Kyou wa Kaisha Yasumimasu episodes 9-10

Well, let’s get this dumb drama out of the way. Kyou wa Kaisha Yasumimasu ended at episode 10, and boy was I glad to see the back of it. Even though I’d grumbled about the writing flaws and I knew Yu and Hanae wouldn’t be end game, I was still prepared to be okay with it overall so long as the drama wrapped things up decently. I wasn’t even against a Hanae-Yuto ending, just that they should start behaving like adults since we’re now into the final stretch. However, the drama couldn’t even do that basic thing and the ending was just epic logic fail. How that even happened, I don’t know and will never understand. As always, Tamaki Hiroshi remains the best thing about the drama.

I will just summarise the idiocy in the following points:

1) Yuto gives up his research dreams and proposes to Hanae because he “can’t make her wait”. This is beyond stupid because there are plenty of ways to work around the situation, but these two pea brains don’t even take the time to sit down and explore possible options and solutions. In the end, Yuto only has to go away to the US for a year for an exchange programme to get his research dreams back on track – how hard was it to figure out that solution?

2) Hanae is a moron for breaking up with Yuto, dragging Yu into the mess, and then running back to Yuto and asking if she can wait for him. This pretty much means she put Yuto through the wringer for nothing, made use of Yu who has feelings for her, and negated whatever growth she and Yuto experienced. She can’t take waiting three years for Yuto to finish school, and has no guts to call him an idiot for giving up his dreams just like that, but she can do a song and dance about her “dilemma” and hurt two people in the process, and then run back to Yuto when she realises it’ll only take a year for him to return? Bitch.

3) Yu’s proposal is swoon-worthy but rather out of character, because I never felt he’s the marrying kind. I wish the drama hadn’t resorted to cliches just to stir up some “tension” – it would have worked better had Hanae been genuinely torn between the two men and actually felt something for Yu, but since she doesn’t, there’s no point using such a cheap trick to make it seem as though Hanae would actually give Yu’s proposal serious consideration. This is doing Yu, the best character in the drama, a grave disservice.

4) Common sense obviously doesn’t exist for Hanae because she thinks she’ll remain alone forever after breaking up with Yuto (how long has she known this guy, again?), doesn’t realise she can buy a plane ticket to the US to visit Yuto, is surprised that lovers who are also like friends can actually make the relationship work, thinks her “sacrifice” of breaking up with Yuto is really noble… I could go on, but I’m afraid I’d lose what few brain cells I still have after enduring this stupidity.

5) Getting Yu involved in her lie is particularly annoying, and while Hanae is not scheming, she knows full well how Yu feels towards her and it’s really unfair to him make him do this – she’s just increasing the ill will that Yuto already has towards Yu. Fortunately, Yu is too gracious and gentlemanly to play Hanae’s stupid game, and immediately sets Yuto straight. He even helps Yuto reflect on what went wrong in the relationship. How much of a winner is Yu, again?

I’d felt somewhere around episode 6 that Hanae may not be the right woman for Yu, and the ending totally verifies it. In fact, I’d go so far as to say she does not deserve Yu at all, or even Yuto. I’ve not liked Yuto all drama but he was just beginning to grow a spine and some brains after that chat with Yu, and Hanae just has to go fuck things up again. I know some people found it romantic how Yuto admitted his sole purpose was to make Hanae happy for the relationship to continue, but to me this just shows he has no clue about anything. He pretty much assumed and swaned his way through the relationship thinking he’s right all the time, how is that romantic? So he’s welcome to Hanae, because she’s just an immature, brainless brat who, despite having so many people helping her, takes none of that advice on board and ends up back at square one (only she’s now got a boyfriend who’s equally pea brain).

I’m not even sore that Hanae rejected Yu’s proposal, because it’s the only thing she’s done right the whole drama. If she’d ended up with Yu, methinks she’d drive him nuts in no time because of how stupid she is. Even Yu’s supposedly infinite patience and good humour would snap. I’m just glad that Yu is focusing on his restaurant business, which looks to be thriving. At the very least, Yu is moving on with his life and new adventures – he didn’t stop after leaving Sapphirus and is not averse to risk-taking. One rejection is not the end of the world for Yu, and he’s just motivated to work even harder where it matters. Hanae could have benefited a lot from being with Yu, not least in the brain cells department, but since she prefers being stuck in her kiddy pool of idiocy, Yu can finally stop babysitting her.

The last two episodes just underlined how fantastic Yu is, so that’s a positive I’ll take away from this drama. Tamaki Hiroshi was superb throughout, whether it was showing how determined and confident Yu is in his ventures, or how sensitive and gentle he can be even when he’s the one being let down. It doesn’t change the fact that Tamaki was criminally under-utilised in this drama, because there’s definitely so much more he could have done had Yu been given more screentime. Still, Tamaki made such impressive use of his limited screentime that he pretty much overshadowed the bland Fukushi Sota. That’s how you make a role work, people! I love that there’s no mean streak in Yu, he helps Yuto and Hanae time and again even though he’s not obliged to, and he’s totally sincere about wanting Hanae to be happy. Yu is so awesome that even Ichika and her daughter Sayaka are impressed, and that takes some doing. Everything that Yu says makes perfect sense, and that’s rare for a drama character, much less a human being. I also like that Yu seems to have struck up a friendship with Oshiro (who likes Hanae too, sigh) towards the end, and I’m kind of glad because I’d grown to like Oshiro in the last few episodes.

I think Ayase Haruka did a great job as Hanae, but not even she could reverse the epic logic fail of Hanae going back to Yuto after the grief she put him through with the pointless break-up. At some point, Hanae’s squeamishness and five-year-old mentality towards just about everything stopped being likeable and relatable, and it’s through no fault of Ayase that Hanae turned out to be so moronic. Even Hotaru wasn’t so dumb. I still think it’s grossly wrong to get actors like Ayase and Tamaki only to put them in such a dumb drama. These two aren’t your average one-note bland-faced idols – give them a decent role and they can actually do wonders with it. So why the drama didn’t take advantage of their wonderful chemistry, I will never understand. Besides, there are younger actors who can act better than Fukushi, so that’s another casting fail. I also did not like Naka Riisa’s Hitomi, but even I could see that she’s a decent actress and towards the end Hitomi did gain a character boost that made her more likeable, so imagine how things could have improved overall if the writing had been sharper. Kagami and Hitomi getting together was cute, and although their progress was way too rushed (they ended up getting married, with a “bingo” moment, haha), it’s better for Hitomi this way. She would have been miserable with Yu since he doesn’t like her and she’d just spend her whole time trying to please him – this isn’t a tactic that will work on Yu.

There was a segment in episode 10 that does deserve highlighting: this is when Hanae wonders whether she would have fallen for Yu had he confessed first and surprised her with all the things Yuto did. So she imagines Yu doing the exact same things: the kabedon in the elevator, where he asks her to marry him; giving her the keys to both the restaurant and new house before hugging her; asking dad for Hanae’s hand in marriage and dad agreeing straightaway, saying he meant to marry Hanae to Yu in the first place, mom cooing that Asao Hanae is such a lovely name, and Yu addressing Hanae’s dad as “otosan”. It was hilarious and awesome, mostly because Tamaki clearly had a blast doing it and everything felt so right – this is the drama we all should have been watching. Alas, it’s only a figment of Hanae’s imagination.

Nevertheless, I leave you with the sexy Yu kabedon:

Hot damn! The next Tamaki drama can’t come sooner!

junny@11.53pm

P.S: Verde Palude is a pretty silly name for a restaurant.

• Ayase Haruka
• Fukushi Sota
• Kyou wa Kaisha Yasumimasu