RandomUsagi

Thanks for sharing ^^
This is for those reading this comment unaware of the terminology, from wikipedia:
''Gray asexuality is considered the gray area between asexuality and sexuality, in which a person may only experience sexual attraction on occasion.''

I'm ace and Adachi being grey ace wouldn't surprise me from what I've seen either. Indeed Adachi was clearly fine with a life without romance, sure he got attached to Kurosawa eventually but without Kurosawa he would've just stayed single forever. The obvious problem ofcourse being that the drama will never clarify it so its left up to interpretation despite some of the signs we've seen.

So this causes fans to see what they want to see, for example in my case that's being fine with the lack of kissing and for others the lack of them isn't okay. Both viewpoints have valid points to make about why a kiss is needed or not needed. I've seen very good points brought up from a user here who described being taken out of the watching experience for the lack of intimacy. Then there's also others who don't feel like it takes them out of the experience at all (like myself).

I think its important to share these sorts of different viewpoints as I do understand my own opinion about the show better through these sorts of discussions as well. It's not like we'll ever reach a definite conclusion on this (since the drama will never clarify) but its nice to see someone had the same experience watching the show ^^

Feel free to share your experience ^^

Thanks for your reply! So I watched Ossans Love yesterday and yeah it really surprised me with the similarities. To the point that I can probably place some scenes of CM and OL right next to each other to compare small differences.
I'm not talking about the wellknown drama here (which you mentioned in your comment, I also saw that one) but about the original movie which I had never completely seen. Watching it in detail gave me some chills at how similar it is. Just make the manager and the roommate into 1 guy.
https://mydramalist.com/22055-ossans-love
-Coffee scene in the dark office
-The hand towards the face while 1 pretends to sleep
-The company has the exact same focus on stationary
-The way 1 of them falls on top of a guy
-The ending is literally the ending of episode 7
-The lunch prepared in detail
-One of the guys loves taking pictures of his crush

This is such a weird experience of deja vu I highly advise you to check it out yourself as well. Of course the general vibe is different.

Thanks for letting me know!

You should! It has a few moments that will show that CM has increased sensibility to certain LGBT subjects but its much less shy about intimacy.
Whatever you do though, don't watch Ossans Love: In the Sky (spinoff). Its better to spare yourself from that disaster.

Thanks for the final subbing ichihachi!

Yeah Ossans Love is from Tv Asahi but there are some similarities between Ossans Love and Cherry Magic in their approach of scenes that make me suspect it definitely influenced the show. Watch the original movie of Ossans Love sometime and you'll likely recognise the coffee scene and bridge scene as very similar.

Minatos actor has actually kissed a guy for a show on the same network before. It just wasn't a BL so I didn't include it. Its actually a show that aired just a few months before Cherry Magic on TvTokyo.

Alright I've done some research into TvTokyo's (broadcaster of CM) past ventures with BL. As the past shows of such a tv-broadcaster can often give clues into its approach of handling shows. Through the help of MDLs database I found out some things. Anyway, just read it if you want some extra information.

It turned out I had watched quite a few shows of theirs which made things easier. I will only use their official BLs but they have done a few LGBT series on other topics.
-2007 Renai Shindan
Older Japanese BL fans will know this one. A very stereotypical BL story with hidden kisses. Tragedy included.
-2008 RH Plus
Basically they turned a BL manga into a bromance with very heavy hints of certain love interests.
-2019 Kinou Nani Tabeta?
No focus on romance but more on wholesome living together and cooking food. Got a lot of praise in Japan.
-2020 Cherry Magic

So based on this there is kinda a view of their approach on BLs in comparison to other tv broadcasters that may do things differently. They're taking the formula that worked with their previous drama (a very succesfull series) and trying to adapt that for Cherry Magic. I highly suspect that the product of Cherry Magic is heavily inspired by their ''Kinou Nani Tabeta?'' and ideas from Tv Asahis ''Ossans Love''. In fact, rewatching ''Ossans Love'' the original movie I saw the exact coffee-scene from ep 1 and a variant of the bridge confession scene from ep 7.

Truly he is

Highly depends on the type of show. However, romcoms usually do less intimate scenes unless their theme is sexual.

For the final scenes, if it was a female-male couple then yeah a kiss scene/arm around shoulders would've been more likely for the main couple. I'm really wondering about how this happened too since other BLs from Japan (outside of Kinou Nani Tabeta, also produced by TvTokyo) in recent years have shown no problem with kisses. Actually, the cause of the missed kiss may just be TvTokyo itself trying to minimize it as they did the same for Kinou Nani Tabeta. I can assure you that outside of TvTokyo BLs, M/M kisses are no rarity.

All in all, I highly recommend you watch Ossans Love. As I've basically found CM and Ossans Love to be incredibly similar. To the point of having vivid flashbacks to CM while watching it. One having more sensibility towards the topic of LGBT and the other showing much more intimate scenes.
If you combined the good parts of both shows you'd probably get a show everyone here would like.

Likely not a BL since its missing Romance tag and does have Friendship tag present. I could be wrong but this feels like another ''Ouroboros'' copy drama. Basically just about kids growing up to take revenge. I even made a whole custom list for these types of dramas since similar plots were appearing frequently. Could still be a fun watch though

I remember the first comments we did on this page as one of the earlier fans. Way back in the first ~20 comments of this page. You asking what type of content this was and me giving a translation of a few words in the ep 1 trailer. We were such a small group of fans, trying out a random show. Back then we could've never known what would happen. I remember you convincing me to get the CM profile picture when I pointed out how everyones profile picture was changing. Your comment did convince me to change it.

It has been an honour being here with you Alysia_ Nevermore, you were among the first and have been there for all this time. I hope to see you in a different comment section too sometime, give me a CM reference and we shall reminisce these times together ^^

I'll miss seeing these Kamen Rider references, thanks for bringing a bit of the KR Built fandom to CM. See you next time Boron!

Oh that was a BL? Interesting, didn't appear that way from synopsis. Seemed like a typical revenge jdrama

Once a crowd sets off to cause damage, there is often no way to control it. Some Chinese fans think its okay to just curse at anyone involved with the drama because they're angry.

Yes Chinese fanbases can make a huge turn and quickly become antifans whenever the right circumstances are met. Its how they cancel any celebrity in the blink of an eye when one wrong word is said. While they deliver good contributions as fans, its wise to not be too dependent on any Chinese fanbase.

I've been reading the hateful comments and it seems to an extent they get joy out of attacking as a crowd. Some Chinese fans do try to call for a halt on the Twitter personal attacks. A lot of Chinese fans are happy with the ending as well and see no reason for the negative response.

The one positive thing is that other nationalities are not joining in on the crowd attack and its clearly mostly coming from Chinese fans who think this type of behaviour is acceptable. I hope Machida, Akaso and the others aren't too bothered by this attack.

It's been a wild ride indeed ^^ I will miss these times.

Yeah, they should let a marketing expert pick the items next time. I don't think they know what will sell because they are just making the fake company items into merch. Would be better to make cute items for fans to buy.

Yeah it was merch T__T Im very sad about it