Anime Pilgrimage RTT

Paradise Kiss – episode 4

November 13, 2005 on 11:38 am | In Paradise Kiss | 3 Comments

“George”

Mixed messages equal wild romance. Everyone is right when they say that George isn’t a very nice character; he’s got that odd charisma about him but he really is quite the selfish bastard. As the script says, logic takes a holiday …

Yukari decides to take some time away from study so that she may spend some time at Atelier. She gets angry when she realises that George is paying her very little attention, and angrier still when he tries to make up for it by seducing her.
Yukari gets into trouble with her mother, but decides that the perspective her adventure has given her was worth the pain.

George’s behaviour and frankness are pretty damned edgy here. Yukari notices that the other members of Para Kiss bounce back very quickly from his outrageous demands, and it looks very much like a case of “you have to get used to him”. The issue here is that Yukari is acting to change herself into a better, “more attractive” person, while George looks like he will remain trapped in his static self image.
While it is positive to change yourself for your own benefit as well as that of others, it’s disheartening when those that you’re trying to change for are stagnant. I believe that Yukari is going to put a lot more into this relationship than George; George can simply cruise to his next dalliance, but Yukari stands a good chance of being affected.

This episode introduces Miwako’s sister, Mikako. The way that she is designed makes her look like she’s from another series, and she is: Miwako hails from Yazawa Ai’s previous work Gokinjo Monogatari (Neighbourhood Story). In one way Mikako looks like her sister with a slightly different hair cut (and later scenes show that somehow the pink hair is hereditary), but her body and clothes seem slightly different in shape to the rest of the characters. I suppose this can be attributed to her having a fashion label separate from Para Kiss.

I still liked this episode because not everything can run smoothly, and Yukari’s problems are beginning to become more real than trivial. There is no way she could have been happy in her previous life, but she now has to discover how to strike a balance in the present without living a lie.