Just!!

Reviewed by Jeanne

Sort of depends where you come from, I guess. To me this story is fluff- fun, dismissable, with all the weight of an after dinner mint. But for those who don't go for the downest and dirtiest of yaoi, it might be a sweet frothy romance and just the ticket. There's no telling.

We've got Sekine, the dark-haired rambunctious high school judo champion. We've got his roommate, the blond best-selling author and high school student (yes, it's manga fantasyland time) Kosakai. And on page 1, a bunch of schoolgirls are sighing over the two and wondering if they're really an item like everyone says. They're overheard by Sekine's kouhai on the judo team, Tamura Mieko, who's determined to have Sekine for herself. The book is about her 'rivalry' with Kosakai, all fought out fair and square and in the best tradition of good sportsmanship. The 'just' of the title is the 'fair and equal' just, not the 'only' one. It's a sweetly humourous love triangle, with everyone being terribly chivalrous and considerate about everyone else's feelings.

The only trouble, from a western point of view, is that there's uhh 'just' no resolution to the situation. Sekine makes the decision not to make a decision, helped out by Kosakai who sends him after Mieko when she rushes off in tears, having concluded that her suit is hopeless. It's left at 'I love you both'-- or perhaps, in view of the lightness of the whole thing, that 'suki' should have its alternative meaning- 'I like you both.'

Nothing happens sexually, of course. It's all gag and joke stuff, with Kosakai dropping heavily innuendoed remarks to get Sekine's goat and Sekine having hot dreams about Kosakai and/or Mieko. Kosakai keeps asking Sekine 'how do you feel about me?' and not getting an answer. We only have one small indication from the perpetually ironic Kosakai as to how he feels about Sekine. (He's serious, were you wondering.) In the end Mieko gets a judo scholarship to study abroad for the Olympics, and the guys are left still rooming together, and probably not having a relationship beyond that of good friends. Mieko wins her gold medal and tells the world, as well as Sekine and Kosakai, that now she's coming back. The end.

I'm a fan of Minekura's other, more famous series, Saiyuuki. It's fun for me as a Saiyuuki fan to look at the familiar artwork, even if no-one in Just is remotely as seductive as the (totally yaoi-free) Sanzou-san-tachi. Odd that she should come off as more erotic in her shounen manga than she does in her yaoi-lite Chara one. But no matter. Minekura does good female characters- feisty and competent and likable. One cherishes the picture of Mieko flipping her senpai against the wall in order to get her point through his head. The point is that he has to go win his judo championship while she will go rescue his kidnapped roommate for him. Everyone here runs on chivalry and giri and the whole damn thing. Minekura does not bad chivalry and giri as a running theme, which is a nice change from modern day loutish looking out for No.1. It's just that, by me, she does it all better in Saiyuuki. And there on the last page of this published in '96 manga is a sketch of Sanzou and the guyz with the penji'd caption 'I'm going to try this- I want to draw a fantasy adventure.' She did. Ohhh, did she ever.