Warning: If you are homophopic, stay away from this title. You were warned.
Genre: Shounen-Ai/Yaoi | Drama | Psychological | Tragedy
Company: ???
American Liscensing Company: None
Format: One 3-part short story
Dates: ????
Original Creator: Kaori Yuki
Age Rating: A definite 18 and up
How much I read: Entire story

Synopsis: Adrian seems to be just an ordinary 27 year old teacher in L.A. No one knows that he is actually a mass murderer known as the "Blind Man" who seeks out and murders young male prostitutes at night. One night, one of the young prostitutes, 14 year old Lawerance, a victim of a male brothel, is a witness to one of Adrain's murders. Adrian is sure that he will have to kill the boy since he saw him committing the crime, but before he can set any plans, Lawerance tracks him down and faces the disturbed teacher. Suddenly Adrian has found that he's fallen in love with the boy, and Lawerance needs Adrian just as much. Can their new found happiness together last?

SCORE: 85%

Highly, highly disturbing. An eerie reminder of how everyone is very, very human, and how truly horrible life can be. If you've ever seen the movie Boys Don't Cry, this tragic manga will remind you of it, except this is about 2 guys instead of 2 girls.

Plot: I am one that avoids shounen-ai/yaoi stories that have underaged participates (especially if one is a boy that is barely half the age of his partner...10 years difference is usually the max I allow, for any kind of pairing). However, this story was short and available to read on one of the scanlation sites I found recently (look for link to site near bottom of this page), so I checked it out.

This story left me disturbed by it's disgusting truth of life and left me with a few tears the 2nd time reading it through (not the first time I read it though; I was too asleep to let it really sink in. ^_^)

I was surprised to see how this piece was utterly wrong; everything, and I mean everything about the 2 main characters was disturbing. However, the characters were meant to be that way, and it made them very sinfully human. I'm sure that it wouldn't be impossible for something like this to happen in real life...that's what is really unsettling. This manga was short, but it worked this way. It probably would have been even better if it had been just a few installments longer, since what was written was barely enough to get the characters' and their emotions established. However, that's just one of few drawbacks of this story.

The point of this manga is how everyone is human and the need of another person's understanding is a huge necesssity. Little to nothing was actually really focused on the taboo of their relationship, the focuse was more on their own disturbing pasts and present lives.

If I'm correct, this manga-ka is the same one to make Angel Sanctuary (which I really haven't given a chance, but so far from what I've seen, I have not liked). No suprise there on why this story is so disturbing then.

Visual: A very strong yet gentle style, and you can just see the sadness in Lawerance's eyes, and the fear in Adrian's. Any love scenes were actually quite short and not too intensely graphic, so that was a relief (I don't care for many sex scenes often in general anyway). The blood was truly amazing, and emotion was drawn very well. Nice visuals.

Extra Rants and Bitching: Lawerance's gender and age is not something to ignore in this story. His gender and age is what adds to the disturbing atmosphere of this manga, as well as Adrian's past. This was a good story, and if it had been a straight pairing with legal age participates, it would have been good still, but not nearly as unsettling as it needed to be.

I highly recommend you avoid this piece if you're homophobic, can't stand underage situations (I can understand that) or can't handle a lot of gruesome bloody scenes. But, that's why this story is this way; it wouldn't be the same without this unsettling factors.

Score Comments: A very good and tragic story that may make you shed a couple tears. I docked the score for it's length, which was good, but just slightly too quick and short. Like Eva, this manga is only good depending on your own opinion because of the story's nature. Once again, you'll defintely have to draw your own opinion from this one.

Websites:
Sakura-Crisis.net (The whole manga short story is available in scanlations on this site)

Have a website about this series, or do you know of a good one? Want me to link to it on this review? Well, the feel free to email the sucker to me! Just make sure to put "Review Link" in the subject.