Bondage Fairies reviews

I wrote these two reviews for the Bondage Fairies series (Anime News Network, Wikipedia) as part of my work on Manga: The Complete Guide, but ended up not being used. They were rather negative for such a historic property, so they got a second opinion. I got permission to repost them here, so enjoy my snark.

The Original Bondage Fairies (Title) (Kanji Title) • Kondom • Mangerotica (1999) • Japanese Publisher (1993) • ## volumes • Straight Adult Mnaga • X (explicit sexual content)

Going way beyond just an X-rated Tinkerbell, Bondage Fairies is an unsettling mixture of lesbian sex, BDSM and a heaping helping of bestiality featuring scantily clad women who fit in the palm of your hand. There’s plenty of simple girl-girl coupling in the series, but much of it also involves domination and rape/torture, spiced up with just every kind of animal or (more frequently and disturbingly) insect the author could work in: worms, beetles, bats, slugs, etc. Industrious readers can read whatever they would like into the fact that beautiful elfin faerie girls repeatedly receive the attentions of hideous male beasts. Perhaps the most disturbing thing, however, is that Kondom renders the female form in a simple and alluring manner. It’s undeniably attractive, making the sinful acts that later occur with vermin and insects all the more grotesque.

1 out of 4 stars

The New Bondage Fairies & Bondage Fairies Extreme (Title) (Kanji Title) • Kondom • Mangerotica (1996-2003) • Japanese Publisher (1996-2000) • ## volumes • Straight Adult Mnaga • X (explicit sexual content)

The sex-crazed fairies continue their adventures, though the stories stray further away from fairie-on-fairie action to include a wider variety of insects and other talking critters getting it on with the tiny bewinged beauties. Fairies serve as the police force in the forest, but “protecting the weak” and “upholding justice” invariably involves having sex or harvesting “fairie nectar” or getting raped by some giant beetle or spider. The art is just as good – if not better than – the original series, but the increased emphasis on girl and insect coupling makes it even more uncomfortable. The short breaks for humorous stories about the author’s encounters with the diminutive nymphos are a welcome escape.

1 out of 4 stars