Air Dates: July 27th to September 14th on NHK
Shows were on 11:30 pm Saturday nights, 28 minutes an episode and subs by HPriest
Main Cast:
Yuki Sakurai as Mana Endo.... 30 year OL who stumbled into the world of Idol groups
Seminosuke Murasugi as Takafumi Shiiba.... Sunny Side Up group's lawyer
Yoshihiko Hosoda as Hiromu Azusawa.... Group's co-manager(?) and a huge otaku
Yu Sawabe as Minoru Shogoin.... Police detective who interviews Yuki
Hideyuki Kasahara as Masaru Urita.... Group fan but overly obsessed with Hana
Sunny Side Up Idol group
Sei Shiraishi as Hana Kurimoto.... Untalented waana-be Idol who Yuki befriends
Ruka Matsuda as Karin Hara.... Group's leader
Akari Matsukawa as Shiori Mugita
Shuri Tanaka as Rinrei Nasu
Jun Amaki as Noriko Tomaji
This is the second batch of four recaps which will finish off this eight episode series. Would help if you read some of the first four as I'm not going to be rehashing what's taken place up until now. But briefly the story revolves around an up and coming idol group named Sunny Side Up. They're not overly popular at the moment but do have some rabid fans or Oshis which is a word you'll be seeing often. One night the main star who is Mana happened to catch a group performance and since then has become a huge fan of the group and before knew zero about the idol world. She's a thirty year successful OL while the group is made of five gals between eighteen to twenty.
Her main oshi in Sunny Side Up has been Hana who she's helped out quite a bit. The story takes place in the Summer of 2018 but the tale is being related by Mana in present time or this Summer. She's being questioned by a detective as it appears she's pushed a man named Urita off a roof. He was a huge fan of the group but specifically Hana who he obsessed over, for now we don't know what led up to the event. Many other things have taken place which is why it may be a good idea to read the first four recaps but in a nutshell that's where the story stands heading into episode five.
Starting this recap off fresh so shouldn't be as scatterbrained as I was for the ending of the previous post. Where we stand is that Karin and Rinrei have put the sordid feelings they feel for each other aside and for now Sunny Side Up will remain as a group. Their popularity is increasing a bit too as they've just done a CM for an egg company but most of the attention began off with Mana and you can see some of that in the above screenshots.
The date Mana is narrating the story to the detective Shogoin is June 30th, the above and below events took place during April. For now Shogoin had informed Mana that the crazed Hana oshi Urita had woken up from his accident, one where he had been pushed from a balcony with Mana being questioned on what really took place. Good thing Urita had arisen or as Shogoin said Mana could have been charged with murder. What he also brought up during their questioning dealt with Mana's outside activity or to be more precise how she had ended up making so much money.
In that second to bottom screenshot we can see Mana hosting her own sexy web show which Shogoin referred to as IT prostitution. Mana had started that side gig in episode four to raise money to get Sunny Side Up chosen for an important Idol festival which worked. Thought she stopped that activity after the festival but it appears that didn't happen, she should have been making enough money as she had a very good position at an insurance company. Her web show is called 'Mai's Room' which she seems to have named after one of her best friends who we can see above.
And Mai is right about Mana's life and why she needs so much extra money. Though she didn't want to admit it Mana has become a full fledged Otaku and has been spending thousands of dollars each month on Sunny Side Up CD's, posters, concert tickets, etc. To pay for all of that she continued her web show and also some of the cash she raised was given to Hana who couldn't work part time and remain a group member. Mai happened to find the site by accident and was furious with Mana using her name for the show which had become extremely popular.
Slightly longer intro segment to begin off but so much more takes place in this and the next episode, so much you wouldn't think it was a 28+ minute show. Mai had tried talking some reason into Mana for didn't she know Hana was only using her to obtain money? And lots of it too as even Mana began wondering if she was just a cash machine in Hana's eyes. That talk from Mai though did eventually hit home with Mana who agreed to stop her Otaku ways and the web show, if she didn't Mai had threatened to report Mana to their company's supervisors. So for now Mana had stopped appearing at Sunny Side Up shows but as you can see above did attend one performance, it was to have a very serious talk with Hana about Mana's discoveries. Mana had also threw away all of Sunny Side Up posters, CD's and such, she had quite a huge collection of merchandise.
Mana had been doing a bit of investigating about Hana as some things didn't appear as they should have. For instance when Hana went to a hospital for exhaustion a few episodes ago she still hosted her mini web show from her hospital room. But examining the video a bit closer Mana had discovered the show didn't take place at the hospital but instead from her apartment. Plus Mana had found an old picture of Hana with a classmate with there being a caption saying Hana had bullied the girl. Few other things didn't add up about Hana's past for Mana including her relationship with Urita as was it Hana who had baited him in and he wasn't as bad as others thought? All of these incidents truly led Mana to believe that she definitely was a cash machine in Hana's eyes and she went to a show to confront her about the situation.
The two began a bit of a chat but before Mana could get into her accusations another woman barged in front of Mana with some startling news. That woman is in the above screenshot and she's the mother of the girl Mana had discovered a picture of with Hana, the one that said she was bullying the girl. That caption turned out to be true as the mother said her daughter Kyoko had slit her wrists because of Hana's bullying and for two years hasn't left their house. She went on a rampage for a while as all of the fans stood dazed on hearing those accusations. It was also learned then that Hana wasn't her real name and the mother was screaming about how could Hana pretend to be such an innocent Idol after what she had done to her daughter?
The mother eventually left but it wasn't the end of Hana being pressured. Mana immediately moved in and told Hana about all of the other discoveries she had made about her pre-Idol days. During this time Hana was silent about the accusations as she knew what Mana was saying was true. The other Sunny Side Up members along with their fans had heard every word and could it be long until Hana's days as an Idol are finished?
The status of Hana and Sunny Side Up will remain unknown until the next recap but with the group already overcoming one disbandment crisis could they weather another one? Least now Mana's life has gotten back to normal or at least she's shed her Otaku ways. She admitted everything to her friend Mai and Mana just couldn't believe how badly she was fooled by Hana, to her now all of Hana's actions were pre-calculated such as her clumsiness and perhaps passing out on stage. But deep down it felt as though Mana still harbored some good feelings for Hana even though she had been used so badly. As she was talking to the detective Shogoin it seemed Mana wanted to attend the group's final concert more than anything.
That performance was to take place on June 30th, the day Mana is talking to the detective as the above events had happened back in April. But in the present time it seemed Mana was about to admit to pushing Urita over a balcony even though he won't tell the police it was Mana that did the deed. With that minor confession this sixth episode came to it's close and a bit of what happened to Urita gets shown in the next recap but actually it may make things more complicated.
Still need to do a post or two for Yuki who I've really come to like so much, she plays the lead character of Mana. Have seen her in two other dramas but this is the first time she's had the lead role in a show and to me she looks quite good. Will work on that once these recaps are done and the final two are below this one. Don't know what takes place in the final show but the next episode is the most intense of any of them, seems every show has gotten a tad more serious as the series goes on.
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