First Impression: MARS (This is Not a Space Drama)

Excuse us sensei, but we are having a shoujo drama moment 

I have never read/heard of the manga series that's base off of it, so I'm going into this completely blind. I've read that this series has already been adapted into a Taiwanese drama back in 2004. And, now Japan has their own version.

Kira Aso (Marie Iitoyo) is a shy high school student who loves to draw. She's sitting quietly drawing and enjoying the ocean view in front of her. Until, she gets a surprise visit from a random ikemen guy, Rei Kashino (Taisuke Fujigaya), who asks her directions to a hotel. (Has he ever heard of Google Maps?) She quickly draws a map for him on the back of her drawing, gives it to him and she leaves without saying anything. 

Apparently, they go to an American school in Japan because they wear casual clothes and they have lockers in the hallway. But what a coincidence, Rei is in the same class as her. He becomes interested in her because he saw the drawing on the back of the map, which he still has it, and he is impressed with her artistic talent.  

  

Kira has her own problems she has to deal with such as getting sexually harassed by her teacher. Rei figures out what's going on and he decides to teach the sekuhara sensei a lesson. (This is my favorite part). During English class, sensei asks him to write a sentence on the board, based on the theme of "The man who I thought was honest, deceived me." Sensei wants to embarrass him in front of the class, thinking that he can't do this. But Rei can write English. He wrote about a teacher who sexually harass his students. As a child, Rei has lived in L.A for 8 years, so he knows his English. BURN!!!

However, sensei gets his revenge by sabotaging the brakes of Rei's motorcycle, he's not able to stop at a oncoming truck. But miraculously, he survived without a getting a single scratch on him. Rei saves Kira from Mr. Sekuhara by threatening him. Hopefully, he would leave her alone for good. Rei promises her that if anything happens to her, he would be there to protect her.

 

Kira decides to go for third base, she asks him if she can borrow his body... She wants Rei to be the model for her drawings and he accepts her offer. I'm not sure what kind of drawing she has in mind, but if she's thinking what I'm thinking, this is such a great excuse to see him in the nude. I wonder if that is the goal for this entire show. I'm sorry my perverted mind has taken over.

  

Light is back, and he's going to set the world on fire!

But wait! Here comes trouble. A new student moved into the school, Tatsuya Kida (Mastaka Kubota) who is also Rei's childhood friend.

Thoughts: It's been a while since I've watched a decent shoujo drama and MARS is something that I can sit back and enjoy it for what it is. Yes, it does have the basic shoujo formula, the love triangle, the hot guy interested in a average girl, and lots of teen angst going on. But I don't mind it as long as it does something interesting and it doesn't get too annoying. The romance and the atmosphere of the drama feels outdated, it has an 80's vibe to it. 

Anyway, in the back of my mind I've been thinking that Kubota and Fujigaya should switch roles because I would love to see Kubota play the cool guy in school. But then again, I have a feeling that his character has a dark/complicated history, and I know that Kubota can play a complex character, so this should be fun. I can't help to make Death Note reference here because Kubota looks like he just stepped out of the DN set and onto this. I'm just waiting for him to take out his notebook and start writing people's names on it. 

As for Fujiyama, he's alright where he is. I'm not really sure what's the story with Rei. Maybe, there's something more to him than meets the eye. I guess I''ll find out. 

 

 I'm going to continue to watch this show. It's only a 30 min drama, easy watch. I have the feeling that this is going to turn into my guilty pleasure watch.