Churasan 3 (2004)

"My beloved child"

"Churasan 3" is the second sequel to the 2001 asadora "Churasan." As I stated in my review for "Churasan 2," it's rare for an asadora to receive a sequel and "Churasan" has three. From this, you can guess how popular the asadora was at the time. "Chursan 3" was an improvement upon "2" but was still loaded with problems from the original series.

Set maybe a year after "Churasan 2," Eri (Kuninaka Ryoko) and Fumiya (Kohashi Kenji) are still living in Tokyo with plans to return to Kohama in the future. The stand-out plot of the sequel follows Eri, a traveling nurse, helping a patient and her daughter Aiko. Eri takes to Aiko to live with her parents and grandmother in Naha, so we get to see more of Okinawa! The plot leaves it open-ended about whether Aiko's mother will die from her illness, though I think it's most likely that she will. The storyline has a lot of emotion to it, which automatically lifts it above "Churasan 2" to me.

However, "Churasan 3" is not without its problems. While Haruka's (Konishi Manami) character was assassinated in the previous installment, this time we have the character assassination of Keitatsu (Yamada Takayuki). [Side note: Haruka was returned mostly to old cool self in this installment, though I still think it's weird that she wants to live in that stupid boardinghouse.] The second big storyline of "Churasan 3" is Keitatsu abandoning his wife Shoko (Yamaguchi Ayumi) and their unborn child. Why? Because he's not ready to be father I guess. While his feelings are not implausible, it's unforgivable to leave your wife in this situation and only return once the child is born. This whole storyline was botched and may have been salvaged had Keitatsu returned sooner and more time been dedicated to it. Shoko giving birth to their child was still a powerfully emotional scene though.

Unlike "Churasan 2," I don't have as many petty complaints though the humor is still not my cup of tea. And, aside from Keitatsu's storyline, I actually really liked this sequel. The bright spots are the same that being Eri's character development through helping her patients and Mariya (Kanno Miho) is still a favorite. If you've seen "Churasan 2" already, I recommend watching this sequel because this one is a lot better.

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