Fathers and sons, just like Turgenev said... What other topic can be more fertile for a producer to make a good modern TV drama?
Having too high hopes for a dorama has never proved a successful strategy for me, but again I run into the same trap. I was hoping so much to see a story about young people making their way into adult life, moreover the characters are only a couple of years me senior.
Instead of a tale about how yutori, the relaxed youth, differ from the previous generations, singing 'I want to break free', I got a story which, as most Japanese dorama do, reflects the older generation's ideal. Feels like the scenario was written by real old farts. Even if it wasn't.
It's a story about several yutori guys who aren't yutori. They technically are, by age, but aren't by nature. Instead of them, yutori are their juniors. And the main characters are name-only yutori dreaming of the good old days.
First, here is Sakama, a young man who entered a university that would let him enter, and is working in a company that would let him work. Sent to lead a local restaurant, even though he is now the head of the establishment, he puts on an apron and starts grilling meat, because that's the way it has been done for ages in Japan: no real experience - no managing. Who cares about his education, take the beer and bring it to the guests. However, he doesn't mind, since he stands for the old ways from the very beginning. He shouts at his junior colleague, when the latter makes a mistake, achieving the dream of every middle-aged manager in Japan - seeing his disciple look up at him and thank him for scolding.
He unexpectedly gets unfairly sued by the younger man for power harassment, but does not bring it to the court to defend himself, because such matters should be settled within the big family, which the company is.
Even if members of this family gossip and your boss occasionally sleeps with your girlfriend while you temporarily break up. Even though your girlfriend says you don't need to go that far.
Eventually Sakama and his junior reconcile and stay on good terms. Sakama then retires to help his family with the traditional craft of sake making. And even his girlfriend retires together with him and starts working in the family brewery too. Meanwhile, his older brother thinks of going to Hokkaido and starting agriculture business because he is not successful in impregnating his wife, but finally he manages to do it and remains the company head (erm... what?). And the younger sister finally finds a work to do. Several times it was shown she was trying a job to be proud of, unsuccessfully, but her brother tells her not to give up, because it's not decent not to work. But in the end she is shown as a novice employee who cannot understand the request of her customers. But that's okay, since she is doing her best right?
Much time is allotted to the main couple trying to settle their relationship, because our first-generation yutori wants to be as proper as he can, no matter he is supposed to be from the 'relaxed' generation.
And then, when his sweetheart is in doubt about her future, he just...
So, following the long-established Japanese way of living one's life, they fulfilled that 'work' and lived happily ever after, 'medetashi medetashi'.
Second, here is Yamaji, a teacher who occasionally inserts a word or two to protect the new 'yutori' system and show the good sides of it, such as children with learning disabilities being able to study together with other pupils. However, Yamaji follows Sakama's example. He, too, scolds his junior colleague out of love and even starts a relationship with her, after she several times let him down seriously and went out with other men. Yamaji was meant to be the comical element as well, but I am not sure whether to laugh or not.
The third, the one I was praying to stay sane in this whirlpool of upbringing madness, is Malibu, the happy-go-lucky owner of a 'kira-kira-name', a non-traditional name for a Japanese with a queer sound, obviously dedicated to a hot honeymoon of Malibu's parents somewhere in... Malibu. He was the only one not afraid to say how things exactly were without trying to cover any motive.
He made the characters realize how they were living their lives, even though his own way of living his life was not decent, at least in the eyes of society. Unfortunately, he was not a real yutori either. He, too, dreamt of being scolded properly by his father, who abandoned him and therefore did not raise him like he should, shouting and showing what's right and wrong. Mostly, what's wrong.
By the end, the only driving force for me to keep watching was the monstrous amount of mistakes in the English subtitles and the high level of difficulty of the original script. I'm really willing to translate, because it's such a challenge. The original text was not easy to understand not only by ear, but even when you have the script, despite what you could think when you watch an average dorama about young people in the modern world.
As for acting, there were some attempts to act on part of Masaki Okada, though I doubt Stanislavsky would ever approve. Sakura Ando was much better in her ingenuousness. Tori Matsuzaka was a blank space to me. He must be considered a real ikemen in Japan, I guess.
Yuuya Yagira was perfect, as if his character was created out of himself. I suddenly realised he was the actor who made an overwhelming impression on me as a young criminal in 'Lady - saigo no hanzai profile'.
Haruka Shimazaki was your average cutie girl, but if she thinks her squeaking voice is cute I'd love to disappoint her. I wasn't surprised to see she's an idol, in fact, I was half suspecting it.
Kotaro Yoshida played an extremely strange character, a dude you can hire to complain about your life, at the same moment being that bad dad who didn't raise Malibu. I couldn't care less about him, as well as all other characters like Sakama's family, colleagues, Akane's dad, mother of Yamaji's pupil and all the others.
Probably one of the best was Takumi Kitamura portraying an extreme variant of yutori - young, fashionable, brazen and stupid.
I did not notice any music there, and the opening theme by
Kankaku Pierrot was disgusting in its mediocrity pretending to be philosophical.
