Fumo Chitai eps 4-7

I can't believe Samejima is the baker from Shiroi Haru. One could say that is the sign of a good actor.

The ratings for Fumo Chitai haven't been good. After starting off with 14.4%, its currently hovering around 11% which is pretty much an average rating, comparable to Liar Game. While Jin is probably the top rated show this season, it is an outrage that Tokyo Dogs rates better than Fumo Chitai at about 15%.

I demand you show more skin to raise the ratings!

As Chuks, the subber for this show mentioned in the subs thread:

This drama isn't getting good ratings. Apparently, it's too difficult for even Japanese, especially for female viewers.
To gain better ratings, the Fuji TV aired a show in which a female comedian Mitsuura
and two female tv personalities discussed about how cool male casts are on the drama, to
appeal to female viewers.
I wish they didn't do that. It's so desperate lol
It's a shame that such a good drama isn't recognized well.

Can you believe that Boss had higher ratings?

WTF? Are Japanese girls that shallow as Real Clothes leads us to believe? Why not sell the dorama as a well acted show with a great story? Sigh. I can or rather have to accept the reality that doramas are all about idols, but how can it be devoid of recognition of good craftsmanship? Is critical acclaim not good enough to sell doramas? Is a well crafted story with suspense so hard to watch compared to a juvenile cop show that plays more like a sitcom?


In ep 4, Iki succeds in the Luckheed bidding but pays a very heavy personal price and finally his stoic expression finally breaks. Japanese politics is so much about not revealing one's true emotions and intentions that it was good to see Iki finally allow himself to show his anger towards Kaizuka. As much as we'd like to see him burn in hell, Kaizuka has profited from the Luckheed victory as well. Iki questions whether victory in business is really worth the sacrifice of his best friend and subordinate. Daimon sacho convinces Iki to stay on and not waste the loss of Kawamata and Koide.

If this were your generic black and white dorama, Kaizuka would have a traumatic childhood and Iki would talk him into repenting before Kaizuka sacrifices himself or something.

Iki is then put in charge of the Business Affairs Department which overseas the overall of strategy of Kinki shoji. This bring him into conflict with the vice president, Satoi Tatsuya and the heads of various departments. This is right before the six-day war between Arab world. Ikki requests information from an Israeli trader and the various departments have to bear the cost of such information.

Entlassen! Noguchi sensei will always be one of my favourite villains.

I really love stories set in eras before mobile phone and internet. When one had to wait for the morning to read about yesterday's news and accurate and up to date information was worth its weight in gold. It makes things much more exciting. I enjoy the conflict between Iki/Satoi. Satoi has a point; the employees would have not be motivated to seemingly follow useless orders from the Business Affairs Department. It means that they are not free to make decisions for themselves and Ikki's decisions were not beneficial to the individual departments.

She reminds me of Aibu Saki in Karei naru...

The only thing that casts Satoi as the villain in all this is that jealousy is part of the reason for his opposition to Iki. Even then, that is very understandable due to Iki's rapid rise and seeming gamble of the future of the company on information provided by a suspicious individual. From the six day war, we go to the Japanese car industry and I'm enjoying the history lesson. We all know Japan as a developed nation but its fun to see how they got there.

I remember having a tv like that back in the day...

My favourite part of the show so far is not all the history and politics stuff but the scene at the end of episode 7 when Iki's wife finally confronts him and bares her emotions. Saying that Iki has been ignoring his family and it is as if he has gone to Siberia. He has trapped himself inside this prison of work and it is as if he no longer lives in the house. As I said in my review of the earlier episodes, I really think sprinkling flashbacks to his Siberian labour camp throughout the series would be very good, especially when he faces difficulties in his work or has to keep his emotions in check.


Give Fumo Chitai a chance. There's an average of 400+ subs downloaded per episode compared with crap like Tokyo Dogs or boring shows like Ohitorisama. There are a lot of dorama addicts out there who are missing out.