pash
Italy
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Terrible script
I decided to watch this dorama since Tanabe Momoko, whom I had really liked both for her looks and for her acting skills in "Yuru Camp", starred in it. And indeed, she didn't disappoint me; she was absolutely gorgeous-looking in this "Konna Mirai wa Kiitenai", and she also did very well acting-wise, given the totally lousy material she had to work with (I'll elaborate more on that in a moment). The rest of the cast was also ok, with the exception of Noro Kayo (she had me climbing the walls every time she was on screen...and whenever she'd ad-lib some of those überlousy "rap lines", I seriously felt the urge to throw something at the display).The seaside setting (my other reason for watching this, btw) was nice, but apart from the opening and ending credits, it wasn't used much, unfortunately.
The big problem this dorama had was the script, which was as terrible as they come. It reminded me of an exercise I'd have my students do in order to show them how bad a script turns out to be, without the proper planning (the exercise consisted in having them write a story where every single students could contribute only with a few lines, and what's worse, every student could only know the few lines written by the previous one, not having the slightest idea about the rest of the story; of course, with those premises, the stories turned out to be plainly terrible, lacking all coherence and structure! Well, that's totally how this dorama felt: a bunch of extremely poorly written scenes, chaotically thrown together without any logic nor any sense of how to write a script - and should I add, without any respect for the viewers. 2/10
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Crazy and hilarious? Yeah, you bet! ^____^
Huge congrats to Odagiri Joe in his triple role as actor, director and screenwriter! This "Oliver na Inu, (Gosh!!) Konoyarou" is exquisitely creative (starting with the usual "This drama is a work of fiction" warning, aptly modified as "This drama is a *great* work of fiction", LOL), without *ever* feeling pretentiously artsy.
The cast did an excellent job, with honorable mentions for Odagiri himself, Ikematsu Sosuke and Aso Kumiko (great actress AND screenwriter herself, BTW).
The production value is pretty high, and the jazzy OST simply fabulous (EGO-WRAPPIN'!...'nuff said! ^___-)
So why don't I give this a "perfect 10" rating?
Well, one of the (many!) reasons that made me choose Asian dramas over Western TV series is that with dramas, 99% of the time, you get to watch a complete series made of a finite number of episodes, with a beginning, a story development and a (more or less proper) ending, rather than the usual Western approach of "well, let's leave things hanging at the end of the first season; if it's very successful you'll get many more seasons and we'll ruin everything good we had previously done by the end of the second one; if it's unpopular, you'll never see how it ends; pray that it's only averagely successful so that you'll get a second season with some kind of ending".
Unfortunately, this dorama is left unfinished as is; I have no idea of the production circumstances or whether a second season or a SP is in the making or at least planned. Fingers crossed!
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What a lovely lil' dorama! ^_____^
I hope you'll forgive me for quoting/paraphrasing what I had written in my review of "Hotarugusa", as it's befitting for this lovely "Miyako ga Kyoto ni Yattekita!" too! ^__^;And that is: amidst the recent, ever-surging wave of "westernized" j-dramas (...), it does one's heart a whole lot of good to find a small gem like this!
The whole dorama is a heartfelt declaration of love for Kyoto, all while portraying the lovely story of the reunion between a divorced father and his 20 years old daughter, whom he hadn't seen in 12 years.
The script is wonderful, filled as it is with witty dialogues, touching scenes and a light-but-totally-not-shallow general atmosphere; the leads, Sasaki Kuranosuke and Fujino Ryoko, both delivered a great performance; the music is adorable, particularly that ubiquitous tango; last but certainly not least, Kyoto in all its glory is such a perfect setting and the short documentary clips, introduced by Fujino-san herself, shown at the end of each episode are just the cherry on top!
What else can I say? I literally enjoyed every single minute of it! Perfect 10! ^___^
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Weaker than the first season
This second season of "Yuru Camp" was in my humble opinion much weaker than both the first season and the in-between special episode. Fukuhara Haruka's screentime was drastically shrinked here, while most of the focus went to the supporting actresses - but that per se wouldn't have been such a big problem, as they're all decent actresses (even though not as good as Fukuhara - anyway, thumbs up to Ohara Yuno for her always contagious chuckle ^__^). The real problem is that the focus was also mostly switched from actual "yurucamping" to silly comedy, alas without much success. As a consequence, also the scenery, which had been an important detail previously, got a bit neglected here (don't expect loads of spectacular views, but rather just the occasional glimpse).I have no idea how much covid-related restrictions could have been the cause of these changes for the worse, though...therefore my not-too-low grade.
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Loved the first episodes, hated the second half
I have mixed feelings regarding this "Edo-moiselle". I loved some things, and hated others, to be honest. Okay, let's start with the things I liked: I found the first episodes really, really good; I loved the FL's character (masterfully portrayed by Okada Yui, who's BTW secured herself a place in my personal top5 ^_^), who acted in my eyes as the perfect representation of the things I like about Japan (a sometimes chaotic mix of tradition and modernity, but with the head firmly set in the past - the Edo hairstyle! ^__^ - and with a simple yet refined philosophy that can still be very useful even nowadays - just like how Senka would at first solve Reiwa people's problems or dilemmas with her Edo wisdom!). And I really liked also the CEO's character (which is something I wouldn't have expected, given how classist I am, LOL), thanks to the brilliant performance by Maeda Goki. Lastly, another character I liked (although horribly underdeveloped!) was the one played by Yamaguchi Mayu, whom I had already appreciated for her beauty and talent in "Mango no Ki no Shita de" (I wish she'll get to lead in a dorama soon, not only in movies or SP!).After the first 3 or 4 episodes, I really thought I was gonna give this a full "10".
But then came the second half, and with it so many thinks I didn't like: first and foremost, how the focus suddenly shifted from "Edo character teaching precious life lessons to Reiwa people" to the Nth, stale, unbearable (all imho of course!) love triangle/square that I honestly could very well do without! I also really hated how the spotlight shifted to the ML (I totally disliked that character, his undecisiveness, his fashion sense - or rather lack thereof!...painful to look at, seriously!).
The ending too (no spoilers, I promise!) felt way too forced to me. This is a perfect example of "lazy writing", as far as I'm concerned.
Too bad, it could've been waaaaay better than this.../.___.\
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Similarly to what happened with that movie, in fact, until a matter of just minutes from the end of this "Blindly in Love", I was gonna give it a perfect 10, put it right away in my personal top10 of all times, and basically review it as a masterpiece. But then (no spoilers, don't worry ^__-) the ending was....well, let's just say: not what I think it should've been.
Still, differently from that other movie, I can't say that this was totally ruined, only slightly.
I wholeheartedly suggest it anyway, as the script (at least, 99% of it) is really beautiful, the cast marvelous (I already wrote many praises to Kaho's beauty and acting skills, and I'll gladly repeat myself once again here: she's simply "WOW"!!! Hoshino Gen as the ML was also absolutely brilliant, like the rest of the cast - honorable mentions for the always great Kuroki Hitomi and Hiraizumi Sei!), the directing top notch, the music lovely. Once again, if only they'd wrapped it up more nicely, this would've been a real masterpiece. It's still a very good movie, though. 9/10
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Why the long premise? Very simply put, because that's exactly what this "Cheat" feels like: a "vorrei-ma-non-posso"!
The directing, the editing, the photography, the music...all top notch and very closely imitating the style of such "heist" genre's masterpieces as the "Ocean's" trilogy or, staying in Japan, as "The Confidence Man JP".
The problem is, this dorama can't actually reach that very same level of excellency due to two big faults it has:
1) the script is good, but not perfect; whereas the cons plots are mostly well written and intriguing, the rest is just "meh": the comic relief is a bit of a "hit or miss" (the whole idol-related side story, for example, is just ridiculous), the characters are bidimensional, and some scenes and twists feel a bit too forced;
2) the cast as a whole is not up to par either; some of them are actually good (Fukuhara Haruka is lovely as usual and Kaneko Daichi is pretty funny!), but others are just embarrassingly terrible (Honda Tsubasa manages to reach new....depths...in the not so fine art of overacting - I thought nobody could do worse than Naka Riisa, but it seems I was mistaken! - and Kazama Shunsuke is outright unbearable, constantly acting as if he were God's sexy gift to humanity, URGH! Dude, no offense, but you're, like, three feet tall! Come off it, will ya? ^__^;...)
(Before Honda's and Kazama's fans jump at my throat: I haven't seem them in many other roles so far - actually, only one other drama for each of them, respectively "Shomuni 4" and "Nemureru Mori" - and I honestly don't remember whether they were good in those or what, so I am willing to give them the benefit of the doubt: maybe the fault here lies with this script, I can't say for sure, so: peace! ^___-)
Still, even with all its faults, "Cheat" ain't too bad either; and if you, like me, are a fan of the genre, you'll probably find it enjoyable enough, all in all...^__-
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1) there's little - and often just nothing - heroic in war; war is bad, it takes out the worst from people, and that means cowardice, betrayal, lies, atrocities etc.
2) what passes for "history" in the mainstream is actually only the "winners' version";
3) the "losers' version" is often - if not always - at least a little more accurate and true to life; why? Simple: losers can't so easily cover their crimes and sugarcoat the truth as winners do.
All this premise so as to explain why I particularly like Japanese productions about WWII: they aren't propagandistic fairy tales, they show war for what it is, in all its absurdity. Just like this dorama does, all while portraying the real story of Ri Kouran / Li Xianglan / Yamaguchi Yoshiko, a Japanese singer and actress from Japanese-occupied Manchuria.
Commenting on another dorama ("Chanpon Tabetaka") I wrote that it felt "like an asadora's digest", but then I didn't mean it as a compliment; here instead it's really as if they had taken the best and most relevant scenes out of an asadora and managed to make a 4-hour movie out of them. Great job indeed! The script is very well done, the acting very good, Ueto Aya - wearing qipaos/cheongsams most of the time - is positively gorgeous and the historical settings, costumes etc. simply great. I also really appreciated the respect the production showed to realism, i.e. using Russian-speaking actors to portray the main character's friend Lyuba and her family (and adding those small touches that alone can give realism to a scene, like when they're all drinking tea at one point and Lyuba asks if they have any jam - 'cause she would want to drink tea "the Russian way", of course! Small detail, but it shows the authors did their homework, doesn't it?).
Last but not least, some lovely music makes this lil' gem of dorama shine even more. Perfect 10!
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Wait!
I know you've already read the synopsis, I'm not such a lousy reviewer as to needlessly repeat it, trust me...so bear with me for a few more seconds, will ya?
Where was I?
Oh, yeah:
...and they came up with a master plan: to have a dorama made, starring Kumada Rinka as the ideal wife (she's beautiful, kind, feminine, honest, sweet...add a few dozens more qualities and you'll get close to understanding how perfect she is in this!) so that even such old and staunch bachelors as yours truly would actually change their mind at least for the duration of the dorama and think that it'd be nice to get married.
I swear, these Japanese are a clever bunch! Chapeau, guys! ^__________^
p.s.
Jokes aside: it's a refreshingly clean, sweet and heartwarming lil' dorama, with a beautiful script and great performances by the whole cast! Highly recommended!!!
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