surelyijest

Surprisingly competent airline drama for this aviation geek.

They put in an extremely fun and perhaps unrealistic detail - casting Kichise Michiko as a female 767 captain. She looked amazing and totally sold me on it lol.

I miss this show. Kanno Miho is an one-woman show in whatever she stars in, and this (sub-title: she who made a deal with the devil) gave her ample opportunity to flex her melodramatic muscles. I saw her on Another Sky revisiting her drama school in London, and this is the drama that popped into my head. (no, not hataraki man!)

The entire cast deserved a better script, more expensive production, or both. This show was beneath Aibou in script quality and production value.

It's normal for Amami to not get a script that deserves her, but BG was a much better setup that carefully considered what made sense for an older Kimutaku.

Wowow has followed the American premium cable business model. In interviews Wowow people always say, we don't have to worry about sponsor dictates and our hands are not tied unlike the major networks, we only answer to our paying customers. But Wowow has much less budget than you'd think, and I thought that was particularly apparent on this landmark production.

For the novel's major plane crash, the equivalent of real-life Japan Airlines flight 123, they just went to 1 of 3 airliner interior sets regularly available in greater Tokyo. They conveniently showed just a peek of the cabin (filmed with volunteer lay people extras) at the start of emergency, didn't try to use CG and IIRC, also didn't try to recreate media reports etc. It was very low cost. Now, you should know I'm not trying to say they needed a Mayday-style CGI crash clip. I'm just saying I kinda expected more from such a big project for them.

Onchi going to the US was filmed in a bare room and only propped up by Charlotte Kate Fox's native-tongue American English. Yes she kinda sorta dressed correct for the period, but that was it. Premium cable, people. Surely the same cast could've been spent filming happier material like a couple dark comedies? :)

Typical NTV drama, which means a good amount of plot holes and it's not very well made. Lots of forced "Chinese" elements to facilitate selling the show to Chinese-speaking regions.

Is the script basically gakking character names from the Nakai family? Nakai Kiichi is also on TV this season, starring in The Travel Nurse (S2). He and his real-life sister both have 貴 in their names, which is also the siblings' naming scheme in this show, and their dad died young just like Nakai's dad, the actor Sada Keiji.

Okura is disappointing. It was advertised as something like Bitter Blood, but they just have to add a badly written The Shield, Vic Mackey kind of subplot, and making Sugino seem very amateur and inept as the accuser.

I really want to watch Sorimachi and especially Aoki Sayaka in peace, but I'm left holding this bucket of bad writing.

Yep, this is a Blacklist rip-off. A concierge for crime who suddenly appears to law enforcement and say "I speak only with Elizabeth Keen." They just flipped the male/female, which would've been a great idea because Takahashi Issei is uniquely flexible and can act very soft...

But the show never adequately established Kiriko with enough of anything, be it charisma, oddity or badassery. It's a great disservice to Shibasaki and I suspect she's going to avoid TBS drama projects for a few years, the way Amami avoided Fuji for a while after Chef. Oh well, at least there's no Redarina on this one. (I hope)

This one's a classic. Nishijima in an action role is like Richard Armitage in the first season of Strike Back, they bring so much emotionality to the role. I crave more action roles from him.

This is also the beginning of Kantele's big budget aspirations - that bullet train interior in ep1 cost a ton of money, and the scene where the 2 leads fought their way out of the cult is great. The theme song (criiiiiiiiiiii-sisssssssssss) and opening credits are tacky & camp. (teardrop? really?!)

I believe the creator/writer is Korean-Japanese.

So, for the last 5,6,7,8 years the tabloids have been telling us Yonekura does not want to be typecast as Daimon Michiko forever. Which is well and good, because the name "Daimon" is a reference to the 80s classic Seibu Keisatsu, meaning it's a TV Asahi property above all, and not her own, even if she's synonymous with the character.

So the question with each new Yonekura project becomes: does she escape acting like Daimon Michiko? The answer is always a disappointing no. Yonekura *chooses* to keep reprising Daimon Michiko in each successive role when she could've chosen differently. At this point even Tominaga Ai has greater range than her.

Angel Flight is a very shallow show. It's not deeper or more interesting for being on Amazon Prime; that freedom is wasted and the plot often disappoints. It makes zero attempt to appeal to a wider, international audience. I can only recommend it if you simply like Yonekura and want to be in her presence.

There's very interesting chemistry in making a sandwich with the Cherry Magic duo and Eguchi Noriko's natural-born resting bitch face/voice. She's not someone you'd typically cast for this script and it's probably true that everyone else turned it down, but she makes it realistic. The simmering dynamic between her and Matsushima Nanako (who in a past life would've been default FL for this kinda show) illustrates my point - Mamoru has never been and can never really fill the shoes of that stereotype, and ultimately, you're still a loser to your mentor aren't ya.

I enjoyed this until the last few episodes where I just couldn't hold on to my interest.

There was one generation of Sony smartphones whose wallpaper looked a lot like the art for this show. I always wonder if they had the dele.life app by default lol

IMO NTV as a network is not capable of good serious dramas. Something like this, child/teen-centric and completely comedic, is the kind of drama they do extremely well. I was thoroughly entertained by Kuitan (2006) and this was the beginning of my Karasawa fandom. Just like fellow Gemini Liam Neeson, he found his stride as a B-list action star later in life.

I have to say this show kinda has lower production values and lesser writing, made in the mold of those 80s 2-hour suspense dramas. But as a foreigner I can watch this knowing it's a slice of what Japanese seniors watch, and suspend my belief. Does the head of sousa ikka really go down to every other crime scene personally? It's all fine because Saito Yuki is in it - the original Sukeban Deka herself. She can do premium cable and she's equally at ease in a production like this.

I think it was this season where they suddenly introduced an even zanier element with the ikkachou's family cat, that really did not work well lol.

In retrospect, this is an absolute favorite. It's old-school Showa revenge, but probably also the highest quality drama in its timeslot for a long time. Everyone brought their acting A-game. Tamaki Hiroshi's transformation into muscle stud is complete. Takahashi Issei has that moment before the reception where his eyes let you know he just died inside... there's real-life hapless bunny, Endo Kenichi playing a bastard ruthlessly fondling voluptuous milf Satio Yuki... even Konno is just right in his role.

I wish they had multiple seasons of this drama, but even the original novel was not complete before the author died. Like many fans, I went on to watch Gokushufudo for solace cause I need my Ryuichi fix lol.

Great Thai "indie" vibes. More lakorns should be like this.

11 episodes, even though they really only had enough substance for episodes 1,2 and 11. Explosive setting with Akk doing a spectacular job as the stereotypical jealous gay lover flexing his thighs... but they wasted even him.

Alek is great in this, but there's really only one reason to watch any of The Cupids: FLY HIGH WITH ANGIE from Pink Lady HD

Another Yadech project where Yaya outshines Nadech. That's it, that's the hot take lol

Oh, and The Emporium was my stomping ground for a long time, so I'm very happy they did the grocery shopping scene at Emporium with the golden shopping baskets lol <3

For some reason this is one of my favorite lakorns. It is a little campy (even the pre-chorus "ohhh" in the theme song) and salacious, but the tone is just right, and so all of its plot holes and limited special effects did not seem so bothersome. It didn't even bother me that the shoe of playing a superstar is a bit too big for Jooy to fill.