This drama hits me in the feels. I can relate to the struggles of Sakura and her friends, felt the frustration of their problems, plus understood why some other characters decided to stop being different/idealistic and just stick to the norms (but not with Sakura - obviously). With Sakura's unyielding will to achieve her dream, the drama provides a soft criticism to big corporate culture and how society kinda accept it as a norm.

I loved the cast members, they showed the chemistry very well and the writers were all very aware about keeping their traits consistent for the whole storyline - which I really appreciated. Also the characters did not just throw 'motivational life lessons' out of the blue, they wait until they managed to capture the emotions and conveyed it to the viewers, before giving the strike (I was close into tears in some of those situations). Sadly that strength and the story start to plummet near the ending, as it became somewhat predictable.

It is worth watching, you won't regret it. Who knows Sakura can also change your life.

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The storyline might be somewhat a typical time-travel romance drama will have, but this drama managed to give nice surprises. I think the phrase "life is continuation of choices" in the drama is not just a mere line, but something they take really seriously. The emotion conveyed by Tadayoshi Okura as Motoharu managed to give me the intended thought - "Will I be happy if I can change my past?" instead of "How great it is if we can change the past".

Casts are doing good job overall, Miori Takimoto as Sayaka in particular managed to make me kind of accept her drastic actions due to jealousy without being over the top. The other side characters have an important part and have their own growth too - which I appreciated. I don't have much complain about this series overall, but towards the end it became a slightly boring and draggy. Luckily, the last episode saved the last part of this drama with its "surprises".

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Not gonna lie, I watched this because of Hio Miyazawa. Then I got attached to the story, but suddenly I returned again to my original intent. The good prospect of the story was gone in the latter half where the family issues being settled. Also, that super quick skip from Mr. Ogata asking Shun too come then to Ogata's funeral left me thinking "Huh, what the heck?". And the ending is not satisfying - even though it means Nagisa has decided to choose which one he wanted since you can't have it all. I reluctantly admit that Sora brings life to the story, her role is vital to save the latter half and made me keep continuing.

Not much I can say about other aspects, acting and music were acceptable but nothing is particularly special. So in the end, I just enjoy the calm facial expressions from Miyazawa.

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At first Night Doctor started with the focus on the emergency cases and you might think that this is an action filled case-by-case type medical drama. But as the story progresses, you will be taken to another side of the night doctors which has their own personal struggles and also faced with the unpleasant judgements from others. As we dive into each of the main leads' problems, we are gently being reminded that doctors are also humans which are not perfect and also have things to do outside the hospital.

The stories are well prepared and you can see the growth of each of the Night Doctors as an individual (especially Fukazawa). Unfortunately, for me it did not manage to capture the emotions to the level that I expected. I don't really feel like it is super touching or any strong emotions in most of them. I felt the same thing when watching Unsung Cinderella, where they have many personal stories but they were just 'Good' and that's it.

Regarding the acting, you don't really have anything to doubt from the star studded casts. Haru, Kei Tanaka, and Ikki Sawamura are solid as usual. Sae Okazaki might be the one who is overlooked in this drama, but she did very well here. Kishi in here is just Kishi with medical knowledge (side-effect of watching him too much in varieties I suppose), but hey his facial expressions are the main highlight here. Takumi Kitamura also nailed his role as a man who seems to be happy and always positive but actually have many secrets. Also shout out to Zen Kajihara as the 'main antagonist' in the hospital.

They have many insert songs here and I liked all of them. Might end up in my playlist soon.

So to sum it up, if you wanted to watch a medical drama which focuses on the character story or personal growth, then this is the right one for you.

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Soap opera with beautiful food (?)

To be honest the story was not my cup of tea - lost heir, family drama, etc. But you got to watch the beautiful wagashi and a bit of nice scenery in the drama. They managed to keep the main "mystery" until the very end, and I think it's the only thing that made me finish this drama. Acting by Minami Hamabe and Ryusei Yokohama are good for me, they were able to convey the emotion to the viewers. Alisa Mizuki who played Tsubaki's mother was successful in becoming your standard "soap opera antagonist". Yamazaki Ikusaburo also did well as a supporting character.

There's not much I can actually say about the drama, but somehow it is good enough and I can finish it... Watashi wa douka shite iru? 🙈

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This drama an example of a good balance and I really enjoyed it. You won't see many detective dramas with "just right" amount of romance and comedy out there. Yui Aragaki successfully portrayed Kyoko, the weirdo main character, without overly doing it. Masaki Okada's acting as Yakusuke is also superb, it made you sympathize and want to help him too.

Speaking about the story, at first I felt that the cut-out animations to explain cases were a bit distracting. But as the story progressed, I got used to that. The cases were mostly good, but there were a few of them that lack twists and slightly not as interesting as the others. Regarding the music and OST, I loved the main theme. I did not really notice the other background music, but the sound effects were well-executed and not exaggerated. I would recommend this for those who want to watch a less serious detective drama, but not full blown comedy/romance at the same time.

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A J-Drama in MDL with rating higher than 8? Now, I am tempted to watch....

First let's talk about the main characters: MatsuJun really fitted the role for Miyama - a grinning troll but actually thoughtful guy. Teruyuki Kagawa and Nana Eikura also played very well as if they were playing their own characters, which created a trinity of skilled lawyers with weird quirks supported by the "exploited" Akashi.

I loved the concept and the story in general - the cases are carefully crafted and the revealing clue often caught me off-guard. With the comedic touch, it helps you to enjoy this drama even if you are not into law/legal themed drama. Puns and the dad jokes were acceptable since I have basic understanding of Japanese, but pro-wrestling characters are unfamiliar to me so personally the whole concept of Bando's restaurant was a bit unnecessary (imagine the difficulty for those who lacks knowledge in both). Other gimmicks such as "Akashi ikimasu!" or the rain of "Eh?" are well executed, and never made me bored. But in the last 3 episodes it seemed that the story became less engaging and a bit stretchy - hence I deducted the score.

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I have watched quite a lot of medical dramas and I have to say that this is the best one I've watched so far. The story might not super creative: the main theme is power struggle and revenge with the genius showing up at the last minute when the operation screwed up. But how they serve the story and the casts' acting are very remarkable, I did not skip a single second of the story. I only hope that Sera just use less 'unmei no hi' phrase every time they did a time skip lol.

Never seen Nino's acting before and I have to say I am impressed with his acting, I think his usual face expression already fit in this role - as if he's destined for this job. Kotaro Koizumi also did a great job, I always think he is 'too kind' to do any other characters and I'm proved to be wrong. All other main roles such as Sera, Prof. Saeki, Prof. Nishizaki, Kinoshita, also deserves the praise. Probably I'm not really sure what Nekota is doing there other than giving scary look to other characters - would be good if they give her some little background.

Just watch this if you haven't, seriously, you won't regret it.

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I just watched it despite I have seen the trailer a long time ago and I regretted not watching this earlier. This drama is both fun and meaningful at the same time. Most of the victims might be your cliche gross antagonist or changed due to "something in the past", but you can't 100% guess the outcome and ended up tricked by the small twists - which is good since this drama is a case-by-case type.

Loved the acting of the con-men trio, they made the story alive. Some might consider that Nagasawa and Higashide took the biggest credits, but Kohinata's acting should be appreciated too. For me, they don't just cast him as a "gentleman" role because of his age/appearance, he really did the job very well. Listening to him speaking gave a true gentleman vibe (even more biased if you know the Burari Tochu Gesha no tabi program). This trio managed to convey the message for viewers "to be cautious, trust but never became super overly trusting - even if you're super close."

Music is nice, they didn't overuse them... I couldn't really comment on anything else. The main theme made me hooked with Higedan, and I am glad for that. Definitely would rewatch again for laugh, I won't get bored with this. After this I gonna watch the movies too!

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So an acquaintance kept asking me to watch this since I watched '18 Again' and I decided to give it a try. I have to say I really liked the story, it is quite different with other 'time travel' dramas and do not overly focus on the romance part despite the main female lead is a miserable woman who can't move on from her dead boyfriend. Viewers can become detectives together with Huang Yuxuan to solve the mystery and experience her growth along the journey. I appreciate the 1998 story also featured some aspect on teenagers issue, including some which are considered taboo. However, I docked some points from the story aspect since the pace is unbearably slow, especially nearing the end despite the ending is very nice and realistic (oh and also why Li Ziwei's hair is so 2019 when he was in 1998 lol).

The casts are marvelous in my opinion, Ke Jiayan and Xu Guanghan obviously took most credit since both of them successfully delivered various characters. Patrick Shih also had a good chemistry with both, and I felt the balance in term of acting between this three main characters. In term of music, I loved the opening and closing songs but not the magic Wu Bai's song.

In conclusion if you love time travel/fantasy drama but also wanted a good storyline, this is for you. No excessive romance, no random subplots, and quite straightforward. Enjoy the story, think together with the characters, and then became touched with the story.

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This drama tries to give us another perspective in medical field, where we commonly only know doctors and nurses. I loved this drama try to break away from "1 episode, 1 patient" pattern and by doing that it became less predictable and of course more interesting. All the cases are well structured and very interesting, it's not just about medicine but sometimes also expanded to mental health too.

Satomi Ishihara is brilliant as usual, while both Kei Tanaka and Yuki Sakurai did a good job portraying tough-on-the-outside-but-caring seniors. I also liked Narita Ryo's acting as Onozuka. The actors/actresses for the patients are also mostly very natural in showing skepticism or holding their (wrong) views on the treatment/medicines.

That being said, while this drama involves a lot of human emotion and interaction with illness, I did not feel like super emotional in most of the cases. Like I have sympathy to the stories, but most of them somehow lack a bit for me- usually medical dramas which involves emotional stories will easily drives me close to tears. The music did not help in bringing the feel too, although I loved the main theme.

So overall it is a good drama and I still recommend you to watch it despite the shortcomings since the concept is quite different from the usual medical dramas.

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It could be better

The drama contains historical stuff and a combination of for 4 languages (Japanese-English-Mandarin-Taiwanese Hokkian) that I liked so much. Together with Aaron Yan and its 3 episodes length, those factors add extra appeal for me. Despite the different languages, I don't feel any gap between the stories and the characters are not 'disconnected' when speaking or showing emotions to other characters who primarily speaks different language. The main story itself is not complicated - you know what is the problem and you know what the outcome will be - but it is not boring. But still you will find some scenes that is not necessary at all when the drama could use them to develop more depth in the story. While I understand some of the side stories are not solved well due to the pandemic, I feel that at least they should try to do something (e.g: Letting Haruka narrate some updates about them). There also a few times they "eliminate" extra actors from the scene with a rather unnatural way which made it less realistic. In terms of music, I couldn't say much but yes I love the theme song.

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People kept comparing this drama to "Fall In Love With Me", so I gave it a shot and wanted to know it myself. To me, the drama is like a pilot project for "Fall In Love With Me". You get excited with the first part of the story and someone came in the middle, wreck it up, and then the writers did not know how to end it. The problem with the story is that it is mostly flat and you can end up with an episode with no significant conflict at all. They dragged it too much and I ended up watching the last 8 episodes in 2x speed. In some point, I felt that the cutscenes for ad breaks are more interesting for the story.

The casts' acting are good overall, I liked the fact that the supporting characters are given bigger part in the story (but they never revealed what happened with Cui Xia's mom lol). However, Lyla Lin wasn't "fierce" enough as an antagonist.. where the story might came to blame - in one episode she almost did not appear or do stuff to break Qi Yi and Liang Liang while she's supposed to be so desperate with that.

I generally liked the music, but yeah they just flooded it whenever they like and sometimes it doesn't sound right for me. I don't think I'll rewatch this again, since I don't find any strong points that made me want to rewatch.

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Well, well, I gave this drama a shot since I liked the OST when researching for something. And I have to say I just endure whatever ugly stuff the writers have thrown just to finish drama just because I am already past the halfway mark.

The drama started with a good story until the middle, many romantic cliches were thrown at the first but became less as the story progresses. Then suddenly it took a U-turn from an exciting romance drama into a Chaebol-themed forbidden love soap opera when the Auntie appeared and the story became draggy with everyone became so unwilling and stupid before abruptly ended it with every single antagonists repent, thus paving the happy ending to Lu Tian Xing and Tao Le Si. Although there are small twists from my plot prediction near the end, they didn't continue from there but became instead even more predictable than ever. I also found it funny how Tao Le Si started with SMS and suddenly changed into Line to make it possible for dramatic effect (looks like they got the sponsorship in the middle? lol). Also comic relief from Jia Gai Xian in the middle to ending is also unnecessary since it wasn't funny nor useful. Uncle Fu as the cheat engine also had his role vanished when I thought he's going to help. Also what happened to Mr. Long ? Lol.

As I am familiar with the OSTs first, I am slightly biased to the music. The instrumental versions of the songs are very good. I expected they will play the songs whenever they feel like it, including when it shouldn't be there and ended up ruining the atmosphere.

In conclusion, this drama would be better if it ended after Tao Le Si knows the truth of Xiao Lu and gave a moral lesson not to prank others - and that's pretty much the parts I would rewatch if I wanted to.

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