Air Dates: July 2 to July 30, 2017 on TBS/MBS, Sundays at 12:50 am for five episodes
The two main characters:
Marie Iitoyo as Marin Sakamoto...Kanto Maritime student who loves ships and the ocean
Rena Takeda as Tsubame Ishikawa.... Kanto Matitime student who doesn't like the sea
Rest of the cast:
Doro Sakurada as Yamato Yagi.... another Kanto student who has a crush on Tsubame
Yuhi as Arata Narumi.... Kobe Hainan student
Yuki Izawa as Kensuke Kogure.... the oldest trainee as he's 27 and married
Keito Ikemoto as Shotaro Yamada.... another Hainan student
Mikoto Hibi as Anju Ukawa.... another Hainan student and the rival of the above trainees
Keisuke Horibe as Kazuya Yokoyama... main trainer of the students
Yoichi Nukumizu as Yonosuke Hayashida.... captain of the Mikumaru ship
Mai Takahashi as Akane Fujiwara.... ship's assistant navigator and a trainer
Bit of a large cast for a short show as an episode just runs shy of 24 minutes pus there's only five of them. Most of the episodes revolve around Marie and Rena which is my main reason for viewing this drama. These recaps shouldn't be too, too long though I have a bad way of stretching them out, will have all five recaps in a row which means there's four after this one.
As you can see in the top screenshot this series is about two colleges joining forces who are Kanto Maritime University and Kobe Hainan University. There may be more schools as there seemed to be quite a bit of trainees though we were never told that info. The two colleges with six students each will be heading out to the sea for a month to introduce to the students the life of a sailor and to train them a bit to see if they're interested in the maritime as their future.
Fist person we met was Tsubame(Rena) who as she says is a person who has no interest in boats or the ocean. We saw a flashback on why she went to the school, she had applied to many other colleges but couldn't pass their entrance exams. She had been dating a guy named Kaito who had plans on going to Kanto Maritime, upon hearing that Tsubame decided to try enrolling. While Kaito flunked the exam to enter the school Tsubame somehow passed it but she didn't learn her boyfriend had failed the exam until after she had enrolled, it was the end of their relationship.
Marin is the complete opposite of Tsubame as she's such a fanatic about ships and the high seas. She's really such a gung ho gal and because her and Tsubame are the only females from Kanto they became roommates much to the disappointment of Tsubame. There's many other characters who we see often but those two are the ones the show revolves around.
Most of this first episode was learning more about the pair along with a few others who became part of their small team. Their team of six consisted of three students from Hainan along with on from their own college who was Yamato. He had never met the pair of girls up until the voyage though once had seen Tsubame practicing her swimming in the school's pool, he fell instantly in love with her though was never able to confess his feelings to her through all five episodes.
The other three who made up the team were Arata who took an instant disliking towards Marin. He may have been the most skilled person on their team and often to his dismay he was ordered to help Marin out, she's so avid yet her skills as a sailor were severely lacking. Also on the the team was Kensuke, at 27 he was the oldest student on the ship. He had graduated from college two years before but being a salary man was not a vocation he could see himself doing for the rest of his life so
re-enrolled at Hainan to become a sailor.
Last up was Shotaro who we never got to know that well through the five shows, he was a very quiet guy and while the others also had a turn in the spotlight he never did. The main trainee was the Senior Navigation Officer Yokoyama, he was a much older man who could really come down hard on his students but was always fair and helped them out as much as possible. The ship's captain was Hayashida who was another person we rarely saw which made no sense considering his important position. Two other characters we saw on occasion though won't discuss them as their roles were smallish, they were the ship's cook and assistant navigator.
The group got to know each other a bit better in the ship's cafeteria, seems that was the location most scenes took place in. Tsubame had confessed she was a person who wasn't that much into the sea or ships, a main reason for her enrolling was because a sailor paid much better than an OL. The training and getting to know each other better took up much of this first show, rarely was there any action but wouldn't call this a boring drama.
It's almost time for the ship Mikamura to head out to see, before that the students were given a short leave where they were allowed to go back to land for the final time. That short leave almost cancelled the journey or at least for Marin as she was caught up in an incident and it wasn't her last time doing something like that. On land she had sat on a small hill to get a nice view of the ship, there she met a much older man who Marin began conversing with.
The man was an old time sailor and like Marin loved everything about the sea. But during their chat the man fell ill and passed out, Marin was in a panic but managed to call an ambulance and escort him to a nearby hospital. Marin didn't notify the ship though and everyone was furious with her for not showing up in time for the ship's departure. Plus it made them all very confused as Marin was the most avid student on the ship.
Well past the ship's departure time the captain and Yokoyama finally found out what had happened to Marin, when they discovered why she had been late they understood fully. The old man was named Tanba, he was person who all sailors knew about and was such a respected figure. Though they weren't happy with leaving for the sea so late no one could be mad at Marin for what she did.
No punishment except extra cleaning duty which she and her team seemed to do every show. Now that everything is back to normal and Tanba has recovered it's finally time for the ship to make it's departure. That event brought us to this episode's conclusion, did have to stretch things out a bit as a show runs less than 23 minutes.
One of the woman in the cast is named Mai Takahashi and at one time she was a huge fave of mine. Must have seen her in close to ten films and had forgotten all about her for years until this show. Think she's changed her name back to her real one which is Seiko Iwaido. May have to see about doing a post or two for her as she was also a gravure model and though it's hard to tell in the screenshots she is one fine looking woman. First episode was okay, this series didn't turn out to be a classic one but it was enjoyable. Next four posts are the recaps for the rest of the drama and though the shows are short did take an overabundance of screenshots.
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