Sean Akizuki's East Asian Drama and Movie Blog

With the ongoing proposal to ban Koreanovelas and the like from the Philippines and protect Pinoy garbage, one might really consider what's wrong with Pinoy Drama.  Here are some that I can name and what I can learn as I progress and learn from my mistakes as well: 1.) The protagonists tend to encourage rebellion and the idea that the poor are always oppressed and worth pitying even if it's not always true.  On the other hand, you might see in the Chinese, Japanese and Korean drama that though they may be blinded by revenge or rebellion at first, they do see through their mistakes and start to become better persons. 2.) The antagonists on the other hand seem to be very trim and proper, always rich and are always pictured with the misconception that wealth is evil (by the Pinoy leftists).  I was thinking that many of the protagonists are always pictured to be dignified villains all the time rather than a mix of different protagonists. 3.) Over-extension of the story...

Pacing is a very important part in writing drama.  Some shows do suffer from slow pacing like TV drama in the past from the Philippines tend to drag even for a year or two landing in no real ending.  Zaido may have been advertised as a TV drama but still, it was no excuse for its lame execution.  As said, there were good ideas but rather poor executions.  Now to see why pacing does matter. Kamen Rider as a Tokusatsu drama really required proper pacing.  During Kuuga, Naruhisa Arakawa and Toshiki Inoue were careful about the time pacing.  That is, okay maybe you don't see Yuusuke beat up a monster in the first episode but they were careful not to spin things around too much.  The whole way Kuuga did its pacing was pretty much the model to follow and improve for later Kamen Riders, that is provide some plot even if there are some plots that run around in circles like Faiz, you still get the right pacing.  Faiz despite its rather redundant pass ar...

Obviously Kamen Rider Kuuga should always be remembered by fans as that experimental show that was a huge success despite some shortcomings and what really triggered a revolution. I find Agito better than this successful experiment but it would be wrong not to give this show its credit. Now for the stuff that was tried on... by Naruhisa Arakawa the head writer (his first headwriting job was here), Toshiki Inoue as a sub-writer (but too bad he later faltered after the success of Agito) and producer Shigenori Takatera as an experiment that was done with utmost care with some mistakes to learn from. Just my thoughts on how the season itself was starting to write, "How should Kamen Rider be written" and can serve as a guide for newbie writers, in fact I feel like I need to rewatch this series: The way the hero handles through ALL of his forms. Unlike Black RX where the hero seems to learn things immediately, here the hero must learn to control the new power. While it's a...

I'd like to compare the styles of Inoue between Agito (which I like more) vs. Kiva (which I like less) but I will probably say where Inoue got it right and where he got it wrong in the otehr.  Not that Kiva is awful but could have been better only if Inoue managed to write better.  Now moving on ... The main hero: I would say that Tatsuya and Wataru have their own uniqueness although the latter is pretty weird.  For Tatsuya I enjoyed the part he was an amnesiac and how he got the Agito powers, for the case of Wataru I think there was a cool concept with how his story goes (like his half-Fangire revelation) but it just got too predictable or, since Kiva's a rainbow and teddy bear type of Kamen Rider, I shouldn't expect more compared to Agito which has a more serious side. Supporting characters: Inoue's supporting characters in Agito usually range from the jerks to the nice ones, they pretty much aren't too serious nor too dark.  For example, in Agito maybe H...

I was reading through Fantasy Leader's blog Valsag Fantasy to discover his gem of knowledge that lighter isn't always lesser, darker isn't always better.  So I would like to use this in reviews of TV Drama, Tokusatsu, etc. but I am writing it here and here are my thoughts... Example #1- Meteor Garden I vs. Meteor Garden II I remembered seeing both Meteor Garden I and II.  The first season was lighter and softer, the second season was really darker and edgier.  While Meteor Garden I had a moderate pacing, it pretty much was enjoyable (except for the arrival of Dao Ming Feng who sadly didn't have as much screen time as her Manga counterpart Doumyoji Kaede).  However when Meteor Garden II arrived, the pacing was SO SLOW, everything was SO GLOOMY, you're being kept to a thrill... and of course too many heartbreaks in one season.  Maybe I should mention there's a lot of USELESS scenes in Meteor Garden II like Papa and Mama get too much screen time, Yesha and Lei...