Paradise Kiss - 10: Rose

Title:Paradise Kiss
Episode:10: Rose
Synopsis
On the day of the Yazawa fashion show, Isabella is up early at his (yes, his) majestic mansion. He thanks the Butler, "Sebastian" for his loyal service, despite the fact that "I must be an unbearable shame for my parents". A strangely dressed George is waiting for him, and presents Isabella with a remarkable gift. At the school festival, Caroline wants to check out the stalls with Miwako, but they'll be busy all day today (and tommorrow if they win). George has put Arashi and Isabella to work painting roses, as a substitute for the confiscated accessories. Arashi complains that George ought to design more practical clothing, while George insists that he's an "artist to the bones" and Arashi "lacks vision". Caroline/Yukari arrives, and loves the colored roses. Contrary to what George was expecting, she is excited and enthusiastic, whereas he couldn't sleep last night because he was "stressed". To herself, Yukari admits she's a little uneasy--when the show is over, will she and George remain together? Hamada-sensei is surprised to see Asou-san, a tremendously successful former student who is supposed to be studying in London. Yukari realizes she hasn't practiced walking gracefully at all, and has only half an hour before she must report for makeup and dress fitting. She fears she may let down the Parakiss team which has worked so hard for this day. Tokumori has come to the festival with Noriji, the manager of the building where Arashi and Miwako used to live. As Isabella dresses Yukari he tells her about his experiences with George in elementary school, and how they teamed up to design dresses...
Comments
I knew about Isabella being a "drag queen" from another review, but I had concluded that that element of the plot must have been dropped altogether from the anime, perhaps because the story needed to be seriously compressed to fit within twelve TV episodes. By chance I stumbled across volume 1 of the manga in a bookstore, and in that format Isabella's true sex is made clear within the first two or three pages. Anyway, this episode has a strange, dreamlike feel to it--so many bizarre things happened early on that I guessed that Yukari must still be sick as a dog and was dreaming all of this (wrong again!). It seems strange that several new characters are introduced so late in the series, namely Asou-san and Noriji (a narrator makes the comment that we should keep an eye on him!). As always, this is an unconventional show about unconventional people--that's one of the reasons I like it.

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