Oh My Sweet Alien! (ヨメがコレなもんで。)

(Picture found on Google Images)

I have a real soft spot for stories about interspecies relationships and/or slice of life stories with a twist. There is something really heartwarming about vastly different people coming together to discover that they are not so different, or at least that they can still get along really well. Oddly, you often see these themes come together in harem or ecchi manga. One prime example is Everyday Life with Monster Girls (Monstā Musume no Nichijō), which features a young man in Japan during a period of time recently after many species of monster have revealed themselves to humanity. The monsters come to stay with human families as part of a cultural exchange program, and the main character seems to have more and more coming to live with him. The series is fun to read not only due to the humor and the sexy female characters, but also because the characters have to problem solve to get through normal life situations in the midst of living in a less than normal situation. They go grocery shopping, they treat an illness, they go on vacation, et cetera. Another example is Shuffle!, which is also harem manga. It is about another young man who lives in the future after the gates to Heaven and Hell have been opened and both gods and devils often move to Earth where they go to school and live their lives in normal homes. One of my favorite manga is called Love in Hell (and its sequel series Death Life), which chronicle the stay of a couple humans in (you guessed it) Hell, where they are paired up with devils for their punishment.

A scene from the from the opening of the anime for Everyday Life with Monster Girls, showing the main cast in wedding dresses that represent their love for the main character.

(Picture found on Google Images)

For me, there are three things that really make good science fiction or fantasy: (1) the creativity that goes into the imagined elements of the story, (2) the understanding of the realistic parts, and (3) the believable collision of reality with imagined realities. Sometimes the understandable reality aspect is only the pieces of the alien character's personality that we as human beings can relate to, but other times it is something as big as a country on earth. In the case of Oh My Sweet Alien! and others like it, you can think about the interactions between the science fiction parts (aliens, spaceships, etc.) like you would a foreign culture. A lot of care goes into the day to day interactions between the characters and their environement, as well as the detail of their extraterrestrial or magical bodies, abilities, and tendencies.

The premise is this: Nobuo was abducted by aliens when he was a young punk rock guy, only to be so smitten with one of them that he asked her to marry him. She was so flattered that they began dating. Throughout the two volume manga, Nobuo's alien wife is never named, but she is generally the main focus while he does conventional salaryman things with his day. While I find it annoying that the character that is on the cover and drives most of the episodic chapters does not have a name, I have to admit that I did not realize it until I began writing this review. She is enjoyable to the point that I neglected to notice that no one ever calls her by name. If I felt like it, I am sure I could make a long, feminist argument regarding her title as "the wife," her role as a housewife on earth, and so on, but I really do enjoy this manga and I did not come here to bash it. The role of women in Japan is a relevent conversation, but a long one. Perhaps aspects of Oh My Sweet Alien! are symptomatic of the problem with the perception of women in Japan, but I do not think it dehumanizes (pardon the term) the character to the point of putting her in a box. Yes, she chose to move to earth to become Nobuo's stay at home wife and mother to his child, but Nobuo cooks and cleans when she has something else to do, carries the baby on trips, and recognizes the sacrifice that she has made for their relationship. He, too, seems to have made certain sacrifices in order to be a good husband. Flashbacks show that he was probably something of a troublemaker or an employeed bum in his youth, or at least an aspiring musician, but he transformed himself into a respectable salaryman after meeting his wife in order to support her and be worthy of moving to earth for. They both put themselves into new boxes in order to explore their relationship.

Nobuo being abducted. Notice his dyed blond hair, his jewelry, and his guitar case.

Nobuo's first good look at his future wife

(Picture found on World-Three.org)

Nobuo and his wife's relationship is what really makes the manga good. This is a good spot for me to mention that while this is definitely an ecchi manga with some adult themes, it is in no way pornographic. Instead, it is simply honest about relationships, home life, and naked bodies. Nobuo's wife walks around naked at home, free to use her head tendrils and not wear a camouflage skin suit. The fact that she does not have a belly button or outrageously large breasts also makes it easier to ignore her nakedness. After a few pages, the reader becomes accustomed to her breasts and her bottom. Clearly Nobuo is used to it as well, but that does not mean he is not attracted to her. There are multiple times throughout the series that it is suggested Nobuo and his wife have sex, which is a healthy part of any marriage, even after their baby is born. A particularly cute chapter is about Nobuo's wife trying to seduce him using costumes she bought at the flea market: waitress, policewoman, nurse, schoolgirl, and soldier. After insisting that none of that works for him, Nobuo notices that his wife has gotten stuck while changing and is overcome with how sexy she is getting out of the bulky military uniform. It is implied that he proceeds to seduce her.

After failing to win his attentions with cosplay, Nobuo's wife strips off her military uniform, unknowingly drawing his eye with her own partially revealed body.

(Picture found on Mangakakalot.com)

Aside from sex, the couple have a genuinely codependent relationship. In the early years of marriage, Nobuo goes to work while his wife cares for the house and their baby. However, when they are together, Nobuo is usally the parent holding the child, and he does the household things when his wife has old friends over. He suggests going on dates, picks up little tokens of affection such as expensive strawberries, and teaches his wife about language, baths, and other parts of life that are alien to her. He is supportive of his wife when his mother criticizes her for not acting more like a human, berating her for using her tendrils to hand her mother-in-law items rather than her hands and other things. He swallows his cultural needs and goes naked on his wife's home planet during a vacation. He even goes so far as to suggest the family move to her planet if earth is not able to accept aliens once they come out into the open. Nobuo is not a hansome or physically strong man, and sometimes he has a hard time bringing himself to try foods and experiences from other worlds, but within the bubble of his family he is a hero. His wife loves him because he thought she was beautiful from the beginning and loves all versions of her. In one lovely scene, Nobuo looks at his wife and thanks for her coming to earth. Wrapped up in this moment is his appreciation for all she does and all she has sacrificed. They are best friends as well as husband and wife, getting through all the hard things together.

On a vacation to his wife's planet, Nobuo learns about a climb they can take to see a beautiful sight. However, he then learns that he must make the climb naked.

(Picture found on Mangakakalot.com)

The traditional family unit within the story actually makes a lot of sense, in my opinion. If we return to the point about how an alien moving to earth is a bit like a foreigner moving to Japan, we see that Nobuo's wife faces some of the same issues. She wants to be accepted; she did not move there to rock the boat. The juxtaposition of her average days as a housewife and her physical reality of being an alien makes this slice of life story more engaging. Although she is well adjusted now, she has had a long, uphill battle. In the beginning she knew some things about earth, but nothing detailed about Japanese culture. For example, she showed up for her first date with Nobuo wearing an elementary school uniform rather than women's clothes. Just as a foreigner might wear something strange without realizing since the clothes in their country are very different, Nobuo's wife had to learn about earthly fashion from scratch since aliens usually go naked. Additionally, Nobuo's mother initally was very against the marriage due to their extreme differences. I know that a stressful part about any relationship is the relationship with the parents-in-law, which is especially true in cross cultural relationships. Nobuo's wife is not trying to conquer the planet, make grand scientific discoveries, or run for political office. She just wants to live with the husband she loves, be a mother, manage her home, and do other day to day things, yet because she cannot be herself problems still arise.

Nobuo's mother criticizes his wife's use of her tendrils, as well as her habit of walking around naked. We later discover that she is actually a fairly adventurous person who would like to try riding in a spaceship, but she gets embarrassed and ends up being mean to Nobuo's wife instead.

(Picture found on World-Three.org)

One thing that Oh My Sweet Alien! does not cover is the fact that Nobuo and his wife have a mixed race child. In Japan this can be a touchy subject to cover. Although manga often uses the "I'm half English" trope to explain why a character speaks English, has blue eyes, or the like, the reality is that Japanese people usually have a fairly ethnocentric perspective on the world. I have heard of people sighing with relief when they discover that a mixed race couple does not have children. Being part one thing and part something else can affect a child growing up in any country, depending on their environment, but in a country like Japan it can be especially challenging. The child in this manga is fortunate in the fact that at first nobody knows about or notices his mixed heritage, and later on lives in a society that accepts all manner of people regardless of appearance or background. Interestingly, Nobuo's wife is also mixed race. We see her parents several times, and she shares some of both their features, but they are radically different looking from each other. Nobuo, on the other hand, seems to be cut and dry Japanese. His mother is such a traditionalist that she even wears a kimono most of the time. This makes it more striking and heartwarming when the families become good friends.

Nobuo's wife's parents

Nobuo and his wife's parents together on vacation

(Pictures found on World-Three.org)

The end of the manga shows us what life in a fully accepting, galatically connected earth looks like. Two epilogue chapters give a glimpse into the couple's life some years down the road when their son/daughter (I have not seen the original Japanese, and I've seen different translations) is in school and aliens no longer have to walk around in skin suits. This also reminds me of modern Japan, since what looks like a homogenous society actually features a fair number of "outsider" groups: Muslim, Brazilian, American, et cetera. While the family is still living on earth, Nobuo's wife is much more comfortable now that she can go out without a skin suit, although she puts on clothes to leave the house. Since their child has grown up a little, she has also gotten herself a job at the grocery store. In the midst of it all, the series ends with Nobuo and his wife have a little romantic moment holding hands in public with nothing to hide.

(Picture found on Mangakakalot.com)

The last thing to say about Oh My Sweet Alien! is that the science ficiton designs are really fun. I am a huge fan of aliens, and I love a fun aesthetic. I am also a fan of sexy drawings, so the style of this manga is perfect for me. The alien women are pretty sexualized since they walk around naked, but that is about as far as it goes. At some point their breasts just become normal parts of the designs. Most of them follow a pattern of having a belly, hips, and chest that look exposed while their arms, legs, and heads are covered with a different texture. The inspiration for the designs seems to come from many sources: squid, sting ray, crab, et cetera. Other aliens are also fun to see, such as Nobuo's wife's parents, whose individual characteristics you can see in her design as well. The art style, the sci-fi creativity, and the relationships between the characters are what make the story really enjoyable.

A restaurant display on Nobuo's wife's home planet

An unexpected visitor comes to the house, catching the couple offguard. Nobuo was in the bath while his wife was pulling her skin suit out of the washing machine. This results in a funny scene where the neighbor sees Nobuo and his wife practically naked, as though they were just enjoying a romp in the sheets together. Rather than being discovered as an alien, she is the subject of gossip with the other women living in the apartment complex.

Two aliens from Venus reveal their true identity

Nobuo's wife has her two friends visit earth and has to find them some clothes to wear while they have their skin suits on

Nobuo's wife at her new job at the end of the series

Nobuo, his wife, and their child Asora. I am unsure about the sex of the child since an online translation says "son" while my book translation says "daughter." Asora is shown in both traditional girl and boy clothes, so that makes it hard to tell. In Japanese it is possible that gender neutral pronouns were used for Asora throughout (e.g. "my child" rather than "my son") but it is hard to say without getting a look at it. During the epilogue, Asora is dressed very much like a boy and plays sports with the other boys. However, Asora is also shown to have a crush on a man living in their building and is good friends with the neighbor girl. Homosexuality is, like the role of women and the collision of cultures, a difficult topic when it comes to Japanese culture, so I am unsure if the manga meant to push this envelope or not. I worry that if it did, the book translation I have that calls Asora a girl might be misleading.

(Pictures found on Mangakakalot.com)