"Thus Spoke Rohan Kishibe" drama: Episode four of six, 'The Run'

 

 Air Dates: December 27th until December 29, 2021 on NHK at 10:00 pm

Subs were done by Leviathan at NYAA

Main Cast: Just the top two appear in every show and mainly Issei. The title says 'Episode four of six' as this could be considered a continuation of season one which aired a year ago.

Issei Takahashi as Rohan Kishibe.... Eccentric manga writer who is also extremely popular and we thought until the first show quite wealthy. Rohan works for Shumeisha Publishing and had gone through many editors until Kyoka was assigned to him a year ago. The biggest thing about Rohan is his special ability which is to put people intro a trance like state when he utters the words 'Heaven's Door'. That will make the person pass out and somehow their face becomes a book(!) with the incidents of their life. Rohan can make edits to that person's life but only for future events, you'll see plenty of screenshots of this unique and odd power.

Marie Iitoyo as Kyoka Izumi.... Works for Shumesha Publishing and a year ago became Rohan's editor, the only one not to leave him after a month. A smart yet daffy woman who seems more suited to be the editor of a fashion magazine and broke up with her boyfriend in season one.

Guest stars for this episode

Sho Kasamatsu as Yoma Hashimoto.... Struggling young actor/model who met Rohan at a gym. Yoma was told to beef up for his auditions by his agency but became too obsessed with working out which led to four deaths(!) and the fifth was almost Rohan!

Marin as Mika Hayamura.... Yoma's girlfriend and she's supporting him as it's her apartment plus she pays all of the bills. Things were going fine until his obsession to tone his body.

Links to the three recaps for the first season.

Episode one .... Episode two .... Episode three

 This mini series was subbed quickly and wish that happened more often! This mini drama is based upon the manga stories that ran in the issues of "JoJo's Bizarre Adventures" that started in 1997. Things don't follow the manga 100% but are close and the episodes are based upon the stories. The first three shows aired right after Christmas 2020 and must have been very popular to have another trio of episodes. Have only viewed this show so far but will probably watch the second before this is finished so may have to edit the info on the main two characters.

 Marie was the biggest reason for checking out the first season but even if she wasn't in it would have eventually viewed this mini series. It is just so odd yet also very interesting, would like to have seen more than three shows at a time but perhaps it works out better with just that amount. Not too much Marie in this first show but that's the way it was in the first season too but her role will be very key in the next two shows. These recaps will be longer than the ones I've been doing recently as an episode is close to fifty minutes long, let's get to this show which was titled "The Run".

 The town or city has never been mentioned but the location is a suburb of Tokyo and Rohan lives in a very unique and old fashioned house. But for how much longer(?) as it appears he's sold his large house but by the end of this show was still living in it. The reason for selling this valuable property is that Rohan needs much money quickly to purchase something else, of all things it's a mountain! In that first screenshot are the two real estate men selling the odd piece of land, their names were Nakamura and Masuda. Nakamura is the older of the two and he's prepared to take advantage of Rohan as he felt a manga artist would be naive on the ways of the real estate world. Not so as though Rohan rarely leaves his mansion he has other ways of learning about people and what's taking place in the world.

 That's by Rohan's very strange ability to turn a person's head into their biography, you can see that in the bottom screenshot. When Rohan looks at someone and says the words 'Heaven's Door' is when that person's head turns into a book, Rohan says how and why in the second to last screenshot. He was able to read the agent's current thoughts and read that the man was going to pull a fast one on Rohan by inflating the price of the mountain. Rohan can change that person's bio but only for future events so he made an edit where the agent would give him a fair price, looks like Rohan has bought his first mountain! The questions are though why would he need such a location and where is it plus is there anyone living there?

 Right after that scene is when we saw Marie but just for about five minutes and then not again until the end of the show. Rohan asked for an urgent meeting with her character Kyoka who is his editor, seems she's held that position for about a year now. They both work for Shumeisha Publishing and Kyoka was stunned at Rohan's request. He needs an advance from the company immediately as he's now in debt, to Kyoka how could such a wealthy and popular manga artist be flat broke? Rohan confessed that he's now the proud owner of a mountain and to raise the money he sold his one of a kind house plus most of his possessions. Rohan explained he was getting a bit stale in that large mansion and to create new manga stories a change of location was needed, but a mountain(?) mused Kyoka.

 We never did see the mountain or learn if Rohan was able to get that advance by the end of the episode but sure it'll be explained in the next recap. Being his editor Kyoka had also wanted info on Rohan's next story or manga series, seems this man can churn them out at such a rapid pace. So as the pair were heading back to Rohan's house he began to narrate his latest story and for the longest time we, along with Kyoka, wondered if it was true or just a work of fiction. At this point it became a dream sequence of Rohan telling his editor the story and actually this lasted about 35 of the show's 48 minutes. The main character in this tale was a young man named Yoma who is right above and in most of the upcoming screenshots. He'll get more time on air then Rohan during this story and Yoma is a struggling actor/model who has had little success but met Rohan one morning at a gym.

 When we first saw Yoma he was kind of a scrawny man and was sent to the gym by his manager to beef up his body. That's where he met Rohan and Yoma confessed he's not much into weight lifting and such as he much prefers running which he does every day and that could be why Yoma isn't too muscular. But over time that slowly changed as Yoma also began to work on his upper body and also became much more obsessed with running, Rohan had been noticing the change in his body which he did mention to his new 'fiend'. Yoma lived with a very cute woman named Mika who paid the rent and all of their bills as she thinks Yoma will someday be a star. Sadly it'll never happen and it's not just Yoma's body that was changing but also his brain. He began 'borrowing' money from Mika to pay for his obsessive training as he purchased new shoes, weights, protein food and much more.

 Rohan doesn't look it but in his narration of this story he's one buff man, perhaps he made himself look a bit better to Kyoka. He was challenged in a treadmill race by Yoma and Rohan actually beat him which wasn't too wise in a way as Rohan was realizing how much Yoma was changing. At first this training was to build him up a bit to look more fit at auditions but is now acting a thing of his past? Yoma was offered an audition for his best role ever but turned it down as it was during one of his running sessions! One other thing about this obsession is how impatient Yoma is if others 'interrupt' his training and we'll see how deadly those become. Mika's just about had it with Yoma and who could blame her, that next screenshot shows what he did to her apartment!!!! Right after that Mika said to leave forever, we didn't see what took place but that'll be revealed at the the end.

 Final segment, will try to make sure no important details are left out and don't want to reveal everything in case you want to view this series. Did this all in one sitting which is rare for me so have no clue what will be happening after this show, no clue to an extent. Yoma is no Hulk but has really turned into such a buff and tough man, also one that's becoming a bit of a bully. An evening or so later he ran into Rohan at the gym again and he's amazed at how bulked up Yoma has become. True a lot had to do with all that training but Rohan was wondering could there be some mysterious evil force behind everything? It was usually the busiest time of the day at the gym yet there was just the two of them, later on Rohan discovered that Yoma had blocked the entrance plus he was about to find two dead bodies courtesy of Yoma!

 A treadmill rematch is what Yoma is demanding, he's so in shape it didn't appear Rohan would have much of a chance to win again. But that he did thanks to a sly move and one that sent Yoma staggering to the ground. Rohan realized this would be his only chance so he quickly pointed at Yoma saying his chant 'Heaven's Door' which put Yoma into a trance and his face burst open to pages like a book! Rohan was trying to discover what made Yoma so obsessed with training but couldn't find a definite answer, that led him to think a Specter was behind everything. But to his fury Rohan read in the bio that Yoma had killed both his girlfriend Mika along with a deliveryman, that makes four deaths as he had killed two at the gym earlier that evening. So what took place in the final minute with Yoma was a bit confusing and there was no true outcome.

 He awoke and Rohan spoke to Yoma as if he was some sort of evil spirit which could have been true. After a few seconds of talking Yoma seemed to just disappear into thin air and even Rohan was a bit confused about what took place but it may not be the end of Yoma's story. That brought us to the end of Rohan relating that tale to Kyoka who didn't know if it was a real story or not, she tended to think it wasn't. That is until she checked the newspapers and discovered that the four people Rohan said were killed actually were. Two of the bodies were dumped at a site called Mutsu-kabe Hill and that leads me to think that's the mountain that Rohan has bought. So my prediction is the next episode will be of Rohan and his editor Kyoka heading to that mountain, that is the next post.