Over Time

I didn't expect to enjoy this but it came out as a pleasant surprise. Basically, the drama's about two people who eventually become best friends - the kind who understand everything about each other - while parallel subplots go on about the people they are currently dating. Then, at about 3-quarters into the story you get that "sliding" into should-we-be-more-than-friends territory. Someone else here has said that the drama makes you think about the fact that maybe sometimes you don't end up marrying your soul mate.... your soul mate just remains your friend. And yes, this drama does center around that. And it's a very nice message about how life works. The acting and script delivers well with really cute chemistry between the two leads.

Still, like another reviewer said, the ending was disappointing only because I can't understand why the lead girl made the decision that she did. She made it clear that she loves the doctor very much, but it's just so hard to believe that she loves him more than Soichiro who's you know her best friend and soul mate. And she knows Soichiro loves her. Speaking of, he let her go because he believes she would be miserable with him. Well, I can't see why he should think that because she seemed much happier when she hung out with him. So, although I like that it wasn't fairy-tale, the bittersweet ending was just lacking because I couldn't completely empathize with the characters. Either Soichiro should never have fallen in love with her - so that both best friends can mutually think of each other as friends - or there should have been a better, more powerful reason for them to stray apart. Or, you know, they could've have just chosen each other.

I also felt that this some minor characters were just so random. Like, Kobayashi-kun. I thought he might end up with Nozana but it seemed like Nozana still likes Soichiro. What was his point in the story? I don't know.

Anyway, I would recommend this. It's slow-paced but in a good way. It makes you warm inside and gives you hope of finding a friendship as strong as Soichiro and Natsuki's. :)

until the last two episodes the score would have been a 10 but Soichiro was a stupid childish baby and Natsuki for some idiotic reason chose to marry the stupid doctor that she doesn't love or even like

...ing

[Beware: Possible spoilers!]

I remember this being the first J-drama aired on the International Channel in early '99 after the excellent "With Love," the first after FCI (stupidly) discontinued English subtitling. It took a full ten years, but I finally got to see it and... color me frustrated.

The acting in this is phenomenal by all involved - particularly Esumi and Sorimachi in the leads - to the point that it's difficult to believe that these are actors playing roles. The soundtrack is excellent too, but then I never could resist Tomoko or BuriGuri, and Yamaguchi Yuko is a revelation. The problem is with the writing and that horrid, illogical ending.

For a story to be good it has to adhere to its own internal logic. So here you have an artfully-constructed development of characters and their relationships from a chance meeting, a clear chemistry building between two people (a chemistry palpable between the actors, Esumi and Sorimachi,) but in the end it's all for a huge, anticlimactic nothing.

This isn't about "realistic ending" vs. a "fairy-tale ending," but rather an ending that is utterly arbitrary, that runs counter to a story that had painted a convincing picture of two people who are really "halves of the same whole." Natsuki's decision - and Kaede's insistence on her making that decision - is a massive short-circuit to the entire story up to that point. Forget "fairy-tale endings" - in real life, when two people meet and discover over the course of time and experience that they're kindred spirits, the most "realistic" outcome is for them to become an item. I disagree too with the point someone else made here about Kaede's stoicism. I don't think his stoicism makes his professions of love for Natsuki hard to believe - if anything it increases their depth and intensity.

The "love triangle" thing is necessary for the story's conflict, but for that to work the relationship between Natsuki and Kuga-sensei needed to be much deeper - at least as deep as the bond between Nat-chan and Kaede. I'm not talking about Shiina's acting - which was superb - but the fact that his character, Kuga, has virtually no chemistry with Natsuki. His character is written almost like a supporting role - like Haruko or Fuyumi - but it needed to have the same depth as the other two leads. Balance is everything, and the love triangle is horribly lopsided. The result is that Natsuki's climactic decision seems completely arbitrary, nothing more than a pragmatic whim.

I can't help wondering how much more powerful this story - and its ending - would have been, if Kuga's character and relationship with Natsuki had been written with enough depth to balance against her relationship with Kaede. It would have lent far more weight to her conflicting emotions, and far more dramatic punch (not to mention plausibility,) to her final decision.

In short-circuiting what had been an excellent romantic buildup, the writers effectively pulled the rug from beneath the audience's feet. I feel like I've just been through a lengthy, heart-wrenching ordeal with no satisfactory resolution. The series is well worth watching, but I can't say that I'm sorry it's over.