First Impressions / Paradise Kiss

OP Sequence

Summary:
Hayasaki Yukari is a very stressed senior in high school. While walking along a busy street one day, she is chased by a blonde man with several piercings on his face. When she tries to run away, she bumps into and faints in front of an odd-looking woman. She wakes up to an angel with pink hair who explains that they want her to model in a fashion show. Yukari turns them down, saying that she’s very busy. Arashi, the heavily pierced blonde, gets angry at her, so she leaves. Miwako, the pink haired girl, yells to her an apology, calling her Caroline because she doesn’t know her real name. Caroline runs off, but Miwako picks up her dropped student ID and gives it to George, who arrives later and gets filled in on the situation. The next day, Yukari is fretting about having lost her ID, which has a picture of a guy (Tokumori) in it. George finds her at the school gates and gets her to ride with him by mentioning the ID. They arrive at the Yazawa school where Miwako and George take Yukari to a hair and makeup artist. One Yukari’s been made over, they go back to the Paradise Kiss hideout and Miwako gives her a dress to try. While she’s putting it on, Miwako tells her about their brand Paradise Kiss. George draws the designs, Isabella works with the patterns, and Miwako and Arashi handle the sewing. Their ultimate goal is to be able to sell the clothes that they make. After Miwako presents a dressed up Yukari to the group, Yukari apologizes for not understanding them and Arashi apologizes back for blowing up at her. George gives her back the student ID, but, with a serious look on his face, he asks her to be their model.

ED Sequence

OP: 「♥Lonely in Gorgeous♥」 by Tommy february6
ED: 「DO YOU WANT TO」 by Franz Ferdinand
I really liked the song by Tommy february6 when I first heard it on the trailer. Having heard the TV size version now, my feelings really haven’t changed. The interesting thing is that Tommy heavenly6 did a song on the LOVE for NANA album. (Tommy heavenly6 and Tommy february6 are both names for Kawase Tomoko) Does Yazawa Ai have an affinity for her music? The ending song is by Franz Ferdinand, one of the only times I’ve ever seen a Western band do a song for an anime. Granted, this isn’t exactly a new song (released earlier this year), but it’s good all the same.

The first episode of the long awaited Paradise Kiss is finally here!
To be honest, I am not overwhelmed or under-whelmed. I came in with very high expectations, and most of those have been met. All the characters look and sound more or less like I thought they would, with the exception of Arashi. That exception seems to be because the animated version’s Arashi has a smaller forehead and eyes that don’t look as sharp as they do in the manga. The other thing I noticed is that they chose a female voice actress for Isabella. I guess that’s fairly easy to pull off as I can’t remember a time in the manga where she doesn’t look like that (minus the flashback later in the story). This won’t bother me at all as long as they don’t completely omit her tiny bit of story.
The animation and direction caught my eye right away. It’s been know that ParaKiss would be directed by Kobayashi Osamu, who also directed Beck, and his style seems subtlety apparent to me in this first episode. The two series also share the same animation director, Uehara Shinichi. Those aren’t bad things, just as long as this series doesn’t run out of budget by the end of the show. But I do find those scene transitions (flowers and puppets) very weird. The chibi/round-headed scenes will also take some getting used to.
I’m very happy that they followed Yazawa Ai’s manga relatively faithfully. The first episode covers the first two chapters at a good pace. MOON PHASE lists the series as 12 episodes long, so I can only assume that they’re going to start covering more than two per week since there are 48 total chapters of the manga. Oh man, I’m already thinking about how this’ll all end and we’re just beginning.
So there’s no question that I will be following this series. I’ve been hooked to Yazawa Ai works and I’ll continue to be…

30 Comments

  7. But I have a feeling those wacky little chibi thingies just had to be there…. that if they weren’t Kobayashi would feel sort of boxed-in, it wouldn’t have enough of his flavour if he didn’t put those in. And I heartily approve! It’s really quite cute (well okay, to me…) so it’s not totally out of place, but it’s also a break from the smooth visuals, it kind of makes you go “wait a minute”…

    wao
    Reply

  8. I hate the chara des (Arashi is horrible, Miwako isn’t cute… and those super deformed are… bleah!), but I’d like to see the anime… I hope I’ll get a subbed version soon XD

    Btw (I don’t know where I can ask this ^_^;), can I use some of your images on my website, the Ai Yazawa’s World? It’s an Italian Yazawa fansite. Of course I’ll put a link at you wonderful job.

    thank you so much for your attention

    Misato-san
    Reply

  10. If they one day make a Nana animated series with this level of quality I’ll be in pure heaven. I know they made a Nana movie but I soooooooooooooo want an animated series that would be this good!

    The intro and the ending were awesome.

    morrigan1111
    Reply

  13. the intro of the anime was bit…arkward i guess. with the these cartoon animals mixing with reality. but a nice touch.

    the openining song is probably the best beat i have ever heard. the humor isn’t die-hard laughter, but passable.

    it’s those kind of animes where you want to read the manga to know what your getting yourself into.

    carol
    Reply

  21. I luvv paradise kiss…unfortunately i only read up to volume 2…is there any place where i cud download n read da book from or download da movie??…i really wana read it aaand watch it…thanx fo helpin!!…….btw i luv george koizumi:D

    Applebum
    Reply

  25. Hello freaks of paradise kiss! hola frikis de paradise kiss!
    I think too, that the manga is better than the anime…I think that yukari´s expresions are very bad in the anime ..I think that they must do another.hehehe…but is my freak opinion, I love paradise kiss, and I love too the desings of clothes of AI YAZAWA and they change a few dresses….aish…really i think that they can do better. kisses from tere.

    please somebody tell me something about how to take the anime whith others translations.

    Hola frekis de paradise kiss!
    yo creo también que el manga está mucho mejor que el anime … creo que las epresiones de yukari son peores en el anime…creo que deberían rehacerlo. pero es mi opinión friki, yo adoro paradise kiss, y adoro también los diseños de ropa de ai yazawa y ellos cambian muchos vestidos….aish..realmente creo que podrían haberlo hecho mejor. besossss de tere.

    yukari.san

    tere yukari-san
    Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *