On Sidonia, To Love Ru, and @lychee's guilty pleasure of harem manga

(Current Playlist: nothing... :C)

These past few days, I've been re-reading Knights of Sidonia, and I was reminded of multiple feelz I hold dear for this series.

What kind of feelz?

Well.. I guess to go into this, it's a bit of a short long story, so sit down, kick back, relax, get a cup of coffee, and definitely flee for your dear lives if you don't want to get caught in another #lycheeramble.

Oh, and you were wondering about the clickbait title?

Yeah, yeah, there's nothing to see here. @lychee has been leveling-up with making clickbait-sounding threads, so you can ignore it entirely.

Yup. There's nothing to see at all. Bye bye~!

*waves*

Now shoo if you don't want to read a text wall.

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On Sidonia, To Love Ru, and @lychee's guilty pleasure of harem manga
@lychee writes stuff - blog post #5

disclaimer: despite what this image may suggest @lychee does not stare at computer screens creepily in the middle of the night... blue light isn’t good for you and makes it hard to sleep!

*ahem*

So now that maybe 15% of the original readers are gone... (or not?), let's talk about harem.

harem harem harem harem harem harem harem.

what's so good about harem?

....

absolutely nothing!!!! \o/

....

Okay, sure, sure. Yes, harem sucks (99% of the time), but why does @lychee still end up reading it? Yes, @lychee admits it, @lychee does read harem as a guilty pleasure... well, actually @lychee reads a lot of weird and morbid stuff that besides harem, but we'll brush that aside for now.

It might seem odd that I read harem when I barely even spin that way (sorry, you're not going to find any yuri here!), but there's a certain aspect of a certain particular brand of harem plot that I really dig.

I mean, a majority of harems suck (sorry, I say that with a completely straight face). It's only a rare few (maybe 5%) that I actually feel like I can connect to.

To really explain, let's talk about the harem in Knights of Sidonia.

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The main reason why I like harem is because I'm a total sucker for jealousy-angst.

I don't care a single cookie crumb about the MC, and most the time the MC is boring, but I'm sure even the guys could agree with me on that.

Usually, the harems that I completely melt over are the kind where there's heavy competition between the girls, and furthermore the girls are friends, so they don't exactly want to step on each other's toes, but there's definitely sparks flying and envy/jealousy/angst in the air.

Or well, maybe it isn't obviously there on screen, but in my headcannon, it's usually that way.

Hey, hey it has to be done gracefully.

If the harem is too happy-go-lucky, fluffy, and rainbow unicorn like, I can't watch it.

I also can't take it seriously when the girls fight in a catty kind of way (where the purpose is only to exhibit their moe moe disgusting sappy overflowing crawl over the MC moe).

Sorry, but can I see less of the MC?

At least give me the good stuff, bruh~

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The harem in Sidonia is precisely the kind of harem that hits the exactly right spots for me.

Why? Well, I mean let's take a quick look at each of the main female leads:

Candidate A: Hoshijirou - dead girlfriend </3

Candidate B: Hoshijirou placenta - alien slime of dead girlfriend, research specimen, can't speak Engrish, has tentacles

Candidate C: Izana - 3rd gender forever friend-zoned in childhood friend territory

Candidate D: Yuhata - too busy at work making sure the ship doesn't blow up, can't even third wheel (and in fact is no-wheeling)

Candidate E: Tsumugi - Tentacle monster, daughter of ex-girlfriend and love rival, nice effort but the height gap is a bit much...

Can't you see how glorious this lineup is?

There's so much angst angst angst angst I love it!

I mean, sure, there's no that much angst or fighting on screen, but I can smell jealousy-angst from a mile away. On the surface, they're good friends and everything, but on the inside they can't help but feel all the pain because MC-kun is at first only interested in the dead girl, and then later the placenta copy of the dead girl. There's a clear leader in this competition... the only problem is that she's not even alive!!!!

The instability of this harem is precisely what makes it so enjoyable for me.

There's inferiority complexes flying back and forth, and each of the characters can't help but compare themselves to the other candidates secretly on the inside. In Izana's case, she's not even a girl (at first). In Tsumugi's case... well... let's start with the fact that she can't even fit her entire body in the same room with MC... never mind the fact she's a tentacle monster and doesn't even look human...

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The reason why the jealousy-angst of the harem scenario appeals to me so much is because it's something that I feel like I can relate with deeply.

Envy is not a pretty emotion.

Actually, it's a really really ugly emotion, because it can make you think negative things about your friends and other people whom you are otherwise very close to.

When I am perfectly honest about myself, and I look at myself within, envy is one of the strongest emotions that I see lurking around in there, and I'm not proud of it. In fact, it haunts me sometimes, and it's very strange to be self-aware and think:

"Oh, there it is again. I'm feeling it right now. That's my good friend, the Envy."

Nobody likes to talk about their negative parts, and that includes me. I won't talk about the times where my envy has gone sour and wrecked its own havoc.

However, knowing that it is within me is kind of gloomy to think about sometimes. If I feel particularly chuuni, I've even embraced it in the past and gone for the "villainess" theme. After all, of course it's the villainess whose the most envious and jealous of MC-chan, and that's why she does all the dark and morbid and scary and ugly things that she does.

Don't worry! I'm not scary at all! I promise you that! I'm definitely not the hyper-clingy stalkerish you-can't-get-rid-of-me yandere-type secretly on the inside.

I believe that I lie and deceive and manipulate and twist truths and half-truths more than most people do. Kind of like... weaponized social interactions? Can that be a way of putting it?

Can "cute and harmless" be considered a facade too???

((emojis really are the most wonderful things!))

disclaimer: I'm definitely not chuuuuniiiii even though I'm already 23 years old!!!!!

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Ahem. You can pretend you didn't see that leak from the dark period in my dark history.

You see, the real story of this particular Villainess begins... hmm... well, let’s just say it was a long time ago.

A long time ago, there was a Senpai (don't worry, it's not the same Senpai in #YandereSimulator), and like all senpai's are, Senpai was popular! Senpai had multiple and many admirers, and trust me, Villainess-chan know the identities of precisely each and every one of them even though Senpai was #toodense.

Villainess-chan... well, she wasn't popular. Nope, not at all. What do you expect? What kind of person do you have to be to be on NUF?

Anyways, Villainess-chan knew she was hopeless from beginning because she was (believe it or not) the next door neighbor osanajimi, and like all good otaku with common sense know, childhood friends are DOOMED to be friendzoned from the beginning. No questions asked!

Nope! Zit! Nada! Zero chance!

Hey, hey, wouldn't that make a great JP light novel title?

"My next door neighbor can't be the villainess!" <--- the story of my life.

Anyways, Senpai had 4-5 other love interests that Senpai cycled through between middle school and high school and college. As for me... well, duh, what did you expect from an osananajimi? I liked Senpai since middle school! Straight! For.... wait let me count... ten years! Ten whole years!!!

And of course, Villainess-chan watched as Senpai went through each and every single one of those love interests...

...and Villainess-chan definitely may or may not have sabotaged some of them and thrown some dirt around.

...but well, that's a classified information. You didn't hear anything.

I definitely did not spend my entire middle school, high school, and college years playing Yandere Simulator in real life. Yandere Simulator came out in 2014! I'm innocent! There's no way I could be influenced by such an indecent game! If anything, you could argue the game is based on me! mwahahaha!!!

.....

okay... I'm getting bored now, let's press the fast forward button.

Now it's year 2018, and somehow Villainess-chan managed to win the war of attrition and managed to snare Senpai back in college, and now they've been dating for quite some time.

Please don't ask what devilish tricks Villainess-chan employed to brainwash Senpai because honestly she doesn't have a damn clue how it happened.

Evil triumphs after all~~~ yay~~~~

The end.

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Anyways, it's getting close to my bedtime, and I've roughly explained why I'm a complete masochist when it comes to jealousy-angst-envy-hurt-comfort stories. The more the merrier! Bring on the pain!!!!!

Oh, I like neotare and cheating and that kind of stuff too.

Hmm... it seems like I'm forgetting something.

Oh, right, To love ru, how could I forget?

Well, I'm out of time, so I'll leave you with only one note.

MOMO IS THE BEST I LOVE YOU I SUPPORT YOU ON YOUR DREAM FOR THE ONE TRUE HAREM END!!!!