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In doujins coupling characters from a show off, the characters are usually referred to in the title as "Character A x Character B"

(I feel this snippet from hanagai! explains it better)

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Is there any meaning to the order of the 'multiplying'?

Is the first character mentioned the main character, more dominant, alphabetically first, randomly chosen or something else?

кяαzєя
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Toshinou Kyouko
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    Seems that Wikipedia has extensive articles on this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shipping_%28fandom%29, http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%82%AB%E3%83%83%E3%83%97%E3%83%AA%E3%83%B3%E3%82%B0_%28%E5%90%8C%E4%BA%BA%29. And from Bulbapedia: http://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Shipping. Seems like Western and Japanese fandom have some slight different in convention. – nhahtdh Aug 08 '14 at 08:19
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    afaik, the order matters. I remember it was discussed in one of the Genshiken: Nidaime episodes. I just don't remember who's "top" and who's "bottom" :p – Hakase Aug 10 '14 at 13:41

1 Answers1

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The first one is the dominant one a.k.a. seme while the second one is the receiver a.k.a. uke. For example in doujinshi Puella Magi Madoka Magica Doujinshi Homura x Madoka (available online in online manga sites), Homura will be the seme, while Madoka is the uke.

絢瀬絵里
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  • unless it's Moemura before she had to kill Madoka in one timeline or it's Ultimate Madoka "punishing" Akuma Homura for making her wait even longer to finally be reunited – Memor-X Aug 14 '14 at 22:21