Never Ending Music Power

Taguchi Junnosuke

Group: KAT-TUN

Birthdate: November 29th, 1985

Easily my favorite member of KAT-TUN, partly because he never looked like he belonged in the group. He has that shine to him that you would expect in other Johnny’s groups but not so much in the “bad boy” group. But as the group has been aging that gap seems to be lessening.

He has really impressed me with his improved vocals, thanks to actually working with a vocal coach. And his dancing has always been solid. He has taken it up a step though as he has begun to choreograph dances for KAT-TUN.

I figure I should try to translate something at least once a month and the profiles for Fresh Juniors do tend to be the easiest thing for me to translate right now. Plus these three are candidates for the Twenty Twenty group, so I have some interest in that. I do not know why I feel I need to become invested in something that looks like it will be a train wreck but it looks like that is where I am going. Perhaps it is part of the excitement that this has never been done before and such. But enough chatter from me, here are the profile translations.

And as a reminder I am pretty rusty with my Japanese, which I only made it to about third year in my study, so it is possible that I will make errors. I have the original page I am translating posted below for anyone who wants to double check, and I always welcome corrections.

Motodaka Katsuki「本高克樹」
December 12, 1998
Born in Kanagawa prefecture.
Blood type, unknown
Height: 166 cm
Weight: 50 kg
Foot size: 26 cm
Nickname: Kakkun
Specialty: soccer. I can juggle a soccer ball about seven times.*
Hobby: cooking
Type of girl you like: Someone who thinks about me the most and a beautiful heart.
Current fascination/obsession: dodgeball
Admired sempai: Yamada Ryosuke
Favorite food: curry
Least favorite food: cheese
Future dream: Debut and [become a] doctor.

* To be more clear he means when juggling a soccer ball he can keep it going for about seven turns.

Muraki Ryota「村木亮太」
January 26, 1999
Born in Tokyo.
Type B blood type.
Height: 166 cm
Weight: 47 kg
Foot size: 26.5 cm
Nickname: Ryou
Specialty: basketball
Hobby: watching movies
Type of girl you like: A girl who is kind and very helpful/good at taking care of others.
Current fascination/obsession: collecting manga
Admired sempai: Yamashita Tomohisa
Favorite food: karaage (fried chicken), hamburger
Least favorite food: green pepper, eggplant
Future dream: Debut. I also want to become a doctor but I am no good at the sight of blood...

Matsukura Kaito「松倉海人」
November 14, 1997
Born in Kanagawa prefecture.
Type O blood type.
Height: 157 cm
Weight: 44 kg
Foot size: 25.5 cm
Nickname: Matsuku
Specialty: shakariki dance*
Hobby: music and watching movies
Type of girl you like: A cheerful and funny girl.
Current fascination/obsession: collecting hats
Admired sempai: Ninomiya Kazunari, Yabu Kota
Favorite food: ramen
Least favorite food: green peas
Future dream: To increase my number of fans, to debut.

* not sure what this is. I found something called DANCEROID that it could be, but I am uncertain.

Onto the first episode of the February episodes for 2008 and we finally see the shift back to the Juniors.

In the introduction all the ungrouped Juniors get introduced simply as Johnny's Jr. with Morimoto Shintaro and his lot of little Juniors up front so you cannot really see who the older Juniors behind them singing.

And this episode has another member of Kanjani8 guesting, Yokoyama Yu, so the introduction is of the Juniors singing the Kanjani8 song Dreamin' Blood with Yoko joining them in the end.

The theme of the show is Takaramono (treasure) and Takaki Yuya gets to talk about the theme. This is most likely because his push has started as he has his main role in Gokusen 3 at this time.

For the theme medley we just get the ungrouped Juniors, or officially ungrouped Juniors as there is of course the Hasshi-trio. But there is a bit of a surprise when Nakayama Yuma shows up to sing with the group of Fresh Juniors that has Takada Sho in it. This is probably because the two are starring in a drama, Battery, at that time.

The first MC segment is with the group of five that they are calling the Fresh Juniors. Juniors to note in this grouping are Takada and Masuda Ryo. They each talk about something that they treasure. MasuRyo answers a guitar while Takada's answer is his siblings. When it was MasuRyo's turn Koyama Keiichiro calls him Massu to get Nakamaru Yuichi to correct him that it is a different Masuda than Masuda Takahisa who is in NEWS with Koyama.

Next up is a performance of Real Face by various Juniors but lead by Morimoto Shintaro. Shintaro's rise will follow Yuma's for a while as Shintaro gets cast in a couple of the same dramas so they get built up around the same time. In fact he is also in the drama Battery, playing Yuma's younger brother. Other than him Kyomoto Taiga and Anderson Casey got the most camera time for the performance.

The Shiroyagi to Kuroyagi segment breaks the momentum of the episode like usual. I have done a quick check of upcoming episodes to remind myself of things coming up and I was happy to see that this segment does go away with the new season that starts in April.

Question? thankfully kicks things back into gear with a performances of Mezamero! Yasei. I feel bad that Question? was never really able to go anywhere with Johnny's. I would have loved to have seen them debut as another band group but I guess they never picked up the momentum Johnny's wanted them to for that.

Following this is the game segment and we have the return of introdon. Yoko is brought out to participate but of course not as a judge like usual as this is a game that needs none. Instead Yoko is there for something called Yoko Chance, where Yoko takes a turn and each team beforehand has to decide if they will beat on Yoko being able to get it right.

The introdon songs are all K8 songs so the chances of Yoko are high but it makes it a bit more challenging to the rest as they typically do not back dance for K8 as much. In fact for one song they audience has to give a hint for the guys to figure out what it is.

Yoko then gets his MC segment where he talks about what he treasures, the members of Kanjani8. He brings up that the group has felt like family to him even back when they debuted about three years ago.

Yoko then performs a solo song titled ConfUsion, which I cannot seem to find information on so it may be a concert only song. I know he should have a few since he has done solo concerts before.

This episode's Junior ni Q is on the topic of charm points. Hashimoto Ryosuke is called over to explain what he wrote, which is style. He does some poses but it is hard to tell if it shows off his style if he is stuck in a stage outfit.

They bring over both Shintaro and Yuma to talk about their charm points. Yuma put down that his was his eyes.

Shintaro had wrote being mischievous, which he gets to talk a bit about as you really do not see that with him on the show. And I rather love how Koyama Keiichiro fixes the collar of his outfit during this. I have always had a weakness for Koyama's paternal nature with the younger Juniors. The two get a chance to promote their drama before the segment is wrapped up.

There is then an MC segment with Hey! Say! JUMP with each member talking about something they treasure. I will only go over a few as doing all ten would take long. Chinen Yuri continues to prove what a big fanboy he is of Ohno Satoshi by writing Ohno's goods, and brings up a telephone card that Ohno wrote on. Nakajima Yuto talks about a pair of sunglasses that Matsuoka Masahiro gave him, which was probably from when he starred in a TOKIO PV. Arioka Daiki also had a gift from a sempai, this was a birthday present from Kimura Takuya from when the two were in a drama together, a soccer ball that Kimutaku wrote a message on.

HSJ then perform Star Time, a B-side off of their debut single. Inoo Kei plays the piano for the performance and for some reason someone thought it was a good idea to have Junior back dancers for this song, a ballad, on an already crowded stage.

The final song is lead by Yoko with it being the Kanjani8 song Mugendai. With Yoko starting in the audience than joining the rest of the Juniors and HSJ on stage for the rest of the song.

This episode did much better with balancing the amount of focus on the debuts Johnny's and the Juniors than the past few. I think it helped that they only had HSJ perform once in the episode and left them out of the theme medley.

Honestly this balance is what I have been expecting to see once more on the program the further away from 2011 we have gotten. So it saddens me to see no such change. I want to see more of the Juniors that are meant to become debuted acts one day not the ones that have already reached that in their careers.

I want to see if I cannot catch up with some of my drama watching in time to cover at least one of the upcoming summer dramas. My backlog of dramas I want to watch just seems to keep growing...

About half-way through the drama and things look like they have begun to kick into high gear for the final arc. In fact I would split the series into two arcs, the beginning arc from episode one to five that is more about bringing the team together to start working as a team then from six on it looks like it will be mostly just focused on Pluto, the organization operating in the shadows helping making the murders happen.

The mysteries have been good with being believable, if just a bit easy to figure out the culprit for some, and making sure they include the motivations behind the culprits. I have found that motivation tends to get glossed over in other mystery series as the writers tend to get too wrapped up in how the crime happened without thinking about why it would have happened. So it is nice to see this series avoid that problem.

While I have been enjoying the mysteries and all one thing that gets me every time one is solved is that Kyu (Kamiki Ryonosuke)will lecture the culprit. For a couple of the cases it worked out but for others it seemed like an ill-fit, as I doubt the murderer at the time was in any right state of mind to want to hear a kid tell them how wrong they were for doing what they did.

Kamiki is doing a good job of having to carry this drama despite being so young. I can really see why he was selected to play the lead in this series. And I am not surprised both him and Shida Mirai have gone on to be popular actors in their own right since.

Kyu and Minami Megumi are characters that do not take a lot to make you sympathetic to them, with Kyu seeming to take each case to heart and Megu having to deal with the fact that she remembers everything perfectly, which includes the gruesome murders they have to deal with.

Amakusa Ryu (Yamada Ryosuke) has become a much more sympathetic character from what we saw of him in the first episode. He still is mainly the brooding, loner type but you can tell that by the end Kyu will have won him over. I think the biggest indication of that is the fact that Kyu is willing to accept him no matter what his past is. And I am glad that we are getting to Ryu's past and already know a bit of it already instead of having it teased about until the end.

While this is not going to become a favorite drama of mine I am enjoying watching it and very glad I hunted it down to watch. I think the real test for it is how it will deal with wrapping up the Pluto plot line. It is something that could horribly wrong or really well depending on how it is dealt with. So off I go to complete this series.

The main cast and the title of the next Dreamboys musical has been announced. The lead will be Tamamori Yuta with Senga Kento and Miyata Toshiya also co-staring. Actress Otori Ran (retired Takarazuka actress) and Johnny's dai-sempai Kondo Masahiko also have roles. What other Juniors will be in the musical has yet to be announced.

The title of the musical has changed to Dreamboys JET and it will run from September 5th to the 29th.

Oricon Style article (Japanese)

From the promo pictures floating around it looks like that instead of boxing the sport the musical revolves around is car racing this time. It would definitely explain why Matchy is involved seeing as he owns a professional racing team and his overall interest in the sport.

And it looks like Kis-My-Ft2 might be taking over the musical from KAT-TUN. Of course it started out as a Takizawa Hideaki musical so this will not be the first time it has changed hands. Even so, I expected this to have remained a KAT-TUN musical for a while longer, but I guess the fact that Kisumai members had been in it for the past couple of years was probably a sign that it could be changing groups. Next year's production will probably will need to be seen if it really is being passed on and not just having Kisumai cover it this year for whatever reason.

And it looks like Tamamori is going to be extremely busy for a while. He has his drama for the summer season as well as the current tour Kisumai are on. Plus in August he is going to have to be promoting the group's upcoming single on top of all that then there is only about a two week break from the tour ending to when this musical starts. I hope he will get enough rest while trying to juggle doing all of this.

We get the return of an old Shounen Club feature this episode.

This time with the introduction song the Juniors introduced are all by their individual names. It is the usual groups, with Yamashita Shoon and the Hasshi-trio for this. Also at the very start it has the little Juniors standing back to back with some of the older and I had to laugh a bit at seeing how small Morimoto Shintaro is compared to Hashimoto Ryosuke. That boy has grown so much since then.

And like last episode the guest for the episode joins the Juniors at the end of the song, Yorokobi no Uta. We get a change in guests this time as Taguchi Junnosuke comes out followed by Nakamaru Yuichi to finish the song with the Juniors.

In the the intro talk they announce that this episode will have a producer and bring out Yamada Ryosuke who will be doing so. He then announces the theme of the episode Love Song and remains (mostly) cold towards Junno's energetic showings of love to him.

Again the theme medley is just with the unofficially grouped Juniors and has Nakayama Yuma popping up to sing with the Fresh Junior group. But we also really get to hear Hasshi sing as he opens up the medley with a solo and pretty much proves that he can sing.

There is a letter exchange segment but with Yamada reading a letter to those special to him (I honestly cannot figure out what Minu is so I am dropping that part.).

Yamada then performs his first solo song, Perfume, backed by Chinen Yuri and Morimoto Ryutaro. I think this was the point when it was pretty apparent that Yamada was finally surpassing Nakajima Yuto as the most pushed member of the group. And while some fans begrudge him for it I never did, I may have wanted to see some of the other members get pushes as well but I have always liked Yamada and still do.

After that it is an MC segment with Junno dressed up in his "samurai" outfit that draws out some remarks from Koyama Keiichiro. They of course ask him about love songs. He does an impression of B'z singer Inaba Koshi singing the band's song Hadashi no Megumi. That happens to be the first single and CD I bought for B'z so I have new random reason to love Junno.

Of course Junno is in that outfit because he is performing his solo Samurai Love Attack. I love Junno's solos because they were really poppy and fun and this song is the most fun of them all. And not only does it have Junno in a ridiculous outfit but the little Juniors get to be his cheerleaders for it.

For the game segment Junno is back on stage to act as judge, though really it is for him to confirm who won after the audience is asked to respond to which one they thought did better. The game is where they have to do certain prompts. Like the first prompt is to a move from the Real Face choreography. The next is say a phrase in baby talk, followed by feeding your girlfriend.

The final prompt is about getting on a train, or not getting on the train if I followed what happened in the skits they played out.

Arioka Daiki, Takaki Yuya and Inoo Kei are up next for the MC segment where they start off getting prompted by Nakamaru to say romantic phrases. They then move on to say what their favorite (Johnny's) love song is.

Following this is Yaotome Hikaru singing his latest solo, Honoo -Flame of Love-. I have also been surprised that neither Hikaru or Yabu Kota have had any of their solos released on CD. They have plenty of them and have always had a good amount of popularity since their Junior days.

We get a sorta return of the Takizawa Hideaki Special Project segment as well as Tackey talks about Butokan then we get to see the group to a pre-recorded studio performance of Now and Forever. I do not see why they just could not have the group at the regular filming of SC as it seems off to see them perform for no audience for a SC performance.

Hikaru and Yabu then get an MC segment to talk about their favorite (Johnny's) love songs. I believe overall a lot of Kinki Kids songs were selected which can be seen as testament of the impact the duo has had with their music.

The performance after is with both Kis-My-Ft2 and A.B.C. as they sing Real DX together. It is during this period of time the two groups had quite a bit of activities together, mainly thanks to Tackey wanting to use the two groups for his concerts and butai.

The end song is Hoshikuzu no Spangle which is kicked off with Junno and Nakamaru singing. The rest of the older Juniors and Hey! Say! BEST come out during the song to join in singing it to wrap up the program.

Again there are too many performances by debuted Johnny's to make this feel like a nicely balanced episode. This month neither Kis-My-Ft2 or A.B.C. had group performances and they could have easily been one of the performances in this episode instead of the one with both of them together. I guess as long as HSJ remain a part of the program there is going to be balance issues, though they will stop being regulars with the next season until they return to host the program.

Yamashita Sean will be in another play this coming August. He will be in the cast of Tomoe Gozen which stars Kuroki Meisa. The play starts August 4th and ends August 25th with only a run in Tokyo.

Theatre's Official Page (Japanese)

I am happy to see Sean continue to get theater roles. I have the feeling that is what his future career is going to go like, with perhaps some tv/movie acting thrown in eventually.

~*

The LDH girl groups, Happiness and Flower will be releasing new singles on the same day. It is so the two groups will compete against each other for number of sales. Both singles will have three versions of the singles. A limited edition with a DVD, a regular edition and then a special limited edition which will only cost 500 Yen (a "one coin single" as these tend to be called as the largest coin amount in Yen is 500) that will only have the title track on it.

Happiness' single will be called Sunshine Dream - Ichido kiri no Natsu and both the LE w/DVD and RE will have the B-side Boyfriend (Sunshine version) on it. The LE w/DVD though has another track, Eien, on it as well.

Sunshine Dream - Ichido kiri no Natsu [w/ DVD, Limited Edition]

Happiness

Flower's single is called Taiyo to Himawari and both the LE w/DVD and RE will have the B-side Boyfriend (Moonlight version) on it. The LE w/DVD though has another track, whose title has not been revealed yet, on it as well.

Taiyo to Himawari [w/ DVD + Photo Book, Limited Edition]

Flower

Both groups will be doing a series of small concerts across Japan when the singles are released to promote them.

It will be interesting to see what the outcome of this will be, especially as Happiness has added two members to the group, which includes another vocalist. If anything releasing the singles like this will help the group garner some extra attention as well as getting their fans to want to make sure they pick up a copy of the single for their favorite group.

Arioka Daiki

Group: Hey! Say! JUMP

Birthdate: April 15, 1991

Daiki is the member of Hey! Say! JUMP that I keep feeling bad that I do not pay as much attention to as others even though I do like him.

He seems to really stuck between fitting the youthful image of the group but also being one of the older members of the group as a member of Hey! Say! BEST. He does get to be pushed a bit more because he can be with Yamada Ryosuke and Chinen Yuri and fit with them, but he tends to look a bit out of place with the rest of BEST.

And we enter in the final month for this season of the program.

The introduction of the Juniors for the episode is the more basic one with everyone just dancing as they are introduced. While Nakayama Yuma can be clearly seen on stage he does not get an introduction and instead we have the usual groups, Hasshi-trio and Morimoto Shintaro and company that get formal introductions.

The theme for the episode is Namida (tears). Of course the theme covers all kinds of emotions connected to tears, not just sadness.

We get some new Juniors getting featured in the medley, one of them being Yasui Kentaro who looks just about the same now as he did back then.

And like the other recent medley it ends with most of the Juniors featured in the medley joining in for the final song. I rather like this even though the large group that had most of the future Mis Snow Man members in it was not a part of this. But we did get the Hasshi-trio (with Hashimoto Ryosuke making sure to interact with those around him), the Fresh Junior group and the group that had Yasui in it. Plus Nakayama Yuma because he is still being randomly included in Shounen Club.

The following MC segment has a few of the Juniors from the medley asked about times they have cried. Nozawa Yuki talks about crying while watching movies. Kishi Takayoshi is something about his grandfather. Morimoto Shintaro talks about crying on a roller coaster then Jesse talks about crying at a karate match, I believe it was because he advanced to the next belt.

The guests for the episode are NEWS and they perform their single track Taiyo no Namida. I was never a big fan of this song, I do not mind listening to it but there are many more NEWS songs I prefer over it.

NEWS then have their MC talk with Nakamaru Yuichi. While the talk about the theme of the episode they bring up that Masuda Takahisa can be moved to tears easily, and of course Koyama Keiichiro. Koyama brings up a time that while eating Kato Shigeaki started crying, and I believe he explained it that he was thinking about something he had heard earlier.

Following this we get Question? changing things up by performing both Midnight Shuffle and Mezomero! Yasei. While I am glad to see more of the band I wish they would change up the songs they have been performing at least a little bit.

The game segment is another one that is language heavy as the guys have to talk about various topics and have the best story for it. I did get the first answer to the greatest shock prompt with Fujigaya Taisuke talking about being approached by a couple of fans that told him that they like Miyata Toshiya. This prompts Nakamaru to talk about a time that he was approached by a fan that thought he was a member of Kanjani8.

For the final prompt we get more active one where they have to go through a series of cool poses spending about three seconds on each. Koyama volunteers Shige to give a demonstration and Shige decides to go with taking off an article of clothing until everyone stops him from taking off his pants.

Yabu Kota then gets to perform his latest solo at the time, Rain Dance. I really wish he and Yaotome Hikaru would have had their solos released on CD at some point. I actually like the ones from this era even though the two do not have my favorite voices from the group.

The Junior ni Q segment is up next with the theme being tears that they do not forget. Up first is Masuda Ryo who talks about being moved to tears first hearing Michael Jackson's We Are the World. He is then asked about his favorite Johnny's song and he answered with Hoshikuzu no Spangle.

Kitayama Hiromitsu is brought over to explain that for one of his birthday's he received a present that meant a lot to him and he was moved to tears, if I followed the story right.

Sakuma Daisuke is up next who wrote that he cried fighting with his younger brother.

Up last is Goseki Koichi who talks about at a KAT-TUN Tokyo Dome concert seeing Nakamaru cry at the end.

There is then a letter exchange segment between Kyomoto Taiga and Anderson Casey. Kyomoto talks about first meeting Anderson at a KAT-TUN concert and Anderson brings that up as well.

The following performance is A.B.C. with a new song Sayonara Box. I do not care too much for this song though it has the rockish sound that I tend to like in pop songs. The highlight of the song is the fact that they do have a large box that is worked into the performance for this.

Then we have a Hey! Say! JUMP performance squeezed in as the group does the ballad version of Ultra Music Power. I am pretty sure this version was only created so they could perform the song the four times they did at their debut concert.

The episode ends with Hurricane right after. I guess they wanted to make sure they get the end songs in before the season ends. But I am glad as the end songs for this season were good and a fun way to end the episode on. Especially since the boys are willing to be a bit playful when performing them.

I love that we are seeing more and more of the current Juniors show up in these episodes. Of course I am sure that this will be a continuing trend throughout the year. I am anxious to see more and more of Kis-My-Ft2 and the creation of A.B.C-Z which should be coming up closer to the end of 2008 if my memory serves me right. Until then I await to see what other Junior will pop up that I was not expecting like Yasui.

Next month should prove to be a bit more interesting with the episodes as that is when the changes for the new season will start but until then it looks like we will be getting some solid episodes out of these final ones for the current season.

From L to R: Kana, Aya and Li

Sadly I have to start out this post with the news of members leaving a group. Kana and Li from the indie idol group Love La Doll will be leaving the group to pursue a non-idol life. This will leave on Aya as the sole member of the group. The group's final live performances as a trio will be at the Tokyo Idol Festival 2013 on July 27th and 28th.

OHP Information page (Japanese)

In a little happier news for the group Aya has a role in an upcoming production. She with other idols will be part of the cast for Pirates of the Desert which will run from July 10 to July 15 and star Dream5's Hibi Mikoto for the July 10-12 performances.

AmiPro site (Japanese)

It is always sad to see a member leave a group, especially when it comes to smaller groups. And then add on the fact they are an indie group and it makes a fan feel anxious. Though the staff did say that they plan to continue on with Aya but I wonder if they will be adding new members in the future. It will seem strange to only have a group made out one member.

I wish the best for the group though as a fan. I am sad to see Kana and Li leave and wish them the best in whatever they plan to do for the rest of their lives.

And now the final episode of this season of the show.

We start off with the Juniors singing Ao no Jidai. There are no introductions past having those singing having their names on the screen, which is just A.B.C., Kis-My-Ft2, Hasshi-trio, Yamashita Shoon and the two hosts of the program, Koyama Keiichiro and Nakamaru Yuichi.

They bring Senga Kento over to announce the theme of the show, Seishun (youth). They then go on to discuss some of the things that this episode will have in it before introducing the theme medley.

We get the Juniors from the last theme medley in this one. I think it is easy to see why Nozawa Yuki was picked to join the Hasshi-trio later with this. He looked so comfortable on stage when singing LIPS with Hashimoto Ryosuke and some of the other Juniors he was being grouped with at the time. He managed to stand out and looked like he had a good sense of where the camera was.

Following this there is a talk with some of the Hasshi-trio and a couple other Juniors as they talked about things they did when they were young, though honestly they all are what I would consider young. One of the Juniors wrote about doing splits and someone from the audience called something out to Koyama which prompted him to try to do the splits himself.

The next performance is of the trio of little Juniors that are getting the most spotlight, Kyomoto Taiga, Morimoto Shintaro and Anderson Casey, singing the Junior song A-HA-HA. Probably the nicest thing about the performance is that you can hear what their voices actually sound like. Especially Kyomoto's who is the vocal lead for the song.

It is Hey! Say! JUMP up next starting with a MC segment. Various members are called on to speak. I got Yamada Ryosuke talking about cooking and I believe Yabu Kota was saying something about exercise. And I was lost with Yaotome Hikaru's story, though Inoo Kei did jump in a couple times to help him with it.

They perform a special medley, which is Ultra Music Power mixed in with some of their concert songs, which include their sub-unit songs and Hey! Say! thrown in as well. I am quite happy that they cannot where these outfits anymore. They may not be the worst that they have had but I really do not care for them much at all.

Following this we have the game segment, which is the final one for the season. It is a new game where get challenge is only given a minute to be done. Such as with the first one is that one member of each team has to look at a list of words about spring and then try to write down as many as possible within a minute. To liven things up Yokoo Wataru comes out to randomly dance to give the audience something more interesting to watch then two guys writing, or trying to remember what they need to write on a board.

The next event has one member of each group strapped with step counters, one for each leg and arm, and the one with the most steps counted wins. Like with the last game the other members of the teams come out to help entertain.

They then play charades, and since most of the prompts are easy to figure out it is an easy one to play along with.

They end up having to do a tie-breaker game to figure out which group is the season winner and gets the prize for it. They decide to do janken with the team captains, Yabu and Hikaru.

The winning team gets to perform a song, Wana, together afterwards with the losing team having to sit in the background and watch them. I guess it is hard not to spoil who won but it is still a game segment well worth watching.

An MC with NEWS, who are still the guests of the month, have them talking about various topics. Koyama brings up Kato Shigeaki's photography hobby. It is an interesting MC to watch as you can tell that the four members that currently make up the group already have built a strong connection with each other as their topics seem to revolve around each other.

NEWS then performs one of their B-sides, Utsukushisugite Beautiful Eyes. And you can tell it is a ballad as we have the fog on stage for the performance.

The best thing about this Shiroyagi and Kuroyagi segment is that this should be final one. At least this one does not seem to break the energy of the show so much coming after a ballad number.

There is time for another group performance and we get Kis-My-Ft2 with a new song on the program, Brand New Season. I have always loved this song and I am so glad that there is a CD version of it. Pretty much all the songs the groups gets for the next year or so land in my favorites from their time as Juniors.

And we now have the final song of the season as the older Junior groups sing Va Ni La ~Burn It Up!~. I will miss the end songs from this season as they have been some of my favorites yet. And the Juniors tended to look like they also enjoyed performing them.

With that we end another season of Shounen Club with a nice Junior-centric epsiode. While it looks like they are still figuring out which Juniors they want to really promote they are giving quite a few some good chances to shine. And it really looks like A.B.C. and Kisumai are really benefiting from being a couple of the remaining Junior groups as they seem to be really stepping things up for themselves with making the most of the screen time they get.

It will be nice to have HSJ out of the way for a bit so the Juniors can get more time dedicated to them. This is really what I have wanted to happen with the more recent SC episodes but it does not seem like we have been getting it much.

Even though it has been noticeable that Matsushima So has been growing quite a bit recently watching the latest Shounen Club episode (July 3, 2013) makes it even more apparent.

He and Yo Marius had an MC segment that focused on them and when So spoke I had to do a double take. Now not only does he look older than Sato Shori but he sounds older with his deepening voice.

I had to go back and check out the SC episode that had Sexy Zone's debut performance to compare, and in about one and a half years he (and of course Marius) have really grown.

And overall I am just so happy to see the two younger members of SZ back on the program. I still believe the two have a lot of potential talent, and they are both so much more comfortable speaking and performing onstage than they were before. I do not think So stopped smiling once when he was dancing and I wish they performed something that let us hear what his voice sounds like now.

And I fail to see how Marius and So can be considered looking too young for the cooler image SZ's three elder members are getting. Mainly because Shori still looks like he could be thirteen with his baby face. And I am not saying I dislike Shori for this, I just think management is trying to put him in a style that does not suit him well at the moment.

Matsumura Hokuto

Group: n/a

Birthdate: June 18, 1995

Hokuto is one of those Juniors that caught my attention from the first time he showed up on Shounen Club. There was just something about him that put him in my instant “like” list of Juniors. He was my favorite member of B.I.Shadow, and was disappointed that he was not pushed as much as other members of that group.

Since B.I.Shadow was broken up Hokuto has had his chance to shine. He is proving to be one of the better actors in the Juniors and his performance skills are improving steadily. I have faith he will debut someday.

And I have gotten around to finishing this series so I can move onto another.

The series ends strongly, in fact the final three episodes are easily my favorites from the series. The episodes leading up to that are good too but are more in line with the ones from the first half.

While the mysteries sometimes feel more like an afterthought compared to the character drama going on in an episode they are still solid mysteries that make sense to how they are solved. The only thing I would have against them is that if you are familiar with mystery series it tends to be easy to figure out who the murderer is so only the 'how' is left to be solved. But considering the age of the cast I can only assume that the series was meant for a younger audience that may not have seen many mystery dramas before so I do find that I can find that as an actual fault.

We get to see that there is a bit more to Kyu (Kamiki Ryonosuke) than his usual happy-go-lucky character. I would have liked to have his character be explored more, especially as we learn more about his relationship with his dead parent than the one he has with his still living one. But it is easier to take his speeches to others better once he is stuck having to deal with the fact that he has some darkness in him as well.

As that second arc of focusing more on Pluto kicks in Amakusa Ryu's (Yamada Ryosuke) role expands as dealing with his connections with the organization cannot be ignored. But with this focus it allows Yamada to do more than just look broody. You can see that he holds promise as an actor but while need more work to hone his skills as there are a few scenes that do not completely work with the emotion he is trying to convey.

After a while it feels like the series is less about the mysteries but more about the group of people who make up Q Class that happen to solve murder mysteries. Especially as other characters than Kyu get to be lead characters in episodes and we learn why they are driven to become detectives.

I think the series is good but it is a strange balance of shounen and mystery. I like both genres but I am still mixed on whether I think they work well together. But TGQ tries it best and final few episodes are the strongest of the series and make watching the rest well worth it. I think it is really the characters that help sell the series as the mysteries do serve to help flesh them out and give you reasons to care about them.

And it is great to see Kamiki, Shida and Yamada so early in their careers, which helps give a gauge of how they have grown as actors since. So it helps if you are a fan of any of the actors in the series.

Now that I have this series watched I will finally get back to Piece to finish up the last two episodes for my reviews and then see about trying to catch up with the other Midnight Johnny's dramas before Kamen Teacher finishes airing.

First episode of a new season and this has to be one of the highest quality files I have seen yet for the older episodes of Shounen Club.

We get quite a few ungrouped Juniors introduced at the start of the episode as they sing various songs. One thing to note is that Kamei Taku is no longer with the Hasshi-trio and Nozawa Yuki has taken his place. So this should mean he has had his dating scandal and is no longer with Johnny's. Since the trio is Hashimoto Ryosuke, Sanada Yuma and Nozawa now I will be calling them by the group name they had briefly before being split up, TOP3.

The introductions end as the guest of the episode, Takizawa Hideaki, comes out to sing with the Juniors.

Tackey stays on stage for the opening talk that gives us the theme of the episode, Deai (a meeting). And then it moves to the usual medley. It has the same break down as the past couple of months with the usual Junior groupings singing the songs and at the end all singing the last song of the medley together.

We have a new letter reading corner for the season, Heisei Post, that has members of Hey! Say! JUMP up for its debut. They each read a fan letter from a fan of the member and that is about it. This will not be a favorite segment but it is bearable as it moves along more briskly than Shiroyagi to Kuroyagi did.

The segment is followed by HSJ performing a new song, Chance to Change, which is a B-side on their second single, Dreams come true. There are only nine members of the group performing though as Takaki Yuya is missing. He should be busy with filming for the Gokusen 3 drama at this time.

We get the first MC segment with Butokan and Tackey. This is Butokan's first time performing live on SC, something that gets mentioned near the start.

Butokan then perform their song Now and Forever. Most of my love from this group came from my love for Senga Kento and Hamanaka Bunichi. Looking back I have to wonder if this group really worked. Performance-wise they are solid but the ages are rather scattered and I just cannot imagine what they would like as a debuted group.

Following this is the game segment, which remains unchanged from the last season. The two teams have a fresh start for their overall score though. The first game of the season is Takizawa Mania, in honor of the guest for the episode.

It may not be the easiest game to play along with as it is just questions about Tackey, like his favorite food and what he eats before going to bed. Unless you are a Tackey fan you will be stuck randomly guessing, but from the answers from the guys most of them are just guessing as well. I do think Nikaido Takashi should get special points for having his answer be "Imai Tsubasa" for the two food questions.

After the game segment Question? perform. They perform one of their songs, Parallel World, which is a favorite song of mine from the group. Unfortunately I doubt the songs from the band are going to be used by the newer Juniors seeing as they are meant for a band group and Johnny's seems to have given up on those.

In Junior ni Q the topic is about the meanings behind names. There is only one Junior that I recognize to still be in Johnny's and that of course is Goseki Koichi. His name came from his mother wanting to use kanji from the names of other people in his family but for the first character in his given name she dropped a radical.

Then there is an MC segment with Kitayama Hiromitsu and Fujigaya Taisuke. Kitayama talks about meeting Tsubasa and topic derails to Kitayama somehow being added to Tackey & Tsubasa to make it Tackey, Kita & Tsubasa.

Fujigaya brings up that at his audition when he was eleven he met Tsubasa, and brings up that Nakamaru Yuichi was at the same audition as well. Nakamaru brings out a photo of Fujigaya from when he had entered the agency.

Then one gets pulled out for Nakamaru by Koyama Keiichiro to even the score for them. I always love seeing these kinds of comparisons so I thought this was great.

A.B.C. then perform Sayonara no Box with it being followed up immediately by Kis-My-Ft2 performing Brand New Season. Since they do not have a lot of time to clear the stage for Kisumai you can still see the box from Ebi's performance in the background during Kisumai's.

The ending song of the episode is T&T's Crazy Rainbow performed by Tackey and the Juniors. It was a great way to end the episode as the performance is fun to watch with seeing a whole stage full of Juniors going back and forth across it.

It is a pretty good start for a new season. The Juniors are back to being the focus of the show and Tackey usually makes for a fun guest as the Juniors are less intimidated by him compared to other senpai.

I loved TOP3. They may not have lasted long but I remember being a big fan of theirs. I think the trio worked out well and I was sad to see Hasshi be moved to A.B.C-Z as I really liked him with Sanada and Nozawa. But I think he worked out well with Ebi in the end and I hope Sanada and Nozawa get to debut as well someday.

When they announced the Tokyo Dome concerts for Johnny's World I figured that if they were to release something Johnny's World related it would be for those concerts. So I am not surprised that is what we are getting. Instead I am more surprised that this is a true DVD/BD release with both versions being exactly the same with the content and there is no special DVD version with extra content. But this is most likely because it is Pony Canyon releasing this and they have been pretty good about that.

For the contents of the release all that is listed is that it will be 163 minutes long. The first press bonus for it is a poster of the cover. It will be released on August 14.

JOHNNYS' World no Kanshasai in TOKYO DOME / V.A. (DVD)

JOHNNYS' World no Kanshasai in TOKYO DOME / V.A. (BD)

I definitely want this, especially since it has a BD version. And it would be nice to see what this was for myself, as the bits that were shown on the morning shows of the concert interested me. Plus it is always great to see something that features more than one Johnny's group and I want to see the Hey! Say! JUMP, A.B.C-Z and Sexy Zone interactions.

This episodes gives us NHK cross promotion.

The episode opens up with a shared performances of Sekai ni Hitotsu dake no Hana for the Juniors that get the chance to be introduced. I did not bring it up with the last episode but we do have a few more of the Kansai Jrs on the show for this month than just Nakayama Yuma. There is of course Hamanaka Bunichi, as he is a member of Butokan, and a few other of the older Kanjuu that I am not very familiar with.

It is just Koyama Keiichiro and Nakamaru Yuichi introducing the theme for this episode. It is Magokoro (sincerity/devotion). And we get the usual Juniors doing the theme medley and it going the usual mix of various groupings of Juniors doing a song before they all join together to sing the final song of the medley.

This is followed by a letter exchange segment with Morimoto Shintaro and Yuma. It's rather cute, especially when Shintaro reads his own name instead of his older brother's in his letter, and his want for Yuma to be his real brother.

There is then another medley that has the two leading it. It brings in more of the Juniors than the theme medley and has an interesting mash up of Mack the Knife and Namida-kun Sayonara.

Yara Tomoyuki seems to be the guest of the episode as he gets his own MC segment this time around. He talks about working on Endless Shock, which is Domoto Koichi's annual muscial.

Instead of a solo for his performance he instead does a collaboration with A.B.C. and Kis-My-Ft2. I always find myself enjoying Yara's performances as the dancing always stand out. And he has a good sense of how to get the crowd going.

The game segment is next and Yara is there as the judge for it. It is the game that has the two teams acting out prompts. One thing that is rather noticeable with this is the fan reaction to the Kis-My-Ft2 members. There are a couple of times that it almost got hard to hear what was being said because of how loud the crowd was.

This was also a surprisingly good segment for fan service with Goseki Koichi showing off why he's thought of being good with female and nee-san roles. And he even gets a kiss from Yara for it.

Overall this was a really fun segment, and I liked that they ended it with having them try to do some of the choreography for Kamenashi Kazuya's solo song sixteen seconds. As it actually uses something tied to the show, the performance, than something a bit random.

Nakamaru is on his own for an MC segment so it gets turned into a talk segment with him speaking about the theme of the episode.

We had a solo Nakamaru MC apparently because Koyama gets a solo performance this episode. He performs Private Hearts, which was a B-side on NEWS' NEWS Nippon CD. Koyama gets to show off his dance skills a bit with this performance.

For the VTR segment of the episode we get something different as Yuma is visited on the set for the Battery drama series that started airing that month. To be noted this drama airs on NHK with SC airing on an affiliate channel, NHK BS2, which is probably a big part of why we are getting this segment for this drama and not any of the other dramas Juniors and guests are in.

Yuma is joined by Shintaro part way through the talk and we have Shintaro again praising Yuma. He does make it sound like he would rather have Yuma as his older brother than his actual brother.

There is then an MC with the members of Hey! Say! BEST that are there for the April episodes. They talk about Jikkon (putting one's heart and soul into) with how it relates to them as a unit.

Following this is a Yabu Kota solo, My Everything. It is a standard ballad so I think whether or not you will like it will depend on how much you like Yabu.

This season does have an ending song for the program as one is introduced, OH! MY DREAM. This is performed by the main older Juniors so there are plenty of fun little moments which matches with the fun sound of the song.

With this episode Yuma seems to have begun getting the push he will have for years to come. And Shintaro will also start getting his push as well though he does not go as far as Yuma, or at least not yet. But I expect to see much more of the two in the near future on the program.

And while Hey! Say! JUMP is present, or at least some of the group's members, there is a definite reduction of their screen time from last season. I am certain they will stop being regulars on the program soon, IIRC.

Yokoo Wataru

Group: Kis-My-Ft2

Birthdate: May 16, 1986

One of the initial draws to Kis-My-Ft2 for me was the fact that Yokoo was in a previous Junior group with Kato Shigeaki and Koyama Keiichiro. Being the big NEWS fan I was anything related to the group got my interest.

Even though Yokoo was a member I paid attention to as first with Kis-My-Ft2 he remains a bit of a mystery to me. Perhaps because he is one of the quieter members or just one that does not get pushed much. But I like have members like that in a group, it makes things a bit more interesting.

Watching this episode I have to wonder why I have taken so long in getting back to finish up reviewing this series. I guess perhaps it was an issue with the fact there was a bit of a wait time for the subs to come out and it would have been hopeless to try to review an episode like this without knowing what was all being said.

The episode begins with a part recap of the previous episode and part look at the relationship of Narumi Hiro (Nakayama Yuma) and Origuchi Haruka (Mizuno Erina). Without a doubt there was something between them despite both being rather quiet in nature.

When it returns to the present Hiro and Suga Mizuho (Honda Tsubasa) are talking in a cafe about Origuchi. Hiro tells her that he has not been in touch with Origuchi for some time and mentions that he has hopes in seeing her again someday. Mizuho then has to break the news to him that Origuchi passed away. Hiro does not take it well and runs off with Mizuho following him.

At the place Hiro is staying at Mizuho gets him to talk more and he confesses on being the one to have almost killed Maruo. He also tells her that was the reason Origuchi rejected him. He then takes his paintings, including a portrait of Origuchi, and set them on fire. Mizuho though saves the one of Origuchi and tells him that he shouldn't erase the little that is left of her so easily.

Some time afterwards Yanai Takashi (Matsumura Hokuto) and Nishida Remi (Arai Moe) show up. Yanai confronts Hiro about getting Origuchi pregnant but Mizuho cuts in telling him that was a mistake, it was her friend that had gotten pregnant.

Remi then speaks up and explains that the friend that Origuchi was helping was her. She confesses everything then about her relationship with Origuchi, as she was the one that helped her and was there for her during the most painful period of her life.

So with this the main mysteries are solved and I feel rather satisfied with them. Certainly they are heartbreaking but they make a lot of sense for the characters so it did not seem to come out of left field. That and this series focuses on discovering hidden truths about others as one of its themes so it fits very well with that.

And I remain impressed with Yuma, as even though I do not care for him to play both Hikaru and Hiro it does give him the chance to show off his acting skills as he makes it difficult to confuse which character he is playing with both roles having very distinctive feels to them.

Hey! Say! JUMP are confirmed as no longer being regulars on the program with this episode.

There are quite a few missing Juniors in this episode, in fact only two members from Kis-My-Ft2 (Fujigaya Taisuke and Kitayama Hiromitsu) and A.B.C. (Kawai Fumito and Totsuka Shota) are there for the taping. So the opening is all the main Juniors singing Hey! Minna Genki kai? with everyone just getting individual name tags on the screen.

Koyama Keiichiro and Nakamaru Yuichi then introduce the theme of the episode, Genki (energy, spirit, health, etc...). They tie the theme into some talk about concerts and how those make them energetic.

They introduce the guests of the episode, Hey! Say! 7. The group goes directly into a dance segment to highlight each member before starting their performance of Hey! Say! For the theme of the episode they picked the perfect guests.

The group then has their MC segment and they are asked about who the most genki is and they all answer with Chinen Yuri. They then ask what makes them genki and Okamoto Keito answers with a massage, as well as Nakajima Yuto. Morimoto Ryutaro answers with his hamster and I did not quite get what Yamada Ryosuke or Chinen's answers were.

We then get the usual theme medley with the same run down as the past few episodes with the fresher and younger Juniors being the ones participating. And oddly enough everyone but the ones in the Junior Boys grouping get name tags during their performances.

The following MC segment is just with Koyama and Nakamaru. They talk about things that make them genki. Nakamaru said something about taking a bath and a DVD player. Koyama talked about how eating sweet things made him feel energetic.

The quartet of Juniors that has Masuda Ryo in it get to perform a song called DANGAN - LINER. This group also has Takahata Misaki who was in the original B.I.Shadow line up but quit the agency before Kochi Yugo was added to the group. The other two Juniors I am uncertain of as I do not remember seeing them for some time on the program. The performance also features the camera doing some tricks that are more annoying than anything. I think I recall seeing something similar to it in old 90's cheap music videos.

Butokan, or the three members that are there, have an MC segment. Each get to say what makes them genki. Yara Tomoyuki answers love, Yamamoto Ryota with dance and Hamanaka Bunichi brings up the fact that he really does not change emotionally. Which if you have watched Bunichi you completely understand what he is talking about.

Butokan then perform a new song for the group, C=Normal. I have liked all of Butokan's songs, though they are not favorites but I do like to listen to them. And the performances are always fun to watch, especially with some unique choreography put in them.

Next up is the game segment which has the guys going off of prompts that ask them to react to things. Like the first one is about water in the bath and the second is finding their pudding missing from the refrigerator. Then there is the reaction to a girlfriend confessing to you.

It then moves to have two at a time get a prompt to act out. The first is that at the opening of a play it begins and the actors notice no one is in the audience. The following one is that they have to pretend that they are a couple and one of them wins for being the millionth customer.

Question? is up next to perform and they sing their song Beautiful Mind. If I have not said so already this is one of my favorite songs for the group and I will never tire of listening to it.

For the VTR segment the theme is the source of genkiness. First up is Hashimoto Ryosuke who answered with karaoke and punching machines. When asked about it he brings up that he likes to go alone for karaoke.

Next up is Morimoto Shintaro, who shows off his genkiness to start things off. His answer was simply that he was always genki. He surprises Koyama and Nakamaru when he brings up the fact that he is only ten years old.

This is a rather good Junior ni Q segment as most featured are still with Johnny's as next up is Jesse. He wrote that drinking vegetable juice (or more specifically vegetable juice made from mainly green leafy vegetables) is his source of genkiness.

There is then a letter exchange between two Juniors that one I am not familiar with and another I know has left the agency and is now in a rock band.

This is followed by performances of the members of Kisumai and Ebi that are present. It starts off with Kitayama Hiromitsu performing his solo song Chikara.

Then Fujigaya Taisuke performs his solo song, Maria. I am surprised these songs have yet to be released on a CD as the rest of their solos from their Junior days have. But there is still just enough unreleased songs for Kisumai that they could do one last Kis-My-Zero CD.

Going back to the performances Kawai Fumito and Totsuka Shota sing parts of their group song, STAR SEEKER, solo. They are then joined by Fujigaya and Kitayama to finish up the song.

This then takes us to the end song which is OH! MY DREAM for this episode. Again only the older Juniors are performing this. It is a bit strange to see Nozawa Yuki and Sanada Yuma without Hasshi for this, it is easy to forget that they are older than him.

A good Junior focused episode even though some of the more prominent Juniors are missing. I can only assume they were busy with either a concert or stage show as that is the usual reason for having so many missing. Either way we got the chance to see some more of the Juniors that are not usually pushed as much in the episodes, Nozawa and Sanada even both got to participate in the game segment instead of it just being Kisumai, Ebi and Q?.

I tend to feel that most of 2008 is an intermission year, with very little changing and Johnny's trying to figure out which Juniors they should start focusing on for the next debut. Probably closer to the end of the year things should start falling into place but until then there is still plenty to enjoy in these episodes.

Johnny's Under 100: Taguchi Junnosuke

duet May 2013 close-up Johnny's Jr. profile translations

The Shounen Club 3 February 2008 review

Tantei Gakuen Q mid-season impressions

Dreamboys take to the races

The Shounen Club 10 February 2008 review

Other Idols Master Post 008

Johnny's Under 100: Arioka Daiki

The Shounen Club 2 March 2008 review

Other Idols Master Post 009

The Shounen Club 9 March 2008 review

The kids grow up so fast.

Johnny's Under 100: Matsumura Hokuto

Tantei Gakuen Q final impressions

The Shounen Club 6 April 2008 review

Johnny's World for you!

The Shounen Club 13 April 2008 review

Johnny's Under 100: Yokoo Wataru

Piece Ep. 12 first impressions

The Shounen Club 4 May 2008 review