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So, I’m always entering contests to win free stuff, especially when I think not many other people will enter, and I’ve actually won a lot of things from magazines etc. (makeup, nail polish, an ipod…). And usually the prizes show up in a plain padded manilla envelope with no note or anything explaining why someone has sent it to me. Usually I vaguely remember entering a contest for the thing, but a couple of weeks ago this anime dvd Paradise Kiss showed up in my mail and I have no idea where it came from! There was a return address for a mailing company and I sent them an email, but no reply…I don’t remember entering a contest to win a Paradise Kiss dvd (I checked shoujobeat)…my only idea is that Geneon/Funimation sent it because I had emailed them feedback about how much I liked the Kodocha voice actors in the American dub I recently bought. It’s a mysery!


DVD 1

But anyway, I’ve also enjoyed watching Paradise Kiss, so here’s some info about the anime (I hadn’t heard about it before it randomly showed up in my mail). It’s about this girl Yukari whose a serious student and is always studying and going to cram school (her mother puts a lot of pressure on her), and one day she is walking around and some punk looking guy starts talking to her. She thinks he’s weird, and runs away, and then meets an eccentric looking lady with a purple flower painted around her eye, and faints. When she wakes up, she finds herself in the strange but intriguing studio of Paradise Kiss, a fashion school design group. The group consists of the kind lady with the purple flower around her eye, the punk guy from earlier, the sweet loli-looking girl with pink hair that always calls her Caroline, and of course an intensely mysterious leader, and the love interest, George. They convince her she is the striking image of the Paradise Kiss fashion line, and will she please please pretty please model their clothes for them?? And I won’t give away the rest, but there is shaky but potential-filled romance and drama in the fashion world ahead in this anime.

So far (dvd 1) the plot has been okay, mostly predictable but neither terribly innovative nor insulting to the intelligence. The “girl with overbearing mother meets new eccentric friends and finds new passion in a field not approved by her parents” plot is repeated so often, but this anime does a pretty good job given the mostly predictable premise. The animation is interesting and has some moments of collage/montage going on to keep things interesting. Sometimes the characters are shown from far away and they don’t look very detailed, so I kind of wish they would zoom in closer more often. I do like how the backgrounds are usually interesting, like the dressing room has a really cool intricate gold pattern and the paradise kiss design studio has a full drink bar in the background haha.

I haven’t seen the japanese version, so I don’t have voice actors to compare to, but I do like the english dub. The voices are interesting and they sound like pros which makes me happy. I like George’s voice, he kind of talks a little funny, like he should be a goofy character, but he also acts so serious all the time so it helps makes him seem mysterious and likeable even though he is actually kind of jerk to Yukari.

I haven’t seen past the 4th episode yet, so all I know is the romance just getting started. Yukari and George have good chemistry, George is all mysterious and experienced, and Yukari is unique and refreshingly young and naive. Right away their different personalities clash, and they almost break up before they really start dating. But they also recognize that for some reason they are really attracted to something in each other, despite their differences, and the want to give it a try. Good luck to the cute couple and we’ll see what happens…