Konnichiwa and Annyeong Haseyo minna-san

Konnichiwa and Annyeong Haseyo minna-san

Hope that's correct above but what I'm saying is welcome everyone. May 10, 2019 is the first day of this blog and many may know me from 'Nao Kanzaki and Friends'... aitoda.com. There I have such a mix of things and finally decided to branch out with just a blog devoted to Japanese and Korean dramas. Will also be having some film reviews but one thing you won't see are any J-Pop idols or gravure models except for their dramas, this blog is dedicated 100% to dramas and films.

Also actresses as will be having many, many posts for them. Such as them appearing at events, mag spreads, interview pics and whatever else. So you should be seeing a lot of my bigger long time faves such as Erika Toda, Park Min-Young, Lee Yeon-Hee, Tsubasa Honda and too many others to count.

News and upcoming projects

News and upcoming projects

Should have done this on my Aitoda blog which is to let viewers know what's going on. Seems like a good way to let everyone know if I'll be taking a break, what to look forward to and any other tidbits.

Updating update, May 19th:

Whew, have finally finished transferring over enough posts from the Aitoda blog. May be a few here and there in the future for some new that's being introduced but there shouldn't be too many. Have also included announcers for women that I'll be posting about as my top two current faves just happen to be in that profession.

The first five episodes of '3-Nen A Gumi' have now been posted. For series over five shows will be doing two batches of them as I figure ten posts are way too many to read through during one sitting so will have the second half of the drama coming up in 2-3 weeks, highly recommend the show.

June 4th.... Have written up the recaps for episodes 7 and 8 of the '3-Nen A Gumi' show and will have those long with episode eight by June 6th. Up next for Korean dramas is up in the air but leaning towards a pair of shorter series which will be either "Splish Splash Love" or "The Universe's Star".

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Monday, May 13, 2019

Kakegurui drama: episode two recap




 Start Date: January 14/16 as it aired on both the MBS and TBS networks
Theme song: "Strawberry Feels" by BIGMAMA    Director: Tsutomu Hanabusa

 Listed the characters this way for the "Re:Mind" drama and thought it's be a good idea to do it once again. This series reminds me so much of 'Liar Game' and there aren't many dramas better than that one, lets get to the characters and think these are the main ones that will be featured. Have the character descriptions though some may be blank for now as we haven't met all of them yet.

Minami Habe as Yumeko Jabami.... transfer student who is addicted to gambling


 Aoi Morikawa as Mary Saotome.... The evilist of students who gets severely humbled


Mahiro Takasugi as Ryota Suzui.... wimpy guy who befriends Yumeko


Ruka Matsuda as Itsuki Sumeragi.... Richest student at Hyakkaou Academy


Taishi Nakagawa as Kaeda Manyuda.... student council member


Natsume Mito as Runa Yomozuki....


Kiyo Matsumoto as Nanami Tsubomi....


Natsumi Okamoto as Yuriko Nishinotoin....


Yuma Yamato as Jun Kiwatari.... school bully


Yurika Nakamura as Sayaka Igarashi....


Miki Yanagi as Midari Ikishima....


 And those are the eleven major characters who will be appearing in the series, through two episodes we've only met five of them. At the top of all of the posts will have a different video, some will be promos while others may be from a press conference that was held for the series or perhaps other kinds. The one for today is from the opening scene which had the showdown of the for the thrilling conclusion of the 'Ballot Rock-Paper-Scissors' game which had a pot of twenty million yen(!). The video is unsubbed but will discuss the outcome to start the recap off with.




 When the intensity level rises Yumeko's eyes turn to a fiery red as you can see in the top screenshot. That intensity level is scorching now as after losing 1.2 million yen in the first episode Yumeko wanted to try her luck once more and says she wants to play a second round of 'Ballot Paper-Rock-Scissors' for 10 million yen! Mary reluctantly agrees though she should have nothing to worry about as she knows how her flunkies are voting.
 Won't go into too much detail on what happened in the first episode as that recap is just above this one. But in the game there are thirty students in the gambling den who will secretly put one piece of paper into a box with one of three symbols: paper, rock or scissors. Both opponents take three pieces from the box and have a showdown using one slip of paper, if there's a tie you go again.
 All thirty owe Mary money so until they pay up they're her 'house pets' and must do what she says. As you can see in the middle screenshot Mary has told all thirty how to vote, knowing how many of each symbol is in the box makes it so much easier to pick one card for the showdown. It's worked up until now as Mary has never lost a game of it or actually any kind of gambling game. Yumeko knows what Mary is up to yet still insists on playing another game but she has one catch. It won't be a game of many rounds but Yumeko wants to bet all ten million yen($95,000) on one hand!!!!






 No need to tell you the outcome of the ten million yen showdown, Yumeko's card was on the left while Mary's was on the right. That has to rank up there for all time upsets as Mary felt there was no way she could lose though she was sweating a bit before the face off. It wasn't explained though may be in the future but Yumeko also appeared to have her own bag of tricks in figuring out which card to use in the showdown.
 Didn't mention it that recap but in the first episode we saw one of the two slip a piece of paper into their pocket, by the angle we thought the person was Mary but now I'm starting to wonder. Unlike Mary Yumeko isn't one to gloat and she would rather not have any student be her doggy or kitty. However Mary now owes her the massive sum of 8.8 million yen($83,900), Yumeko won ten million this game but had been in the hole for 1.2 million.
 Don't know what Mary has done with all of her winnings as she had never lost a match until now. Say that because she doesn't have the funds to pay Yumeko, in a matter of seconds she's gone from the academy's biggest winner to it's lowest peon. Like 'Liar Game' the scene was stretched out quite a bit to bring the suspense level up which worked but that one hand took close to ten of the 24 minutes in the show.





 Yumeko did have some tricks up her sleeve and admitted one of them to Ryota after the match. He had been standing behind her most of the time, Yumeko had the feeling one of the thirty students was giving Mary signals which was an excellent deduction. Someone was and that devious person was Ryota though Yumeko doesn't hold any bad feelings towards him. Yumeko knew that the thirty students in the room were under Mary's control so she understood why Ryota did what he did.
 That bottom screenshot above is how Yumeko discovered that Ryota was giving signals, surprised Mary didn't catch on. Wouldn't call Yumeko and Ryota close friends but the two do hang around together quite often, he's actually the only person who has somewhat befriended her. With her huge victory Yumeko even paid off Ryota's 100,000 yen debt which means he's no longer a pet.
 Wasn't said but have the feeling Yumeko may have paid off everyone's debts, she could afford it plus Mary no longer has any pets obeying her. The school is set up into two classes of students, the elite who have won money gambling and have-nots who owe money  and are are the elite's pets. Mary has now moved to the lower rank, the other students haven't forgotten how she treated them and begin to bully her. Mary couldn't take the abuse and ran out of her classroom, that was with a few minutes left and was the last we saw of her but there's no doubt she's planning her revenge.




 Yumeko truly loves to gamble and is more than obsessed with it. Ryota constantly tries to talk her out of wanting to continue with her addiction, it didn't work in her match with Mary and don't think it ever will. The news of Yumeko's huge win has spread quickly around school, will there be any student willing to go head to head against her?
 Before we get into that there's also a student council at the school which controls all of the gambling. We've only seen snippets of them up until now and not sure who that mysterious leader is above. Perhaps some of the characters I haven't talked about yet could be in the council. Back to Yumeko and there is a student who is willing to take her on in a gambling match. That's Itsuki and she took up the challenge thought there were only two minutes to go in the show, she's also by far the richest student at the academy.
 Itsuki also appears to be an obsessed gambler as she has her own traveling case. Not just an ordinary case but one that has what every gambler needs such as many decks of unopened cards, dice, chips, cash and more. Wasn't mentioned but sure it will be but it also appears Itsuki has been undefeated up until now, wonder if all of Yumeko's challengers will be that way. In the closing seconds it's official that there will be a challenge as Itsuki has finally met the student everyone is talking about. She goes up to Yumeko and says the two need to have a match, despite Ryota pleading with her to say no Yumeko agrees. That will be how the third episode will probably begin and the stakes are rising rapidly as the wager for this game has gone from ten million yen to.... twenty million!!!!




 Don't know what Double Concentration is but we'll be finding out soon enough. Two episodes in and I'm really enjoying this drama immensely. Have said it many times before which is that these late night shows are so much better than prime time series and the gap isn't even close. Don't know why there aren't more prime time shows that are dark and suspenseful, when there are they seem to be fairly successful.
 There's a total of ten episodes, to date six have been subbed so don't want to rush the recaps and then wait weeks for them to be to be done. So will do a pair of recaps like these every week and hopefully in the meantime the remaining four episodes will be completed. Keep saying the next drama recap will be for the 'Video Girl Ai' series but so far the subs for the last two shows haven't been done, that team is also doing this show. That's okay as there's a few films I've meaning to view and review. Here's plenty more screenshots to help you follow the story better but think all of the main details were discussed.























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