Sweet Revolution

I love Yukine Honami's sensitive and beautiful art, but she keeps picking the strangest stories for her manga. Desire was realistic but disturbing and Sweet Revolution is, well, pure fantasy but still disturbing.

It's a story about two schoolboys, Tatsuki Kandori and Ohta Amakata, who are seemingly cousins living together, but who their school mate Misaki suspects being something completely different. Tatsuki is bossy and keeps ordering Ohta around, making him do all his duties for him - and one day when Misaki is returning a bag Ohta has forgotten he catches two two boys having sex. But Ohta is crying so Misaki becomes determined to save Ohta from the "evil" Tatsuki, but has no idea of the boys' true identities. And it turns out that the boys are from another realm, and that Tatsuki is the only son and the heir of the Dragon King, and that Ohta is a homeless house spirit, and his only vassal. Boys are hiding in our world because the succession is coming up and Tatsuki is required to take a bride which he doesn't want to do.

It's an obsessive love story, of two boys in a master and servant relationship. Ohta is completely devoted to his master and has followed at his heels all his life - and as a homeless house spirit he doesn't have any other place to go either. He's got an extremely low self-esteem and thinks that purifying Tatsuki's chi (i.e. having sex with him) is the only thing he's good for. Tatsuki on the other hand is obsessed with controlling Otha and seems to be spending most of his time watching him. But on the other hand he also deeply loves Ohta and as the story progresses Tatsuki's character deepens from the obsessive bully to a devoted friend and a lover who will do anything to protect the one he (obsessively) loves.

Whereas Desire I think was saved by Honami's gorgeous art, it's not enough for Sweet Revolution. I found the story very confusing when I read it for the first time, partly because it uses flashbacks to let the reader in to the boys' background, but partly because I was having great difficulties telling Tatsuki and Misaki and their other black-haired school mates apart (Ohta is of course the blond uke). On the second read it made a lot more sense, and third time (for the review) I was starting to quite enjoy it - on the other hand it's nice that a BL title has enough depth to carry re-reads that well, but it really shouldn't come with the expense of initial readability.

I would also like to warn that if you're considering picking up Sweet Revolution because it has a "Mature" rating you shouldn't expect too much - in fact I'm not quite certain where the rating comes from. There is really only one sex scene (where Misaki walks in on Ohta and Tatsuki) and absolutely nothing is shown - it's possible that the rating is because of the seeming coercion, but I think 16+ would probably be more accurate. In fact, sex is not relevant to this story and there isn't really sexual tension or sexual desire between the two characters - sex is a purification ritual for Tatsuki in our world, and a way to control Ohta.

Giving a rating for this manga was incredibly difficult. Like already said I adore Honami's art: her school boys are the prettiest around and the way she conveys emotions with character expressions and postures is spot on. I also have a particular penchant for master and servant stories so it helps while reading this book. I have decided on a C however because while story is interesting and even touching, in the end of it all I don't actually care about the characters. Ohta lacks any kind of free will, and Tatsuki lacks all sensitivity. I don't even really know who I would recommend this title to: I think that if you liked Desire, you'll most likely like Sweet Revolution, and if you love Honami's art you'll love this one. But if you're looking for hot guy-sex or deep earth shattering emotions this is not the manga for you.