Josh O

Other commenters have left a synopsis, so I will get straight to the point. This is a pretty dark take on the Freaky Friday trope. There is a lot of drama, plotting, conniving, etc. There is comedy here and there, which is quite a relief from the dark themes. The performances are good, and the story is interesting and well paced. The story stays true to the fantasy world that they have created, which really helps the story feel tense and dramatic. One thing that the other commenters seem to have overlooked: there is a very graphic and realistic shot of a character committing suicide by jumping from a building. This shot has a purpose in the story, to show that once you have "switched" you can't "switch back". For me, the scene was a bit too much. And this scene is repeated at least five times during the series.

This drama series starts out strong, but becomes dull and tedious toward the end. A young manzai comedian (Tokunaga) becomes obsessed with a slightly older comedian (Kamiya) who becomes his mentor/alcoholism enabler. This is meant to be a gritty, realistic look at the impossible challenge of becoming a successful comedian. The story is told almost like a documentary, each episode is set one year after the previous episode. The cinematography of Tokyo back alleys and ezakaya is great, and so is the music. It works better as a music video than a drama. Tokunaga is the hero of the story, and we see him get falling-down wasted _every_episode_. It is like this show is trying to promote alcoholism. The crux of the show is supposed to be the relationship between Tokunaga and Kamiya, but it is just kind of gross. After 10 45 minute episodes that cover a ten year time period, we don't know anything about the hero Tokunaga. No friends, romantic interest, family, backstory, etc. is shown, only getting drunk with Kamiya over and over. The pace slows to a crawl in episodes 8 and 9, probably they could have cut this down to 7 or 8 episodes. If you want to see a dark, gritty Japanese drama that shows daily life in the Tokyo area, with some nice camera work and music, Hibana is okay but not great. Note: the manzai comedy does not translate well, although I am not convinced it is meant to be funny...