Carpe Librum

Hi! I have just finished this drama and I think I can answer your questions. It seems to me, Natsu's mom knew her son would never actually insist on an abortion, but she also knew that indecisive and weak as he has always been he just wasn't seen by Mizuki as fit to be a father. And that - not being someone you can lean on - is almost the same as forcing her to get rid of the baby. Besides, there is sad truth in that, if Natsu was really ready to take the responsibility, he would have behaved differently. He could have said something like: ' No, I am not signing this. Because I want you, I want our baby, I want our future together.' He could have insisted on keeping the baby, but instead he cried, felt extremely sad and bad about Mizuki but mostly himself, but still signed the paper, because that was the convenient decision. That's what his mom was so upset about. I am not sure I'm making myself clear enough, but that's how I understand the scene.
As for living alone with Umi... I think he partly wanted to keep his job and his income, and moving in with the Nagumo family would mean leaving his company and starting afresh somewhere else. Besides, I guess he was affected by Mizuki's example: she was a single mom of a newly born baby and still she somehow managed to support her daughter and herself, so he would probably feel ashamed if he -- being an adult man, a well educated man, and a father of an older kid -- had to burden other people... I think at one point, after the conversation with Umi's grandfather, he was ready to agree to moving in with the Nagumo, but then he changed his mind.

When the ML and the FL are watching the fireworks together, the FL confesses she seems to have broken their promise of not falling in love with each other, to which the ML replies he has already broken that promise a long time ago. While I was watching the film, the scene felt really sweet. But. Isn't it awkward that the FL managed to fall in love within a single day with the person she had no prior memories of? On the day of the confession the ML entered her life as always - firstly, through the diary entries, photos in the gallery roll, then in person... But still, despite all the previous history of their relationship, he was nothing more then a new acquaintance to her, someone she has JUST MET. So how could this feeling progress so fast as to encourage her to confess? Or was it a form of pretense: maybe she read the diary and rationally figured out that it was time to advance their relationship a bit, and going to the festival together was a great opportunity? After all, she agreed to date him in the first place because she wanted to find out what it feels like to have a boyfriend, so for her this has always been just an experiment, - then, why not further it a bit?... Maybe I am just reading into this story something that isn't there, and this scene was written by the screenwriters just for romance's sake, but unless it's a logical mistake, it kind of changes the perception of the whole film making the story even sadder. Sorry for the long read.

Lovely, lovely, bittersweet film. But, being a terrible bore, I couldn't help noticing a tiny inconsistency / logical mistake, - if it is one...

My goodness, I love this drama. It's on another level completely. Meguro Ren's acting here is incredible, and the story itself is ... something else. It's so deep, so moving, the characters are so nuanced.

I badly want this to be true (*fingers crossed*).

Thank you!

Sorry, I haven't had the patience to read the entire feed, so I might repeat someone else's question: does anyone know, if this drama is anyhow based on Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice? Has it been stated anywhere officially? And, if not, does it have another source -- a novel, a manhua, etc.?

Yes, they do.

I am surprised too! I am currently watching ep. 7 and so far I am loving it. In some respects I would say it's even better that the first season...

Thank you very much! Your comment has been very helpful: now I am not going to further waste my time on this and turn to something better instead.

Hi, guys! Came here after FoF, and so far I can’t help feeling disappointed. I’m on ep. 8 and so far I find the drama rather boring. I mean, so many characters have been introduced, but nothing is actually happening story wise. And the acting seems grotesque. But the rating is quite high, so I am intrigued and I really don’t wanna drop this… Please, tell me, will it get better eventually? And, if yes, when will the plot start to develop?

It is Baby Zhang. I checked the final titles for the characters of her name and it is there.

... a more articulate conclusion. Instead, we have to decide on how we want to understand the final scene.

My understanding of the whole story is this: the girl and the boy are having difficulties in their relationship, because the girl is jealous and not quite satisfied with their status. They are -sort of- seeing each other, but going out on a date just once a month doesn't seem to be a proper relationship. Besides, the boy is obviously a flirt, he quite enjoys his popularity with other girls, which makes the girl even more uncomfortable. On the 1st of November they go on a usual cinema date, but the boy has to leave, and he doesn't even explain why. The girl is naturally insulted. Later that evening the boy texts her asking her to see him at the clock tower (lovely allusion to the Back to the Future franchise). They have a conversation, the girl finally articulates her jealousy and dissatisfaction with their relationship. Feeling she has broken up with him she goes away without properly discerning her path and is nearly knocked down by a lorry. She barely escapes because the boy reacts faster, pushes her away and takes the blow instead. While unconscious, the girl hallucinates: her brain is trying to cope with all the shock and provides the whole groundhog day illusion, in which she -thinks- she finds out the boy's real feelings towards her, the reason why he was secretive and had to leave on their date night, in which she tries to save him and eventually succeeds... They key word here is 'thinks'. She doesn't know anything for sure, and neither do we. Maybe some of these deductions were true and the boy had a good reason for everything. Maybe they were not, and all of it was just wishful thinking on the girl's behalf (remember the scene, when the girl's best friend told her that in dreams we see things we subconsciously want to be true? that's precisely the case: she badly wanted her boyfriend to be faithful, to be loving, to be romantic and planning out a surprise for her, but more than everything she wanted him to stay safe, and that is exactly what she saw in her hallucination). Once she wakes up, she finds out that she is more or less fine, but her boyfriend got hit badly and is on life support. She gets the letter he had written for her but failed to deliver because of their fight. The letter kind of supports her deductions, making her all the more sorry for everything she had said and done. And that is basically the end. The boy stays comatose, the girl goes on with her life hoping for him to recover one day. And I would interpret the final scene as another portion of the girl's wishful thinking or a dream: she would love the boy to wake up and meet her at their spot. But I guess, this is not really going to happen, because -- mind the title -- she has lost her 'blue sky', that is her first love. That's just my understanding of the plot. I will be glad if this comment helps someone puzzled with the ending to make something out of it :)

I guess, my opinion won't be a popular one, but for me this film is mediocre, 3.5 out of 5. It's totally watchable, the whole groundhog day concept never fails, but it didn't have a long-lasting emotional effect on me. And I genuinely didn't like the ending, because, in my view, this sort of story needed a more... SPOILER ALERT DOWN BELOW ->

I hope you enjoy it. But you might want to keep a box of tissues by your side - just in case ;-)

I suppose, I might be a little late, but no, the two films are VERY different. The Japanese film doesn't have the same plot twist, the story is pretty straightforward (but personally I like the Japanese film a lot better).

The film is really beautiful, a bit slow-paced but never boring, very touching and sweet.

I don't really understand why this film is so underrated. Personally, I don't really mind that the film doesn't go in line with the original manga and does not dwell much on the Death Note itself, and I am very much into the DN legendarium, have read and watched almost everything related to this story. In general I prefer the 2015 drama to the original films, but this particular movie is just amazing, and I L-O-V-E how Matsuyama Kenichi portrays L. The OST here is probably the best in the entire franchise. And the ending... the ending got to me. It's powerful, indeed.

Lovely summary, delightfully full of spoilers... OK, I'm just being sarcastic. Hate how they have managed to spoil the plot of the entire series.

I am watching 'Checkmate' and I have a weird question to those who know Chinese well or are Mandarin native speakers: there is an occasional character obviously based on the original Hercule Poirot (bowler hat, moustache, David Suchet vibe and all that), whose name is He Ni Tang. The way he introduced himself and pronounced his name in ep. 16, it sounded like a pun or a joke or some sort of an Easter egg, but I can't get it. The only translation of the name I can think of is 'Drink you soup' (喝你汤), which doesn't make any sense, unless there is some 成语 that I don't know that makes use of these characters. If anyone knows what the name refers to, please share.