24 thing I liked in 2024

30 Jan, 2025

I'm sure yearly retrospective posts can happen anytime in January, so I'm still on time. This is, at last, my attempt at it: 12 made-up categories of stuff (sorted haphazardly), with an appointed thing for each, and a runner-up of sorts. This totals to 24 things, which I find kinda fitting for 2024.
Things in this list have impacted me in different ways - not all of them necessarily that much, but all of them did. Some have been far from all-consuming, but have remained nice or interesting things looking back on them, or have been repeatedly tugging at my thoughts since. Some have struck me in ways I didn't know existed and changed me much more deeply. Still, all moved me somehow.
I could probably list more, or swap a few with others; but the fact that I could build more or less specific categories for most pairs here was honestly a fun decision factor.

I hope you can find one or two that change you in there, too.

Queer angry things in French

Clémence en Colère by Mirion Malle:

I have been following French comic artist Mirion Malle's works for some years now, and several of her comic books have had a deep impact on me - most notably the previous two from what losely forms this trilogy, This is How I Disappear (C'est comme ça que je disparais) and So Long, Sad Love (Adieu triste amour). I could write a whole recommendation post about this, and may do so someday; the first one deals heavily with depression from abuse, and the second about escaping an abusive relationship and finding a queer community.

I had been anticipating Clémence en Colère¹, her latest release, with excitement; and it's been so... so intense and true and rough. It talks about that deep-seated queer anger toward an abusive and unfair society, to a point that eats you inside and mutes all other feelings aside from that anger. It talks about recovering from sexual abuse in ways that are not meant to shock but instead to give hope, to fill with hope, through support groups and the precious support of queer friends. It talks about recovery, overall; of huddling with close ones and slowly regaining the ability to feel other feelings than rage and despair from the nightmarish current state of the world. It talks about building beautiful relationships still, and being, at times, joyfully angry together.

It blew me away when I read it last Spring. I may need to reread it in these very hard months. If it reaches English-speaking shores, I wish it, or Mirion Malle's previous two titles, can help you too.

Je vis dans une maison qui n'existe pas by Laurène Marx:

I just reread parts of this one to write this little paragraph and I am in tears. Seriously, there is no runner-up in the current category, even if I placed this one second for some reason.

Je vis dans une maison qui n'existe pas (literally I live in a house that doesn't exist) is a short autobiographical text where author Laurène Marx writes on madness and transness; on dissociation from abuse during her childhood and her psychiatric internment; on her mental landscape and how her inner house allows her to survive. She uses very simple words, and sentences like streams of thoughts, and some unusual pages and sentence layouts; and it is poetry, and it hurts, and it gives you space to embrace change, and tiredness too. Some of this text's sentences are bound to stay with me for a long, long time. It makes me want to write. To cry, too. To thank her. Apparently, as an actress, she also performs the text on stage; I'd like to see that someday.

Things in French that are fun and about the 2000s

Samuel by Emilie Tronche:

Samuel is a short French animated series made and dubbed almost entirely by Emilie Tronche, of 21 episodes of 2 to 6 minutes, that follows the daily life of elementary then middle schooler Samuel in the 2000s, through events he tells to his diary - and that feels like a true time capsule of that period. It's real, and silly, and heavy sometimes, and it just works and it's funny and touching in ways I am unable to put into words². Emilie Tronche apparently dug back her own diary and memories of that period to write something faithful, and it definitely shows in so many phrasings and moments that make you feel "yup, this is definitely a 10-year-old kid in the 2000s" (and as a cherry on top, it's highly quotable, too). I don't know at all whether any of this will be accessible to an English audience, but it's been a strange and memorable ride, and among French acquaintances, family and friends, this may oddly be the work of this list I can show to the widest audience.

Ocean by Lucie Bryon:

This comic by French artist Lucie Bryon (who also made the excellent Thieves (Voleuse)) was first released in English as part of the online ShortBox Comics Fair, an event that has been featuring various indie comics throughout the month of October for a few years now. It's been re-released in print form in French as part of a wider collection of three stories titled Happy Endings, where it's definitely the strongest story of the three.

Ocean is a cozy and fun story about two time travelers stranded in a small French port town in the 2000s, somehow opening a hair salon to make ends meet, adopting the cat they were supposed to take back to HQ, and slowly learning to relax as they realize nobody will come for them. The art style has great paneling, and gets a more soothing color palette and fluid lines as the lovable protagonists - including a cute neurodivergent lesbian gremlin - settle into that new routine. The ending is a bit loose, and some parts of the plot sure are convenient, but somehow - for its visual style, its atmosphere, its charming sight of two ex-time travelers enjoying reading Ranma 1/2 in the bath and watching Yu-Gi-Oh on the TV - this remained a highlight of my year.

Unsettling and bleak manga series with 12-13 volumes

Land of the Lustrous by Haruko Ichikawa:

I once posted a recommendation for this manga on cohost when I was just out of the seventh volume, and may repost it here one of these days. Its thirteenth, final volume, should hopefully reach us in English this year; reading the previous twelve was, in any case, a memorable experience of last year.

Land of the Lustrous tells the story of nongendered crystal-based humanoids who fight a vain war against invaders from the moon who come to break them into pieces and steal those fragments. It has a very specific fluid art style, some very striking pages with elements of (light) body horror I can only call horribly superb; and fascinating considerations on identity, memory, grief, breaking out of what you were "supposed to be", distrust and seeking the truth, and trying to hold a nuanced position in a war. Indeed, as the gems - the Lustrous - break apart, they lose parts of their memories; and the story follows fragile Lustrous Phosphophyllite as they really want to fight and prove themself to the rest of them. They get into more and more dangerous situations to do so, notably as they realize they can break and attach more efficient body parts to themself - but this also means that, in some Ship of Theseus way, they become less and less who they used to be.

This manga also specifically appeals to me because I'm fascinated-terrified by works that explore notions of identity and the self, and boy does it do that. I'm not convinced by absolutely everything it sets out to do, but it sure is an endlessly fascinating read.

(Also it yielded a beautiful 3D anime adaptation of the 4-5 first volumes, which was my first contact with the series a few years ago.)

Dead Dead Demon's Dededede Destruction by Inio Asano:

This manga carries a profound understanding of what it feels like to live in a world that could end any day. Its read infused my month of September with a permanent feeling of dread, and I think back on it often considering the horrifying last few months.

It took me three volumes to really get into it, and it feels uneven at times, notably on some of its wider political elements (as a warning, it contains depictions of the fucking current US White House resident, so, huh, take care on that front); and it also has unaddressed fatphobia. All that being said, DDDD really shines when it mainly focuses on the daily lives of two quite unhinged high school girls as they try to care about anything at all... since a giant flying saucer appeared over Tokyo a few years ago and led to the increasing militarization of Japan (and other countries) to counter the "threat" - including by irradiating entire neighborhoods, while no one really knows why the aliens are here.

It's an extremely bleak, but accurate, read: that feeling that any day now the stalled conflict could resume with big bombs and kill you, and even in your daily life there are bigger and bigger weapons installed around you and aliens slaughtered and soldiers everywhere and ship parts falling and destroying houses, and with all this you're supposed to care about the end of term exams and where you're going to go for uni, and not just, you know, curl into a ball and cry and maybe grieve the people who die. Or alternatively play video games all day and spout nonsense for fun to try and forget the future.

Seriously. Fuck. I'm not sure this is an helpful read for anyone these days considering how it may resonate with the present³... but this is proof that DDDD is really good at the core of what it sets out to tell, and it did change something in me when I read it. And in spite of its heavy atmosphere, it has some beautiful things on being together and supporting each other through everything at the end of the world. I cling to that, when I can.

Original animes about sapphic teenagers making art

Girls Band Cry by studio Toei Animation:

Oh hey, it's one of the two animes I wrote a post about a while ago!

Girls Band Cry is a wonderful anime about music, and anger about both Japan's education system and the marketing pressure of the music industry - and hope that, by refusing to compromise our values and ideals, we may someday be understood and recognized without having given in, in spite of all the hurdles along the way.

Though its cast is cool in many ways, its larger-than-life protagonist Nina really steals the show, in all the ways she pours her traumas and wounds into her singing and on the scene, and how she headbutts with deuteragonist Momoka over any band decision. The show is also propelled by some very expressive 3D (with clever use of flashback 2D segments), and an extraordinary soundtrack played by the voice actresses themselves, which has been a good part of my OST of 2024 - full of fighting angry energy against unfair systems, right from the anime's opening, Wrong World.

I cannot recommend this series enough: I think its first few episodes are strong and intense enough to draw many people in. Though I sometimes wish GBC had been even angrier and ready to sever ties completely with society and norms on some points (family-wise notably), its core idea that you should stand by your righteous actions and stay determined, because one day people will understand you were right, fills me with hope. And I'll take that hope - and the accompanying theme that sometimes, music can save you and carry you through the darkest of times.

Jellyfish Can't Swim in the Night by studio Doga Kobo:

Oh hey, it's the other anime I talk about in the same post!

Let's start by addressing its big problems: right from the get-go, this anime has a long, skeevy sexualizing shot of its high schooler protagonist; and such a thing happens to a much lesser extent two more times during its run. It also has an adult hitting on a high schooler, and implications that they start dating, and a veeery dragged out boob comparison and fondling scene in one episode.

And still, Jellyfish is, in so many ways, so very good. First because it has a fully queer main cast, including a bigender character, and some of them are clearly neurodivergent and/or socially anxious - and it addresses a lot of it much more directly than I ever would have hoped. Second, because it has some episodes about the anxieties of art creation, self-deprecation, jealousy and the need for recognition that hit extremely close to home. Third, because it explicitly ends on a very high note of marginalized characters who found each other and are ready to support each other - and in several ways, to help and inspire others, too.

And, gosh. Wow. My energy is low these days but this show gave me a lot to write about, and I hope I manage one of these months. It has a few gaping flaws; but to me, at least, Jellyfish means so much.

Fantasy anime adaptations with a future second season

Delicious in Dungeon by studio Trigger, from a manga by Ryoko Kui:

Delicious in Dungeon, as an anime adaptation, took a lot of the Internet by storm in early 2024, and for good reason. What starts as a somewhat silly fantasy food show slowly morphs into something much darker and more epic, while never quite losing sight of its initial idea. Its first few episodes are admittedly the weaker part, notably as they make the (then) one woman of the group the butt of a bunch of cartoon jokes... But she is, and the characters all are, much more than that; and it is a delight to see Delicious in Dungeon slowly grow a beautiful cast of varied and carefully crafted weirdos, along with an extremely intricate and thought out worldbuilding that truly revolutionizes the classic dungeon fantasy setting. Please, give this anime a few more episodes, come back to it week after week if need be: I'm sure you'll get enthralled too. As the episodes reach the double digits, you'll realize that it's now miraculously and constantly striking the perfect balance between hilarious and ominous, between silly and epic, between humorous and grave - with a clear understanding of and care about what makes it work, from both original author Ryoko Kui and adaptating studio Trigger.

Honestly, I initially thought I would wait for the second season of the anime before reading the (apparently fantastic) original manga version: the anime adaptation is a beautiful rendition of its source material, and discovering the first season live without knowledge about where it'd go was an absolutely fantastic experience. But I'm not sure I'll wait much more: I really miss these characters too much.

Frieren by studio Madhouse, from a manga by Kanehito Yamada and Tsukasa Abe:

This anime has a foot in late 2023, but anyway. An adaptation of the ongoing manga by the same name, Frieren follows the eponymous elf Frieren after she and a group of heroes defeated the Demon King and brought peace back to their fantasy land; and she ages much, much more slowly than all her ex-party members. Soon, she takes some of their apprentices under her wing, and together they travel the country, retracing the path she one took with her late comrades in arms.

Frieren successfully talks with a melancholic air about memories, and grief, and changing slowly - from the perspective of someone who has a widely different perception of time from humans. It does so using rather simple characters overall, but somehow that doesn't hurt most of its topics, which cut deep anyway; and the elf Frieren remains a fascinating main character herself. There is also a focus on the progress of magic much like any science would in a hundred years that feels very grounded, somehow.

The series does have some more teeth-grinding elements, though - like some very binary gendered behaviors at times, one instance of homophobic joke; and most notably a clear simplistic antagonization of most of its demon antagonists, toward whom Frieren has a clear genocidal intent supported by the narrative. Yet, the latter is an interesting flaw to analyze; and with the manga still ongoing, and apparently some new elements waiting in volumes not yet adapted and that I have yet to read, I remain curious in a wary way.

In any case, Frieren's central themes and often contemplative pace have found some echo in me still. Also, I must add that the anime adaptation may be the most flawless I have ever seen: it cuts literally not a single line from the manga, adds some foreshadowing and some fighting dynamism at times, and is simply breathtaking artistically speaking. I wish some anime adaptations had even a tenth of this treatment, and can only hope a future season 2 holds to this standard.

Video games about witches with more stunning female characters than my lesbian heart can take

Cosmic Wheel Sisterhood by studio Deconstructeam:

My video game crush of 2024, this queer narrative adventure will make you question your every choice, and maybe doom yourself and/or your friends along the way.

Play as space witch Fortuna, who has been cast out of her coven after predicting its fall, and stranded alone on an asteroid for a millenium... That is, until she summons a forbidden cosmic entity, a Behemoth, regains her powers of cartomancy through some kind of Faustian bargain, and gets the opportunity to see her old friends again. The thing is: her tarot card readings are no joke. The readings you choose as a player will happen. And as Fortuna walks back into the rivalries and politics of her old coven, you may use these powers wisely, or not; all this while knowing that someday, the Behemoth you summoned will collect his due.

This game is incredibly engrossing, through its great all-female cast (Behemoth aside), how easy it is to get attached to most of them - and how easy it also is to tamper with fate, half-fearful half-hopeful, until it blows up in your face and terrible things happen to the ones you care about. Cosmic Wheel Sisterhood also gets very queer and very political, which were both extremely pleasant surprises; and it has a narrative climax of a rare intensity, that may be one of my favorite video game moments ever.

Also, so many things can probably happen differently. I'm still recovering from my first run, but I can't wait for another try at it.

Hades II by studio Supergiant Games:

Supergiant Games has now been my favorite video game studio period for ten years, as I discovered in 2015 their first and second games Bastion and Transistor: two hack'n'slash video games that are also works of art with cryptic worldbuilding and a meticulously crafted atmosphere - some kind of postapocalyptic fantasy Western movie ambience for the first one, and cyberpunk film noir for the second⁴. The studio since made Pyre, the best and only mystical fantasy basketball road trip visual novel, and Hades, a rogue-like retelling of Greek mythology which represented the studio's clear coming into the public eye. Hades showed the honed mastery of all of their previous craft, all of it gorgeous and gripping: the art, the story, the music, the gameplay, the voice acting, and the way it all comes together to make a die-and-retry particularly exciting.
I don't have enough words to praise their games, overall.

Now four years after the release of Hades comes (the early access of) Hades II, which is... really, more of Hades. I was, to be honest, a bit afraid at first: Zelda Tears of the Kingdom, for instance, has been a "Breath of the Wild, but more" experience I really didn't like. Did I really need more Hades in my life? As it turns out, four years after the previous opus: yup. I definitely did.

Hades II is charming, with an atmosphere as brilliant as ever, striking new and old characters that make it clear to me I am gay, a fascinating new storyline extending the world of the first game in so many ways, and already more content than the original Hades. Though I would not necessarily recommend it to people who played Hades recently, to avoid some kind of overdose, or to people as a starting point as it is clearly enjoyed better after playing Hades itself, Hades II is really, really good. I can't wait to see what more the studio has in store - and wish its staff safety in these harsh times.

Lesbian movies

Go Fish by Rose Troche:

This thirty-year-old movie showed me what movies made by and for the lesbian community could be. It is slightly experimental at times, but not inaccessible, though many a lesbian reference may skip past some audience less used to it. I wrote a post about it back in November, and I regularly think back on how actual it is today still, and how seen it made me feel.

Go Fish somewhat follows a central romance, but it is not a romance per se; it is a constant display of the support of friends and roommates and lovers and exes, close ones with whom you share a part of your identity. It shows how you help each other through the hard times and the good times, through the heteronormative pressure of society and the gatekeeping and discourse of some of your own community. It is a purposeful message of hope and joy, made amidst the AIDS epidemic but without any mention of it, to remind other lesbians how beautiful and important it is to have each other's back through all the hardships, and to revel together in the joy and sillies of budding relationships. It is made, first and foremost, by people who wanted to be seen and to be proud, and to be hopeful; and it is striking for me to relate to it so much thirty years later.

Carol by Todd Haynes and Phyllis Nagy:

A cult classic lesbian movie made to be watched around Christmas season, this historical romance grounded in the 1950s was actually very compelling. I mean, being a classic, I expected it to be cult in a somewhat memetic way; but no, it's been genuinely good. It does have some lesbian tropes, starting with a flirty blonde and a shier brunette with some kind of slight power imabalance; but it has a lot of stengths, from its lead characters that are more than the sum of their parts, to its relationship obstacles grounded in the 1950s' "morality clause" of denunciation and prosecution of homosexuality, and even a lesbian ex and best friend side character which evokes a wider lesbian community support⁵. It is also based on a book by Patricia Highsmith that was notable at the time of its release for featuring a happy ending for its lesbian couple, at which the movie hints too. I'd rewatch it happily.

A blonde and a brunette visit a strange world and are gay

Otherside Picnic (vol. 8) by Iori Miyazawa:

You may have expected this one if you have ever read a bit more of my blog. I couldn't shut up about Otherside Picnic, first and foremost a yuri novel series (though there has notably been a manga adaptation), for the past few years already; but in 2024, I got to read its eighth volume, and still haven't recovered. What were the odds of seeing one of my already favorite yuri series talk through an entire volume about some of my all-time favorite subjects - relationships, communication and the expectations around romance - with such depth and lucidity?

Otherside Picnic, as a whole, is some wonderfully strange genre fiction: it is eldritch horror based on Japanese creepypasta and ghost stories that is a clear love letter to them; it is the goofy, silly and scary adventures of two girls slowly growing closer while exploring a dangerous parallel world; it is a weird and sometimes brainy read with elements on human cognition, understanding each other, anthropology, but also survival in a hostile environment and gun use; and it has elements that feel very reminiscent of the SCP Foundation or the Backrooms. Also, its protagonist may be my favorite fictional character ever: a sapphic ghost stories nerd and misanthrope that is clearly neurodivergent and canonically traumatized and dissociating, she is extremely relatable to me; and her growth and slow opening up throughout the volumes are such a sight to behold.

Otherside Picnic clearly takes some time to find its footing, though: some of its early Files are honestly very meh (most notably, in my opinion, the few military oriented ones), and they can feel like some haphazard monster-of-the-week stuff sometimes. But around the end of its second volume the series starts to shine, as it broadens its scope and strenghthens its core story arcs; and it only grows stronger and stronger from there. Some of its volumes are absolutely incredible, notably volumes 4 and 7; and truly, volume 8 I've read this year feels like one of the most important and nuanced pieces of lesbian fiction I have ever read. I mean it.

Volume 9, currently releasing bit by bit in English until a full online release in March, is shaping up to be a wonderful followup to the conversations planted in the previous volume, which is no small feat. I can't wait to see what awaits still.

Touhou CD - Taboo Japan Disentanglement by ZUN:

This one is going to be kinda niche. Anyway.
ZUN, the creator of the Touhou series, has been releasing - on and off - music CDs for more than 20 years now, containing both remixes of tracks from the Touhou games and brand new original ones. A good portion of those CDs come with a small story booklet; and almost all of these stories focus on two rather obscure characters, Maribel and Renko, who come from our world and repeatedly visit the strange world where most of Touhou happens through the former's powers. I care a lot about these two for various reasons.

This year of 2024, we got a new music CD, and therefore a new story, after 8 years without news from these characters. It was not as intense as I expected, but it was fascinating regarding several implications still; and the music, particularly some new original tracks, is really good too.

If you don't know what Touhou is, I can only redirect you toward my short or longer explanation on this blog. If you know what Touhou is, but don't know who Renko and Maribel are, here is a celebratory post about why these relatively obscure canon characters matter to me so much. If you know about Renko and Maribel, well, you probably celebrated this news too. Or in the future you'll just consider it part of history.
In any case, the sheer surprise of speculating and witnessing it in real time was quite meaningful to me.

Animes directed by Kunihiko Ikuhara

Revolutionary Girl Utena by the Be Papas and studio J.C. Staff:

I should talk again about Utena very soon (hi, Februaryuri), but I must talk about it here already.
I had heard of it as the grandmother of yuri and sapphic media in many ways, with some great influence both on anime but also on several queer US cartoons. And, you know, it is definitely yuri. It is also a surrealist work of art, that borrows from old shoujo elements with roses and androgynous characters and swordfighting, and twists them until they become an entire language of metaphors and meanings - a language the show teaches you as it goes.

But what I did not expect was for Utena to be such a deep and nuanced piece on patriarchy, grooming and control, analyzed through a deconstruction of fairy tales. It does take its time to do so, though: some early episodes set up extremely harsh themes, very notably several elements of incest, that seem treated like background information at first - but they are directly looked at in the series' third and last arc, which cuts extremely deep. Some of the later episodes are difficult to watch - and may sometimes be triggering for people who experienced any kind of abusive relationship. But all this is addressed. All of this is the core theme of Utena's story. The show depicts in details how abuse traps its characters, and it does hurt a lot, but its ultimate goal is not to hurt you: it is to show how said characters fight to free themselves from this. Overall, the way this 1997 series faces all these themes head-on is downright impressive, and if you give yourself time and aftercare to swallow its most intense episodes, Utena will offer you a profoundly cathartic and powerful ending that struck me like lightning.

It's not all heavy stuff, though. Utena is also really silly at times, with more and more cheeky self-references and in-jokes as it goes. But please, watch it knowing you are in for something strange, and tough, and deeply rewarding.

As an extra note, there is also a movie, The Adolescence of Utena, that I watched in early January - and that feels like an acid trip retelling, 10x speed, of the series. It has less nuance, it is more unhinged, and it's both very roundabout and very straightforward about its message of escaping heteronormative and abusive fairy tales. It's also one of the most gloriously lesbian things I have ever seen.

Sarazanmai by studios Mappa and Lapin Track:

Sarazanmai is currently the latest anime directed by the same person as Utena, Kunihiko Ikuhara, and it shows: it's surrealist as fuck, and pretty uncomfortable to watch at times, and I wouldn't suggest it to anyone without a hefty list of content warnings; and with all this it also has great characters and a striking ending that is beautiful in ways that are difficult to put into words.

Seriously, don't watch Sarazanmai without any warning, though, unless you're really ready for something pretty bizarre. I tried it once two years ago and couldn't get past the first few episodes, because there was way too much, um... magical anal penetration is somehow the only way I can put this - something heavily based on the mythology of the youkai that are the kappa. Sitting with the first episode's imagery for a while may help you get used to it, and give you a good idea of what happens basically most episodes... at least until, in traditional Ikuhara fashion, the show's structure slowly crumbles, so that in the end it becomes and means something new entirely. But yeah, it really may not be for you.

All that being said, Sarazanmai is great. Below its zany surface, it talks of the secrets we keep (but also of the traumas we cope with and the narratives we bind ourselves to), of what prevents us from connecting with other people (but also of what ties us to others despite everything), of policing our desires (but also of learning to stop doing that), and of helping each other against unfair structures. It's also a powerful piece looking at you in the eye and saying that gay relationships should be allowed to exist onscreen without being concealed.

Mangas not yet published in English

Hanamonogatari by schwinn:

I did not expect this still Japan-bound three-volume yuri manga to make it into my list, even more as the fan-translation I'm following is only halfway through its run, but it sure did. I mean, a yuri story focusing on 65-year-old women is already something, but this one juggles with so many realistic themes I've been simply over the moon with each new chapter release.

As Hanayo, its main character, starts living alone after her husband's death, she slowly unpacks how his controlling and belittling attitude impacted her life; and she reconnects with many things she didn't have a chance to try in her life, either because she was a woman (like long university studies) or because she was an old woman (like makeup). She also slowly thinks back on her relationships and attraction toward other girls and women throughout her life - though it's only when meeting openly lesbian people that she suddenly realizes, in ways that feel perfectly pictured and incredibly relatable, how the heteronormative path she always thought was laid out before her may not be the one for her after all. Truly, I have never seen this moving mind-expanding realization captured with such accuracy before, and it's been such a read.

The manga's title, Hanamonogatari, is borrowed from the seminal collection of short stories by early 20th century novelist Nobuko Yoshiya, whose works are at the heart of the Class S genre, and later heavily contributed to the birth of the yuri genre. The novel Hanamonogatari is also itself an element of this manga, since the protagonist is lent a copy of it, and she realizes she relates somehow to its stories' characters. There is something to this about how books like this can truly help people feel seen and find themselves, but also how their sad endings can trap them, and how historical social pressure motivated these endings to begin with.

This manga also talks about how some hobbies and/or fields of studies are belittled because they are considered by or for women - and overall it has a clear, deep-rooted understanding of how femininity is looked down upon in so many ways. At its core, it shows old women slowly escaping all those prejudices and expectations in extremely grounded ways, by helping each other and showing each other lives outside of the norm.

There's even more nuance and details to this work that I don't have room to expand upon here. Somehow, this manga just feels like a lesbian feminist treasure trove. I hope it gets published outside of Japan soon - I've just seen that it should be picked up by the wonderful editions Akata in French in 2025 and I'm extremely excited.

Tonari no Youkai-san (as Nos voisins les yôkai in French) by noho:

My first contact with this series was through its anime version that aired last Spring. I once posted a recommendation of it on cohost, because it's been very good, and once again I should probably repost it here one of these days. Its manga version started reaching France during the year, and though a good bulk of its four volumes made it into the anime, I'm happy to announce that the manga version is simply more of that - I've read two volumes so far and it's been just as delightful an experience.

Tonari no Youkai-san is overall a warm story of community, in a world where humans and youkai live together. It is mostly centered on the little village of Fuchigamori, and has a large cast of people and beings, all extremely loveable and good, who help and support and love each other in various ways. The story has simply excellent character design and a clear mastery of its atmosphere, and it's one of those stories that really make me want to live in it.

That being said, a lot of the characters are going through heavy stuff, and most of it is linked to death: grief and the fear of loss are always there in the background of the story. Tonari no Youkai-san is resolutely soothing and tries to provide comfort and closure about it, both through its characters themselves and its narrative... but be wary, if you watch the anime version, of its last few episodes (and I'm bracing myself for the corresponding fourth volume): through a slightly jarring and intense atmosphere shift (that may be less so in the manga version?), it tackles loss much more directly, with some clear heartwrenching moments. It obviously cares about the way it depicts its topic, though, and in the end it wants to do what its community sets out to do throughout its all run: to support you, and help you, and give you hope in spite of it all.

As with other things I recommended here, I wish for its warmth and community support to find you in these times.

Oh look I have an additional category I can put here about jealous girls and messy relationships

Look Back by Kiyotaka Oshiyama and studio Durian, from a oneshot by Tatsuki Fujimoto:

I made a post about this movie (and the original oneshot) back in November, which focuses on two girls of the same age making manga throughout their school years, Fujino and Kyomoto. Fujino is praised for years about her skills until she's faced with the art of Kyomoto, and with comments saying how good the latter is. From this, Fujino develops some intense jealousy toward her self-appointed rival, that at times pushes her forward and at times makes her give up... except said Kyomoto is a sincere admirer of her, and so she won't ever admit that she's admirative and jealous in return.

The two slowly develop a relationship that sometimes feels like genuine friendship and capture the sheer joy of creating together, and sometimes feels like a way for Fujino to somehow control a much shier, socially anxious and neurodivergent Kyomoto, by having her work for and with her. It's heartbreakingly ambiguous and realistic in a way I have not seen elsewhere in fiction. It really hurts and it's really beautiful at the same time - to see them really bond through art, and yet to see the unhealthy ground on which their relationship stands.

This movie also talks about grief, in a latter part, and guilt, and some sense of denial - and that also hurts. And it also talks about how tedious and hurtful and soul-sucking making art can be; and how it can still inevitably draw us in, and motivate us, and be such a wonderful thing when it is done to crystallize happy moments together. All this is served by a beautiful soundtrack and a very specific stunning art style, and that makes it for a great experience - not one I want to oversell, but one that is definitely interesting in several ways, and that clearly stuck with me.

Yuri is My Job! by Miman:

(June 2025 important note: as time has passed, I have realized that despite my original attachment to the characters and a good amount of the themes Yuri is My Job had elicited in me throughout a great amount of my reading (neurodivergence! difference between love and like! web of messy relationships!), all of it now feels retroactively tarnished by its tweflth volume's CSA and sexualized sexual violence, and the series' extremely sparse and subpar handling of these themes for what they are in subsequent chapters. It took me a while to grieve what this series has been in good, and I'm still interested in how it might address these topics in the future, but the joy I once found in it and to which I clung has mostly rotten and been replaced by the bitter aftertaste of its most horrendous moments.
For honesty, I will preserve what I wrote about it below; but I low-key regret putting this title here and don't feel comfortable enough recommending it it anymore. I put it in this list before the whole thing entirely settled down in my mind - but now that it has, the main feeling left in me is anger that the author inflicted this upon their readership in the first place.
Long story short, I do not wish you to read Yuri is My Job, because getting invested and then hurt by such plot points is an extremely unpleasant experience :( If you ever do read until volume 12, though, similarly conflicted reviews from the staff at yuri blog Okazu may help you get through this and possibly mend your relationship with the series one way or another; I know they helped me. Still, I hope you don't need this: there are many other great yuri mangas to read instead.)

Meta stuff with uncapitalized names

toki pona:

toki pona (literally, "the language of good", but also "the simple language") is a constructed language created by linguist Sonja Lang in 2001, of which I had been vaguely aware for years; and 2024 was when I took the plunge. Made of around 130 words and grammar rules that fit on a sheet of paper, it is designed to be extremely simple to learn and to understand. In some ways, learning toki pona changed me - allowing me to break down difficult thoughts into simple elements, reigniting my love for linguistics and learning languages, and even giving me enough of a spark to start Japanese a few months after that.

Some of its words I have adopted into daily use, because they just sound so right and practical as concepts with big semantic spaces. I also find extremely euphoria-inducing its naming system, which asks any kind of personal name to be built as a completement to a base noun, pushing people toward thinking about how they first want to be described as a concept, which feels extremely inclusive and expanding identity-wise. Also the language is mostly nongendered, which is always nice, too.

Overall, I regard toki pona as a whole extremely fondly, after months listening to music and reading work in that language (or its glyph system, sitelen pona). I hope to find some energy one of these months to put together a post about learning resources that helped me learn it. In the meantime, this wonderful 18-minute video was my first actual contact with it, and it may be yours too.

cohost:

cohost was an independent social media website that died in 2024. There are a lot of nuanced eulogies out there about it, highlighting notably its moderation problems and how its collapse came to pass. On my end, as we're leaving 2024 behind, I suppose I just want to say that cohost has been more or less the only form of social media I have been on. It was definitely a formative experience that shaped me throughout the year - sometimes with anxiety, but many times positively too, allowing me to meet even a little a lot of kind people interested in so many things.

Still, I don't think I want to reiterate this experience elsewhere in the near future: most Internet spaces feel too crowded and intimidating, and I prefer being a fox in a den, infrequently shouting about things she likes in the quiet space of a blog. I have a hard time being social these days, with a wobbly mental health. I sometimes wonder about whether cohost would have helped or not in these trying times, if it had kept on going.
Anyway. Keeping in touch is harder in this whole return to blogs and emails, but it's rewarding too. Sometimes it takes months, but that's ok: I think I'm more of a fit for that slower pace than for the permanent influx of news of social media.

In any case, this blog is my attempt at continuing what I set out to do with cohost, albeit with much less microblogging: a place where I talk about what I liked and hope it speaks to some people at some point (while trying not to say too many clumsy or wrong things, but accepting that it happens sometimes too). Many blogs shaped me throughout my years on the Internet, at random, because they were the right niche website at the right time, and I suppose I want to pay that back in some small way. So far, it's been a fun, if sometimes slightly scary experience, and I intend on continuing for a while, if I can.

Onwards.

#things I liked in...