Summer 2015 Drama Review

[spsn]

It's the time of the year again. Fall has started and I honestly haven't even finished lots of the drama from the Summer season. Instead I've been rampaging some old & dark Kimutaku drama in the last few weeks because I know if I keep on trying to finish this summer batch without distraction, I don't think I'll even be able to finish them. This should say something about the drama themselves. Lots of them are so so, if not mediocore, which is not a problem if you're just want something to waste your time on eg. if you literally have nothing to do on the weekend or you just cannot sleep at night. There're one or 2 that I like but that's about it.

With that in mind, I'll divide the dramas into several buckets based on how I watch the drama. Do bear in mind that my category of drama watching is quite shallow but at the very least it has to be not totally boring or lazy, and has some sort level of acting (no point if you have the ikemen there but he's making you start nitpicking on him on the drama instead of actually enjoying the drama itself).

The normal ones

Risk no Kaisama ~ A summer drama that at least makes sense to me. The risk management here is more on how the company handles corporate scandal, rather than actual real life corporate risk management (which is dull and boring if it turns to a drama LOL). Here, we have the mentality of internal corporate blaming when something went horribly wrong and it ended up with somebody has to take full responsibility (regardless of the actual issue at hand), and held a press conference and announce resignation, which totally so not important to how the company actually will solve that freaking problem and prevent it to not repeating ever again. What makes me continue watching this (it takes me awhile to finish this because I need the subs badly - corporation & business lingo is not the vocab that I can just skim through and get the gist of it) is Saigyoji's forward thinking in basically cover all possible loopholes imaginable on ensuring minimum damage to the company when those corporate scandal occured. The plotting, scheming and underhanded method that went behind the scene and often unknown to anybody but Saigyoji himself often frustrated Kagiri (the only female member of the team) but at the same time she's becoming more and more like Saigyoji in managing all those scandals. And I'm not lying if one of the reason why I'm watching this is because of Morita Go. However, the whole premise itself is making it an interesting drama and having Tsutsumi Shinichi leading this drama comforts me that at the very least I'm getting some good watching session.

Death Note ~ Yes, I thought I'd never watch this drama when they announced that they had changed the characters because what is Death Note without the arrogant Yagami Light and the eccentric L. But I was proven wrong for this drama. The major change they made here is Light character. L is still the genius but instead of the smart and very confident Light, we have the Light whose all the tactics and everything is sprouted out of the survival instinct alone. All those strategy which were perfectly executed in the movie ended up in failure in the drama because somehow L was always 1 step forward. Kudos to Kubota Masataka for bring us this over the edge Light. He owned this drama in my book and really made this drama worth the watch. As for Yamazaki Kento's L, he did his best, but I find that the L in here is rather odd. The L here came of as malicious to me, rather than more objective in his pursue of Kira. It's like L is totally obsessed with the idea of Light as Kira, which is sort of what makes out the chase, but just that in this drama, it comes out as more emotional rather than just brain play.

Attack on Titan SP ~ I haven't watched the movie yet and I think I'd rather not watching it after so many bad reviews of both of the installments, including my brother's very long rant on them. But the SP itself is fine to me. The episodes are divided into the side story of Hanji, Sasha and the couple, which the dude died so tragically in the manga (sorry I forgot the names). Despite the cheap CG for the fighting scene in the last episode, I enjoyed watching the whole set. Especially Hanji's part. Ishihara Satomi's interpretation of Hanji is almost exactly like the anime. Zero complaint here. The only thing that miffed me in this series is that 2 stooges with the 1 lady side kick that looked like coming out from some slutty S&M ero manga.

Jishaku Otoko 2015 SP ~ As if somebody in NTV dug out my last year's wish list, we have the sequel of Jishaku Otoko! Oba Sosuke is back, and apparently still in relationship with Sion, sort of. The matchmaking business is still the background with the focus of trying to find a match for certain client, who needs to let go of her past. This sequel delivers us all the best laughs and hilarity that I'd expect, from the failed kabedon (instead of real wall, we have ushiko served as substitute XD), ruined girlfriend's house stayover (thanks to the funky grandma), and off course new colleagues and the usual annoying reflection of things that women don't want to hear but somewhat they know it deep inside by Oba. Perfect quick perk me up drama.

Unfair SP ~ This is part of the promotion of the last installment of Unfair Franchise. I'm not even sure whether the movie will be the last after so many plot and twist and so many people die and everybody is not what we think they are. The SP is served to hype things up as to me it looks more like a side story and has nothing to do with the main story of Unfair itself. Why? Because the main lead for this SP is not Shinohara Ryoko, they just put her as bait in 1 scene that lasted less than 1 minute, with her saying only about 1 or 2 sentences. Sobs! I want to see more airtime of the cool inspector Yukihira, not some over enthusiastic newbie with a haunting past. Anyway, the story for the SP itself has some twist though it's kind of obvious who's the bad guy here, and real first killer is still not solved in the end.

Omotesando Koukou Gasshoubu! ~ It takes me awhile to continue this drama after the first 3 episode. If we're looking at the drama as a whole itself, it's just another mediocore high school themed drama. Just like the rest of school themed drama, the drama shows us how complicated the life of high school kids. We have the extremely positive driven girl as our lead with the family drama where her parents are on the verge of getting divorce. And her only method of bringing the family back together is to find the 'legendary' love song to remind her parents on how they used to love each other. Then we have the other kids with heart problem, identity crisis, etc. And I kind of feel weird about the school drama nowadays that they just have to insert some LGBT aspect on top of the bullying. Whether it's touched on a very shallow surface or deeper and more serious tone. In this drama, it's the earlier, and I just feel that the drama made a touch and go about it that I'm not sure about the intention, is it to raise awareness or just to put it out there to follow the trend. Overall, it's a light drama with lots of nice to hear choir songs. The pace does pick up faster on the later episodes that it makes it more enjoyable to watch.

Drama for you to spend time idling

Hotel Concierge ~ Yes it's pretty, but it's totally mediocore at best if not boring because it's just some concierge running around meeting customer demands with no real plot twist or actual 'drama'. At the very least they should add some sparks (I even accept the vagueness at any level at this point) between Amano and Honjo, but nope, they don't even bother to think of that. Yes, it may sound like Hotelier (the drama where I like Bae Yong Jun the best, not Winter Sonata, it's this drama for all the cheesy sugary lines) if they take that route, but at least, there's something. What makes Hotelier a good drama in my book is that they added lots of friction & tention within the hotel employees team, not just everybody bonding nicely together and being goody two shoes, on top of interaction with customers. The drama tried to add 1 tiny friction towards the end of it where they have some dickhead intern who I don't even get why he choose hotelling business as carrier choise if he doesn't want to serve the customer (the logic is just beyond me), but that's about it.

Okaasan, Ore wa Daijoubu ~ The 24 Hr TV drama special. From all the 24Hr TV drama special that I've watched so far, I don't like this the most. Not because of Yamada or even the story. Everything is fine and as per standard theme to the drama for 24Hr TV EXCEPT the stupid narration. Why on earth that now they have all those stupid narration for? It's annoying, irritating and it makes those tear jerker heart warming drama lost all those feels. I didn't even shed any tears this time, but instead, it pissed me off. I really hope they ditch this narration format next year, seriously, just show us the normal drama. You don't really need to narrate anything for audience to know what's going on. It didn't even help to shorten the airtime length to say, 30 minutes, or 60 minutes, instead of the regular 2 hours SP drama. So what's the purpose of the narration? Job creation? Hmph.

Drama still not on the finishing bucket

37.5C no Namida ~ This actually an interesting drama and I like the topics that they brought up in it around the working parents, esp single parenting, the childcare policy and child raring. But I don't think I'm mentally ready to watch how those evil step mother and siblings come back to Momoko's life with the equally evil intention. That's just plain cruel. I really want to finish this drama but seriously, I don't think I want to feel agitated and being emotionally distressed with anger when I watch a drama nowadays.

Dumping bucket

Koinaka ~ ah, though I like Fukushi Sota for all those eye candy, I can't even continue to touch Epi 2. The 1st episode is enough for me to enjoy all the pretties. It's just plain boring, just like my losing interest on shoujo manga live action. And to make it worse, we've seen these same people in too many shoujo manga live action, with similar acting style, similar characters, so for me, it's like 'I've seen them been there, done that.' For those who love the current pattern of Shoujo manga live action, you may love this drama. But even my friend who's literally watching this drama for Fukushi Sota really struggled to finish this one, so for me, it really says a lot about the boringness of this drama.

Now, for my fall season list (the whole list is at Amara):
5 Ji Kara 9 Ji Made ~ At first I thought this will be the case of Ishihara Satomi eats Yamapi alive, but after 1st episode, I gotta give it to Ishihara Satomi to not outshine Yamapi, or is it that Yamapi has improved? I'm not sure about the latter though LOL, anyway, 1st episode looks promising
Angel Heart ~ From a hotel concierge, we have Miura Shohei as an assasin here, but he's not the main. This drama is part of the City Hunter franchise, and frankly I like Kamikawa Takaya as Ryo Saeba (the melancholy City Hunter, not the perverted comedic one) in this drama.
Gisou no Fuufu ~ Fake marriage is one of the almost cliche drama theme, but I like the premise set for this drama, the lady has fake personality, the dude is gay, so we can expect more drama here.
Mutsu ~ well, it's Nishijima-san's drama, and they throw in Ito Hideaki too, so.... I'm sold :p
Toshokan Sensou SP ~ I'll watch anything related to Library Wars... period.
Otona Joshi ~ Not sure whether the drama will end up as boring, but for all the pretties (Shinohara Ryoko's hair is so damn nice here).
Kinkyuu Torishirabeshitsu SP ~ the side story of the drama.
Kyouhansha SP ~ waiting for the subs... it's quite dark, so preparing my heart for it and I don't feel like watching it more than 1 time.

Comments

[tokeruyouna.livejournal.com]

What old and dark Kimutaku have you been watching? I recently watched Wakamono no Subete, though that is just old and not dark.

Yes, mediocre dramas are good for pretty much what you said, though in my case it's when I'm sick and want to do something but don't have the energy to invest in anything good.

I didn't like any of the summer dramas that I tried.

LGBT stuff just to be trendy is so annoying.

You know, I didn't think Yamapi was that bad when he was young. It seemed his acting got worse as he got older (and got more boring roles). Now you have me even more curious about 5→9.

I didn't find Kyouhansha dark myself. . . .