I am currently reading two manga series set in Japanese high schools.
Japanese high schools all have similar layouts, which allows many readers to automatically relate, and greatly simplifies set-design. Having most of the story take place in a high school or having most of the characters attend high school also gives the author a number of ready-made situations where other characters can be introduced.
And, for fan-service ('decorative feminine visuals'), the baths, sports fields, stairwells, roof tops, etcetera, can all be used for pantsu (views of feminine underwear), accidental bosom gropes, naughty winds that blow up skirts, our hero's face landing in inconvenient places........
However, neither of these two manga series are about fan-service. No pantsu!
桜蘭高校 OURAN HIGH SCHOOL
Ouran High School Host Club is a comedy series that deals with the clichées of manga drawn for a female audience. With the exception of the hero, all main characters are male. Shallow, silly, self-indulgent rich-boy male. But the 'hero' is female - we don't find that out till chapter three.
Of all the boys, our hero (who isn't a boy) is the most likeable. He (she) is drawn in such a way that you cannot tell that he (she) is actually 'that other gender', and in any case 'that other gender' doesn't really enter into the story. What could be homo-eroticism is neutered by the egomania of the boys and the superficiality of their emotions.
[Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ouran_High_School_Host_Club]
クロマティ高校 CROMARTIE HIGH SCHOOL
On the other hand, Cromartie High School is deep. Truly deep.
It's about angst-ridden delinquents. A very texty manga.
Cromartie High School is notorious for having the most violent and under-achieving students. Bullies, thugs, extortionists, criminals, and psychopaths.
Again, no pantsu.
It is by far the better of the two series.
From Wikipedia's entry on Cromartie High School, here are some of the characters:
Yutaka Takenouchi (竹之内豊, Takenōchi Yutaka)
The leader of Cromartie High's first-year students. Known to be an incredible fighter and a reliable person. His weakness (unknown to everyone else) is motion sickness. Though he loves field trips and excursions in general, he hates having to travel because he gets sick very easily, and struggles with all of his might not to vomit.
Gorilla (ゴリラ, Gorira, Hiromi Go (豪ヒロミ, Gō Hiromi))
A gorilla. He sometimes wears a watch and is considered smarter than most of the main characters. He is also an extremely talented sushi chef. He has a sister who looks just like him but has prettier eyes and a red/pink flower on her left ear.
Shinichi Mechazawa (メカ沢新一, Mechazawa Shin'ichi)
One of the most notorious delinquents of Cromartie. Though it is suspected that he is actually a robot, no one but the main characters (Kamiyama, Hayashida, Maeda, etc.) seems to notice, including himself.
[Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cromartie_High_School]
I should mention that Savage Kitten has also been reading Cromartie High School. It is somewhat disconcerting, while lying in bed with my first cup of coffee, to hear loud hoots of hysterical laughter from the kitchen. I am not ready for loud anything at that hour. But because it starts her day off with a smile I will tolerate it. Encourage it, even.
This is some good stuff. Even without pantsu.
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On a note of complete and utter dorkish irrelevance, I wonder if the title "Cromartie High School" has any reference to Warren Cromartie, one of the first Major League Baseball players (Montreal Expos) to seek his fortune playing for the Japanese Major Leagues (I want to say Yakult Swallows, but I could be completely off-base there; it has been a long time since I have read Robert Whiting's YOU GOTTA HAVE WA.).
We now return you to your regularly scheduled programming.
Actually, it was the Yomiuri Giants, and not the Yakult Swallows. My bad.
Warren Cromartie actually sued because he thought his name was being sullied - the characters drank, smoked, threatened people..... and at one point, played baseball (though like all their sudden obsessions, it fizzled out within weeks).
Warren Cromartie was either ill-advised, or lacks a sense of hmour.
lacks a sense of hmour.
Correction: lacks a sense of humour.
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By the way, Spiros, you're baseball obsession is astounding.
Anytime you want to guest-post something fascinating about the game, loaded with details that are generally unknown or unremembered, let me know.
You...saying somebody's obsessions...are ASTOUNDING?
Excuse the heck out of me?
You of all people?
I appreciate the compliment, but I'm not sure I merit it for such a commonplace obsession.
What he said.
It's magic.
Everytime I post about manga, somebody who may not be able to read English decides that I need to read about pornography in Japanese. And posts a link to a site.
Now, make no mistake, the intellectual concept of pornography has my fullest support - men are inspired by visuals, and there's nothing wrong with a bit of zesty aesthetic appreciation. That's what half of all mediaeval painting is is all about - yes, I can see that the painting is titled "St Margareta Feeding The Pigeons", but you know and I know it's actually a naked redhead in a bosky dell with a naughty bird drawing attention to a perfect mammary gland..... are we really supposed to believe that a painter with the practiced eye of a peeping-tom and the sensitivities of an elderly pervert was gushing religious fervour when he produced this piece of lovely cheese? Hoo hah!
But blunt-as-a-bucket-of-elbows photographs of women who are FAR from anybody's ideal of Japanese feminine beauty? A bunch of rather pedestrian looking trollops? Why?
I suppose they're all 'presentable', and probably 'very nice girls' in their private lives, but, errrrm, the visuals that have been offered do not serve the purpose of telling us about their likeable character traits, and merely show us the most unprivate aspects of them. I am not tempted by their business ends, and now utterly uninterested in them period.
I suppose if I could read the accompanying texts, it would be as exciting as National Geographic....... perhaps that was the point.
Dude, you should devote an entire post to underpants.
Lev
"Dude, you should devote an entire post to underpants"
Tayre Lev,
Remarkably, I have done exactly that. See this: UNDERPANTS GNOME.
Or copy http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2011/07/underpants-gnome.html in your browser.
And I sincerely apologise for the two year wait.
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