The 1st Dorama World Awards 2016 - Winners in the Best Leading Actress category

The voting situation for this category can be said to be full of twists and turns. During the first few days, No.2 and No.5 were locked in a tight race for the top spot until No.3 came in to make it a three-way fight. However, the unexpected thing happened in the second week of the voting when No.1 suddenly rose up the ranks with such momentum that the rest of the field could never catch up.

Without further ado, let's meet the top 5 winners in this category!

No.5 Ishihara Satomi - Jimi ni sugoi! Kouetsu Girl Kouno Etsuko (46 points)

Ishihara started off quite well at the beginning of the voting period but lost speed very quickly as well. Frankly speaking, I was sort of expecting that it will be a two-way fight between her and No.2 since there were a lot of comparisons between them and the performance of their dramas which were aired in the same season. What's interesting too is that many of the people who voted for Ishihara did not include No.2 in their top 5 list.

I haven't watched Ishihara's performance in this drama yet so I can't really comment on how she fared. To be honest, when Ishihara first started out as an actress, I thought that she was really "jimi" and didn't really stand out among her peers. However, she went through an amazing transformation in recent years, not just in terms of her appearance and image which are now seen as fashionable and trend-setting but also in her acting which I think shows a new degree of maturity. That's not to say that she was bad in the past but it probably took her a bit of time to find her strengths and build upon those traits to make her become who she is today.

No.4 Mitsushima Hikari - Totto Terebi (50 points)

As compared to her peers in the top 5, Mitsushima's ascent in the ranking was slowly but surely. Although she did not shoot up at once, the constant and steady flow of votes across the entire voting period contributed to her performance.

Likewise, I haven't watched her performance in this drama yet but I've always liked Mitsushima's acting although the dramas I've seen her in tend to be the emotionally-heavy ones for some reason. That's why I'm very excited to see her bright side come up in the new drama "Quartet". Having to play a person who exists in real life Kuroyanagi Tetsuko, I believe that there is a fair bit of difficulty to look convincing but it looks like the blog's readers liked what they saw from Mitsushima as seen from the votes.

No.3 Kuroki Haru - Juuhan Shuttai! (78 points)

I haven't seen any of Kuroki's works other than the drama SP "Oriental Kyuukou Satsujin Jiken" but I struggle to remember what her role in that SP was. I attribute this partly due to the fact that the drama SP had so many actors in the cast. Likewise, I haven't watched this drama yet to give an accurate assessment of how she fared. However, she has actually won the Best Leading Actress for her role here in the 89th The Television Dorama Academy Award so this probably means that she did well enough in this drama.

In terms of the voting pattern, Kuroki didn't look like a serious contender in the first few days because No.2 was practically hogging a lot of the votes. However, just like Mitsushima, Kuroki started to receive a steady flow of votes later which helped her to climb up to No.3. Alas, it was still not enough to pull down No.2 while No.1 was practically unreachable.

No.2 Aragaki Yui - Nigeru wa haji daga yaku ni tatsu (90 points) 

I'm sure many of you thought that Aragaki was a shoo-in for this category especially seen from the number of guesses who chose her as the winner. In fact, she did look like she was going to grab this easily, thanks to the huge support for her right from Day 1 of the voting period. However, unexpected things do happen even when you think you are sure to win because No.1 came in like a flash and swept the title off Aragaki's hands with such great momentum that the eventual point gap between the two was impossible to bridge.

My "interaction" with Aragaki can be considered fairly limited but there were two dramas which I thought she made an impression on me i.e. "My Boss My Hero" where she played Nagase Tomoya's classmate and love interest and "Legal High" where she appeared with Sakai Masato. I think I'm quite neutral about her. However, she did look very endearing and adorable in NigeHaji even though I've only watched the digest versions so far.

And the winner is Yonekura Ryoko - Doctor X 4 ~ Gekai Daimon Michiko ~ with a whooping 173 points!

Actually, in the first week of the voting period, there were hardly any votes towards Yonekura as Aragaki, Ishihara and Kuroki were locked in a three-way battle. By the time we got to the second week, things literally changed overnight where there was a steady supply of votes for Yonekura which seemed to suggest that her supporters had waited till for a while before submitting their votes. As such, the tables were overturned and Yonekura never looked back as she marched her way to the top just like her sassy character in this drama.

Now that I think about it, I have been watching Yonekura's dramas for such a long time. The first time when she made an impression on me was back in 2001 when she appeared in "Love Revolution" and I thought that she did well opposite the more experienced Esumi Makiko although her character in that drama irked me at one point when she was obsessed with Oshio Manabu's character who didn't love her. Subsequently, I watched quite a lot of the dramas where she played evil or scheming women which I must say that she had the screen presence to tackle those roles. Surprisingly, I sort of stopped watching her dramas ever since she began work on the Doctor X series which I wouldn't say was deliberate but it just so happened this way for one reason or another. Perhaps I can go and search for the earlier seasons of Doctor X to see why the series could last this long?

And if you are keen to know who I chose, here is the list! And yes, they both did not make it to the top 5 this time:

No.1 Amami Yuki (Chef Mitsuboshi no Kyuushoku)

Actually, I do wonder if this drama had not been aired on the same day as Doctor X (Chef was shown at 10pm while Doctor X was shown at 9pm), would it have enjoyed a bit more success? Watching this drama was by chance actually since the cable TV station Waku Waku Japan was showing it but I found myself enjoying this more than I imagined. I credit that to Amami who was so vivacious, positive and inspiring even though there were some predictable elements in the story.

No.2 Haru (ON Ijou Hanzai Sousakan Toudou Hinako)

As I mentioned previously, this drama felt like a gathering of psychos. In order to stand out among them, Haru managed to show a good blend of ordinary and extraordinary in her character. On one hand, she looked emotionless and unfeeling while the next, you could see the emotions within her which were seemingly suppressed in order to look normal and fit into society. There were a few scenes when I felt shivers from watching Haru. In this regard, her performance in this drama was really mind-blowing for me.

So how do you feel about the winners list in this category? Be sure to share your views here or via the Facebook page!