A Wild Dal Shabet Sighting

As a fan of Dal Shabet, I had a happy surprise watching Episode Three of the awesome “You Who Came From The Stars” when who should show up as a couple of junior actresses under Cheon Song-Yi (Jun Jihyun) but Serri AND Subin!!! Ahahaha, You know, I think I remember reading about them having a cameo in a drama some time before, but I’d completely forgotten about it! When they came on, I just HAD to laugh!!! Sadly, All their time was spent being scolded! 

    At first, the Junior Actresses are in such awe to meet their famous sunbaenim, but she quickly chides them for not properly greeting another fellow (but less popular) sunbaenim Yoo Se Mi (Yoo In Na) that had also been in the room!

Drawing them in closer, she quietly tells them that all the rumors about her having a bad attitude are true, leaving the two properly scolded juniors speechless...

After she leaves, the two hurt girls mumble something along the lines of 

"Meh, maybe this unnie isn't all that after all" LOL

Nonetheless, the two young actresses were seen aboard a private yacht with the company later that evening, so we must assume things worked out OK!
Posted by zdorama @ zdoramaagain.blogspot.com

New K-Drama "You Who Came From The Stars" Totally Rocks!

Arrival! Byeoreseo On Jeudae (You Who Came From The Stars)

  Just finished watching the first episode of “You Who Came From the Stars”, that new K-drama being touted as the next big thing- so much that I felt I just HAD to check it out! Now, I haven’t watched all that many Korean Dramas, counting from “My Girlfriend is a Gumiho” through to “The Prime Minister and I”, there have only been about five or six shows I checked out (and all with only varying degrees of completion), but I have say that judging from the first episode alone, this may be one of the BEST ones ever!

Do Min Joon (Kim Soohyun)

meeting the 16th Century Cheon Song-Yi (Kim HyunSoo)

I’m not even kidding, EVERY aspect of this show rocked- this story of a man who beamed down to earth 400 years ago and has been biding his time, settling into the Human way of living until the comet comes around again that will take him back to his homeworld is as exciting as ANY sci-fi drama of its kind! I’ve long been a fan of time-travelling movies, and though not technically a time-travelling story, the way the drama jumps back and forth from his life in 1602 and the present 2013 is exactly the same in feel!

20th Century Do Min Joon

And Stylish Actress Cheon Song-Yi (Jun JiHyun)

Of course, the show wouldn’t work without some great actors to back it up, and we’ve got a perfect cast here- with Kim SooHyun as the time-travelling “Man From the Stars” (under guise of a regular school teacher named Do Min Joon),  he’s cast in a perfectly cold, stoic role, and MY GOSH, Jun Jihyun is simply STUNNING as the lusciously SASSY hot young actress Cheong Song-Yi! As the story begins, fate has somehow placed the two together as neighbors in a High-rise apartment complex, and whenever they cross paths, Song-Yi’s abrasive and larger than life personality against Min Joon’s stern and introverted outlook creates some very dynamic conversations!!!

Fateful Meeting in the High Rise Elevator

And then there’s the overshadowing backstory of the young princess he met when he first beamed down- something has happened to her (so far hasn’t been revealed yet) and he’s been chagrined over his loss so much that when he gets a flash that a young girl that looks just like her in 2001 is going to be killed, he speeds to the site and saves her.

 Little does he know that this young girl he saved is in fact the obnoxious actress living next door to him! Adding further to the fact that she’s just returned to School and has found out HE’s her new teacher, ya just KNOW that things are GONNA GET INTERESTING!

With a lead man as cold and soft-spoken as Min Joon, you really need a energetic and LOUD counterpart, and BOY does Song-Yi deliver! This is a girl that does and says what EVER is on her mind! And yet, while on one hand being loud, bossy and arrogant, beneath the surface is this really likeable girl who just wants to be loved by people and is genuinely hurt when her so–called fans attack her online and call her airheaded. I liked her from the very beginning!

   In fact, every person on this show is so enthusiastically played that they are a joy to watch in any scene ,and even the roles of Song-Yi’s put-upon assistants are hilarious- they know that their charge can be thick headed and must use the utmost diplomacy handling her!

And I really like the side-story of Min Joon’s only Earth friend- a lawyer he worked with in what appears to be the mid 1950’s. Now very old, he still meets up with Min Joon to talk, and is quite saddened to her that his friend will soon be making the trip back.

 Aw, there's just too much good stuff going on in this show that I can't even cover them all, and besides, it's time to get back to watching the next episode! O Yeah, I’m TOTALLY in this one for the LONG HAUL!!!!

Posted by zdorama @ zdoramaagain.blogspot.com

My Autographed Dal Shabet CD "B.B.B." Arrived Today!

As someone who JUST missed out on last year's Dal Shabet Autographed Album Special for their release "Be Ambitious", I was very happy to have been able to pre-order their new CD "B.B.B.", and just this afternoon my shipment came it!
 Holy COW is it beautiful!! First off, the depictions of the cover that they've released online have featured the pics of the girls with a black background, come to find out the reason for that is that the album's cover is actually a silver reflective metallic cover which would have been hard to photograph (and as someone who struggled to take these pics, I can attest to it!) add to that a thick photo booklet inside and you're ALREADY got a pretty package!

But THEN, you've got not only the six exclusive photos of each girl, but the actual AUTOGRAPHS themselves!!! Yes, I've already got an older autographed album of the girls' sophomore release "Pink Rocket", but you can NEVER have enough autogrpahed goodness! Additionally, at the time, WooHee hadn't joined yet and so it is with this new album "B.B.B." that I finally have her John Hancock!
Ahhh, time to take this CD out for a spin!!!

Posted by zdorama @ zdoramaagain.blogspot.com

Adventures in Cuteness with Kanjiya Shihori

Kanjiya Shihori in Kimi Hannin Janai Yo Ne?

  A few weeks ago my friend Car and I were taking about NHK Taiga dramas and the actors who appeared in them. At one point she was talking about an actress but couldn’t recall her name. She said, “it was that one actress from Ryomaden with the funny name that you said you used to think was unattractive but saw her in another drama and thought she was cute”.

   By the clues “actress with the funny name” and “Ryoma”, I’d already figured out she was talking about actress Shihori Kanjiya, and I HAD told her about seeing her in a mystery comedy called Kimi Hannin Janai Yo Ne” and liking her a LOT in it, but I didn’t recall thinking she was “cute”, seeing as how that just AIN’T Shihori Kanjiya’s STYLE! Quirky, yes… but cute?

Kanjiya Shihori with Kaname Jun

Thinking about Kimi Hannin Janai Yo Ne, I then realized that I actually hadn’t even finished watching that drama and it was still sitting on my backup harddrive! I dusted it off and started watching it again all over from the beginning, and I GOTTA SAY…Shihori IS really CUTE in this!!! Not in the “Beautiful” sense, but more in the “Adorably spazzy to the point of wanting to cuddle her” kind of Cute!

"Ehhhhh!"

Such a hilarious comedy- Kanjiya plays a would-be mystery novelist named Morita Sakura who, because of her keen eyes of observation and a freakish photographic memory, is invaluable to hapless Police Investigator Udagawa (played by Jun Kaname) who pays her to help him solve cases so he can “save face” within his troupe. Only problem is, she’s an utter realist, and Udagawa’s a romantic fool who falls in love with all of his suspects, leaving the two to bicker almost non-stop! Additionally, the other police team members(who don’t realize Morita is helping solve the crimes) think she’s just a wannabe novelist snooping around for book inspiration and frequently harass her! Sounds mean, but it’s all done is such a comically silly way that ya just GOTTA laugh!

"D'oh!!!" thinks a bummed Sakura

If it sounds like I’m overly harsh on Shihori Kanjiya, it’s probably because just about the FIRST thing I ever saw her in was the 2009 drama “Love Shuffle” and oh BOY was she an unlikeable character- it wasn’t until I saw her in “Buzzer Beat” as Kitagawa Keiko’s best friend Mai that I even began liking her! After watching her in Ryomaden, I DID finally respect her as an actress, but seeing her in Kimi Hannin Janai Yo Ne is a totally new side of her!

with Karina in Love Shuffle

with Kitagawa Keiko in Buzzer Beat

Looks like I’ll have to stand by my original observation that Shihori Kanjiya is CUTE in this one- she really steals the show, and that’s saying something when you figure that each episode features a different beautiful actress as the latest murder suspect, from gals like Sayaka Yamaguchi, Nana Katase and even Ayaka “Sailor Venus” Komatsu, among others… 

Yamaguchi Sayaka

Katase Nana

Komatsu Ayaka

Heck, even Morita’s merciless book editor (played by the luscious Nana Ogawa) is a total babe! 

Ogawa Nana

With all this eye candy, knowing that Kanjiya is STILL the main reason I want to watch this show is impressive indeed! Looks like when you get right down to it, I actually REALLY like her!!!

Posted by zdorama @ zdoramaagain.blogspot.com

Call Her Lightning: Aoi Yu in "Raiou"

Aoi Yu as Rai in Raiou

 Man, I have just finished watching the most awesomest movie! Years ago I saw a super fun episode of Kuwazu Girai (which I detailed here) featuring Okada Masaki and one of my very, very favorite actresses, Aoi Yu, who were at the time promoting a movie called Raiou (The Lightning Tree) and the couple was so much fun and seemed to get along so well that when I found the movie up for grabs, I downloaded it right away!

Okada Masaki and Aoi Yu

    Now, you would think that after how much I love Aoi Yu, I would have immediately watched that movie as soon as I got it, but truthfully, when I read the movie summary stating Raiou as a story of “a girl and a boy in the Edo Period who fall in love but are separated by class status”, it didn’t really grab me and the movie fell onto the pile of “watch when I have time” flicks…before I knew it, I’d forgotten all about it!

So just the other day I was going through those old stacks of discs, and once again came across the movie and figured it was about time I checked it out! Even though the romantic storyline seemed basic, I reasoned that any movie with Aoi Yu is one worth watching! So I sat down to watch it and BOY I was I glad I DID! WOW was this movie GOOD! How come it took me so darn LONG to get around to watching this?!   

  First thing I gotta say is MAN, this movie is NOTHING like what the synopses I’d been reading had indicated- far from a typical romance separation by class, Raiou took that basic premise and took a MAJOR left turn with it, turning the movie into one featuring not only romance but Action, Adventure, and Human Drama!

Beyond the tale of a high class young nobleman falling in love with a peasant girl, we’ve got the male lead Narimichi (Okada Masaki) as a prince plagued by illnesses that not only make his sickly but prone to bouts of delirium as well, meeting Rai (Aoi Yu), a gruff wild-child raised in the mountains by the assassins who stole her away from her family when she was just a baby. Put these two together and you’ve got a whole new tale on an old tale!

  And the second and probably most important thing about Raiou is the awesome acting, ESPECIALLY on the part of Aoi Yu, my GOSH can this chick ACT!!!! MAN, her scenes were always so gripping, emotional and intense- I have to say that by the end of the movie, I was just DRAINED! Man, NOBODY sells a character better than her, NOBODY! What will this girl do NEXT?!

Posted by zdorama @ zdoramaagain.blogspot.com

Crush Of The Day: Kimura Fumino

Kimura Fumino as Kahiyama Rika

       Just started watching the wacky mystery/suspense drama Henshin Interviewer No Yuutsu, and already I can tell it’s going to be a fun romp! After the heavy handed Nagase Tomoya drama Kurokochi, I needed a light comedy to let the breeze back in, and this show seems like a perfect fit! 

  The story of a mystery novelist named Shirakawa who, suffering from writer’s block on the eve of his 100th book, takes to the mountains to investigate the details of a real-life mystery called the Tulip Murders (to hopefully rejuvenate his writing) sounds like a straight-forward tale, but his eccentric way of disguising himself as a dapper young flatfoot journalist and his eagle-eyed sense of details makes for a zany and intriguing story all in one!

   The plot’s an interesting one, and Nakamaru Yuichi of KAT-TUN fame is terrific as main character Shirakawa Jiro, but honestly, the real reason I’m loving this drama so much is all because of ONE person, and that’s actress Fumino Kimura! As Shirakawa's nerdy and eager book editor Kahiyama Rika, she is so adorably spastic, dramatically goofy, and yet sweetly feminine, that she MELTED MY HEART after just ONE episode!

Nakamaru Yuichi and Kimura Fumino

As Shirakawa’s dutiful editor, she feels obliged to follow him as he goes out to investigate the unsolved mysteries, and the charm of Kahiyama is her sensibly uptight persona- besides carefully scrutinizing every scene and pooh-poohing most of Jiro's theories, she's practical to a "T", carrying this ENORMOUS bag full of the most peculiar and unexpected things, all “just in case of emergency”... Laptops and tape recorders make sense, but I even saw a hardhat in there! 

Watching her pull out a pair of sneakers before a big hike and happily put them on before cutely lacing them up had me in a BIG smile, YES, she can even make putting on SHOES adorable!

Throughout the show, every time Kahiyama (or, as the easily-annoyed Shirakawa likes to call her, “Gebi-yama) peers up from those thick glasses and curiously squints, I realize that there’s an extremely pretty girl under there (in fact, she kind of reminded me of gravure idol- actress YUKA for awhile there), but it’s her dorky aura that’s got me in SUCH a crush right now!

Checking the dramawiki stats, it seems I’ve seen Fumino before in dramas like ATARU and Mitsu No Aji, but I didn’t remember her at ALL, and that’s probably due to the fact that she was in her “regular” guise as a pretty actress! Funny though, once I dug those old dramas out to take these screencaps, I DID remember thinking her “Rai Yoka” character in “Mitsu No Aji” was a cutie, guess that shows that even THEN she had that special something!

in ATARU

above and below: as Rai Yoka in Mitsu No Aji

Going onto Youtube and checking out some of her many CMs, I gotta say, I was STUNNED my how gorgeous she was- Holy Crap, who knew Kahiyama was so good-looking under all that mousey camouflage? Just freaking BEAUTIFUL!

And is it just me or does she look a bit like actress Nagasawa Masami here?

Aw MAN,  such a pretty young actress/ model, but you know, the more I see the gorgeous side of her, the more I wanna get BACK to more episodes of Fumino so I can see her once more as Kahiyama! She's just TOO PRECIOUS!

Posted by zdorama @ zdoramaagain.blogspot.com