in Winter" (and "Beckett" and "Lawrence of Arabia"), so unsurprisingly, I am a fan of "Quod Ames" as well, which explores a possible romantic relationship between Phillip II of France and Richard I of England. I love Philippe, who is naive and doesn't know it and, when made uncomfortable, does not hesitate to resort to minor cruelty to regain equilibrium. Much of this first part of "Quod Ames" are Philippe's fantasies, and he has two: one where he allows Richard to bed him, and another where he is a haughty authority figure and Richard, abject and groveling, kisses the edge of his robes. Both are rendered like illustrated manuscripts or stained glass windows, eschewing traditional paneling for a fecund tangle of vines and limbs and memories, a profane iconography that is so unique and fitting for the subject matter. I cannot wait for Part 2, and I hope it is not long coming.

You can buy a physical or digital copy of "Quod Ames"!

Some miscellaneous small zines:

"Catte," by Eastern Downpour: I have been telling everyone that this is the most important zine I bought the whole weekend. It is so precious and filled with the artist's particular sensibilities. I only wish they had put their socials somewhere on the zine itself!

"Shipping Patterns," by puppetbomb: Perfect execution mimicking the Campus notebook branding and design, and featuring doodles of their favorite pairings throughout the years as if you are flipping through a private notebook. I'm seethingly jealous I didn't think of it myself.

"The Love of the Game," by poxei/nico/vivi: I love all three artists and in fact have bought art from poxei and nico previously/separately. This beautifully printed 8-fold features art from six different sports anime/manga, including Prince of Tennis (!) and 100 Meters (!!). I can't wait to get the OC zine from the half dozen collective later this year!

LOGH pamphlet, by cathartesaurora and cyr: Amazing and inspirational. I am already brainstorming what I could do that's similar for next Manga Ichiba. Every table should have their own pamphlet. I am so serious, we should have a Pamphlet Phest.

Thank you to all the artists who sacrificed their time, sleep, energy, and sanity to make Manga Ichiba the success it clearly was. I will likely talk about this in more depth in part 2, but attending Fanime / Manga Ichiba resurrected all the questions I was brooding on a while back about how to make bl manga a hobby outside of "consumption," or, at the very least, spending money. I don't think I have figured out the answer, but I think there is a role for the reader who takes their job seriously, who wants to form connections with other readers, who understands that in this community and fandom, the readers are often creators as well, that the creator of one doujin may be the reader of another. This may be all I can bring to the table, but at least I am here. At least this is my table. At least I have something to put on it and offer you. And I hope you found something in here for you.

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