Yukari Uchida

Yukari Uchida is a first-year student at Kamakura-Kita High School and Hitomi Kanzaki's best friend.

In the anime
In The Vision of Escaflowne, Hitomi and Yukari are best friends. Hitomi is an athlete on the track team, and Yukari is the manager of the track team. Yukari teases Hitomi about her crush on Susumu Amano, but holds secret feelings for him herself. When she walks in on Amano about to say something to Hitomi, she is frustrated and asks Hitomi to buy her snacks to "make up for it." But soon afterward, knowing how important Amano is to Hitomi, she tells Hitomi that Amano is going to leave the country, and encourages her to tell Amano how she felt.

Just as Hitomi is running around the track, the Fanelian prince Van Fanel, in the middle of the dragonslaying Rite of Succession, and a land dragon are transported to Earth. Hitomi, Amano, and Yukari run away. Yukari hurts her ankle, and Amano carries her to the shrine, where the dragon and Van end up as well. Hitomi has a vision of the dragon impaling Van with its tail, and warns him, which enables him to successfully defeat the dragon. Hitomi's pendant reacts to the dragon's heart, and Hitomi and Van disappear in a pillar of light.

After Hitomi's disappearance, Yukari and Amano tell Mrs. Kanzaki that Hitomi has vanished. Later, Mrs. Kanzaki tells them the story of her mother and how she traveled to Gaea as well.

When Hitomi returns to Earth for the first time and relives the day she was first taken to Gaea, she realizes after Yukari tells her that Amano is leaving the country that Yukari had a crush on Amano all along, but didn't want to voice her feelings out of consideration for her friend. Hitomi realizes how blind she was to Yukari's feelings and comes to believe that Yukari should be the one to get together with Amano.

When Hitomi returns to Earth the second time, it is revealed that Yukari and Amano are dating, and people see them as "the perfect couple."

In the movie
Yukari is Hitomi's best friend in the movie as well, but Amano is not present. As in the anime, she is cheerful and doesn't take everything too seriously. Despite her friendship, Hitomi pushes Yukari away due to her depressive state, thus isolating herself and allowing herself to be called to Gaea by Sora and Folken.

Yukari is not seen after the movie's opening.

Trivia

 * The name Yukari means "reason, cause" (由) (yu), "fragrance" (香) (ka) and "village" (里) (ri).
 * Yukari's surname Uchida means "inside, within" (内) (uchi) and "field, rice paddy" (田) (da).
 * Yukari shares her Japanese voice actress, Mayumi Iizuka, with Millerna Aston and Sora.
 * The Hitomi-Yukari-Amano love triangle parallels Hitomi Kanzaki's love triangle with Allen Schezar (Amano) and Millerna Aston (Yukari). Hitomi's ability to realize Yukari's feelings is likely influenced by her time spent with Millerna and how their shared feelings for Allen complicated their relationship.