Review of Peach Girl: Volume 1

Introduction

`Peach Girl` is about as far away from macho, full on action anime as its possible to get. And this is no wacky teen comedy (ala `Love Hina`) either. It`s solid teen soap with romance at its core, with twists and turns that will thrill its intended teen-girl audience.

I watched `Peach Girl` with my two daughters (14 and 11) who normally don`t have much time for anime. What I saw as a fairly obvious and frothy concoction, with predictable storylines and obvious emotional string pulling soon had them literally shouting at the TV. `I HATE that girl!` they declared in unison as yet another piece of misinformation dealt by a so-called friend of `Peach Girl` prevents the two leading protagonists from getting together.

It may be fairly pedestrian soap drama but there`s no doubting its power. And it`s completely addictive too. My two girls got sucked into this one quicker than `The O.C.` or `One Tree Hill` and, believe me, that`s going some. Strangely, I didn`t find it too much trouble to watch either which opens up a whole new bag of bananas.

Momo Adachi has brown skin (from swimming every day with the school team) and golden blonde hair, hence the `Peach Girl` tag. Momo would rather be pale, like her so-called friend Sae, because she has heard that the boy of her dreams (Toji) prefers whiter girls.

Sae is insanely jealous of Momo, and the first 5 episodes essentially revolve around her attempts to keep Toji and Momo apart. As if this doesn`t make life complicated enough, another boy (Kairi) makes no secret of his love (lust) for Momo, and loses no opportunity to try it on.









Momo and Toji do actually start dating (sorry if I spoiled things here) though their faltering start together is constantly hampered by rumours and lies.

Sae manages to keep up the innocent pretence in front of Toji as she continues to poison his relationship with Momo. She plants a hairclip in his wallet, and even manages to persuade him to kiss her when she knows Momo will be watching.

In the last episode on Disc 1, Sae manages to turn their whole school-class against Momo which had my two girls nearly busting a blood vessel in indignation at such obvious injustice!

Video

This is delivered in original Standard 1.33:1 Colour. It`s a damn nice looking transfer too.

Audio

English and Japanese Dolby Digital Stereo options. This has a very good US dub that really means that viewing in original Japanese with subs can be left for the purists (or native Japanese of course). It`s a nicely recorded and mixed piece with great casting, nice score and a generally high quality feel to proceedings.

Features

There`s a US commentary with Kate Oxley (Momo`s US voice) and Zach Bolton, the US Producer of the show. It`s the usual self-promotion stuff, but fine if you time to kill.

There`s also an interview with interview with Saeko Chiba, the original Japanese voice for Momo, telling us her thoughts on Momo and the series.

Finally there`s a `clean` opening and closing sequence as well as some trailers.

Conclusion

I really didn`t know what to expect from `Peach Girl` though all my instincts were telling me that this one would be a perfect for my teenage daughters. I was right.

It`s an imaginatively drawn, nicely rendered piece with stories that are full of addictive hooks. It`s a great introduction to Japanese anime for young teen girls as it`s really easy to follow from the outset. In many respects, this is just a good old-fashioned teen soap, with all the twists and turns you`d expect in a romantic narrative that eventually stretches across 26 episodes.

From my own point of view, I found this more fun to view than I should have done, and there`s no doubt that after these initial 160 minutes that you (and your children) will be back for more.