Full, original post can be found here. The below is about 50% of it.

In the book Japanamerica, the lives and habits of some genuine otaku are documented, almost like a tribute to Otaku no Video. Now the word “otaku” gets used in a wide variety of ways in the States. To some extremes, I’ve heard corporate marketing people mention it in interviews with press, saying it interchangeably as the in word for “fans” with us anime/manga people. It felt like he’s gotten the 1-sentence low-down on it and decided to use the word as if it gives him some cred (see: stupid Sakura-con commercial! Sushi! J-rock! Otaku! Etc.) To that end, Japanamerica also documented the term and its definition over time, of the transformation from its normal verbiage in Japanese to its first, sci-fi, roots. The continuing transformation of the term to today’s uses by the Japanese, is briefly documented in the book. And…it’s all just to point out the delicious irony on how Americans totally watered down the term, despite how some Japanese folks referred to the old school geeks here, who may fill the halls of a SCA meeting or a Leonard Nimoy autograph line, as the first otaku.

But is it really so different? I think some of us (Americans) use the term that way still, and it fits. I find myself using the term “Akiba-kei” or the branched-out/derogatory versions of otaku (fujoshi, kimo-ota, etc) in the place of how some calls plain-vanilla “otaku” more and more, but that’s probably because there grows a necessity to distinguish, and those words became available and acceptable in recent years.

Honestly, I have no claim to any otaku fame compared to those who calls themselves that in Japan and East Asia. They are just that much closer to the source, to the scene, to the culture, that unless take, you are no match. The full plunge here means you go live and breathe Japan for a while! And by doing so you might just well earn the right to call yourself otaku in the eyes of the world, even to the Japanese. A few transplants were interviewed in the book too, and you can tell they are likely to take the term otaku like I do.

Which, if you’d ask me, the word otaku is more like "The Scarlet Letter" than a "Metal of Honor." And I think the problem between these varying definitions of the word otaku arises from that impression–it’s not something to be wore with pride, to some! But alas, this is as “Japanamerican” as it gets–they take our culture, we take it back, and so on, and so forth. The end result is probably not anything we should be worrying about.

However, this leaves people like me in a bind–we’re too “otaku” to call ourselves otaku, but we’re not at all like normal folks, or even like the people who would call themselves otaku! Ah well. Who cares?

All I could think about in terms of shoujo titles along that line (at first) would be stuff like Marimite, where a big key here is that the girls take on roles that a guy would–well, more like within a certain liberated confine (a walled garden if oxymorons are not your thing) in which the gender roles are reinvented in an unisex fashion to cater to certain mainstream fantasies about womanhood. (Or manhood.) We could find these “elements” in even perhaps shows like Natsume Yuujincho, which a real-life adaptation would fit its untamed, undead, and ungendered host of ghosts. It doesn’t matter if you carry one or two X genes in your chromosomes, as long as you can scream with your emotions in style it’ll sell. Actually Natsume would be a good example, and I always want to write about how Natsume the boy is such a patsy compared to his yankee [the Japanese slang] grandmother, and what does that signify. Maybe some other time.

To me, it’s clear that there is no one answer, or one mechanism or element that makes Takarazuka Revue attractive to its predominately-female audience. And short of mentioning that not all yuri fangirls think alike, it’s just common wisdom to pepper your work with all the elements you love, of that genre. Because maybe more people would love your work if there are more elements of things people in general like to see?

Which is why the whole idea about pinning Takarazuka Revue’s charm points from shoujo manga a bit like shooting fish in a barrel. (Admittedly it’s a barrel I do not read, and do not want in general, so this is real “homework” to a degree.) It’s just much more exciting to see it play out in seinen/shounen works like Sakura Wars, or Hitohira (does this really count?), or a very deep read of the Sola anime. Because you don’t expect to see it there, yet there it is.

(For Sola, I look at it from a context that there is a whole slew of late-night breed of anime that resemble stage plays from a script compositional standpoint. I am not sure if many of them have “Takarazuka elements” or whatever but those showgirls are relatively well known in Japan. They leave a mark in the mind of some, and it’s not just some superficial reference usually. Maybe sometimes it’s an subconscious imprint which affects people or the arts as practiced locally. At any rate it’s a long shot.)

But perhaps all of that is just a coincidence. To be honest, a major theme in Ouran High Host Club is Haruhi’s personal development through interpersonal relationships, and how that is a way of feminine empowerment in Haruhi’s own context. A big part of Haruhi’s story is invariably entwined with the identity of a woman lawyer, an identity taken by her mother. Suddenly Phoenix Wright seems a natural title for the Revue to do, and it is well.