Buzzer Beat / ブザー・ビート / Gakeppuchi no Hero / 崖っぷちのヒーロー

11 episode, Fuji TV sports romance drama that aired in Japan between July 13 & September 21, 2009.

First of all, it starred my FAVORITE, Japanese actor, ITO (HOT-TAY) HIDEAKI!!

Second, I watched this in conjunction with DREAM (Korean drama I'll dissect next), and by comparison - BUZZER BEAT was better - BUT, not by far.

~ Let me explain ~

The Japanese drama also starred a guy named Tomahisa Yamashita -

 

He's not bad-looking, and I had to admit he's got a pretty, awesome CHEST, too. His hair kind a bugged me, but not too much.

And, either it was his character who seemed a bit, too mopey for me, or he's like that all the time? Hang-dog, emotionless, boring kind a guy? I don't know, but it drove me crazy a majority of the time that I watched this exciting and well-written drama.

I liked his skin, too. It was golden, smooth, and flawless - like the hip clothes he tended to wear - crop pants in purples and print t-shirts under a flannel shirt.

Still, if I met the guy in person and had to spend any amount of time with him, I'd probably have ended up SHAKING him physically and begging him to WAKE UP! Offer him copious amounts of coffee or something, I guess.

To me, it was like he wasn't digging the part or the job, and he just, wanted OUT.

He played Kamiya Naoki, a wanna-be basketball player for a second-rate team in Japan, and it was his lack of faith in his talent which kept him from being the best at the sport. He grew up playing the game, and as a child, he swore that he would become a great baller some day, and yet as a young adult, he still carried enough doubt in his mind to hold him back.

At the beginning, he's dating one of the cheerleaders, Nanami Natsuki (Aibu Saki), who also works for the basketball organization, and she knows there's something wrong with her boyfriend, but her way of bringing out the best in him backfires when she has repeated sex with another teammate, and a guy not, too many girls watching along with me at aznv.tv found attractive -

Kaneko Nobuaki (金子ノブアキ) as Yoyogi Ren  

I liked him, though. He was a 'dude' in every sense of the slang term, and I guess after seeing one Ken-doll, effeminate actor after the other, Nobuaki was a welcome change of pace sensually speaking.

I've also, always had a penchant toward naughty boys, too, and until the end of this drama, Kaneko's Yoyogi played the antagonist to the hilt. He's a good actor who brings realism to his work, and I appreciate his efforts, so I hope to see him in something else soon.

What I didn't like was that my honey, Ito's Kawasaki (the coach) lost out in love to Yamashita's Naoki. It was another of the ubiquitous fated to love you with a triangle twist stories, where HE leaves his cell phone on a bus, and SHE finds it - but, instead of getting to return the item to its rightful owner, she instead meets Kawasaki, who retrieves the cell for Naoki and falls crazy in love with HER at that instant.

SHE, btw, is Kitagawa Keiko as Shirakawa Riko.
Such a pretty woman! Love her hair, her eyes, her skin -- she even wore a few, cool tops, and she showed off her curves as well - another, refreshing change of pace in the Asian drama department! Or, maybe it's that I'm coming from the Korean aspect, where all the girls dress like 30-something, single school teachers? She did a lot of running in kitten heels, too, which I'll never understand or figure out how it's possible to do!
She'll either end up busting an ankle or getting a really, bad back when she's older - who knows.
I can't do it!

Anyway, Riko is a budding violinist with the same, self-doubt plaguing her as Naoki has with his game. Every night, she finds Naoki practicing on the court across the alley from her apartment bedroom window, and it's the same place she likes to go to practice her violin. While she's trying to be nice to Kawasaki, who is now in dogged pursuit of her heart, she is falling deeper and deeper in love with Naoki, who is still with the cheerleader messing around behind his back.

You get where this is all going, right?

It's a cute story with good characters and a surprising ending (but only from the American not understanding Japanese culture stand-point, I assure you).

The music was great, too!

Let's get to the fun stuff now, shall we?

!! the PICTURES !!

(sigh)

(yes!)

(everyone suspected the guy on the right had a thing for Kawasaki-san)

(he even looks FAB in the gekko!)

he kind a gets the feeling Naoki-san is doing something behind his back -

his sinewy, broad back.

 

(he's gotta go to Boston, and he knows

something ain't right with him & Riko)

I CRIED!!  (come to me!  i'll cheer you up!)

(ok - what I wouldn't give to be on THAT beach!)

See what I mean about Yama's chest?  (and his hair?)

(giggle)

~ Now for the kawaii aspect of the drama ~

the apartment where Riko lives (love the colored balconies!)

Kawasaki-san bought Riko a huge bouquet of red roses after a mall concert, and Naoki-san had this, single sunflower.

love, love, love

pretty!

love this top (sorry so blurry, though)

silly

funny!  the fat WHITE chick in the background.

I hope, when I go there, I get to be in a cameo!

I wonder, do they get to meet or even SEE any of the hunky actors?

pouty boy

m-hm!

guy's got kissable lips, yes?

(funny, the cell in a plastic bag!)

how's THIS for eye candy?!

ta-ta for now!

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Kazoku / 家族 / Family

～妻の不在・夫の存在～
~Tsuma no Fuzai, Oto no Sonzai~
~Absence of the Wife, Existence of the Husband~

October 20 to December 08, 2006 8-part drama from Japan that starred Yutaka Takenouchi as Kamikawa Ryohei, a 35 yr old over-achiever whose wife, Satomi (Ishida Yuriko), decides to leave him in pursuit of an architectural career.
Their son, Yuuto, is the focus of the drama, and he's an adorable 5-yr old caught in the middle of his parent's marital stand-off.
Ryohei is left to care for Yuuto when the little boy returns to the house thinking that his mother will soon follow and life will go back to normal again.
Satomi doesn't mind this at first, since she's determined to succeed at work - and having her child around would only weigh her down.
Ryohei ends up getting fired from his high-power corporate job because he has to take care of Yuuto, and he ends up selling sardine fish cakes or something at a local grocery store.
Once Satomi becomes established at the design firm, she wants her son back, and she's also become more adamant about the divorce as well.

In typical, Japanese style, this story is poignantly portrayed and volleys from past to present, character to character in such a way that you never lose focus or become confused.
Ryohei wanted a family, and at the beginning, he truly loved Satomi and vice versa.
His job became the main focus of his life, and aspects of his childhood cropped up to make him behave the way that he did as an adult.
Because the story is about him and how he has to deal with another side of his otherwise typical life, it's easy to see why so many people who commented on this drama at the aznv.tv website took Takenouchi's side (aside from his being totally gorgeous, of course).

However ~ that wasn't the case for me.

To the very end of this drama, I don't think that Ryohei ever, really got it!
He got married, and then he went to work and never returned.
Because he grew up having to fend for himself, he never learned how to let someone else in.
Before the split, he cut off or ignored Satomi every time she tried to talk about anything with him.
Yuuto once thought that his father's best friend was his actual papa since Ryohei was never at home.
Ryohei didn't follow the rules of the game, and Satomi didn't have the guts or the training to teach him a thing or two about what it means to live together as a family.

People often argue against arguing.
They claim that shouting matches cause more harm than good.
I couldn't disagree more.

Had Satomi snapped earlier in their seven-year marriage, things might have turned out different for them.
"Excuse me! I said - I'm thinking about going back to work!"
"Don't walk away when I'm trying to talk to you!"
"I know you didn't, just say your son's piano recital is trivial!"

If Ryohei didn't have a clue from the start, then how was he expected to know anything was wrong if Satomi remained mute?

Satomi gave up and Ryohei forged ahead without knowing anything was wrong.

The drama showed us that Satomi tried at the start to get Ryohei's attention, but that he was too busy moving up the corporate ladder to notice or care.
He made a lot of important decisions without discussing them with his wife, and finally, when he was too late to watch his son play the piano, she decided to end the relationship.
Throughout the show, the other characters took Ryohei's side and felt sorry for him since he ended up with Yuuto and lost his job.
Ryohei did a commendable thing by choosing to look after his son and not focus so much on work anymore, but unlike a majority of the other viewers, I thought that it was too little too late.
It was his turn to suffer, and suffer he did!

And, I'm not being unsympathetic, either.
It takes heaps to make me cry, and Kazoku had me in tears practically from the very start.
It was touching a majority of the time, and reality tends to bite regardless of the circumstances, so to see anyone have to suffer usually tugs at my heartstrings anyway.
The scene at the carnival (Disneyland, I think) killed me.
I fought back the tears, but it became futile and I let it go - which caused a few, curious glances from my mother each time she passed by my room.

There were funny moments, too - like when the father & son first began to live together and Yuuto awoke early because he wet the bed.
Ryohei struggled to wake up, and he whined at Yuuto to just use the potty - and little Yuuto grinned when he said, "Too late!"
Then, and because all of his things were still with his mother, Yuuto had nothing to wear, so Ryohei decided to give him a pair of his boxer shorts, which he duct taped together so they wouldn't fall down - and they fell down anyway.

I fell madly in love with Ryohei when, after realizing that he forgot his own son's birthday, he ran out after dark to buy something, and when none of the stores was still open, he bought packs of paper to draw train tracks, a park, a depot, and stores.
When Yuuto awoke the following morning, he peered over the railing and saw everything laid out on the floor.
Again, with a boyishly cute grin, he whispered, "Wow!" and ran down to play while Ryohei remained asleep on a sofa nearby.
And, I learned that while a bento box is darling under any circumstances, it's seemingly imperative that it be outstandingly kawaii for a five-year-old in kindergarten.
Ryohei cannot cook, let alone recognize another person's feelings, so until he finds out he's doing it wrong, he continues to make yucky bento boxes for Yuuto, and every day at the Cherry School, the kids gather round his desk to see what burnt offering he's forced to have to consume that day.
Eventually, he learns how to slice tiny sausages so they curl up into octopus legs, and how to put smiley faces on carrot rounds - things only a mother apparently knows how to do for her child.

And, while I'm on the topic of kawaii - I couldn't get over the uniform the kindergarten child had to wear.
The first time I saw it, I immediately thought of Pepito from the Madeline books.



Kawaii fascinates as much as it annoys me.
Maybe I'm jealous because it's over there and not over here, who knows.

Kaneko Noboru also stars in this as Yadomoto Kazunori, a guy who works at Satomi's firm and with whom we assume she is having an affair.

He's HOTTT!

Lastly, and it's another, personal observation ~ but, if they used less glam actors for parts like this, it might make the situations seem more realistic.
If I was married to a guy who even remotely resembled Takenouchi, I'd be inclined to put up with just about anything in order to assure that he remained in my life.

It's hard to be sympathetic with a woman who dumps a guy like him!
Heck, it's hard to believe she could be so blatantly stupid!
Sure, who wants to see a balding beer belly with stubble - but, when most women are already married to a guy like him, trying to understand why a woman would disregard a hunk is a little too much to ask.

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Cinderella Man - 신데렐라맨

An April 15 through June 04, 2009 Korean drama that starred Kwon Sang woo as both Lee Joon hee (the wealthy heir of a fashion empire) and Oh Dae san, the forgotten twin.
Also starring Im Yoon ah as Seo Yeo jin, a designer hopeful who is forced to return from Paris early after her father's untimely death.
Han Eun jung is Jang Se eun, the snobbish daughter of a banker who also studied design in Paris, and Song Chang ui as Lee Jae Min, the hot but ruthless stepbrother of Lee Joon hee.

It's about a rich family whose son has an affair with a woman beneath his social status who gives birth to twin boys.
Unbeknownst to the man's mother (who looked like a guy in drag, I swear), she stole just one of two heirs, leaving the ill and weak lower class woman to have to give up the second twin to an orphanage.

The drama then moves ahead to the present day, and the wealthy Joon hee is having heart problems like his birth mother.
He hates his father's family and his stepbrother, Jae min.
Meanwhile, Dae san is working hard at a place called Great East Gate, a 5th Avenue of sorts in Seoul, where fashion knock-offs reign supreme.

Jeong woo as Ma Yi san, Dae san's buddy from the orphanage, was a definite scene stealer in this 16-episode drama.
The chemistry between them was undeniably perfect and their delivery, magnificently hilarious.
It's my hope they'll work together again soon.

It, too, has become increasingly obvious to me that whenever a Korean man plays the part of a homo, it's hard to distinguish fact from fiction, and Lee Byeong joon did it again with his to the hilt portrayal of Elegance Choi.

Anyway, it's the story of the separated-at-birth twins who grow up in entirely opposite directions.
They meet by chance at age twenty-seven, and because the wealthy twin is dying, he enlists the aid of his identical twin in order to obtain the answers about his past.
Wealthy Joon hee goes to Paris for a heart transplant (I know - whaaat?) and struggling-to-survive Dae san takes his place.

Song Chang ui (wicked stepbrother, Lee Jae min) is a good-looking guy!



Dae san worked with Yeo jin's father at the Great East Gate shopping complex, so he meets her at the man's funeral and eventually falls for her.

Jae min meets her, too, and he falls for her as well.

Se eun once dated Jae min, but when he asked her to get serious, she dumped him and ran off to Paris to become a fashion designer.
Then, she keeps bumping into the fake Joon hee and eventually falls for him, thinking he's wealthy and available.
She and Yeo jin met in Paris at the same design school, and because Yeo jin is better than her at their art, and because Se eun is wealthy and Yeo jin isn't, they don't get along too well.

Se eun tolerates Yeo jin until she finds out that Yeo jin and Joon hee (Dae san) are into each other, and then she goes Korean actress crazy.

I know - it's fake - it's drama - but, wtf?

every woman knows that blackmail works on a guy!

so, she brags about it to his stepbrother, like that makes any, more sense

suitable?? and, for whom?

yikes

so, do as I say - boy.

yes, because this mean, nasty bitch who hasn't got a clue about what real love is wants to make you into her whipping boy - why can't you get that?

Since Kwon's a married man with a kid now, I'm not as inclined to go crazy over him anymore, (while watching Cinderella Man, I kept wondering about his lucky wife, and what it might be like to get to hold a guy like him in bed every night - sigh)
but he's still got one of the finest bods in Korean show-biz, and it was only revealed to us once in Cinderella Man, wah!
Also, the scene was shot too fast for me to get a good screen image. (sniff)

I'd have liked to see Song Chang ui topless, too!
I never heard of him before, and now I'm curious to see him in something else.

OMG!

The first, few episodes I watched at Mysoju, and they used Ning and Ku6 for their uploads, which was great!
But, either they or my PC began acting funny, so I had to go to Viikii to watch episodes six through ten.
Y'all already know how I feel about Viikii, and they didn't fail to disappoint me AGAIN.
There's nothing I or any of the other subbers there can do about timing - it's entirely up to the person who submitted the drama to work that out, and it was the timing that was off along with the horrible subtitling.

I worked on it to the best of my ability, and then I just gave up.
Fortunately, Ku6 and then Ning came back at Mysoju and I was able to finish watching in relative peace.

Isn't this vase adorable?



Continuity isn't something Asian directors seem to care about, but toward the end of the show, I noticed that the Great East Gate suddenly disappeared from view at Dae san' place.

All through the show, whenever he or Yeo jin or both of them went to the roof to talk or contemplate about life, there was always a magnificent view of the city lights -
and then, near the end of the show - it wasn't there - and then it was!



Finally, my last, constant complaint about Korean drama -
SEX, or lack thereof.

the first and only time they kissed - at the very end

It's Ok, though, because I'm not at all fond of the way they do it over there anyhow!
It's kind a like two fish in the sea (or a tank) that touch lips in order to extract food from one another.
The girl always hangs limp in his arms, not touching anything about him, and keeping her lips limp as well.

HOW FREAKIN' BORING AND UNROMANTIC!

Not at all happy about that aspect of Asian life (unless it's totally toned down for censorship reasons), and I know I'd go stark raving MAD if I dated a guy who'd expect me to behave that way, too.

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