Dakara Watashi wa Oshimashita drama: Episode five recap

 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.

 Huge bombshell ended off the last recap as the detective Shogoin announced to Mana that the final performance of Sunny Side Up will be beginning shortly. She's being questioned about Urita being pushed from a roof and there's just been an eyewitness who claims Mana was at the scene. Mana is still relating the events of the previous Summer when Sunny Side Up headlined a small but important Idol festival. The group still wasn't immensely popular but are slowly getting there but as Mana mentioned the signs were there for the group to disband.
 That bottom screenshot above is of the group's leader Karin who we don't see enough of but do this recap. In a flashback scene her main Oshi Hiromu was talking about when he first met her, often in screenshots you'll see his nickname which is Azuki that I'll use on occasion. At the time of their meeting Karin was a street singer and Azuki had helped her by preventing a pair of policemen from breaking up her small performance. Karin was going nowhere with her career so Azuki asked if she ever thought of becoming an Idol which had never crossed her mind.
 But Karin wanted to be any kind of popular singer and with a bit of guidance from Azuki eventually found herself in the new Idol group Sunny Side Up. From day one she was the group's leader and did most of the talking and introductions at their concerts. As mentioned it's now the Summer of 2018 and there are hints of friction within the group and mainly from Rinrei. She's a college student who had begun missing some practices and shows because of her school schedule which started to annoy the group but mainly Karin. But what made the situation even worse for Karin was at a photo shoot for the group shortly after Rinrei had missed another performance.

 At that photo shoot Karin was supposed to be the cover girl for a small Idol magazine but that changed as the people in charge now wanted Rinrei to be the cover girl. That infuriated Karin to no end but to her credit she kept her anger hidden and continued to put the group first. But that honor for Rinrei soon went to her head as at Sunny Side Up's next gig Rinrei jumped in before Karin could do the introductions and did them herself. Also instead of letting Karin sing the main song lines she did it herself which was an utter flop.
 At first it seemed as though Hana was the worst singer in the group but not so sure of that now after hearing Rinrei. She was beyond horrible as she sung the group's most popular tune and before long Karin just couldn't take it anymore as she grabbed the mic out of Rinrei's hands. This led to a fierce argument on stage between the pair which soon spilled over to the crowd after Rinrei pushed Karin hard to the ground. Rinrei had become much more popular after being on the cover of a mag and did let the attention go to her head but it also really increased her fan base who were fighting in the audience with the members other otas, an ota is a fan who has an oshi in a group.
 That incident appeared to spell the end of Sunny Side Up as the pair of fighters wouldn't talk to each other and shortly after Mana received a call from Hana that the group may disband. There's no way Mana could allow that as after her job the group was the most important thing in her life. Mana quickly tracked down Hana to help her patch things with Karin and Rinrei though Hana insisted she needed no help as it was a group matter. Sunny Side Up is also the most important thing in Hana's life as before joining the group she didn't belong to anything and had been bullied often growing up. She told Mana that for once in her life she would take charge of such a situation and headed back to the group's headquarters to patch things up.

 That get together was a failure for Hana though soon things may be back to normal. To make a short story even shorter eventually the gals did put their disbandment on hold for a while which was arranged by Azuki. Karin believed in him so much as it wasn't for him she would have never joined Sunny Side Up. For now Azuki was able to smooth out the rivalry between Karin and Rinrei though once a situation like that arises it's just a mater of time until a final breakup occurs.
 That concert event was quickly forgotten and soon the quintet are back on their rise in popularity, they even were chosen to do a CM for an egg company. That's where the episode came to it's close it a rather quick ending for the recap. Had written the first two segments a week ago and completely lost my mojo to finish things off though don't think anything was overlooked.

 Did wrap up things fairly fast but in all honesty 90% of what took place was described in the first two segments. When you go a week like I just did between writing a post up you can get a bit scatterbrained which happens to me often. This is the first of four recaps to finish off this eight episode series which I've truly enjoyed but not going to view the final show until the seventh recap is written up as not to spoil anything.

Dakara Watashi wa Oshimashita drama: Episode six recap

 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.