Ryusei no Kizuna – My New JDrama Addiction

Hello, hello! Yes, I am alive believe it or not. After much wandering in the dark abyss of no-drama-zone (there weren’t any good drama for me to watch), I have finally latched onto a good one — FINALLY!

Ryo (Tasuke), Ninomiya (Koichi), Erika (Shizuna)

The show is called Ryusei no Kizuna (it should really be Ryuusei in order to properly translate the title) and means “the bond of the meteors.” It stars Ninomiya Kazunari as Koichi Ariake, Ryo Nishikido (from One Litre of Tears) as Taisuke Ariake, and Erika Toda (from Liar Game) as Shizuna Ariake. As you can tell, they’re all related. The story is about this group of 3 siblings and their life struggles after the sudden death of their parents. The story begins with the 3 still at a young age. The oldest brother, Koichi, wanting to see a meteor shower sneaks out of the house at night. However, in the process causes his other 2 siblings to wake and want to tag along. Sadly when they return, Koichi finds his parents murdered. Hence forth, the show begins with the 3 in their early 20s but continues to switch back to the past to slowly reveal the murder incident. After much thought, all 3 have decided to find the killer themselves and kill him for revenge. In the meantime, in order to survive the 3 swindles people they know (only bad people of course).

Given the dark storyline I just talked about above, you would imagine the show to be very depressing. Quite the contrary! Ninomiya, who plays Koichi, is somewhat of an awkward loner but provides the most hilarious moments in the drama. Being socially inept, his interaction with the outside world can sometime be very strange…but hilarious. His younger brother, Taisuke, is much more energetic and brings out more of his brother’s awkwardness when the two are together. The youngest, Shizuna, is the gullible but cute character. She’s funny in her own way as well. The plot line has these funny moments but very sparingly. Every now and then, the viewers are reminded of the three’s current fate. The laughter only masks the hidden sadness of the siblings. In addition, I must say the chemistry of the casts is just great. More so, this chemistry leads to very natural interaction among the three. This is my first encounter with Ninomiya, unlike the other 2 leads, but he proves to be a great actor as well.

Overall, I think this drama has a lot of potential. The humor is light and in just the right place. A good cast and an intriguing storyline to boot. Highly recommended. I am currently watching it on YouTube for anyone who wants to know. Also, Mika Nakashima (my favorite singer in the whole world) has a small part in this drama as well! I haven’t seen much of her, but what I have seen is very funny. Below is the song Orion sung by Mika herself. It’s the ending theme song for the show.

First Impression

So Thanksgiving Break is just around the corner and I can finally have some time to relax. In the meantime, I am still knee deep in homework, and essays. Thus, I’m not going to force myself to post every Friday anymore. Though I will try my best to update once a week. You guys are probably tired of my saying sorry anyhow, right? So over the past weeks, I was able to stay up late (mainly because I couldn’t sleep) and watch some drama! Here my impression of these shows.

Beethoven’s Virus
My first impression on the acting is that it’s pretty mediocre. However, this may be because the female lead keeps having these crazy daydreams that encourages outrageous acting. There’s also a bit of comedy that sparingly exists throughout the episode…but it wasn’t enough to crack a smile on me. However, I’m still eager to see what’s going to happen next

Korea Secret Agency / Parachute Agent
I caught part of an episode on TV the other day, and got a little hook to be honest. Of course what I saw was from somewhere near the middle of the story or near the end (so I didn’t understand a thing). From the 1st episode, however, I think this drama has lots of potential. There’s a great mixture of mystery, suspense, and even comedy. The comedy is the biggest plus because I think it’s very hard to include it in a suspense drama. My point? Where in shows like Alias can you put a joke in? Nowhere, people are too busy staying alive.

P.S. This isn’t a new drama by the way. BUT it’s still very good, or at least, at the moment.

Drama News

Hello, everyone. Sorry for not posting last Friday but I really haven’t had any time to watch anything new or the time to write a review for what I have seen. I decided against the idea of putting together something halfheartedly so instead I waited until there is something to write about. For today, I have some bad and good news.

The bad news is actress Choi Jin Shil was recently found dead in her home in Seoul. The police believe it is suicide due to stress about bad rumors that were circulating about her. Now, stars are probably used to rumors but this one was especially heinous because it pinpointed her as the cause of her friend’s death (also by suicide). Her recent work is the drama The Last Scandal of my Life. The show was well received and I intended to watch it as well. This is truly very saddening and clearly show the power of words. I hope the media and gossip-medium like blogs will watch what they say from now on. Just because you are behind a LCD screen and no one knows your identity doesn’t give you the right to freely insult others.

And so after probably ruining your mood with the news above, I have some good news. The cast for the Korean version of Hana Yori Dango is finally revealed. Even though I am very familiar with the storyline at this point, there is still a part of me that’s wondering how they’ll do this. My hope is that they’ll add a new twist to the story while keeping the core elements like the F4 guys and the hard-working personality of the female lead.

The new F4.

CAST:
Lee Min Ho as Domyoji character
Kim Hyun Joong as Rui character
Kim Bum as Sojirou character
Kim Joon as Akira character

The characters will naturally have Korean names but each character should have similar personalities to the Japanese counterparts.