Title: Taiyou no Uta aka Midnight Sun aka A Song to the Sun
Genre: Drama/Romance
Director: Yamamuro Daisuke, Imai Natsuki, Takei Atsushi
Format: 10 episodes
Dates: 14 Jul 2006 – 15 Sep 2006

Synopsis: While working at a seaside inn with his high school buddies, Fujishiro Kouji meets Amane Kaoru, a street musician. Kaoru is suffering from an incurable disease called XP (xeroderma pigmentosum), and can’t be exposed to the sun. Under the sun, the two would never have met. Still, destiny brings the two together. Since the day he suddenly lost his job, Kouji has lost sight of his dreams. But when he meets Kaoru, who is making positive efforts to become a singer, Kouji regains his long-forgotten passion for music.

The Highlights
Sawajiri Erika: She sings! And quite well too.
Nissan product placements: Past and present Fairlady Zs for the LOL.
Story: All over the place; doesn’t have enough focus.
Music: Better than the story itself.
Comparison to the film version: Ultimately inferior compared to the Midnight Sun movie.

Just a moment. Haven’t we seen this before?

That said, I don’t have anything against works that reuse the “sick girl” premise, as long as it is done well; in fact, this premise accounts for a lot of my favourites in Japanese works of any media, whether they be live-action movie (Crying Out Love in the Center of the World), drama (One Liter of Tears), anime (AIR TV), or any other media (Narcissu). However, I do expect such works to give proper treatment to the storyline, and that is where the drama version of Taiyou no Uta fails.

Let’s put it this way: for those going into this drama series expecting another One Liter of Tears just because it has Sawajiri Erika reprising the “sick girl” role, forget it. This version of Taiyou no Uta is nothing like One Liter of Tears, and for that matter, Sawajiri‘s Amane Kaoru is nothing like her breakout role as Ikeuchi Aya either. Which isn’t really a bad thing in itself, for while her portrayal of Kaoru as a sassy, punkish tsundere isn’t quite my thing, I do admit it is a breath of fresh air to see a “sick girl” who’s assertive and confident, instead of the usual “wilting flower” stereotype. Yamada Takayuki‘s Kouji, on the other hand, is a flat, uninspiring male lead; as dull as Kaoru is sharp, well-meaning but largely incapable, always getting into trouble with or needing to be bailed out by either his group of high school buddies or Kaoru, Kouji’s type is something we’ve all seen all too often in anime, and in my opinion, should have stayed within that medium.

And the meandering nature of the plot itself would have put the Mississippi River to shame; simply put, too many characters, too many side plots, not enough treatment of the main theme. I don’t care that Kudou Youhei (Kaname Jun) wants Kaoru to ghostwrite for his charge, Tachibana Asami (Matsushita Nao) (who is also linked to Kouji), because the latter can’t write songs to save her life without a certain someone by her side; I want to see more of Kaoru and Kouji, and how they deal with the debilitating effects of her illness on their relationship. What is particularly galling is that Kouji’s buddies, three more in an already overcrowded cast, was actually necessary to move the plot along, since Kouji was simply too weak a character to achieve anything on his own; a fatal weakness the movie Kouji does not share. And the fact that Taiyou no Uta doesn’t seem to know what it wants to be (sometimes the story of a sick girl, sometimes a comedy, sometimes a melodrama) doesn’t help it in its case at all. By the time the drama had gone through half its episodes, I had started amusing myself by watching the Nissan product placements that popped up every so often. (I can understand Kudou driving the classic 240Z, but what kind of female popstar drives a 350Z? Shouldn’t they be driving, like, BMWs? I digress.)

In the end, there was just so much going on within this drama version of Taiyou no Uta, that there wasn’t enough love for Kaoru to make me feel for her when the time came. And any time a “sick girl” drama fails to make me feel, I consider it a failure. Apologies to fans of Sawajiri Erika, but I don’t think of this drama as particularly good in any way. Except for the music, perhaps; there’s a good reason why Sawajiri‘s single of “Taiyou no Uta” was more popular than the drama series.

The Rating: 4

Reviewed by: Ascaloth