New dramas starting in May 2017 on Waku Waku Japan

For those who have access to the cable TV channel Waku Waku Japan, do check out these new dramas beginning their runs here in May. Note that the start dates and timeslots are based on the channel's Singapore website so this may differ depending on the country you are in. I am only listing those dramas which are being shown for the first time on this channel so re-runs happening within May are not mentioned here.

Titles in brackets are the translated titles in English as listed by Waku Waku Japan on their website so you may need to rely on this to check your local TV schedule. You can also access the dramas' respective pages through the hyperlinks in the titles.

Have fun watching these dramas this month!

Team Batista no Eikou チームバチスタの栄光 (Glory of Team Batista)
Autumn 2008 drama from Kansai TV
First drama in the Team Batista series
Cast: Ito Atsushi, Nakamura Tooru, Shirota Yu, Tsurumi Shingo, Hayashi Ryuuzou, Natori Yuuko, Miyagawa Daisuke, Shaku Yumiko, Ihara Tsuyoshi
Start Date: 5 May 2017
Timeslot: Wednesdays 9pm (first episode starts at 10.30pm)

Hachimitsu to Clover ハチミツとクローバー (Honey and Clover)
Winter 2008 drama from FujiTV
Drama version of the hit manga by Umino Chika
Cast: Narumi Riko, Ikuta Toma, Harada Natsuki, Mukai Osamu, Narimiya Hiroki, Takizawa Saori, Kimura Yuichi, Matsushige Yutaka, Takahashi Hitomi, Nagano Satomi, Maekawa Yasuyuki, Kashiwabara Takashi, Izumiya Shigeru, Murakami Jun, Seto Asaka
Start Date: 8 May 2017
Timeslot: Mondays 9pm

S - Saigo no Keisatsukan - S -最後の警官- (S The Last Policeman)
Winter 2014 drama from TBS
Cast: Mukai Osamu, Oomori Nao, Hirayama Hiroyuki, Ikeuchi Hiroyuki, Takahashi Tsutomu, Aragaki Yui, Fuse Eri, Asakura Erika, Ayano Go, Takashima Masahiro, Motomiya Yasukaze, Hirayama Yusuke, Fuchikami Yasushi, Fukiishi Kazue, Tsuchiya Anna, Odagiri Jo etc.
Start Date: 10 May 2017
Timeslot: Wednesdays 9pm

Ooku 大奥 2003 (Ooku -The Inner Palace-)
Spring 2003 drama from FujiTV
First drama in the Ooku series
Cast: Kanno Miho, Asano Yuuko, Ikewaki Chizuru, Adachi Yumi, Harada Ryuji, Kitamura Kazuki, Katsurayama Shingo, Okada Yoshinori, Kimura Tae, Washio Machiko, Yamaguchi Kaori, Kubota Maki, Mizukawa Asami, Kinoshita Houka, Nogiwa Yoko etc.
Start Date: 11 May 2017
Timeslot: Thursdays 9pm

Fragile フラジャイル (FRAGILE)
Winter 2016 drama from FujiTV
Based on the original manga by Kusamizu Bin and Megumi Saburo
Cast: Nagase Tomoya, Takei Emi, Nomura Shuhei, Koyuki, Tsuda Kanji, Matsui Rena, Kitaoji Kinya
Start Date: 12 May 2017
Timeslot: Fridays 9pm

Yuusha Yoshihiko to Maou no Shiro 勇者ヨシヒコと魔王の城 (Brave "YOSHIHIKO" And The Great Satan's Castle)

Summer 2011 drama from TV Tokyo
First part of the Yuusha Yoshihiko drama series
Cast: Yamada Takayuki, Takuma Shin, Kinami Haruka, Muro Tsuyoshi, Okamoto Azusa, Satou Jirou, Nakao Ryuusei
Start Date: 14 May 2017
Timeslot: Sundays 3pm

Team Batista no Eikou SP

FujiTV will show the SP sequel to the drama series, "Team Batista no Eikou" which is titled "Team Batista no Eikou Nightingale no Chinmoku" (The Glory of the Batista Team - The Silence of the Nightingale) on 9 October at 9pm. The drama series was shown in October last year and features the combination of Taguchi (Itou Atsushi) as a psychology therapist working with Ministry of Health official Shiratori (Nakamura Toru) again. This time round, Yamada Yu, a new addition to the cast, will play Hamada Sayo, a nurse working in the paediatrics department who holds the key to the case which Taguchi and Shiratori are investigating.

Team Batista no Eikou DVD Box

Title: Team Batista no Eikou DVD Box Set
Date of release: 4 March 2009
Price: 23,940 yen (inclusive of tax)
Number of discs: 7
Total run time: 540 minutes
Number of episodes: 11
Produced by: Pony Canyon
Premium footage: Spoiler interviews with the cast, production press conference, birthday celebrations, end-of-filming, SP boom-up programme and trailers

Review of Team Batista no Eikou

I absolutely love suspense dramas so this is definitely my cup of tea. No doubt there's a lot of mind-boggling medical terms and the general atmosphere of this drama is heavy and dark, I'm sure those who are looking for a roller-coaster ride and are interested in medical dramas will be satisfied with this drama.

Be warned that there will be lots of spoilers from now on so if you have not watched the drama and do not wish to know the ending, you may wish to skip this review.

To be frank, there were minimal clues from the beginning to the middle which could pinpoint the identity of the culprit. And there wasn't a single cause to the series of surgical deaths! As such, you will find that things were not simple by the time you got to the end. With regards to Himuro's involvement, I still find it hard to fathom why he decided to kill 4 of the patients. If according to him, he had simply thought of killing the patients because he was so tired of work, lonely and snapped when his pet died, that just feels a bit weird. As for Kiryuu, Narumi and Kakitani's reasons or motive for causing those deaths, I find it more logical. For the sake of ensuring the existence of the team and saving more patients before Kiryuu's eyes reach the limit, Kiryuu and Narumi were effectively challenging themselves almost to the point of no return. Meanwhile for Kakitani, his motive was impulse-driven and he just wanted to confirm his suspicions about Kiryuu's skills. However, despite knowing the implications, Kakitani gave in to his need to find out the answer to his burning question and caused the death of an innocent person.

Anyway, this ending is different from the novel so I will have to read the original to see which version I prefer. Do look out for a cameo appearance by the author Kaidou Takeru in the last episode where he "interviews" Shiratori on TV.

As the story has a sequel and the movie version will be made with the same cast, I am guessing that we might see a sequel for the drama version in time to come since ratings have been pretty OK (No.4 this season).

Among the cast, I like the performances of Miyahara Daisuke (Narumi) and Nakamura Tooru (Shiratori) very much. Miyahara played Narumi very well which makes him the most favourite character of mine. As for Nakamura, I've always liked his acting and his potrayal of Shiratori is quite a refreshing change from the past where he usually plays cool roles. This time round, he manages to create some comical relief with Ito Atsushi who plays Taguchi which really helped in making the mood of the drama lighter especially when the tension mounts up suddenly. Ito is good with his acting but I really don't like the fact that he's always in roles of meek good guys. It can get really boring over time.

And my ratings for this drama...
Story: 9 out of 10 (The tension builds up nicely and progressively but the front portion may be mind-boggling as the story seems to leave little clues for guessing)
Acting: 8.5 out of 10 (Especially for Miyahara and Nakamura)
Theme song: 5 out of 10 (They should have gotten a better theme song. This song did not leave an impression on me at all)
Visual effects / Scenery: 6 out of 10 (Majority of the scenes were within the hospital or the operating theatre)
Teamwork / Chemistry: 8 out of 10 (Ito and Nakamura did pretty well together. As for Team Batista itself, their characters keep to themselves most of the time so chemistry wasn't that evident. It seems like they are on good terms off-screen though.)

Total score: 36.5 out of 50

Autumn 2008 drama satisfaction ranking by Oricon (straight after the first O.A.)

This is a survey done by Oricon to find out the satisfaction level after watching the first episode of the drama.

1) Aibou season7 (TV Asahi) 79.9

2) Black Monday (TBS) 76.7

3) Ryuusei no Kizuna (TBS) 73.8

4) Kaze no Garden (FujiTV) 72.7

5) Room of King (FujiTV) 70.8

6) Team Batista no Eikou (FujiTV) 69.7

7) Shouni Kyuumei (TV Asahi) 69.6

8) Gira Gira (TV Asahi) 69.1%

9) Yume wo Kanaeru Zou (NTV) 69.0

10) SCANDAL (TBS) 67.4

Autumn 2008 drama anticipation ranking (Oricon)

This is a survey done by Oricon to find out which dramas are highly anticipated by viewers prior to the start of the season.

1) Ryuusei no Kizuna (TBS) 59.6 points

2) Team Batista no Eikou (FujiTV) 58.8

3) Bloody Monday (TBS) 54.3

4) Aibou season7 (TV Asahi) 53.1

5) Innocent Love (FujiTV) 50.9

6) Celeb to Binbou Taro (FujiTV) 49.4

7) Yume wo Kanaeru Zou (NTV) 49.2

8) SCANDAL (TBS) 48.7

9) Room of King (FujiTV) 47.7

10) Shouni Kyuumei (TV Asahi) 47.3

Review of Team Batista no Eikou Ep 1 - 謎 Nazo (Mystery)

O.A. Date: 14 Oct 08
Ratings: 15.2%

As this is a suspense thriller, I expected the first episode to be nothing more than introducing the background of the key characters. However, some of the cast members put up a rather compelling performance which should help to pull in more viewers as the action thickens. By that, I am referring to Nakamura Tooru and Ihara Tsuyoshi. The lead character Taguchi Kohei played by Ito Atsushi simply bored me to death. I just don't see why he gets to play this lead role and repeats his one-pattern acting time and again. Since he looks like a meek guy who gets bullied, shouldn't the casting director choose someone else to turn up the chemistry and tension between Taguchi and Shiratori? Compared to Nakamura or Ihara or even members of the Batista team who had much less airtime, Ito fails to impress, at least from what I've seen so far. I do hope that he will prove me wrong.

Given the fact that this drama adaptation comes after the movie adaptation, there will no doubt be comparisons. However, as I've not seen the movie nor read the novel, I can't judge which is better. Nonetheless, on paper, the movie version boasts of a stellar cast including Takeuchi Yuko, Abe Hiroshi, Kikkawa Kouji, Ikeuchi Hiroyuki, Tamayama Tetsuji, Igawa Haruka, Tanaka Naoki, Sano Shiro and Nogiwa Yoko etc. I guess the movie version had a bigger budget to begin with but I'm generally OK with the cast selection except for Ito. By the way, the movie made 1.56 billion yen at the box office when it was shown from Feb this year. Another interesting thing which I noticed was that the movie was produced by TBS but FujiTV is making the drama. Let's see who will do a better job at the end of the day.

Coming to the story, I'm OK with the pace so far but I hope the scriptwriter can turn up the speed a little and focus more on the development of the investigation instead of showing Taguchi weeping all the time. It does get on my nerves when I'm obviously watching this for the suspense. Like what I said, the first episode serves mainly to introduce the team members i.e. the suspects in this possible series of murders. It has yet to be established that the deaths during surgery were intentional but going from case 31, the operation looked flawless. As such, like what Shiratori said, this is likely to be a serial murder which could destroy the hospital too if it is really the case.

As for the theme song, it didn't leave a deep impression on me. I guess I need to listen to it a few more times to see if it will grow on me.

Ryusei no Kizuna and SCANDAL off to a good start! / Autumn 08 dramas' debut episodes ranking

Source: Mainichi Shinbun

Ryusei no Kizuna made its debut on 17th Oct 08 with the highest first episode rating of 21.2% among fellow Autumn 08 drama competitors. Meanwhile, SCANDAL which started on 19 Oct also achieved a relatively high rating of 16.9%.

With all Autumn 08 dramas having shown their first episode, this is the ranking so far on the basis of the debut episode's ratings:

1) Ryusei no Kizuna 21.2%

2) Kaze no Garden 20.1%

3) Celeb to Binbou Tarou 17.6%

4) Innocent Love / SCANDAL 16.9%

6) Team Batista no Eikou 15.2%

7) Salaryman Kintarou 13.8%

8) Scrap Teacher 12.6%

9) Gira Gira 12.2%

10) Bloody Monday 11.4%

11) Room of King 10.4%

12) Shouni Kyumei 9.6%

13) Oh! My Girl! / OL Nippon 8.3%

15) Yume wo Kanaeru Zou 7.1%

Team Batista no Eikou (The Glory of Team Batista) - Autumn 2008

Title: Team Batista no Eikou (The Glory of Team Batista)
O.A. Start Date: 14 October 2008
Timeslot: Tuesdays 10pm
Broadcaster: FujiTV / KTV
Original Novel written by: Kaidou Takeru
Scriptwriter: Goto Noriko
Theme song: Mamoritai mono - Aoyama Thelma


Cast:

Taguchi Kouhei - Itou Atsushi
Shiratori Keisuke - Nakamura Tooru
Kiryuu Kouichi - Ihara Takeshi
Ootomo Naomi - Shaku Yumiko
Himuro Kanichiro - Shirota Yuu
Kakiya Yuuji - Tsurumi Shingo
Narumi Ryo - Miyakawa Daisuke
Haba Takayuki - Toda Masahiro
Sakai Toshiki - Suzuki Yuuki

Storyline:

In Toujo University's affiliated hospital, there is a team which specializes in Batista surgeries and boasts of a 100% success rate. However, the occurence of 3 consecutive deaths during the Batista surgeries raises the question whether the cause is a medical malpractice or intentional murder. In comes Taguchi Kouhei, an internal medicine doctor of the hospital and Shiratori Keisuke, an officer from the Ministry of Health who come together to investigate the suspicious deaths.

*Note that there was a movie version made before this drama version. The movie starred Takeuchi Yuko in Taguchi's role (the novel set this role as a guy) and Abe Hiroshi in Shiratori's role.
*The ending for the drama will be different from the novel and movie.