"Abunai Deka" drama: Episode 25 of 51(!!!!) recap(season three, episode seven)

 

 Air Dates: October 5, 1986 until September 27,1987 on NTV, Sunday nights at 9:00 pm

Director: Toru Murakawa, this episode's rating was 19.9%

Subs were once again done by GEO9875, this was one huge project to do so will give a huge thumbs up for doing the subs and hope the recaps gives the series it's proper justice. 

Main Cast:  The first two get the most screen time by far but the other four main characters are also very key to this drama. The setting is the Minato Police Station in the Naka ward of Yokohama and the station is part of the Kanagawa prefectural police. If you enjoy J-Pop songs then this show has some superb tunes, most know I'm a fan but do prefer the music from the 80's. Plus there's no beating the hairdos of women from that era! This series also goes by the name of....

 Hiroshi Tachi as Toshiki Takayama.... You'll see him referred to as Taka often in the screenshots. He's about a 35 year old man who is an investigator of serious crimes and the gangsters go out of their way to avoid him! Takayama has a bit of a 'cool persona' about him and is an ace with guns, he's the partner of Oshita but seems they didn't start working closely together until the first episode. While both are aces with guns their methods also get them in hot water with their superiors but the pair usually come out on top at the end as far as solving cases go.

Kyohei Shibata as Yuji Oshita.... About the same age as Takayama but looks younger. During the first episode Oshita blurted out he's got a bit of a shady past and it surprised many he became a sergeant. He knows how to pick a lock and some other methods criminals use, sure we'll find out more as time goes on. Like his new partner Takayama he is quite adept using all guns, unlike his partner Oshita isn't much of a 'people person' as Takayama is the one who often interviews witnesses, criminals or others. 

Atsuko Asana as Kaoru Mayama.... Member of the Juvenile Division which shares the same office as the Investigative Unit which Takayama and Oshita are a part of. Karou has gone out to crime scenes with the detectives but they never let her get in on the real action. However she is a tough woman who used to be a regular officer and knows how to use a gun well.

Toru Nakamura as Toru Machida.... Not a rookie but hasn't been an inspector for all that long. Machida is the best fighter in the unit and also the women swoon over him but he does have a girlfriend which he said in the first show.... that may have been a lie.

Shizuo Chujo as Takuzo Kondo.... Chief of the Investigation Unit, smart man but seems to be more concerned on what he'll be having for lunch! But at one time Kondo was feared by the Yokohama gangsters and has been on the force for thirty years.

  In the third season the roles of Yoshi and Tanaka have become much larger, will add them in for season four. In the two screenshots below Yoshi is on the left, Tanaka is right next to him.

 

Previous recaps: There's 51 episodes but they were divided into six seasons, there was no break between them. Season one was episode one to nine, second season was ten through eighteen and this third will run from the nineteenth until the 27th episode. 

Episode one .... Episode two    Episode three .... Episode four .... Episode five

Episode six .... Episode seven .... Episode eight .... Episode nine .... Episode ten

Episode eleven .... Episode twelve .... Episode thirteen .... Episode fourteen

Episode fifteen .... Episode sixteen .... Episode seventeen .... Episode eighteen

Episode nineteen .... Episode twenty .... Episode twenty-one .... Episode twenty-two

Episode 23 .... Episode 24

 

 The 19.9% rating was the highest to date and why not as this was one superb episode. I've enjoyed every show and the writers did a terrific job as the stories have constantly been interesting plus always different. Huge twist in this show as one of the drama's heroes was arrested for.... MURDER! Who and what happened will be revealed though of course it was a setup. You will be hearing the term Soapland in the recap and also be seeing in a few of the screenshots. Checked out what it meant and originally it referred to a Bathhouse but the meaning changed over the years. While they're still known as bathhouses Soaplands are fronts for brothels and while illegal they keep popping up and of course are quite popular. We didn't see much of them in this show but they were mentioned often plus the main woman perp had worked at one, let's get to this episode's action.

 The last few shows have had some scenes of lightheartedness, not this episode which was intense from the first second. The show opened with the first two screenshots, Takayama had been at a hospital observing an emergency surgery which sadly wasn't successful. The victim was a night patrolman who had been smashed in the head in an alley the previous night with a pipe, it was so severe he couldn't be saved. The patrolman's revolver had been stolen after the beating and it took place in the Yamashita area of Yokohama where there's a huge park. Rumor had it a Soapland woman had been near the alley and hope you read the above intro which described them, the females are basically prostitutes. Oshita joined his partner Takayama at the hospital and both were musing why would a prostitute assault a cop? Shortly after the Minato precinct chief Kondo received a call, that's the older man above, that there had been a robbery at a local pharmacy. Takayama and Oshita were sent to the location where just 25,000 yen had been taken, that's not a large amount and was it the same woman as the night before? The pharmacist was hit over the head so was very groggy and at the time presumed that just the small amount of cash was taken but soon it was found out the crime wasn't about money.

 Oshita had an inkling on what Soapland woman may have committed the crime, her name was Maki Kitagawa and he paid her a visit. Oshita had arrested Maki once before but she swore up and down she had nothing to do with the robbery or cop killing which was the truth. Oshita didn't quite believe her and was trying to tell Kondo above he felt Maki was involved in these crimes. The name of the popular local Soapland club Maki worked at was called The Bee though of course the investigators couldn't enter it's main area. Across the street from the 'Brothel' was a upscale bar where Oshita and the younger detective Machida went to as the woman from The Bee would go there after work. It was a long wait for any woman to show up and during that time Oshita ended up quite drunk, don't know why he did it but Machida left the bar and what a mistake that was. An unknown woman soon entered the bar and picked up Oshita bringing him to a love motel!!!! Of course he was too blitzed to realize what was happening and as it turned out she had slipped sleeping pills into his drinks. When Oshita arose the next morning he had a hangover for the record books, when he entered the bathroom who should be there but Maki with.... a bullet in her head! That's the last two screenshots above and Oshita wondered how did she get there and what happened to the other woman? Plus where did this gun come from that had one bullet fired out of it?!

 In his hungover state Oshita did immediately call into the Minato precinct about the murder, luckily for him arriving first on the scene was his partner Takayama. The two went over what could have taken place that previous night, it's such a shame that Oshita was so drunk at the time for he could remember very little. The only thing was that the woman he had gone to a hotel room with had been wearing red shoes and from the way Oshita had been approached everything could have been planned out. So this woman who will soon be named shot Maki with her gun and put it into Oshita's coat pocket, not much to go on but soon things will fall into place. In that second screenshot above more Minato investigators arrived at the scene and said the pistol used on Maki was the same one that had been stolen from the murdered Yamashita officer two nights before, sound a bit confusing? Though there wasn't much evidence to go on you can see what Takayama told his partner Oshita in the third screenshot.... 'You're under arrest for murder!'. Takayama never believed Oshita played any part in Maki's murder nor did anyone else at the Minato station. But by keeping Oshita confined for a while Takayama and his mates could run a smoother investigation and soon the evidence began to pile up.

 Takayama discovered Maki had worked at The Bee Soapland/Brothel and that seemed like the most logical starting point. Takayama did pay a visit there and learned a bit about Maki, the key detail was that she had tried to steal away the boyfriend of another prostitute working there. Her name was Nana Yoshizawa who will soon be suspect #1 and the key culprit from here on out. Takayama paid a visit to her apartment but right at that moment Nana was leaving so he just followed her. Another key detail that Takayama noticed was the shoes Nana was wearing, red ones and were they the shoes that Oshita had mentioned? The tail on Nana led to a coffee shop, it was too early for Takayama to announce himself so just sat in a corner to observe Nana. Which lasted for hours and Takayama couldn't take the wait any more as he was probably running out of smokes, he lit up more in this show than any other episode. Takayama finally approached Nana saying he was from the Minato station but Nana wanted nothing to do with him there but said she would talk at the station. Just as she hit the front door of the coffee shop the man in the second to last screenshot above arrived, he will be an important figure. Outside of the shop Takayama had hailed a taxi and just when it's door opened he was clobbered from behind by that new man who fled the scene with Nana.

 Takayama did give chase but to no avail as the pair had too large of a head start, he did call into the Minato station to say put out an APB on Nana and that mysterious man and will reveal his identity shortly. The top two screenshots above are of the station chief Kondo and though it's not a huge role have enjoyed the character. He took the call from Takayama and right after that had a meeting with the pharmacy clerk Tanaka. He was also the store owner where 25,000 yen was stolen which isn't a large amount of cash, he had been bashed over the head and may have had a concussion for at first couldn't remember what exactly had taken place. After being discharged from the hospital Tanaka did a quick inventory to see if anything besides money was stolen, there was one other item. Which was 500 grams of Sodium Cyanide and that would be enough to kill three thousand people!!!! One other key note was that Tanaka could recall Nana being at his pharmacy with a man, first time the Minato police were aware of that. So a little more digging at The Bee brothel has discovered that Nana had a boyfriend named Akira Iwamoto, a photo of them is right above. Iwamoto and Nana have been gamblers, bad ones as they owe over a million yen and is that the main reason for stealing the Sodium Cyanide?

 Good chance of that and more about it very shortly. The murdered prostitute Maki had been slain by Nana for trying to steal Iwamoto away, it just so happened that the very drunk Oshita gave Nana an easy way out so it would appear someone else killed her. Now that Nana has been identified as the true murderer Oshita has been released and no one at the Minato station believed he was involved in any kind of crime. He's back on the case and so isn't Takayama whose beating wasn't too severe. He paid a visit to Nana's flat though of course she had fled and the cyanide was nowhere to be found there. That's Iwamoto in the third to last screenshot above, he's with Nana and we only heard a small portion of a conversation. Which was of him trying to blackmail 300 million yen off someone or else, does that else mean the cyanide will be used? It appears so as shortly after the Minato precinct received a few calls about cats and dogs dying along a street in Yokohama. Rushing to the scene was of course Takayama who has been reunited with his partner Oshita. What had taken place was that some pieces of chicken were thrown along a street, they were laced with the cyanide and of course the animals died very quickly. The area was right in front of a house that a Yokohama politician lived at, he swore up and down to the investigators he had no clue about what had taken place.

 Of course this man wasn't telling the entire truth and that's him in the first four screenshots above. His name was Ryuji Numata who indeed was a councilor for the area he lived in but also had a shady side to him. It was rumored that he owned a few of those Soapland/Brothels around Yokohama such as The Bee which is why Nana knew about him. Iwamoto had placed that earlier call to Numata and said to pay 300 million yen by 3:00 pm or else! Numata had no intentions of paying this blackmailer and the reason the animals were poisoned was to show him they meant business! While Takayama and Oshita were at his house Numata received another call from Nana and Iwamoto, he still said there was no way he would pay the 300 million yen! By now it was a few minutes after 3:00 pm, the deadline had passed and Iwamoto told Numata there will soon be blood on his hands as many residents of Yokohama will soon die! Iwamoto's plan was to put the remaining Sodium Cyanide into the city's water system, him and Nana were planning on doing that within a matter of minutes!!!!

 The finale to these shows are never that long as there's less than five minutes to go. The entire Minato PD rushed to the Yokohama Water Treatment Plant which was a huge area, of course the two heroes Takayama and Oshita picked the right building to enter.... there were only precious seconds left to save the city! Takayama went one way, Oshita another and he soon caught up with the culprits who were climbing some stairs. Oshita grappled a while with Iwamoto and came out on top, you can see Oshita gloating above and asked where's the Sodium Cyanide? That gloating was a bit too premature as on the level below Nana was standing next to a water pipe, in her hand was the bottle of cyanide and she was about to dump it's contents into that pipe! For the second show in a row we saw what kind of Ace marksman Takayama is for from over 200 feet away fired his pistol and knocked the bottle out of Nana's hands and it just crashed to the floor. So these terrorists/blackmailers were hauled away and with that the episode concluded, it was such an intense conclusion. This ended up being one of the best shows to date, the following post has the recap for the 26th episode and after that there's just one more to go in this third season.