Air Dates: January 6th to March 10, 2019 Sundays at 10:30 pm on NTV
Average rating: 11.5%
Director: Naoko Komuro and Yuma Suzuki Writer: Shogo Muto
Also goes by the title of 'Mr Hiiragi's Homeroom'
Main Cast:
Masaki Suda as Ibuki Hiiragi.... the slightly warped homeroom teacher
The Students, thirty in all so just listing a few of them
Mei Nagano as Sakura Kayano.... homeroom class president
Moka Kamishiraishi as Reina Kageyama.... committed suicide in September
Rina Kawaei as Kaho Usumi
Haruka Fukuhara as Suzune Minakoshi
Mio Imada as Yuzuki Suwa
Ryota Katayose as Hayato Kai
Jin Suzuki as Kaito Satomi
Tsuyoshi Furukawa as Ken Sunaga
Kaito Mifune as Ren Nakao.... Hiiragi's first victim
The rest:
Kippei Shiina as Makoto Gunji.... detective who is leading the case
Yoshihiko Hosoda as Ryoichi Miyagi.... Gunji's partner
Kohei Otomo as Toru Igarashi.... superior of the two above detectives
Bengal as Koichi Ichimura.... principal of Kaio high school
Akane Hotte as Mizuki Morisaki.... teacher who had a crush on Hiiragi
Seiichi Tanabe as Yamato Takechi... annoying teacher who is also an author
Kenichi Yajima as Takahiko Sagara
Whew, this may be the biggest cast ever for a regular drama as there's twenty more students and a few other teachers. There's no promo videos for each episode but will have something different at the top of all the posts. This post is just a behind the scenes one though it does feature Haruka and Mio.(Forget that idea as the video was deleted.... why?) The show began on the date of March 1st and by what was told to us in the first episode the events take place until March 10th, the day the students were(are?) supposed to graduate....
Should be able to squeeze everything into one post but once again an incredible amount of things took place but now the episodes are regular length at 46 minutes. This show began off a bit lightheartedly as the obnoxious teacher Takechi had been interviewed by a newscaster, everything he says is BS and he told the audience how much he wanted to save the students. Instead it was more of him plugging himself and his book.
It's now day two for the series so presume each episode will cover one day and who knows what will happen on the tenth day, the date for this show is March 2nd. Lot took place in the first episode so would highly recommend reading those posts. Where we ended off was with one student being killed who was a boy named Ren. Shortly after that Hiiragi had put in a demand to the police, they had to go on to the website 'Mind Voice' and have each of the registered users donate 100 yen each to his special fund for a total of 5 billion yen.
Don't think Hiiragi is holding his class hostage for the money but bets he has a good use for it which hasn't been revealed yet. But the police and school staff don't know what's up with the demand so they're treating it as a regular hostage case with the 5 billion yen being the ransom. However don't think the main detective in the case, Gunji, feels as though this is a normal hostage situation but for now his hands are tied. He knows Hiiragi isn't bluffing about killing as he's already taken one student out but as we'll soon see is that student really dead?
The main question Hiiragi had posed to his homeroom in the first episode was 'Why did Reina Kageyama kill herself?'. If the class couldn't come up with the correct answer one student would die and Hiiragi did keep that promise. We're still on that Reina suicide theme and Hiiragi is still demanding the answer to why did she jump from the school's roof. However he's added in another question for the class to answer, once again an incorrect one will lead to the death of a student.
Reina had been an excellent swimmer and shortly before her death had won a major national swimming meet. However right after the competition a rumor began circulating around the 'net that she had been doping up for the event. Plus once the rumors had spread nationwide and Reina's reputation was smeared an video had been uploaded to the SNS forum where all the comments were posted. The video showed Reina at her locker before the race, in it she had consumed something which the uploader said was dope.
That accusation was 100% false but once a vicious rumor starts there's no stopping it even if it is a lie. There was nothing Reina could say or do to stop the slandering against her so was that the main reason she killed herself? It could be but for now Hiiragi is more concerned about another issue which is who uploaded the video and why? The time is approaching noon, if the person won't confess to their dastardly deed by 8:00 pm then a second victim is on Hiiragi's agenda.
For one hour Korean dramas have been able to keep the recaps at five segments or parts. This is the third so my goal is to have five for this and all of the remaining recaps. Does make for an easier read and will make sure no major details are left out. With the odds 28-1 in their favor it's obvious what the students need to do is jump on Hiiragi as a mob. It was tried in the first show but was a failure as Hiiragi still has his watch that can set off bombs plus he may look a bit scrawny but is one tough fighter. Twice this episode the male students did try to jump Hiiragi, both times he repelled them but not by much, one of these times the students should be able to best their teacher.
One of those incidents took place above while Hiiragi was in a bathroom repairing the floor where the SWAT team almost tore through. Once again four males attacked Hiiragi, almost looked like the students would crush Hiiragi but he was able to wrest a pipe away from one of them and put quite a beating on his students. After that incident Hiiragi returned to his art room to take care of his injuries, shortly after another small group of students entered the room but not to attack Hiiragi. They're curious about their classmate Ren who was the first victim. But the question the boys posed to Hiiragi was 'Is Ren really dead or are you just hiding him?'.
There was some evidence in the boy's theory as there was no trail of blood when Hiiragi dragged Ren into his art room. Plus it had been over twelve hours since the death, shouldn't his body begin to smell by now? Good questions but Hiiragi assured his students that he did kill Ren, didn't they see first hand that their friend was dead? For proof Hiiragi went into his room and returned with an object which he threw on the floor. It was the hand of Ren(!) or at least that's what Hiiragi told them, believing him for now the students ran panicking out of the art room.
Top screenshot is of Gunji who is still on the case but with nothing to do at school so he began to investigate Hiiragi's life. He started out talking with the principal of his former school, he told the detective Hiiragi was a fine teacher but had a violent streak to him. He never attacked a student but the rumor was he had been abusing his girlfriend Fumika who was also a teacher at the school. It got so bad she quit her job which was also the time Hiiragi transferred to Kaio high school. Ginji also visited the home of Fumika but didn't gt a chance to meet her or at least yet. What Hiiragi did to her has left Fumika with a warped mind and rarely can leave her house these days as her father is taking care of her. This will be a story that we'll be learning much more of as the show goes on.
Back to Kaio high school, it's approaching 8:00 pm and Hiiragi has returned to his homeroom to find out if the students had an answer to his question. But once again the males aren't willing to put up with being Hiiragi's hostages any longer as they jumped him but this time all at once instead of one at a time. They were able to pin their teacher to the ground and in a wise move removed the watch from his arm which left him defenseless. That's what the students thought but Hiiragi had planned for an incident like this happening.
The watch they took off him was fake, Hiiragi had transferred the 'weapon watch' to his ankle. He quickly sat up, pressed a button and another bomb went off in the classroom. Now the students knew they were defeated, not forever but at least for this night. Back to the question in hand which Hiiragi had posed to them, 'Who uploaded the fake video of Reina to the internet?'. He had the students line up against the blackboard as none of them had an answer, was he just going to take a pot shot at them with a gun or other weapon. That didn't happen and for a while the students talked among themselves about the video and had many bad things to say about Reina. Unable to take it anymore Sakura, the sweet class rep, screamed out to everyone that she was the evil person who posted the video!
That was a lie though all except one student knew that. And also Hiiragi who above asked for the password to the account that uploaded the video but it being a lie meant Sakura naturally didn't know it. But with that it meant a wrong answer, the students looked at Hiiragi with panicked faces wondering who would be next. Hiiragi himself didn't and was pondering who the next victim would be but that was a ruse on his part. He realized if he waited long enough the true culprit would reveal their identity and that's what happened. It was a female student who I had thought all along was the uploader, for a change was correct and that girl was Kaho.
Kaho is played by Rina Kawaei and she had her best performance to date. At one time Kaho had been best friends with Reina who was always leery about their friendship. Reina had thought Kaho was using their 'friendship' to make Kaho look better as she posted many pics of them at her SNS site. However that wasn't true as Kaho really did enjoy being Reina's friend and did't realize what Reina had been thinking.
Eventually Reina began to hang out with Sakura and wanted to have nothing to do with Kaho, that's the pair above when the two had their final meeting which left Kaho so upset. Kaho was so jealous of Sakura being with her ex-friend and began to start making Reina's life miserable. She would cut up her clothes, vandalize her locker and desk among other things. In her final act of vengeance Kaho filmed Reina at the swimming meet and uploaded the fake video of Reina doping herself before the major race. Kaho broke down on the homeroom floor and told everyone she was the person to blame for Reina's death, would seem that was a big reason for it but Hiiragi said it was something else. He also said that it wasn't Kaho would too the video, she admitted that and someone had put a DVD in her bag of the locker scene, that should be discussed more in the next episode.
That long scene brought us close to the show's end, there are plenty of screenshots below to view more of that scene. But with a correct answer it meant that no student would be killed though the police aren't aware of the 'game' Hiiragi is playing with his students. With that question out of the way it's time to retire for the night, what we haven't seen is how the students sleep, at their desks perhaps? Plus the students are running out of food, as the episode came to a close Hiiragi requested onigiri for everyone and wants it delivered by one person to the school's lobby. Gunji's chief said he would deliver the food, as he entered the building hiding in the shadows was Hiiragi who then revealed himself to the chief, how it ends will be known in the next episode as this recap has finally hit it's end.
Know it's only been two shows but can easily see this being my #1 drama of the year. Korean dramas the last few years have been much better but for a change can't see one topping this series. Haven't watched any show past this one as I don't want to get too far in front of the recaps. Will view the next two this weekend and will be doing posts for them about the same time next week. Have been setting records for screenshots and it's a good idea to view them to understand the story better.
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