Danica Davidson
October 29, 2015 
Yaoi fans probably never thought they’d see the day their favorite genre was openly discussed and lovingly spoofed on American television, but last night’s new South Park proved them wrong.
South Park has previously tapped into otaku interests (everything from a spoof on Pokémon to Sony video games), showing a knowledge of Japanese pop culture that you don’t normally witness on American TV. Last night on “Tweek x Craig,” the recently introduced character PC Principal is trying to teach students more about Asian art. We all know it’s not going to go the way a lesson on Asian art would usually go, but when Wendy proclaims it’s going to be about Yaoi and starts talking “seme” and “uke,” a lot of otaku watching in real time probably fell out of their chairs laughing. Why wouldn’t you laugh when you knew what was coming, and that a lot of Americans watching were learning these words for the first time? It almost felt like the spoof was written just for the enjoyment of otaku.
We have been getting to know some of the Asian girls who have introduced us to a art style called ‘YAOI’. pic.twitter.com/F4wrSMyCOd
— South Park (@SouthPark) October 29, 2015
So what happens after Wendy’s presentation? Yaoi fever hits South Park. Students even have their own favorite yaoi couple at the school: Tweek and Craig. The episode shows well-done and real, manga-inspired fanart of the pairing, including one ginormous mural of them over the school. Parents are putting Tweek x Craig artwork on their walls. Stan’s dad Randy, seeing the new craze, pretends to know all about yaoi and goes so far as to have a sit-down talk with Stan like a parent-child sex talk. But the best clueless Randy can come up with is trying to say “boys love” in a Japanese accent and horribly mix up the story of Nanking.
Will this bring a new mainstream visibility of yaoi to America? We’re just going to have to wait and see. If you missed last’s night episode, it’s online and will be playing again tonight on Comedy Central.
Watch the new episode “Tweek x Craig” for free here: https://t.co/4XY3qBLIpB pic.twitter.com/XluVTjwta2
— South Park (@SouthPark) October 29, 2015
“For Minecraft fans, the young-at-heart and people who know young Minecraft fans, Danica Davidson’s middle grade Minecraft novel Escape from the Overworld is now available and its sequel, Attack on the Overworld, is released October 6. You can also listen to the audio book, which is narrated by anime voice actor Dan Woren of Robotech and Bleach. “
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