Girls Love - Television Tropes & Idioms

alt title(s): Girl Love; Yuri

Since homosexual males are called "gay", homosexual females should be called "ecstatic".

This mostly anime and manga genre focuses on female/female relationships. Girls' Love tends to be less well known and dabbled in than its counterpart Boys Love, partly because of the belief (misguided or not) that male viewers are more interested in lesbian porn than in romantic stories. By the same token, Girls Love seems to be more often animated due to the belief that girls watch less TV. Curiously, in manga a lot of the works in this genre are firmly planted in the shoujo side of the spectrum, so are aimed squarely at a female audience, addressing the typical shoujo issues of trust and dealing with one's feelings instead of emphasizing the sexual side.

Girls' Love is also called yuri, and can focus either on the sex or on the emotional aspects of the relationship. The latter aspect is sometimes called shoujo-ai by Western fans, who coined the term following the pattern of the Boys' Love term shounen-ai.

Most Girls' Love couples follow the Sempai Kohai pattern: an older, sophisticated and more popular schoolgirl, often Tall Dark And Bishoujo, and a younger, more innocent Moe girl. The latter looks up to her "Onee Sama" as a mentor figure, while the former becomes fiercely protective of her innocent kohai (e.g. Sachiko/Yumi, Chikane/Himeko, Shizuma/Nagisa, etc. etc.). Another couple type whose popularity has been on the rise recently is Tomboy And Girly Girl and its derivates, e.g. a pairing of a straight, no-nonsense Tsundere with a more unworldly, often idealistic and dreamy girl, such as an Cosplay Otaku Girl or an innocent Cute Bruiser (e.g. Natsuko/Honey, Teana/Subaru, and Kagami/Konata). Mixed forms are possible (e.g. tomboy Mari and TD&B Hagino from Blue Drop).

Just how explicit the relationships are varies wildly. For some reason, most lesbian relationships tend to be ambiguous, and use subtext in place of kisses and love declarations.

A disproportionate amount of these end tragically or inconclusively. Some move on to boy-girl relationships with the romantic two-girl friendship as only a steppingstone, as assumed by traditional Japanese views on Romantic Two Girl Friendship. Others are driven insane when the other girl enters a "real" relationship with a boy, and still others step back to let their love be happy with another. Finally, many are killed off for the same purpose. The majority are just left inconclusive or up to subjective interpretation. A Girls' Love couple with a definite happy ending is the exception, not the rule. That's not even counting how many series mine their Girls' Love content in the trailers, only to back out of the Official Couple at the last minute and go with a safe boy/girl pairing instead.

Expect lots of white lilies, especially in GL manga.

Girls Love is the genre; for couple-specific examples, go to Schoolgirl Lesbians. For video games that have a yuri pathway in its plot but the game itself isn't themed around yuri, see Gay Option. For series that aren't yuri but attract a lot of yuri fanworks, see Slash Fic and Everyone Is Gay. See also Yuri Fan. Boys Love and Bara are the Gender Flipped versions.