Yasha / 夜叉

Ok, so I said I'd watch Green Rose ...
Not that I don't want to, or even that I won't watch it!
I just saw the word Yasha when I opened Mysoju, and decided that staring at someone as incredibly hottt as Ito might be worth my while.
So, all day (and night) yesterday, I watched Yasha.

I became dead-tired around 9:30 pm, but I only had about six episodes to go, so I decided to stick it out and watch the entire, ten episodes before I crashed for the night.
I'm glad that I did, too.

For YEARS, Yasha's storyline didn't appeal to me.
This JDorama came out back in 2000, and even though Hideaki Ito is the star, (and as twins, no less!) I just, didn't think that I'd like watching anything as far-fetched and gruesome as genetically altered ... well, Yasha people roaming the earth, doing despicable things because they are conceived in a petrie dish, and therefore have no soul or conscience.

The storyline turned out to be fascinating, though.
(Why have I not learned by now to simply TRUST the powers that be in Japanese cinema to fascinate the hell out of me, regardless of the storyline, genre, or even characters?)

Sting's Desert Rose was completely apropos for this drama, and I also liked the soma.fm-esque Drone Zone music in-between.

This guy appeared at the end of beginning credits (if that makes any sense), and for the first, few episodes I couldn't figure out who it was, or why they had to show him.
It still looks nothing like Ito to me, but I began to wonder if it might, not be Moichi, the pianist?
Sei never wore a white coat ... unless it's a lab jacket?
I think the guy has glasses on though, and I'm sure it has to be Ito's character, but I just, don't see it.



I especially liked the piano tune that Sei's surrogate mother taught Moichi (Kashiwabara Shuji, 柏原収史).

It's super-pretty, but of course, I'll NEVER find out what it is, let alone who performed it ... because since 2000, no one has posted a reply to the dozens of questions regarding that particular piece of music!!!

Sei (Hideaki Ito) is a genetically cloned ... human,

Good Clone Sei


and Rin is his nine-month apart twin, also cloned at the same genetic lab.

Bad Clone Rin

Sei lives with his surrogate mother, and his best friend is Moichi, a blind boy with a natural talent for the piano.



When Sei is twelve, the genetic lab that created him tries to take him back, and in the process, his surrogate mother is killed (or so we think for the next, few episodes).

At age twenty, Sei returns to Japan, and he meets his twin, Rin, at a new-age nightclub.

Now, ... this is where the storyline did a weird twist on me ...

It was revealed late in the drama that both Sei AND Rin were conceived of the ovary and sperm of Sei's surrogate mother and Rin's adoptive father.
So, does this really qualify as genetic cloning, and how could their cells die early if they are, in fact, of two, human beings?
It was pointed out numerous times (perhaps so we wouldn't forget) that Sei is an uber-genius, with the highest IQ possible, the quickest reflexes known to man, and with the ability to hear and see at great distances.
THESE traits were ... added to the fertilization process, and both Sei and Rin are of equal genetic make-up as well as phenomenal, human capabilities.

Sei finds out that his mother is still alive, and that Rin's father loved the woman deeply.
Still, Rin's father is the mad scientist type who works with a warped Congressman to help 'balance' the already dwindling population of Japan by spreading these lethal viruses that infect everyone, but that only kill off ... undesirables, like old people and unintelligent folk (like me).

People that think this way make me nervous for a number of valid reasons, and Yasha made me naturally curious about the Rhysyn (sp) thingy that occurred in that country, killing all those innocent people on the subway train in Tokyo.

I know ... turns out it was a wack-job from a cult, but still ...

Sei is the good clone, and Rin is the bad clone, but not because the scientists injected a bad boy gene into Rin's petrie dish.
He's not supposed to be human, but Sei is traumatized by the shooting death of his mother, and Rin is jealous of the fact that the surrogate mother cared so much for Sei.
So, Rin is on the side of the wipe-em-out-with-deadly-viruses plan and Sei is against it.


This guy was smokin' hot, but I have no idea who he is.
He came in toward the middle of the drama, as the son of the woman that carried Rin's cloned cell, and she died after giving birth to him.
So, I don't know if this qualifies them as brothers in any way, and even though the hotty knew that Rin was the reason for his mother's death, he still sided with Rin and even became his sex partner toward the end of the drama.

I felt that Rin was the hotter Ito Hideaki character,



but as this drama unfolded, I began to dig them both equally for their raw sex appeal.



Ito has got it goin' ON, and I just wish that Japan would relax their copyright laws, because I really want to see EVERYTHING that Ito has starred in!
And ... what is the deal about BUYING these things online?
I can't, even find his dramas or movies on Amazon, so what gives?
Japan only wants people from their own country to watch their dramas & movies, is that it?

I did, happen to find a movie he stars in ... Kodoku no kake 孤独の賭け.
I hope that it arrives before my Christmas break from school ends.

Yasha also starred the equally HOTTT Abe Hiroshi as Sei's terminator-type bodyguard.



This guy is HUGE compared to all of the other actors in this drama!
He seemed to tower over even Ito!
Ito is 182cm and Abe is 189cm tall.
Ito is nearly 5 feet 10 inches tall, while Abe is 6 feet 2 inches tall.
Both numbers are unusually high for Japanese men, and I don't think that Abe is of a mixed origin, either, like our dashing Hideaki Ito, with his smoldering, Portuguese blood pulsing through his red-hot veins.

I leave you with lots of pretty pictures from the drama, and a trailer for the drama at the end.