Entries for August 2005:
<previous | next >

I want to draw your attention to a friend's work, who's begun selling gay drawings on eBay. He signs "Alex del Hierro" and intends to do those really nice black & white drawings if he manages to sell them. They're cheap (at least at the beginning of the bids), and I'd really like to see him develop as an artist, so go and see his selling list.
------------------
Update 08/22: My friend has also built a gallery where you can see the uncensored drawings (they're shown censored on eBay). See here.

Tim Barela's strip Leonard & Larry has now been over for about three years, and I haven't found a trace of a new project by the author, which is a shame since he had a very unique voice in the world of gay comics. How Real Men Do It is the fourth collection (published in 2003), but doesn't collect the end of the strip.
In this volume, Barela keeps on developing his cast, with friends, lovers and births in the family becoming fodder for gags ranging from the very silly to the rather serious. In his sitcom way, the author addresses a number of prejudices, mainly revolving around homophobia and racism. The characters aging is also made fun of, Larry still having trouble adjusting to his late forties... and impeding fifties - but as usual, Barela laughs with his characters, not against them. Even the reactionary ones are given some good sides, after all. There's a great coming-out, hunky straight plumbers discovering the joys of gay modeling, and another woman trying to seduce a gay guy. Hilarity ensues.
It's really hard leaving those characters again, especially since it might be for the last time, since there are no current plans to collect the last strips, according to the publisher. Tim Barela's Leonard & Larry deserves better than that, but it shows that even the best (and best-known) gay strips don't have much clout.

Tina's fourth review is of a yaoi title, which are now numerous in English.

Retail | $11.99 USD
Page count | 176
Release | July 2005
ISBN | 0-9766045-0-7
Publisher | Drama Queen 

Drama Queen has done what Be Beautiful was unable or unwilling to do…

Everyone knows I am not a big fan of licensed Yaoi, yet I got my hands on a copy of Brother tonight. No picture reading here man! This one is licensed and in English…and completely uncensored. Gay fans of hard-yaoi should get this book before buying any other licensed material claiming to be for ‘mature readers’. This is how it’s done.

Brother is by Yuzuha Ougi, and it’s about a 22 year old advertising exec named Asuka who is quite a chipper if not spastic young man [we all know a guy like this don’t we…?] who has only two problems in life: one, he still a virgin and two, he can’t get it up. Of course one can be blamed on the other so technically they are same problem-he’s convinced himself his problem stems from a romantic [if not rather claustrophobic] encounter with his young step-brother when they were boys.

As if on cue we then meet younger step brother Yui. Yui is a strapping 17 year old sports star who arrives back in Japan and confronts Asuka over their childhood encounter, but their argument leads to something more. Dear Lord, we have a pair of Step-Brothers who stumble into bed together, have some hot sex, and then try and build a relationship. Now that is YAOI baby! This book is a welcome ‘ball-grab’ to the watered down fiascos some other licensors of hard-yaoi tried to bring over from Japan. Ougi’s men are nicely toned, detailed, and quite lovely. The sex scenes are very explicit with well drawn private parts-there is NO CENSORING in this book; you get dangling bits, you get penetration, you get yaoi-romance coupled with graphic encounters complete with very sensual ‘f*ck-faces’…what a treat. I cannot comment on the translations since I never read the original Japanese material, but I can say they even translated the comments of the artist at the end, which is a nice ending touch to a very well delivered title.

This is Drama Queen’s first licensed release and I say bravo. The printing is on par with American publisher Yaoi-Press’s quality, clear and crisp, with strong binding and decent price tag. The dust jacket is an added bonus not found with any other licensed title in the states, and the cover art is true to what was sold in Japan. It’s worth the $11.99 USD even though it’s only 176 pages, come on…Playboy does cost more than People Magazine-even though you know damn well they cost the same to make. So compared to what other publishers are charging for ‘censored’ hard-material, this book is worth it. You get shelf worthy smut in a package that is built to last.

Gynocrat
Tina Anderson