J-Drama Diary 10 Years Ago this Month

I was scrolling back through my older posts on my still-hanging-on Livejournal account and was kind of surprised to realize it went all the way back to 2010! Scrolling through the posts brought back memories of specific moments in dramas, with some months being quite prolific to my overall fandom!

With that, I thought it might be fun to jump back and reminisce about what I was watching during the month of March back in 2014!

 Shitsuren Chocolatier

This was the first drama of Satomi's after "Rich Man Poor Woman" so anticipation was high for her pairing with Jun Matsumoto. One of her early "Selfish Spoiled Girl" roles that she would excel in in later shows! After falling in love with Kasumi Arimura in her bit part in "Keizoku", I was excited to see her playing a bigger role, here as Matsujun's little sister.

The first drama I think I ever saw Kiko Mizuhara in, as well.

Asami Mizukawa appears here in a role that she would (sadly) be kind of typecast in, the role of the unrequited love interest side-character. Guess she has that hard-luck woman vibe to her,  a type that she admittedly does pretty well! Ironically enough, Satomi's first drama was playing the unrequited love interest to Matsujun in "Kimi wa Petto"!

Boku No Ita Jikan

Haruma Miura/Mikako Tabe drama dealing with Lou Gehrig's Disease hit all the usual notes with tragedy dramas like these.. High notes for me was seeing Mizuki Yamaoto again after her stunnign turn in Summer Nude, and I also found particular thrill seeing Mieko Harada again- and her looking as sexy as ever!

Kimi Hannin Jyanaiyone?

Absolutely wonderful detective drama starring the criminally underrated Shihori Kanjiya as a mystery novelist paired up with bungling actual detective (Jun Kaname) who, when together, manage to crack all the cases. Hilarious drama that made me a big fan of Shihori- she became a HUGE Crush Of The day for this one,  and Kimi Hannin ended up on my best drama list of 2000-2014 as well!

Otome-San

Kuroki Hitomi/ Aibu Saki Mother in Law and Daughter in Law psychological slugfest.

A drama I tried watching but couldn't get into, and ultimately gave up on it.

Honestly, until i saw it listed on my LJ, I'd forgotten all about it and can't remember much about it now! Maybe time for a re-watch?

Also:

You Who Came From the Stars

(Byeoleseo on Geudae)

The original Korean version starring Kim Soo Hyun and the beautiful Jun Jihyun in the decades-spanning romance which captivated both me and audiences everywhere, and inspired the 2022 Japanese remake starring Sota Fukushi and Mizuki Yamamoto as the main leads. A good effort, but nowhere as awesome as this one was!