Queering the Guillotine

It's time for another grab bag of gay comics! This week we mostly cover series depicting queer adolescents coming to terms with themselves and their identities and relationships to other people. Plus, Sarazanmai got a spin-off comic so we naturally had to cover that too. We share our queerpinions on:

Roadqueen: Eternal Roadtrip to Love

A Tropical Fish Years for Snow Vol. 1

Sarazanmai: Reo and Mabu

Heartstopper Vol. 1

Blue Flag Vol. 1-2

Queer authenticity and art specifically for queer people

Believable depictions of adolescent characters and emotions

You can find the episode on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Podcast Addict.

Content warning: We’re a fairly NSFW podcast that includes use of reclaimed homophobic slurs. Our discussion this episode contains spoilers for all the aforementioned titles, as well as discussions of police/policing and homophobia both external and internalized.

It's our second Patreon episode! The topic at hand is Haruichi Furudate's Haikyu!!, the best ongoing comic in the world (at least according to Alex). We share our queerpinions on:

Haikyu!! chapters 1-69

Chapter one: the GOAT or kind of slow?

The Karasuno team members and their early character arcs

Furudate's talents for comedy, horror, and just plain awesome sports action

Rival teams and characters as foils to Hinata and Kageyama

You can find the episode on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Podcast Addict. You can find the article Trevor mentions here.

Content warning: We’re a fairly NSFW podcast that includes use of reclaimed homophobic slurs. Our discussion this episode contains spoilers for Haikyu!! up through chapter 69.

We go a bit long again this week, but hey, there's a ton to talk about. Moriking and Chainsaw Man continue to be high quality while Time Paradox Ghostwriter...does not. Also of note are our parting thoughts on The Promised Neverland, why we could never do sponcon, and how the latest new batch of Jump series is shaping up. We share our queerpinions on:

Act-Age chapters 114-118

Chainsaw Man chapters 71-75

Moriking chapters 6-10

My Hero Academia chapters 273-276

The Promised Neverland chapters 179-181

Spy x Family chapters 27.1-29

Time Paradox Ghostwriter chapters 3-7

You can find all our episodes on Spotify, Podcast Addict, and Apple Podcasts!

Spoiler and content warning: We’re a fairly NSFW-podcast that uses reclaimed homophobic slurs. We also spoil the hell out of all the series mentioned above. Content-wise they (and our discussions of them) touch on physical violence, blood, gore, and sexual objectification of women and girls.

Welcome back, one and all, to the Naruto discourse. The time has come to dissect Sasuke's battle with Itachi, as well as its resulting lore dumps about the brothers' bond and Senju/Uchiha tensions across Konohagakure's history. We share our queerpinions on:

Naruto chapters 384-403

Artistic renderings of various types of jutsu during the battle

Itachi as a tragic hero figure (and whether that's an accurate descriptor)

Some major irony

Developing characters' motivations after the fact

You can also find the episode on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Podcast Addict! To catch up on our Naruto coverage thus far, check out parts one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, and eight.

Content warning: We’re a fairly NSFW podcast that includes use of reclaimed homophobic slurs. Our discussion this episode is full of Naruto spoilers up through chapter 403. Content-wise these chapters include lots of body horror and death.

Things are a little different in this one! Trevor streams "Solo" by Jennie and records an episode alone, reacting and commenting on Sony's Playstation 5 presentation! In a year where E3 was blessedly cancelled after the ESA fully stepped in it last year, we have these digital presentations to enjoy and in this episode Trevor gives their queerpinions on:

How art styles are being flattened by attempts at realistic graphics

The difference in mood present in the Demon's Souls remake

Hoping at least one game shown is free to play

The degree to which "originality" is both fake and lacking in the IPs

You can also find the episode on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Podcast Addict! For more of our gayming overage, check out episodes seven, fifteen, seventeen, and twenty-six!

Content warning: We’re a fairly NSFW podcast that includes use of reclaimed homophobic slurs.

We hope you're interested in deep dives on boys' love manga, because that's what we have for you this week. We're discussing Takahashi Hidebu's Yuki and Matsu (or Yuki to Matsu), a story about found family, love in limbo, and lots and lots of sex and gore. We share our queerpinions on:

Takahashi Hidebu's Yuki and Matsu Vol. 1-3

The series's handling of sex work and gender roles

Melodrama and affecting portrayals of the characters' anxieties

The arc of the main characters' romance

Hidebu's renderings of sex and bodies

You can find the episode on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Podcast Addict!

Content warning: We’re a fairly NSFW podcast that includes use of reclaimed homophobic slurs. This episode contains explicit spoilers for all of Yuki and Matsu. The series (and thus our discussion of it) touches on sexual assault, familial abandonment, blood and amputation, and generally explicit sex talk.

This episode's a long one, as there's a lot to talk about. Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba ended this month, and The Promised Neverland is nearing its conclusion as well. Thankfully, there's a promising crop of new manga here to take their place. We share our queerpinions on:

Act-Age chapters 111-113

Chainsaw Man chapters 68-70

Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba chapters 204-205

Moriking chapters 3-5

My Hero Academia chapters 270-272

The Promised Neverland chapters 176-178

Spy x Family chapters 26-27

Time Paradox Ghostwriter chapters 1-2

You can find all our episodes on Spotify, Podcast Addict, and Apple Podcasts!

Spoiler and content warning: We’re a fairly NSFW-podcast that uses reclaimed homophobic slurs. We also spoil the hell out of all the series mentioned above. Content-wise, they (and our discussions of them) touch on physical violence, blood, gore, death, sexual objectification of women, child abuse, and generational abuse/trauma.

A few weeks back we recorded an episode, just to have Audacity continually stop functioning and for the file to seem corrupted. And now...we ended up finding an MP3 of it that had actually successfully downloaded! The lost episode, unlost! In it we discuss the various media we consumed in our time off from work due to COVID-19. We share our queerpinions on:

Persona 5 Royal - combat, life simulation gameplay, and thematic flailing

Final Fantasy XIV and Final Fantasy VII Remake

Annihilation and the nature of adaptations

Tsurune

All-time great film Paranoid Park

One Piece and depictions of anti-government sentiment in media

Et cetera

You can also find the episode on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Podcast Addict!

Content warning: We’re a fairly NSFW podcast that includes use of reclaimed homophobic slurs. Our discussions this week cover media that include sexual assault and hypersexualization of women.

The f*ggotry is out there. It's looking for you, and it will find you if you want it to. This week we discuss the Matrix franchise, including the original trilogy as well as The Animatrix. We share our queerpinions on:

Themes of individual choice, determinism, and savior figures

Neo as an audience surrogate character

Neo as the least interesting figure in the entire cast

The resounding theme of hope throughout

An unsatisfying romance and a galaxy brain explanation for it

Unneeded lore dumps and metaphors going awry

You can find the episode on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Podcast Addict!

Content warning: We’re a fairly NSFW podcast that includes use of reclaimed homophobic slurs. Our discussion this episode contains spoilers for the Matrix trilogy, The Animatrix, and Avengers: Endgame (we only talk about the MCU briefly, we promise).

I'ma let you finish, but Chainsaw Man chapter 64 was one of the best chapters of all time! Also, Kei Yonagi struggles to inject artistic integrity into capitalism, Demon Slayer is wrapping up beautifully, and My Hero Academia epitomizes superhero comics' handling of female characters in the worst ways imaginable. Plus, we enter the age of the insects with Moriking! We share our queerpinions on:

Act-Age chapters 107-110

Chainsaw Man chapters 64-67

Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba chapters 200-203

Moriking chapters 1-2

My Hero Academia chapters 266-269

The Promised Neverland chapters 173-175

Spy x Family chapters 24.1 & 25

You can find all our episodes on Spotify, Podcast Addict, and Apple Podcasts!

Spoiler and content warning: We’re a fairly NSFW-podcast that uses reclaimed homophobic slurs. We also spoil the hell out of all the series mentioned above. Content-wise, they (and our discussions of them) touch on physical violence, blood, gore, death, and brutalization and sexual objectification of women.