.:PARENT'S GUIDE: DOUJINSHI:.

What is doujinshi, you ask? Creating doujinshi is a common practice in any fandom. Doujinshi are comics created by fans of an existing series and characters. In Japan there are doujinshi conventions (notably Comiket) where artists can sell copies of their creations to other fans. There are doujinshi for all ages at varying levels of quality, ranging from art that looks like it was ripped out of a middle school sketchbook to pieces that almost perfectly mimic to colorful cel-style of Japanese animation. In fact, some famous manga-ka (or Japanese comic artists) started their careers off creating doujinshi. One of these is a famous all-female group known as CLAMP who is responsible for titles such as Card Captor Sakura, X, Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicles, xxxHolic, and Magic Knight Rayearth. Another well-known example is Ken Akamatsu of Love Hina and Negima?! fame.

You may be wondering if the practice of selling doujinshi is technically legal. The answer is no. It is illegal to recreate and sell copyrighted works. I recently read an article in Wired magazine that discussed the doujinshi phenomenon. It all boiled down to manga companies looking the other way and letting the sale of these amateur works continue. The reason for this being that doujinshi sales do not harm the professional manga market, and may in fact be advantageous. A person who buys a doujinshi is likely a person who is already familiar with (and has likely already purchased) the series, and if he is not, will likely look up and purchase the original. The sheer number of doujinshi artists and consumers, also, makes controlling it nearly impossible.

When we get into Tokyo Mew Mew doujinshi specifically, we get into a number of issues that need to be addressed. The main issue that needs to be mentioned is intended audience. This is because most Tokyo Mew Mew doujinshi is aimed at adult audiences - usually adult male audiences. Now, why this is, I am not sure, but nearly all of the doujinshi for this series that I have come across fall into a category called "hentai". What is hentai? Hentai basically means "perverted" in Japanese. Typically these are manga that involve explicit sex scenes not appropriate for readers under 18 years of age (and in some cases I wonder if even this is old enough). These can be characterized by a number of things and vary greatly in their approaches and how "bad" they are.

The mildest of these... I will take a title called "Strawberry Sex" by Studio Wallaby as my example, offers us with an actual storyline. Ichigo's upset because Masaya is busy with other things, so she is relaxing by a brook when Ryou Shirogane happens to show up. They talk for a bit, and he offers her a soda. Then Kisshu spots them and becomes jealous, sends a Chimera Anima at them which Ryou blocks and Mew Ichigo later defeats, and Ryou is knocked unconscious in the process. Ryou eventually wakes up, and upon seeing that Ichigo's ears have appeared because she was so upset, he takes the opportunity to kiss her, and it goes on from there. Ryou decides to take things further, having the decency to stop and ask her permission, and it leads to sexual intercourse. Supposedly this is Ryou's way of "cheering her up" since Masaya is absent. While the content is adult, this is a fairly tame example, and though improbable seeing as Ichigo is devoted to Masaya in the original series, it is otherwise realistically handled.

With your more graphic titles, it is common to see overexaggerated proportions - especially that of thighs and breasts, group sex, switched gender body parts (called "futanari"), rape (and in some cases these are monsters or machines rather than actual people), et cetera. Oftentimes there is little or no plot. The girls are frequently portrayed as objects or pets, rather than people, and that may be what is the most disturbing thing of all, especially coupled with the titles where the other participant remains completely anonymous.

So if you are under 18 and interested in owning doujinshi, please realize what you are getting yourself into. I cannot express how much it worries me when bids of doujinshi rise dramatically on eBAY, when often the only images posted are the covers and a clean or censored page, and there is no way of knowing exactly who is buying it. If you are a parent, make sure you know exactly what your children are bidding on!

You probably want to know if there is any doujinshi worth looking at for younger audiences. While there is no published doujinshi I feel I can recommend, there are a number of online projects by English-speaking artists. Notably are projects such as "Child Care", "Shadows of the Past", "He Made Me Fall", and "She Can't Change". I'm also working on starting a Tokyo Mew Mew doujinshi circle on this site, which will focus on individual works and multi-artist anthologies by character. All of these are suitable for younger audiences.

Here are some links to non-adult English doujinshi you may enjoy:

+ Child Care (Keiichiro)
+ He Made Me Fall (LettucexMasaya, IchigoxRyou)
+ Shadows of the Past (IchigoxKisshu, RyouxLettuce)
+ She Can't Change (LettucexPie) + TokiDokiMyuMyu (Original Character; note - some cursing)

Here is the link to MewProject.NET's doujinshi project group, Myuu Doujiinkai.

1. Ichiban! (Ichigo Anthology)