At last, I finally found a jdorama that I have no desire to continue past episode 1 and that is Scandal Senmon Bengoshi! With this recent rush of watchable shows, I find I am spending more time on Jdoramas than I want to so Scandal is a breath of stale air for me.
The beginning of the first episode has this one shot moving camera scene where are lawyers have infiltrated a party and each of them are causing enough ruckus so Takeuchi Yuko can approach a politician and blackmail him about his son's sexual harassment case.
The one shot camera is really trying to be cool and I can see that they've spent a crazy deal of time and effort on the shot but all I could think of during the scene was whether all this was necessary. Could they not have ambushed him somewhere and say the words musuko and sekuhara? This smells like like a jdorama trying way to hard to be cool.
Scandal is about a group of lawyers who are in crisis management. Problem is, the show in episode 1 did not show us why they had to be lawyers in the first place and instead of crisis management, Scandal is more about uncovering the truth behind the crisis instead of taking measures to avert it.
Episode 1 was about a threat to an idoru's life and the studio did not hire a specialist security group and instead went for a bunch of lawyers. I don't recall seeing them giving legal advice or going to court. I just completely do not understand the concept of the show just because of the name of the show.
I would have kept watching if it were called Scandal Crisis Management and had no mention of them being lawyers.
The humour wasn't funny and Scandal hasn't given me any reason to care about the characters unlike say The Good Wife. There's a cliffhanger at the end of episode 1 but I don't care. I like Takeuchi Yuko and Mizukawa Asami but the writing for Scandal Senmon Bengoshi is very bad. Avoid.
I feel almost the same as you about this drama. Are you watching Zettai Seigi, starring Yamaguchi Sayaka (I remember you used to praise her acting)? I like the black comedy in the latter.
ReplyDeleteI saw one episode (ep 3) and did not feel I needed to watch the rest. Takeuchi Yuko seemed to be overacting and the story was a bit silly, so it was a pass.
ReplyDeleteIf you're looking for another Winter 2019 show that won't temp you beyond episode 1, I suggest giving Innocence a try.
ReplyDeleteI say this, but I'm six episodes in and still watching that awkward mess.
I have watched 3 episodes and I quite like the individual stories, the "cases" themselves. But as you said, It tries too hard to be cool. Instead of fleshing out the characters or developing the narrative, they waste time trying to copy American/Korean TV shows and be cool. Also, I think they should have spent at least 2-3 episodes in one case. I feel the cases had potential.
ReplyDeleteSeriously, it's disappointing to see good concepts relegated to mediocrity due to poor execution.
Same here. Couldn't get past ep 1. It's a waste of Takeuchi Yuko.
ReplyDeleteI started Tokusatsu GaGaGa lately, which is light stuff and quite funny.