Drama: Houkago wa Mystery to Tomo ni ep01-09 Final

Plot:
High school student Kirigamine Ryo (Kawaguchi Haruna) is the vice president of the detective club at Koigakubo Academy, a school on the outskirts of Tokyo’s Kokubunji. Posing as a famous detective, she makes deductions to solve various cases that occur within the school. But because her deductions are flawed, she never solves the cases. She is helped by her biology teacher Ishizaki Hiromi (Hayami Mokomichi), detectives and suspects, as the cases are solved.
Credit: Jdrama Weblog

Cast: Kawaguchi Haruna, Hayami Mokomichi, Takashima Masanobu

Story:
Kirigamine Ryo, a cute, 16-year-old girl, with a great fast ball (as she puts it), that always gets mistaken for a boy because of her name and the way she talks.  And always gets made fun of for having a name like an air conditioner.

Ishizaki Hiromi is Ryo's biology teacher and soon head of her Detectives club. He's a bit eccentric (i think a bit is an understatement!) but really smart and able to solve crime cases almost immediately.

Ryo had picked up an interest in mystery cases and became the vice manager of her detectives club.  Every episode she witnesses a crime and takes it into her own hands to solve the case, or more like, butts in.  After writing down all her information, she takes a look through her student handboook with all her notes.  When she finally gets to the last page, she witnesses her favorite baseball player's picture and her idea of who the criminal is comes about.

She always picks the most obvious suspect, but under Ishizaki-sensei's advising, he tells her she's wrong.  Turns out in most cases she's actually right, its just her assumption of how the crime played out is what's wrong.

Arc #1: A member of the school track team was knocked out unconcious at the sand pit.  Ryo tries to figure out who attempted to murder him. (turns out he stepped on a sand rake that was left there,hidden in the sand, and it smacked him in the back of the head.)

Arc #2: An acting group of former students from Koigakubo come back to put on a play for the students.  The most popular girl in the group was attacked at night.  Ryo accuses the other girl in the group because of her jealousy, but she had an alibi.  (turns out Ryo was correct, but her alibi was a cover up of her attempted murder)

Arc #3: Ryo's friend, Nao is sad that her grandpa had been injured which could have been due to an attempted murder.  When she goes to visit Nao's family's house, her grandpa had been poisoned.  Ryo accuses the maid because she was the one that served them drinks.  Ishizaki-sensei tells her she had no reason to kill him and that her accusation details dont make sense.  (turns out Ryo was correct, but the maid's reason for murder was different).

Story #4: Ryo's rival, Arakida, was attacked in the fine arts room. Ryo runs through this building and finds suspects lurking at all exits of the building.  She accuses everyone and all the possibilities as to why they would attack him.  Ishizaki-sensei leads Ryo to the right suspect and possible reason of attack (turns out Ryo had at least accused one of the suspects correctly but the reason was completely off.  Mistaken identity is the reason for the attack, because of Ryo)

Arc #5 (Final): A teacher loses consciousness after a student falls from the roof of a building and lands on top of her.  It is assumed that the student was trying to commit suicide but the student regained consciousness saying she didnt and that someone tried to kill her.  The case is presumed as a closed-case because all the doors were locked and a student on the stairway did not see anyone.  (turns out the attack was by the teacher that lost consciousness. Pushing the student off the building in an attempt to avenge her sister who committed suicide because of bullying due to the student.  The students body was dangling in a tree before dropping to the ground on top of the teacher).

Comments:
The drama only has a slight connection episode-to-episode.  Besides having 2-episode arcs, stories dont usually connect, meaning that if you watch the series midway, not having watched the first episode wont stop you from understanding the rest of the series.  I mean, she introduces herself in the beginning of each episode, and explains what had happened the episode before and there the episode continues.

The only thing that does connect is due to character development. 
- There's an ongoing creepiness that Ishizaki-sensei has about a woman's body hidden inside a cooler.  Buying her things to prepare for a wedding he wants them to hold.  In the end the woman that was hidden in the cooler was a doll named Mariko. 
- Ryo and Arakida's ongoing rivalry, which im still confused about.  Does he like her? I'm pretty sure he does, it's just the things he says makes me think otherwise lol.

I was really excited at the time the drama was announced.  I love both Hayami Mokomichi and Kawaguchi Haruna. When I first skimmed through the first episode I wasn't really feeling it, it seemed kind of "tacky" so I was close to dropping it.  The day that I was actually going to get rid of it, subs were actually getting released.  So I gave it another try and I ended up actually liking it.

The type of comedy and acting is something that people need to get used to.  If you don't watch enough comedic dramas, then the acting will get on your nerves really badly because of all the over-exaggeration.  I can't even really say much more about it.  It's a fun drama.  Not your typical tantei stories, but still pretty good.  I'd give this a 6 out of 10.  It's a quick drama to get through so even if you don't like it, it wont take you long to finish, though i wouldn't see a reason to finish the drama if you didnt like it in the first place haha

Drama: Ouran High School Host Club ep09

Official Site: TBS - Ouran High School Host Club

Story:

 So the episode starts with the host club coming across some old lady who's being a huge bitch to Tamaki.  Turns out she's his grandmother.  The grandmother is resentful to Tamaki and the rest of the host club offer their opinions of the lady.

Haruhi announces to the club that she's going away for the summer working at a small pension (bed and breakfast).  The club is shocked and end up following her there to stay there as guests while she works.

Haruhi comes across an old friend from middle school who happens to be working at his uncles produce store.  Haruhi introduces him to the host club but only refers to Tamaki as a senpai.  He becomes depressed because he thought he would at least be given a better title.

 Inside the pension, Haruhi and Arai-kun are talking, catching up with each other when the twins become jealous.  Hikaru gives a snarky comment and in the end Haruhi slaps him because he's being rude to Arai-kun.  Hikaru runs off and Kaoru chases after him.

 Kaoru apologizes on behalf of Hikaru's outburst and asks Haruhi if she'd like to hang out in town.  Kaoru devised a plan to get Hikaru and Haruhi to spend a day together, sort of like a date.  Kaoru wanted Hikaru to learn to express himself with others and come to terms with his feelings for Haruhi. 
The date doesn't go too well at first, with Hikaru starting to to lose some patience, but ends up having fun with Haruhi in the end.  The host club of course trails behind their every move like a bunch of stalkers.  At some point they come across Nekozawa who's giving out readings to the people in town.

So, Haruhi runs into Arai-kun and Hikaru becomes jealous.  Haruhi wants to get back to the pension soon because she notices a thunderstorm is coming.  Hikaru doesn't want Arai-kun's help and runs off stranding Haruhi.  The host club becomes worried that the two arent back yet, so they call up Hikaru and gets yelled at by Tamaki for leaving Haruhi alone.  He tells him that Haruhi is afraid thunder, and Hikaru goes in search of her.  He finds her at a small church and protects her by covering her ears with his headphones.

Tamaki comes in, drenched from the rain, in Haruhi's aid.

Back at the host club, it turns out that Tamaki caught a cold because of the rain.  Haruhi thanks him, and his cold just magically disappears and he's his usual, crazy self.

Comments:
A really crappy review.  I was doing this by memory since I had the screencaps saved for such a long time and no comments written prior.  Let's see what I can say about this episode.

I thought it was a cute episode and I know a lot of people were waiting for this episode because of Hikaru and Haruhi's "date".  The best part of the episode was definitely watching the host club dress in costumes to avoid being spotted.

Drama: Ouran High School Host Club ep08

Official Site: TBS - Ouran High School Host Club

Story:

 Haruhi met with the chairman of the school for the first time.  He gave her a stationary set so that she can write Thank you notes to him from time to time for letting her into the school.  His crazy gestures reminds her of Tamaki.

 

 The host club is having another themed party, this time as police officers.  While having their party, they are interrupted by a little girl who mistakenly calls Tamaki "oniichama" (cute way to say older brother).  Not knowing who she was or where she came from, Nekozawa creeps in calling for her.

 The little girl, Kirimi, freaks out at the sight of Nekozawa, causing him to get depressed.  He's never been able to play with her because she's scared of him.  All she wants is to see the brother she notices in the hallway picture, her prince.  Nekozawa decides to try to change himself in order to be able to play with her.

 They were trying different tactics using the light, but nothing was working for him.  He would just freak out the whole time, making him feel useless.

 They noticed outside that Kirimi was staring at a cat.  Nekozawa mentions that Kirimi is scared of cats the most and runs outside to save her.  His will to protect his sister made him forget about the sunlight.  After thanking the host club, he faints.  It turns out he had too much sunlight at once to handle.  To regain his energy, Tamaki plays a song for him, thus leading Haruhi to question more about Tamaki's life.

Comments:
yeaaaaaaah you like that.  An actual summary.  It's short too, in my standards.
Anyways.  I thought the episode was cute and it was a nice change, allowing Nekozawa to have his own storyline.  My favorite part had to be when Kyouya was opening and closing the curtains.  Can't even be subtle about it, he just blatantly opened and closed them like it was nothing.  I also liked how in the background when Mori was helping Honey with his tie, you can see in the background wanted posters for Kuma-chan and Usa-chan

Drama: Ouran High School Host Club ep07

 Official Site: TBS - Ouran High School Host Club

Story:

The story starts with Tamaki taking a trip down to whatever scary ass place Nekozawa's Black Magic Club hangs out at.  He gets a reading from them to see what would happen when he meets Haruhi's father.

The host club head to Haruhi's apartment complex.  In style, of course.  Heading over in a Hummer limousine, they attracted the attention of the neighbors angering Haruhi.  She tells them to leave but convinced her to late them stay with some fancy cake.

 The boys take their first look into a commoners household and are truly amazed at... pretty much everything.  How small the place is, how interesting it is to reuse jars, Kyouya intrigued by aluminum foil (haha!) and Tamaki finding the kotatsu (table with a heater).  After eating their cake, Honey suggested Haruhi making lunch for them.  She agrees but needed to go to the grocery store to pick up items.  All them wanted to go since theyve never been to one before.

 Before heading out, Tamaki days a prayer to Haruhi's mother.  Tamaki becomes enticed by Haruhi and eventually, while getting up, trips and falls on her. Lo and Behold, Ranka, Haruhi's transvestite father, comes home and sees him on top of her.  He ends up tossing Tamaki out of the way.

 The club has a group talk with Ranka.  Tamaki is super depressed after being turned down by Ranka.  The boys find out that Kyouya has been texting Haruhi's father.  Tamaki getting even more depressed is hurt by Ranka's outburst to him and runs out of the apartment crying.  Haruhi goes and comforts him and takes him to the super market.

 Tamaki wanted Nabe for lunch (even though it's summer).  He was so amazed at how everything worked in the market.  He loved how everything was inexpensive and went crazy like a kid in a candy store.  The rest of the club members and Ranka went to go spy on them. 

Ranka refuses to recognize Tamaki as a "father figure" and basically tells him to gtfo.  As this was going down, a little girl accidentally knocks over a canned food display that was going to topple over Haruhi.  Tamaki comes to the rescue and protects her.

 In the end, they all had lunch together, under the kotatsu.  Ranka was close to accepting Tamaki until he opened up his big mouth again causing Ranka to get angry and giving him the mushrooms that Tamaki had cultivated to eat for lunch instead of the nabe in the pot.  Of course, Tamaki gets depressed and yells out.

Comments:
(I wrote this before I went on hiatus) I really liked this story line.  It's nice to see them outside of the high school, especially since its the first and basically the only time you actually get to see Haruhi's apartment.  It's also funny to see Ranka for the first time and it transitioned really well from the manga/anime to live action.  I also like the portrayal of Tamaki cultivating mushrooms in their closet.

I don't have much to comment on since I turned off my Ouran Live Action fangirling when the series ended haha.

(new comments) As I was taking screencaps for this episode I noticed a lot of small things again that they added at subtle nods to the anime and manga.  Honey passes his carrots to Mori.  While Honey didnt mention it in the drama, if you read the manga, you'll know he doesn't like carrots which I thought was really cute.

Also, why was Kyouya not wearing his glasses at the last few seconds of the episode.  He was wearing it when they said grace, but as they were actually eating, they were off haha!  Must have been fogging up from the food, small space and kotatsu warmth!! :)

Also, the mushrooms that Tamaki was given to eat... those are poisonous haha!!! As a scientist, we know that the brighter the color of items, the more poisonous they'll be.  Yikes!