We are currently in 2026 and it has never been a great time for people who loves queer media. In the sea of garbage that the world has thrown at us, there were a silver lining that when the art is good enough, love will wins. And that's exactly how queer media especially in Asia has seen a bit of a golden age. From BL there's an explosion with Thai BL and that really propped up a lot of BLs in other countries like Japan, South Korea, and even Western countries like Canada. There are also a lot of great queer representation in media especially in trans characters strangely enough in anime. While they're sometimes still seen as comedic relief, their stories really humanized them and they became favorites amongst anime fans. And then there's the curious case of GL and Yuri.
As someone who have followed this genre before I came out as trans, GL and yuri has never been as popular as this decade. I was into this genre when the biggest GL that we had was Utena and Sakura Trick. Heck the yuri anime that came out the season I was into the genre was Citrus and I ate that shit up even though the stories derailed in Volume 3. Suffice to say GL and yuri weren't seen as a good investment for a lot of studios. The running joke here is that yuri anime won't get passed one season or never finished their story or arc. It was really not a good time for us Girls Love fans let's put it that way.
Though looking back at that era I am wondering if any genres at all would've survived with the avalanche of new power fantasy genre you might know it, it's called Isekai. No amount of anime retrospective in the 2010s would be completed if we don't talk about the twink main character's in another world sized elephant in the room. Even though we still in that Isekai rush even now, in 2010s it was seen as something fresh something new. Yeah some of it did aged badly, but they're using the trope of trapped in another world or MMORPG and used it creatively. Anime like Re:Zero, Konosuba, Sword Art Online, Overlord, and Tensura really opened the door for these type of shows to be very lucrative for better...but mostly for worst. And that sadly really pushed aside a lot of great anime including the queer one.
So how did we get here? How come there's now influx of LGBTQ elements in anime and manga in the 2020s? Well, there are a few theories I can think of. With how easy it is to make manga or light novel these days, voices that never been heard are suddenly have a medium to express themselves without sacrificing their authenticity. There's also a possibility that with the rise in popularity of anime and manga in the mainstream lexicon, not just in Asia but the world, with more women and minorities reading and watching more anime, so too they find GL and BL and got opened up to a lot more stories that resonated with them fully. Or maybe because those stories are great enough that the cishet people have to noticed it like in the case of The Summer Hikaru Died or Green Yuri.
Now this is really great news for me especially given how barren the scene was when I first started to pay attention, even with the manga releases. But, I still have that nagging feeling that maybe we are a bit overselling it or that something of quality was a miss. With the spotlight being pointed at these genres, came really bad discourses that have been brewing for a long time, but definitely being blown out of proportion.
The one controversy or discourse that I wanna highlight in this piece is about how a queer media is not queer media if it's only implied or subtly hinted. Now I would say that these crowds can missed the point wildly with how they interpret the queer media that they watched. But to their credit, there's a truth that seeing a media that you have investment with and then at the end, the main couple didn't really moved much can be frustrating I get that. But I think they missed the point of what subtle queer media played into in the modern age. It's time to talk about one of those shows that mastered this and also the first yuri anime series of this decade.
Asteroid In Love is an anime based on a manga about Mira meeting a guy named Ao in a campsite when she was younger. They have the best time together for the weekend and Mira promised Ao that they'll meet again and find an asteroid together. Cut to the start of high school year where Mira applied to this high school because they have astronomy club in it. Turns out the club had merge with geology club and under the new name called "geoscience". She visited the club with the teacher supervising it and found four students in it. Turns out one of the members of the club is Ao as we found out that she's a girl. Then hijinks ensues.
Now let's start off with what I don't really like about the anime because it is a bit substantial. The animation can be wonky at times, you can see some of the proportions and stuff like that aren't up to par with what Doga Kobo can make. The story can be very generic especially the middle part. The fact that this is anime was halted in the middle to give a recap episode because of the start of the pandemic didn't helped the pacing. And honestly if you expect stuff like even New Game! you'll be disappointed.
But what I like about this anime is the one I really want to talk about which is the chemistry between Mira and Ao. There is an art towards subtlety that a lot of people didn't really get especially in the queer media fandom. Yes the fact that they didn't at least confessed will drive people off the wall and sometimes you should have the balls to do it like The Owl House. But, there's a certain charm in how the tension of the scenes conveyed when it's only implied. I know it's pure fantasy but isn't that what you seek out in your escapism?
There's this nagging feeling inside me that I shouldn't try to agree with the consesus. The contrarian side in me would love to say "Well if you want a better yuri anime just watch this instead" and I would be set for life as the one that buck against the trend. But when I tried to do that, I would eventually have to be true to myself and just accept defeat. I know that the reason why this was forgotten in the wayside because afterwards, yuri and GL anime are getting better and more popular. And that populous energy I shouldn't reject at all.
Though there's a certain part of my brain that do prefer anime like Asteroid in Love or Yuru Camp. Stuff that relaxed you without thinking and honestly that's just my privilege talking. Yes I'm trans and bi that made me marginalized almost immediately. But I do live in a relatively middle income family and also I'm part of the majority religion and race wise. So there's this feeling that I shouldn't think and that you just need to relax and something will come to you because you are part of the majority.
The reality is that my generation won't be able to taste that privilege one way or the other. So being subtle is actually can be healing like trying to subliminally saying "I wan't to be free but I can't". Maybe that's why this has resonance with me. Seeing Ao has almost the trans color bed sheet might be very reaching, but at the end of the day symbolism is important. This has been a long time coming to say that Asteroid in Love is one of my favorite anime of all time. Not because it's perfect, but because it dared to be not perfect. It's flawed and has a lot of problem. But for me, this hit just enough for me to just put the smile on my face whenever I remembered a certain part of the anime. The anime was left behind but I will remember it as the hidden gem that it is.
So a bit of a short one since I'm still knee deep on writing my retrospective list for 2013. I hope this bite size review/essay will be enough for this month. But yeah 2013 beckon and oh boy.
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