2016.07.01 Sengoku Musou Review!
SENGOKU MUSOU!!! This is the second installment to the series (it's 2.5 theatre so lets assume this is now gunna be a series). I watched the first one back in May and really enjoyed it. I enjoyed it a LOT more than Basara (both have Sengoku in their titles amd I'm pretty sure both games are by the SAME company so I'm naturally gunna compare the stages between them too. I think the stages are the same company too *runs to check* Musou is Marv so it's clearly a 2.5 production... BASARA seems to be produced by CAPCOM themselves so... but anyway, I'm comparing okay!)
Pre-Show Worries
I was a little worried, as I always am with historical stages with how much I'll understand and for Musou, I was going in knowing nothing except I knew the cast, I knew it was the sengoku period, I knew it was at Shikoku BUT I actually couldn't find any historical info on this Shikoku event - probably because it wasn't called Shikoku at the time- so I went in knowing nothing. LUCKILY, I was able to understand at least 50% of what was going on... the other 50% I was either lost (mainly too many names to try to remember especially when in Sengoku their characters look COMPLETELY different to what they would've looked like in real life) or I've forgotten cos I'm a stupid ass that doesn't write complete notes after a play anymore -__- I need to fix that... so yes because I had SUCH a hard time (and disappointment) with the first BASARA (see review here) I was worried about this one BUT I had watched the first Musou stage and understood it pretty completely so it was half dread, half excitement, cos y'know, Maki-Chan xD I'm waffling now, let's move on.
So let's get down to the important parts.
The Story
So I'm just do some quick googling now to find a plot for y'all to read up:
In the 1585 invasion of Shikoku, Toyotomi Hideyoshi seized Shikoku, from Chōsokabe Motochika. Hideyoshi's army was divided into three forces. Despite the overwhelming size of Hideyoshi's army, and the suggestions of his advisors, Chōsokabe chose to fight to defend his territories. Chōsokabe made a half-hearted attempt to relieve his castle from the siege, but surrendered in the end. He was allowed to keep Tosa province, while the rest of Shikoku was divided among Hideyoshi's generals.
That's literally all the English info I can find on it! The above summary is literally like the last 20 or so minutes.. so looks like I'm gunna have to try and remember for all of us...
So just to help myself also, I'm gunna put a cast and character list here:
UeChan (Ueda Keisuke) as Ishida Mitsunari
Akimoto Ryutaro as Todo Takatora
Wada Masanari as Otani Yoshitsugu
MakiChan (Aramaki Yoshihiko) as Koboyakawa Takakage
Inou Hiroki as Mori Motonari
Watanabe Kazuki as Chosokabe Motochika
Kishimoto Takuya as Kato Kiyomasa
Shohei as Shima Masanori
Yamaoki Yuki as Shima Sakon
Nakada Hiroki as Akechi Mitsuhide
Would you prefer if I wrote out the cast list everytime? I know I always refer to actor by their nicknames and I just assume y'all will go to the official website to see who I'm talking about and read the plot there and stuff but maybe that's too ignorant of me? Let me know! Also there's actually an emsemble guy who caught my eye and I just checked and omg he's from freaking Yamaguchi, what the actual hell xD
So we follow Uechan's Ishida who working under Hideyoshi (who is mental and crazy as hell xD) and this stage is clearly set BEFORE the first stage because (not to spoiler but) Uechan dies at the end of the first stage so this has got to be a prequel, also a lot of Wada's time on stage is him having a dream slash predicting Uechan's upcoming death and him worrying about it and hoping it won't happen (the scene of Uechan dying is replayed like three times on stage). So yes we follow Ishida and Hideyoshi and it starts off with Uechan fighting against Motonari and his son Koboyakawa but after Motonari dies (which is after like 30 minutes) Koboyakawa decides to join Uechan's group. Then they make there way to Shikoku where they battle against Chosokabe and Chosokabe is pissed cos earlier on they killed Mitsuhide so he's like blood thirsty for revenge and fights with Mitsuhide's sword. But.... I think he got killed... I don't remember.., I'm gunna be honest. I spent the entire play googling over MakiChan or UeChan and his damn voice <3 so that's all of the plot I can tell you... I hope this helps? I'm sorry I'm so sucky... I really did fail at getting the story in this stage... *runs to natalie for synopsis* ... moving on!
THE ACTORS!!! And the characters...
Let's quickly get my UeChan praise out of this way... This BOY! who is really NOT a boy cos he's nearly 27 years old but he really does blows my mind everytime I see his face - he's a baby! xD but anyway.... DAMN UECHAN! This boy KNOWS how to act. He's this cute 5ft4/5ft5 Osakan boy but DAMN! You get him on stage and steals all the attention. He can act and his voice. OMG his voice is SO powerful. It's got such control and he can grab ALL over attention with it and it's so powerful. It's easy to understand why he got a historical role because he talks like a leader and he's got such power in his voice. You can't not be impressed. As soon as he talks he becomes this GIANT presence. Even without speaking you can feel and see his massive presence whenever he's on stage. He is phenomenal. I've seen him act in a few stages but through DVD, this was the first time seeing him on stage and damn I will definitely pay money to see him live again and I will be seeing him live again in Septebmer for Inferno (see details here). Phenomenal seriously.
AND now to my baby, my MakiChan!!! <3 I know Maki-Chan was super excited to be a part of this stage because he played the games as a kid and he's said himself that he loves the Sengoku era and all the articles I read for this with him in, he's just like 'I'm excited because I played these games and I know these characters and as a kid I'd read all I could about the Sengoku era' (your mother must be so proud for bringing such an intelligent boy into the world *motherly feels*). ANYWAY his performance... the FIRST time he's on stage, he's on the floor on MY side of the stage <3 ahhhhh!!!! *dead* he did a great job but his voice was so soft and so...nice! Like an angel *hits self* xD and he was so SMILEY! I'm not used to MakiChan doing SMILEY roles. I'm used to him playing the very serious roles like Yaman from Touken Ranbu or Kuro from K, but in this he's so genki and smiley; it was adorable <3 but, I was surprised at how LITTLE time he had on stage. Him AND Inou had like 15 minutes max. They had a few fight scenes and they would walk in and off stage to say a few lines and then walk back off and I was a little upset at how small his role was but he did an amazing performance when he wa son stage. And he so pretty >.<
OH! Btw there was a running joke! If you didn't know Inou and MakiChan have worked together before and at that time they were (I think) brothers in it but this time they were playing Father and Son (MakiChan being the son) and on twitter and stuff Inou was like 'A photo with my son, even though he's older' or like 'this is my son, but he's older than me' xD Cos Inou is 24 and MakiChan is 26. And because of the lack of stage time they had... they obviously had time to mess about; like this:
I hope in the next stage MakiChan gets a bigger role; purely because he was so excited and enthusiastic about this stage <3
I really enjoyed Hideyoshi's performance. In true style he played the role very comedically and we were all laughing because of him. There was one scene though where his finger sets on fire and it was either an actual performance-turned-incident or it was amazing acting cos I was convined Hideyoshi was in a LOT of pain once the fire went out. He was sucking his thumb and going 'that hurt' but in the next scene we seem him, I noticed his hand was fine and he was moving it without anything seemingly wrong so it must've just been amazing actor - I really was concerned...
Chosokabe was VERY interesting. I really loved the fact he had a Shamisen and it was how he fought! Like instead of sword fighting, his song would come on and he would just stand there strumming the shamisen and it would 'attack' his enemies. Normally I would think it a stupid idea (we all remember my hate from Juri's character in BASARA (Sen no Rikyu) with those stupid fucking fans -- but UeChan also fights with a fan but it's freaking massive and actually looks like it has implied sharp edges!) but I really got down with the idea. And at the end where he's fighting with Akechi's sword <3 I got a little teary, especially when Nakada then came on stage and took the sword so it looked like Chosokabe was reminding his enemy of Akechi and they 'fought' side by side each other! Such a great idea.
The only returners in this cast (from first stage to this second stage) are Uechan, Wada and Akimoto and, again, I was surprised how SMALL Wada and Akimoto's roles are regardless of the fact they're featured as part of the MAIN three. They were on stage possible less than MakiChan was... which was very surprising... it's weird how they got featured as the main but like... were never there xD
The entire stage time was strange in general, I feel like NO ONE got enough stage time except Hideyoshi and UeChan... everyone else was like fleetingly on stage. I understand they had to cram a lot into a stage (and it didn't feel crammed at all) but it's a shame just how sacrificed everyone's stage time became... I would've liked to have this been split into two and gotten more character development from everyone.
Other Aesthetics
Moving on from the actors and the characters...
The music was amazing!!
As well as the choreography and the sword fights were great
And as already mentioned, the comedy was great. It was spot on. Not only did we get comedic relief from Hideyoshi but also Shohei's character Shima was really funny too! Musou is a lot funnier and more relaxed and less serious than BASARA which is probably why that although the story got a little confusing, everything else entertained me and everything else I enjoyed so it ended up being a good stage play ^_^
The ensemble did a great job too and I noticed Mister Yamashita who also was part of the ensemble in Touken Ranbu ^_^ he's talented with his stunts.
I liked the little boxes they used to move and change the set too! ^_^
Curtain Call
The curtain call today was Inou and he was like 'I don't know what to say.... Thank you for coming today?' and UeChan was like 'this isn't your first stage! Why you acting like it's your first!' we were all laughing and he said his thanks and in the normal style asked us to come again if we had the time ^_^
Goods Venting
Also can I express my rage for a moment? ALL the pamphlets they gave out were freaking bent! I have a BENT pamphlet! And if you know me, I have an OCD about straight, none-messed up magazines/books and the fact that my pamphlet is CURLED and BENT, it's literally driving me mad. And everyone else's was the same cos I could see the freaking pile! RAGE!!! And I've kept my pamphlet under a crap ton of books since I brought it back home and *pulls it out* IT'S STILL CURLED!!!! RAGE!!!!
*breathes*
The other one isn't rage but like EVERYONE was wanting MakiChan's bromides and these companies a freaking demons and always do 'Random Bromides' which is like they'll have 40+ different bromide photos in silver packets and you buy as many as you want and you won't know WHO you got til you open it and I did not have any luck at all, I got like 12 bromides and none were my MakiChan. And to make it worse, everyone wanted him! But no one wanted to trade and I got super upset about that cos then to buy them at K Books (a store in Ikebukurou that sells second hand stage goods) is freaking expensive cos they'll know he's popular and ramp up what was a 200 yen bromide to like 3000 yen. Both the company for making the Randoms AND K books are the devil... and no one even wanted the main character which is Ueda! I had Uechan ones and no one wanted them cos we ALL wanted MakiChan... stop being popular please xD
---
Overall: This was very entertaining! I loved the action and the choreography was great! The comedy was spot on and was rather frequent and added to my entertainment value. Ueda is a freaking giant god on stage with that presence and voice of his <3 MakiChan was so smiley and his role was cute! ^_^ But I felt the stage time was a little odd and I felt everyone didn't get enough time and I hope there's a third installment where we get more stage time from people and more character development. Also, due to my own lack of research prior to the play, I got a little lost in the story. I look forward to the DVD!
Rating: 7/10
Pre-Show Worries
I was a little worried, as I always am with historical stages with how much I'll understand and for Musou, I was going in knowing nothing except I knew the cast, I knew it was the sengoku period, I knew it was at Shikoku BUT I actually couldn't find any historical info on this Shikoku event - probably because it wasn't called Shikoku at the time- so I went in knowing nothing. LUCKILY, I was able to understand at least 50% of what was going on... the other 50% I was either lost (mainly too many names to try to remember especially when in Sengoku their characters look COMPLETELY different to what they would've looked like in real life) or I've forgotten cos I'm a stupid ass that doesn't write complete notes after a play anymore -__- I need to fix that... so yes because I had SUCH a hard time (and disappointment) with the first BASARA (see review here) I was worried about this one BUT I had watched the first Musou stage and understood it pretty completely so it was half dread, half excitement, cos y'know, Maki-Chan xD I'm waffling now, let's move on.
So let's get down to the important parts.
The Story
So I'm just do some quick googling now to find a plot for y'all to read up:
In the 1585 invasion of Shikoku, Toyotomi Hideyoshi seized Shikoku, from Chōsokabe Motochika. Hideyoshi's army was divided into three forces. Despite the overwhelming size of Hideyoshi's army, and the suggestions of his advisors, Chōsokabe chose to fight to defend his territories. Chōsokabe made a half-hearted attempt to relieve his castle from the siege, but surrendered in the end. He was allowed to keep Tosa province, while the rest of Shikoku was divided among Hideyoshi's generals.
That's literally all the English info I can find on it! The above summary is literally like the last 20 or so minutes.. so looks like I'm gunna have to try and remember for all of us...
So just to help myself also, I'm gunna put a cast and character list here:
UeChan (Ueda Keisuke) as Ishida Mitsunari
Akimoto Ryutaro as Todo Takatora
Wada Masanari as Otani Yoshitsugu
MakiChan (Aramaki Yoshihiko) as Koboyakawa Takakage
Inou Hiroki as Mori Motonari
Watanabe Kazuki as Chosokabe Motochika
Kishimoto Takuya as Kato Kiyomasa
Shohei as Shima Masanori
Yamaoki Yuki as Shima Sakon
Nakada Hiroki as Akechi Mitsuhide
Would you prefer if I wrote out the cast list everytime? I know I always refer to actor by their nicknames and I just assume y'all will go to the official website to see who I'm talking about and read the plot there and stuff but maybe that's too ignorant of me? Let me know! Also there's actually an emsemble guy who caught my eye and I just checked and omg he's from freaking Yamaguchi, what the actual hell xD
So we follow Uechan's Ishida who working under Hideyoshi (who is mental and crazy as hell xD) and this stage is clearly set BEFORE the first stage because (not to spoiler but) Uechan dies at the end of the first stage so this has got to be a prequel, also a lot of Wada's time on stage is him having a dream slash predicting Uechan's upcoming death and him worrying about it and hoping it won't happen (the scene of Uechan dying is replayed like three times on stage). So yes we follow Ishida and Hideyoshi and it starts off with Uechan fighting against Motonari and his son Koboyakawa but after Motonari dies (which is after like 30 minutes) Koboyakawa decides to join Uechan's group. Then they make there way to Shikoku where they battle against Chosokabe and Chosokabe is pissed cos earlier on they killed Mitsuhide so he's like blood thirsty for revenge and fights with Mitsuhide's sword. But.... I think he got killed... I don't remember.., I'm gunna be honest. I spent the entire play googling over MakiChan or UeChan and his damn voice <3 so that's all of the plot I can tell you... I hope this helps? I'm sorry I'm so sucky... I really did fail at getting the story in this stage... *runs to natalie for synopsis* ... moving on!
THE ACTORS!!! And the characters...
Let's quickly get my UeChan praise out of this way... This BOY! who is really NOT a boy cos he's nearly 27 years old but he really does blows my mind everytime I see his face - he's a baby! xD but anyway.... DAMN UECHAN! This boy KNOWS how to act. He's this cute 5ft4/5ft5 Osakan boy but DAMN! You get him on stage and steals all the attention. He can act and his voice. OMG his voice is SO powerful. It's got such control and he can grab ALL over attention with it and it's so powerful. It's easy to understand why he got a historical role because he talks like a leader and he's got such power in his voice. You can't not be impressed. As soon as he talks he becomes this GIANT presence. Even without speaking you can feel and see his massive presence whenever he's on stage. He is phenomenal. I've seen him act in a few stages but through DVD, this was the first time seeing him on stage and damn I will definitely pay money to see him live again and I will be seeing him live again in Septebmer for Inferno (see details here). Phenomenal seriously.
AND now to my baby, my MakiChan!!! <3 I know Maki-Chan was super excited to be a part of this stage because he played the games as a kid and he's said himself that he loves the Sengoku era and all the articles I read for this with him in, he's just like 'I'm excited because I played these games and I know these characters and as a kid I'd read all I could about the Sengoku era' (your mother must be so proud for bringing such an intelligent boy into the world *motherly feels*). ANYWAY his performance... the FIRST time he's on stage, he's on the floor on MY side of the stage <3 ahhhhh!!!! *dead* he did a great job but his voice was so soft and so...nice! Like an angel *hits self* xD and he was so SMILEY! I'm not used to MakiChan doing SMILEY roles. I'm used to him playing the very serious roles like Yaman from Touken Ranbu or Kuro from K, but in this he's so genki and smiley; it was adorable <3 but, I was surprised at how LITTLE time he had on stage. Him AND Inou had like 15 minutes max. They had a few fight scenes and they would walk in and off stage to say a few lines and then walk back off and I was a little upset at how small his role was but he did an amazing performance when he wa son stage. And he so pretty >.<
OH! Btw there was a running joke! If you didn't know Inou and MakiChan have worked together before and at that time they were (I think) brothers in it but this time they were playing Father and Son (MakiChan being the son) and on twitter and stuff Inou was like 'A photo with my son, even though he's older' or like 'this is my son, but he's older than me' xD Cos Inou is 24 and MakiChan is 26. And because of the lack of stage time they had... they obviously had time to mess about; like this:
I hope in the next stage MakiChan gets a bigger role; purely because he was so excited and enthusiastic about this stage <3
I really enjoyed Hideyoshi's performance. In true style he played the role very comedically and we were all laughing because of him. There was one scene though where his finger sets on fire and it was either an actual performance-turned-incident or it was amazing acting cos I was convined Hideyoshi was in a LOT of pain once the fire went out. He was sucking his thumb and going 'that hurt' but in the next scene we seem him, I noticed his hand was fine and he was moving it without anything seemingly wrong so it must've just been amazing actor - I really was concerned...
Chosokabe was VERY interesting. I really loved the fact he had a Shamisen and it was how he fought! Like instead of sword fighting, his song would come on and he would just stand there strumming the shamisen and it would 'attack' his enemies. Normally I would think it a stupid idea (we all remember my hate from Juri's character in BASARA (Sen no Rikyu) with those stupid fucking fans -- but UeChan also fights with a fan but it's freaking massive and actually looks like it has implied sharp edges!) but I really got down with the idea. And at the end where he's fighting with Akechi's sword <3 I got a little teary, especially when Nakada then came on stage and took the sword so it looked like Chosokabe was reminding his enemy of Akechi and they 'fought' side by side each other! Such a great idea.
The only returners in this cast (from first stage to this second stage) are Uechan, Wada and Akimoto and, again, I was surprised how SMALL Wada and Akimoto's roles are regardless of the fact they're featured as part of the MAIN three. They were on stage possible less than MakiChan was... which was very surprising... it's weird how they got featured as the main but like... were never there xD
The entire stage time was strange in general, I feel like NO ONE got enough stage time except Hideyoshi and UeChan... everyone else was like fleetingly on stage. I understand they had to cram a lot into a stage (and it didn't feel crammed at all) but it's a shame just how sacrificed everyone's stage time became... I would've liked to have this been split into two and gotten more character development from everyone.
Other Aesthetics
Moving on from the actors and the characters...
The music was amazing!!
As well as the choreography and the sword fights were great
And as already mentioned, the comedy was great. It was spot on. Not only did we get comedic relief from Hideyoshi but also Shohei's character Shima was really funny too! Musou is a lot funnier and more relaxed and less serious than BASARA which is probably why that although the story got a little confusing, everything else entertained me and everything else I enjoyed so it ended up being a good stage play ^_^
The ensemble did a great job too and I noticed Mister Yamashita who also was part of the ensemble in Touken Ranbu ^_^ he's talented with his stunts.
I liked the little boxes they used to move and change the set too! ^_^
Curtain Call
The curtain call today was Inou and he was like 'I don't know what to say.... Thank you for coming today?' and UeChan was like 'this isn't your first stage! Why you acting like it's your first!' we were all laughing and he said his thanks and in the normal style asked us to come again if we had the time ^_^
Goods Venting
Also can I express my rage for a moment? ALL the pamphlets they gave out were freaking bent! I have a BENT pamphlet! And if you know me, I have an OCD about straight, none-messed up magazines/books and the fact that my pamphlet is CURLED and BENT, it's literally driving me mad. And everyone else's was the same cos I could see the freaking pile! RAGE!!! And I've kept my pamphlet under a crap ton of books since I brought it back home and *pulls it out* IT'S STILL CURLED!!!! RAGE!!!!
*breathes*
The other one isn't rage but like EVERYONE was wanting MakiChan's bromides and these companies a freaking demons and always do 'Random Bromides' which is like they'll have 40+ different bromide photos in silver packets and you buy as many as you want and you won't know WHO you got til you open it and I did not have any luck at all, I got like 12 bromides and none were my MakiChan. And to make it worse, everyone wanted him! But no one wanted to trade and I got super upset about that cos then to buy them at K Books (a store in Ikebukurou that sells second hand stage goods) is freaking expensive cos they'll know he's popular and ramp up what was a 200 yen bromide to like 3000 yen. Both the company for making the Randoms AND K books are the devil... and no one even wanted the main character which is Ueda! I had Uechan ones and no one wanted them cos we ALL wanted MakiChan... stop being popular please xD
---
Overall: This was very entertaining! I loved the action and the choreography was great! The comedy was spot on and was rather frequent and added to my entertainment value. Ueda is a freaking giant god on stage with that presence and voice of his <3 MakiChan was so smiley and his role was cute! ^_^ But I felt the stage time was a little odd and I felt everyone didn't get enough time and I hope there's a third installment where we get more stage time from people and more character development. Also, due to my own lack of research prior to the play, I got a little lost in the story. I look forward to the DVD!
Rating: 7/10