Air Dates: November 5, 1987 to February 18, 1988. There were a total of fifteen episodes which aired but it had been scheduled to have twenty but was cancelled due to poor ratings. It aired on Fuji-TV at 7:30 pm on Thursdays, originally it was planned on being the fourth "Sukeban Deka" series though the story/plot was very different from those shows.
Average rating: 7.12% Rating for this episode that aired on December 10, 1987: 8.4% which was a large increase from the past two shows.... Subs were done by Big Nova Subs who also have done a few other older series. An episode lasts for 25 1/2 minutes but the last two minutes are for the credits, think it was longish so fans could hear more of the theme song sung by A-Jari who were a true rock group and somewhat popular.
After taking a needed break from Japanese dramas this show signals my return, thought I would start out with a simple show but upon further reflection much more will take place than I thought. After viewing so many hundreds of dramas from Japan and Korea over the last fifteen years I was so burnt out with them which is why the longish break was needed. Hope I can get back into the swing of things and have so many series to recap, had almost all of the dramas before the break began. Won't be in any kind of hurry to finish many such as this one which is over 37 years old so what's a few more weeks?!
As mentioned in the beginning there's a total of fifteen episodes so will have five batches each containing three recaps which means there's two more after this one. Will leave this intro section here but will be making some changes to it along with many edits for the below character section, after two shows we haven't met everyone yet. That average rating of 7.12% doesn't seem too bad to me and what did they expect from a 7:30 pm show? Izumi also happens to be the first name of the main character and think it's just a coincidence, Izumi Igarashi was a somewhat popular actress and this was her first main role. At the time she had just turned nineteen in age, she was busy up until 2001 which was the year she got married and then retired, over 23 years later she never made a return to acting.
That's Izumi on the left above, she was one tough chick(!) but also had a very soft side to her plus was quite attractive. On the right side is Keiko Yuasa, will give some bio info on all below and at first her main objective was to.... see Izumi killed!!!! That never happened and near the end of the second show a slight friendship began. Most of the action will take place at the Harumi Academy High School and the surrounding area, Harumi is a region of Tokyo. This series began in November 1987, in the show it's also that time frame and to be more exact it was November 5th which was the date Izumi returned to Harumi after three years.... where did she disappear to? There will be many students in each episode but only the top three listed below are key characters, many will be coming and going plus at 23 minutes a show you can only have so many main characters. Wrote most of this up after viewing the first two shows, know there will be a lot of editing to the info as we go along plus a few more characters may be added in.
**** Briefly here's the storyline in a few sentences, it will be explained better in the recaps. Three years ago(late 1984) the 'heroine' Izumi Gojo was a fifteen year old delinquent who got into many scraps but for the most part didn't commit any crimes. One evening she got into a fight with her rival Reiko and beat her badly but the girl was living when Izumi departed. Coming out of the shadows was a man who finished the job as he strangled Reiko to death, unknown to all watching the fight and then murder had been a fourteen year old girl named Saori Saegusa. She knew that Izumi hadn't killed Reiko and that the unknown man had done the cruel deed but shortly before Saori could go to the police another man stopped the young girl. This man was also unknown, like the killer this man was a henchman for the evil R Agency organization and threatened to kill Saori unless she told the police it was Izumi who had slain Reiko!
Which Saori did so soon the police were after the young Izumi and cornered her on a pier. She held her own against a dozen officers but of course the numbers were too overwhelming for Izumi who jumped into the bay, the main detective Fujiwara presumed Izumi had drowned and it was case closed. **** Now it's three years later and Izumi has made her return to the Harumi area of Tokyo, where had she been for three years? When she jumped into the bay divers from R Agency rescued Izumi and for three years she was held captive by them. During that time Izumi was being trained to be the Ultimate Weapon for this evil organization, she had the code name of Prototype #1. In the first episode Izumi escaped from their compound, now her goal in life is to bring down R Agency who also secretly develop superweapons and to also find out why Saori fingered her for Reiko's murder. So that's most everything in a nutshell, more details and info are in the below character bios and of course in the recaps.
Izumi Igarashi as Izumi Gojo.... The main 'heroine' who is eighteen in age, she had been missing for three years and was presumed to be deceased. There will be a couple of main focuses of this series, where and why did Izumi disappear for three years, why/how has she returned and also a main part of the story will be of Izumi seeking revenge for what had been done to her those three years! Did talk about that just above and Izumi does have the nickname of Ice Doll as she appears to be a cold person but really wasn't. Izumi grew up alone as her parents died when she was ten in age but never moved into an orphanage and had lived on her own. One positive about Izumi being held prisoner is that she became such a ruthless fighter at the R Agency 'prison/training facility', now she'll use those skills they taught her to bring them down! Seeing as how I wrote this up after viewing just two shows sure more will be added in. It's now two episodes later, not much has changed save for the fact that Izumi has enrolled at Harumi Academy but will she be staying there? In episode six Izumi moved into her first ever apartment, after helping the detective Fujiwara out in a duel against a thug the local residents donated enough moolah to pay for a year's rent!!!!
Yumi Tsuchida as Keiko Yuasa.... President of Harumi Academy's student council, she too is a tough young woman though not in Izumi's class. For two shows Keiko couldn't strand the sight of Izumi and wanted to see her dead(!) but once the truth came out about Izumi being framed for Reiko's murder Keiko did begin to warm up to her, this will be another character where much more info will be added in. Yumi in real life is like the below character who had a very short show biz career as she retired at the age of twenty or two years after this show ended. In this series Keiko does have many cohorts who she bosses around but none seem to mind, the only two with any kind of screen time are named Mako and Shoko. Did learn in episode four the student council is called SSG but don't know yet what those initials stand for but there's little doubt there could be something sinister about the group. SSG stands for Shadow Student Government, we learned that in the sixth episode. They're an offshoot of the student council who try to maintain the peace in Harumi though very secretly.
Masami Katsuragawa as Saori Saegusa.... As far as I can tell this is her only acting role and has no Ja.wiki page so who is she? Don't know but even though we didn't see Saori until halfway through the second episode she is an important character and was the reason the police were hot on Izumi's tail three years ago! That's because in November 1984 Saori had secretly witnessed the brutal fight between Izumi and her bitter rival Reiko so knew Izumi wasn't the killer. However the R Agency forced Saori to tell the police Izumi was the killer and in episode two Saori finally was able to tell the true story to all, including the police. Saori has recently transferred to Harumi Academy from Tsukiura high school which was an elite school and mainly it was to get closer to Izumi whom she has a crush on! In the fourth show Saori got a part time job at Ken's Burger in Saki poolhall/diner, think it's because Izumi often goes there!
Takeyuki Yue as Ken Kuwabara.... Runs the pool hall/diner Burger in Saki, Ken is just eighteen in age but doesn't appear to be a student. As of now don't know who owns the pool hall which happens to be the hangout for many Harumi Academy high school students, especially Keiko and her cohorts. To me Ken seems like a decent young man and someone you can rely on.
Takeo Chii as Eiji Fujiwara.... Detective at the Harumi precinct in Tokyo, he mainly works in the Juvenile Division. Fujiwara was supposed top have a female partner named Moe Muto but haven't seen her through four shows. We did in the sixth episode but don't think we'll be seeing much of Moe who is one cutie! He was the main detective for Reiko's murder and had tried arresting Izumi but to no avail as she jumped into the Harumi bay. So Fujiwara naturally thought Izumi was dead and was shocked by her return, he was doubly shocked when he found out that Izumi was innocent after hearing Saori's tale. So over time he does become Izumi's ally and Fujiwara wondered if R Agency has a mole at his precinct for the file on Izumi had gone missing....
Takeo is an actor I know so well and he's one of my faves from the 1970's and 80's. Did recap his "Strada 5" drama last year but sadly. it was just so-so however not to be missed are the two 'Stray Cat Rock' films, all five in that series need to be viewed!!!! He was in many other films and dramas worth seeing, sadly he died in 2012 at the age of seventy.
Hiroyuki Watanabe as Rinichiro Ishizu.... The most known of the cast, Hiroyuki was a very busy actor up until 2022 when he passed away and was just 66 in age. In this series he's the president of Ishizu Industries which appears to be a legit company, what isn't legit is the organization he's a top exec at. Which is a very underground team called R Agency which develops superweapons(!) and were responsible for Izumi's three year disappearance. They were the group who saved her from the police in November 1984 but did some cruel things to her such as trying to make Izumi into their.... Ultimate Weapon! Not much is known so far about Ishizu and R Agency but know they will be very important to the story so will edit this section plus may add in another character if needed. Did learn in the fourth episode R Agency has been recruiting teens from all over Japan and have been training them to also be ruthless but according to Ishizu none is as skilled as Izumi is and most shows will deal with trying to recapture her.
Previous recaps
Do recommend reading a few of these and actually all as they are easy to breeze through plus it will help you follow the storylines so much better. In a way you could wait until I have finished recapping the entire series, go to the final post and start reading from the first link!
For each recap will also try to have a different video, there aren't too many but there could be enough for most posts. The one for today is another Izumi song which is titled "Escape", it's from her first album that came out in December 1987 and this tune has been played a few times in this drama. I think it's a decent tune though no classic, I actually prefer J-Pop tunes from the 1970's though mid 90's over the current ones from the last 10-15 years. The first screenshot below shows the air date and title of the episode, will have a new one for each recap.
One genre I have never watched is a Sukeban series though most are supposedly solid and I do know most of the main cast in them. Have just acquired the first regular Sukeban drama from 1985 which is the first of three in that series. There are others so if I enjoy this first season may end watching more of that genre and also it's offshoots. That won't be for a few weeks and will let you know what is up next though it's just my diehard readers or drama fans who read these recaps! The main storyline in this show is of Izumi getting revenge on the evil R Agency organization who had kidnapped and trained her for three years to be their Ultimate Weapon. Her first revenge mission was the last story but Izumi didn't make too much headway.... YET as we still have nine episodes to go after this one. Not much talk in this show about R Agency and as mentioned Takeo Chii playing the Harumi Juvenile Detective Euji Fujiwara had quite a bit of screen time in this show. Three years ago he had tried to arrest Izumi for a murder but it's been learned she had been framed, now Fujiwara is becoming an ally of Izumi who does respect him and so aren't some other Harumi Academy students.... but the main protagonist in this episode had zero respect for the forty year old detective and would love to see him dead!!!! That above screenshot isn't exactly a beautiful sight though Saori thought so and how Tokyo has grown in 37 years.
Did say in the intro section how the Juvenile Division detective at the Harumi PB Eiji Fujiwara finally got more screen time and he was the main story in this episode.. In the top two screenshots above we finally met his assistant Moe Muto who mainly works at a desk and is very tech savvy though of course computers in 1987 were so different than they are these days and they had such limited capabilities. However Moe is a whiz at them and has helped out Fujiwara so many times in the past but not with his present enigma. Which is finding out information about Izumi Gojo as two episodes ago Fujiwara discovered her file was gone from the Harumi PD archives room. Moe did a search for the entire Kanto region but even she couldn't find out where the file has disappeared to so my prediction could have come true. Which is that the R Agency has a mole at the Harumi precinct and wanted Izumi's past to remain a secret, Fujiwara also has an inkling about there being a mole at the station but why? Of course it's to keep what they did to Izumi a secret, in the first screenshot below is the R Agency exec Ishizu receiving a call that Moe had been trying to access Izumi's files! That thug in the bottom three screenshots above is named Tetsuji Saotome who has just been released from the Harumi Juvenile Center six months early where he was serving a three year sentence. Him and two mates that met Saotome upon his release are back in Harumi which is near Ginza and are causing havoc in the area with the reason being to draw Fujiwara out!
Saotome even attacked Ken's Burger in Saki pool hall/diner and it's when we learned what the initials SSG stand for. It's a group that Keiko runs and she's also the leader of the Harumi Academy student council, SSG is a small offshoot group of it. It stands for Shadow Student Government, Keiko and a few others try to keep the peace in Harumi by whatever means necessary. It's not affiliated with the high school and they do work in secret but some know about the group such as Saotome who had just threatened to badly hurt Keiko and her friends. Keiko had expected Izumi to jump into action and save her group from Saotome but she refused to for Izumi said she can't use her special powers/ability to stop a fight between punks! That word Punks incensed Keiko's SSG group to no end and Izumi was just going to kick back watching Saotome and his thugs create havoc around Harumi again? Just then walking into the Burger in Saki joint was Fujiwara and did that make Saotome's day! He immediately challenged Fujiwara to a duel which at first was declined and though Fujiwara is a tough detective think he realized he may be no match for Saotome who is so much tougher and younger. Fujiwara is forty in age and had been ribbed earlier by Moe for still being a detective but he does have many police fighting skills so told Saotome that their duel will be the next morning at a pier and what did Fujiwara have hidden up his sleeve?
But Fujiwara couldn't keep up this pace forever and it would be just a matter of time until Saotome got the upper hand. It appears Fujiwara may have set something up in advance which we didn't know about as he dashed over to Keiko and said it's now time to start your part time job! Which was of her, Ken and Saori trying to give Fujiwara a hand in his battle but those three were not much help. Can't say the same for Izumi who said she wouldn't try to defend punks but coming to the rescue of a helpful detective was a different matter and what a team they may make in the future. Fujiwara had been practicing the night before on throwing his handcuffs around an object, he was able to do that to one of Saotome's legs. Izumi is a master with that silver object she's holding above which has many uses, she was able to wrap it around Saotome's other leg and he was trapped like a rat! Fujiwara and Izumi then threw a few kicks and punches in for good measure to make sure Saotome couldn't escape, he didn't and was wheeled away in that casket his cohorts had brung for Fujiwara! So a happy ending for once to a show and guess Keiko had approached Fujiwara earlier about a part time job to help Izumi pay her rent. So that's one main reason Keiko was at the duel but her reward was just 3000 yen, only about $30 in 1987! However once the local merchants and residents heard of Izumi's heroic deed they all chipped in to help with her rent and she now has enough for a whole year! So that ends this recap and looking back on it seems all of the paragraphs were about the same size, medium length ones which I just can't make smaller. So far am really enjoying this drama and wonder why it had such low ratings when it aired back in late 1987, will be back in about four days with the next trio of recaps.
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