The Medical Hobbit

[calixa]

I finished watching both seasons of Iryu (sadface, no more medical dragon marathoning) so I watched the first episode of Code Blue because my soul yearns for more crack medicine drama. It's nowhere near as good as Iryu, but as pilot episodes go it was decent and I plan to keep watching. Sorry for all the comparisons, but I just finished one right before starting the other so it's hard not to compare.

Overall, It probably could have benefited from some editing to make the separate plotlines weave together more smoothly, or perhaps eschewed them in favour of a more cohesive "patient of the week" story involving all four rather than four different scenarios. There just wasn't enough time to give impact to any of the doctor-patient relationships, which is a big failure in this kind of drama. Hopefully the future episodes will focus on one at a time.

I think I must be the only person who enjoys Yamapi's hobbit-like obaasan hair. He plays Medical Hobbit exactly the same way he did Kurosaki but I think I prefer stoic trainee doctors to stoic conmen. Yamapi has the same wooden expression for everything, but it works very well for this role.

This is my first time watching Aragaki Yui in a main role and she is pretty cute. Right now it seems the otp will be Medical Hobbit/Aragaki Yui but you never know!

Erika Toda is doing so much better than I expected. Let's be honest - she may be adorable, but thus far hasn't done anything beyond 'cute/naive/dumb' and this is a big improvement. I find her cutesy characters a bit cardboard and forced but she's fairly natural in Code Blue. I was hoping she would be more of a bitch, to stretch her acting chops a bit more and because having two "nice girls" on the same team lacks contrast. The geeky intern is likable, too, if a bit grating with his "I'm the perky one!" deal. The characters are pretty generic.

DR. ASADA WOULD SAVE THE PATIENT AND THE ARM. Because he is that good. Medical Hobbit is no match for Medical Dragon, though I admire his calm fortitude in the face of emergency limb amputation.

Review of Iryu (both seasons) coming up next. IT WAS SO GOOD. I don't mean that in an ironic way, either.