#ike junko

[offbeat-manga-ships]

SUENAGAKU YOROSHIKU ONEGAISHIMASU / 末永くよろしくお願いします / I WANT YOU IN MY LIFE FOREVER / TOGETHER FOREVER by Ike Junko / 池ジュン子 • chapter 1

[vermaxen]

Mizutama Honey Boy (2014-18) - :)

When I first started reading manga there wasn’t a lot to choose from in terms of what you got from a heroine.  Girly girls, tomboys who clean up into princess-looking girls, nerdy girls who clean up into princess-looking girls, magical girls, and the occasional tough action woman (these are never “girls”).  I couldn’t fully identify with any of these tropes but I enjoyed reading the stories all the same.  I didn’t suffer from a lack of representation the way some people do, but I certainly didn’t feel like these character tropes got me or my way of thinking.  I should have figured that given enough time I would finally find what I was looking for, just due to the sheer volume of manga in existence.  This is the relationship I wish I could have read about as a teen who wasn’t comfortable in wholeheartedly embracing their presenting gender, and now as an adult who feels the same way this was a breath of fresh air.

Mei Sengoku is a high school girl who exhibits personality traits and quirks that could be considered traditionally masculine.  In addition, her main hobby is kendo where she is obsessed with becoming and remaining strong, a philosophy that spills over into every other aspect of her life.  As a result of all this she is called terms like “samurai” but is also idolized by many girls and boys in her school.  Meanwhile, Shirou Fuji is a high school boy who exhibits traditionally feminine traits and sticks to stereotypical girly hobbies like cooking and sewing.  He is typically accused of being gay, or regarded with mild shock for his frequent crossdressing.  Fuji immediately confesses his feelings to Sengoku and the basis of the rest of the manga is, immediately following her rejecting his feelings, how they grow in friendship and beyond despite Fuji being perfectly honest he still has feelings for Sengoku.  As a couple they are delightful and balance one another well.

More important to me than the relationship, even though both of these characters are presented as behaving counter to their expected gender they don’t have any real angst about it or desire to change.  Sengoku is living a life she’s proud of and is confident of her choices and behaviors.  Fuji is ridiculed for his feminine hobbies and behaviors but he shrugs off the criticism and does what he wants because he’s comfortable with himself and how he presents.  Even though their gender presentation is often played for laughs, they themselves never feel like the butt of the humor.  There was also never a scene where they were forced to act like their expected gender as if their personalities were some sort of phase that they would grow out of when they got older.  As someone who has made compromises regarding gender presentation to avoid criticism, I see this as inspiring.  I wish I had access to this ages ago.

[kinbari14]

[yatorifan]

[mina-ahavi]

[mangathime]

[shoujo-screencaps]

[matchabitchy]