Kodomo no Jikan = Love Hina + GTO for lolicons? A review of Volumes 1 & 2
Posted by: Owen S in Manga, Review, tags: Comedy, Commentary, High school, Kodomo no JikanIf rational, level-headed opinions (and sarcasm) offend your conservative, illogical sensibilities, you can still turn back. You don’t have to read beyond this. No one’s forcing you to do anything, no sirree. Exit’s that way.
It’s easy to spin anything. Bet you didn’t know that. The witch-hunting, pitchfork-waving mob gets their kicks from taking things out of context. I blame the rise of a post-modernist society. Because, you know, things should be taken at face value and all that. The importance of looking at something from a structured perspective, or in context, is antiquated fundamentalist bullshit; the new way to go about things is to analyse things on the surface level. Nevermind differing cultural norms, I mean, since it’s being published in my country I must be able to hold it to my own set of personal values, and say things like “I’m fully aware this isn’t part of my culture, but the PERVERTS! How DARE they!”
That’s brilliant reasoning there, if I say so myself.
So the hullabaloo came and went. Kaworu Watashiya-sensei apparently posted something on her blog, only to remove it later. Seven Seas’ CEO decided to start a blog so he could explain why decisions were made, etc. Which is irrelevant to the content of this post actually, but I thought I’d give a little context before I begin. Just sayin’.
Back to the review. Where can I begin? Kodomo no Jikan, to me, is beautiful and heartbreaking, nevermind how the premise might sound to those who haven’t read it. A girl in third grade falls in love with her teacher. There, I said it. That wouldn’t be so bad because crushes happen all the time, it’s a puppy love thing at that age, so on and so forth, only this is a nine year-old we’re talking about here. Cue sulphur and brimstone, hailstones and blue murder.
no, I don’t know what this is either (printed on the inner cover of volume 2)
Part of the fuss comes about from how KnJ takes on a very Love Hina-ish approach towards things. There’s a lot of that physical humour and nudity going around. However, what I find that KnJ has that every other work in the same genre has failed in doing, is understanding the female perspective. Let’s dive into the subject of gender perspectives for a moment — the average manga-ka generally writes a story from his or her gender’s point of view. This is done irrespective of the gender of the main character of his or her manga, and what happens is that even with a girl protagonist, if it’s a male manga-ka, she’s going to behave in a predictable manner relevant to the interests of the readers.
This is why I have issues with stuff like these usually — it isn’t a “true” representation of girls per se, and it annoys me no end. Not all shounen subscribe to this though, Love Hina, for instance is a good example of characters with non-cliche personalities, but it’s more of the exception rather than the norm. Considering how realism and representativeness isn’t something most manga-kas strive for when writing a harem, romance, or comedy series (or anything in-between) nowadays, KnJ is a gem in that aspect.
My understanding of what influence gender has on the work of a manga-ka is this: the male and female manga-kas generally draw for their respective genres. This means that there’s always that chance that what he or she writes has the chance of turning into something mediocre; what happens is that instead of telling a story, the manga-ka looks at his or her work as a fan, instead of a writer, leading to the possibility of bias; this has the effect of interfering with the story in a critical manner because the manga-ka tries to fulfil expectations or wishes of the target audience, or perceived target audience, resulting in something heavy on glitter and gloss, but without the meat of characterisation and story.
KnJ has no such issue, and I’m under the impression that having a woman as the manga-ka has something to do with this. The beauty of KnJ is how it doesn’t force the readers to choose between fanservice or character development, because it does both, without the clumsy, condescending, heavy-handed treatment that male authors of a series tend to do in something of a similar work. For it pulls no punches even from the first note. My earlier impressions here about the series while reading the raws were confirmed — we’ve got a winner on our hands.
It’s apparent from the first chapter of volume 1 that Kaworu Watashiya’s doing something right here; her portrayal of a well-known issue, bullying, is viewed from another perspective, in addition to being unflinchingly honest and almost painful to watch. It does several things at once — aside from the obvious character development, it rationalises to an extent the provocative actions of Rin, who begins teasing Aoki, her teacher, from his very first day in school. It’s like watching a mashup of Love Hina and GTO all at once — there’s the easy-going, relatively light-hearted theme with a bit of fanservice on the side, thrown in alongside darker themes and issues that connect back to the real world.
I loved GTO for that reason. Onizuka’s delinquent and perverted behaviour, despite being a teacher, wasn’t something thrown in to wring laughs alone, although one could argue along those lines; it also served as a metaphorical gap between the student and teacher, and how he managed to bridge that through showing a more humane side of teachers to a bunch of students who hated them. His no-holds barred teaching style was both a venue of hilarity and apt social commentary on the state of Japan’s education, and the type of delinquents produced by that very same system that couldn’t, or wouldn’t understand them.
Watashiya does the same thing, bringing us to the world of an elementary school teacher this time round. The approach, however, is markedly different. While GTO showed the loss of innocence that came with experience, and how some teenagers, being pulled kicking and screaming into that world turn delinquent, KnJ does it better by contrasting innocence with experience in a bunch of nine year-old girl; their precociousness is something uncertain, almost chameleon-like, and serves to underline the difficultly of handling kids at that age, through subjects like the growing pains of prepubescent girl, same-sex crushes, single-parenthood, skinship, and the like. The end result is strange, something with much emotional weight that would seem better off in a josei setting, rather than its current seinen one.
The character development deserves special warrant here for being touching and poignant in a manner very few series in this vein have dared to do. Beneath the gag-a-minute setup lie real people, with real concerns, fears, and emotions. Aoki’s character, for instance, goes beyond the standard teacher-with-a-heart-of-gold; beneath all the vehement protests at being sexually harassed by Rin lies someone who’s genuinely concerned about the welfare of his students, often sacrificing his wellbeing in order to go that extra mile for them. This has the added effect of making the attraction that Rin (and Houin, to a lesser extent) has towards Aoki seem a lot more realistic, which dispels any fears of it being a potential traditional harem setup, and is an excellent step in the right direction for a series like this.
Finally, this review wouldn’t have been made possible without the speedy translations of SaHa, a one-man (woman?) scanlation group that’s been throwing out chapters at an average of one a day since the 8th of June. NaRoYaDo is better, but I didn’t see the point in torturing myself when the alternative was just as good, albeit a lot more faster. At the time of writing this SaHa’s already onto chapter 16 of volume 3, and having viewed the raws beforehand, I can say that it gets even better from here on. Mark my word.
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June 18th, 2007 at 6:10 am
I think you’ve finally managed to make me forgive you for your Kanon post, lol.
I totally agree. I’ve been reading the SaHa scanlations as well, and find myself anxiously waiting for every new release. The most frustrating thing about this series, being an American reader and knowing all the controversy that surrounds it, is that, from the perspective of people who would probably never ever read the manga. I can understand why they wouldn’t want it being printed. But that’s just the thing — they aren’t gonna read it, so why the hell should they have a say in whether it’s going to be printed? People like that brand anyone who’s interested in this manga as being the Almighty Demon Pedophile when really I think the point of the manga is more to explore the issue of sexual maturity, and how people can’t seem to deal with a perceived disparity. The role reversal between Rin and her classmates anachronistic sexual knowledge with Aoki-sensei’s naivity (for his age). Then there’s the fact that Rin pursues Aoki in an adult, forward manner, and yet the possible blossoming romance between Aoki-and Houin, both grown adults, is much sweeter and innocent.
June 18th, 2007 at 8:24 am
I generally agree with the sentiments presented. Odd though it may seem to many, there are children like Rin, and if literature is supposed to increase understanding, then this is definitely filling a gap. Although I confess to being a little squeamish about some of the content and a bit guilty for the reading I have done. I happen to have some of those conservative, illogical sensibilities. I wonder, however, with Seven Seas’ attempt to bring KnJ to the market and Tokyopop’s plan to bring Futari H, is there a reason for these two events to happen so close together? Also, who is SaHa? Whoever they are, it’s no small feat for a single person to work that fast. Does anyone have information about them, other than that there appears to be one person and that there work quickly.
June 18th, 2007 at 10:13 am
*Points to the bear*
THAT my friend is pedo-bear. Loveable(arguably) Huggable(after a good wash) Pedo-Bear, some time mascot and avatar for lolicon everywhere. It is possible e was created on niichan but his fame is most well known in the internet cesspool known as 4chan. He has his own seal of approval and drives a van, he has candy, it seems legit.
Now, the fact that this image comes from the manga itself shows, at least by my standards, the delightful post-modern reflexiveness that KnJ seems to suffer from. Now I say suffer in that every page, having read a fair amount of it myself, seems to be keenly and almost painfully aware of the fact that it is giving the lolicon something to look at while at the same time attempting to preserve an actual plot.
But please, don’t kid yourself, KnJ is fap-bait. You seem to stress the humanity and well drawn characters, and they are indeed what makes it singular, but this manga was made for fappin.
In no case is this intrinsicly a bad thing, I just think it is worthwhile for us to keep our heads about us and realize that right now some sweaty, overweight, pock marked, moaning, completely unrepentant japanese man is wanking it in the 95 degree 75 percent humidity to this delicately beautiful vision of pre-pubecent confusion and over-ripe sexualization that we see on the page.
That being said, continue with your review, anything that bridges the gap between people and all that.
Aren’t you happy it’s getting an anime release in just a few weeks?
June 18th, 2007 at 11:00 am
I had the sneaking suspicion that it had something going for it other then lolicon fanservice (even if that’s a big part of it). I’m almost tempted to take a look sometime, except it would definately be the kind of series I’d keep the fact I’m reading a secret… much as I would like to correct misconceptions about it, the fact of the matter is that I know some people who are way too solidly entrenched on the other side of this debate. I’m not a good “in person” debater (I’d like to think my forum/blog debate skills are pretty good) because I don’t think well on the spot, I get irked too easily by “drama”, and I don’t want to be labelled a lolicon by the ignorant (I’m a catgirl man myself, although my tastes in that regard are very specific).
(One saving grace of this controversy is that while it may have gotten the US release cancelled, you can still get it via scanlation. Contrast that to the fact that the game version of Kanon would be considered child porn under my country’s laws (I live in Canada). Because it contains drawings of fictional teens making out. At least you can get ahold of the material in question somehow! And yes, I did add this last bit because I like complaining about how ridiculous I think Canadian porn laws are sometimes.)
June 18th, 2007 at 11:14 am
Wait, I forgot one thing…
>>>Not all shounen subscribe to this though, Love Hina, for instance is a good example of characters with non-cliche personalities, but it’s more of the exception rather than the norm.
Would you mind elaborating on this? I have trouble seeing LH’s characters as uncliche… I did a really big mental “WTF?” when reading that.
June 18th, 2007 at 12:22 pm
In response I would say they defined the genre cliches, and that in being so close to type they manage to break free from it. It is like saying that Chobits was unlike every other show in that it was EXACTLY inside of genre conventions, without twisting or anything unexpected really. By defining genre you transcend it.
Of course thats what I am hoping the answer is, I would be quite disappointed if the immediate reaction to Naru was anything but “Tsundere” however she is not ~A~ she is ~THE~
Now of course I hate Ken Akamatsu and wish he would boil in hell for all eternity. Everything he does turns into finely greased excretions after about 5 minutes.
June 19th, 2007 at 12:39 am
bettynoire: That’s good to hear. I hope this doesn’t become a habit.
stormelemental13: Whoever SaHa is, it’s probably a paid job. Note that there are people attributed in the scans who “commissioned” Sayo, so I’m guessing this efficiency came from being financially reimbursed. You never know.
Man ‘O Brass: No, the bear in 2ch was of an entirely different sort from Pedobear. It’s probably just a gag those familiar with the reference would understand. I’m looking forward to the anime release, though! You can bet your bottom dollar.
0utf0xZer0: Man ‘O Brass answered your question there. I wasn’t referring to the Love Hina anime in any case, that one was ugly disjointed crap that couldn’t hold a candle to the manga. And I thought it was still… disputed in Canada? I don’t know. Good luck on that one.
June 19th, 2007 at 3:23 am
Not being a KnJ reader (though apparently maybe I should be?), I can’t really comment there, but it seems another title has fallen prey to the perpetual book-burning morality police that have been around since the days of Gutenberg. A shame too, because you actually make it sounds appealing, despite the loli issue.
June 19th, 2007 at 3:56 am
[...] but there is still a lot of upset over nudity, especially with children regardless of context. Owen’s diatribe about Kodomo no Jikan gives us a pretty sharp look at [...]
June 19th, 2007 at 4:23 am
Somehow, I knew the LH manga vs. anime thing was going to come up. Oh well, gives me another reason to give the manga a go when I get the chance.
Canadian law is VERY clear about porn where characters are depicted as being under 18: you’re only allowed to possess it if you created it yourself (because if you already had the idea, it’s not considered “harmful to your mental state”). That said, nobody I’m aware of has ever been convicted of possessing such material unless they had previous child porn convictions or also possessed real child porn. I attribute this largely to a lack of police resources.
Regardless, trying to import such material is, in my opinion, extremely ill advised, as Canada Customs is known to keep watch lists for porn. I suppose one could turn to the net, but since most P2P programs show your IP address, you’re still making yourself a potential target if the RCMP ever did decide to go after such material. For me, being able to play Kanon in it’s uncensored form just isn’t enough to be worth the risk of getting a child porn conviction, since there are many jobs that require criminal record checks and I can’t think of many convictions I’d like to have less (plus lack of a translation patch!).
(Although I would be interested if one could slip a copy of Kanon in under the “has artistic value” loophole, I’m not going to be the one to try it.)
What makes the case really interesting is that except for the issue of whether Makoto has enough mental capacity to give consent by the time her H scene rolls around, Kanon doesn’t depict any sex that would be illegal under Canadian law… even if the age of consent here is raised to 16 from 14, as it probably will be soon, anything I can think of in the game (which I admittadely haven’t played) would still be legal due to close in age loopholes.
I don’t expect this issue to be fixed anytime soon. Canada’s freedom of speech rights are not absolute and the Supreme Court considers Parliment’s excuse that such material is hazardous to children (due to possibility of encouraging child molestation) to be a valid one. My primary issue with this excuse is that even if you accept the logic that lolicon porn is harmful (I’m still undecided on that), I don’t think the arguement that schoolgirl porn (which is where many H games run afoul) is harmful is nearly as strong.
The problem is that I strongly expect that any move to change the laws to deal with this issue would result in the same sort of moral grandstanding KnJ raised. It was moral grandstanding that got this legislation implemented in the first place (unliked government in 1993 trying to save its ass in a fast approaching election by looking like it was protecting kids). KnJ, BTW, should be legal in Canada because it isn’t explicit enough to be considered porn.
June 19th, 2007 at 7:48 pm
Indeed it is awesome.
June 20th, 2007 at 2:30 pm
I’ve always thought of KnJ as a modern Japanese incarnate of that cult favorite “Lolita,” that old Kubrick film based on the 50s book, and then remade 1997 with a rather lolilicious Dominique Swain, that hottie daughter in Face/Off. It’s definitely raunchy and risque enough to be considered “fap bait,” but I believe its main purpose is to question the very moral fiber surrounding a culture that has shown progressively increased interest to girls of a younger and younger age. Much like Kanon, the H elements are necessary for the material to survive in the market, but the fact that the well goes much deeper is evidence to its true purpose. Of course, one could make the argument that the “deeper meanings” are there to legitimize the loliporn, but I’m going to take a mental leap and give the mangaka the benefit of the doubt.
After all, what makes KnJ so much more than the others? It could be the fact that the girls are in 3rd grade - but then again, in a culture where it’s not uncommon for 12, 11, 10 year olds to be gravure idols, the ripe age of -9- was necessary to actually be considered truly loli. Still, given the abundance of material available with girls that age, it’s unlikely for this to be the primary reason. Rather, it begs the question - what happens when a 3rd grader has reached the level of maturity to understand things such as love and loss? Is age the only thing we should be concerned about? Even if the supposed “adult” is of a lesser maturity? This sort of lopsided love triangle between Reiji, Rin, and Aoki continues to pile on the issues that, well, here, you said it best:
“…her portrayal of a well-known issue, bullying, is viewed from another perspective, in addition to being unflinchingly honest and almost painful to watch… there’s the easy-going, relatively light-hearted theme with a bit of fanservice on the side, thrown in alongside darker themes and issues that connect back to the real world.”
No, it’s not something the general public is going to accept anytime soon, or ever, but here’s to convincing ourselves that we’re not going to hell for enjoying it. Frankly, I feel a little better after reading this.
btw, you’re getting some good comment count lately with some real good discussion - ante up!
July 31st, 2007 at 7:57 am
That’s Pedobear.