Zíza

What can I tell you, I got incredibly hooked during the first episode; it's just great! The plot, the excellent acting – Suda Masaki excels, not to mention the whole class of students, where no one is dead weight, everyone has a say, no one is ignored, as is usually the case with high school series where we get to know like three or four people from the class and that's it. Everyone has a role, motivation, gifts, and weaknesses. Apart from the students, the series also familiarizes the viewer with the police officers and other characters more than adequately. I'm not saying it’s a deep introduction, but each character gets just enough space for us, the audience, to understand their motivation for the actions they take. Mutō Shōgo really exceeded my expectations because he hasn't really written anything complex, basically it's a theme that quite a few series or movies are turning to these days, yet he puts a hilarious spin on it and the whole time drops hints, clues as to what's really going on and what it will all turn into. Certainly don't expect a whopping climax where the head of the American criminal organization is revealed... not at all, it's much more down to earth and human. And yet it actually manages to be that much more impactful. Basically, Mutō is speaking to us through Hiiragi in the last episode, when he says he hopes it will resonate with someone, at least one other person. He himself doesn't believe it will appeal to everyone, but he does believe it will at least reach someone. And I can easily say that this show got me. Not so much in its message, but in the way it's crafted, the soundtrack, and most importantly, the performances. You want an unusual high school drama? Go for it, because here a new generation of actors is being taught by a contemporary star and he does it brilliantly. I enjoyed it and I was looking forward to the next episode every week, to the twists and the suspense. For the first time in a long time, a series that entertained me from beginning to end; I liked how it was done and I want to watch it again right away. My number one for 2019.

Lyrical. Fantastical. A detective story. It's all intertwined and tied together very nicely by the soundtrack. I think it reflects the Japanese mindset in an interesting way, or rather how they are, what they believe in. Jun, Shiro, and the smoking detective were all well acted. The bonding, the slow unraveling of a past that to a certain extent is still very hard to understand, all of it made for a very interesting cinematic experience. Don't expect a frantic pace, don't expect bloody fights, don't expect a "fluid" story. This film is about the image, it's about what can't be conveyed through peppery dialogue. Watch and listen, but above all keep your expectations low.

Tedious. I watched it in three days, but that was only because I wanted to get the "burden" off my shoulders. Who wouldn't care if she died or not? But that's true of her entire storyline. I was more interested in the other one's storyline, the one who did the lending. And she also appealed to the Angel of Death, the Scheduler, who cried pretty hard in the end. I confess I shed a tear at the last episode too, not so much for the comatose one, but for the other one and what she found in the backpack. Well. You'll see if you watch. Otherwise, nothing. I didn't connect with them. I didn't sympathize. I didn't care for the OST either. But it left me feeling disillusioned – first, the ending sucked, and second it made me think about my own life. Yikes. A better 2 stars.

Yamada Yuki is just not suited to romantic comedy with his voice, looks, or facial expressions. He's a great comedian, he can handle dramatic characters too, bad guys even better, but the main character in a romcom... no, he just didn't fit. Nagasawa Masami, on the other hand, is the type who can act in them just fine, and she wasn't bad here either, though I've seen her do better. Director and writer Fukuda Yuichi, who has a plethora of comedies and parodies to his credit, took a stab at romance and I don't think it suited him. It seemed so bland to me, always just biting off something but not quite finishing it. Sure, it is based on the American original and leaves out the most vulgar jokes, though that's the film's strength and weakness. What it fails to translate, though, is the chemistry between the main characters; I really missed that here. I couldn't understand at all why the two fell in love. Not great.

The beginning held my attention... for about ten minutes. Then came – apologies to anyone who might be bothered or offended, but I really can't call it anything else – blatant American kitsch. And it didn't hold my attention, or even seem to deserve it. Maybe Shane Acker should have stuck with his 11-minute short from 2005, because he didn't give the world anything new by multiplying the time of the short by seven. Yes, the grim depiction of a post-apocalyptic world was very successful, perhaps I could call it the animated face of Orwell's 1984, but that's just a maybe and a happy accident. Someone wrote here about the gripping action, which I certainly didn't find gripping, rather it made me worry about whether I needed to paint my nails, which I also managed to do, and that just doesn't happen with good fantasy... It would have been a good movie if it could have held my attention. And it doesn’t help that it had been one of my most anticipated films of 2009.

By now I'm worried about my mental health – how on earth did I devote 16 hours of my life to this? Cringey, awkward, boring, a bad story, and even the actors can't save it because they have nothing to play. I think this is a strong contender for the worst Korean series I've ever seen. I also think it's going to take a lot of time to find a rival on the same level. If ever.

Okay, a full round of applause. MatsuJun finally got a role where he proved he can act. I have at last watched a series since Boys Over Flowers where he had a lead role and had fun. I had been starting to think he had bad luck with his choices, but this was good. He shined, but the other main characters played by Eikura and Kagawa were great as well. I devoured it in one sitting and didn't think for a moment that I’d had enough. The episodes managed to keep me on my toes, and even though I pretty much always knew who the culprit was, I was just waiting to see how they would convict him. The plots are simple, the themes have been seen a thousand times, the crimes retold a thousand times; it's just that this bunch of lawyers gives it a whole different dimension. Lots of clichés, but it doesn't matter because they either managed to pull it off brilliantly or just used it appropriately (because who says clichés are bad? it's just the inappropriately used ones). For example, the two lead lawyers meet before they start working together when one of them destroys the other's cell phone by running over it. But it's used well in the end, and you're just watching the concert of these two personalities, these two guys, that it rests on and certainly doesn't fall. It's funny, quite brisk, you're not expecting moral speeches in every episode. Jun is a likable guy, Eikura is a hottie, Kagawa is a seasoned badass. It was just good, a lot. It was fun, a lot. Kind of overdone Japanese, but I had fun. Awesome. A strong 4 stars.

It's a very enjoyably international film, but unfortunately it's torn between being a crime drama or a dark period drama, and maybe that works somewhere, but it didn't quite work for me here. The acting wasn't great, but the worst was the dark shaky camerawork where you couldn't really see what was going on during the scenes with more action. Too long, indecisive, with good and bad scenes. An average 55%.

So it’s like this – I watched it at school with my class. I was hearing from all directions: "That's disgusting!", "That's a terrible movie.", "I'm going to kill that Oskar!", "This movie has only one negative character and that's Oskar.", etc... so I guess I can't even make up my own mind anymore, or rather – I do, but I'm out of words to express it. I understand what it was about, I know when it was written and for what purpose. Period. The end. Plus, David Bennent was really excellent! He really played it to the hilt, after all, 90% of my class started hating him, and when so many people in my class agree on something... well, that's saying something! :-D

At the very least, you learn a few things here about how it is in Japan with preschool education. In my opinion, the cast was chosen very well, it was interesting to watch them play together as I know them from other series/movies where they played quite different characters (well, except for Tomosaka Rie, I've seen her in a similar role before). But it was a bit too whiny for my taste, and some episodes had too many scenes that bored and I didn't want to watch them. On the other hand, there were moments that I truly enjoyed. The series has a way of cracking you up as well as moving you – and it's nothing violent. In fact, it's a family affair, where you gather around the table and eat dinner while watching the fortunes of Avarenbow Mama unfold. A better 3 stars.