#this is THOROUGHLY unrelated to mha

[bakuhatsufallinlove]

Time for a lighthearted review!

By now a number of people have heard of ボクの神隠し(boku no kamikakushi), aka “My Spiriting Away” or “My Mysterious Disappearance,” aka the BL manga that Okamoto Nobuhito, voice actor of Bakugou Katsuki, was involved in. It is available to read for free in Japanese here with a total of three chapters. This post contains spoilers for the ending.

Here’s a Q&A peppered with my thoughts on it.

The Premise

Crybaby Uzuki idolizes his childhood friend Haruto who always protected him, but since they started high school, their relationship has soured, leaving Uzuki utterly alone. One day, the pair are kidnapped by a strange man and forced to participate in a mysterious game of life-or-death.

How is Okamoto involved?

Okamoto is credited for the 原案 (gen’an). A corollary industry term in English would be “original idea” or possibly “scenario.” In my experience with comics, this suggests he created the characters and premise, then wrote the concept out and submitted it to a second party to be fleshed out for full production.

The script is credited to Production Beijyu (プロダクションベイジュ), a company who offers a variety of production and promotion services with a focus on editing and proofreading books, magazines, manga, and anime.

The manga—so the artwork and all of its production—is credited to 戸真伊まい, a name I can only guess is read as Tomai Mai, which sure sounds like a pen name and doesn’t appear to be linked to any other published work. This could be for a lot of reasons; the artist might be totally new or they might have worked in other genres and chose a unique pen-name for BL, but the only thing I found attached to this name online was their Twitter account.

How’d it get made, anyway?

As far as I can tell, Okamoto must have personally reached out to Beijyu and applied for their services to help make his idea a real thing. Beijyu gear themselves towards small, independent artists and authors, especially those who haven’t debuted with a magazine or printed publication yet.

For those unaware, manga is a massive industry in Japan, and it can be extremely difficult to get your foot in the door. Many creators talk about having their concepts rejected repeatedly by magazine after magazine, or getting a single one-shot published and then struggling to keep the momentum. There’s a reason all of the huge Shounen Jump creators talk about the intense pressure to keep their work popular and to avoid getting dropped from publication by any means necessary.

Boku no Kamikakushi is available for free and I haven’t heard of any plans for a physical release. To be honest, this suggests to me that Okamoto genuinely wanted to get his story made regardless of profitability—he isn’t just a celebrity attaching his name to a series for attention. There wasn’t some industry demand or opportunity that he took advantage of for professional gain, he must have been the one to initiate this endeavor, and honestly, good for him.

Is it really bkdk?

Nah. I will grant you that the tropes at play certainly reveal Okamoto’s tastes, and we sure could extrapolate about his feelings on bkdk from those tastes. But beyond the similarities in backstory, base themes, and design aesthetic that people have pointed out, the couple have very little in common with bkdk, and in fact, the way they diverge is kind of hilariously shocking??

Okay, fine. What’s their deal, then?

Uzuki is a yandere rich boy who likes to get choked. Haruto is honestly a hapless, horny victim in all this.

What!?

Yeah. The “mastermind” behind the kidnapping is Uzuki himself, who staged the whole thing with his butler. Basically, their high school classmates tease Haruto for being associated with Uzuki, the son of the richest noble in town; Haruto resents it so he distances himself from Uzuki and rejects him. Uzuki ends up lonely with no friends and missing Haruto, so he stages his own kidnapping and puts them both in the “death game” as a way to force Haruto to remember his childhood promise to protect Uzuki as his hero.

That’s insane???

YES. IT IS ABSOLUTELY INSANE.

It’s especially funny because the parameters of the death game don’t technically require them to have sex or get intimate, Uzuki is just a fucking freak and Haruto is confused by his own horniness and goes along with it. The first trial involves a selection of drinks, one of which contains poison, and they have to keep choosing one to drink from until someone dies. Haruto ends up poisoned, and Uzuki uses his prize (“one wish”) as the winner to get the antidote and save him, of course passing it to Haruto via full-on mouth kiss.

Haruto has a gay crisis about it.

The second game: whoever raises the other person’s heart rate to 130 beats per minute first wins, and the person with the elevated heart rate dies. Haruto’s heart rate spikes from aftereffects of the poison, and Uzuki’s solution is… for Haruto to choke him… on the bed they woke up on… so his heart rate increases as well. And then he asks Haruto to kiss him, too, and they just start making out until Uzuki’s heart rate hits 130. Haruto gets upset because he lost his head and ended up dooming Uzuki, but then somehow they arrange for this death to also be nullified, and they end up continuing to play the game for three days.

Three whole days!?!

THREE DAYS! This kid traps Haruto in a dungeon so he can make him participate in weird, sadistic, horny shenanigans for three days!

And then when they finally escape and everything is revealed, Haruto is just blankly confused and has this absent look on his face, repeating that he’ll protect Uzuki. The butler says that Uzuki performed excellent mind control, but then Uzuki imprisons the butler so it can be “just the two of them.”

What the fuck, Okamoto???

Right? And you know what, it isn’t my jam at all, but can we just take a moment to recognize that a professional voice actor who is popular and prominent in the public eye wanted his weird horny BL idea to come to fruition, so he went forth into the world and made it so? And he didn’t even hide behind a pen name or anything, he wants people to associate him with it, he’s promoting it! He loves the hell out of it!

Like, I’m pretty astounded by that, and honestly I respect it. More people should just make things that cater to their own tastes without any self-consciousness about it. Wave your freak flag high, Okamoto.

[haleigh-sloth]

What do you think of the notion that Hori might be ending the series earlier than expected because he knows Bones and Shueisha/Jump are franchising the hell out of MHA, what with 6 more movies still in the pipeline and an ever-increasing amount of spin-off mangas, all of which he'll feel compelled (or be heavily pressured) into creating tie-in side content for alongside writing the main manga? Or am I overestimating the impact this side stuff actually has on Hori's workflow?

Well first, I don’t think this is sooner than expected really. He said he had intended for the final act to be five volumes, but obviously miscalculated lol. But regardless that tells us he’s serious about ending it now. He’s been trying to end it. In fact, I think it’s possible he’s been trying to end it for a while:

The title here seems kind of finale-ish. It’s only volume 11 (Kamino arc chapters). This kind of matches up with his original intent on not doing villain profiles at first, but then the story “evolving beyond that”. He’s changed his mind a bunch, but I think he’s wanted to get close to the ending for a while now. But the war arc didn’t leave off on the note he wanted, because it couldn’t. So here we are, watching him try to wrap all of that up.

So, I think BNHA needs to end. Like soon. But I’ll get to that. What I’m more interested in knowing is exactly how much input does the author have into the spin off content, light novels, movies, etc. I know they ✨say✨ that Hori has to give the final stamp of approval before things are published. But does he? Like does he read through it all before saying he approves? I’m certain he does some of it, or maybe little parts of everything, but all of it? I ask because it seems that the man can’t even get a firm grip on his own main story line. The editor is ruining all kinds of stuff with his own input, so why should I believe the side content is actually thoroughly run through Hori and that he has the final say? Also, with that impossible schedule I just don’t know how that would be possible. I mean yes you can make time for anything, but there is a LOT of side content coming out constantly. So idk, I’m skeptical of that. I’m also skeptical because it’s interesting how there is NO side content for the villains. And I’m not saying “the villains are better so we deserve content for them 😤😤”, I’m saying that they are legitimate characters with prominent parts in the story so it just makes me wonder if Hori himself doesn’t want to risk certain characters of his getting misrepresented in side content that isn’t written by him.

So branching off of that, I do feel that it’s a bit soon to see just how fast we’re barreling to the ending. But it’s possible that maybe he is ending it sooner than what the story led us to believe in order I preserve the main story he created. Meaning, the sooner he ends it, the less chance of another fucking movie interjecting.

But aside from that, I feel that he’s ending it simply because it needs to end. Like, I’ve never understood why people want stories to just keep on going forever. I get not wanting to leave the world of the story, and that’s where the side content comes in (if you’re into those, I’m typically not). But I’ll never understand people wanting a story to be ruined by being drug out just for the sake of getting new content. Also, if it wasn’t obvious—Hori is reaching his limit. It’s obvious with the sudden breaks he’s taking. Scheduled breaks? Normal. But suddenly not making the deadline because of his health? That’s pretty unacceptable tbh. Not on HIS part, but on the people demanding him to work non stop til he drops dead. Idk how he makes a chapter a week. I really really don’t. But it’s also obvious in the story. The writing is getting incredibly lazy. The last chapter felt like straight up advertisement, and idk where we’re going with this American hero lady. But everything else from that is just being so sloppily handled. He’s tired.

I would much rather him end it sooner than later so that his drive to actually give us a good ending doesn’t die out. Like at a certain point, I’d be worried he’d stop caring about the ending altogether. Luckily, I think he cares a great amount. I also think he really likes his villain characters a lot more than he lets on in interviews and stuff. It’s obvious in the story. So I do think he is going to try to nail the ending for every character, but I’m lowering my expectations for the nitty gritty details on the path to that ending.

Idk that you’re overestimating the impact it has on his workflow, because if he really REALLY does give the final stamp of approval before all that side stuff is published, then wow. What a fucking work schedule. And I thought I had it rough working in CPS. Lol. But I personally am skeptical of just how much input he gives into Team Up Missions and Vigilantes. Vigilantes is it’s own thing entirely and I can’t imagine him basically overlooking two separate mangas. Team Up Missions is just about the kids (if I remember correctly? I don’t read it so idk for super sure) so it’s not hard to make content for them. They’re easy. Lol. The light novels, I feel is a little more realistic for him to have a say in those since those are released way more sparsely than the other content. Those, I believe he looks over. Everything else I’m kinda “hmmmm idk”.

But anyway, I think it’s ending because it freaking needs to. That being said I do hope he’ll give like, little surprise epilogue chapters later down the line. Like how is Shigaraki doing? Toga? How are Touya and Shouto with their family, how are Midoriya and Bakugo doing as heroes, stuff like that. But like….a bit of time after it ends. Kinda how Takaya did with the extra fruits basket stuff. Just surprise us here and there lol. Unrelated, but I hope Hori writes something else later. Only this time with everything he wants and because he’s already become wildly successful, he won’t need to adhere to editors if he doesn’t want to. I feel like if he had free reign of his story, he’d make something really really good. And I hope he makes something later with all the elements he wants. But before that—REST. Lol.

[italicwatches]

My Hero Academia, season 2 - Episode 32

Food’s in the oven, so let’s try and squeeze this in while I wait for my meal. It’s My Hero Academia, episode 32! Here we GO!

-We begin at the hospital. Deku’s still stuck in bed, and with nothing better to do, he’s just chewing on news about the whole Stain mess. As far as the public is concerned, Endeavor took down the hero killer, and three young men happened to suffer unrelated injuries due to accidents during their internships.

-Tenya’s already gone back home, his mother having come to retrieve him to recover somewhere that isn’t a hospital bed. Shoto got out of it pretty light, so he was just plain declared safe to discharge the next day, and thus went right back to his internship.

-So now it’s just Deku on his own, waiting for his leg to be useful again, and contemplating what everyone else is up to at their own internships…

-Opening!

-Episode 32: Everyone’s Internships

-So first we cut over to Best Jeanist, taking Katsuki out on patrol. And he has a pop quiz for the kid. The chief reason for patrols is to have a deterrent effect on criminal activity; the would-be crook sees heroes walking around, and decides not to hold up the local bank today. But what’s the secondary effect?

-Katsuki figures it’s kicking ass and taking names.

-Katsuki is wrong. As in all things. It’s to form a connection with the people; the hero walking the beat gets to know their people, and in turn the people know they can trust the hero and rely on them if things go wrong.

-…Anyways that’s when some kids recognize Katsuki from when the slime thing tried to eat him. And so he literally makes small children cry. Repeatedly. Best Jeanist has to figure out how to grind down this kid’s stubborn pride so he’s not, you know, all of this.

-Over to Gunhead and Ochaco. He’s showing her how to deal with a knife or similar weapon, and it’s pretty solid advice against someone who’s not trained. It’s not gonna help against a Stain-type, but she is both deeply impressed and loving that gap-moe that the gentle Gunhead has to offer.

-Let’s see what Uwabami’s up to!

-She’s signing autographs while her girls just stand there and quietly contemplate where they went wrong in life. (It was when you picked Uwabami as your mentor, I’m sad to say)

-Kirashima and Tetsutetsu are helping clean up a park. In hard contrast, Kyoko is doing real rescue work with the rough and tough Death Arms, and her earphones gave them a major asset in a hostage rescue. She’s feeling good about it, too, feeling like she’s really making a difference…For a character who’s so often shown as grumpy and snarky, it’s good to see that earnest pride bubbling up for once.

-And then to Tsu, who’s scrubbing down a boat. One of the sidekicks here, Sirius, is sympathetic that it’s a boring gig out here most days…But you stick with it, and you find your purpose.

-So obviously the Captain being all cutesy is our image. And Sirius is so very embarrassed at the attempted gap-moe from this rugged and tough Captain. But this banter is, itself, kind of adorable.

-Then they get a message from the coast guard! Sounds like they’re getting put to work. The ship’s unhooked, and the Oki Mariner sets sail to go to the rescue!

-And soon Captain Selkie is laying out what they’re dealing with. A ship was reported to have stowaways…But instead, when investigated, all they found was missing cargo. So they’re not just looking for victims of the sea…They’re hunting pirates! Hell yeah! Also Tsu is totally enamored with the Captain’s big tough frame being cute. She and Ochaco clearly need to share their doujin collections.

-So Selkie hits the water, having a Quirk much like Tsp’s: While she has the proportionate strength and skills of a frog, he has the proportionate strength and skills of an incredibly buff seal. So while his crew searches with the ship, he sonars his way through the water…

-Until well into the night, when they’re having no luck…Until they get a report from the coast guard! A fishing boat was spotted fleeing in their direction…And then Selkie gets back with a confirmation that that very same boat is coming their way! Kill all the lights and get ready to sneak up on them!

-Soon the orders are coming in, and Tsu finds herself left waiting on the ship with no room to actually do stuff…But as Sirius lays it out once Selkie gets gone, there’s a big risk any time you’re dealing with something like this. Miles away from shore, away from anyone who could help you…You have to be doubly careful with criminals on the high seas.

-Anyways a flare goes up, blinding the stowaways, and Selkie demands they stop for an inspection at once! Soon the ship’s being gone over from top to bottom…Until Selkie has one last place he wants to look. Open the fish bin.

-…So the two squid lookin’ fuckers turn out to have taken this humble fisherman hostage, and now they have Selkie and his sailors too. And then the fisherman goes in too, leaving enough time for their boss Innsmouth to do his work. I assume he secretly ravishes land women.

-Back at the ship, Sirius’s fine hearing catches a sonar signal from Selkie…Telling them to get after the ‘stowaways’! He’s going to get himself out, but it’s going to take too long!

-Soon, their path takes them to a rocky outcropping, where Tsu gets put to work catching a squid lady. Who promptly gets interrogated and then tied up. There’s only one more person left…

-And meet Innsmouth. Who’s knocked out their last sailor cold, and has Sirius in his grasp! Tsu is on her own now, and Sirius’s attempt to get free with a baton just sees her slowly getting crushed…Tsu needs a plan, and NOW.

-Which is when the other sailors come in on Sirius’s radio. Innsmouth forces Tsu to lie to them, if she wants Sirius to survive…And Tsu remembers Sirius’s words. The true importance of being a hero, and her trust of the captain…

-So she takes the radio…And immediately shouts out their location GET HERE NOW! Then it’s a frantic leap into the rocks, with Tsu whipping out her tongue to catch Sirius and get her out of the line of fire…Only for Innsmouth to catch her and drag her across the rocks! It’s the end for her, if she can’t figure out a way out of this…

-Cue Innsmouth’s underlings being thrown into him, and Selkie arriving with a full display…He gets blinded, but his sonar hearing catches Innsmouth’s every movement, letting him fight and keep the bastard’s attention long enough for Sirius to grab his leg! Now, Captain!

-CAPTAIN KIIIICK

-So Innsmouth goes down hard, as Tsu and Sirius check on each other, and Selkie tries to be all cute about his relief that they’re okay. While Tsu’s figured out a real, honest idea of what’s important to being a hero…

-Back on land, these would-be stowaways are taken away by the coast guard, and they can only apologize that Tsu had to go through something rough like that…But Selkie’s overwhelmingly proud of the kid. Froppy might not be licensed yet…But she’s got the heart of a hero, and the skills to back them up. She’s going to be great one day very soon. And oh, the pride on this kid’s face at that kind of praise.

-Credits!

That was pretty fun! More Tsu time is always a good time. Even if it does leave me with the certain irony that MHA taps into the charm of superhero comics so well, and has so many cool characters we barely get to see, that it really makes me want more people able to pour ideas into it and make a more thoroughly explored universe. Like, I would devour an entire one-cour anime just about a graduated Tsu working on that ship, stopping sea-crime and bantering with her gentle yet buff Captain. And you know my stance on a Mei spinoff. (GIVE IT TO MEEEE)

Do I dare dive into the world of fanfic for my fix? It might be the only option on the board. But for right now, we’ll just have to catch back up with Deku next time, in episode THIRTY THREE of My Hero Academia! Wait for it!