Peach Girl

Title:Peach Girl
ピーチガール
Overall:Rent
Keywords: , , , ,
Notables: CHIBA Saeko
KIUCHI Hidenobu
NASU Megumi
Original Concept - Kodansha Manga Award Winner
R1 License - FUNimation
SUZUMURA Kenichi
Momo is a high school girl with rich dark skin and red hair, which makes her look like a fashionable partygirl. She is swimmer and the sun and pool bleach have given her a distinctive look - a look that has everyone assuming the worst of her. However, she is really a nice shy girl, but none of her classmates understand her. She has had a secret love for Toji since they were in junior high. Along comes Kairi, one of the most popular guys in school, who appears to be attracted to Momo. Sae looks totally opposite to Momo; she has a white skin, and looks delicate. In spite of Sea's looks, she is a bad girl who keeps stealing other girl's boyfriends. What will become of Momo's fondness for Toji? Will Kairi every stop chasing her? And the malicious Sae is certain to try to mess things up.


Peach Girl is based on the manga by Miwa Ueda. Read the translated manga online at MangaFox.

Produced by Marvelous Entertainment, TV Tokyo, Studio Comet
R1 license by Funimation
25 Episode TV Series

For more info, see ↗Wikipedia entry - Peach Girl

FUNImation has opted to post the first few episodes to HULU.
click here to see the first episode on HULU
Episode Details 
2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25
OverallArtAnimationCharacter Design MusicSeries StoryEpisode StoryReviewer
Watch 7 5 7 5 4 4 Ggultra2764 [series:951#1552]
(Watch-/ Avoid+)

If there's ever a series that embodies the worst of shoujo anime tropes, Peach Girl certainly comes close to that endeavor. The series is a rather frustrating one in its focus on female lead Momo, the two boys she develops romantic interest in with Toji and Kairi, and her meddling troublemaker of a "best friend" in the form of Sae. The series relies heavily on melodrama, angst, misunderstandings, and the stupidity of its cast to carry along its plot with Momo continuing to have issues in her romances with Toji and Kairi, while Sae has a fanatic obsession with wanting to make Momo's life as miserable as possible throughout a good chunk of the series. There's little dimension and depth to the characters as they embody character types typical of shoujo anime, regardless of how pretty and attractive our leads look thus I could care less with whatever issues they faced throughout Peach Girl's 25-episode run. While I don't mind watching romance anime in general, Peach Girl goes too deep in its tropes as such where it was frustrating to watch at many points and I wouldn't recommend watching it.

Last updated Sunday, April 08 2018. Created Sunday, April 08 2018.
Rent 10 10 10 10 10 10 Violet D [series:951#1393]
I loved Peach Girl and was torn between the two guys who liked her. but I must admit the last episode I was rooting for Kairi. This is a typical love and Romance story. Which means you can't have someone all good and not have someone bad who wants to reck your life. Bring in the nemesis who pretends to be Peach Girls friend and ends up causing problems for her with a capital P. this is a fast and enjoyable one to watch. I highly suggest you give it a try.

Last updated Saturday, March 07 2009. Created Saturday, March 07 2009.
Watch 6 6 4 4 KBanger1 [series:951#1694]
Only watching three episodes, I got turned off immediately. The story is weak because it's something I have seen a lot in other animes. It isn't new or interesting. It's about a girl (Momo) who's judged for her tanned skin and "loose" appearance. She's a slight outcast from her peers which makes her a loner with the exception of her "best friend", Sae. With that much said, it's a story on how she gets screwed by her so called in almost every episode and how she never gets the person she longed for but ends up with the person she didn't really like. I've seen this plot repeated so often that I don't see anything interesting about it. I know this is a sub-par review, however, it is IMO to be a sub-par series. I only give it a "watch" rank so you can judge for yourself.

Last updated Friday, November 30 2007. Created Friday, November 30 2007.
Rent Stretch [series:951#628]
I kind of wonder why I liked this seriously flawed series as much as I did, and remained eager for each additional episode to become available right up 'til the end. Basically, Momo is a girl whose love life swings like a pendullum between two boyfriends, Touji and Kairi (it would have been a good idea to make the two main male characters easier to tell apart!) She has known Touji for a long time, he's a straightlaced, honest, reliable guy, though not extremely passionate. Kairi, on the other hand, has a reputation as a womanizer (he has a clique of female admirers at school), and has a troubled past. The wild card is Sae, a girl who is supposedly Momo's friend but in fact is a jealous, conniving bitch who gets her kicks by screwing up other people's romances. And she does a lot of scheming, because Each episode of this show has at least as many plot twists as two or three episodes of the average High School romance anime. The notes I wrote down about a single episode took up half a page (and I write incredibly small). Sometimes watching just half an episode wore me out.

One distinct problem was that the plot involved too many coincidences! In one episode, not only does one of Sae's highly complicated schemes come off without a hitch, but all sorts of coincidences, which she wouldn't have dared hope for, work to her advantage as well (doesn't anybody suspect a trap when Sae is involved?). These coincidences happened time after time, until it got to the point where Momo seeing them and immediatedly jumping to the wrong conclusions almost made me groan. It didn't help that I was concurrently watching an outstanding series which does a first-rate job of providing believable transitions (without relying on coincidences), since this only highlighted just how shaky the plot of Peach Girl sometimes was.

Another problem is Momo's habit of continually bouncing back and forth between Kairi and Touji. She does it too easily, changing her lover based on those damn coincidences, and without ever wondering if she may have misunderstood something. This tendency could be amusing and intriguing (and sometimes it is), but it has got to be handled very delicately, or else she could easily come off as a scatterbrained, flighty girl who is more annoying than sympathetic. Are her changes of heart due to circumstances beyond her control--other people's schemes, or coincidences--or is she just incapable of making up her mind? At one point Momo goes from deeply in love to heartbroken so suddenly that I initially thought I'd missed an episode.

The most frustrating element of the plot came about when Touji found himself being blackmailed by Sae. Earlier on, Touji had shown himself to be far from an idiot and didn't fall for every trick she pulled--which made the series believable and intriguing. Now, inexplicably, he let himself be utterly manipulated, and behaved in a cruel and indifferent manner towards Momo, who he was actually trying to protect. And it dragged on and on--you'd think in three months he would've come up with an idea. I was glad when the whole blackmail business finally come to an end--it just didn't work for me, it seemed like a cheap trick to get Momo to switch boyfriends yet again.

So, why did I enjoy this series after all? The thought occured to me that relatively serious romance series like this one need far more plausible plots than the comedy romance anime I'm used to--that would explain why I got frustrated with Peach Girl at times. This show does manage to be fairly touching at times. My impression is of a lot of clever touches, but not all that well organized. The willingness of characters (especially Kairi) to love even if their love is not returned, is interesting. I think Kairi got a good deal more character development than Touji, owing to his troubled past. Touji's finest hour came in the final episode, where he displayed a remarkably astute grasp of Momo's problems. And, despite what I said earlier, this is a fairly amusing show. The comedy comes largely from what struck me as a clever and inventive use of SD mode, to display charicatures of Sae's true nature (see episode 7!), for example. At one point the SD image of a beaten-up Kairi cracked me up!

However, I think Sae definitely wound up as my favorite character. Initially, you'd think she was the devil herself, what with her talent to sow distrust and sabotage other people's romances. She's almost too good at it to believe! Her bitchy, arrogant personality was more fun (perhaps even more believable) than Momo. With time, however, she definitely undergoes quite a change--she's no longer pure evil and has a vulnerable side to her that you can sympathize with. Nevertheless, she's still mischievious--her most precious and amusing trait. Towards the end Sae even seems to be acting as a sort of matchmaker to atone for messing up Momo and Touji's romance--she's a lot more fun this way. I wish she had gotten some better closure at the end. Hell, I wish she was given her own TV series!*

As the series neared it's end, I couldn't help wondering if Momo would ever manage to make a final choice between Touji and Kairi. Both boys were so well known to the viewer by now that it seemed it would be hard to make the series end on a happy note if either one was permanently rejected. Had Momo become so exasperated by the continual misunderstandings and disappointments that she'd had to endure that she would just tell them "lets always be friends"? I had a smile on my face as the final episode came to an end, even though Momo's final choice (or maybe refusal to choose) between Touji and Kairi kind of came out of left field. It was almost as if everything was decided in this final episode and the rest of the series didn't matter. Well, if the show was popular in Japan, there would be no trouble tacking on a second season. Something must have been done right, because rather than being relieved to be done with Peach Girl, I wouldn't mind watching some more episodes!

My favorite line: "Are you (Sae) a parasite that feeds on people's unhappiness?" --Momo

*I read somewhere that Sae will get her own manga!

7/06

Last updated Monday, March 10 2008. Created Monday, April 04 2005.
Buy Jan-Chan [series:951#967]
With long legs, a dark tan and long red hair, Adachi Momo is easily mistaken as being a flirty high school playgirl. Only her junior high school friend, Toujigamori (Touji) understands that her tan is from when she was on the swim team, and how the pool chlorine damaged her hair, changing its color to a deep autumn red. Momo really just a normal shy high school girl with unspoken feelings for Touji, but everything went very wrong one day at school. Momo's troublesome friend, Kashiwagi Sae was teasing her about who she was in love with, Touji perhaps? Which Momo denies, and on an impulse she admits to being in love with (?) and points her finger randomly in the hall (?) and there stood the very popular Okayasu Kairi, who winks back at her!!! The next day there was some chalkboard graffiti with Momo and Kairi names under an umbrella, and everyone is talking about the rumor that she had kissed Kairi. It turns out that the playboy Kairi does have feelings for Momo, and he remembers that some two years ago she had saved him from drowning at the beach. When Momo mentions that it was the male lifeguard that gave him CPR, Kairi moves close and gives Momo a kiss, saying now the rumors are true. And then Touji finds out that how Momo feels about him and shares that he likes her too. Momo is in bliss, dating the boy that she really likes, but what about Kairi? It appears that he is not about to give up easily. But Sae has her eyes on Touji too, and is certain to do anything to break them up.

(and this is only some of what happened in the first episode .. this series moves very fast)

High romance and drama in the classroom! While obviously being oriented to the teen-girl crowd, the story does move very fast with a good mix of drama and comedy, which will keep any romance anime-fan entertained. It kind of reminds me of Aishiteruze Baby, with a very similar type of anime style and story line.

Having only watched nine episodes, I am going to give this series a tentative <buy> rating, with the understanding that if you are a fan of romance anime and high school dramas, then you are really going to enjoy this series.

Episode Titles

01. Love Hurricane!
02. Trap Kiss!
03. You'll Go That Far!? Super Sae
04. Pure and Righteous Declaration of Catastrophe
05. Swimming Competition of Red Hot Raging Waves
06. Crash! Love's Sudden Death
07. A Brief Love Sign
08. Black Girl
09. Operation: Destruction of Pure Love
10. Peach Crisis
11. An Unbearable Breakup
12. The Peach Flower Blossomed?
13. Shock! An Intruding Ex-Girlfriend!?
14. The Man Who Calls Forth A Storm
15. Who's Your True Love?
16. The Whereabouts of Love from the Abyss
17. Straight Line of Pure Love!
18. Temptations of Midsummer
19. Puzzle of Feelings
20. One Stormy Night
21. Storm Warning of Love's Revival
22. Love Existing Only in Your Head
23. Forced Into a Choice
24. The Truth of Goodbye
25. Last Hurricane!



Last updated Friday, August 12 2005. Created Saturday, January 29 2005.


Other Sites
NameURL
Japanese Series Web Site http://www.tv-tokyo.co.jp/anime/peachgirl/
Funimation (R1 English) Web Site http://funimation.com/peachgirl/

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