LinkBy Hikari Toriumi, A Story Artist At Walt Disney Animation Studios

Link By Hikari Toriumi, a story artist at Walt Disney Animation Studios

Pest control

first and last spring of youth

They haven't even kissed yet. Somebody save them

I love how much of the Togachako chapters and ending of Ochako in MHA mimic the first ever yuri manga published.

I have been on a shojo kick and tried to read all manga that kickstarted GL and BL, and especially the Year 24 group authors (go read Moto Hagio... her work is wild). Among the Year 24, the author Yamagishi Ryouko who wrote the first yuri manga: "Shiroi Heya no Futari".

This post will have full spoilers for this manga!

The manga follows the story of Resine, a very sweet girl who is also very naive, and her new roommate Simone, who is a rebel, often laughs and can be kind of mean. Simone is much more open with her feelings, she loves freely as well and she soon falls in love with Resine and declares her love openly.

Resine tries to forget about Simone by dating Rounaud but he is not what she really wants.

Resine is not ready to accepts Simone's love - not because she does not love her back, but because she is afraid of the rumors around them, basically of society's reaction. She decides to leave the school.

Later she finds out Simone has been killed and she laments that she was at fault for it - because Simone was killed after goading a man, telling this man that she was in love with someone else when he tried to flirt with her. Simone is stabbed to death and dies because of blood loss, smiling and thinking of Resine:

The end of the manga sees Resine reading a poem Simone wrote about her and for her, and she decides to love Simone for the rest of her life and never love again, always mourning Simone.

The ending sets the scene with Resine alone on a cliff/in the forest, crying about Simone while Rounaud (the man Resine tried to fall in love with to avoid being queer) runs towards her to console her.

This is just like Deku reaching for Ochako while Ochako is mourning. We can see Resine and Ochako both curling over each other's in pain, to cry about Toga-Simone.

Their regret is also similiar, it is not only pain but guilt. Both Resine and Ochako think their loved one died because of them.

I thought the similarities were quite a lot. Maybe it is by chance, maybe it is just because of how influencial the first yuri was in determining the standards of many subsequient GL work, but it is still interesting.

Resine and Ochako are both positive girls, naive girls experiencing love for the first time. Both try to fall in love/fall in love with a boy (Deku, in the case of MHA) which is the socially acceptable choice for them, the choice that society would not mock or shame.

Both characters are put in contrast with another (Simone and Toga) who is open with her feelings. She is not afraid of acting freely, she wants to be free and she keeps her freedom even if that leads her to her death. The "teaching" experience is the same for both Simone and Ochako: live freely, declare what you love without shame.

Many expected that this meant Ochako would declare her feelings towards Deku, and instead Horikoshi uses this lesson to allow Ochako to mourn for Toga and to feel pain.

In both manga, Ochako and Resine end up living for Toga and Simone. Resine declares that she will always love and mourn Simone, while we see Ochako dedicating her life to never allow someone to be abandoned by society like Toga was:

HIGH ON STANDARDS LOW ON SKILL. CREATIVE PROCESS MAKE YOU ILL