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This review may contain spoilers
One Terrible Casting and One Missing Story
The decision to cast the actor who plays Chiaki almost singlehandedly brought the entire show down. That and a missing love story. And no, I’m not exaggerating. Let me explain.
Acting
He can’t act. He has two faces he uses. He can smile which appears a handful of times but the other, much more prominent face, the one you will see him wearing for 97% of this show is one that makes him look like he’s about to throw up or be sick. For every emotion he will have this same face. He’s upset, he looks like he’s sick. He’s frustrated, the same. He’s taken aback, the same. He’s nervous, the same. He’s being flirted with, the same. It doesn’t matter what emotion he is supposed to be portraying, the actor will keep the same facial expression that makes him look constantly ill. I cannot understand or relate to a character when they only have one facial expression. It just made me so annoyed with the character because I was yelling at the screen, “please show some form of emotion.” It made every scene with him frustrating because I knew that no matter what happened, he would react the same way. I genuinely cannot put into words how much this ruined the show for me. It stripped Chiaki of all character traits because he looked the same no matter what he was doing, no matter what he was feeling, no matter what he was thinking. There was no dimension to his character not due to lack of trying from the writers but due to a failure in the acting direction. He became a blank piece of cardboard who looks ill all the time.
Chemistry
Due to the acting choices of Chiaki mentioned above, the chemistry is nonexistent from his side. I will come back to this chemistry thing and their relationship but there was no chemistry between the actors.
Why does AE like Chiaki?
As I listened to AE’s closing speech and confession, I sat there wondering who he was talking about. He described this character who is supposedly Chiaki but was not who I had been watching. This could be due to the acting direction failure and terrible execution in that regard when it comes to Chiaki as all I never ever saw those characteristics AE described in Chiaki. I sat there for a lot of the show thinking to myself, “Why does AE like this guy? What does he offer AE? Why is he attracted to this boring and uninteresting person?” I’m confused as to why in the world AE likes Chiaki. From the characteristics he described I can maybe see him liking that character but there is nothing appealing about the Chaiki I saw on screen. If I cannot understand the character’s draw to their love interest, whether I think they would be good together or not, then you have failed as a love story.
Where is the story part of the “love story?”
I’m gonna be honest, when I was watching AE confess to Chiaki, I learned things about the evolution of their relationship that I didn’t get from watching the damn show. I did not ever see either one of them fall in love. I was honestly taken aback when AE is with his stylist and he claims to be in love. I was shocked because what do you mean you’re in love? I genuinely did not see a transition from whatever feeling he had toward Chiaki to begin with into this love. While watching it I forgot that he had different intentions to begin with because we were never shown him falling in love, they just said he loves him and so my brain corrected their errors and made me think he always liked him. Chiaki and his love for Enaga. What love? He dodges AE’s kiss because he thinks about Enaga and I’m sitting there like, “He made your heart flutter once, that’s all. Do not lie to me and say you’re in love with him!” Chiaki is OBSESSED with AE, okay, he would not dodge that kiss because he wouldn’t even be in that situation if he gave a damn about Enaga in a romantic sense. If he truly liked Enaga, he wouldn’t be trying to run after and accost AE in the street and then have him pierce his belly button (why did he have the tools on hand to do that btw?) and get all close with AE physically there and say those weird things about wanting a reminder of AE on him. No matter how hard you try to convince me, you can’t. Chiaki never saw Enaga as anything other than a friend and work partner. You can’t tell me he fell in love with Enaga at the end of the show and have me believe you when you showed no such thing. For both of these characters there was no falling in love, they just suddenly were in love. AE’s was documented more and we knew about it for a lot longer but Chiaki was just thrown in our face with a 2 second flash back and that was what they considered sufficient.
Their relationship(s)
I feel like the development in both of the versions of their relationships were wildly unbalanced. We were told all about how he felt about AE, the ups, the downs, the obsession, (yes, told, not shown because the acting was a problem) and with Enaga we were shown nothing. By that I mean that the weight put on Chiaki’s relationship with AE was far larger than that put on his relationship with Enaga. Chiaki never told us how he felt about Enaga beyond, “We’re friends and having friends is fun.” Chiaki says he fell in love with Enaga and not AE but no, I don’t believe you. You didn’t give him a second thought when you ran after AE in the rain, okay? You never gave him a second thought, especially not romantically, as far as the narrative is concerned. They focused on the wrong relationship is what I’m getting at.
Final thoughts
I walked away from this having liked the first few episodes until I sat down and realized what I liked was only the end of episode 2 when AE is on that balcony because he looked cool there. So, yeah, a failure of a story. I’m completely ignoring how the power imbalance between them is ridiculously large and they shouldn’t be in a relationship.
Acting
He can’t act. He has two faces he uses. He can smile which appears a handful of times but the other, much more prominent face, the one you will see him wearing for 97% of this show is one that makes him look like he’s about to throw up or be sick. For every emotion he will have this same face. He’s upset, he looks like he’s sick. He’s frustrated, the same. He’s taken aback, the same. He’s nervous, the same. He’s being flirted with, the same. It doesn’t matter what emotion he is supposed to be portraying, the actor will keep the same facial expression that makes him look constantly ill. I cannot understand or relate to a character when they only have one facial expression. It just made me so annoyed with the character because I was yelling at the screen, “please show some form of emotion.” It made every scene with him frustrating because I knew that no matter what happened, he would react the same way. I genuinely cannot put into words how much this ruined the show for me. It stripped Chiaki of all character traits because he looked the same no matter what he was doing, no matter what he was feeling, no matter what he was thinking. There was no dimension to his character not due to lack of trying from the writers but due to a failure in the acting direction. He became a blank piece of cardboard who looks ill all the time.
Chemistry
Due to the acting choices of Chiaki mentioned above, the chemistry is nonexistent from his side. I will come back to this chemistry thing and their relationship but there was no chemistry between the actors.
Why does AE like Chiaki?
As I listened to AE’s closing speech and confession, I sat there wondering who he was talking about. He described this character who is supposedly Chiaki but was not who I had been watching. This could be due to the acting direction failure and terrible execution in that regard when it comes to Chiaki as all I never ever saw those characteristics AE described in Chiaki. I sat there for a lot of the show thinking to myself, “Why does AE like this guy? What does he offer AE? Why is he attracted to this boring and uninteresting person?” I’m confused as to why in the world AE likes Chiaki. From the characteristics he described I can maybe see him liking that character but there is nothing appealing about the Chaiki I saw on screen. If I cannot understand the character’s draw to their love interest, whether I think they would be good together or not, then you have failed as a love story.
Where is the story part of the “love story?”
I’m gonna be honest, when I was watching AE confess to Chiaki, I learned things about the evolution of their relationship that I didn’t get from watching the damn show. I did not ever see either one of them fall in love. I was honestly taken aback when AE is with his stylist and he claims to be in love. I was shocked because what do you mean you’re in love? I genuinely did not see a transition from whatever feeling he had toward Chiaki to begin with into this love. While watching it I forgot that he had different intentions to begin with because we were never shown him falling in love, they just said he loves him and so my brain corrected their errors and made me think he always liked him. Chiaki and his love for Enaga. What love? He dodges AE’s kiss because he thinks about Enaga and I’m sitting there like, “He made your heart flutter once, that’s all. Do not lie to me and say you’re in love with him!” Chiaki is OBSESSED with AE, okay, he would not dodge that kiss because he wouldn’t even be in that situation if he gave a damn about Enaga in a romantic sense. If he truly liked Enaga, he wouldn’t be trying to run after and accost AE in the street and then have him pierce his belly button (why did he have the tools on hand to do that btw?) and get all close with AE physically there and say those weird things about wanting a reminder of AE on him. No matter how hard you try to convince me, you can’t. Chiaki never saw Enaga as anything other than a friend and work partner. You can’t tell me he fell in love with Enaga at the end of the show and have me believe you when you showed no such thing. For both of these characters there was no falling in love, they just suddenly were in love. AE’s was documented more and we knew about it for a lot longer but Chiaki was just thrown in our face with a 2 second flash back and that was what they considered sufficient.
Their relationship(s)
I feel like the development in both of the versions of their relationships were wildly unbalanced. We were told all about how he felt about AE, the ups, the downs, the obsession, (yes, told, not shown because the acting was a problem) and with Enaga we were shown nothing. By that I mean that the weight put on Chiaki’s relationship with AE was far larger than that put on his relationship with Enaga. Chiaki never told us how he felt about Enaga beyond, “We’re friends and having friends is fun.” Chiaki says he fell in love with Enaga and not AE but no, I don’t believe you. You didn’t give him a second thought when you ran after AE in the rain, okay? You never gave him a second thought, especially not romantically, as far as the narrative is concerned. They focused on the wrong relationship is what I’m getting at.
Final thoughts
I walked away from this having liked the first few episodes until I sat down and realized what I liked was only the end of episode 2 when AE is on that balcony because he looked cool there. So, yeah, a failure of a story. I’m completely ignoring how the power imbalance between them is ridiculously large and they shouldn’t be in a relationship.
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