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areodax · 1 year ago

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Otherside Picnic Rant

I'm coming off the high of shotgunning what there is of the manga and then the entire novel in about a week, so it's hard to gather my thoughts. It's incredible. I'm probably not being very objective about it right now, yesterday around midnight I wasn't even reading anymore, I got to volume 8 and it was less like reading and more like drinking the story. Just vacuuming it up like a burger on the brink of starvation. I don't know how coherent this rant is and I don't care, I just had to get it out there. Spoilers for the whole series below.

Seven volumes of romantic and sexual tension culminates in an entire book of romantic catharsis. A whole book dedicated to Sorawo's feelings. It's not even out of place, it's a horror series and there's nothing Sorawo is more afraid of than human emotion. It's so fucking smart. Every single deflection, every single longing look, every single comment, every single "I love you", every single moment of romance prior to vol8 pays off.

Sorawo falls in love without realizing. She can't take her eyes off Toriko and doesn't understand why. She gets jealous and protective. She rationalizes it using the "accomplices" label. She doesn't think too much about it, but knows Toriko is special.

Then, Toriko confesses her love. Initially, Sorawo genuinely doesn't even understand the implication of it. She realizes Toriko is acting like a boyfriend, and doesn't understand why. Slowly, Toriko shifts from "special" to "the most important person in her life". She still doesn't understand they're in love.

Then, Toriko keeps pushing, and Sorawo picks up on what's happening. She starts deflecting. She goes from being genuinely unaware of her and Toriko's feelings, to actively supressing them. At this point, she still acts like she doesn't get it, but understanding is slowly creeping in. As she continues to act like she doesn't get it, she starts purposefully ignoring these feelings, and it gets harder and harder. She sees all the pieces, and knows what the puzzle would look like if she put them together. The Otherside is terrifying, but that's never stopped her from trying to understand it - these feelings are worse.

Finally, enough is enough, and Toriko pushes one last time - 7 volumes of rising romantic tension come to a head in volume 8. Toriko doesn't know what the fuck is going on anymore, and asks Sorawo to sort out her feelings. Sorawo can't run anymore. Her fear of these feelings influences the Otherside in the most blantant and direct way so far. She is being directly haunted by her feelings for Toriko. It's barely even metaphor at this point. The Otherside has targetted Sorawo before. Satsuki is used to prey on Sorawo's fear of losing Toriko, as well as her jealousy and, to a degree, fear of becoming evil. The Red Person manipulates her through isolation and loneliness. T-san makes her fear losing her connection to the Otherside. All of the phenomena Sorawo encounters, in some form, prey on her emotions and insecurities, but it's at least somewhat obfuscated - they feel like evil monsters with a vague connection to her. They feel like tangentially related phenomena that just so happen to fit the bill.

Satsuki and The Red Person haunt Sorawo specifically, but you could easily make arguments for them haunting others as well. Vol 8's Mujina is different. It's a phenomena that is directly targetting Sorawo and only Sorawo, it's directly targetting her feelings for Toriko, in a way that leaves no doubt or ambiguity about what's happening. It's not even that scary, objectively speaking. Just one volume ago, Sorawo brutally exorcizes Satsuki in a triumphant, cathartic slam dunk against the horrors of the Othersie. Even before that, at this point, she's faced off against countless, unimaginable horrors and has come out on top. The Mujina is one of the simplest, most basic phenomena Sorawo has encountered. It's incredibly mundane. It's not some crazed serial killer, or an eldritch abomination, or some inhuman chimera. It's not some deep reflection of her past, it's not some sort of mind bending apparition designed in a lab to terrify. It's not a 20 stage haunted house with twists and turns. It's a scrap of paper passed to her during class, and all it says is "you love her and you know it". It's fucking genius.

Vol 8 is a mad dash and a chaotic scramble to sort out her feelings. It's never been this hectic before. She pulls out all the stops. There are stressful moments throughout the series, but for the first time, it feels like Sorawo genuinely might break under the pressure. She goes as far as asking her classmate for advice. I think vol1 Sorawo might choke out vol8 Sorawo for even thinking about doing that. She's scrambling through town asking everyone everything she can and all the way throughout she's being haunted, tormented, tossed around like a plastic bag through dimensions. She's fighting for her life.

All of this culminates in the single greatest chapter of any romance story I've ever seen. The 80 or so pages that have potentially ruined all other romance for me. If you got your hands on the original manuscript, tore out Accomplices No More and processed it into a drink, I'm certain you'd have made a love potion. File 26 feels like a fucking galactic event. A nuke could have dropped on them during their talk and I doubt it would have made into the footnotes. Any burglar trying to break in would be torn apart on the atomic level by the sheer level of desperate love on display. I'm surprised neither of them had a heart attack. I'm not surprised by the lack of Otherside interference - whatever it is, whoever it is trying to make use of it, at this moment, even God knows better than to try. Calling it cathartic feels like an insult.

Sorawo and Toriko sit down, pick up volumes 1-7 of Otherside Picnic, and take a leisurely stroll through every second of their time together, from the moment they first met, to the Big Bang of yuri currently occuring. It's love. It's always been love. Toriko lets her into her apartment. Sorawo doesn't care anymore. She accepts that she's not like other people. She accepts that she doesn't love like others do. She accepts that she doesn't think of people like other people do. She accepts that she loves Toriko. Their feelings fly off the page like a meteor shower.

Sorawo has never been interested in Toriko's past, because Toriko's present is so radiant nothing else matters. That's fine. She loves her.

Sorawo has never thought of Toriko in a sexual way, and how could she have? Have you ever wanted to fuck the sun? Even if Sorawo wasn't ace, I don't think she could have felt differently in this moment. That's fine. She loves her.

Sorawo has never wanted for them to become lovers, because, in her eyes, they were far, far beyond that point. That's fine. She loves her.

Sorawo has seen herself through Toriko's eyes in the past. It brought her to tears. I wonder, how Toriko would react to seeing herself through Sorawo's eyes?

Toriko's love is a lot more typical in comparison, but she loves her just as much as Sorawo loves her. Sorawo confuses her. "This girl keeps staring at me". "She wants to spend all her time with me". "She gets jealous of me". "She protects me at the cost of herself". To Toriko (and literally everyone else who has ever seen the two together for more than two seconds, including the fucking esoteric eldrich beings from beyond the realm of human imagination who don't even know what the fuck feelings even are), the way Sorawo acts towards her can be nothing but love.

Written from Toriko's perspective, Otherside Picnic is a romcom about a Canadian lesbian who progressively goes more and more insane over the fact that her hot, nerdy crush won't go out with her despite not even trying to hide the fact it's mutual, with a mild subplot about some monsters or whatever. At this point, I could argue that Toriko isn't even especially fearless or anything, and that the reason she handles the Otherside so well is because she's too thrown off by the densest lesbian to ever walk the earth to spare a thought to whatever the fuck the Otherside is trying to do. Maybe she'd be more shook by her ex being turned into the Grooming Devil if she wasn't busy writing a 50-page essay titled "What The Fuck Am I Doing Wrong" in her head at the same time.

Jokes aside, Toriko's love for Sorawo really is just as big as Sorawo's love for her. Toriko might be a bit rough around the edges, and she herself admits she's not great with people. Toriko got books on childhood trauma so she wouldn't hurt Sorawo by accident. Toriko has been agonizing potentially having overstepped Sorawo's boundaries. Toriko knows she's hurt Sorawo before, both on purpose and by accident, and she hates herself for it. Toriko lets her into her apartment, something she's never done for anyone else before, and she tells Sorawo everything she's afraid of telling other people.

She loves Sorawo. Not the cool, smart Sorawo, the fearless Sorawo, the Sorawo that treats the Otherside like an adventure. She loves Sorawo. The cool, smart, fearless, weak Sorawo. The jealous, pathetic loner Sorawo. The dense, ovethinking Sorawo who can't hold her composure. The heroic Sorawo. The Sorawo that says she doesn't care about people. The Sorawo who faced hell for her. The Sorawo who wouldn't let her go. The Sorawo she wouldn't let go.

The moment Sorawo and Toriko sit down in her apartment, all doubts of whether or not they love each other are incinerated. All that's left is to clear up any misunderstandings, and figure out where to go from here.

Toriko places lovers above accomplices, Sorawo does the opposite. Misunderstanding resolved. Toriko says she loves Sorawo, Sorawo responds in kind. All clear. Sorawo thinks that maybe it's not romantic, Toriko isn't buying it, in the end, the label feels meaningless. It's love regardless. Toriko is worried her advances went too far. Sorawo doesn't get much out of the kissing, but absolutely doesn't mind it. We're getting somewhere. Before a label is decided for their relationship, Toriko admits she wants to have sex. Sorawo doesn't get the hype, but she's down. They have boring, normal, incredibly disappointing sex, and get nowhere.

If this is as far as it went, I could see Sorawo compromising and labeling them as a couple. I don't think sexual incompatibility could ruin their relationship. Toriko would be disappointed, but they'd happily work out some kind of compromise and end up a happy couple. Happily ever after.

Thankfully, Toriko is horny as hell, a bit mean, and a sore loser. Turned on, next to her beloved, her pride as a second generation lesbian having suffered critical damage, she mutters about taking care of business herself, something I'm sure is partly just an actual idea she had, but also as a bit of a mean jab against Sorawo.

Sorawo's internal monologue following this statement is the best string of letters and symbols I've ever seen in my life. I'm fully aware I'm still riding the hype and not being objective. I don't care. As of writing this, I don't think anything I've ever read or ever will read will ever reach the heights of Sorawo discovering what a kink is. 16 hours later, I'm staring at it, and I'm still floored. I imagine I still will be a week later. I would do deplorable things to get Iori Miyazawa to write a version of this scene from Toriko's perspective. I'd go as far as watching Hibike Euphonium if it made him put his pen to paper.

Toriko's offhanded remark leads right into the most insane sex (???) scene I've ever seen. I could wax poetic for days, words just don't do it justice. To begin with, it's beautiful, romantic, erotic, absolutely hilarious, as well as just a touch terrifying. It fits thematically, both in the obvious sense of it being kind of horrifying, but it also touches on the overarching themes of the story.

The horrors of the Otherside are often used to represent abuse, and a big part of Sorawo's character is coming to terms with her abuse by both claiming the Otherside for herself, as well as fighting against the horrors representing her abusers. Using these powers in such a loving, passionate way that stands as a direct counter to the Otherside is an incredible middle finger to their abusers as well as the powers that be. Come what may, they can't be broken, and together, they can heal.

It's also relevant to the struggles Sorawo has throughout the series. She's not like other people. She doesn't think like other people. She struggles with societal expectations and labels. On top of that, both her and Toriko have been irreversibly changed by the Otherside. Sorawo is pushed by others to label their relationship, she's pushed by Toriko to conform to typical sexuality. Of course the normal sex was terrible - neither of them are normal, and once they accept that, they're rewarded with reality breaking sex that puts the horrors of the Otherside to shame.

Lastly, it's also the final piece required for them to fully accept each other. Throughout the series, they push and pull each other through various misunderstandings and such. Once the misunderstandings are cleared up, the issue that remains is that they're incredibly scared to hurt each other. Sorawo is scared of driving Toriko crazy with her eye. Toriko is scared of… whatever the hell her hand can do to Sorawo. The thing that finally clicks is simple - they're scared of hurting each other, but neither of them are scared the other would hurt them. They're scared of hurting each other, but the thought of being hurt themselves doesn't even occur to them, and since they trust each other with their lives, there's no reason to be afraid.

Rationally, I can look at this sequence of events and understand that it's only four pages or so long, but I don't think I'll ever be able to wrap my brain around it. It's a masterpiece.

Once they're done inflicting permanent mental damage on me, the Otherside, as well as everyone in a 5-mile radius, they go back to labels. Suddenly, the idea of normal is a lot less interesting for the both of them. At this point, it doesn't matter what they call each other. With the nerdiest justification ever put to paper, they label themselves after some weird, esoteric Japanese beast. Why not?

I'm usually not a fan of the "we don't need a label" trope in yuri, as it's usually used as a copout to avoid labelling the characters as queer. Otherside Picnic is like the polar opposite of that. It's not trying to avoid labelling the characters as queer. I think it just invented a whole new brand of queer. I'm exceptionally happy about how it handles the topic of sexuality, from Toriko's lesbian mothers, to Toriko herself, to Sorawo's asexuality, to whatever the fuck they did to each other.

Given that Iori Miyazawa could be called the father of "yuri of abscence", as funny as the memes are, and as sure as I was that he was mostly joking, I was still a bit worried that Sorawo and Toriko would end up being ambiguous. I couldn't have been more wrong.

Iori Miyazawa really said "a bench by the sea with room for two is yuri. You know what else is yuri? Two women having sex". What an incredible man. What an incredible story. I don't know what I'll do with myself once it's over.

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