Start Date: Wednesday, October 5th, airs at 10:00 pm on NTV Rating: 12.9%
Main Cast:
Satomi Ishihara as Etsuko Kono
Tsubasa Hinda as Toyoko Morio
Goro Kishitani as Naoto Takehara
Masaki Suda as Yukito Orihara
Munetaka Aoki as Hachiro Kaizuka
Noriko Eguchi as Rion Fujiiwa
Hiromasa Taguchi as Taisha Oda
Takeshi Kaga as Daisaku Hongo
Masato Wada as Mitsuo Yoneoka
Rika Adachi as Seshiru Imai
Kind of a late start recapping this series as episode four will be airing tomorrow. But there's a good reason for that as in a pleasant surprise this drama is going to be subbed, first episode was just done this weekend. Hopefully the whole series will be subbed as it seems as though it's going to be a really enjoyable show, had skimmed through the first two episodes but subs for me are really needed. First show was almost an hour long so let's get right to it.
Etsuko is a 28 year old unemployed wanna-be fashion magazine editor. For the seventh year in a row she's applied to the Keibonsha publishing company, six years in a row she's been turned down but until Etsuko has achieved her dream there's no stopping her. Looks likes it's going to be seven years in a row without a job offer from the company as they told her during the interview they weren't hiring any editors.
The company has many magazines but the one Etsuko wants to work for is Lassy, she's been a fan of that fashion mag since her high school days. Even though Etsuko shows so much spunk and knowledge during the interview it's another failure and she returns home though not too dejected. Not sure of what 'home' is for Etsuko, she lives above an oden shop owned by an older man named Oda. At first thought it was her father but it's not and seeing as how she hasn't been working unsure how she's paid her bills, perhaps working at the oden shop?
To Etsuko's surprise a few days later she gets a call from the Keibonsha company with a job offer! The title of the position wasn't mentioned but Etsuko naturally presumed it was to be aas n editor but to her dismay it was far from it. On her first day she goes to the main office on the fifth floor, a snickering OL tells her she'll be working in the basement office. Eventually Etsuko reaches the basement and meets her new boss Takehara. Will say now that he's an excellent boss, throughout this episode he stuck his neck out to save Etsuko with really no thanks from her.
Etsuko is stunned to learn that her position will be as a proofreader, she didn't even know there was such a job. It's not as easy as she thought as everything the company publishes has to be checked, they put out many magazines and books. What has to be checked is spelling, much harder in Japanese as the Kanji symbols can mean so many things, plus all other issues pertaining to grammar. It's tough going at first for Etsuko but she settles in a bit but still doesn't have the respect of the other proofreaders, there's around seven in the small office.
A huge opportunity arises for Etsuko as the famed writer Hingo is about to release his next book, all of his books sell at least a million copies. Etsuko convinced her boss Takehara to let her do the proofing for the book, she goes a bit overboard with her editing. A proofreader is just supposed to suggest what grammatical changes need to be made, Etsuko also says certain words and phrases need to be changed and she ends up having a heated argument with Hongo's editor at the company.
As you can see in the above middle screenshot there is a lot of talking about Kanji, not too intense but there have been a few points learned so far in the show. After making all of those edits which a proofreader isn't supposed to do Etsuko, along with the editor Kaizuka, are asked to meet with Hongo. To Kaizuka's dismay, he doesn't like Etsuko too much, Hongo tells them that the edits really helped and he wasn't aware of too much modern lingo.
Seemingly all of her changes were made but when Etsuko read Hongo's draft again there was one change not made and it had to deal with the Tappi bridge in Tachikawa. Hongo had spelled it as Tata in his book and wouldn't change it, Etsuko then headed to the bridge to figure out why. As she thought the correct name is Tappi, why would Hongo insist on having the name different? While in Tachikawa she stopped at a shop where she discovered a picture at least twenty years old of Hongo and his family, her curiosity almost cost her the proofreading job.
At the office she asked Hongo about the picture and the bridge's name, that really upset him quite a bit and he said he would never write another book for the company. Etsuko was later filled in on the details which was that Hongo had divorced his wife two decades prior and lost contact with his son. He still gets a bit upset about it and it's taboo to bring up the subject when he's around.
Etsuko pleads to meet with Hongo to apologize, they do have that meeting and everything gets soothed over fairly easily. Hongo realizes Etsuko didn't know about his past and he's also aware that even though she's just a proofreader she has a lot of talent in writing and fashion. Hongo will also keep releasing his books through the company and the one Etsuko proofread is released, even her changes remained intact.
That brings us to the final scene, least for this post. As Etsuko left the office shortly after that scene she was bumped to the ground by an unknown, not to us but to her, man named Yukito. He was just hired as Lassy magazines's first male model and it was love at first sight for Etsuko even though the whole scene lasted just twenty seconds. We didn't see much of Yukito but he will be playing a big role in the upcoming episodes as he may be Etsuko's new(first?) love interest even though she's 28 and he's as 22 year old college senior now male model.
Left a few things out, the main one is about Etsuko and her best friend from her high school days Toyoko. Have another post after this and will briefly talk about the pair but mainly Toyoko. Actually took so many screenshots for a change that a second post was going to be needed anyway. Promising start for this drama and am looking forward to the next show(s) so hopefully the subs will be done on them soon as I don't want to fall too far behind as the fourth show airs tomorrow.
