Winter 2010 Dramas

Code Blue ~ Doctor Heli Kinkyukyumei Season 2
Date: From 9.00 p.m., Mondays, 11 January 2010
Station: Fuji TV
Cast: Yamashita Tomohisa, Aragaki Yui, Toda Erika, Asari Yosuke, Higa Manami, Shiina Kippei, Lily Franky, Katsushima Masanobu, Terashima Susumu, Sugimoto Tetta, Kodama Kiyoshi
Synopsis: –
Website: wwwz.fujitv.co.jp/codeblue

Hanchou ~ Jinnansho Azumihan Season 2
Date: From 8.00 p.m., Mondays, 11 January 2010
Station: TBS
Cast: Sasaki Kuranosuke, Nakamura Shunsuke, Tsukaji Muga, Kurotani Tomoka, Kashu Toshiki, Yamaguchi Shogo, Yasu Megumi, Hosokawa Shigeki, Tayama Ryosei, Natori Yuko
Synopsis: Young, individualistic urban detectives led by Assistant Inspector Azumi Tsuyoshi, have neither special abilities nor the backing of influential figures, but they solve each case through their persistent efforts.
Website: www.tbs.co.jp/hancho
Related: Hanchou ~ Jinnansho Azumihan

Nakanai to Kimeta Hi
Date: From 9.00 p.m., Tuesdays, 26 January 2010
Station: Fuji TV
Cast: Eikura Nana, Fujiki Naohito, Kaname Jun, Anne, Danta Yasunori, Kimura Yoshino
Synopsis: Kakuda Miki (Eikura Nana), 22, graduates from a second-rate university and is fortunate to join a topnotch trading conglomerate as an office lady. Her heart flutters everyday at the prospect of working at her dream company but it is a closed world over there. A small photocopying mix-up causes her to become the target of bullying by her stressed boss and senior colleagues and she is driven both physically and emotionally to the edge. She is ignored, harassed at work and a fictitious blog is set up to bully her in the virtual world in a series of horrifying actions.
Website: www.fujitv.co.jp/nakanai

Massugu na Otoko
Date: From 10.00 p.m., Tuesdays, 12 January 2010
Station: Fuji TV
Cast: Sato Ryuta, Fukada Kyoko, Kanjiya Shihori, Endo Yuya, Sasaki Nozomi, Uno Misako, Ukaji Takashi, Takizawa Saori, Sakura, Miura Rieko, Watabe Atsuro
Synopsis: Matsushima Kenichiro (Sato Ryuta) is an employee at a medium-sized building firm and works in design. He is basically a straight guy because he hates dishonesty. However, he is inept when it comes to love. Kenichiro’s destiny changes after he meets Kurita Narumi (Fukada Kyoko), an audacious, self-centred impish female. He becomes serious about leading her back to the right path, which she finds interesting. While getting pushed around by Narumi, who is the exact opposite of him, Kenichiro learns about her way of doing things and way of life. He is stimulated by her and gradually becomes attracted to her … Before long, he starts to search for a new self and at the things he had believed were correct, maturing into a more upright man.
Website: ktv.jp/man

Akakabu Kenji Kyoto-hen
Date: From 9.00 p.m., Wednesdays, 13 January 2010
Station: TBS
Cast: Nakamura Baijaku, Kikukawa Rei, Hara Sachie, Asagi Kuniko, Nakanishi Ryota, Kawamata Shinobu, Abe Shinnosuke, Yasui Kenichiro, Ono Takehiko, Kotegawa Yuko
Synopsis: Hiiragi Shigeru (Nakamura Baijaku) is not an elite who passed the bar exam but a public prosecutor’s assistant officer who worked his way up to be a public prosecutor. He is certainly not the aggressive sort and speaks in Nagoya dialect. He defeats sly, elite lawyers in courtroom showdowns through his decades of experience and legal knowledge. A lover of red turnips, his nickname “Akakabu Kenji” came about when he was the head of the Takayama District Public Prosecutors’ Office in Gifu. During one episode, he bought his favourite red turnips first thing in the morning, brought them to the courtroom and scattered them on the floor out of a whim, earning the laughter of the judges.
Website: www.tbs.co.jp/akakabukenji

Magerarenai Onna
Date: From 10.00 p.m., Wednesdays, 13 January 2010
Station: NTV
Cast: Kanno Miho, Tsukamoto Takashi, Tanihara Shosuke, Nagasaku Hiromi
Synopsis: Ogiwara Saki (Kanno Miho), 33, is a woman who does not go with the flow of society but forges her own path. She hates flattering men and trying to be nice to people of the same sex. She has failed the bar exam ten times in a row but persists in her dream of being a lawyer while working as a clerk at a law firm. Saki’s good friend, Osabe Riko (Nagasaku Hiromi), who is a mother of two children, was high school classmates with Saki, but is in fact 35, because she had deliberately declared herself to be two years younger. She has no qualms of lying for the sake of female happiness, pretending to be married to a man of wealth and blessed with children. Because her personality is the exact opposite, this accentuates Saki’s uncompromising way of life.
Website: www.ntv.co.jp/mage

853 ~ Keiji Kamo Shinnosuke
Date: From 8.00 p.m., Thursdays, 14 January 2010
Station: TV Asahi
Cast: Terawaki Yasufumi, Tomita Yasuko, Sugawara Daikichi, Totsugi Shigeyuki, Hayashi Tsuyoshi, Shintani Mayumi, Ogawa Nana, Tanabe Seiichi, Kaneda Akio
Synopsis: –
Website: www.tv-asahi.co.jp/853

Angel Bank ~ Tenshoku Dairinin
Date: From 9.00 p.m., Thursdays, 14 January 2010
Station: TV Asahi
Cast: Hasegawa Kyoko, Wentz Eiji, Namase Katsuhisa
Synopsis: Ino Mamako (Hasegawa Kyoko) has been working as an English teacher in a high school for nine years. Wanting to “reset her life”, she decides to change jobs despite the severe employment situation. However, Mamako meets with the charismatic career-change representative, Ebisawa Kosei (Namase Katsuhisa), by coincidence and finds herself attracted to his service-mindedness and inability to refuse when asked. She is hired on probation as a career-change agent but at this new workplace, she faces clients with all kinds of problems and circumstances, as well as the reasons and real intentions of the employers who look to these career-change applicants to get over the economic downturn.
Website: www.tv-asahi.co.jp/angelbank

Kinoshita Buchou to Boku
Date: From 11.58 p.m., Thursdays, 14 January 2010
Station: NTV
Cast: Itao Itsuji, Tanaka Naoki, Toyama Kyoko, Yamada Maiko, Takuma Shin, Ikeda Kazuma
Synopsis: Kinoshita (Itao Itsuji) works as a department manager at a major advertising agency. However, he is an irresponsible man who lives according to his moods, comes late and leaves early, and also nods off at work. He has no ambition and is unreliable but resolves difficult tasks after another when the elite Kimijima (Takuma Shin) challenges him with sudden ideas.
Website: www.ytv.co.jp/kinoboku

Shukumei 1969 – 2010
Date: From 9.00 p.m., Fridays, 15 January 2010
Station: TV Asahi
Cast: Kitamura Kazuki, Koike Eiko, Uehara Misa, Hosokawa Yoshihiko, Fujii Mina, Matsuzaka Keiko (guest star), Maya Kyoko, Tanaka Ken, Okuda Eiji
Synopsis: Blessed with looks, intellect and wealth, Arikawa Takashi (Kitamura Kazuki) is a man who aims to reach the pinnacle of power. Raised as the son of a distinguished family, that has hospitals across the country, Arikawa, who works as a bureaucrat at the Ministry of Finance, has an established reputation of an elite government official. He gets engaged to Shirai Naoko (Uehara Misa), the daughter of an important Diet member who seeks a “political marriage” for money when her father’s financial base is weakened. Naoko’s appearance puts an end to the dreams of marriage of Sasayama Nobuko (Koike Eiko), a successful currency dealer, who has had a romantic relationship with Arikawa for 10 years.
Website: syukumei1969-2010.asahi.co.jp

Yamato Nadeshiko Shichihenge
Date: From 10.00 p.m., Fridays, 15 January 2010
Station: TBS
Cast: Kamenashi Kazuya, Omasa Aya, Tegoshi Yuya, Uchi Hiroki, Miyao Shintaro
Synopsis: Takano Kyohei (Kamenashi Kazuya), is a handsome but bad-tempered university student who is always ready for a fight. Kyohei; Toyama Yujinojo (Tegoshi Yuya), who possesses a cuteness that can be mistaken for a girl; the cool-headed Oda Takenaga (Uchi Hiroki), who excels in academics and sports; and the princely Morii Ranmaru (Miyao Shintaro) who loves females, accept a proposal from the female owner of the house where they are lodging at for “free lodging if they are able to transform her niece into a proper lady”. Her niece, Nakahara Sunako (Omasa Aya), lives in a gloomy and solitary world because of an inferior complex about her looks.
Website: www.tbs.co.jp/yamanade2010

Salaryman Kintaro Season 2
Date: From 11.00 p.m., Fridays, 8 January 2010
Station: TV Asahi
Cast: Nagai Masaru, Inoue Waka, Aoyama Noriko, Hosokawa Shigeki, Furuya Ikkou, Utsui Ken
Synopsis: –
Website: www.tv-asahi.co.jp/kintaro

Bloody Monday Season 2
Date: From 8.00 p.m., Saturdays, 23 January 2010
Station: TBS
Cast: Haruma Miura, Sato Takeru, Kichise Michiko, Matsushige Yutaka, Ashina Sei, Kawashima Umika, Fujii Mina, Narimiya Hiroki, Ryu Raita, Nakahara Takeo, Kurokawa Tomoka, Takashima Masahiro, Yoshizawa Hisashi
Synopsis: Two years after the ‘Bloody Monday’ terror attack, another phone call shakes Japan. “Tomorrow night at 8.00 p.m., Tokyo will be nuked!” The caller is Orihara Maya (Kichise Michiko), the terrorist from two years ago, and the person at the other end of the line is the present Prime Minister, Kujo Akihiko (Ryu Raita). The Prime Minister hurriedly calls together the members of Third Eye but it is the new member, Hagiwara Taro (Takashima Masahiro), and not Kirishima Goro (Yoshizawa Hisashi) who spearheads the unit. Meanwhile, Takagi Fujimaru (Haruma Miura), who failed his entrance exam, has not been able to recover from the shock of losing so many friends in the terror attack two years ago and lives in solitude. Then a mysterious exchange student, Mizusawa Hibiki (Kurokawa Tomoka) appears at the place where he is working part-time. Fujimaru is unaware that that is the prelude to his involvement in the attack but he flees with Hibiki when a female assassin identifying herself as ‘Orihara Maya’ attacks his workplace, and gets stuck with Hibiki.
Website: www.tbs.co.jp/program/bloody-monday_season2
Related: Bloody Monday

Hidarime Tantei EYE
Date: From 9.00 p.m., Saturdays, 23 January 2010
Station: NTV
Cast: Yamada Ryosuke, Yokoyama Yu, Ishihara Satomi, Okada Yoshinori, Katahira Nagisa
Synopsis: Tanaka Ainosuke (Yamada Ryosuke), a third-year junior high school student with a strong sense of justice, underwent a cornea transplant of the left eye. However, after that, he received news that his older brother, Yumehito (Yokoyama Yu), the donor of that cornea, had died in an accident. Furthermore, Ainosuke was shocked by the images in his left eye which he had never seen before. Deducing that these images were connected to his brother’s death, Ainosuke began to search for the truth surrounding the death of his beloved brother and only immediate family. But as the investigation progressed, Ainosuke discovered that Yumehito’s death had been fake and that he is actually the leader of an evil organisation. This sets the stage for a clash of fate between the two brothers. Ainosuke, the young sleuth armed with a special left eye and Yumehito, the genius criminal who has carried out many criminal plots.
Website: www.ntv.co.jp/eye

Kimitachi ni Asu wa Nai
Date: From 9.00 p.m., Saturdays, 16 January 2010
Station: NHK
Cast: Sakaguchi Kenji, Tanaka Misako, Sudo Risa, Kitamura Yukiya, Aso Yumi, Murata Takehiro, Sakai Masaaki
Synopsis: Murakami Shinsuke (Sakaguchi Kenji) is a consultant working at a company that undertakes corporate restructuring. Murakami is a professional who goes into companies which have been squeezed by the recession and are on the verge of collapse. He conducts interviews with the employees of such companies and pressures them to resign in the name of “voluntary retirement”. Faced with this crushing life crisis of “corporate restructuring”, Murakami’s interviewees are severely distressed. They are forced to look hard at themselves and make the ultimate decision. This time, Murakami’s client is a manufacturer of building materials listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange. He is assigned a “quota” of 200 people for “voluntary retirement”. No matter how resentful or battered they are, Murakami dispassionately induces his interviewees to take “voluntary retirement” in one interview after another. However …
Website: www.nhk.or.jp/dodra/kimiasu

Soil
Date: From 12.00 a.m., Saturdays, 6 March 2010
Station: WOWOW
Cast: Hoshino Mari, Tayama Ryousei, Takahashi Issei, Arai Hirofumi, Horiuchi Keiko, Kitaro, Pierre Taki, Kobayashi Yuto, Mizusawa Naoko, Curtis, Nakamura Yasuhi, Honjo Manami, Sasano Takashi
Synopsis: A family disappears in the quiet suburb of ‘Soil New Town’. Detectives Onoda (Hoshino Mari) and Yokoi (Tayama Ryousei), who are dispatched to solve the case, are shocked when they find a bizarre pillar of salt that had been left behind in the room of that family’s daughter. The chairman of the residents’ association has a daily routine of persistent surveillance; a youth has gone missing ever since the incident occurred; an old woman had a horrid experience in this town in the past; and bad business runs rampant here … The dark side of the seemingly healthy and sound residents begin to peek out …
Website: www.wowow.co.jp/drama/soil

Ryomaden
Date: From 8.00 p.m., Sundays, 3 January 2010
Station: NHK
Cast: Fukuyama Masaharu, Terajima Shinobu, Kodama Kiyoshi, Sugimoto Tetta, Matsubara Chieko, Kagawa Teruyuki, Omori Nao, Hirosue Ryoko, Maki Yoko, Kanjiya Shihori, Kaname Jun, Sato Takeru, Oizumi Yo, Takahashi Katsumi, Kanie Keizo, Takeda Tetsuya
Synopsis: Sakamoto Ryoma (Fukuyama Masaharu) was born as the second son of the Sakamoto family, who were merchant samurai in the Tosa domain (present day Kochi Prefecture). Because the Sakamotos were originally merchants, Ryoma was in touch with the free and businesslike mercantile spirit as he grew up. He left the constrictive Tosa domain and learnt sailing under Katsu Kaishu (Takeda Tetsuya), a vassal of the shogun. Ryoma later established Kameyamashachu, a trading company and political organisation, and then Kaientai, a naval force, in Nagasaki. He mediated peace and concluded an alliance between the Satsuma and Choshu domains which had been at odds with each other. Furthermore, he orchestrated Tokugawa Yoshinobu’s restoration of imperial rule and was a key force in pushing through the Meiji Restoration. However, he was assassinated by someone at the young age of 33, with his dream to create “the world’s naval force” half accomplished …
Website: www.nhk.or.jp/ryomaden

Tokujo Kabachi
Date: From 9.00 p.m., Sundays, 17 January 2010
Station: TBS
Cast: Sakurai Sho, Horikita Maki, Endo Kenichi, Takahashi Katsumi, Nakamura Masatoshi, Asano Yuko (guest star)
Synopsis: Compassionate, meddlesome Tamura Katsuhiro (Sakurai Sho), who burns with a sense of justice, enters the admired world of notaries public to save his mother. He moves from Hiroshima to Tokyo and joins the firm Ono Notaries Public. Studying as he works, he aims to become a notary public. Tamura in reality believes “law is not in the least just” but uses it as a weapon to save the weak. On the other hand, Sumiyoshi Misuzu (Horikita Maki), who used to be a delinquent youth, is a highly capable notary public. She hates to lose and dislikes men. Unable to accept Misuzu’s callous working style and nastiness, Tamura clashes with her over every little thing. At times, she yells at him but they gradually grow to understand each other, and mature as people and as lawyers.
Website: www.tbs.co.jp/tokujyokabachi

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