JMovie review: Rookies: Sotsugyō

Title: Rookies: Sotsugyō Also known as: Rookies - Graduation Release date: 5/30/99 Genre: Sports, drama Cast Sato Ryuta, Ichihara Hayato, Koide Keisuke Plot: The baseball team of Futakotamagawa high school are now seniors. After recruiting some freshmen players, the team once again begins their journey toward Koshien. Of course, their beloved teacher and coach, Kawato Koichi, is back to cheer them on. What is good: The characters seem to have grown up a bit. What is bad: The big payoff is missing. Letter rating: B

I was really hoping for some real closure with this movie. The boys would make it to Koshien and we'd see them kick everyone's butts in the tournament. Alas, we don't get to see that. We see the boys make it to Koshien but then the movie skips to their graduation. We never really find out how they performed.

That doesn't mean it was a bad movie. The two new characters, Akahoshi Shoji and Hamanaka Taiyo, are great additions to the cast. Without them, I think the movie would have felt repetitive since the team pretty much does the same thing over and over. I also enjoyed the actual graduation of the senior players. It was extremely heartwarming. There was more than one tear that came to my eye.

If you watched the drama, then you should watch this. It won't give you a ton of closure, but you will get some. However, if the drama wasn't your cup of tea, then you should be fine skipping this entirely.

Jdorama review: Rookies Special

Title: Rookies Broadcast date: 10/4/08 Genre: Sports, drama Cast: Sato Ryuta, Ichihara Hayato, Koide Keisuke Plot: The baseball team of Futakotamagawa high school has been banned from playing for six months after fighting on the field. Rookie teacher Kawato Koichi arrives with promises to help them achieve their dreams. Together, the group fights to get to the Koshien baseball tournament. What is good: It's a good recap of the story if you haven't watched the series. What is bad: There isn't anything new. Letter rating: D Overall: I didn't bother to read anything about the special before watching it. As a result, I was expecting a side story about one of the minor characters. Nope. This special is nothing but a two-hour rehash of the 11 episode series. I'm guessing this was supposed to get people ready for the movie's release. That way they could quickly introduce the story to new people and remind fans about what had already occurred. Unfortunately, when the special stands on its own, it is very boring. I can really only recommend it if you don't feel like sitting through the whole series. But then you'll miss all the little moments between Kawato and the team. Watch the series and skip the special.

Jdorama review: Rookies

Title: Rookies Broadcast dates: 4/19/08 - 7/26/08 Number of episodes: 11 Genre: Sports, drama Cast: Sato Ryuta, Ichihara Hayato, Koide Keisuke Plot: The baseball team of Futakotamagawa high school has been banned from playing for six months after fighting on the field. Rookie teacher Kawato Koichi arrives with promises to help them achieve their dreams. Together, the group fights to get to the Koshien baseball tournament. What is good: Sato Ryuta is a very good actor. What is bad: Aniya (Ichihara Hayato) is a bit of an annoying character. Letter rating: C+ Overall: I was hesitant to list this as a 'sports' drama because, really, the baseball takes a backseat to the personal dramas of each of the characters. Granted, the main plotline is to get the team to Koshien but it's still not the core of the story. As such, I found myself getting a lot more enjoyment out of the show. I'm not a huge sports fan so usually things like this are lost on me. However, by making the characters the meat of the story, it makes the show more interesting for people like me. I'm actually looking forward to watching both the special and the movie to see where this goes.

JDorama review: RH Plus

Title: RH Plus Broadcast dates: 1/2/08 - 3/26/08 Number of episodes: 13 Genre: Supernatural drama Cast: Miura Yuu, Tochihara Rakuto, Ojima Naoya, Takano Hassei Plot: Four vampires, living together as a family, secretly help the police with unsolved cases. What is good: The change in eye color when they "vamp out" is pretty awesome. What is bad: The plot gets annoying after the first few episodes. Letter rating: C- Overall: I really wanted to like this drama. After all, vampires are awesome. Unfortunately, RH Plus is very heavy on the 'drama' aspect and not in a good way. Makoto (Yuu) was abandoned as a child, which the writing wants to beat you with every single episode. We get it. He had a crappy childhood. It didn't really need 12 episodes to attempt to overcome it. On top of that, the acting is cheesy at best. As much as I wanted it to get better, it just didn't.

Jmovie: Kamen Rider Decade: All Riders vs Dai-Shocker

Title: Kamen Rider Decade: All Riders vs. Dai-Shocker Release date: 8/8/09 Genre: Tokusatsu Cast: Masahiro Inoue, Kanna Mori, Ryouta Murai, Moe Arai, Ryuichi Oura Plot: The worlds are merging together, destroying each other. Only by killing all of the Riders from all of the various worlds can one world be saved. Or is that the real solution? What is good: Watching the Kamen Riders fight was interesting. What is bad: Gackt's cameo was awful. Letter rating: B- Overall: I've never watched Kamen Rider in any of its forms. As a matter of fact, the only reason I wanted to watch this was for the Gackt cameo. Unfortunately, the Gackt cameo was terrible. Despite not knowing anything about the series, the movie wasn't too bad. I was able to keep up with the plot, for the most part, and it was kinda cool to see all the various incarnations of the Rider. The main downside was that the movie was only 66 minutes so it was more like a special episode then a full-length movie. They probably could have spent a little more time fleshing out some things or let the battles go on a little bit longer. As a whole, I had a decent time watching it.

Jmovie review: Kagen no Tsuki

Title: Kagen no Tsuki Also known as: Last Quarter Release date: 2004 Genre: Supernatural romance Cast: Kuriyama Chiaki, Narimiya Hiroki, Kurokawa Tomoka, Ochiai Motoki, Hyde Plot: As Mizuki (Kuriyama) turns 19, she finds out that her boyfriend, Tomoki (Narimiya), has been cheating on her. Running away from her heartache, she comes upon an abandoned estate. Inside she finds a mysterious guitar player named Adam (Hyde), who claims to know her. During the last quarter of the moon, Adam tells Mizuki that he must leave. Desperate to stay with him, Mizuki races to find him, only to be hit by a car. Two schoolchildren (Kurokawa and Ochiai) soon find the estate with a mysterious girl who cannot leave. What is the connection between the house, Adam, and Mizuki? What is good: Kuriyama is a very good actress. What is bad: The story dragged a lot. Letter rating: C Overall: I mostly rented this movie because Hyde is in it. I didn't realize that both Kuriyama and Narimiya were in it as well. Despite all of the talent in the film, it was still very difficult to watch. The pacing was extremely slow. It takes a long time for the characters to come to relatively easy conclusions and some things that don't need to explained are over explained. If you are a fan of the actors, it's a nice way to spend a couple of hours. Otherwise, feel free to overlook this without a second thought.

JDorama review: Mei-chan no Shitsuji

Title: Mei-chan no Shitsuji Also known as: Mei-chan's Butler Broadcast dates: 1/13/09 - 3/17/09 Number of episodes: 10 Genre: Romantic Comedy Cast: Eikura Nana, Mizushima Hiro, Sato Takeru, Yamada Yu Plot: Shinonome Mei (Eikura) lived an ideal, if poor, life helping her parents run their udon shop in the countryside. After her parents sudden accidental death, it is revealed that Mei is the heir to a multibillionaire. Now she must attend a prestigious school in order to learn how to become a lady. However, at this school, every student has a handsome butler. Including Mei. What is good: Mizushima Hiro is wonderful as Mei's butler, Shibata Rihito What is bad: It plays out pretty much like any other "new girl in school" drama, except with butlers! Letter rating: B Overall: I made a decision to marathon this entire series in one day. Since it's only ten episodes, it wasn't a difficult task. As a whole, I found the series to be fairly decent. Nothing stood out as fabulous but nothing was particularly terrible either. The plot had an interesting take on the lady/butler relationship, even though it had a predictable ending. However, I was left feeling like there should have been a bit more meat on these bones.

JDorama review: Kisarazu Cat's Eye: The Movie

Title: Kisarazu Cat's Eye: The Movie Release date: 11/2003 Genre: Comedy Cast: Okada Junichi, Sakurai Sho, Okada Yoshinori, Sato Ryuta, Tsukamoto Takashi Plot: Bussan (Junichi) is dying. His doctors continually tell him that he has six months left to live. Instead of being depressed, he lives life normally with his friends. What is good: There are some very funny moments. What is bad: The beginning of the movie is rather confusing. Letter rating: C+ Overall: I should start out by confessing that I have not watched the 9-episode drama that goes with the movie. This was just something I plucked off of Netflix without any expectations. As such, I was terribly confused for the first 45 minutes. Perhaps, if I was familiar with the series, I might have understood what was going on. Either way, the movie really picks up in the last half of the film. Once you can piece everything together and see how each event relates to other events, the movie is quite fun! I actually found myself staying up way past my bedtime just to find out how it ends. (I rarely stay up past my bedtime. I like sleep.) Now I need to track down the series so I can see what other adventurous mishaps this gang gets into!

Jmovie review: Lupin III: Strange Psycho-Kinetic Strategy

Title: Lupin III: Strange Psycho-Kinetic Strategy Release date: 1974 Genre: Action Comedy Cast: Yuuki Meguro, Hideko Ezaki, Kunio Tanaka, Shirou Itou Plot: Hijinks ensue when Lupin (Meguro), the world's greatest thief, meets Fujiko (Ezaki), a female thief. What is good: Lupin versus Zenigata (Itou) is always funny. What is bad: Too much slapstick. Letter rating: D+ Overall: For some reason, when I added this to my Netflix queue, I thought it was an animated version of Lupin. I was a little surprised when I popped in the disc to see a live action version instead. Regardless, it's still Lupin and I always enjoy Lupin movies. Well, now I can change that line of thought. Where Lupin tends to be silly, he always has a serious side. This version failed to show his serious side. We saw "Funny Lupin," "Horny Lupin," a little tiny bit of "Clever Lupin," but never once was there "Serious Lupin." In my opinion, this is where the movie failed. They relied way too much on "Funny Lupin" to carry the movie. Perhaps this would have been satisfactory in 1974, but it just doesn't stand the test of time.

JDorama review: Blood: The Last Vampire

Title: Blood: The Last Vampire Also known as: Last Blood Release date: 5/29/09 Genre: Supernatural action Cast: Jun Ji-hyun (Gianna Jun), Allison Miller, Koyuki Plot: Saya (Jun) is a half-human-half-vampire that hunts and kills other vampires while searching for Onigen (Koyuki), the head vampire. What is good: Koyuki is gorgeous as Onigen. What is bad: The cinematography was weird. Letter rating: C+ Overall: I enjoyed the Blood: The Last Vampire anime, so I was intrigued to see how it would be translated into a live action movie. For the most part, the movie was entertaining. However, the fight scenes (and there are a lot of them) seemed tired. Even when Saya was fighting a huge mob of vampires, the entire fight was pretty predictable. It was a decent movie to watch. Just don't expect anything overly impressive from it and you should be fine.