There have been a spate of old doramas getting subbed and one of them is Mama wa idol starring Nakayama Miho as the herself as she gets married to her old primary school school teacher who has three kids.(Suzuki sensei, take note) Normally I pretty much hate jdoramas as idol vehicles. That's why most of the big name ones are crap. Stunt casting and fitting the story around the idols they want to promote. But Nakayama has credibility in my book with Oishii Kankei, Sleeping Forest, Home & Away, Love Story and Love Letter.
Maybe I'm biased towards old jdoramas. Maybe its just the case that only the best of the old jdoramas get subbed so my perception of the standard of oldies is skewed. Surely the ratio of good and bad doramas can't that much different between the 80s and this 2k10 era. One the other hand, my favourite shows from the past few years have mostly been the not so famous ones.
Anyways, Mama wa idol is an idol vehicle but it is a fun one. The youngest one is stoked because he is a huge fan. The oldest son is, well which guy wouldn't be happy living with Nakayama Miho. The only daughter, Akira though objects vehemently. Its not clearly stated what her reasons are but its obvious that she has taken over her mother's role since her death and does not appreciate a stranger walking into the family and trying to take away her role, much less an idol.
One interesting observation is a storyline where the father, a primary teacher is mistaken for a lolicon when Nakayama Miho's collection of underwear drop from a box. The whole lolicon thing is used as a joke when in a lot of countries, The father would have been branded for life and kids would have looked at him in fear. Also interesting to note that the housekey was placed under a flower pot. Not exactly in plain sight but not exactly as safe as well.
Its only been two episodes so far but I've enjoyed them very much. Too early to judge whether it is a must watch show but I am glad that this is not another in-law jdorama. I'm happy to watch to watch cute daughter fights hot mom with generic dad in middle. Not much chemistry between Miho and the dad but we'll see when the story gets to revealing details of their relationship. The raws can be gotten from rare doramas, an awesome site with lots of golden oldies.
addendum: Just noticed rare doramas has dvdrips of Love Complex. Now that was a good dorama with a weird ending.
oh! another old dorama. i remember an episode on shinya shokudo when there was a director of a shoot getting pissed on casting idols. that was just a slap on what's going on. and the idols are invading nhk doramas as well. haha..
ReplyDeletei also added oyaji on my watchlist as well. the young miki mizuno is just difficult to ignore.
the last dorama i saw Nagasaku Hiromi was 2010 M Onna with miho kanno. so i cant tell ya if shes hot because shes preggy on that one.
newshfan last money subs - http://newshfan.dreamwidth.org/12161.html
i dont know why newshfan removed it. hopefully im not incriminated from sharing this one by newshfan
i just want to add my observations of Mama Wa Idol
ReplyDelete1.the big TBS presents sign is worthless
2. Miporin resembles Ueno Juri and i sometimes thought it's Ueno herself.
3. the acting seems less natural compared to kita no kuni's acting.
overall it's fun. but i still have to watch episode 2
Oyaji is must watch.
ReplyDeleteI managed to find the whole series of last money hardsubbed. The links were from a livejournal page.
Yes, Mama wa idol is typical comedy overacting but no one is a deer staring at headlights. cough * Horikita Maki* cough.
I really liked this one and I'm glad it's been subbed (too bad I've already seen it)). Light and funny comedy with Nakayama Miho, what's more to wish for? But this show introduced to me another great actress - Goto Kumiko (Akira). Now she is a wife of Jean Alessi, F-1 racer. I've been trying to find her other shows, but to no avail((
ReplyDeleteI agree, that if the drama is old, that doesn't necessary mean it's better than newer ones. There were lots of crappy shows at that time too, it's just very few survived till today (much less been subbed). The only thing that is sure different - the atmosphere of dramas and themes. Feeling of 70s, 80s, 90s... That is precious and couldn't be duplicated. That's best seen in Kuramoto Sou dramas such as Zenryaku Ofukurou-sama/Haikei Chichiue-sama and Kita no Kuni kara/Yasashii Jikan - even though the themes are similar, newer dramas lose in atmosphere of old times completely.