that was a blast! i love this morita. hubby thinks this morita was even better than the anime, who in his opinion was rather bland. i told hubby that's blasphemy, nothing beats the original anime. but this morita (eddie peng) has such animated expressions-- i'm looking forward to his gian recital, expecting that to be the highlight of the series this time around. ah, to see him in such gaudies... not that he's not plenty flamboyant as is. i loved seeing him flip through the book of birds and seizing on just the right haircut for takemoto.

hagu... uh... the voice... ouch. still, she did a reasonable hamu imitation while slurping down food. and those things they put in her hair to simulate the hamster ears... i... *look down* kinda like them...

bonus points: hubby's joy when he understands a bit here and there, recognizes the characters and explains to me that grown ups call their fathers 'ba' not 'baba'.

but... i was hopeful through the first 2 episodes of the j-drama, too. certainly i have gripes as well, but since this is a sunny post, i'll leave those for later.

damn. i _am_ loyal to the honey and clover franchise--i'd rather watch the 4th iteration of honey & clover (in a language i don't understand and was grateful to find easy on the ears) than episode... is it 8 or 9? of zettai kareshi, fully translated. as for osen, i'll be thrilled if someone subs up to ep. 6.

spoilerific since i've forgotten how to use lj cuts






AWESOME THINGS
shizu and osen--so like mother and daughter. i could feel the love. really excellent chemistry.

osen--at the beginning, when shizu is talking her into going on the miai, enjoying the life of a normal 23 year old. 'tatoeba, hamburger...' and when she got home from the miai, and says tanoshikatta! when she battled through her hurt feelings while pounding out hamburgers. plus the smile when she's talking w/ uchi/yocchan on the bridge (after sendo rushed to the western-style restaurant to say he had to cancel because of work)... that smile there is worth 50 thousand screencaps.

osamu mukai (tome) and his comical moaning. i concede the man has talent. honey and clover was an aberration due to woeful script and direction.

uchi was good, though he's still over the top now and then i think he's done a great job as one of the anchors of this series.




LESS AWESOME THINGS
not understanding what sendo said in the key scene at the end. if he was leaving japan, why would he go looking for a wife _now_, why employ the miai baba now? was he planning to take his new wife along like a light novel bought at the airport gift shop?

next epis. preview didn't look that intriguing, but as long as it's still osen with aoi yuu i'll surely be watching.

so i downloaded rainbow song simply because aoi yuu is in it. and i cried, then had to play the Dutoit version of The Planets really loud--Jupiter, of course. must reclaim it from this sappy movie. which was actually good, thank goodness, since aoi chan was in it for all of 20 seconds.

juri ueno, huh? all i know is she looks hot in those last friends cap w/ the short hair (thanks for confronting stereotypes of dykes). i don't think i'll watch her in nodame--the hair is unbecoming. besides, not even ayako (seiyuu for lafiel in crest of the stars) could make me endure the anime version, so forget the live action. and last friends sounds like it has some overacting from masami n., so i'll pass. better to look at pictures and imagine the rest.

the actor who played kishida would've made a good takemoto. why doesn't any casting director realize this? sakurai sho was a terrible miscast. ikuta toma was a miscast too but he's so good that i could bear his turning takemoto into a perv who would chant 'nudo, nudo'...

still, the part of the movie where kishida almost lets the psycho woman marry him dragged for too long--a little judicious editing would have done. same with the end. aoi-chan did a good job, and was adorable in the goldfish scene. she was a bit of a wise yoda here and was convincing in her role.

thanks to aoi-chan i discovered osen, and now rainbow song. after the honey and clover j-drama i sort of lost faith in live action, so this is rather welcome.

another 5 minutes of cool down, and i'll put on osen to chase away the down.

of course there's got to be a miai episode--after all, that's tradition. maybe osen's mother set it up to kick start yocchan's ambition. don't think she's expecting much from tome (though i'm starting to like tome more and more). maybe tome and yocchan will have to cooperate in this episode.

heck, a week away still, and already i'm expecting too much from this episode :D

episode 5... i have mixed feelings about it. i couldn't say really whether that fierce, powerful voice felt like it was truly hers--like it was fully believable. will have to watch it again. but i did feel how fiercely osen would fight to protect what's precious to her. the little tigress of episode 5... who was skipping like a school girl in episode 4...

i adore osen and aoi yu.

osen 3 made me cry. ETA did an outstanding job translating this episode. when i first saw this in the raw, i just thought it was a dull episode that would lose all the momentum episode 2 built, but today i found it moving and nostalgic. i was even willing to forgive the extremely unflattering hairdo they chose for osen during the 'show ryu-san the flavors of today's ishouan' segment.

wow. been a while since a tv story moved me.

i thought ep. 2 was fun, super cute. i thought ep 4 was truly excellent--what a cutie, she even had a cute skip, could convey emotions without over-acting, and there were smooth transitions between the cute and the serious portions of the show. i love the scene where she is taking the ribbon out of her hair, inwardly reproaching herself for acting like a giddy school girl when she had the grown-up task of ensuring isshouan's survival right in front of her...

i sound like a sap. but it's nice to be pleasantly surprised.

still, ep. 2 and ep. 4 had much better hair styling (let's not forget what's important here). even counting the part of ep. 4 where she had the towel over her head and was watering the vegetables, the adorable 'ii desu kedo' moment...

so thankful i found this series.

good translation makes me adore this episode even more. and such a fun, uplifting feeling. i will be watching this again and again. already paid tribute to ETA :) for the awesome work, to our hour for the caps and raws.

on memento garten made a remark about the US version of honey and clover. joke or not, i started thinking of a name for takemoto. how does brad smith sound? should they cast one of the guys from gossip girls as takemoto? :p

hard ep. to understand without subtitles. makes me appreciate people who upload raws, and especially people who do the hard work of subtitling episodes even more. also, a higher ratio of drama to comedy, which isn't a bad thing necessarily, just not what i was hoping to see.

to get my fill of comedy i re-watched ep 1 and 2. grinned like an idiot. ;) thank you.

ah! that reminds me--gotta go say thank you to ETA. nice subs that made me appreciate the ep. more, tho on first glance i didn't think there was much depth to this show. can't wait for ep 2 to be subbed, or raw of 3.

what can i say? good escape from the drudgery of RL. music that's entrenched itself in my consciousness :p

can't get the BGM for osen out of my brain. and i keep referring to 'osen' as 'onsen.' the show, not the cutie :p

found a blog for someone who enjoyed the h&c drama, at least the early episodes. here.
http://astronerdboy.blogspot.com/search/label/Honey%20and%20Clover

he made some good points.

something smells yummy.

must play some spitz lest the osen sprain my brain...