Notes on "Love Song"

Sakura Fujiwara and Masaharu Fukuyama in "Love Song"

Just watched the first episode of the new Masaharu Fukuyama drama “Love Song”, and so far it seems to be a pretty interesting show: Fukuyama plays Kamishiro, a musician who once had a big musical career but now works as a Personnel Counselor of the Big Mobile company. 

Masaharu Fukuyama as Kamishiro

Sakura Fujiwara as Sakura

One day he is asked to counsel a young mechanic named Sakura in the company who has problems with communicating. Through this first meeting he finds that the reason she is closed up is because she has a speech impediment and though she doesn’t seem to want his help, something about her touches him, and he begins looking for ways for her to get through her problems.

He notices one day that she likes to sing to herself, and they have a breakthrough when they realize that when she sings, she doesn’t stutter. Her voice, which reminds Kamishiro of his former singing partner, enthralls him and he finds he wants to encourage this girl to pursue a singing career.

When I first read the synopsis, it sounded a bit generic, but the actress playing Sakura (Fujiwara Sakura) is really great and I found myself really caring about her. (reminds me a LOT of Satomi Ishihara back in her “Kimi Wa Petto” days) Additionally, her circle of friends are really great too, especially Kaho who plays a sort of surrogate elder sister to her (they both grew up in the orphanage), the interaction between these two is really awesome, very high emotions!

 Kamishiro himself is a bit of an enigma, I still can’t tell if he’s a cool dude or an inept and clueless guy.   Though he really seems to care about Sakura, BOY he’s really a player when it comes to his women, and he’s really a nuisance to his friends, especially his ever suffering colleague (Miki Mizuno), the woman who was the keyboardist in his band. He hits her up when he needs a place to sleep, all the while oblivious to the fact that she loves him.

Well, so far so good, though I must say that the preview for next week looks FULL of those clichés I hate in these kind of dramas…eek, hopefully the strength of these characters will be enough to keep this show feeling fresh and original...we’ll have to wait and see! 

Posted by zdorama @ zdoramaagain.blogspot.com