is a manga

Manga

Manga is the Japanese word for "comics" and consists of comics and print cartoons . In the West, the term "manga" has been appropriated to refer specifically to comics created in Japan, or by Japanese authors, in the Japanese language and conforming to the style developed in Japan in the late 19th...

 by Fumi Saimon

Fumi Saimon

is a female Japanese manga artist and novelist. She is best known for the series Tokyo Love Story, which was adapted as a live-action television series. She won the 1983 Kodansha Manga Award for general manga for P.S. Genki Desu, Shunpei and the 1992 Shogakukan Manga Award for general manga for...

. Tokyo Love Story was adapted as a Japanese television drama

Japanese television drama

, also called , are a staple of Japanese television and are broadcast daily. All major TV networks in Japan produce a variety of drama series including murder romance, comedy, detective stories, horror, and many others...

 (dorama) in 1991. It aired on Fuji Television

Fuji Television

is a Japanese television station based in Daiba, Minato, Tokyo, Japan, also known as or CX, based on the station's callsign "JOCX-DTV". It is the flagship station of the Fuji News Network and the ....

 in 11 episodes (plus one special) between January and March 1991. Actors include Yuji Oda

Yuji Oda

is a Japanese actor and singer.Yuji Oda was born on 13 December 1967 in Kawasaki, Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan. He was born to an upper-middle-class family and attended the private academy of Touin Gakuen. Originally he had a promising career in sports, but had to give it up after a knee injury. He...

, Honami Suzuki, and Narimi Arimori

Narimi Arimori

Narimi Arimori is a Japanese actress.-External links:**...

. The drama's theme song, Love Story wa Totsuzen ni by Kazumasa Oda

Kazumasa Oda

is a Japanese singer-songwriter, composer and is also known as the leader of the folk rock band Off Course.As a vocalist and leader of Off Course, Oda wrote many Japanese standard numbers in the 70s and 80s. He and Yasuhiro Suzuki were important composers in the band...

 is Japan's 8th best-selling single in history.

Synopsis

Snagging a new job at Heart Sports' sales department, Kanji transfers to the Tokyo office, where he meets his new colleague Rika and is reunited with his best friends from home—Mikami and Satomi. Mikami, Kanji, and Satomi have been friends since they were children, having grown up in the same small town. Mikami is Kanji's best male friend and Satomi is their platonic female friend whom both Mikami and Kanji have had a crush on since high school. After seeing Mikami forcedly kissing Satomi, Kanji felt despair, however, then quickly developed strong affection for Rika who was always energetic, funny, encouraging and caring. Their relationship was rather unstable to begin with, given Kanji's history with Satomi as well as Rika's (not so) secret affair with her and Kanji's boss Sendo [this affair was much more of a determinant in the original manga than in the drama, when Rika got pregnant bearing Sendo's child (not shown in the drama version), which was one of the reasons why Kanji chose Satomi over Rika]. In the meantime, denied by Satomi who thought Mikami was just playing with her, Mikami's attempts on pursuing his med school classmate Nagasaki had also been with much frustration.

Cast

• Honami Suzuki as Rika Akana
• Yuji Oda
  Yuji Oda
  is a Japanese actor and singer.Yuji Oda was born on 13 December 1967 in Kawasaki, Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan. He was born to an upper-middle-class family and attended the private academy of Touin Gakuen. Originally he had a promising career in sports, but had to give it up after a knee injury. He...
  
   as Kanji Nagao
• Narimi Arimori
  Narimi Arimori
  Narimi Arimori is a Japanese actress.-External links:**...
  
   as Satomi Sekiguchi
• Yosuke Eguchi
  Yōsuke Eguchi
  is a Japanese poet, actor and singer, who most recently starred in 2009 Japanese film Goemon. Since 1986, he as appeared in a number of television series and movies. He is married to the actress and pop star Chisato Moritaka, with whom he has a son and a daughter....
  
   as Kenichi Mikami
• Akiho Sendo as Naoko Nagasaki

• Tokuma Nishioka as Natsuki Waga
• Kaori Mizushima
• Miki Ito
  Miki Ito
  is a Japanese voice actress.-Notable voice roles:*Air Gear 2006*Angel Links 1999*Ashita no Nadja *Aishiteruze Baby *Battle Angel Alita *Battle Athletes Victory...
  
  
• Hideyuki Nakayama

Production staff

• Producer:
• Director: (episodes 1, 2, 5, 7, 9, 11), (eps. 3, 4, 6, 8, 10)
• Screenwriter: Yuji Sakamoto

Episode titles and viewership

1. 20.7%
2. 20.8%
3. 19.9%
4. 17.1%
5. 19.9%
6. 20.1%
7. 22.4%
8. 22.9%
9. 26.3%
10. 29.3%
11. 32.3%
    • SP:29.9%

External links

• Internet Movie Database entry
• Review