The person whose hand you are now holding, meeting them is like a miracle.

[piranha]

i shall just have to give up trying to write a rational review of nobuta wo produce, because really, all i can do is squee.

i want you all to watch it. i can't think of anything else right now about which i'd say that.

i am tearing up just thinking about it. and that's me; i don't tear up this way easily, this way that feels true, not manipulated. i usually resent it when television or film try to pull my heart strings. but this, this touches me where i live.

nobuta wo produce is a japanese television drama about ...

	shuuji (kamenashi kazuya). he's popular and easy-going, always joking around, helping people out, everyone's pal. except that nobody knows shuuji is a liar. shuuji has invented this version of himself in order to skate through high school without any true emotional investment. he doesn't actually care; it's all a game to him.
	akira (yamashita tomohisa). he's mostly shunned by his classmates, because he is weird, eccentric, with no sense for proper social interaction, touchy-feely in a culture that is anything but. even shuuji who gets along with everyone tells akira to get out of his face. (not that akira listens...)
	nobuta (horikita maki). she's sullen and silent, hiding behind a curtain of hair, shuffling through life hoping at best to be ignored. isolated and bullied mercilessly, nearly suicidal, she has given up on people.

nobuta becomes the new student in shuuji and akira's class, and after seeing her bullied, akira decides something needs to be done, and drags the initially unwilling shuuji into a plan to secretly "produce" nobuta: make her popular. shuuji accepts because hey, that's the biggest challenge he's had in a while, what a capital game.

nothing in this drama is quite as might be expected from that initial plot. there are so many ways this could be done badly; we've all seen them. but no, not here. it's brilliant. even if all the adults in the show are nuts. or maybe in part because? yeah, i think so; it's just now sinking in how much that is a metaphor, really. it's all about friendship, and how much it matters, how much it can change and enrich your life.

it makes me want to call everyone i've ever loved and tell them that i still love them today.

i got the paramour to watch it. and even the paramour cried. read the review.

watch it. like any good pimp, i'll help you by providing a taste in the f-locked post following this (f-locked just because i don't have the bandwidth to be eaten by random googlers), and a link to the rest of the episodes (there are 10). it'll appear about 4 hours from now (because *wah*, small upload pipeline). if you're reading my LJ, are now sold on watching it, but are not on my f-list, let me know here, and i'll give you access. there is also a good, active torrent out there (raws with soft subs), if you prefer that: http://d-addicts.net/torrents/nobuta%20wo%20produce.torrent.


yes, i know it's about friendship, and i am certainly not one who must turn everything sexual, and really, my favourite kind of slash isn't primarily even sexual, but mostly romantic. my kind of slash is the one where close friendship trumps everything else, where best friends end up in life partnerships. sex optional, really.

so don't let this turn you off if you're not into 20 year old gay boys, because you can totally watch it without looking at it that way. :) but oh man, this show is so very slashable, and the male leads are made of pure pretty. there are boys touching all the time! (not at all graphically, don't worry). i get such a kick out of het boy touching too, just because it's so damn rare. but i love, love, love the slash because it normalizes the gay and that makes me happy. furthermore, not only is it slashable, but it's totally possible to see it as polyamorous. heck, not only possible, i think it's canonical according to several pieces of dialogue.



*wibble*. so, so good in every which way. my heart-felt thanks go to bookshop for squeeing about it so exuberantly that i had to take notice. though i am not sure the paramour will thank her once japanese boyband pictures appear on the walls.

Comments

[swerved.livejournal.com]

Okay, you've sold me, I really want to see this. :)

[ritaxis.livejournal.com]

Is torrenting the only way to get it? Can I rent it on DVD or tape anywhere? This is so right up my alley. I too like the relationship most of all. Even when I do want visual erotica I don't care if parts are even in the scene: I want the people in reference to each other, and I don't care what parts they have, actually. It's that embrace or that posture or that contact, warm or cold, intimate or not, fluffy or kinky or whatever, but it's those people in reference to each other. (And not too many at a time -- not orgies and and not vast casts of characters -- though several is all right, if the relationships are all well worked out). I just realized I slipped back and forth from story to erotica a few times, but you get the point.

[pir-anha.livejournal.com]

only torrent or direct host download (to which i'll link in a bit). it's a very recent show, and i don't know if it is out on DVD yet in japan. even if, it'll only be in japanese and very unlikely to ever get officially translated or dubbed into english. (i will buy it if i can get ahold of a legal japanese copy just because this sort of thing should be supported.)

and *nod* about the story/erotica stuff. i've been looking at a lot of explicit manga recently, and for the most part it doesn't excite me unless i can care somewhat about the relationship between those people who're getting it on there. and as you said, it's not so much exactly what kind of relationship, but that there _is_ one. well, one i can believe.

[futabachan.livejournal.com]

It sounds kind of like Yamato Nadeshiko Shichi Henge, only not on acid.

[pir-anha.livejournal.com]

minus the nosebleeds. :)

seriously, while i actually like YNSH, this is lightyears beyond that. YNSH isn't quite fulfilling its promise, IMO; nabuto is surpassing it.

[bookshop.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry I haven't yet responded to your (very thoughtful and thorough!) post about Tenipuri yet - I need a bit more space where I can ramble just a bit more than I already have!

But in the meantime, this post is full of happiness. And. it makes me want to call everyone i've ever loved and tell them that i still love them today. This makes me smile - yours is I think the third reaction post I've read where someone has said this exact thing. It makes me happy because I said it in my reaction post too. It's so, so, so true.

[pir-anha.livejournal.com]

*smile*. i am still all glowy from watching episode 1 again, this time with the full ending. so, so glowy.

no hurry with the tenipiru rambling, though i love it. i watched through episode 27 today, and made screen caps. i am not utterly captivated yet, but i am no longer quite as annoyed as i was, so maybe it's growing on me like fungus; real slowly. :) besides, it's fun to concentrate on catching the small moments when tezuka watches ryoma, or vice versa, *snrk*. "i'll bring the balls" -- you can't be serious! that does _so_ not count!

[serenejournal.livejournal.com]

I have to get this. wtfpotatoes introduced me to some yaoi when she was here, and it was so very sweet and romantic.

[pir-anha.livejournal.com]

this isn't yaoi, though, nothing sexual happens at all. just warning you -- i think you will like the show though.

if you want tips for good yaoi, i am quickly becoming an expert source, *snrk*.

[serenejournal.livejournal.com]

:-) I am far more interested in the romantic stuff. And I really don't like anime, so that it's live-action is a huge plus. someotherguy found me the whole series on bittorrent. I am having some bad feelings about getting it that way, as I've never bittorrented something not in the public domain before.

[pir-anha.livejournal.com]

yeah, i understand about the torrenting -- as i said to lucy above, when i get ahold of the japanese DVD i'll buy it. just that there will probably never be a legal way to get an english translation because no commercial interest will make it, and that makes the torrenting less of an iffy issue for me -- if it's shown on public television channels, and a friend in japan could tape it for me, i don't feel particularly guilty about getting a copy via torrent.

[michaelsullivan.livejournal.com]

*snif*. Apparently I am not on your flist.

But I definitely want to see this show now. Especially after mayaknife's post.

[pir-anha.livejournal.com]

huh; i thought i added you when i noticed you had an LJ, but you were just not ever posting anything. d'oh.

anyway; that's been remedied. you should be able to see the locked post now.

[haircaspian.livejournal.com]

Yes I'm sold on watching it, and am not on your f-list. I'm wondering about how the Japanese boyband pictures come into it, but I'll take that risk.

[pir-anha.livejournal.com]

the japanese boyband pictures come into it because both the male leads are members of japanese boybands, and certain people on my flist have been pushing their music and pictures lately. :)

ok, so how do i get this to you; you've got no email address listed.

oh heck, i'll add you to the flist for now. please not to feel insulted if i remove you again in the next cleanup; i try to keep my flist as a pure reading list so i don't have to make and keep track of oodles of filters. it's not a reflection of my liking for people, just on how much time i have to read LJ and interact in some meaningful way with people.

do we know each other from somewhere else? you journal didn't give me any clues that clicked.

[haircaspian.livejournal.com]

I used to post a lot to soc.singles.moderated a while ago, possibly just as Caspian (that name was taken on lj and I didn't want to use my full name). It's been a long time though.