Hey... since i watch tons of drama, i wondered if anyone would be interested in a ranking / review of both language ease, and generally how good they are?

There's still plenty that i'm either not interested in, or haven't watched yet. And, obv it's just subjective opinions, so if anyone wants to rank some other ones, or disagrees with what i've said, i'l reedit this post to incorporate it... i'l also edit as i watch more, if i change my opinions. if it works well, we can do it again next season...

http://fansub.d-addicts.com/Jdrama_Fans … #Fall_2009

difficulty level: B, B/I, I, I/A is this ok?

Tokyo DOGS: I/A
http://wiki.d-addicts.com/Tokyo_DOGS
Genre: Crime & Police
Fast talking, and some difficult language. But, looks like a cool action show.

LIAR GAME 2: I/A
http://wiki.d-addicts.com/LIAR_GAME#Season_2
Genre: Maths, Logical, deception, mystery
I love liar game. Its one of my favorite shows. It is kind of difficult to keep up with if your trying to do maths and work out whats going to happen next while trying to understand all the explanations and language though.

Real Clothes：　I
http://wiki.d-addicts.com/Real_Clothes
Genre: Fashion, lifestyle
「つまらない服を着ているとつまらない人生になるわよ。」
Yeah. i've watched the 1st episode, and so far i really like it! the main girl is really funny. It might turn into the well used drab-girl-becomes-beauty-queen type storylines, but until then, i like it. The language is not tooo difficult but theres still plenty of hard stuff along with the easy stuff, and it's not as clear as some.

Gyne: I/A
http://wiki.d-addicts.com/Gyne
Genre: medical, gynacology
yup. there's women giving birth everywhere. There's also this female doctor who makes some... well... weird decisions. She is kind of socially deficient, but gets hurt badly for it. in english programs i can't stand birth scenes, but they do it relatively quietly in this show. I'm sure i'm missing a ton of subtelties to the storyline though, it's hard in places. There is medical terminology, but it's not too bad.

Shinya Shokudo: I
http://wiki.d-addicts.com/Shinya_Shokudo
Genre: Restaurant, character
i only watched half an episode of this, but if you like heavy stuff this might be for you.　Its about a restaurant where all sorts of people go at night.

Fumou Chitai: I/A
http://wiki.d-addicts.com/Fumo_Chitai
Genre: War, business
This is NOT your average air-headed japanese drama. It's pretty serious and seems well made and well written. For all of you that like serious stuff, or are interested in modern japanese history, it looks like a good show. I've marked it as I/A, but those of you who watch the news a lot, and have a lot of that kind of vocabulary will find it easier...

Bocho Mania 09: B/I
http://wiki.d-addicts.com/Bocho_Mania_09
Genre: Law
This is great if you want to learn some legal terminology while still being able to understand a lot of the language. It's a weird mix of funny / silly, and slightly unhappy. I only watched the 1st episode so far. Its about a guy who sits in on law courts.

Untouchable: I/A
http://wiki.d-addicts.com/Untouchable
Genre: journalism
ok, i've watched a few shows in the background now, and stuff don't have much of a clue what it's about. So, changed it to I/A.

Ohitorisama: B/I
http://wiki.d-addicts.com/Ohitorisama
Genre: School, teachers
all the language is extremely clearly enunciated, and mostly easy to follow along with. Its a decent show too. I guess it's about the herbivorous men and carnivorous women thing.

My Girl: B
http://wiki.d-addicts.com/My_Girl_%28TV_Asahi%29
Genre: Family, children
definately the easiest show i've watched this season so far, because most of the dialogue is with a 5 year old girl (who happens to be one of the cutest little girls ever! ；）). Its really sweet, but quite idealistic as well. A great show to start using subs2srs with.

0 Goushitsu no Kyaku: I/A
http://wiki.d-addicts.com/0_Goushitsu_no_Kyaku
Genre: Strange
These are 15 min episodes made by young film directors. I've only watched the first so far, and, it seems like a great show for improving understanding, because there is far more talking than action, so you can't work it out from whats going on.

Shokojo Seira: B/I - I
http://wiki.d-addicts.com/Shokojo_Seira
Genre: School, bullying, rich / poor
Quite easy to follow, reasonably watchable too, though the main character is totally pollyanna-like.　The language is pronounced very clearly again. It's about a girl at a private high school, so it's different from normal school dramas. She suddenly becomes poor and has to work as a maid.

Challenged: I
http://wiki.d-addicts.com/Challenged
Genre: School, teaching, blind man.
cheeeeeeese. If you love it, you might want to watch this. Its about how a teacher who went blind learns to teach again. Even the title makes me cringe slightly. But i might carry on watching it, it kinda sucks you in ；）

Jin: I/A
http://wiki.d-addicts.com/JIN

watashimo wrote:

Genre: Historical/Medical
Cast: Osawa Takao, Ayase Haruka, Nakatani Miki, Uchino Masaaki

Osawa Takao plays a surgeon who ends up in the Edo period without knowing why. He decides to stay true to his responsibility to save lives as a doctor and changes the course of history (performing surgeries/fighting cholera/...) while trying to find the reason for him being in Edo anno 1962.
Ayse Haruka plays his assistant and Uchino Masaaki as Sakamoto Ryouma is one of the highlights of the drama. If you like Iryu, you should like JIN.

Difficulty: Definitely not for beginners. I would rate it as I/A. The dialogue in here is not particularly difficult, but the medical terms and the various styles of Japanese used ("ancient" Japanese, Tosa-Ben, "Oiran-Japanese?) make it rather hard for a beginner to follow the dialogue.

I am so addicted to this drama now, thanks Watashimo!!

So... Is B the hardest or the easiest? I'm not sure how you are rating them...

bombpersons Wrote:So... Is B the hardest or the easiest? I'm not sure how you are rating them...

B stands for 'basic' I guess. I = 'intermediate' and A='advanced'

IceCream
Thanks for reviews. I'll be watching this thread as I haven't checked any dramas this year yet. Care to mention the cast, btw?

You haven`t watched JIN yet? I`d rate that one as my personal favourite so far.

Genre: Historical/Medical
Cast: Osawa Takao, Ayase Haruka, Nakatani Miki, Uchino Masaaki

Osawa Takao plays a surgeon who ends up in the Edo period without knowing why. He decides to stay true to his responsibility to save lives as a doctor and changes the course of history (performing surgeries/fighting cholera/...) while trying to find the reason for him being in Edo anno 1962.
Ayse Haruka plays his assistant and Uchino Masaaki as Sakamoto Ryouma is one of the highlights of the drama. If you like Iryu, you should like JIN.

Difficulty: Definitely not for beginners. I would rate it as I/A. The dialogue in here is not particularly difficult, but the medical terms and the various styles of Japanese used ("ancient" Japanese, Tosa-Ben, "Oiran-Japanese?) make it rather hard for a beginner to follow the dialogue.

My favorites this season are Samurai Highschool and Liar Game 2 (I loved the first season, so I was really excited to find out about this new one)

IceCream Wrote:iAurora: if you click the link to the fansub page, then click on whichever drama you're interested in, the wiki shows the cast and a better synopsis than i gave, along with some other information. I'm a bit too lazy to copy paste all that information here ;p

I didn't mean full cast for each show of course, just names worth mentioning if there are any at all. But now that I think about it, 'worth mentioning' is quite an abstract and subjective definition. Nevermind I'll be checking them myself. Thanks for links and reviews once again.

Tokyo Dogs, JIN, and Untouchable are my favorites so far (Untouchable only because I think Nakama Yukie is pretty funny). I've only been studying Japanese for a few months so most of the dialogue is unintelligible to me, but I can follow the stories and do pick up complete phrases every so often. I'm going to blow my brains out if I watch another jdrama about high school, so Samurai High School is out.

I think your ratings are quite fitting
I can't enjoy Liar Game or 東京DOGS without subs, but My Girl is failry easy to understand and I love having Japanese subs for all those dramas lately (*_*)v

I watched Liar Game season 1 about 2 years ago and I'm happy that there's a second season now! I also wanna go and watch the movie next year!


EDIT: Oh, and I'm sure you now about that wiki, but if you want to know a name of an actor or in which other dramas somebody appeared, then I rec this website: http://wiki.d-addicts.com (here's Tokyo DOGS e.g.: http://wiki.d-addicts.com/Tokyo_DOGS)

watashimo Wrote:You haven`t watched JIN yet? I`d rate that one as my personal favourite so far.

Genre: Historical/Medical
Cast: Osawa Takao, Ayase Haruka, Nakatani Miki, Uchino Masaaki

Osawa Takao plays a surgeon who ends up in the Edo period without knowing why. He decides to stay true to his responsibility to save lives as a doctor and changes the course of history (performing surgeries/fighting cholera/...) while trying to find the reason for him being in Edo anno 1962.
Ayse Haruka plays his assistant and Uchino Masaaki as Sakamoto Ryouma is one of the highlights of the drama. If you like Iryu, you should like JIN.

Difficulty: Definitely not for beginners. I would rate it as I/A. The dialogue in here is not particularly difficult, but the medical terms and the various styles of Japanese used ("ancient" Japanese, Tosa-Ben, "Oiran-Japanese?) make it rather hard for a beginner to follow the dialogue.

Omg this sounds so good. I couldn't care less bout difficulty. Anything close to Dae Jang Guem i want

@liosama

That show is surprisingly addictive. I usually get bored with and thus try to avoid historical dramas but this one got my attention.

@Icecream

You watch too much TV

Also, you could just post a link to the D-addict wiki, and let people browse it there. Save yourself a lot unnecessary typing.

Edit: Wasn't there already a show called My Girl?

Another good drama to watch this season might be "Fumo Chitai".

It's from the same author as "Karei Naru Ichizoku" and "Shiroi Kyoto", arguably
two of the best dramas to come out in the recent years.

kazelee Wrote:Edit: Wasn't there already a show called My Girl?

There was one called Oh! My Girl!! last year. Quite fun and easy to follow.

Slightly OT: Anyone know if they're going to do a second season of Galileo? I miss that show, despite the 2 films and Mr. Brain.

nest0r Wrote:Slightly OT: Anyone know if they're going to do a second season of Galileo? I miss that show, despite the 2 films and Mr. Brain.

You watched the Galileo TV special and also the movie that came afterwards, right?

I think the movie is supposed to be the end of the series and apparently it was really good.
The TV special leads into the movie. So definitely watch it first.

chamcham Wrote:

nest0r Wrote:Slightly OT: Anyone know if they're going to do a second season of Galileo? I miss that show, despite the 2 films and Mr. Brain.

You watched the Galileo TV special and also the movie that came afterwards, right?

I think the movie is supposed to be the end of the series and apparently it was really good.
The TV special leads into the movie. So definitely watch it first.

That's what I meant by 'despite the 2 films', the movie and the prequel special or whatever it was. I want 10 more episodes to continue the storyline! Movie wasn't that great, hope it wasn't the ending.

Just bumping to say thanks for this thread, the recommendations and the link to d-addicts. I'm still working through RTK so since I haven't done much with vocab and grammar yet I'm watching shows with subs for now. I did go back later and rewatch an episode of My Girl without subs as an experiment. I recognized a little more than I expected to but of course not enough to know what was happening. Still, cool stuff. Now I can't wait to get home and watch the next episode of Jin

Captain Kanjipants Wrote:Just bumping to say thanks for this thread, the recommendations and the link to d-addicts. I'm still working through RTK so since I haven't done much with vocab and grammar yet I'm watching shows with subs for now. I did go back later and rewatch an episode of My Girl without subs as an experiment. I recognized a little more than I expected to but of course not enough to know what was happening. Still, cool stuff. Now I can't wait to get home and watch the next episode of Jin

Just to let you know. All dramas started this season will come with perfect Japanese subtitles. That's because they've figured out how to automatically extract the Japanese subtitle/captions from the HD satellite feeds.

The great thing about drama scripts is that all of it is spoken dialogue by Japanese actors. So you can be almost 100% certain that you can use all the words in daily conversation.

You can use Openoffice to layout the subtitles nicely.

Here an example using the subtitles from episode 1 of Ohitorisama:
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=T3QYPE19

Wow, that's really cool! So when I followed the links in this thread what I found were torrents to the original raw video (with no subtitles) and then for each show there are a series of .srt files to go along with them to add in the English subs. Where do I find the Japanese subs? Is there a Japanese .srt somewhere? Is this the kind of thing you need to use the sub to srs program?

I won't really start sentence mining until I finish RtK (should be around Christmas) but it's good to know this stuff is out there.

*wishes bad things on the person who concocted the plot for Challenged*

Subtitles are here(scroll down to the section with Japanese subtitles):
http://www.d-addicts.com/forum/subtitles.php

List of Dramas for this season (Autumn 2009):
http://wiki.d-addicts.com/Currently_Airing_JDrama

For info on dramas and actors (use the search box on the left side of the page):
http://wiki.d-addicts.com

Thanks!

kazelee Wrote:*wishes bad things on the person who concocted the plot for Challenged*

can't be as bad as Fukunaga in the first season of LIAR GAME.
now that was the worst.

IceCream Wrote:

watashimo Wrote:If you like Iryu, you should like JIN.

because of this, im watching Iryu now. Its great ：D

does anyone know much about the hospital system in japan? Is it really as corrupt as this?!?!

dramawiki Wrote:This drama exposed the difficulties encountered in the rigid Japanese medical professions in treating patients whereby decisions made were based more on protecting the hospitals than the patients.

Iryu is hands down my favorite Japanese medical drama.

Although I still haven't seen "Shiroi Kyoto" (The Great White Tower).


There's even a reference to Shiroi Kyoto in the first episode of Iryu, when Asada is looking up at the building for the first time (when Dr. Kato says "Youkoso" and meets him outside).

I'm sure it's not just Japan. No matter what the country, it is all about money, power, and fame.

*currently watching last friends*

god that 宗佑 is a bastard.

mezbup Wrote:*currently watching last friends*

god that 宗佑 is a bastard.

... with cool shoes. Don't ever forget the shoes. They're his trademark.

That shows an excellent comedy. (sado)

chamcham Wrote:can't be as bad as Fukunaga in the first season of LIAR GAME.
now that was the worst.

Now I'm curious. I might give it a go for torture factor alone. (maso)

Quote:If you like Iryu, you should like JIN.

If you like JIN, you'll loathe... I mean, 'love' Godhand Teru. Now if only I could find Japanese subs for this 6 episode cacophony of a drama.

My personal recommendation: Othros Inu. It starts off with a rather interesting plot and... like Last Friends, goes nowhere with it. Even has some of the same actors in it (something peculiar going on there). As a result I just watch first 3 episodes over and over. Wait, we're recommending good shows, aren't we?

I started watching a series called きみはペット on pandoratv. I wonder how it will turn out.

I also have the first episode of Iryu (anyone noticing the common denominator yet ). I hope it turns out to be good.