囀る鳥は羽ばたかない

Went on a BLCD acquiring spree yesterday. Some notable titles include Yoneda Kou’s Saezuru Tori wa Habatakani Series and the full suite of DMMD audio dramas.

Anyway.

囀る鳥は羽ばたかない
Hatano Wataru x Shingaki Tarusuke

I vaguely remembered reading the manga the thinking about how typically Yoneda Kou this work was, but better than usual. Apparently it is a big deal in the community now and some are saying that is her best work yet, and I am inclined to agree. In an amazing stroke of luck, the voice acting for this title was also excellent. I got excited seeing Yasumoto Hiroki in the cast but the main took my breath away instead. Shingaki Tarusuke is a BL rookie? Holy moly. I hope he is somewhere in Japan earning big money and getting lots of gigs. I got almost giddy on the train listening to the quality of the voice acting. It was like Border Line all over again.

Yashiro (Shingaki Tarusuke) is this lewd, mostly masochistic hitogirai who has probably fooled around with most of his gumi and is also in line to be the gumi‘s second in command. Don’t ask me how that mixed well, but it mixed well. Doumeki (Hatano Wataru) is an expressionless former policeman and ex-convict following Yashiro around as his bodyguard. He believes Yashiro to be ‘strong, kind and beautiful’, much to everyone’s mirth, but as the series progresses you will realise he is right. Kageyama (Yasumoto Hiroki) is the only person Yashiro ever cared about and Kuga (Ono Yuuki) is a host that Yashiro set Kageyama up with. There is Miyake Kenta and Ookawa Touru somewhere in there too. This is one star studded cast.

You can read the manga here.

This was the scene through which I learnt the phrase 「公務執行妨害罪」. Plus it was cute

The DMMD audio dramas were ennui inducing. I don’t think many fans actually think that DMMD plot or voice acting were particularly memorable (really, Mink? You needed someone to tell you that you were alive?), but the smut.. I get up just listening to the BGM.

While revisiting my old fangirl material again about a decade older (and wiser? I guess not), it kind of hit me that sometimes, just sometimes, the depiction of the climax in BL is.. almost entirely female, and the headier and more potently female it is the chance that the title would be a hit increases tenfold. DMMD is a good example of this; look at the Noiz x Aoba good ending in DMMD reconnect and you will know what I mean. BL media is, 所詮, mostly created by women for women after all. It kind of sank in exactly how remote and fantastical these fantasies are.. it made me feel a little forlorn, really.

These were heavy in my diet throughout my impressionable youth. I used to lie awake for an hour or so every night listening to them. It was like a disaster waiting to happen

Everyone harbours demons, but the largest ones are the ones you feed.

I try not to think about this too much.