Japanese Title: Octave

 

Genre: Yuri Drama

Length: 6 volumes

 

Positives:

• A mature approach.

Negatives:

• Slow to start and goes on for too long.
• Poor representation of male characters.
• Unlikable protagonist with an idiotic friend.
• A bit boring.

(contains nudity and sex)

When Yukino was fifteen, she became an idol and joined a pop group. Unfortunately, her group didn’t take off and she returned to her hometown in shame to much gossip. At eighteen, sick of her rural town and the nasty people, she returns to Tokyo to work at an agency. She meets Iwai, a woman who works as a ghost composer for famous idols. Iwai uses her confidence to seduce Yukino and they sleep together on their first night; however, Yukino panics the next morning, running away.

Yukino suffers from self-esteem issues, leaning on Iwai as a crutch. Eventually, her former pop group members enter the story; one started a successful solo career, while another moved onto the adult industry. The worst of the supporting characters is Yukino’s hometown friend, an idiotic character that doesn’t seem to know lesbians exist and somehow believes that regularly sleeping with women doesn’t make you interested in women… What? “But that doesn’t mean you like women, right?” she says in response to Yukino’s admission of dating and sleeping with Iwai. How did this character last until the fifth volume?

Then there’s Yukino herself. She’s a bit of a slut, frankly, which is fine for drama, but she gets away with it because of her shyness. Weak. She is lazy in her relationships and never takes responsibility for anything, hiding behind her meekness as if that excuses her. How convenient.

Lastly, the representation of male characters, or more specifically, the perception of male characters by the women is pathetic. The women seem clueless about men, making the women look like idiots when mentioned.

I personally found Octave boring. The manga seemed to drag on forever, and with the unlikeable protagonist and her stupid friend, I begged for mercy long before the end.

Art – Medium

Minimal work on the characters; even less on the backgrounds. Several nice colour pencil pages.

Story – Low-Medium

A mature story of sex and relationships. Shame it drags and Yukino is insufferable along with her hometown friend.

Recommendation: Try it/don’t bother. If you are after something mature and subdued, Octave is for you. You must enjoy a trudging pace. I personally fell asleep from boredom.

(Find out more about the manga recommendation system here.)