Fifty Shades of Reina in "Perfect Crime"

 

Can’t say I’m too much of a fan of these DoS-DoM Christian Grey/Anastacia Steele Bodice-Rippers, but I wanted to watch a few episodes if only to see Reina Treindl (whom I like very much) tackling a more mature and serious role than the cutesy/comedic ones I’ve been seeing her in.

Perfect Crime follows the tumultuous life of Interior Designer Kaori Maejima who is having an affair with her married supervisor (Hidekazu Mashima). She knows she is ultimately being used by him but accepts that this is the only way she can be with him.

At work a hotshot designer from America named Haruto Shinonome (Dori Sakurada) is assigned to their department  where he will be partnered with Kaori.

She meets him in passing but their relationship starts off rocky when he happens to catch Kaori and Fuyuki making out in the records room.

Chastizing her, he tells her that she disgusts him but will continue to work with her on a professional level.She fires back that  she will continue to work with him, and that she hates him mutually...

But as the two work together, Shinonome cannot keep quiet and asks her why she tortures herself by staying in a dead-end relationship where she knows she’ll never be satisfied.

 When she asks why he even cares about her business, he tells her that there are many who love and respect her and that even he sees how hard she works. 

 Kaori begins to be drawn towards him but what she cannot fathom is that this is all part of Shinonome’s plans to manipulate Kaori into a web of sex, control and domination….

Egads, this drama is REALLY not my cup of tea, but as each episode is (blessedly) only about 22 minutes long, I suppose I will continue on just to see where this thing goes....

EDIT:

Ah man, I just finished episode 2 and I don’t know if I can take much more. It is so frustrating watching these two suave jerk offs treating Kaori so cruelly- the show is literally non-stop using and abusing her. Is this how it was in Fifty Shades Of Grey? Is this something that women actually WANT from a guy?????  As the Old Man in Gremlins once said, "Aiyaa."
   
 PS: A Reina Trendl Memory:

My friend and his girlfriend are avid NETFLIX watchers and sometimes they see J-drama I haven’t seen yet (like the Mirei Kirtani drama Underwear/Atelier), and he was telling me about some fun Japanese reality show they were watching. 

It was based in a Share house and followed the goings on of the tenants. He said, “The show has these hosts who watch the show and make comments. One of the ladies is that lady from "Nobody Knows.” I laughed and went, “oh, you mean YOU?” He said “I guess”.

“Anyway,” he continued, ‘there’s this super cute hapa girl who is like the contrast to the lady, I bet if you saw her, you would like her.”

He said, go online and look up “Terrace House”. They show the panelists and you can see the girl. Maybe you already know who she is!”

And indeed I did! For when I went onto the terrace House site, the “super cute hapa girl” was none other than Reina!

Posted by zdorama @ zdoramaagain.blogspot.com

My Sheena Ringo Experiment

I've been antsy for some new music to pique my interest and while listening to Utada Hikaru's duet with Sheena Ringo on Utada's album "Fantome", it waned on me that Sheena Ringo is one artist with whom I have only the most minimal knowledge of and decided to pick up some of her CDs and give it a whirl!
4/5/19:

Muzai Moratorium

I decided to begin my journey into Ringo Shiina's catalog in order, with her 1999 debut album, and it was a hard-hitting album indeed! With a phat sound and wild, catchy melodies, I was immediately sold on this one! I love Icelandic Chanteuse Bjork and there are a few tracks here that are clearly inspired by her, with a meld of both music and sounds...
4/6/19

Heisei Fuzoku

I needed an album to listen to for my sunset drive and so I chose this jazzy/classical release Heisei Fuzoku for my second album experiment. I was blown away by the HUGE orchestral sound as the album began, but I have to say I wasn't too much of a fan of her screechy style of singing here.

Reminded me too much of aiko's (whom I'm REALLY not a fan of) warbly, out-of-tune style of singing. But the songs really grabbed me and I was won over by the dreamy and haunting compositions, and it became another album I'll be sure to play over and over!

Shoso Strip

As Ringo's song "Tsumi to Batsu" (Crime and Punishment) was the first song I ever knew from her, I was really looking forward to this album...

But Holy HELL, Ringo's out-of-tune, meandering and screechy style of singing was here in FULL FORCE, and this time, even the MUSIC seemed purposely hell-bent on being as screechy and obnoxious as possible, with tinny guitars doing these loud and abrasive off-kilter solos over and over again...

Truthfully, I could only get through half the album before i gave up. GADS, it was like having 15 bratty children screaming in my ears at the top of their lungs for 30 minutes straight!!! While trudging through this album, It occured to me: is this why Sheena Ringo is popular with the teens? Because her music is purposefully grating and obnoxious?

Will go back to this album at some later date where I can play it in the background while I'm doing something else. No more trying to listen to this while I'm driving- I just can't have this as the main focus of my night.
4/7/19

Sanmon Gossip

Gotta admit, I was so put off by my Shoso Strip experience that I was rather discouraged to try another one of her albums, but I was so glad I did because Sanmon Gossip was as good, perhaps even BETTER than Heisei Fuzoku! Full of symphonic pieces, jazzy interludes, droning bass rockers and a smattering of 60's kitsch, this one had me on my toes for the entire album!
THIS was what I was expecting to hear from Ringo Sheena!

Kalk Samen Kuri no Hana
After the wonderful experience with Sanmon Gossip, we're back with another uneven album with half the songs intriguing me and the other half irritating me. hate to say it, but man, I really dislike Sheena Ringo's guitarist, not sure if he (or she) is purposely playing so erratically, but he seems to think messy/sloppy playing equals edgy/punk (maybe it does, nowadays) and whenever these odd rock songs come on with those whiny screechy guitars, they drive me so insane I just have to fast forward over them.
Fortunately, there are enough tracks on here that I really like so I suppose in time I'll learn to love 'em all the more I spin the record....
04/09/19
Gave Shoso Strip another listen, and I can't say I'm liking this much more (though at least this time I managed to get through it). There are  a few sporadic tracks I like, but for the most part, this is pure obnoxiousness! So ironic since track Tsumi To Batsu is one of my favorite songs from her.

04/10/19
My second listen to Muzai Moratorium. After how much I haven't liked some of her other albums, I wanted to go back and make sure my love of this first album wasn't a fluke. Very glad to reaffirm how great this album is. Though there are a few "crazy" sounding tracks with spiraling vocals, the main thing is that Ringo still sings in TUNE with none of that later thing about purposely warbling in any old way.
04/21/19
After a week of listening to all four over and over, I will say that I do like a lot of Ringo Sheenas stuff, but ultimately it's a pick and choose thing and I'm clearly not the target demographic for her kind of music.
Will be checking out her later releases when I have time....

A Detective's Life in Reset in "Keiji Zero"

In a scuffle to arrest a murder suspect, detective Rekihiko Tokiya (Ikki Sawamura) falls off the side of a building into a container of water, which saves his life but puts him in the hospital.

When Tokiya awakens the next day, he finds that he cannot remember where he is and can’t even recognize his own partners when they come in to visit him. Upon checking the newspaper’s date, he realizes he has lost 20 years of his life and has no memory as a police investigator!

Hiding his illness, Tokiya is introduced to his new partner, rookie Tomoka Saso (Miori Takimoto) who is given the job of assisting Tokiya as he makes his way back to the force.

Saso’s been a great admirer of Tokiya's work in the past and cannot understand why the once outspoken and brave detective is now timid and unsure about his methods.

Tokiya goes to visit his physician Uncle Morio (Takeda Tetsuya) who looks Tokiya over. He acknowledges his malady as memory loss, but attributes some of it due to psychological reasons. His memory may return in a day , a month, or never! For now he suggest to keep his amnesia a secret. 

As Tokiya learns that he will be let go of his job if they discover he has lost his memory, he cannot reveal his secret to anyone, but little by little, the sharp instincts he had as a 20 year veteran of the force comes back to him and though he doesn’t know how, helps the cases they are on get solved!

Of course, this cannot go on forever and eventually Saso gets wise to Tokiya's predicament. But when she sees the spark of genius she once admired about him, she agrees to help him out. As a great admirer of Tokiya's work, she has a huge database of knowledge about him, and with this, they might just get through this!

Tokiya’s memory reminds me a bit of Anne Nakamura’s similar malady in “Love Rerun”. Her character Sayaka was feeling remorse about her life and at that moment her mind wiped her memories of the past 3 months, as if in retreat. In the same way, just before his fall, Tokiya questioned his life as a detective, and fate has somehow stepped in to give him an opportunity to ‘start over” again at zero!

Posted by zdorama @ zdoramaagain.blogspot.com