Anata no Ban Desu Counterattack Episode 12

Anata no Ban Desu started off as an interesting who dunnit mystery but now its just bloody dragging on and on and on. It feels like a show that was so successful that NTV is squeezing as much as they can but not giving the viewers enough breadcrumbs.

Instead we just get more specials about the weird people in the mansion. The best who dunnit thrillers are tight and exciting not the ones with padding. I thought the story was coming to an end cause everyone kept dying and they are introducing even more characters? I've lost any will to go on and don't care about revenge or if everyone dies. Meh.

Mirror Twins Seasons 1+2

Mirror Twins is Fuji TV/WOWOW joint production with 8 episodes for season one shown on Fuji TV and 4 episodes shown on WOWOW.

Mirror Twins is a cross between The Fugitive and Byakuyako about two twin brothers, one of whom was kidnapped as a child. The other brother ends up being a police officer while the other is on a plan of revenge.

The Johnny actor who plays both brothers does a decent job at the role. It helps that you can easily tell the brothers apart because the cop is rigid and well dressed and the other is scruffy, has lots of make up under the eyes and loves hoodies.

What truly helps Mirror Twins is that Johnny guy is surrounded by a lot of my favourites including Kurashina Kana, Ishiguro Ken, Takahashi Katsunori and Takeda Rina. How long has it been since I saw Takeda Rina in High Kick Girl? I'm glad that she's still around.

As an action/mystery jdorama, Mirror Twins is pretty exciting. Sometimes people are a bit too incompetent and certain things happen because they have to but the twists and turns really kept me on my toes until the end of season 1 and the pacing is good. I watch the two series in 3 days because I could not wait to see what happened next.

Season 2 is very meh. They turned an accident in season 1 into a murder but it just didn't make sense to me and I was thanking the jdorama gods that it was only 4 episodes. Nevertheless, I was invested enough in the fate of the characters to see the show to its end.

A shame Mirror Twins isn't being subbed as far as I know but I am so happy that Henrietta_R_Hippo uploaded the torrents on nyaa with Japanese subs.

Edit: Mirror Twins is being subbed by fanofta here.

On the whole, I saw Mirror Twins is a surprisingly watchable detective series with a meh second season. Flawed but pretty well done.

Kioku / Memory Episodes 6-8

My biggest concern with Kioku was that there would not be enough side stories to pad up the 12 episodes but luckily the side stories have become interesting from the clown incident to Honjo's dad to Honjo's deceased child.

The only one character who doesn't feel as developed would be Honjo's wife played by Yuka. She's no more than the perfect wife but I feel so much more of their relationship could have been explored and their chemistry is kind of not there.

 The paralegal and assistant are my favourite couple of the series and its just fun to watch them together.

Four more episodes to go and things are heating up with everyone finding out about Honjo's alzheimer and Honjo getting closer to the truth which will probably turn his world upside down.

After 8 episodes, Kioku is turning out to be a very watchable show about treasuring what you have that doesn't get too preachy.

I wholeheatedly recommend Kioku but you need the raws from avistaz.

Impossibility Defence jmovie review

Casting can often times make or break a movie and Japan is not known for casting the best person for a role instead of the most famous face. Impossibility Defence is about a devilish character who has the ability to kill people with the power of suggestion hence Impossibility Defence because you can't charge someone for a murder when you can't prove that they were responsible for it.

This devil character grants the wishes of people who wants someone dead with the requirement that their desire for murder is 'pure'. Impossibility Defence is your typical morality tale where after someone's wish is granted, they found out that there are actually grave consequences or that they don't actually want that person dead.

In this story of the devil granting the wishes of foolish humans is the trying to be hardboiled detective played by Sawajiri Erika. Yes, the Sawajiri of 1 litre of Tears and countless beauty saloon ads.

If the only way to get the money to make this movie was casting her, then I would have said there are plenty of actresses who can do a much better job because it is just so freaking wrong. No amount of posturing and and cigarette smoking and turn Sawajiri into this hardboiled detective who struggles between doing the right thing and doing the right thing.

The movie does not fall apart behind Sawajiri's casting but there's this nagging feeling that a stronger lead to face the devil would have worked better. The stories are interesting but the movie just feels like a setup episode to a long running series. Meh.

I think I got the raws from j-raws long time ago which has since shut down. Anyone know any other website for getting smaller size raws?

Perfect World Episodes 9+10

Perfect World is what I would call stock standard boy meets girl with a disability angle thrown in jdorama.

Plenty of relationship triangles and unrequited love and all the supporting characters are super nice and get a consolation prize in the end.

While I might have been a bit harsh in my review of the first 8 episodes, there's nothing much wrong with the show except maybe the chemistry between the two leads is not that good.

There are not many boy meets girl jdorama that I can watch all the way until the end.

If you want a just watchable and predictable renai jdorama that doesn't do anything wrong but doesn't excel much, Perfect World might be for you.

Have to mention I like the ending song Machigai Sagashi and I'm not sure whether I want to give the movie a try because the story would definitely be leaner.

Survival Family jmovie review

Survival family is an interesting movie about what happens when every electrical good and machine in Tokyo stops working through the eyes of this 4 person family.

Kohinata Fumiyo aka Kita Yoshio is the father who loves to blame everyone else and Fukatsu Eri is the mom who keeps the family together.

Having watched so many zombie movies, Survival Family feels like a zombie movie without the zombies.

Survival Family asks the question of how do we as human beings survive when we can no longer get water from our pipes and food from the konbinis and I had an enjoyable time thinking what I would do in their situation.

Survival Family is more of a family movie so it does not have the gore and violence of similar themed movies which usually are concerned with showing how low humans can go.

Survival Family is more concerned about with showing this family learning to cope with things that we take for granted.

I have no complaints about Survival Family. It was a breezy watch and I liked all the characters and the beautiful Japanese countryside.

Survival Family is a very watchable family movie that is available at avistaz with English subs.