BOB BARR’08!

Now that I think about it, it could just be that my girlfriends suck.

The recent Edison’s Mother (エジソンの母) was also lightheartedly amusing, and at the same time it brought into question the idea that the most capable (creative) students who stand out are being driven back in with the rest of the nails. It also addresses the issue of “monster parents” as a second theme. One of my favorite episodes was when Kenta (the main character) draws a snow scene on a white piece of paper with a white crayon, and the “art teacher” tries to destroy it with criticism in front of the class (along with other creative pieces that students had drawn that didn’t fit the “ideal composition”)

For purely entertaining reasons, I enjoyed Sleeping forest (眠れる森), which also stars Kimura Takuya, but as a very creepy character; completely the opposite of his cool-guy persona.

Trick was also a fun drama.

Japan has two versions of `The Wire`.

The first is `Ghost in the Shell – Stand Alone Complex` which ran on cable, is just as well produced as `The Wire`, and actually won a larger domestic audience. It is science fiction, but this does not mute serious themes like refugees being placed in concentration camps by Japanese neo-nationalist politicians in order to preserve Japan`s homogeneous character. The series also looks at the Jieitai, Japanese-American alliance, etc. Science Fiction is a potent way to critique the present and GITS is one of the best examples ever. It is also mad marketable internationally.

The other version is `Odoru Daisosasen` which is the most popular Japanese drama ever, is a complete piece of garbage from an aesthetic POV, but actually puts foward many of the same themes as `The Wire` – the police are more concerned about their political position and jockeying for promotion than actually helping people, etc. There is even a similarity between what happens to Oda Yuji`s `Aoshima` and West`s McNulty in the end. Now I`m not saying that `Odoru Daisosasen` is any good, but it actually does trash the Japanese police very strongly and for the same reasons that Simon made `The Wire`. One could also make the point that its sappy, melodramatic way of putting forward its themes is actually a more impactful popularlizing formula than that used in `The Wire` which alienated audiences with its excellence and was hovering on the verge of cancellation.

There are plenty of examples of decent Japanese dramas that absolutely RIP the system. Two important ones are throwbacks to the great `shakaiha` novels of the first postwar decades – `Shiroi Kyoto` and `Karei naru Ichizoku` (that one had Kimutaku, come to think of it). Shiroikyoto has Japanese doctors playing with the lives of patients in experimental treatments so that they can move up in the ranks (this is a total trashing of Japanese university, hospial, and business culture). This theme also pops up in `Black Jack ni yoroshiku` (which was crap compared to the manga. The manga, in my opinion, actually does a better number on Japanese journalism than `The Wire` did – that element of season 5 was the weakest part of the whole series). Karei naru Ichizoku is all about how irresponsible business practices in Japan destroy lives.

Even silly dramas like GTO take shots at some of Japan`s most cherished national myths like gakureki – one of the teachers with a todai degree and monbusho connections is actually a perv / date rape drugger and uses his `elite` status to hide this. In the end, the monbusho are also the main bad guys.

I`m not sure what Joe means by serious media broadcasts, but the TV that I watch brought down Abe`s thug government and apart from the dramas and other seires that I mentioned has a variety of series and programs that are very critical of the current state of things in Japan. NHK runs a variety of programs where teens debate serious national issues, Tahara Soichiro`s stuff on Asahi over the past decade has not only spread critical war knowledge on TV, but has looked at just about every issues you could imagine. Just last week, Beat Takeshi`s TV Tackle show did a feature on the Communist Party (which apparently has gotten 10,000 new members in the last year) where JCP members were allowed to give their opinions on just about everything and one of the show regulars described them as having the `best ideas for Japanese politics`. Yesterday, Asahi did a feature on just how many hundreds of percent of tariffs Japan slaps on agricultural goods, deconstructing things nicely before the new WTO round concludes (while journalists outside of the country suggest that the Japanese people are not `allowed` to know how high their tariffs are), etc.

Japanese TV is, of course, not perfect, and 99% of dramas are poorly made (of course, `The Wire`, being the best thing ever made for televsion anywhere, is an unfair means of comparison). There are, however, plenty of alternatives to `Change`.

What Japan really needs is its own version of The Wire… the subtitled version is being shown on cable, but just imagine how awesome a homegrown, truly honest look at social issues would be. It wouldn’t have to be about drugs (since Japan’s drug problem is non-existent by comparison) but there is probably about 20 seasons worth of issues ripe for the David Simon treatment (any of those Alex mentioned above, for starters).

I am sure such a show would hardly generate 20% ratings but, much like America selecting a black presidential nominee, the mere fact that it happened would be a huge step forward.

And this idea shouldn’t be so far-fetched. Can Japanese TV studios really be satisfied with a show like CHANGE, which ran with respectable ratings for 6 weeks but has absolutely zero resale value or potential for years of continuous appeal? How can they sit and watch as shows like The Sopranos rake in millions?