Kóri no sekai

It's definitely not a series without its flaws; even the beginning didn't particularly grab me, but as it went on it just sucked me in and I couldn't stop watching. I watched the second half of the series in one sitting and I'm so glad I didn't watch it when it came out because the wait for the next episode would have killed me. Matsushima, though she was yet again playing a teacher – I may not know her otherwise – really shone. I finally felt like she managed to extract all the acting talent she has in her. She was perfectly complemented by my favorite Japanese actor, and I could have snorted with delight. Who's the culprit? What was really going on? And it all started with selfishness... I kept changing my mind about who the culprit was until the very end, and at the end it really surprised me who the real culprit was. Like Karel Gott accepting a Nightingale: "I really wasn’t expecting this." And that hasn't happened to me in a long time. (12.01.2012)