This post is inspired by Booya’s recent post on Team Medical Dragon tv series. I was replying to his recent reply to my comment and figure I might as well make an actual post about j-drama recommendations because I got overboard with the info-dump of a reply that will really kill his post’s comments XD;;;

Genre : Medical, Human Drama, OMFG Can’t-the-Bastard-Die-Already?!
Team Medical Dragon : I am a fan on the manga and thus was kind of wary about how it’ll translate on screen. Because it’s a manga certain level of excessive dramatic expressions are expected. And it made the manga an AWESOME read. The mangaka makes performing surgery as the next most badass thing EVER. So how will it turn out in a live action adaptation? Will the tv production crew keep the awesome dramatics and NOT make it … y’know, cheesey?

Team Medical Dragon tv series took it all up, did all that and managed to still manage to make you bite your fingernails watching it. Kudos to the screen-writers who managed to adapt the manga to tv series wonderfully, compressing many many manga chapters into a 11 episodes series that stays quite true to the original source ( as for the changes, I happened to like them a lot too )

The synopsis in block

Ryutaro Asada is enjoying his peaceful life in the countryside, when he is visited by Akira Kato, assistant professor of the Faculty of Cardiac Surgery at Meishin University Medical Hospital.

Ryutaro is a genius surgeon who used to lead “Team Medical Dragon,” a world-class NGO medical team. In harsh environments that lacked medicine and electricity, Ryutaro witnessed many lives pass away. At the same time, he saved many other lives, helping his matchless skill overwhelm other doctors.

As a female doctor, Akira managed to become an assistant professor. She has ambitions to be promoted to professor by succeeding in a surgery using the Batista technique; an extremely difficult type of heart surgery and also by writing a paper on it. A year ago, Akira witnessed Ryutaro’s skills when he was an NGO doctor. That’s why she recruits him and asks him to use the Batista technique. Since Ryutaro’s arrival, urgent patients who would have been abandoned in the past, are miraculously saved by the “hands of God.” –Fuji TV

Booya had posted a nice review on this series over at his blog ( from a non-jdrama watching person POV ) so I won’t say more of it.

So he asked me to recommend some other j-dramas that has [quote] weird mix of stuff [unquote]. And because I *like* inflicting these on unsuspecting people sharing, here is a giant of a post. Because I care. Really

MADHATTER’S TOP 3 FAVOURITE J-DRAMA LIST!

In no particular order actually because I loved all these three for different reasons.

Genre : Crime/Investigation, Kuryuu Kohei : Ace Prosecutor
Hero : This is one series that I followed faithfully and squee in fangirly happiness every single time they announced something new from it ( Not many to be honest, but it makes it more precious ).

The series spanned a 11 episodes series, a 2 hours special ( which takes place 5 years after the original series ended / same timeline as the year the drama series were produced ) and a movie early this year ( with the same cast as the original tv series and takes place AFTER the special episode ). 7 years since the original series started. And I still love it so much. Plus, the relationship-non-relationship between Kuryuu and Amamiya teased the shippers ( read : ME ) for YEARS. SEVEN DAMNED YEARS. Whoever who wrote the series, is brilliantly evil ;3;

Kohei Kuryu is a former juvenile delinquent who drops out of junior high and goes on to earn a high school equivalency diploma. After passing the law board exams, Kuryu becomes a prosecutor. Not your typical prosecutor, which is quickly seen through the clothes that he wears, Kuryu possesses quick instincts and a kind of cleverness that only someone raised on the streets could have.

Although earning a reputation as a bad apple, the influence from Kuryu’s strong pursuit of justice slowly begins to change things around him. - Fuji TV

Miles Edgesworth will totally cringe at the sight of Kuryuu

The OST for the series is done by Hattori Takayuki; one of my favourite in the j-drama scene and THE main theme for HERO still makes me feel the heart of the series the moment it starts after all these years. Totally teared up the moment it played in the finale of the whole Kuryuu saga in the movie ;3;

Genre : Human Drama (?! I dunno how to classify this tbh )
Antique Bakery : This is the series that sat on the throne of my list of “#1 Favourite-st J-Drama EVER!” for years until the little gem below took over in 2006. It’s quite hard to say what I love about this series. And I know my description is going to make it sound LAME but there’s beauty in every single characters and episodes in Antique that I can never really describe well.

This is a light-hearted series that takes an interesting look on the personalities of the 4 men with different backgrounds and motivations who ended up working together in a bakery. Every episode is stand alone and shows the interactions between the main characters and the customers that walks into Antique. Plus, there’s the quirky narrator that inject strange observations throughout the series in a type-writer-esque way really adds to the flavour of the whole show.

This story is about four men who work in a confectionary. Tachibana Keiichiro (Shiina Kippei) is the owner; Ono Yusuke (Fujiki Naohito) is the superb baker that has a mysterious and mesmerizing aura; Kobayakawa Chikage (Abe Hiroshi) is the waiter and close bodyguard of Tachibana; and last but not least is Kanda Eiji (Takizawa Hideaki), the ex-boxer who loves cake so much that he becomes a waiter at ‘Antique’. This is a refreshing, yet heartfelt comedy about the 4 very unique personalities that work until the wee hours of the night at the small confectionery. The series follows the romance, family life, and most importantly friendship that these 4 men from different generations experience. - J-Dorama.com

Ah, another notable thing about this series. Music used as theme and insert songs are all by Mr. Children. And on that reason alone, it’s pretty damned awesome \:D/ *adores Mr. Children*

Genre : Comedy, Music, Romance, ROTFLMAO
Nodame Cantabile : My favourite j-drama to date. A story centered on classical music and the musicians involved. With crazy manga treatment. You know all those dramatic actions, crazy eyed expression in manga? I never knew they can pull it in a live action series SO WELL ( not convinced? Just watch that trailer ). Loveable characters, GREAT music, hilarity all around.

Based on the hit comic book by Tomoko Ninomiya, this is a fun-filled quirky romantic story of two very opposite people.

Noda Megumi, or “Nodame” is a piano student at Momogaoka College of Music. An extremely talented pianist who wants to be a kindergarten teacher, she prefers playing by ear rather than reading the music score. She is messy and disorganized, takes baths several days apart and loves to eat, sometimes stealing her friend’s lunchbox when it is filled with delicacies.

Shinichi Chiaki, is Momogaoka’s top student. Born into a musical family, he is talented in piano and violin and has secret ambitions to become a conductor. An arrogant multi-lingual perfectionist who once lived abroad in the music capitals of the world as a young boy, he feels mired in Japan because of a childhood phobia. –Wikipedia

Add in a set of interestingly bizarre characters along the way, you’ll get a fun series that is Nodame Cantabile.

Description doesn’t do any justice to the tv series. It’s brilliant! It’s genius! It’s lol-tastic and full of good kind of crack! I loved it <3

Oh! The non-classical tracks here is done by Takayuki Hattori *see Hero* as well \:D/

Notable mentions of interesting series I picked up some time back :

Genre : Crime/Investigation, I-Wish-I-Paid-More-Attention-in-Classes, I Want Hot Physic Teacher Too
Galileo : Crime solving with eccentric genius physicist/university associate professor. What can I say? I do like crime solving/mystery genre. Pair off a handsome, self assured, high and mighty genius with a rookie and hot blooded cop who can’t help but to rely on the weird “Detective Galileo” resulted in many hilarious banters ( of course ) of two very different individuals facing the same problems in their own ways. And my ossan complex does help because I do adore Fukuyama Masaharu

Genre : Human Drama, Comedy, Supernatural, WTF Japan
Sexy Voice and Robo : .. is interesting. The rating is actually pretty pathetic from what I can see from drama wiki. The story is over the top and unbelievable in the manga-esque portrayal of characters and scenarios. But I’m a manga-fan and can take certain level of non-logic in my diet of stuff to read/watch.

Despite its’ strangeness I found Sexy Voice and Robo very powerful in the message they wanted to deliver. Sometimes the least expected character said some of the most profound thing about simple things in lives that people tends to overlook. It washed away the whole WTF-was-THAT-all-about feeling instantly. Not the regular staple of stuff you’ll go “Whoah AWESOME! Now I must get everyone else to watch this!”-series, but I had a fun ride with it.

And currently I’m guilty of indulging in watching this :

Genre : Wuxia, People-Flying-Here-and-There, Brotherhood, TBH-I-Started-This-Because-Hu Ge-Is-Innit
Legend of Condor Heroes : The 2008 mainland version of the infamous epic wuxia novel series by Jinyong in 50 episodes. What have I done? I usually stay far far away from any series that hit 20 episodes because I hate to dedicate myself to the time I’ll spend in front of the screen ORZ

And I totally need wikipedia to help me keep tabs of the characters involved. I get headache trying to know all of them from the first episode already. SO WHY AM I STILL PUSHING MYSELF AHEAD WITH THIS?

D: Don’t judge me. It has pretty people innit mmmkaaay? 胡歌哥 <3

To be fair, I love period Chinese drama because of the pretty costumes but wuxia stuff never really appealed to me because of the crazy quasi fantasy kung-fu going around. I loved stuff like Wong Fei Hong because it’s more down to earth. But still, I can see why this series remained hailed as one of the most famous Chinese novel after all these years ( This series had like … 3-4 different incarnations in tv series form in the past 20 years methink @_@ ) But eh, it had been fun so far? Is at episode 14 now

Tags: Antique, Galileo, HERO, Hu Ge, J-Drama, Legend of Condor Heroes, Nodame Cantabile, Team Medical Dragon