otakulys's manga / #trauma(11)

I liked it up to the rushed ending. I felt like it could have done well with a bittersweet ending, but it was ultimately like "oh hey, I guess everything is fine now!"

Wow, that's sad and fucked up. Kinda gross. I love bugs, so I knew I probably shouldn't have read this (had the feeling there'd be bug torture and killing), but it's definitely a powerful and sad little short.

Read this in Yami BL. Very sad and twisted, but kind of sweet in a messed up way. At least they finally got to touch, sort of.

The way people were acting, I thought this was going to have a sad ending, but it was perfect! THIS is what I want. This is the hurt/comfort that I crave! Why can't there be more yaoi like this? Where the seme loves and protects his uke, and the harm comes from some other piece of crap? There's no force or rape to love or any of that garbage. Just real emotion. Plus, for me it's the psychology of trauma and the character working through it that draws me to violence and rape in manga, so it makes me sad that so often rape is romanticized or treated like a firm handshake. This was exactly what I was looking for. The beginning was a bit clumsy and rushed, so I wasn't sure what to expect, but I was very happy with where it went. I imagine people are freaking out because the rape was so graphic and the character actually had a realistic reaction to being assaulted, but the tags *did* say there was rape, and every chapter had a warning for violence, etc. So why are 90% of the comments people bitching about it? If you're a delicate person, skip stories that say that they contain violence and rape. At any rate, I really enjoyed this one, and it's the embodiment of my list, "Rape that Doesn't End in Love."

Feels a liiiiittle convenient that he's seemingly run into the guy he raped and had consensual sex with him. But hey, it's yaoiland, so whatever. I was mostly intrigued because it's really rare in omegaverse to have the alpha feel guilty for raping an omega. I would love to see that played out more, like genuine trauma from his own actions. I'm guessing this will mostly be smut, which bums me out since I like more story, and the smut so far didn't do much for me. But it's not a bad manga as of chapter one. I guess we'll see how it unfolds. CHAP 2: Still interesting, and the sex as therapy for his past trauma is nice. I really like seeing someone truly damaged by the awful thing they did, specifically rape. You just never see that explored, and it's even rare to see a rapist in a BL even acknowledge that he is one. So I do like that, if nothing else. I wanna see what's going on with that other omega at the brothel, though. I hope he gets a spin off.

Ugh, poor Momo. So fucked up. He went through SO much. This is just another chapter of that. I'm so glad that in Yatamomo we finally got to see the moment where he stops the facade and lets himself cry, truly mourn the awful things he's experienced. Also, his mom is horrible, but I like the concept of her. I would have liked to have seen more of her, like her own spinoff of her life and what not. Harada is pretty amazing in a lot of ways, and one of those ways is that her female characters are always just as interesting and often just as fucked up. Not super common for yaoi.

Hmm. Honestly it isn't nearly as bad as I expected given the description. It's sort of similar to my favorite omegaverse story, regarding fate and past mistakes, etc. though this one doesn't handle it anywhere near as well. Still, I'm used to much worse with this stuff. At least the rape isn't brushed off, or worse, played for laughs.

Hmmm... Interesting so far. I need more chapters to get a better feel, so it's a four for now, but could go either way. Only one chapter at the moment. It's got a concept I'd like to see more often in yaoi, overcoming homophobia and what not. But how it unfolds is tricky. We'll see. EDIT: Five stars for going much better than I thought it might! I need to read it again from the start, after these few chapters, but it's such a sweet, touching story. Sad, too, but in the right ways. I also like that it wasn't some random dude who wouldn't take a hint. I was worried that was the case, so I'm glad it ended up being more complicated between them. I really wish there were more stories like this. I love the whole overcoming homophobia thing, the fear and the bravery and the growth. This was a great read, and I love the twist with Matsuri. I hope he gets some love soon! Maybe in an extra chapter or something. He deserves his own manga.

I mean, I knew what it was about and I still read it, so that's on me. Definitely made me cry. Poor girl. I get that the ending could go either way, with her actually being a ghost and her just being a hallucination. Maybe it's a mix of the two, that she's lingering even though her friend can't actually see her. Mostly based on the line about how happy she must be in heaven to have someone on Earth who loves her so much. Yeah... I guess that makes sense, so I suppose it does have that supernatural element, unless it's more of a metaphor. Either way.

I love this mangaka, though this wasn't my favorite by her. Still, it was dark, sad, interesting, and complicated, like a lot of her stuff. I haven't read the manga it's the prequel to yet, though, so I wonder if I should have read that first. Poor baby, either way. I even feel sorry for the uncle, because he lost his mind. He wasn't like that from the start. I do have to ask, though, why did people tag this as incest? Am I missing something, or were there just that many people confused by the fact that he calls him uncle? He was dating his mother. They aren't related in any way, biological or otherwise.