Dr. Asura おわり

Wakana Matsumoto in "Dr. Asura"

 The “Medical Drama with the Genius Surgeon” is surely one of Japan’s most enduring and popular tropes and follow such an unwavering formula that many episodes could be interchanges between shows with nary a hitch!

Despite their similarities, there are some medical dramas which strike me as mundane-and others which dazzle me and keep me on the edge of my seat, and I’ve concluded that it all comes down to the charisma and passion of the actor/actress/team who are are playing the lead role(s). It’s THEY who are responsible for my interest and involvement with the stories, and so it was with Wakana Matsumoto as the titular character and the terrific ensemble cast in the highly entertaining DR. ASURA, which kept the show as a “must see” for me this season!

From its first episode all the way to its very intriguing last, this drama kept me thoroughly entertained, holding my breath through its intense operating sequences and wiping away the tears during some of its more touching and inspiring passages!! 

Wakana Matsumoto has moved WAY up on my list of favorite actresses, and I'll definitely be keeping a lookout for what projects she decides to do next!!

Wakana Matsumoto is "Dr. Asura"

Generally speaking from my limited observations, J-drama medical series tend to fall into two camps: one where the show is more grounded in real-life (so to speak) where it’s mostly about gifted surgeons with a strong sense of doing what is right, (think shows like Radiation House, Fragile, Lady Davinci no Shindan, Unnatural, etc), and then there are the ones which feel more like sci/fi super-hero thrillers, with quirky physicians boasting almost superhuman medical abilities (Get Ready, Dr. White, even the charming Doctor Chocolate)...

And now we have the spirited “Dr. Asura” which seems to be mostly of the latter style, featuring the brooding Shura Anno (played with deadpan delivery by the svelte Wakana Matsumoto) who has an almost preternatural sense when it comes to the patients she sees in the Emergency Room of a struggling Hospital!

She can sense any malady a patient may have- simply by sight, smell and/or their actions and she even knows when a new admission is on its way even before the telephone can ring! And her skills in almost any field of surgery is unsurpassed- even performing TWO operations at ONCE!

Dealing with the injured at the scene of a horrific accident along with her newbie subordinate Yakushiji (Masaya Sano), they must think on their feet as they meet unexpected challenges...

Beautiful, calculated and always cool, in the end, the obsessed Dr. Asura and her team always gets the job done! But there is a dark past fueling Anno's determination, and the operating room victories are always bittersweet. Thanks are rarely given and indeed unwanted. The patient's well being  and recovery is her only desire.

As is natural for ALL Japanese medical dramas though, the real problems aren’t the emergencies that come their way or the complications the patients bring with them, but (of COURSE), those corrupt hospital heads, all crooked and up to (seemingly) no good, and it’s up to Asura Sensei to defy them all! 

Nagisa Katahira

Atsuro Watabe

Seiichi Tanabe (with Worst Haircut of the Season)

Yoshiyoshi Arakawa

Koyuki

Shiro Sano as the big bad hospital director Fudo

Checked this one out for the charismatic Wakana Matsumoto and she’s a real dream in the front seat of this drama- really like her character and despite the show’s many cliches, is somehow quite fun to sit back and watch! Watching Dr. Asura,  it almost seems like they’re setting this series up to be the next generation’s “Doctor X”! 

Posted by zdorama @ zdoramaagain.blogspot.com

“The Name of the Game is a Kidnapping” 2024!

Not even three months ago I was raving about reading author Keigo Higashino’s awesome book “The Name of the Game is a Kidnapping” (Game no Na Wa Yuukai) and the 2003 movie adaptation of it, "g@me",  (of which I've gushed about here)...

...and here we are with a brand new 2024 mini-series adaptation for the next generation to jump into!! The Higashino novel originally came out in 2002, thus this new mini series has been updated, taking us from the Heisei to the Reiwa era. But outside of that, the story and characters remain the same, and I must say that after watching episode 1 of the mini series tonight, think it is a fantastic adaptation!!

The Name of the Game is a Kidnapping tells the story of a successful if arrogant advertising designer named Sakuma (here played by Kazuya Kamenashi) who, at the crux of a huge business venture, is told that the company has inexplicably cancelled the project.

This termination is due to the seemingly whim of the business account’s president, Katsuragi (Atsuro Watabe), who has decided he doesn't like Sakuma's vision and style. 
Despite conversing with the company president face to face, they get nowhere, and though they are able to convince the car company president to give them one more chance, it is with the explicit instructions that Sakuma must be taken off the project.

That night a frustrated Sakuma makes his way to Katsuragi’s mansion. He doesn’t know if he’s going there to plead his case or duke it out with the man, but instead, he comes across a young girl leaping over the walls and running away.

Her name is Juri (Ai Mikami), and, deducing that she is Katsuragi's daughter, Sakuma quickly makes moves to confront her, thinking that perhaps he can win points with Katsuragi by helping her...

Though he picks her up with plans of using her to his advantage with Katsuragi, Sakuma will find this girl is running away from home because she is fed up with her family, in point her father, whom she feels alienated from. Sakuma gets Juri a hotel to hide out in for the time being, and they get to talking. They realize they have a mutual interest in Katsuragi: Juri needs money from him to run away from the family, and Sakuma wants to ‘get back” at Katsuragi for his humiliation.  

Together the two team up to create the most elaborate hoax on Katsuragi: To fake Juri’s KIDNAPPING and bilk the Company president for MILLIONS! But plans like this must be meticulously thought out and executed, but Sakuma is calm and collected. After all, it’s a game to him. And he just LOVES a challenge!

Episode One just aired and like I said, was really great, and for many reasons! Making the decision to air it as a mini series rather than a movie gives them more time to fully cover the source material and scenes and scenarios that were changed or cut can be fully realized...
In the original book Katsuragi was president of a Car Manufacturing Company but in the 2003 film it was changed to Beer business. Here it is restored to Car Manufacturer, and I must say, the advertising campaign of  having a “virtual test drive” of the car via computers, a fancy idea back in 2002, is so “of the time” right now!!

Additionally, I mentioned in my earlier post that one thing that always bugged me about the 2003 film was that Yukie Nakama seemed waaaaay to old to be playing the young teenage runaway Juri, but Ai Mikami portrays her just fine!

As well, Kamenashi as Sakuma is great. Naohito Fujiki played Sakuma in the film and while he was okay, you didn’t see the bitterness and the stakes he was playing for as much as you do in the miniseries. Kamenashi really conveys the EGO that Sakuma has and the burning desire to get the upper hand on Katsuragi!!

The Miniseries is going to be a lean 4 episodes long and I fully expect the next three episodes to be as great as this first one was! Should be a wild ride!

PS: OOOOH, and just LOOK at where Sakuma resides! As a highly succesful businessman, of COURSE it makes sense that he lives at THE AFFLUENT APARTMENT, that hoity-toity abode I JUST  talked about a few days ago! 

When you gotta show that the person is a success, ya GOTTA have them reside at the AFFLUENT apartment, it's just a given!!

Posted by zdorama @ zdoramaagain.blogspot.com