Yandere^2 Blog

Welcome to the blog accompaniment to Yandere Squared, the 4-koma series! This is a blog about all things yandere. You can find a bunch of original and collected yandere stories and poems here - about 60 in total - as well as original, collected and/or translated articles and essays on yandere. var _gaq = _gaq || []; _gaq.push(['_setAccount', 'UA-25485643-4']); _gaq.push(['_trackPageview']); (function() { var ga = document.createElement('script'); ga.type = 'text/javascript'; ga.async = true; ga.src = ('https:' == document.location.protocol ? 'https://ssl' : 'http://www') + '.google-analytics.com/ga.js'; var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(ga, s); })();

[y2blog]

Hi! I was wondering, after yandere^2's forum closed down, if you've made or considered making another one?

I haven't really been in contact with the forum for a long time now. Forums in general are an increasingly obsolete way of engaging with a community online, I've found.

Last I heard, part of the community has moved to an unaffiliated Discord server. If anyone knows more about this, please feel free to reblog/reply. Thank you.

[y2blog]

Imo, one doesn't willingly choose to become a "yandere". I can't think of a single character, who could get classed as a "yandere", who became that way because they made a conscious decision to do so. There's always various circumstances which lead to a character becoming that way. Although, honestly, the idea of someone wanting to become an anime character trope is pretty bizarre in on itself.

(Now that I think of it, a story about someone trying to be yandere could be very interesting. It could be played for comedy, like Matsushima Michiru’s attempts to become the ideal tsundere in Grisaia, but it could also be taken very, very seriously.)

Anyway, maybe it’s because I’ve been blogging about yandere for several years, but I really don’t find it strange for people to want to become certain varieties of yandere.

It’s like this.

You see a character on the screen. She - it’s usually a she, in anime - is designed to appeal to an audience, to be interesting and relatable and lovable all at once for at least some people, and this gives them a pretty good chance of drawing your curiosity and/or admiration. And so, when you’re designing yourself, you try to be like this interesting-relatable-lovable character that you want to understand better or that you uphold as an ideal. (After all, you like them; maybe being like them will make others like you.) Sometimes, that character is yandere. That’s all.

A good portion of it is, I think, aesthetic. Someone recently asked whether it was possible for someone who isn’t cute-looking to be yandere; this is an interesting question, as it shows that the popular impression of the yandere is that they’re expected to be cute. There are definitely people who find portrayals of yandere behaviour cute - look at all those who say things along the lines of “overly attached girlfriend can overly attach herself to me any day”. We may not be able to think of any examples of characters trying to become yandere, but I’m sure that examples of characters trying to become cuter are a dime a dozen. I’m sure that examples of people trying to become cuter or otherwise more appealing according to their cultural context are just as common.

Of course, fiction tends to skim over the messy parts, from the bits that are tedious or inconvenient to the bits that are deeply damaging and may end up costing you everything important. As I have been saying, the sort of yandere that people try to become or try to make their partners into doesn’t tend to be the same sort that people warn against. It’s more about striking cute poses with boxcutters or expressing a certain (cute, to some people) level of obsession or jealousy or neediness, and less about actually giving yourself or your partner a literal mental disorder with all its associated suffering.

It’s also possible that what you have in mind are the people who are themselves very troubled and often distressed, who find yandere characters exceptionally relatable because of who they themselves are. In those cases, perhaps the presence of the yandere trope and the adoption of the yandere term for themselves might help them to accept the parts of themselves that often receive criticism. I don’t have the expertise to assess the consequences of this, and in any case it will vary from person to person. I can only wish them well, and hope they find the understanding they so often seek.

[y2blog]

There is any character who is yandere for their pet?

The one example that comes to mind is an unnamed character from the light novel Goth by Otsuichi who, suffice to say, is very, very protective of her dog. She doesn’t appear in the manga adaptation, however.

Arguably, there’s also Cindy from Kindergarten.

Perhaps there are other examples out there - it isn’t exactly an easy concept to search - but these are the ones I would point to.

[y2blog]

Yandere flash fiction

Most of the recent posts here have been April Fool’s Day posts, so I won’t try to pull a bait-and-switch this time. Those of you who are here are probably familiar with my unfortunately diminished post schedule, and know what to expect. Without further ado, then:

1. I can feel her bright green eyes on me, every single day. They are wide, staring, surprisingly small, and weigh my pockets down ever so slightly.

2. My dog won’t stop barking. Someone must be here. Someone unwelcome. I look around, panicked. A flashlight shines on my face. I cover my eyes. What? No, wait! No, I’m not an intruder, this is my house and I’m your wife, yes, really, I can prove it! I know you very well-

3. I place the final photo of my beloved on the wall. I took it while she was sleeping. Her face is turned away, but her whiskers glisten in the sun.

4. You make my heart go doki-doki all day and all night. I’ll die without you. Please stay with me forever and ever. Thank you for always being there for me, my pacemaker.

5.  Boy meets girl. Boy leaves girl. Or tries to. Girl doesn’t let him. Girl ties boy up. Girl keeps boy in her walk-in closet. Girl’s walk-in closet leads to Narnia and boy freezes to death in the snow. The end.

I hope you enjoyed these, and thank you for coming back.

[y2blog]

Keeping an Eye on Senpai

He's walking up to the window! I duck into the bushes. A branch tries to stab me in the eye, so I squeeze my eyes shut.

Shhhhh. You can't see me. I'm not here. You absolutely don't have a creepy stalker-with-a-crush right under your window...

...I hear him close the curtains. His footsteps recede.

Phew. Crisis averted.

Leaning against the windowsill, I peer into the tiny gap between the curtains, trying to spot him as he walks away. It's awfully dark in there. Where is he? Where-

Augh!

I was about to make tea when my phone emitted a triple beep. An intruder? Now? In broad daylight? It's most likely only a cat, but that would be dangerous to assume, especially in this day and age.

Glancing at the screen, I headed towards Window B-3. It was closed already and opening it would be foolhardy, so instead I pulled the curtains almost completely shut, turned the lights down remotely using an app, and walked on the spot for a few moments to make it seem like I'd walked away.

Ducking beneath the level of the window, I watched the video feed on my phone - with the night screen on for added stealth - and waited.

A figure emerged from the bushes. I was right! Someone really was after me! I glanced through the other camera feeds - looks like they're working alone, although they might be connected to someone else remotely. For now, though...

Ha-ha! You made the mistake of touching my windowsill, you fool! I activated the current in the wire to tase them into unconsciousness, and ran out of the back door.

Keeping my head under the bushes in case of snipers, I approached their position and- Huh?

A girl blinked up at me, clutching her hand with a grimace. She was very clearly still conscious. Wait. A girl? I panicked and hit her on the head with my phone. She collapsed into a heap.

Whoops.

It took a surprising amount of work to drag her through the back door and into the house, but I had no other choice. I was incriminated already, and the best I could do now was to retreat somewhere safe and try to protect myself. At least she was still breathing - I could try to extract information from her.

I locked every lock on the door. And the other door. And all the windows. When I finally returned to my room, the girl was... still unconscious? Just how hard had I hit her?

I left her tied up - just in case - and carefully looked over her.

There were no devices in her ears, and no signs of implants there either - I couldn't rule out the possibility, as the Guide to Spotting Implanted Communication Devices was almost five years out of date, but for now I could at least hope nobody knew what had happened to her just yet.

I emptied out her pockets and her schoolbag. Aside from an ordinary iPhone, she didn't seem to have any other means of communication. Using her thumb to unlock her phone, I found nothing unusual. That mostly ruled out governmental agencies and many other organisations - they wouldn't let a field operative work without guidance or monitoring.

A chill ran down my spine. Was she a cultist, then? I could rule out the Freemasons, mostly, because they don't usually accept women into their ranks-

I was suddenly very conscious of the warmth of her body and the soft curves beneath her clothing.

Eep. Calm down, calm down!

Hastily pulling a sleep mask over my eyes, I began patting her down in case I'd missed anything. Was that some sort of- no, just the bottom of her ribcage. Alright. It seems like she doesn't have any physical modifications. So, just her mind, then?

The same chill felt even stronger now, and I shivered. No. Please, no. I'd never wanted to go head-to-head with the Illuminati itself...

I pulled the sleep mask off and looked over everything again, taking deep breaths to calm my racing heart.

The girl, whose physical integrity was intact but had most likely been brainwashed - I had no way of knowing how dangerous she might be, but she should at least be limited to a normal amount of strength.

The pile of items, which didn't seem to contain any unusual technology (although, of course, there was no way to be sure) - I picked up a few of the items and examined them more closely. There was nothing hidden in the lip balm. Nothing behind the mirror in the compact. Nothing inside the iPhone. Nothing inside the bag itself, either. I plugged her flash drive into my old offline-exclusive laptop and found only some schoolwork and a personal folder filled with-

Pictures of me!?

I scrolled through the folder. There were hundreds of photographs, some dating back to months ago. Just how long had she been following me? And why?

I looked back at the pile of items. There was a little notebook there that I'd briefly looked over earlier just to check that it didn't contain some sort of communications technology. Picking it up, I flicked through the pages and-

9:02am. Senpai was a little late today. Did he oversleep? How cute ♥ 9:45am. Senpai is the first out of the door. He really hates History class, doesn't he? I do too! We have so much in common! 9:47am. Senpai stopped to chat with his friend. They've started watching _____ on TV? I should look at it too.

The notebook fell from my fingers. I couldn't bring myself to pick it back up. Instead, I glanced at the girl again. She was pretty cute, really. She looked like she'd led quite a happy life before the Illuminati had chosen to use her. And now, whoever she once was had been destroyed; her heart and soul had been twisted - to obsess over me, of all people...

Such ruthlessness. Such wanton cruelty. Maybe... Maybe I couldn't just look away from their crimes anymore. I could fight them. I could spend my life working against them, to make sure they wouldn't do this to anyone else. And this girl...

She made a small noise and stirred. I snapped back to the present as she opened her eyes.

She yelped as soon as she saw me, her voice muffled by the handkerchief I'd stuffed into her mouth. I opened my closet, which I'd made soundproof for just this sort of situation, and tossed all the clothing out before hauling her into it and closing the doors behind us.

I removed the improvised gag. She coughed for a moment before turning back to me.

"S-senpai?" She said in a small voice. I could see her trembling, but I'd made up my mind.

"It's alright now," I told her as calmly as possible. "You're free. I won't let the Illuminati use you any longer."

The look of confusion in her wide eyes broke my heart. It was as I'd suspected. She didn't even know she was being used - they'd so thoroughly convinced her that she was acting of her own volition, and wiped any memory of the horrors they must have put her through.

"Shh. It's going to be alright." I placed my hand on her shoulder. She was warm, and breathing heavily, and her eyes shone in the light of my phone screen as a blush spread across her cheeks and- eep!

I shoved her away. She flew through the closet doors and landed on the floor. I covered my eyes just in case her skirt had landed in an indecent position.

"Kyaa! Um, Senpai???"

"N-never mind! Just go!" I slammed the closet doors shut and took a few deep breaths. Curse the Illuminati for using a weapon I was utterly defenseless against. The fight could wait. I'd have to mentally prepare myself first. Deep breaths. Deep breaths...

"...S-senpai? I'm still t-tied up..."

The closet doors did not open.

(A/N: Happy April Fool's Day! It's the best day for bringing my most outlandish story concepts to life. This was going to be a simple bait-and-switch, but the conspiracy theorist Senpai was so much fun to write that I quite lost track of my word count. Oh, well. I hope you enjoy it - it was certainly entertaining for me.)

[y2blog]

Yandere CD Re:birth

The fourth installment of the Yandere no Onna no Ko series is planned for release on the 21st of December! This CD features two girls, one of whom may look familiar...

If you guessed Nagisa, you are exactly right. The endearing imouto Nonohara Nagisa (CD1, track 1) is back with a new design and a more detailed backstory:

Her new red scarf is a precious gift from her beloved Onii-chan, and... she pads her chest out in the hopes that he’ll notice her as a girl? Goodness, Nagisa-chan, you’re all grown up. (◕‿◕✿)

It seems like the storyline might involve her and her Onii-chan playing at romance for “practice”, when someone intrudes on their relationship and Nagisa quietly objects...

An unofficial, non-canon prologue for Nagisa’s track can be found here. It goes over how she has recurring nightmares of the final few minutes of her previous episode, but the real Onii-chan is still alive and well - she muses about the nightmares, and about how at the very least her precious scarf never appears in them (after all, she couldn’t possibly allow it to be stained with blood), and about how once in a while she is the one who is killed by a rival and those dreams never fail to terrify her, but she still vastly prefers them to the unspeakably horrible dreams in which she kills Onii-chan. She grows to hate happosai, she scours the books for information on dreams and worries about the nightmares being prophetic, but as long as she can wake up to Onii-chan’s smile each day, she believes that she’ll get through it all.

The new childhood friend character Kuchinashi Ayako looks promising as well:

Her surname implies that she speaks very little - a danyandere, perhaps? She appears to be the exact opposite of the other childhood friend, Koumoto Ayase. Her voice actress (Kawaragi Shiho) also voiced Kashiwagi Sonoko (CD1, track 3), Sakuranomiya Erisu (CD3, track 1), Aeka from Yume Miru Kusuri, Megu from Rozen Maiden, and even Sekai from School Days. Her trademark weapon appears to be a frying pan, which makes two out of two cooking-themed girls in this CD.

Her backstory appears to revolve around a promise that she made with the protagonist when they were little - a promise she still believes in with all her heart and treasures more than anything else in the world and treats as her sole reason for living. Her poor judgement aside, it’s a classic setup - maybe after exercising as much creativity as they could in CD3, Edge Records has decided to go back to the basics, or maybe there are more plot twists lying in wait.

...Well, this is quite a respectable Christmas present for the yandere fandom. (◡‿◡✿) I hope you fansubbers out there are taking note!

[y2blog]

Top 5 Yanderes and the reason you like them, please?

These kinds of list aren’t exactly my forte, but I’ll give it my best.

Unmarked spoilers below.

5. Mirai Nikki - Gasai Yuno

I know, it’s unusual to see Yuno at #5 on a yandere list rather than #1.

The thing is, Yuno does everything, and it’s easy to like her for being the most yandere yandere who has ever yandered - but this also makes it harder to pinpoint a memorable aspect of her, or a memorable moment or scene.

Yuno plays a key role in the history of yandere, and I would be surprised to see any character defeat her in terms of sheer yanderosity anytime soon. She takes up much of the screentime and steals essentially the entire show without being tedious to watch, and that is what makes her valuable. She, more than any other character, shows that yandere is capable of performing in the spotlight.

4. Shuffle - Fuyou Kaede

Kaede is my go-to example for a well-presented yandere character. Her breakdown is quiet, almost inconsequential in comparison to the likes of Yuno, but manages to be remarkably compelling.

It might be interesting to watch the series again, from the beginning - and bear in mind that at every moment her guilt is crushing her, that every kindness she shows is a desperate plea for her own right to live. As an example for yandere-as-tragedy, she is just about perfect - and worryingly, she is one of the most believable characters on this list.

3. Fate/zero - Matou Kariya

The entire reason Kariya is on this list is because of his scene in the church. It was the only part that I thought wasn’t done quite right in the anime - I paid particular attention to it, because it had made Kariya my favourite yandere character for a while.

It’s difficult to pinpoint what exactly I liked about that scene. Part of it was Aoi’s reaction to the scene, which drove home the point that her love for Tokiomi was perfectly sincere, no matter what Kariya had been telling himself over the years. Part of it was that, having sacrificed everything in an attempt to protect the daughter of the woman he loved, Kariya… failed. Failed horribly, like some brave individual who dives into a river to save a child, only to drown along with them while pulling other bystanders into the water. To be fair, in his situation, there might not have been any other possible outcome. Pure misfortune and pure tragedy - I think that’s the essence of his story.

2. Kimi to Kanojo to Kanojo no Koi - Sone Miyuki

Ah, Totono. While I can’t possibly recommend it to anyone who isn’t already very familiar with visual novel conventions (since too much of its brilliance would be lost on them), I certainly recommend it to everyone who is. It’s perhaps too ambitious in that the writer clearly had a lot of interesting ideas that could have worked better if given stories of their own rather than compacted into a single visual novel, but many aspects of it are done well. For best results, you should know nothing about it when you begin, but for everyone reading this, that Nice Boat has already sailed.

On paper, Sone Miyuki is an ordinary case of a childhood friend turned school idol, with a mildly tsundere personality based on her easily-embarrassed nature - but various details give her a great deal more nuance than that. Miyuki’s voice actress is one of the main highlights. (For best results, use headphones.)

The main reason I like Miyuki is that, of all the characters on this list, she is the most palpably affectionate. Perhaps part of that is simply because emotions are easier to convey in writing, but the way the storyline is laid out - without going into too much detail - conveys this principle well.

1. Bungaku Shoujo - Takeda Chia

It’s hard to say why Chia is at the top of my list. Certainly, she has a cute character design, her facade is very deliberately moe, and she practically lives in a library - but I think what is more important is the sheer emptiness behind it all. A similar backstory to Aishi Ayano’s in Yandere Simulator, in a way, except that Chia’s meta-emotions are functional - leaving her filled with horror and disgust and despair at her lack of normal emotion.

Her love interest is a boy who has spent the entire light novel series dating as many girls as he could in an attempt to find one who would be willing to kill him because she loved him. This search ends in Chia, who, when he finds himself hospitalised, frightens off all the other girls trying to visit him by holding a knife to her own neck.

Their epilogue together is something I’ve been meaning to translate for a while. The version of love portrayed in it is interesting: “It wasn’t at all like the warm, gentle glow that she’d read about in the dusty books that kept her company. It was sharp and cold and terrifyingly dark, an icicle embedded in her chest that made her hands tremble in excited fear.” It’s a pleasant change of pace from the usual fluff and sugar - I think it’s the kind of thing that drew many of us to yandere in the first place.

…So, there you have it. My particular taste in yandere characters might be a little unusual - I’ve certainly never encountered anyone else whose favourite was Chia - but I hope you’ve found this to be an interesting read.

[y2blog]

Tsunkuuyandanhimekamimayaderedere Adventures! Chapter 1

Summary: Congratulations! You have just arrived at your new high school and already you've taken a wrong turn and walked right into the most difficult heroine's route. You don't want to find out what the Bad Ends are like on this one.

Tsunkuuyandanhimekamimayaderedere Adventures! Chapter 1

Your name is Senpai and today is your first day of high school. You realise that it makes very little sense for anyone at this school to call you Senpai, but that doesn't matter right now because you're too busy running away from what appears to be the world's first ever specimen of tsunkuuyandanhimekamimayaderedere.

(To avoid having to think that really long arguably-a-word to yourself every single time, you let it be known that the girl's name is Nani Kore.)

Being 12.5% mayadere, Nani-san is naturally attempting to kill you right this second. (It is, after all, your first encounter.) Being 87.5% pretty much everything else, however...

"Senpaaaaa~i! I've been stalking you since forever but it's not because I like you or anything but how dare you ignore someone of my stature I will make you bow down at my feet and worship me and uh, umm... ...s-stuff...? ...This is illogical."

The sound of running footsteps behind you stops. You stop running as well, gasping for breath as you turn around just in time for-

"Senpai, I made a bento for you~ ✿"

-the most vividly blushing face you've ever seen.

You decide that this most likely means you've succeeded in surviving your first encounter with the 12.5% of her that is mayadere.

After this, it should be a simple matter of figuring out how to deal with this endgame-stage-Jenga-tower-like personality mix that has 12.5% yandere in it, not to mention the 12.5% tsundere that may have taken on a violent turn according to recent industry fashion, and let's not forget the potential emotional abuse that a hime/kamidere (total 25%) might subject you to on top of that, and of course the 12.5% that is mayadere will continue to feed her killing intent. ...At least the 37.5% that is kuu/dan/deredere should be reasonably safe. Probably. Ish.

You're not sure whether or not it's a good thing that all the archetypes that your newfound love interest Nani-san embodies don't seem to blend with each other too much. You're not even sure whether that would make things more complicated or less.

For the time being, you accept the bento. (Where did she hide it? She wasn't carrying anything while running. You make a mental note to figure this out soon in order to assess the likelihood of her being able to suddenly summon a giant cleaver.)

And then you awkwardly walk to the introduction ceremony together, because it isn't even lunchtime yet.

As the cherry petals dramatically flutter around you, you head off to class and sit at the Protagonist's Desk, tuning out the teacher's voice and gazing stereotypically out of the window until the bell rings for lunch.

What happens next? Will Senpai's lunchbox be filled with apple bunnies or heart-shaped egg slices or green jelly or far too much tamagoyaki or an entire layer of yakisoba or literally-spiked ohagi or maybe even something else entirely? Will they hold hands??? Stay tuned for the next episode of Tsunkuuyandanhimekamimayaderedere Adventures!!

~つづく~

(Happy April Fool's Day! I hope that was reasonably entertaining, but not so entertaining that you're actually holding your breath for the next chapter, since I don't actually plan to write one. ^^; ...Although if you want to put together a continuation of the story yourself, be my guest! And let me know, of course.)

(Edit: The queue didn’t work, for some reason, so I’m posting this manually a day late. ^^; Sorry!)

[y2blog]

but why would anyone want to be a yandere? there's a reason they don't tend to be well-liked in their own universes by anyone who knows their true nature. personally, i wouldn't want to be the codependent who absolutely needs another person to survive while everyone avoids me for being too clingy and jealous, nor do i want to have to lie to people about my true personality just so they won't leave me. reading about yandere characters is great, but actually being one is another story entirely.

This is something I’ve discussed a few times before, but I’ll see if I can go into more detail here.

The thing is, my perspective on this whole issue is probably quite unique. I’ve had people come to me for advice on both how to become yandere and how to stop being yandere, and the posts I’ve linked above can give you some information on my thoughts on this topic.

Below are some other thoughts on why various people might want to be yandere. They’re very unlikely to all be true for any one person, of course, but they should provide an avenue for understanding.

- Let me first repeat one of my main points: Most of those who want to be yandere and most of those who are horrified at the very idea have quite different views on what yandere is. Since you’ve asked this question, your idea of yandere is probably much closer to the one in the Deconstruction (which I never expected to reference quite this often when I first wrote it) or in the Confessions than to, say, the kind of caricature that the checklist is based on. Others will probably have a different impression.

- Considering the above, a lot of people honestly perceive yandere as (a rather messier-than-usual variety of) fun and games. It is, after all, fundamentally a character archetype, and the rules of fiction are different from the rules of reality - but it’s the nature of people to take an interest in what they see on the screen and want to try it out (generally on a smaller scale, of course, and not criminally).

- There are also some who focus on the aesthetic aspect of yandere - the obsession with sharp objects, the splashes of red decorating everything, the empty eyes and wild grins and cutesy voice and broken laughter. There isn’t really a “yandere fashion” - the closest I can think of is guro-loli - but if there was, I’m sure many people would take it up because the visuals are to their taste and speak to them. (T-shirts with heart-shaped blood splatters printed on them? Pleated skirts with rough sketches of sharp things hidden among the folds? Blank eye contact lenses? Cleaver hair clips? Haphazardly sewn stuffed toys? …Maybe this could grow into something.)

- Becoming yandere (of the not-fun-and-games variety) is a sacrifice of your personal freedom. You wouldn’t ordinarily think of that as a good thing, but consider this: Limitations and restrictions are the source of purpose and meaning, because complete freedom means complete pointlessness. (This idea is probably most famously attributed to Jean-Paul Sartre, but it crops up in all sorts of places, including Godel, Escher, Bach and a bunch of far-future science fiction.) I would be surprised if there was nobody at all who could find personal fulfillment in being yandere, even with all the suffering that the helpless obsession causes. It would, however (and somewhat ironically), be quite selfish.

- Becoming yandere is also a way to avoid taking responsibility for things - many yandere characters illustrate this each time they insist on pinning the blame for their actions on someone else. In fairness to them, they probably feel quite helpless in their subjective worlds, and they do pay a large portion of the price. This ties into the above point, as well as the one below.

- It is common to think of love as a virtue - sometimes even the highest virtue of all - and to find the pursuit of love at the cost of all else to be noble. We say things like amor vincit omnia - love conquers all - and yanderes embody these ideals. In other words, it is easy to come up with a plausible system of morality where yanderes are completely blameless. There may be those who sincerely believe in this idea; there will be those who use it as an excuse.

- There is definitely a market for very dependent people. A higher-than-average proportion of this market seems to consist of people who can be considered yandere themselves, but not all of them. This is, therefore, a potential niche for certain kinds of yandere - but not one I would recommend aiming for, since it is also likely to contain a higher-than-average proportion of abusive partners.

- There is also, of course, a market for slightly obsessive and/or possessive partners. Even aside from all the “Yuno is mai waifu” stuff floating around, have you seen how people react to the Overly Attached Girlfriend? There are people who find the behaviour attractive and probably, on some level, reassuring. Particularly in the early stages of attraction, there are many people who would be more than fine with some degree of stalkerishly obsessive behaviour - but then again, that’s the time during which one is most forgiving towards one’s partner.

- As an extension of the above point, for a long time (mostly before the popularisation of psychoanalysis), jealousy was considered to be good evidence of love. Many fans of yandere are fans because they still have this perception, as opposed to the relatively recent views that jealousy is a sign of personal insecurity or poor thinking habits or whatnot.

- Even mostly-ordinary people can empathise greatly with yandere feelings - so familiarity with yandere stories may lead them to want to identify as yandere, particularly when they’re looking for things to describe themselves as. I realise that reading YouTube comments may be bad for your health, but the responses to mildly-yanderesque songs like Love is War are good evidence, as is the popularity of jealousy-related self-help books.

…This is by no means a complete list, and in any case a lot of it is speculation. Still, the next time you see someone try to become yandere, maybe this will help you understand.

(If your reasons are different from any of the above, please let me know. This topic is, by its nature, very important to many people, so I would like to try to understand it as far as I can.)

[y2blog]

Hi Actually i want to be a yandere but i cant kill:o and i am bit or maybe so much not cuter looking and everyone hates me is it still possible to be a yandere ?

If you’ve been reading this blog, you probably know by now that I wouldn’t recommend being (at least certain kinds of) yandere - and most of the answer you’re looking for can probably be found in my previous reply. ^^; Of course, since you’ve volunteered some information about your own situation, I’ll take that into account below.

First, please think carefully about exactly what you mean when you say you want to be yandere - if you want to take up insane laughter and strike poses with suspiciously stained pairs of scissors, that is an entirely different matter (and a much better idea, one that you can get away with if you’re young enough - although I wouldn’t expect it to make you any more popular) from if you want to become the kind of person described in the Deconstruction.

All of that said, I will assume that you aren’t about to make yourself into a blob of tragedy and suffering, and answer you based on that.

No, murderous tendencies are definitely not a required yandere trait - one of my favourite yandere characters, Fuyou Kaede from Shuffle, is barely violent at all. The same goes for Mutsuki Koharu from Koharu no Hibi, Asakura Miu from Bungaku Shoujo, and many, many more. Everything considered, not being murderous tends to be much more practical in the society of today. And looking un-cute might put you in the department of another of my favourite yandere characters, Matou Kariya from Fate/zero. Other examples include Ikari Gendou from Neon Genesis Evangelion, Annie Wilkes from Misery, and plenty of others. Aside from this, cuteness tends to come from behaviour as much as from appearance - you can cultivate it if you wish.

For you in particular, maybe it’s the attitude that’s most important - the idea that maybe finding that one special person will make everything okay, and in exchange for the happiness they offer you with their mere presence, you will protect them from suffering of all sorts and try your very, very hardest to make them happy. This isn’t guaranteed to actually come true, of course - so if/when you do find a special person, try not to frighten them off by acting as though you’re in an anime or, for that matter, in Yandere Simulator. Bear in mind what they might be worried about.

…But of course, it wouldn’t be the best idea to use love advice from a yandere blogger without consideration. ^^; This is especially true because I don’t know your exact circumstances. Think carefully, and take care.

[y2blog]

Something that would be interesting to find out that I don't think has ever been done is what would happen if two yanderes fell in love with each other? Probably would not be that different from a regular yandere relationship but would still be interesting to see how it would turn out.

It doesn’t show up frequently, but I’ve noted a few examples of it and have done some speculation on how it could turn out. Some examples that have popped up since then occur in Liar Liar and its sequel, both OELVNs, and (spoilers!) in a certain phone game.

[y2blog]

Hi! Um, I was wondering if I could use some of the words in your 'Yandere In 100 Words' as prompts. I really want to make some yandere stories but I haven't had any ideas until I saw your poems/short stories. I'd like to use them for a Black Butler story if that is alright. :) :) :)

That is perfectly fine. (◡‿◡✿) I don’t have any plans at the moment to include fanfiction in my lists of yandere stories, since fanfic circles seem to have their own indexing (and it would also make the lists far, far too long), but by all means, you can write them.

[y2blog]

Weird anime: Tokidoki Balloon

So I watched Tokidoki Balloon. It's very... interesting. Strange. Unusual. Unsettling. Sort of nonsensical. Oh, and cute, in a strange-unusual-unsettling-nonsensical way.

Synopsis: A group of cute schoolgirls do cute schoolgirl things together while, somehow, spoilery bad things happen. It's likely to remind you of Higurashi or, perhaps, Madoka.

I'd recommend it to the sort of person who likes yandere. As always, have a yandere-sounding quote:

Because they’re so soft and fluffy! I wonder if they’re fluffy inside, too?

...This, by the way, was said before the show began to go dark. (Translation from here.)

I proceeded, however, on the assumption that most communication in anime is visual - and the visuals were interesting in their own right. (I'm not surprised that Studio B-Chuo disappeared off the radar; this may have been a bit too much for their first attempt at a TV anime.)

Some scenes in Tokidoki Balloon have achieved small-scale infamy. For instance, in episode 3, someone literally tears open a cat. It all goes downhill from there. (It seems like the third-episode twist is quite a tradition.)

There are moments of pure slice-of-life comedy, and there are moments of being meguca suffering, and these are interspersed in erratic but somehow meaningful-seeming ways. (Perhaps it's simply a feature of our psychology to tend to return false positives on meaningfulness, although considering that stories are usually made with intended meaning, it's quite likely to be intentional.)

One particular character - Yonekawa Mimiko - has also reached small-scale infamy, for something popularly known as the Mimiko Event (which is most likely the content that caused the show to be banned and then largely "unpersoned"). You will find blogs referencing her in the tags, saying things like "Mimiko will forever remain in our hearts". She's been praised as extremely cute and been accused of psychopathy. The yandere-caricature potential is clear enough.

Aside from that, there's a lot of cute comedy and some fanservice. People have compared it to Lucky Star. It contains otaku jokes just as Lucky Star does, although in the absence of subtitles I didn't really catch them.

It's possible to criticise Tokidoki Balloon for how monotonous its comedy scenes are, with all its repeated backgrounds and (for those not used to slice-of-life) lack of plot relevance. However, in the second half, this unchanging quality is precisely what makes it interesting.

As things go downhill - please pardon the vagueness as I try to dodge the minefield of potential spoilers - all the dark scenes happen in one place and the light scenes in another, and the two never mix. A scene that is likely to cause nightmares in susceptible people cuts straight to a cheerful and apparently irrelevant joke. The same character may suffer one second and laugh the next. This might seem like non-chronological storytelling or perhaps alternate realities, but eventually the signs of the dark scenes begin to encroach on the light scenes as well.

Doesn't this remind you of the cheerful yandere obliviousness found in Yandere no Onna no Ko and various other works? An apparent cuteness and good humour, under which churns a sea of madness - this characterises both your typical yandere girl and the overall structure of Tokidoki Balloon.

In other words, if you like yandere, you are very likely to enjoy this anime - well, for whatever form of "enjoy" best applies to it, really.

...And now, I'd like to apologise. Tokidoki Balloon is not a real anime. (April Fool's!) It appears to have been invented by one 2dteleidoscope.

Ah, it would be interesting for something like it to exist.

[y2blog]

Would you consider Sylvia Plath a real-life yandere? What happened between her, Ted Hughes and Assia Wevill is like more mature version of School Days.

I’m not an expert on Sylvia Plath by any means, and I can’t seem to find any of the specifics of what happened - it seems like the story is largely obscured by time and media sensationalism. Her actions seem conflicted, so it’s hard to discern any patterns, causes, or motivations behind them. Perhaps it’s just that she was, by nature or habit, a chaotic blend of impulsiveness and indecision.

As for the yandere aspect, well, it was certainly a love triangle that ended badly. The evidence implies, though, that Plath was unstable long before even meeting Hughes. (It would match the broad definition, although nobody seems to actually use it.)

[y2blog]

If one day you (or one of your beautiful followers) would like to create a yandere fanmix, I want to point you in direction of certain Lana Del Rey songs! Obviously she isn't aware of the term, but her personas in many songs are extremely yandere. Check out Live or Die, Noir or Serial Killer! BTW, I LOVE this tumblr. Finally a place for people who love and identify with yanderes.

Thanks for the recommendations, and I'm glad you like my blog.

Yandere really is quite common in music - many artists (particularly female ones) who don’t shy away from dark themes will have a song or two (or many) on distorted love, stalking, jealousy, or other related topics.

I'm not too familiar with most of the yandere music on the market - I can just about keep up with the Vocaloid ones - so, does anyone else have something to recommend?

[y2blog]

Do you think it's possible to be both yandere and kuudere at the same time? I mean... These archetypes seem to be almost contradictiory, but I guess it's still possible?

There isn’t anything all that contradictory about yandere and kuudere - after all, the “kuu” of kuudere generally describes a character’s behaviour before they develop romantic attachment, while the “yan” of yandere manifests afterwards. (An interesting feature is that a lot of portrayals of yandere, by a sort of tradition, include an “emotionless” stage that functions a lot like kuudere - even the blank-eyes phenomenon can be common to both.)

Kuuyandere seems to be considerably less popular than tsunyandere is - on the other hand, danyandere (mentioned here because dandere was often mistaken for kuudere a couple of years ago) seems to be almost standard.

For tsunyandere, we have Sakuya from the Yandere no Onna no Ko series, Sone Miyuki from Totono, Honoka from Yanderella, and plenty of others - it helps that tsundere is one of the most common childhood friend types. For danyandere, we have Sonoko from the Yandere no Onna no Ko series, Maika from Yandere, Noelle from The Way We All Go, and no shortage of similar characters. As for kuuyandere, hmm… Well, there’s Homura, although she started out as a dandere. (Edit: And, now that I think of it, Kyrie from Umineko.) No others come to mind.

Perhaps the main source of the sense of contradiction is that kuudere traits tend to signify in a character a refusal to glorify emotion. Yandere characters are generally subservient to their emotions (often almost worshipping the ideal of “love”), while kuudere characters keep emotions in check almost by habit.

If we think about it, though, and about the popular theory that yandere originated as a deconstruction of the Yamato Nadeshiko (an archetype characterised by a similar control of emotion, among other things), then it stands to reason that yandere could easily function as a deconstruction of kuudere, as well. I wonder why we don’t seem to see many of these - perhaps I’m just missing a few examples?

[y2blog]

I have this issue where my family thinks Yanderes are the bad influence and I am not mentally right for finding Yandere's Pure and True. How do I explain to them that Yanderes are good and get them to stop bitching at me and let me be

This may become a little messy.

I’ve written many, many things about defining yandere and all the different nuances than yandere can take on - as a concept, as a reality, or even as an identity. In short, even if we somehow manage to pin down what yandere really means, it will still take on different shades and tones depending on personal experience, personal priorities, the impression you had of the first character you discovered was yandere, and so on.

In a sense, yandere characters embody many virtues. They are loyal, certainly, and loving. To a particular person, they can be infinitely charitable and kind. The most effective ones are disciplined, resilient, and well-mannered.

(Of course, there are plenty of things that most yanderes are not. They are not just - their actions may coincide with what we know as justice, but they are not truly motivated by the good of the people. They are not sincere - their priorities diverge enough from any sort of common good that honesty would be a liability to them. They are, above all, not moderate.)

You are right in that yanderes are pure and true in many ways. Their love refuses to be tempered by the complex damping system that is reality, and it demands to be acted upon, for better or (as in many cases) for worse. Their ultimate dream of eternal love shows a sort of innocence and naivety about them - after all, eternity is long, and the control of one person over as little as their own life is hardly solid enough to guarantee anything. It can be said that the yandere is the truest of all characters - as many lies as they may spin to direct the paths of others, as many lies as they may whisper to fuel their own hopes, at the very end, they do not generally deceive themselves about what they want.

The trouble is (and this is what puts the “yan” in “yandere”) that attempting to be truly true to oneself is very, very dangerous.

To begin with, what does it even mean? At any moment, a person will have many aims and values in some sort of not-quite-defined order - along with values that apply to their own values, and certain conditions that they will not violate (except perhaps under some other conditions), and so on and so forth.

If a yandere is to be realistic, they will have several priorities at any given time. If a yandere is to be yandere, then the highest priority of all (whatever they themselves say - actions speak louder than words, after all) will be “love”. What does that mean? To protect their target from harm? To make their target happy? To be together forever? There will likely be a mixture, and often their chosen courses of action (which I’m sure we are all familiar with) are hardly recognisable as love to anyone who isn’t familiar with the idea of yandere.

That is probably the main reason why you may see yanderes as good, while the people around you may not. Your personal experiences, personal priorities, and perhaps most importantly, your impressions of various yandere characters have allowed you to look at a yandere character’s actions and see love in them where others will likely only see madness. You see a pure heart where others see cruelty; you see loyalty where others see restriction; you see someone being true to themselves where others see a dangerous, perhaps even monstrous, agent of chaos.

As for what to say to your family - I don’t know them myself, so it would be hard to advise you. (It doesn’t help that many parents are in a sort of read-only mode - if so, it may be too late to change their views.)

Perhaps the best thing to keep in mind is that yandere looks different from where you’re standing. Maybe that can start some sort of postmodernist debate, by the end of which everyone will be too confused to disagree with anything anymore. (Don’t take my word for it.)