Drama Digest #15 Sequels & Romance Dramas

I’ve been busy and lazy and all things in between. Winter was such a bore that I didn’t have the motivation to bring news about dramas on air, and then spring came along with so many delights that it has been a challenge to follow all the dramas I want to watch. However, my most anticipated drama Mozu turned out to be the biggest letdown of the season and I don’t have much hope that the second season on WOWOW will be better since the scriptwriter remains the same.

A sequel for Hanasaki Mai ga Damattenai? … NTV is said to have quickly decided on a sequel for the highest rated drama of the spring season Hanasaki Mai ga Damattenai, which just ended its run on 18 June. A source familiar with the production said a 2-hour special will be broadcast next March and a second season has been scheduled after that. The network has negotiated with Anne and co-star Kamikawa Takaya and obtained their informal consent to appear in the special and second season. According to an NTV personnel, NTV’s reason for insisting on producing the second season in April next year is so that they retain Anne. Because she is now the actress with one of the three best viewership ratings in the entertainment industry, NTV’s objective is also not to let her appear in a TV Asahi, Fuji TV or TBS drama. The network intends to bolster its underachieving dramas with Anne. “This time, Anne is the only one of the drama heroines selected to be a main host for the 24-hour TV 37 which will be broadcast in August. NTV will make Anne its star actress and try to turn Hanasaki Mai ga Damattenai into the post-Gokusen series,” a broadcast writer commented.

New season of GTO … … Fuji TV can only rehash despite series of dismal failures … A second season of the remake of the original GTO drama will air this July with the scene shifting from Tokyo’s Kichijoji to Kanagawa’s Shonan. The media has been quick to pounce on the fact that the original GTO which starred Sorimachi Takashi and Matsushima Nanako in 1998, was a huge hit that scored 35.7% for its last episode. But 14 years later, the GTO remake starring AKIRA only managed an average viewership rating of 13.2% for the first season and a humiliating 6.7% for GTO New Year’s Special last year. “It points to AKIRA’s lack of acting ability and a mixed reception among viewers,” an entertainment writer said. AKIRA’s fans may rejoice in a sequel to the remake, but others aren’t so thrilled that Fuji TV is always rehashing old dramas, doing dramas that aren’t hits and living off its past legacy. “Both Iryu 4 Team Medical Dragon and Team Batista 4 reached new lows for their respective series. Summer Nude which made a mockery of Beach Boys, and Shomuni 2013 from the previous season took a drubbing. Kyuumei Byoto 24-ji Season 5 dropped lead actor Eguchi Yosuke, triggering a rash of complaints from fans. There have also been hit sequels like Legal High Season 2, but because of the many serialisations which give the feeling of being flops before broadcast, quite a lot of people have doubts about Fuji TV’s planning ability,” said the writer.

Fuji TV’s president offers his theory on the waning fortunes of romance dramas … “I think young producers in the whole TV industry may have lost interest in romance dramas. I believe it’s an industry-wide trend.” This was Fuji TV’s president Kameyama Chihiro’s analysis of the current disappearance of romance dramas from TV programming at a regular press conference in late April. In recent years, there has been a boom in dramas about corporations, internal discord, and turnarounds. “Even Disney’s hit Frozen is ultimately about sisterly love when the norm would have been to have the prince play an active role. I feel that a turning point has come for romance dramas worldwide although this is probably overstating it.” He offered the view that “romance dramas have become hard to make” due to the emergence of mobile phones. “It’s difficult to create scenes of “crossing paths without meeting” and “misunderstanding”. When you add work, colleagues and various terms to the mix, it’s no longer purely love and I think the perspective ends up different,” he explained. “During our time, we used idols to make love stories, but I personally believe the actual state of affairs is that young performers and the type who will make people want to watch love stories are gone or cannot be found.” The only romance drama of this season is Fuji TV’s Zoku Saigo kara Nibanme no Koi. while Gokuaku Ganbo occupies its Gekku which has traditionally been dominated by romance dramas. Fuji TV says “Unlike the viewing public up to now, male viewers are more than the average Gekku. It’ll be good in the long history of Gekku to do something besides romance once in a few years.” Goodness. I’m baffled and I’m tempted to think that there’s a great lack of imagination and a disconnect. And certainly it must all come down to one thing in the end: viewership ratings.