"Boku dake ga 17 sai no sekai de" drama: Episode five recap

 Air Dates: February 20th to April 2, 2020 Thursdays at 11:00 pm on Abema-TV

English translation is roughly 'Only I am 17 years old'

Episodes are about 34 minutes in length, subtitles were done by Mich/Irozuku Subs

Link to the drama's Abema-TV site: https://abema.tv/video/title/90-1342

Main Cast: All are 24 in age as most of the action takes place in 2020 though there are many scenes from 2013 when they are seventeen, however Kota who should also be 24 years old is still seventeen...

Marie Iitoyo as Mei Konno... has recently returned to her hometown of Yagami after being fired from her temp job in Tokyo, she had such a crush on Kota when he passed away in 2013

Hayato Sano as Kota Sometani.... died on April 12, 2013 at the age of seventeen but has he just returned from the dead?

Kosei Yuki as Iori Ishikawa.... these top five characters were all high school friends who drifted apart after graduating, Iori is now a doctor at his father's hospital

Karen Otomo as Haruka Noda.... Mei's best friend and works at a beauty salon

Yutaro Watanabe as Ryuhei Yoshimura.... the fifth friend of the group who remained in Yagami and works at the train station

Kenta Hamano as Daiki Shindo... head priest at the local shrine

Yoshi as Naoki Shindo.... teen son of the priest who is in training at the shrine

Yoshihiko Hakada as Kazumi Akaike... the mayor, was he involved in Kota's death?

The drama is set in the city of Yagami in Nagano prefecture and the series was shot on location there. Another slower paced episode where not as much happened compared to the first two shows. But that doesn't mean it wasn't a fine watch because it was, this is just a down to earth, emotional series with no action. So far it's working and have a strong feeling the pace will pick up a bit though to date have enjoyed just about every minute of this drama.
 Have four more recaps in a row which will finish this eight episode series off. Still a bit slow paced but the intensity does pick up towards the end and continued in into the sixth episode which may have been the best so far. Really no cliffhangers to end off shows but in episode four Mei had met Iori after not seeing him for seven years and there's been some reasons why he's avoided all of his old friends. The main one is that he blames himself for Kota's death and blurted out in the third episode to Haruka he killed his old friend, not the exact truth which does get answered in the first two posts.

 To end off the previous recap Mei had brought a teen girl to the hospital after she was struck by a car but she ended up being fine. The hospital is run and owned by Iori's father, he himself is now a doctor but needs to pass one more test to become a full fledged one which will take place in two months. He was the attending physician and needless to say he was startled to see Mei after seven years, he tried to avoid talking with her but she dragged Iori to the hospital's roof. However not much was discussed as Iori is still feeling quite guilty about being a part of Kota's death but was it him who did the actual killing? That's what Mei's best friend Haruka told her that night, Mei is staying with her in Yagami until she can figure out what to do with her life which is currently is shambles.
 Part of  her life being in pieces is because she just broke up with her lover who happened to be married, also seeing Kota return from the dead has played a part in her life being in disarray. Haruka related the story Iori told her one night when he was drunk which is that he killed Kota. Mei said there's no way that could be possible and was a bit peeved at Haruka for even believing such a tale, soon Haruka changed her mind on what Iori told her and even apologized to him. The group of four had been trying desperately to get Iori to join them for a party or dinner which he's refused to attend, though her friend is innocent Mei can't understand why Iori has been avoiding their group.
 Being a doctor there's no way Iori could believe that Kota came back to life, even if you're not a doctor it's hard to fathom. But Iori had seen Kota one day on the street and knew he came by the hospital once to visit him. He couldn't keep hidden away forever so Iori finally made the trek to visit Kota at the Yazakura Shrine where he's been living. Though once again Iori couldn't say much to an old friend, in his mind could the reason Kota returned from the dead was to enact revenge on Iori? That's what he thinks and in a way it's true we'll soon learn, Kota may have come back to avenge the person responsible for his death though it wasn't Iori.

 While at the shrine Kota had invited Iori out to a small party with his old mates. Iori thought this may be the only chance he'll get to confess and apologize for what happened that day so he agreed. All of what you're about to read is what Iori told the group at the mini party. The day Kota died he was supposed to meet Mei under the special cherry blossom tree where if you confess your love under it you'll have eternal happiness. The meeting was scheduled for 5:00 pm, on his way there Kota had been intercepted by Iori who wanted to talk with him, he knew all about the impending love confession. Haruka didn't see their conversation but had seen Iori dragging his friend away which is why she thought all along Kota may have been the killer.
 At their mini pow-wow Iori told Kota that he too was in love with Mei yet like his friend had been too scared to tell her his true feelings. What Iori proposed was that the two of them have a bike race, they had done that before in the past to settle their differences. Kota agreed and the winner would be the one to meet Mei at the cherry blossom tree and confess his love. Iori managed to build a huge lead as Kota had been hindered by some road construction, Iori hit the finish line first in the race which was a few miles long. But Kota never showed up after such a long time, Iori became worried and went back through the race route looking for his friend. He did find Kota but it wasn't what Iori expected as his friend was lying at the bottom of a cliff dead!
 Iori raced down the slope but it was too late to save his friend Kota, in a panic Iori fled the scene and until relating these events to his friends he had kept it a secret for seven years. Kota still didn't remember the last few minutes of his life, everything else he does but not the accident which killed him. Needless to say the group was stunned at what Iori told them, he didn't stick around as he quickly apologized and fled the party. Just before the episode ended the following day Kota had a brief flashback on that fateful day and rushed to the place his death occurred. What he remembered was that during the race a car had come from the opposite way and almost hit Kota while he was riding his bike, could that incident be the true cause of his death?

 At 32 minutes this was the shortest episode but seemed much more happened. Despite a sluggish start this turned out to be an excellent episode and it's set itself up for a dramatic ending. Next show was even better as the intensity continued and a few more minor mysteries were answered, that recap is the next post.