In too many years reading comics, I’ve lost count of the time I’ve looked at heated exchanges between apparently heterosexual male characters and muttered, “Just kiss already.” In the second volume of Kio Shimoku’s Genshiken (Del Rey), a man and a woman actually inspire the response.
What is this phenomenon? Hetyay?
In this case, the simmering undercurrent comes from otaku-hating Saki and nerd plus ultra Madarame. They’re natural enemies, obviously, pretty and predatory versus marginal and obsessive (think snake and mongoose), but there’s something more. They take too much delight in needling each other and zeroing in on each other’s weak points for it to be anything but blistering, shameful attraction.
And now, before I start sounding too much like an otaku myself, I’ll move on to more general reactions.
With the characters largely established in the first volume, it’s time for the manga to set up something resembling a plot. Since most of its protagonists are more interested in buying things than doing things, plots are a bit marginal. The club runs the risk of being eliminated by the officious campus activities vice president, and the members aren’t exactly equipped to respond. This leaves most of the heavy lifting to Saki, and Shimoku does a reasonably good job of illustrating the reasons why she might actually help the club. He also manages to maintain enough of her ant-at-the-picnic persona for things to be credible. It’s nice, careful character work.
But Genshiken does meander. It’s more interested in subculture immersion than narrative drive, so readers looking for a story with urgency will be disappointed. It holds up as a gently weird, funny character study, though, and I’m still enjoying it.