Review: GERARD AND JACQUES

Whenever I review BL, I always have to promise myself that I cannot front-load it with all of my favorites.  I only get one slot for the likes of est em or Fumi Yoshinaga, and I'm using it this year to talk about one of Yoshinaga's most unique yet flawed works.

GERARD AND JACQUES (Gerard to Jacques), by Fumi Yoshinaga.  First published in 2000, and first published in North America in 2006.

PLOT:

Jacques was the teen son of minor nobility, sold into prostitution to cover his father's debts.  Gerard is a wealthy commoner, a novelist with a tragic past and a distaste for the aristocracy.  The two meet in a high-class brothel, and soon after their encounter Gerard buys Jacques's freedom.  Jacques works his way up from houseboy to personal secretary with speed, skill, and intelligence, and in the process the two start to become not just master and servant, but friends.  Then Jacques learns the details of Gerard's past and he starts to question just what the nature of his feelings for Gerard may be.

STORY:

Being a Fumi Yoshinaga work, I had nothing but high hopes for this series.  It mostly met them, but there were a few hiccups that hindered my enjoyment of what is otherwise a better-than-average BL manga. 

The first thing that put me off was that the initial premise for this is more than a little...well, rapey.  One thing I normally love about Yoshinaga's manga is that it avoids most of the tasteless cliches of the genre, and as such her pairings tend to be a lot more consensual and romantic than others.  That's what makes the fact that the story starts with an older man verbally and sexually abusing a teenage boy that he knows was forced into sex work is strange and jarring.  Even though the relationship between the two does eventually become a lot more equal and amicable, any sort of sexual encounter between the two never quite loses that edge of harshness.

Gerard's backstory is good and unique in a number of ways, but the presentation doesn't do it any favors.  It's a shame because it's one of the most unique features.  I mean, where else can you read about a man who becomes a bisexual metamour to an aristocratic couple out of love for a viscountess?  Their relationship ends with a dead child, a scarred eye, and a lot of bitterness, and on its own it could be a great story.  That's why it baffles me that Yoshinaga breaks it up and presents it in seemingly random order.  The conclusion to this reveal ends up being important to the evolution of Gerard and Jacques's relationship, but the material is strong enough that it didn't need any additional gimmicks to make it work.

Then there's the choice of setting.  I love historical manga, and Ancient Regime-era France is a rare one for BL (unless you read Lovers In the Night, of course).  It's pre-Revolution at this point, but it's clear that Gerard's lower-class background and Rousseau-influenced thoughts are going to play out in interesting ways, especially when contrasted with Jacques' noble background and his current, less-than-noble profession.  In the meantime, I'm willing to give Yoshinaga the benefit of the doubt.  While there are some definite missteps here, the depth of the character reading and the material is more than enough to keep me engaged.

ART:

There's also some strange hiccups in the art, which is strange considering how far along this manga came along in Yoshinaga's career.  This manga would have been contemporaneous with Antique Bakery, so she should be long past the awkwardness of a newcomer.  The characters are handsomely drawn as always, but there's something about how widely set Jacques' eyes are that looks a bit off, and in wider shots people can come off a bit stiff.  These are mostly momentary lapses in quality, though.  Most of the time the artwork here is up to Yoshinaga's usual high standards.  That includes the sex, as she lends them a degree of sensuality by focusing on the participants' reactions instead of what's being stuck where. 

She clearly relishes the opportunity to draw all the fancy historical costumes, but this is one of the few times that her signature simple elegance works against the manga.  This is a story set in an era of Roccoco excess, but Gerard and Jacques' world seems to be a fairly unadored place.  Some of this can be excused due to Gerard's middle-class background, but this is a setting that would better suit an artists known for meticulous research and detail instead of Yoshinaga's comparatively spartan style.

RATING:


Yoshinaga's choices (or those from her editors) keep this work from getting the green light.  Nonetheless, Gerard and Jacques still has enough good points and genuine effort to make it worth a look.  It's just not good enough to be an essential one.

This series was published by Tokyopop.  This series is complete in Japan with 2 volumes.  Both volumes were published and are not out of print.