Bloody Monday ~Pandora's Box~ - Drama Review
I watched the first season too long ago
And I finished this season pretty recently
So I thought; Why not?
The first season was about a deadly virus known as Bloody X, which the bad guys were gunna implement on Monday, thus the plan was known as Bloody Monday. The second season is about nuclear weapons and I believe the final battle happens on Thursday. I'm not sure why Thursday; maybe the person putting the days and times up momentarily forgot the show was called Bloody MONDAY, and you can't just skip a couple days in this show; you just can't. The show itself aired on Saturday. For all these reasons, I'm not sure why it was still called Bloody MONDAY.
Oh well.
2 years after the Bloody Monday incident from the first season, Takagi Fujimaru is trying to make ends meet for him and his younger sister. Unable to get into college either because he couldn't or because he didn't want to, he works part time at a convienence store while his friends attend university. His shifts start bright and early, and run late into the night, exhusting him but he never lets his sister know how worn out he is for her sake. Third-i siezed his personal computer 2 years ago, and he had since allegedly given up hacking. He secretly has a whole extra apartment where he has a bazillion monitors and multiple computers and shuts down sites that promote blowing up Japan. Some new terrorists burst onto the scene via plane-trying-to-blow-up-Tokyo, and involve Takagi in more mishaps. The return of J and Orihara Maya bring questions as to what the new terrorists are after, and the Prime Minister is even involved this time. The new foe of Hornet the hacker also poses a threat to Takagi, much more so than Blue Bird last season. Kujou Otoya also gets a more prominate role, being the son of the PM and getting dragged into the mess by Orihara. The race to find out what 'Pandora's Box' contains is on, or so J says.
DramaWiki: Pandora's Box
Everyone from season 1 reprises their roles, except the people that died. That being said, Haru-chan returns as Takagi, although he's more serious around his friends and not as carefree anymore. Understandablly; the kid lost his friends and father last season. He tries his best to remain the same around his sister though, if only to reassure her that things are still okay. If one were to watch the seasons back-to-back, they wouldn't see much difference between first and second season acting, except some expections in the first episode as the actors try to get used to their characters again. Bloody Monday series is rather fast moving, and it's hard to point out specific scenes to poke at. Haru-chan does signifigantly less yelling in this season, and less running around too, totally proving Haru-chan's point that his character is completely useless without a computer, like he had said on Hanamaru xD'
Sato Takeru comes back as his old character, but this time his character actually does something! Hoorah! I'm not quite sure what help he is though. Orihara sets up Otoya to do some stuff, but that kinda gets forgotten after ************** geez it's hard to say anything about this series without giving it everything away >_>'' I thought this season would be a good chance to see Take-chan's awesome acting skills that Haru-chan's always talking about, but Otoya's such a closed character that it's hard to get anything out of him. *headdesk* In any case though, he gets set up to be a very important character, and then doesn't really do anything in the end. Kinda disappointing.
There's too many characters and too much risk of spoiling something to continue with them. =\
As far as the plot went, these terrorists weren't as tricky as 1st seasons. If I were to compare it to 1st season with everything, I'd say 2nd season was what American's do - They hype it up like it'll be a big deal, but then it doesn't live up to 1st season's expectations. Although it was fun and suspenceful, it wasn't as... POW~! effect as the 1st. The 1st had a bunch of twists that makes me to OH WHOA NO WAY~! Where as this season was like... "oh.. that can't be good. OH NO! That sucks." It certainly had it's moments, none that I can point out without giving it all away, but all in all it just wasn't as good as the first.
Plotline: 7.5/10 - I'm trying not to compare it for this, but there were times I just didn't follow. Or I didn't see why it was important or necessary to include certain things. Or things didn't get as good of an explaination as they should've. And with most dramas, I get get a general sequence in my head as to how things progressed, where as in this drama, I kinda get the gist of the beginning and the ending, and the middle seems more like fillers than part of importance.
Emotion: 6/10 - they seems to have relied on the previously established emotions for the characters that people held in the 1st season, because I didn't feel anything new for anyone at ALL. Maybe a bit for the sister, if only because she was given her own subplot to fulfil, but other than that, everyone was pretty static. Even Takagi's feelings of betrayal didn't hit home very well, either due to acting or writing I don't know.
Acting: 8/10 - There wasn't really any challenges besides getting used to the characters again. They were already pre-established. No one's acting stood out for me. Even as biased as I am for Haru-chan, his acting was no different from 1st seasons and therefore nothing new to me.
Script/Writing: 6/10 - I dunno... it just really didn't live up to expectations. Even if I try to ignore first season, it was kinda sloppy. The final bad guy seemed like they forgot who it was supposed to be so they picked a random character ._.'' Also, why and how was **********************?!??!! >.<' DO NOT UNDERSTAND
Entertainment: 9/10 - for all the randomness and annoyingness and lack of understanding, it was still a great drama to watch. Even if when you start picking at it it become stupid. But entertainment doesn't have to pick it all apart =D
Overall: 73%
I think I'll try watching both seasons again in a marathon at some point over the summer, and then review the SERIES rather than the individual seasons. ._.''
Amaya out~