This is one of the latest dramas that was shown in Japan, having just ended it’s run on September 12, 2008. To me, it’s one of the best dramas I have watched recently. Recently meaning during the holidays, since this is the only drama I watched during the semester. It has a star studded cast, in my opinion, comprising of the follow actors / actresses:

Yamashita Tomohisa (Yamapi) – Wiki
Aragaki Yui (Gakki) – Wiki
Toda Erika – Wiki

Ok, perhaps it’s not really that star studded, but it’s quite good already. I’ve watched many of their shows. Maybe it’s not much, but if they star in a drama, I’ll probably watch it, sooner or later. I’ve watched Yamapi’s Kurosagi as Kurosaki, Proposal Daisakusen as Iwase Ken, Dragon Zakura as Yajima Yusuke, and Nobuta Wo Produce as Kusano Akira. I realized I didn’t blog about Kurosagi and Nobuta Wo Produce, but both are wonderful dramas in my opinion, especially since Maki’s acting in both.

I watched Aragaki in Dragon Zakura as Kosaka Yoshino (and she looks very different!), My Boss My Hero as Umemura Hikari, Papa to Musume no Nanokakan as Kawahara Koume and in a movie, Koizora (which I didn’t appreciate). Aragaki has grown up over the “years” and looks really different now compared to when she was younger. (Less baby fat?)

For Toda, I first watched her in Death Note (Movie) as Misa Misa, then Tsubasa no Oreta Tenshitachi 2 as Sakura. I also watched her in Liar Game as Kanzaki Nao.

Anyway, Code Blue is an exciting drama about four medical doctors who went to this emergency hospital as interns to train as flight doctors for “Doctor Heli”. Doctor Heli will receive emergency calls from fire engines or ambulances, and within 3 minutes the helicopter would be ready to take off with the 2 doctors and 1 flight nurse to go to the accident / emergency site to help the people in need. Most of the time, they have to do emergency actions, else the person will probably die.

At the start, Aragaki’s character Shiraishi was chosen to be the first intern to serve as one of the flight doctors, and she actually was quite nervous and blanked out upon seeing the victim. Their mentor, who’s the 2nd doctor, immediately took over. This shows how stressful it is, even for a doctor with numerous ER experience.

Yamapi’s character, Aizawa was chosen as the 2nd day flight intern doctor, and since he’s cool headed, he managed to go on site and immediately performed an amputation on the guy who’s hand is trapped in the machine. The rest of the interns would not be able to do it because they feel more for the patient, who’s a young adult. Aizawa is more focused and choose a treatment that’ll allow the person to live. If the amputation was not done, the person will die. When asked what he felt when he did the amputation, he said, “Heat. It’s hot inside”. As such, his character is actually quite “cold blooded”.

Toda’s first mission also ended up with her blanking out and Aizawa actually flew in via the 2nd round to replace her since there was 2 causalities so the senior doctor was busy.

The whole of Code Blue is a sequence of stories showing how the four doctor interns matured and changed, from being rivals to being good friends who’ll support each other. One particular character to note is the last flight doctor who was only allowed to become a flight doctor intern in the last episode after their mentor saw how he changed when reacting in an operation. This shows that if you put in the hardwork, eventually you’ll make it. And that people’s support to you is very important.

Aizawa also changed, after he amputated his mentor’s arm. He began to feel emotions and he wavers in his decision slightly, and becomes more “human”. One instance is when he decided to prioritise the mother in a difficult “birth”, but ended up suggesting an alternative way to save both mother and child. But the part where I could feel very strongly with him is the part where he says “I will save you and let you see your family again”. Don’t you feel that’s the way a professional is? If you are there and you can play a difference to someone’s life in such a way, even though you’re not a doctor, will you do something?

Shiraishi also learnt not to run away and be more courageous and became a more responsible flight doctor.

There are mini stories inside, like when a senior doctor was sued when her operation failed and killed a mother and child pair. Aizawa’s grandmother also appeared and suffered from dementia, during which it allowed us to see Aizawa’s human side when he teared and hugged his grandmother. Or how the proud mentor lost his arm but actually took it in his stride, not blaming Shiraishi (whom he suffered the injury to save her), or Aizawa (who amputated his arm), because if he didn’t live, he won’t be able to see his son for the first time. (He’s divorced because he spends too much time for his patients).

I felt that the whole doctor heli program (which is being implemented in Japan) is a good program, especially when you can make a difference to a person’s life and death. In Singapore it won’t be applicable I guess since our hospitals are not that far away. But I guess this drama has made me wonder what’s my mission in life. For doctors who became doctors because they want to make a difference in people’s lives, to save as many people as possible, I think they are great. But what’s in for me? Suddenly, there’s more things in life to live for.

I particularly like a sentence inside which goes like this: “A doctor can only lengthen the life of a patient by a bit, but whether its 1 second, 1 hour, 1 day, it’s worth it”. Link it to the mentor talking about seeing his son, and I just felt that it’s really true. There’s so many things in life worth living for.

I give this drama a 5/5 because I like it a lot.

If you want to watch this drama, go to MySoju.

For more information, visit the Wiki.

Well this is the first time I see the title with Japanese words and I understand most of it! Well Papa is a duh, that’s English. Musume is the daughter. ‘to’ is the word for and. no is like an ‘s. Nanokakan, as I see from the story, refers to 7 days. So it’s father and daughter’s seven days. Jia Hao wrote a review once before.

Basically, this story is about this Papa and the daughter (played by Aragaki) who’s not on speaking terms at all. Standard. Father has his own strict views, daughter feels differently, and they cannot really click.

The father feels quite sad actually, and wishes to be able to be closer to his daughter. He keeps rewatching home videos of his daughter telling him that she “dai-suki-desu”, which just means she likes her father very much. He is those kind of fathers who feels that having a relationship during school time is not good for a student. On the other hand, the daughter likes this senpai of hers and the senpai likes her too. Senpai = Senior.

During a trip to visit the grandmother (the wife’s mother) (whom they thought is going to die but didn’t) they had this accident while on the way home. They swopped bodies (think Fann Wong and Gurmit Singh). And I guess I kinda expected it when the daughter (in the father’s body) bathes the father (in the daughter’s body).

But this drama, which spans 7 episodes, take them on a journey where the father attends schools and flunks his tests because he didn’t prepare enough for it, and the daughter attends the work on her father’s behalf, and use her principles during a meeting and creating a lot of hoo haa.

However, in the end, they got to know each other better, especially when the father had to go on a date with the senpai on her behalf, and they always talk at night to find out what had happened to each other. The magical thing is that everything went well in the end, and because of what the daughter did in the office, the father decided to improve and managed to finish a project the daughter started off. He eventually earned a promotion to be the Chief of the Reform department and things go well for them. Their relationship also improved as both can understand each other’s position.

This story is definitely not equivalent to the Gurmit Singh and Fann Wong movie, and I think this drama is much much better. It made me laugh many times and I feel happy watching this drama. Recommended! After all, only 7 episodes, very fast can finish one.

This is seriously a good JDrama. I enjoyed all ten episodes very much and I must say I watched it within 3 days and now it has left a void inside me. This belongs to a comedy kind of drama and it’s based on school life, like Dragon Zakura, another great JDrama that I have watched during this three month university holiday.

So what’s this drama about? This drama is about this guy Makio who’s 27 going on to 28 in this year (2007). His father is the boss of a Yakuza, meaning gang. However, his father wanted to do his part as a father and hence forces Makio to go to school before he will consider him to be the next boss. Makio, whose wish is to become boss, had to agree.

The problem is that his dad got him into the high school through the back door and he has to hide his identity. No one must know he belongs to a Yakuza, so no violence blabla. In the end he gets bullied and has to hand over money occasionally to the class bully. He fails his exams, attends supplementary classes and ends up attending preparation courses for university entrance examinations, something he need not take since he is not going to university.

Through the 10 episodes he matured and learnt more things about love and friendship, and even fell in love with a 17 year old girl. (He hid his age and everyone thought he was 17). This story is pretty funny because he has to pretend to be a nice guy and not get violent. But actually he is a pretty nice guy to his classmates. He becomes the class leader and led the class in many activities.

This is a pretty good JDrama so watch it if you have time!

9 out of 10 stars.

Dragon Zakura, (Wiki), is a JDrama that talks about the education system in Japan. In a way, I find it refreshing and nice because I think it can be used to talk about education systems around the world.

In Dragon Zakura, there is a school where the average score is in the thirties, and students from that school end up with lousy futures because no university will take them in, nor any companies will hire them due to their lousy score. According to Sakuragi (the lawyer turned teacher for a year), they are baka students.

I guess I can relate to it because there are many elements that are prevalent in every society. For example, treating students from lousier schools as inferior. Just look at the Elite Schools vs Neighbourhood Schools problem in Singapore. It exists, and people have the annoying perception that people from lousier schools tend to be hooligans as compared to those from Elite Schools.

I love this drama series because I strongly believe that anyone who works hard can make it to any goal, it is just that the amount of effort is different. I believe that one should not look down on others simply by looking on school standards, and I like it when the twin from the lousier school made it into Tokyo University (Todai), but the other twin from the prestigious school, and always toted to be the brother that’s going to make it into Todai, didn’t.

This just shows that it’s about the effort, and if you look down on people, one day they may climb up to over your head and then it is too late to regret.

The aim of Sakuragi is to produce 5 students who will make it into Todai by one year. Yajima Yuusuke (Yamapi from Prodai) is the first guy he enlisted into the special class. Ogata Hideki, Kosaka Yoshino and Kobayashi Maki came after that. Mizuno Naomi (Nagasawa Masami from Prodai) was the “last” one, until in the middle of the series, Okuno Ichiro was enlisted. This is the twin that made it.

In the end, only 3 students ended up being eligible for Todai, and only 2 continued Todai studies. Yajima didn’t have the money to pay the university and hence is self studying to be a lawyer. The other three are “going to” work hard and enter Todai on their own. I guess in a way, it is a happy ending, but I feel sad because I thought there would be at least 5 of them who made it.

In a way I feel that it is particularly nice and heartwarming to see that people who put in effort will be able to find success. The drama also reinforces certain concepts in me, like no matter what we decide to do in life, we can make it magnificent. We do not let ourselves slump and slack and rot our life away. Hence I ask myself, what am I going to do with my life? What is my life for? I guess, I have to find out, I have to indulge myself in friendships, play a part in their lives, be there for them, and justify my own existence?

Dragon Zakura is a nice JDrama. Opps.