Review: Venus Versus Virus

Venus Versus Virus - this has to be one of my favourite manga series, rather than the anime - which was heavily disappointing in comparison to the manga. I had to struggle to get through it, but I did for my love of Lucia and Sumire, the two girls in the picture on the left.
If you do end up watching or reading Venus Versus Virus, in my opinion at least, I thought that the anime was rubbish compared to the story; so much more goes on in the manga, and there is so much more suggestiveness of a Sumire/Lucia pairing. And Venus Versus Virus is still considered a yuri, which makes me somewhat happier. It also makes me annoyed sometimes when people say "THIS ISNT A YURI! THERE'S NO EXPLICIT YURI IN, SO IT CANT BE!" Shut up, of course it can. It just means that the yuri is more subtext and less obvious than others. But anyway, onto the review.

Venus Versus Virus is the story of a young girl called Sumire Takahana, a normal schoolgirl who finds a broach that suddenly drops out of the sky. In an attempt to pick it up, she pricks her finger on one of the corners of the broach, which suddenly gives her new eyes to see malevolent spirits known as 'Viruses', but is quickly rescued by a mysterious girl - Lucia Nahashia.
During the fight with the virus, Lucia accidentally shoots Sumire with the virus vaccine, and Sumire turns into a virus momentarily and becomes a very powerful killing machine - and once the virus is killed, tries to turn on Lucia. Of course Sumire does not actually do anything to Lucia and Lucia stops her, and the two - whilst initially cold with each other at first - grow closer as both a friendship, and possibly a relationship throughout the series.

I don't want to spoil what goodies Venus Versus Virus has to offer, so I will keep this short - but personally, even though Lucia and Sumire are a little cold with each other at the beginning, I personally think that Lucia is more invested in Sumire than Sumire is with her. One of my favourite parts of the series is when Sumire meets Yoshiki, a boy who she falls in love with for lack of better words, and it is quite obvious to anybody that reads the manga that Lucia is jealous. It is never said that Lucia is romantically attracted to Sumire, but it is very apparent as the manga goes on that she does love her. Sumire does love Lucia back as well, but I couldn't say whether her feelings were necessarily romantic in return or not. However, saying that, I do think that the two of them make a fabulous couple.

As far as Venus Versus Virus goes, I would definitely reccommend the manga above the anime - the anime is really only for the hardcore fans (like myself), who will understand the characters and the initial story without expecting too much from the plot. It is obvious that the anime is primarily aimed at the manga readers as there is very little explanation of anything, except for perhaps the episode explaining Lucia's childhood (which made me very sad). Other favourite characters of mine include Ruka, an evil girl from the people opposing Venus Vanguard - the shop where Lucia and Sumire work, alongside Nahashi, Lucia's guardian, and Lola, a small blonde girl with a psychic ability - who is absolutely psychotic. Some people ship Ruka and Sumire, but god knows why. I think they would be horribly mismatched. D:
But overall, I would definitely say that VVV is worth reading first, and then watching after if you really like it. But don't expect too much from the anime, or you will be very let down. Saying that though, it really wasn't a waste of time watching it - I did enjoy it, just not as much as I'd hoped.

In the end though, Venus Versus Virus gets an 8/10 from me. :)

Any thoughts and opinions are welcome, as always! x