Review: Sounan Desu ka?

Anime
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This screenshot from its last episode sums up Sounan Desu ka best:

we will drink this through our anuses

Four school girls get stranded on a deserted island with nothing but the clothes on their backs. Luckily the girl from the screenshot has been trained by her father from an early age in the fine art of survival, which quite often turns out to be something mildly or not so mildly humiliating. In this case it was because two of the girls were stranded on a raft with only bat guano polluted water to drink. They had the choice of drinking the water and getting sick to the point of diarrhea and vomiting, or not drink and get dehydrated to the point of collapse. Luckily our survival expert had a third option: ingest water through the anus, which involves taking a gulp and pushing it into the other girl’s butt. Ray Meirs never had to do that…

It’s this sort of humiliation play that the series derives most of its humour from. The contrast between the matter of fact Homare, who sees nothing strange about all this and the other three girls, ill prepared for life on an inhabited island is what makes this series. It can all get a bit much as in the last episode and if you don’t like this style of humiliation based gross out humour, this isn’t really a series for you. Apart from that what sets this series apart from any other cute girls doing cute things is the survival aspect. Every episode has Homare teaching the others some handy little survival trick or two and usual grossness apart, it’s always interesting. In all, I liked this series, something fun that at half length episodes never outstayed its welcome.

Historical queerness

history, LGBT
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When the socalled “lovers of Modena” turned to both have male teeth immediately alternate explenations were sought for why they were holding hands:

Some of the suggestions for the link between the two skeletons are that they are siblings, cousins or soldiers who died together in battle, study author Federico Lugli told Italy’s Rai news site

Because what we can blithly assert for a presumed straight skeleton couple, we apparantly cannot do for one that looks a bit gay. As James Lórien MacDonald put it on Twitter in a thread explaining why putting modern labels on ancient relationships is a bit dodgy:

So. It was assumed that these people had been lovers because they were holding hands, and that they were male and female because they were assumed to be lovers. Perhaps there are other reasons to be buried holding hands, and maybe we’ll learn more about those relationships.

Again, this is something we do without thinking when it comes to what we assume are straight couples. None of that “well, they might be cousins” namby-pambyness then. Of course other civilisations had different ideas about sexuality and gender than our own, but if this is only an objection when it comes to queer people it all feels rather hypocritical. Personally I don’t see the harm in claiming these skeletons for the gay camp when the opposite happens daily without anybody noticing or complaining. The specialists can argue over what those two skeletons really were.

A small step for Analog. A giant leap for fandom.

Fandom, science fiction
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“John W. Campbell, for whom this award was named, was a fucking fascist”. That was the opening sentence of Jeannette Ng’s acceptance speech at the Dublin 2019 Hugo Awards. I was in the audience and the room erupted in applause the moment she said it:



And she is right. Campbell was a fascist, a reactionary, a racist and it’s long overdue that the Campbell Award for Best New Writer is renamed, just like the World Fantasy Award lost its Lovecraft bust a few years back. Back then, it was an uphill struggle to get that far, but fortunately this time things are different:

Named for Campbell, whose writing and role as editor of Astounding Science Fiction (later renamed Analog Science Fiction and Fact) made him hugely influential in laying the groundwork for both the Golden Age of Science Fiction and beyond, the award has over the years recognized such nominees as George R.R. Martin, Bruce Sterling, Carl Sagan, and Lois McMaster Bujold, as well as award winners like Ted Chiang, Nalo Hopkinson, and John Scalzi.

However, Campbell’s provocative editorials and opinions on race, slavery, and other matters often reflected positions that went beyond just the mores of his time and are today at odds with modern values, including those held by the award’s many nominees, winners, and supporters.

As we move into Analog’s 90th anniversary year, our goal is to keep the award as vital and distinguished as ever, so after much consideration, we have decided to change the award’s name to The Astounding Award for Best New Writer.

It’s frankly amazing — to coin a phrase — to see the editors of analog, long the most stodgy, rightwing of the traditional science fiction magazines, respond so quickly and so willingly. Personally I expected this to be another shot in the sf kulturwars, just like the removal of Lovecraft from the WFA was back then, but it seems sf’s reactionary forces have lost the fight. Perhaps it’s a sign of how far the field has matured, diversified in the years since we first had to confront our own complicity in the racism, sexism and other bigotry endemic in our societies. In some ways, the Sad Puppies attempt to hijack the Hugos for their reactionary values and the bruised egos of petty little men was the best thing that ever happened to us. It forced us to look more closely at how we acted, which values we celebrated and who we considered part of our worlds.

But…

That it had to take until 2019 for this to happen, that it had to be done –again– by a person of colour using their temporary clout to shame us in doing so, rather than being able to celebrate their own success, that means we’re not there yet. And reading that Analog editorial message, it does still soft pedal Campbell’s true nature. We’re still too hesitant in confronting our true history as a genre and a fandom. It’s still too often the people directly impacted by the racism, sexism and other bigotry consciously or unconsciously present in fandom who have to do the hard work of rooting it out.

This is an important victory, but there’s still work to do.

Best anime of the season — First Impressions

Anime, video
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If you haven’t done so yet, go watch the first episode of Araburu Kisetsu no Otome-domo yo so you can appreciate the clip below in its full glory:

Sex in anime usually is done on the same level as a raunchy eighties comedy, utterly incapable of any thought beyond “boobs are awesome”. Cheap tittelation and fan service is everywhere but it’s frustratingly rare for anime to move beyond that. I didn’t have high hopes for Araburu Kisetsu no Otome-domo yo because its MAL description made it sound like just another ecchi comedy. Which it is, but what I didn’t realise it was one written by Okada Mari. She always delivers something interestingly and it’s the same here. This series has the most honest depiction of puberty, sex and the attraction to it and fear of it I’ve ever seen in anime.

and drank every last drop of the sweet juices pouring forth from her

Not series start by having one of the main characters narrate a description of eating out a girl, to the mixed reception of her fellow Literature club members. While Sonezaki the club president is revulsed by it, the narrating girl herself, beautiful and melancholy Sugawara wants to experience sex for herself. Of the other three members, the stoic Hongō is writing eroica herself and sees all this as reserve, while the main protagonist Onodera and her shy friend Sudō are both fascinated and embarassed by it. Onodera may or may not have a crush on her childhood friend, who has grown up to be a popular football player at their high school, with his fan girls giving Onodera a hard time for even talking to him.

Samurai hair

She herself though keeps seeing the dorky boy she grew up with, still fascinated by trains and thinks he’s just grown bigger, hasn’t changed. She just cannot see him in a sexual light. That is, until one night she goes over to bring some leftovers her mother had made for him and runs into him, well not watching videos of trains anymore… Childhood friend discovers her crush’s hidden porn stash is an anime cliche of long standing, but I can’t think of any series in which she walked in on him having a wank. And he’s actually watching online porn, meaning anime finally caught up with the late nineties. His response, her response, the music playing through it and her final denial on the railroad bridge with the train going underneath between her legs: it’s all perfect.

This is my anime of the season.