Arata Vol. 1 Copyright VIZ Media

Let’s start off this update with something for the ladies with the newly released Shojo manga, “Arata: The Legend”. Shojo, for those who don’t know, are manga specifically geared towards women, so you can expect plenty of pretty girly-men and romance throughout. VIZ has been kind enough to summarize the plot for us, here:

In a world where humans and gods coexist, Arata is the unfortunate successor to the matriarchal Hime Clan–unfortunate because if he’s not cross-dressing to hide his gender one minute, he’s fleeing for his life the next! When Arata winds up in the modern world and switches places with a boy named Arata Hinohara, it’s a wonder which Arata is actually better off…
In Volume 1, Hinohara is the spitting image of Arata, so he suddenly finds himself fighting people after his life! As he navigates through this foreign world filled with power-hungry warriors, who will come to his aid? One thing’s for sure–it’s not easy being Arata!

Yes, that’s right. It seems to be a cross-dressing take on “The Prince and the Pauper” where the male Arata is forced to dress as a woman to keep his position in line as the clan’s next matriarchal ruler. Expect plenty of shenanigans as a result, and a fair share of  Yoai undertones in this teen manga.

Next up, the very hot-button issue surrounding “Dance in the Vampire Bund” and Funimation. For those not familiar with this, basically Funimation acquired the rights to show Bund and announced they would censor said anime for some more questionable content. Of course, there was a huge backlash against this decision, and Funimation was bombarded with rage until yesterday they made the announcement that while the stream would still be censored, DVD and Blu-ray releases should be able to remain uncensored unless the last episode of the series really cross taste borders. (Source: Anime News Network)

So there is a ton of issues on both sides of the fence. On one side, censoring is bad, and really shouldn’t exist with private DVDs for home use. On the other hand is Bund, which is pretty intense. The main character pictured here. (Sorta NSFW), while being about seven-hundred years old, has a very young appearance. With scenes depicted of not so family-friendly behavior, this could further drive those people we’re trying to convince that anime is a valid, moving form of expression. It’s a tough debate, but at least we’re seeing some kind of compromise.

That’s it for this week, but don’t forget to leave your thoughts on censorship in the comments below.