“Traveling Whimsical Roads With Izumi Matsumoto”, 2020-10-14 (; backlinks; similar):
I met Matsumoto in person in February of 2012 when he visited Washington, D.C. to attend the anime convention Katsucon. I had first become a fan of his work 15 years earlier as an adolescent in the mid-90s, and had gained something of a reputation as being one of the more knowledgeable fans of the series [Kimagure Orange Road] by the mid-00s. In 2011, Matsumoto himself became aware of who I was after I contributed to an English language Japan-based article on his work, as I offered context to the interviews conducted by the author of the piece who was, at best, a casual fan. Prior to these interviews, Matsumoto was largely unaware of the depth of North American and English language Kimagure Orange Road fandom.
…And then there’s Madoka. She’s the very epitome of a latch-key kid. Her parents don’t even live in Japan, and she is largely ignored by the older sister tasked to take care of her. There’s a distinct class difference between Madoka and Kyosuke which repeatedly comes up, with Madoka playing the “poor little rich girl turns bad girl” act. There is even some evidence, though Matsumoto was unwilling to give me specific details even in private, that Madoka is biracial. Not only is she based on a combination of Japanese and American idols Akina Nakamori and Phoebe Cates specifically, something Matsumoto confirmed, but characters also hint that her father is not a native Japanese speaker and may not be Japanese. While good at everything (or perhaps earlier driven to be), her parents largely don’t appear to care or even notice. They’re not even there. Madoka has serious abandonment issues and a major inferiority complex which is at the heart of her “whimsical” or mercurial nature. Not to mention her substance abuse issues, specifically drinking.