Let’s get back to the real reason this blog is popular, shall we?
Lord knows it has nothing to do with me!

Over at Eye Weekly, Paul Isaacs seeks ‘porn comics’ from a retailer’s perspective by talking to Chris Butcher, manager of the Canadian store The Beguiling. I found this article via Mr. Butchers blog, where he sort of apologizes in advance for it, [I think] because he got the feeling that the interviewer may not have picked up on exactly what he was trying to convey. I thought it was good, though as someone who isn’t a fan of furry, I think the kemano references could’ve been left out [not a critical slam—seriously, that’s just my quirk]. I did notice they had a thumb of Virtus. I don’t know if I ever went out of my way to talk at GGY about Virtus [which I picture-read in installments in Gekidan] but overall, I didn’t like it from a picture reader’s perspective. Somehow I doubt if I’d dig it, even if it had been translated for me.

ON TO THE SARCASM:

See this guy? He’s a dick.

He’s basically the star attraction of a gladiatorial troupe based in some Roman city. He gets what he wants when he wants because…he’s the best fighter there is. If he finds a lessor man he wants to fuck–he does it, because… he’s the star-seme!

Now—this guy here is your typical put-upon uke.

He’s been star-boy’s whore since he was first brought into the troupe as a young slave. As you can see here at their first meeting [our uke is assigned to ‘wash off’ our star ‘seme’] their relationship is forged by a session of some good heartfelt rape:

Mnnn rape. What every growing gladiator needs.

Over the years our uke’s put up with insults from other gladiators, he’s even tried fighting off our star-seme on occasion, but always fails. After he’s nearly gang-raped by some other less hot looking fighters, his only ally the head “coach” , decides to teach him to ‘fight’ like a gladiator. Of course this sets up the drama-bomb at the end of the series …a match between uke and seme in the forum? Now Coach warns uke that going easy on seme because he cares for him [[because yes 'gay manga' isn't above the typical tropes of BL that dictate all uke are completely in love with the rape=lovemaking motif, forced on him by seme]] this is not wise, and he lets Uke see just how quick Seme will kill another member of the troupe he’s fucked—all for the glory. Oh the epiphany!

Oh BTW – our seme gets to fuck a rich roman woman too. You know…the allure of those sports stars is so great that women MUST have them. So he’s ordered by the troupe’s owner [or her husband, I can't tell] to ‘service’ this woman. Of course Tagame punishes her for daring to be the woman in his all gay drama by sneaking her into the coliseum gym to spy on her seme—just as he’s raping making sweet love to his favorite uke.

Being the evil vagina woman that she is, she’s going to play some games before this book is through, let me tell you! Oh and let’s not forget…a little token coffee in our ricemilk-

Because hey, we all LOVED Woody Strode in Spartacus!

To be honest, I stopped reading after the second installment because I knew where it was going. [Yes I still bought the tank!] I wasn’t fond of the artwork, and the story is so common in BL for women, that it sort of rolled off me and onto the floor. ( >. > ) I’ll give props to the fight scenes, which were strangely similar to the sex scenes. Also, I like the artwork better in this one than I did the old series House of the Brutes [HoB ran in BADI for years, I thought it would never end! - its just recently been collected into tankobon format.] but I’ll admit that HoB had a much better angst story. On an opposite note, I enjoy Tagame’s funny stuff over his attempt at rape-romance. I still chuckle over the one story where a young man and his beefy bear tutor go out to the theater to watch this “bishounen” performer. As the ‘pretty man’ dances, wandering hands infect the men in the audience, and since the tutor is the only real manly man there, all hands end up on him! The moral is, while pretty men may look hot, men are going to pull a bang-train on the hottest guy—who just happens to be the only bear in the room. I think I saw this one scanned at 4chan /rs/ once, not sure…if you can find it, get it—it’s cute.