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mayoraaseiSince the realisation struck me that I shall be starting full time employment in less than a month and I will have sold my life, soul, brain, etc to the job, I thought I should do a few updates before my journal is left to abject abandonment.
Shall start this off with a list of my absolutest favourite young actors, actors for whom I could watch almost entire shows with disregard to its structural flaws. Actors who can act, or at least in the effort to do so, don't piss me off with their posturing or trying-too-hardness.
I have decided to forgo the thirty-up category because there are a lot of EXCELLENT actresses and actors from that age range, but I rarely watch their stories because they tend to choose darker and sometimes more abstract materials.
Toda Erika | 戸田恵梨香
Highlights: SPEC (middle), Code Blue (right), Ryuusei no Kizuna
Low lights: Nobuta wo Produce, Taisetsuna Koto wa Subete Kimi ga Oshietekureta (the biggest mouthful of a name in Gekku history)
Others: Liar Game, BOSS (left), Tatta hitotsu no koi, Engine
I first saw this girl leap ecstatically onto Kimura's back in Engine and I think I adored her ever since. She was an unusual choice for Misa Misa in Death Note, and then Shuuji's much maligned girlfriend both in terms of plot and character in Nobuta wo Produce. After a series of unremarkable side roles and cameos in various dramas, she really shone in Code Blue, making an ambitious (aka bitchy) character complex and sympathetic and totally stealing the scene from the much weaker Aragaki Yui.
Although she does well as the perky innocent girl, what really sets her apart from many actresses her age is her ability to take on more unusual characters convincingly. Young Japanese actresses have the frustratingly limited range between "cute and innocent" and "absolutely bloody useless". Whether it is the aggressive resident doctor of Code Blue, or the anti-social police researcher in BOSS, or the utterly hypomanic detective in SPEC, or back in any stock standard sweet Japanese girl role, she's able to genuinely immerse in her character. This has brought her some very interesting roles and I hope she continues choosing excellent stories.
Ueno Juri | 上野樹里
Highlights: Nodame Cantabile (left), Last Friends (right)
Low lights: Sunao ni Narenakute (middle)
Others: Jodan janai, Gou, Engine
Out of the bunch of kids in Engine, Ueno Juri and Toda Erika are the only two to consistently perform highly in the acting world. Kaho's acting was as atrocious back then as it is now. Arioka Daiki was actually better back then, and Nakajima Yuto is still as awkward.
Again I first knew her from Engine as the no-nonsense oldest child in the foster home. She followed that up with another overbearingly sensible turn in Kame's version of Kindaichi, further cementing her image in my mind of being someone who can carry firm, practical roles.
Then she turned all that onto its head in a surprising casting as the now infamous Nodame, squawking and eye-flipping her way through the series without any reservations. She succeeded that with another character renewal as the memorable Ruka in Last Friends, a completely twisted drama full of WTFery and screaming plot devices, but which flew on the excellent acting from its cast...except Masami, of course.
Unfortunately, just before she could prove herself to be the most versatile actress of her age range, she crashed and burned with the wimpy Sunao ni Narenakute, which somehow sank despite some excellent cast members. I hope she's learned her lesson and she'll go back to roles that are as fearless and headstrong as she is, supposedly, in real life.
She's ranked second simply because there's more bad rumours about her personality than Erika XD
Yoshitaka Yuriko | 吉高由里子
Highlights: Tokyo Dogs, Watashi ga Ren'ai Dekinai Riyuu (middle)
Low lights: Love Shuffle (right)
Others: Gantz (left), Mioka, Shiroi Haru
I know a lot of people adored Love Shuffle and may have even begun liking her since then, but for me that drama ruined my impression of a number of actors, not least of all starting with Tamaki Hiroshi and working my way down the list. It was the first time I saw Yoshitaka, sporting a haircut almost exactly like Toda Erika's in Liar Game and a face that reminded me creepily of Ueno Juri in some scenes and a fox in others. Her turn as the schizotypal and suicidal Kairi was rather flat and irksome...something just did not match up with her character.
She was rather mundane at the beginning of Tokyo Dogs but by then my opinion of her had improved a little because she was so unfazed and cheerful on a huge variety show full of venerable guests. The turning point came in one scene in the latter half of Tokyo Dogs, when the guy who promised to protect her was unable to do so, and the way her smile vanished into sharp disappointment and betrayal was so brilliantly portrayed that she shot up on my rank of actresses to watch.
She hadn't done much since then, but she was convincing, cute and not annoying as Tae-chan in Gantz. Her role in the currently screening Gekku Watashi ga Ren'ai Dekinai Riyuu was what put her on this list, though. In any other scriptwriter's hands, in any other actress's hands, Ogura Saki would have been a despicable character - a cynical girl who works in a cabaret, who keeps "friends with benefits", who stupidly sleeps with a man in hopes of getting a publishing job, who then goes on to fall in love with a married man and continue to maintain that relationship in spite of realising the moral crime in adultery. But she turned Saki into a very likeable character for whom you want happiness. She and Karina's anego-type girl make this drama work in spite of its many flaws and a weak supporting cast. I am looking forward to her next projects...especially the Bokura ga Ita movie with Toma.
Shall start this off with a list of my absolutest favourite young actors, actors for whom I could watch almost entire shows with disregard to its structural flaws. Actors who can act, or at least in the effort to do so, don't piss me off with their posturing or trying-too-hardness.
I have decided to forgo the thirty-up category because there are a lot of EXCELLENT actresses and actors from that age range, but I rarely watch their stories because they tend to choose darker and sometimes more abstract materials.
Toda Erika | 戸田恵梨香
Highlights: SPEC (middle), Code Blue (right), Ryuusei no Kizuna
Low lights: Nobuta wo Produce, Taisetsuna Koto wa Subete Kimi ga Oshietekureta (the biggest mouthful of a name in Gekku history)
Others: Liar Game, BOSS (left), Tatta hitotsu no koi, Engine
I first saw this girl leap ecstatically onto Kimura's back in Engine and I think I adored her ever since. She was an unusual choice for Misa Misa in Death Note, and then Shuuji's much maligned girlfriend both in terms of plot and character in Nobuta wo Produce. After a series of unremarkable side roles and cameos in various dramas, she really shone in Code Blue, making an ambitious (aka bitchy) character complex and sympathetic and totally stealing the scene from the much weaker Aragaki Yui.
Although she does well as the perky innocent girl, what really sets her apart from many actresses her age is her ability to take on more unusual characters convincingly. Young Japanese actresses have the frustratingly limited range between "cute and innocent" and "absolutely bloody useless". Whether it is the aggressive resident doctor of Code Blue, or the anti-social police researcher in BOSS, or the utterly hypomanic detective in SPEC, or back in any stock standard sweet Japanese girl role, she's able to genuinely immerse in her character. This has brought her some very interesting roles and I hope she continues choosing excellent stories.
Ueno Juri | 上野樹里
Highlights: Nodame Cantabile (left), Last Friends (right)
Low lights: Sunao ni Narenakute (middle)
Others: Jodan janai, Gou, Engine
Out of the bunch of kids in Engine, Ueno Juri and Toda Erika are the only two to consistently perform highly in the acting world. Kaho's acting was as atrocious back then as it is now. Arioka Daiki was actually better back then, and Nakajima Yuto is still as awkward.
Again I first knew her from Engine as the no-nonsense oldest child in the foster home. She followed that up with another overbearingly sensible turn in Kame's version of Kindaichi, further cementing her image in my mind of being someone who can carry firm, practical roles.
Then she turned all that onto its head in a surprising casting as the now infamous Nodame, squawking and eye-flipping her way through the series without any reservations. She succeeded that with another character renewal as the memorable Ruka in Last Friends, a completely twisted drama full of WTFery and screaming plot devices, but which flew on the excellent acting from its cast...except Masami, of course.
Unfortunately, just before she could prove herself to be the most versatile actress of her age range, she crashed and burned with the wimpy Sunao ni Narenakute, which somehow sank despite some excellent cast members. I hope she's learned her lesson and she'll go back to roles that are as fearless and headstrong as she is, supposedly, in real life.
She's ranked second simply because there's more bad rumours about her personality than Erika XD
Yoshitaka Yuriko | 吉高由里子
Highlights: Tokyo Dogs, Watashi ga Ren'ai Dekinai Riyuu (middle)
Low lights: Love Shuffle (right)
Others: Gantz (left), Mioka, Shiroi Haru
I know a lot of people adored Love Shuffle and may have even begun liking her since then, but for me that drama ruined my impression of a number of actors, not least of all starting with Tamaki Hiroshi and working my way down the list. It was the first time I saw Yoshitaka, sporting a haircut almost exactly like Toda Erika's in Liar Game and a face that reminded me creepily of Ueno Juri in some scenes and a fox in others. Her turn as the schizotypal and suicidal Kairi was rather flat and irksome...something just did not match up with her character.
She was rather mundane at the beginning of Tokyo Dogs but by then my opinion of her had improved a little because she was so unfazed and cheerful on a huge variety show full of venerable guests. The turning point came in one scene in the latter half of Tokyo Dogs, when the guy who promised to protect her was unable to do so, and the way her smile vanished into sharp disappointment and betrayal was so brilliantly portrayed that she shot up on my rank of actresses to watch.
She hadn't done much since then, but she was convincing, cute and not annoying as Tae-chan in Gantz. Her role in the currently screening Gekku Watashi ga Ren'ai Dekinai Riyuu was what put her on this list, though. In any other scriptwriter's hands, in any other actress's hands, Ogura Saki would have been a despicable character - a cynical girl who works in a cabaret, who keeps "friends with benefits", who stupidly sleeps with a man in hopes of getting a publishing job, who then goes on to fall in love with a married man and continue to maintain that relationship in spite of realising the moral crime in adultery. But she turned Saki into a very likeable character for whom you want happiness. She and Karina's anego-type girl make this drama work in spite of its many flaws and a weak supporting cast. I am looking forward to her next projects...especially the Bokura ga Ita movie with Toma.
