Kaoru Watanabe’s work was first introduced to me through my job at Renta!, quite early in my career here. When I was first assigned her I Might Be Your Fan, But I’ll Never Fall For you!, my first impression was that her art is incredibly unique and beautiful, but her characters weren’t necessarily to my tastes. However, after starting to read it, I was hooked—their personalities made me fall in love with her characters, and eventually I came to love both them and the storytelling so much that my own tastes didn’t even matter—or more like, my tastes evolved to include “anything by Kaoru Watanabe.” I’ve now read everything by her that I can get my hands on.
Thus, I want to introduce you all to the BL powerhouse that is Kaoru Watanabe.
Read on Renta!:
I Might Be Your Fan, but I’ll Never Fall for You!
Lovingly Cruel Services
Release List:
ビッチ受け～純情リーマン×ヤリ捨てBitch～
推しには絶対ほだされない！
恋するサディスティックサービス
はるかといつか
ディア・マイ・ヴァンパイア
ミルクなきみとビターな彼
If I had to sum up the intense appeal of Kaoru Watanabe’s work in one word, it would simply be: “sensuality.” Her stories have a lot of humor to them, and great pacing and comedic timing. But when it comes to the relationships, it’s truly the push and pull of their feelings and biases and fears and desires that truly makes Kaoru Watanabe’s work. This adds a lot of sensuality to her stories, because things tend to move quite slow between her characters—in their relationships, as well as in the bedroom.
Two reoccurring themes in her work include: kenkappuru (characters who show their love through bickering or teasing) and size difference. There’s usually quite a gap in stature between her seme and uke characters, particularly as her art and writing style has evolved. While—as I said in the intro—her uke characters used to be a bit more boyish and not to my tastes, they’ve gotten prettier and cuter and now I can’t get enough of them.
Her uke characters also tend to have some type of naivety, whether it’s in the form of being socially awkward, or not understanding their own preferences, or just being quite innocent to other people’s intentions. Though they’re sometimes a bit tsundere (particularly in her earlier works), it’s often in a cute, pouty way. Her seme characters are often a bit more mixed, but generally lean into being quite cool (sometimes sadistic), attractive guys with a bit of a cute side. The seme character in I May Be Your Fan…, for instance, may seem like an arrogant jerk at first, but it’s after you get to know him a bit that you see he’s actually quite awkward.
For those who haven’t read them, I’ll give a little summary of her two books that are available in English:
Her debut book, I Might Be Your Fan, but I’ll Never Fall for You! (Oshi ni wa Zettai Hodasarenai), is about a young up-and-coming star Yuki who’s finally getting big enough to star alongside his idol, veteran actor and model Masataka. While Yuki is feeling confident and ready to show Masataka his good side, Masataka just laughs at him. After a series of mishaps and unintended intimate encounters, Yuki finds himself endlessly and frustratingly drawn to Masataka, while Masataka seems equally unable (unwilling?) to leave Yuki alone. Nonetheless, Yuki is determined to keep his idol at a proper distance—at least, that’s what he tells himself while fantasizing about the older man. Yuki is boyish and cool at times, and meek and innocent at others, and that gap is truly irresistible.
As for her second work, Lovingly Cruel Services (Koisuru Sadistic Service), the seme character is a bit more like the “sadistic boyfriend” trope because… well… it’s literally about BDSM. Because of his appearance and frontman persona, all of Subaru’s female fans mistake him as a cool, badass sadist, and are desperate to be dominated by him. However, Subaru has always wanted to know what it feels like to be choked and dominated himself. When he meets bartender Ryunosuke, the other man is able to see through his ruse and offers the ability to finally be true to his masochistic nature. But, Subaru’s not sure he has the courage to lean into the part of himself he’s been afraid of all this time.
Kaoru Watanabe’s art is absolutely stunning. Like I said earlier, the first thing that struck me was how unique it looks—very retro-inspired without feeling dated, incredibly clean, soft, and thin linework, with character’s eyes lined in with such detail that they seem to shine like diamonds. Her backgrounds are detailed enough that they add tons of vibrancy and depth to her stories, but she knows just when to make the backgrounds sparse so the emotion of the characters and scene can really shine through.
The way she draws bodies is also absolutely beautiful. One thing I love about BL artists is how you can tell their… um… “proclivities” just by what body parts they tend to put more focus on, or be more skilled in, and with Kaoru Watanabe it’s just bodies in general. She does focus a significant amount of attention, however, on hands, posing, body language, and facial expressions. She also noted in a recent “About Me” on Twitter that her favorite things to draw are hands, eyelashes, and eyes.
One motion in particular she often likes to highlight is the movement of characters’ eyes—are they staring directly? Are they looking away? Are their eyelashes lowered? Is their gaze downcast? These tiny motions add tons of sensuality and emotion to her scenes in even the smallest moments.
Still in line with the theme of sensuality, her ero scenes tend to be heavy on the foreplay, and sometimes lack penetration at all, with more focus on the building of desire between the characters. Her posing during these scenes is beautiful, with a lot of focus on the angle/position of the body more than on the act that’s taking place. All that said, however, the ero scenes are from from existing just as “art”—they’re as sexy as they are beautiful, and she has a knack for including fairly hardcore, erotic, kinky play between her characters.
Her stories are usually fairly simple, with just the right amount of drama and more focus on the connection between the characters. Overall, I think she’s just amazing, and recommend her work to anyone who just enjoys treating their eyes to something beautiful. She kind of reminds me of a less smut-focused Sakana Tojo, where you’re reading it partly because it’s hot, partly because the story is fun to read, but also partly because it’s just a joy to look at.
And I’m not the only one who feels this way, it seems. During J.GARDEN 55, in fact, due to being trapped in Okita Yuuho’s line for 45 minutes (she’s too popular… help…), I wasn’t able to get Kaoru Watanabe’s book. 
That’s how quickly she sold out! I was so distraught, since she said she had no intention of selling the print version online. Thankfully, she must have gotten lots and lots of requests for a reprint, so she did end up posting it online and I was able to buy a copy. And it’s amazing—just ask Sou, who was also creepin’ on it.
Also very cute: because she ran out at J.GARDEN, she also reposted her extra paper to Net Prints (an otaku staple I’ve been meaning to talk about for a while, but essentially when an artist puts their stuff on the cloud and you can print it at participating convenience stores!) with the warning “watch out for who might be standing behind you while printing these!” Sure enough, they were quite dirty, so printing them in public was dicey.
Anyway, I think I’ve conveyed very openly how much I love Kaoru Watanabe’s manga. I really wish we had more of it available on Renta!—or even just in English in general—so I hope me pushing her work can net her more global fans so we can make this a reality! 
rentaBLog 