AniFem Round-Up Evangelion, alienation, and Japan’s 1990s economic crisis In a time wracked by despair, paranoia, and economic devastation, Evangelion captured the nihilistic zeitgeist of a nation and its citizenry. Autonomy, aliens, and a study in female character agency with 16bit Sensation This 2023 series makes for a good case study in stories where the […]
May 22, 2024 • Subscribe
More like this


KADOKAWA’s Weekly Top 5 Manga and Light Novel: May 15 – May 21, 2024
Please note that from the looks of it, the rankings provided by KADOKAWA are limited to that of Japan only. The methodology is not provided, however, it is…


Weekly Round-Up, 9-15 2024: Disability Studies, Hot Gimmick, and Horror Otome
AniFem Round-Up Nina the Starry Bride – Episode 1 An intriguing start for a josei fantasy about a princess’ forced body double. HAIGAKURA – Episode 1 This show…


Weekly Round-Up, 1-7 May 2024: Black BL, Mental Health Chat, and KOSA Updates
AniFem Round-Up From Takarazuka to Terayama: The influence of queer theater on Revolutionary Girl Utena Looking into the queer outsider theatre that Ikuhara drew inspiration sheds fascinating new…


Weekly Round-Up, 15-21 November 2023: “Anime Tourist,” Labor Union Negotiations, and Vita Otome Games
AniFem Round-Up Genre conventions and a gentle story of recovery in My New Boss is Goofy This darkhorse Spring shoujo takes a work-com format and spins a story…


Weekly Round-Up, 15-21 March 2023: Sailor Moon Fashion, Aggretsuko Finale, and Free March Movies
AniFem Round-Up Can’t Quite Be Your Sister: Looking at the Japanese laws relating to gender identity disorder Japanese blogger Honeshabri breaks down laws regarding the stipulations trans people…
Weekly Round-Up, 20-26 May 2020: In Memoriam
AniFem Round-Up Beyond UNIQLO: Tips for supporting Japan’s indie fashion designers Daz Skubich provides a primer on the world of street fashion and how enthusiasts the world over…


Weekly Round-Up, 22-28 May 2024: Indie Otome Spotlight, Ashihara Hinako Memorium, and Discrimination Bills
AniFem Round-Up “Queering” Heteronormativity: Biological essentialism in genderbending manga With the Hana Kimi anime announcement, it’s worth looking back at how cross-dressing rom-coms of its era handled gender…


Weekly Round-Up, 15-21 December 2021: Galko-chan Author Arrested, Border Closures, and Shoujo Manga Roundtable
AniFem Round-Up Wolf Queens and Girl Heroes: How Lonely Castle in the Mirror Plays with Gendered Fairytale Tropes Megan Baffoe highlights Tsujimura Mizuki’s best-selling novel about a teenage…


Weekly Round-Up, 15-21 September 2021: Shojo Beat’s Anniversary, Yuri Game Publishing, and Prime Minister Candidates
AniFem Round-Up Portrayals of Black Masculinity in Carole & Tuesday Katherine Mussellam looks at how the writing of characters like Ezekial and Skip swings back and forth between…


Weekly Round-Up, 10-16 March 2021: Gender Euphoria, Blue Flag, and Predatory Microtransactions
AniFem Round-Up We need more licensed doujinshi Chiaki advocates for more licensed doujins, as these works often create opportunities for marginalized voices and niche interests to find the…


Weekly Round-Up, 21-27 August 2024: Cozy Eroge, Monogatari’s New Director, and Unification Church Fines
AniFem Round-Up Attention to the letter: Lettering and Deaf representation in A Sign of Affection The manga alters its display of dialogue to convey its Deaf heroine’s experiences…


Weekly Round-Up, 21-27 February 2024: Your Name Producer Arrested, Japan’s Stand-Up Comedy Scene, and AI Subtitles
AniFem Round-Up Unlovely Complex: Social Justice, Misogyny, and the Lovely Complex Dub A recent post by Brendan Blaber about “fixing” Lovely Complex through the dubbing process underlined a…


Weekly Round-Up, 15-21 January 2025: Super Robot Ban, Sailor Moon Musical US Tour, and Mignogna Documentary
AniFem Round-Up 2025 Winter Premiere Digest All of the seasonal premieres in one place with content warnings, plus some updates on subsequent episodes. Anime Feminist Recommendations of Fall…


Weekly Round-Up, 30 October – 5 November 2024: Gender Change Laws, The Summer Hikaru Died, and Twitch Rule Changes
AniFem Round-Up “Every Inch of My Imagination”: Mangaka Makoto Yukimura on writing women and slavery in Vinland Saga We had the remarkable opportunity to interview Yukimura about writing…


Weekly Round-Up, 24-30 July 2024: Love on the Air, Birdo’s Gender, and Video Game Voice Actor Strike
AniFem Round-Up How Another Code: Recollection rewrote its villain in an empathetic way The latest game revisits a character coded as sinister for his flat affect and low…
Japanese Horror Weekly Wrap-up 2024/1/21
We are back! Missed some of the cool things that were released in the Japanese horror and Kowabana worlds this The post Japanese Horror Weekly Wrap-up 2024/1/21 first…


Delisting, copyright, and the public’s stake in art
Lately, the debate over the importance of the preservation of artistic works has heated up. This shouldn’t come as a surprise considering the continual shift away from physical…


Weekly Round-Up, 29 May – 4 June 2024: Trans Legislation, Silent Hill Redesigns, and a Portrait of Abuse
AniFem Round-Up The Villain Edit: Dissecting how Oshi no Ko evokes real-life tragedy in its depictions of harassment and reality TV culture Oshi no Ko evokes a real…


Weekly Round-Up, 15-21 June 2022: Fruits Basket Prelude, Reclaiming Lollipop Chainsaw, and Osaka Upholds Marriage Equality Ban
AniFem Round-Up Queer resonance and critiquing heteronormativity in SPY x FAMILY While there are no canonical LGBTQ+ characters in the series, it’s undeniably satirizing what society demands in…


Weekly Round-Up, 15-21 February 2023: New Morishima Akiko Manga, Support for Marriage Equality, and Yoshiya Nobuko Retrospective
AniFem Round-Up Everybody Loves Bridget: The origins of otokonoko and birth of a trans icon Rain B. explains the history of the Guilty Gear star, her influence in…


Weekly Round-Up, 6-12 March 2024: Gender in Yu-Gi-Oh GX, Joint Custody Laws, and Pokemon’s New Protagonist
AniFem Round-Up My Fave is Problematic: I’m in Love with the Villainess It’s a terrible shame that ILTV’s anime showcases all of the story’s early stumbles but barely…


Weekly Round-Up, 19-25 May 2021: Miura Memorials, Toxic Nostalgia, and Queer Demons
AniFem Round-Up Idols Gone Viral: How Hololive VTubers both subvert and reinforce expectations of idol femininity Katie Gill explores the freedom the VTuber space provides for weirdness and…
Weekly Round-Up, 27 May – 2 June, 2020: Protest Resources and Celebrating Black Creators
As with yesterday’s Talk post, this week’s Links round-up is slightly different. Below, we’ve listed links to AniFem articles penned by Black contributors, as well as our podcasts…


Weekly Round-Up, 25-31 May 2022: #OurFlagMeansUnion, PIXIV Lawsuit, and Precure’s Tokusatsu Connection
AniFem Round-Up Framing the Model Minority Myth with Neo Cat Chiaki shines a light on this hidden josei gem, and how its surreal story about self-aware humanoid cats…


Weekly Round-Up, 21-27 April 2021: Free Otome Games, Yasuke, and Grown-Up Magical Girls
AniFem Round-Up The Mazinger Problem: On “different times,” “lost in translation,” and the role of translators Kara Dennison shares her approach to the ethical dilemmas translators face when…


TSUTAYA Weekly Manga Sales Ranking: July 15 – July 21, 2024
There have been some changes to the reporting style here on the Blog. Please refer to the post here for further information. All of the data you find…
Terra Formars, Fighting Spirit, Ascendance of a Bookworm, A Couple of Cuckoos, Shangri-La


TSUTAYA Weekly Manga Sales Ranking: April 15 – April 21, 2024
There have been some changes to the reporting style here on the Blog. Please refer to the post here for further information. All of the data you find…
Shangri-La, Shangri-La Frontier, Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End, BLUE LOCK, Jinsei - Life Consulting


Weekly Round-Up, 8-14 May 2024: Aggretsuko’s Commodified Rage, Medical GoFundMe, and 50 Years of Hana to Yume
AniFem Round-Up BanG Dream! It’s MyGo!!!!! and the value of letting female characters suck Soyo is a relative rarity for the music gacha subgenre: a sympathetic member of…
Weekly Round-Up, 15-21 July 2020: History of Magical Girls, Chivalry in Spice & Wolf, and Anime Fandom in Zambia
AniFem Round-Up Mr Love: Queen’s Choice – Episode 1 Otome adaptation with the usual hurdles but nice production values and a sci-fi hook. GIBIATE – Episode 1 Post-apocalyptic…
Weekly Round-Up, 15-21 April 2020: Domestic Abuse Hotline, Anime Affected by COVID-19, and Another Rough News Week
AniFem Round-Up 2020 Spring Premiere Digest All of this season’s premiere reviews in one place, plus updates on second episodes. Anime Feminist Recommendations of Winter 2020 A robust…


Weekly Round-Up, 31 May – 6 June 2023: Director Utsumi Hiroko, Crunchyroll vs Unions (Again), and Anti-Racism in Game Design
AniFem Round-Up Site Update: New Shoujo-Inspired Merchandise at the AniFem Store! The new “Needs More Shoujo” designs over at our store. She Has Two Hands! Room For non-monogamous…
Weekly Round-Up, 6-12 May 2020: FF7R Interview, New Re:ZERO OVA, and Lesbian Writers
AniFem Round-Up A Tale of Two Nanas: The fuzzy line between homoromantic subtext and queerbaiting in Nana Roy Lemmons discusses the josei classic and the difficulties in analyzing…


Weekly Round-Up, 5-11 May 2021: Olympics Protests, Tokyo Revengers, and Anti-Muslim Discrimination
AniFem Round-Up The Spell of Self-Assurance: How Howl’s Moving Castle challenges myths about youth and beauty Nicci Attfield revisits the 2004 film and the ways its female cast…


Weekly Round-Up, 12-18 May 2021: MAPPA Animator Conditions, Intersectionality, and Nagata Kabi Interview
AniFem Round-Up The Feminist Potential of the Lolita Fashion Subculture Sarah Alexander explores the history of lolita fashion as a rebellious outlet and highlights marginalized voices in the…


Weekly Round-Up, 11-17 May 2022: Evolution of BL, Neurodiverse Manga, and Okinawa Protests
AniFem Round-Up Reading The Duke of Death and His Maid as disability allegory Borealis Capps digs deeper into this story about a couple who can’t touch one another…


May 2023 ANN Interest Article Round-Up
I've been writing some of Anime News Network's Interest articles as of late. Here they all are for your perusal!


Weekly Round-Up, 29 June – 5 July 2022: Crunchyroll Translator Wages, X-Gender Manga, and Coming Out
AniFem Round-Up Yuri is for Everyone: An analysis of yuri demographics and readership Nicki “YuriMother” Bauman breaks down the demographics of reader surveys and magazine markets. Skip Beat!’s…


Weekly Round-Up, 30 August – 5 September 2023: Gundam Doujinshi, Police Body Cameras, and Gender Pay Gap
AniFem Round-Up Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou and Transgender Cyborgs’ Experience of the Apocalypse The 90s manga’s tale of rebuilding and self-discovery after the end has only become more relatable…


Weekly Round-Up, 21-27 July 2021: Olympics Shitshow, Science SARU, and Manga Publishing Roundtable
AniFem Round-Up 2021 Summer Premiere Digest Our summer reviews in one place, with updated content warnings where available. The Idaten Deities Know Only Peace – Episode 1 Visually…


Japan Top Weekly Video Game Ranking: April 15 – April 21, 2024
Overall hardware sales for the week have shown an improvement over previous week’s performance with the exception of Switch where the decline of the OLED edition brought down…


Japan Top Weekly Video Game Ranking: January 15 – January 21, 2024
Note that the hardware sales data has not been released. It is thanks to the wonderful people over at Famitsu that we get to see these charts on…


Japan Top Weekly Video Game Ranking: July 15 – July 21, 2024
The overall hardware sales performance for the brands tracked by Famitsu has noted a remarkable rise in sales by 30.71% week-over-week. The Xbox Series leads in terms of…


Weekly Round-Up, 28 April – 4 May 2021: Yoko Taro Interview, Class S Yuri, and Yasuke
AniFem Round-Up Yasuke – Episode 1 A compact, engaging historical title (with fantasy elements) about the first Black samurai. Anime Feminist Recommendations of Winter 2021 The team shares…
Weekly Round-Up, 13-19 May 2020: Sailor J, the Colonization of Hokkaido, and Shoujo Isekai
AniFem Round-Up Perfect World, Disability Narratives, and Writing Outside Your Experience Zahra Ymer explores this josei romance and the pros and cons of disability representation as written by…


Weekly Round-Up, 18-24 May 2022: Asexual Manga, Otome Game Demand, and Bloober Silent Hill
AniFem Round-Up How shoujo manga helps me grapple with internalized misogyny Shojo & Tell host Ashley McDonnell shares how she came to love the genre, and how it’s…


Weekly Round-Up, 26 May – 1 June 2021: Ace Attorney Localization, “Cool Japan,” and Gendered Translation
AnFem Round-Up The Girl with the Healing Kiss: How Talentless Nana explores gender, morality and the savior complex Avanya Manickum unpacks Michiru’s arc and how it implicitly plays…


Weekly Round-Up, 17-23 July 2024: Nonbinary Chiitan, Crunchyroll Comments, and QUEEN BEE
AniFem Round-Up Classmates and finding the humanity in clichés Nakamura uses the reader’s familiarity with genre conventions to build a framework for a humanistic, multifaceted story about queer…


The AI Anime Generated Art Controversy – My Take
Earlier this year, AI advancements were made as DALLE was revealed to the public, making compelling images. It allows users to generate images from a text prompt. However,…


Weekly Round-Up, 21-27 September 2022: Fushigi Yugi Returns, Nintendo’s Scrapped Accessibility Controller, and #JustAMeeting
AniFem Round-Up Tekken: Bloodline – Episode 1 Unfortunately, the most interesting character dies before the credits roll. Bee and PuppyCat (2022) – Episode 1 It’s a co-production with…


Weekly Round-Up, 21-27 December 2022: Maquia Retrospective, Mental Health Awareness, and Embrace Your Size
AniFem Round-Up Bayonetta 3 Validates Every Insecurity About My Life, Relationships, and Sexuality Lucas DeRuyter examines his reaction to the end of Bayonetta and how the end of…