WOWOW brings acclaimed author Toyoko Yamasaki's 1999 literary tour de force to life on the small screen for the very first time. Audiences have already received television adaptations of Yamasaki's other works – The Ivory Tower (白い巨塔), The Grand Family (華麗なる一族), The Waste Land (不毛地帯), A Son of the Good Earth (大地の子), and My Destiny (運命の人) – and can now add The Unbroken (沈まぬ太陽) to that list with this long-awaited production. Features a star-studded cast and additional filming on location in Afric...
Animal Trail, a natural path made by traffic of wild animals, can sometimes be helpful for people who are totally lost in the wilderness. One day, a woman who is exhausted with her hopeless life unexpectedly meets a gentleman by chance. Out of genuine hope to escape from her misery, she allows her destiny to blindly follow the mysterious instruction given by this stranger. Would this "Animal Trail" ultimately lead her to happiness, or would it lead her to disaster? The life of Tamiko (Yonekura)...
A striking drama of the amazingly gifted surgeon Zaizen Goro, caught up by his desire for power and fame, and his contemporary physician Satomi Shuji, who selflessly continues a quest to save human lives. The Great White Tower is the title of a representative novel by Toyoko Yamazaki that depicts the hidden side of the medical world and the dignity of human life, thus shocking and moving many readers, marking a milestone in medical dramas. A dense human drama develops starting with the first hal...
Natsuko, who was a copywriter, starts to cultivate rice called Tatsunishiki, which is a phantom kind and it is very difficult to grow. She does it to make her dead brother's dream come true. His dream was to make the......
After a failed relationship, Nobuko puts her all into dieting and finds success. She begins to work for her favorite fashion magazine, and just when her new life is falling into place she meets Taiichi, a handsome patissier. However, when Nobuko eats cakes, she can't stop - moreover, if she gains weight, she'll be fired. In the end, will Nobuko rebound...?...
A 'spoof comedy" in which a housewife who lives an ordinary life is forced to live a double life while pretending to be a major actress active in the entertainment industry....
Mariko is a forensic scientist working at the Kyoto PD Crime Lab. Her credo is “science never lies” and she delves into the truth of the case with her colleagues with their specialized skills and knowledge in forensic medicine, physics, chemistry etc. Mariko’s steadfast belief in science makes her stand against conventional institutional ethics of the police department, diehard detectives averse to scientific investigation and sometimes even with her own colleagues, but she stays faithful to her...
This is the dramatized version of the Naoki Award-winning novel by author, Kei Yuikawa. Moe Hayasaka is an office worker in an import service company who cannot devote herself in romance. On the other hand, Moe’s close friend, Ruriko Murono, who snatches Moe’s boy friend away to marry him for her third time, is interested in nothing but romantic affairs. Through their love and friendship, this drama portrays women in their 30s being rocked by marriage, divorce, infidelity, and work....
Arisa Ueto has a mild intellectual disability and autism. She hides her disabilities, but it's difficult for her to have relationships with others. She often makes mistakes at work and gets fired because of it. She has an inferiority complex and she will try to please guys intimately who seem interested in her. Arisa Ueto is unable to ordinary, but she admires those that are. She meets part-time worker Ryuji Okamura at her new place of work. She falls in love with. Due to his tenderness, she s...
Wealthy daughter of a hotel chain mogul meets poor widowed father of three. Despite their vastly different values and beliefs, will their chanced encounter blossom into something more?...
The orphan Nakazo becomes a pupil of kabuki actor Denkuro and attracts the attention of the great star Koshiro. However, in order to help his ailing parents, he becomes an apprentice to wealthy merchant Yoshikawa and decides to quit acting... Nevertheless, he could not turn his back on acting which is his true passion. When he tries to return to the theater world, he has to literally work his way up from the bottom. How will Nakazo rise up from his predicament? Though there are others who hinder...
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Keiichi Kaburagi is arrested as a suspect in a murder case and sentenced to death. He escaped from prison during the transfer, but while fleeing, he rescues the people he meets in his hiding place from the predicament. And when the rescued people realize that Kaburagi is a wanted death-row prisoner, they begin to wonder, "Is he really a murderer?"...
Tottori Kenichi is a foul-mouthed but gifted veterinarian nicknamed Dolittle. His catch phrase is 'pet care means business'. He is the director of his animal clinic and rescues not only 'voiceless' pets but also helps their owners, who lack understanding and caution, with their problems and worries. Working with him is animal nurse Tajima Asuka. Hanabishi Masaru is Dolittle's rival, a charismatic vet and director of another animal hospital who has not only an opposite personality but also a diff...
Again we follow a pair of police detectives as they track down offenders with special abilities (SPEC). However, since the events of the previous chapters, MPD Public Security's special division for solving cases involving unknown circumstances (Mishou) no longer exists. Instead, there is now an exclusive special division (Tokumu) as part of the Cabinet Information Research Office that only deals with cases involving SPEC holders led by Nonomura Koutarou's younger brother, Nonomura Koujirou...
Set in present day Tokyo, Shishio Homare (Dean Fujioka) works as a freelancer crime consultant. From an early age, Shishio Homare has been fascinated with how people become criminals and in original sin. He is a genius, but he also has an impulse to commit crimes. Shishio Homare works on cases which interests him among police or customer requests. Meanwhile, Junichi Wakamiya (Takanori Iwata) is a psychiatrist. He is smart and cool-headed. Due to a case, Junichi Wakamiya gets involved with Shish...
Maejima Satsuki works part-time at a garden centre in Tokyo. While her aspiration is to be a voice talent, she is on the verge of giving up. Satsuki has never been serious about what she does. It is the same with romance. However, she meets Morishita Riku, who is a garden designer. After a terrarium that she made captured his attention, Satsuki ends up helping out with a garden project he has undertaken. Before long, the two of them become a couple. Then, the gardener, Shiraishi Yuma, joins the...
Zankuro Matsudaira (Ken Watanabe) is a low-grade vassal of the Tokugawa Shogun, forced to moonlight as a bodyguard and executioner to make ends meet. He also has a drinking problem, an overeating mother, and a propensity to protect the oppressed, all of which eat into his finances. His confident mother Masajo (Kyoko Kishida) is the descendant of a famous family of shogunate retainers and a mistress of the pen and sword, who regards her son as a failure....
Satoshi Itomura is an assistant police investigator who belongs to the Metropolitan Police Department’s Scientific Investigation Team. Reenactments, fingerprint and voice data collections, profiling... His team collects scientific evidence and pieces together fragments of information in order to help build evidences. However, Itomura often does not care about the scientific approach and instead pays a great deal of attention to the things that the victims always carried with them or treasured. ...
Due to the nation's low birth rate and aging population, the Japanese government implements a new policy. The new policy requires single men and women from the age of 25 to 39 to go on government planned blind dates. The government randomly selects men and women as blind date partners. Each person can say no 2 times if they do not like their partners. If they say no for the third time, then they have to serve 2 years on an anti-terrorism activities support team. Tatsuhiko Miyasaka is a 26-year-...
The 39th NHK Asadora drama is Hassai-sensei. A novice teacher in 1930s Osaka learns that there is more to education than mere instruction. Though her tenure is interrupted by first marriage and later World War II, she begins a quest for "ideal education" after the war....
A drama about a rookie detective who teams up with a veteran detective and develops a good rapport while overcoming difficulties. Keigo starts his new post at a local police station where he partners up with Shoichi, a frigid, yet warm-hearted, detective on the verge of retirement. The drama features how the young detective builds up his career with the veteran and those who are connected with his cases....
'Tokkan' tells a story of Suzumiya Miki, a newbie tax collector who learns the strictness and difficulties of working through her job. Miki is called ‘Guuko’ because she often freezes up in front of her cold-hearted boss....
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Assistant Inspector Fukuie does not look like an assistant inspector but once she starts an investigation, she takes no notice of anyone as she searches for the key to find out the truth. She does not care for the hierarchical relationship of the organisation or career advancement. If she has doubts, she will not listen to her superior and will persist in investigating to the end. Fukuie’s boss Inspector Ishimatsu is completely different from her. He places importance on the organisation and dis...
At the five star Forumonto Hotel, Toko Amano works as a rookie concierge. Her senior concierge is Kazuma Honjo and the general manager is Ryusuke Washio. They are friendly and restrained with the customers at the Forumonto Hotel. Whenever problems occur, the various departments at the hotel work together to place a smile on the customer's face....
Ueba Kamo is a career woman who works as a government official at the Ministry of Finance after graduating from Tokyo University. One day, her mother who is the landlady of an old Japanese-style hotel “Ueba-ya” in Kyoto, suddenly passes away, and she has to take over the hotel as a new landlady. It is hard enough for Kamo to take on this total new type of job, but she is also surrounded by tough and intensive employees. She then teams up with a calculating and clever financier named Kinugawa Shu...
In the end of Meiji era, Takei Chiyo was born in a poor family in Osaka, and was sent to a theatre tea room as a servant when she was 9 years old. There, she was attracted by the world of theatre comedy. She grows up to be an actor and marries to Amami Ippei , but the war broke out and she was forced to stay away from acting for a while. However, when she comes back again, her acting in a radio drama impresses many people and makes herself one of the leading actors in western Japan....
21-year-old Ataru Matoba begins work for an event company as a dispatched worker. This is her first real job. She goes to work wearing a knit hat, sunglasses and a long coat. She is happy to have the various work experiences and she works pleasantly. Ataru Matoba also has a special ability. When she makes eye contact with someone, she can see that person's troubles or indelible memory. With her special ability, Ataru Matoba solves troubles of people she works with....
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Continuation of the popular series of films about the assassins in Edo. This show marks the return of the jidaigeki series "Hissatsu Shigotonin," which has had several seasons between the 1970s and the 1990s. The franchise came back in 2007 with a one-shot special, but this is its first full season since 1992. Makoto Fujita returns as the protagonist Nakamura Mondo, one of the "shigotonin," a team of hired assassins....
The 47th NHK Taiga Drama is a life story of Princess Atsu, who was born in Kagoshima Prefecture, then called Satsuma, and became the wife of Tokugawa Iesada, the 13th shogun of the Tokugawa shogunate. She accedes to the highest rank in Ooku, the inner palace of the Edo castle where women related to the reigning shogun resided. Iesada dies soon after their marriage and Atsuhime assumes the name Tenshoin at the age of 23. She exerts herself for the Tokugawa clan and for the nation during the uphea...
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Osome is an ex-actress who lost her parents in a fire when she was 6-years old. She then is separated from her older brother, who goes missing. While she tries to investigate the fire that killed her parents, an officer, Yoshikawa reveals that her father used to be a shogunate spy. Osome decides to become a spy herself under Yoshikawa, to find the man who killed her parents and to seek out her lost brother....
During the late Edo period when the Tenpo Reforms are in force, public discontent is growing over the collusive relationships between merchants and government officials. Kakie Shinpeita (Kitamura Kazuki) is a samurai who possesses a highly sensitive palate and remarkable knowledge of food. His family publishes a tabloid-style newspaper in block print that covers local happenings. However, Shinpeita is only interested in food and how to prepare it. He scours Edo looking for food stories to report...
It is the late Edo period. Futaboshi Hikoma, the Hirado domain's astronomer, is a rather eccentric person whose only interests are the stars and sea. A beautiful bride Orie comes to him and Hikoma vows to himself to cherish her in his lifetime. However, in less than a month, his new wife disappears without a reason from this dreamlike married life. In truth, Orie is a female ninja that the shogunate has sent because of its suspicions about the domain's illegal trading and activities. The shoguna...
Set in the Ryukyu Kingdom during the latter days of the Tokugawa shogunate, a woman takes the guise of a Eunuch to pass a government examination. She eventually becomes a government official still in the disguise of a man....
Based on the manga by Ritsu Miyako, this unique drama pairs a penniless detective with a razor-sharp eye for detail with a mysterious woman who can detect lies...?! Together, they unravel complex cases where truth and deception intertwine like threads in a delicate web, all set against the backdrop of a retro-modern cityscape....
Inspired by American TV movies like "Hitchcock Theater" and "The Twilight Zone," the show features multiple works with Tamori as the storyteller and actors as the main characters. While horror and supernatural themes are predominant, a variety of genres like comedy and drama are also produced. Most episodes, however, have a bad ending....
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A noble samurai serving the Shogun as 'Kogi Kaishaku-nin' (Official Executioner) is the target of a plot by the evil Yagyu Clan to take away his position and replace him with a member of their own family. When his wife is murdered and evidence is produced that he was plotting against the Shogun the Code of Bushido calls for him and his son to commit sepuku. Instead he defies the Shogun's orders and takes up arms against his enemies, becoming an assassin for hire....
A look at Genghis Khan's life, from his birth to conquests in Asia....
Because of her past, 17-year-old Rio lives her days filling the emptiness in her heart with money--until one day, she meets a university professor named Kouki and falls in love....
Atsuko and Akira are a husband and wife duo with a daughter and a son. Atsuko is in charge of the retirement finances. She saves from money given to her by her husband and also earns money herself by working part-time. She stretches every yen by leading a frugal life. yet, expenses come up. These include their daughter's upcoming wedding and the funeral expenses of the husband's father. Then, and at exactly the worst time, the couple finds itself unemployed....
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An omnibus special comprised of five segments....
An old thief, Kuhei Sagiwara, used to visit his hometown at the foot of the Kurikara Pass in Kaga Province. Hiding from the rain, he overheard a secret conversation between three men, just like him, hiding from the rain. These three conspired to kill Heizo Hasegawa, the head of the arson and robbery police squad, and the head of these three is the outrageous villain, thief and murderer Jingoro Amikiri......
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Two soon-to-be kamikaze pilots stop by a local school near their base to play the piano one last time, leaving a deep impression on a teacher. Years later, she seeks out the relatives of the pilots when the piano is old and about to be discarded....
Shinji (Kazuki Kitamura) runs a bar. A woman named Moeko (Eriko Sato) appears in front of Shinji. In the past, Moeko stole 200,000,000 yen from member of the National Assembly. Shinji , Moeko, Detective Sone (Tetta Sugimoto) and a gang soon begin to collide because of the money....
A historical chivalric drama with tears and laughter, telling the story of Jirocho Shimizu's family, his confrontation with Katsuzo Kurokoma's family, right up to the final battle on the Tenryu River to avenge Ishimatsu Mori....
When a major bank is caught paying off a corporate extortionist, the media and prosecutors begin to dig, breaking open a money-and-favours scandal that threatens to rock the entire structure of business and government to its core. While the bank's top executives continue to vacillate, a quartet of middle-management reformers, led by straight-arrow Kitano (Koji Yakusho), decide to stage a boardroom coup and install a new, clean management team. With the aid of a hotshot news anchor (Miho Wada) an...
Police coroner Kuraishi Yoshio (Masaaki Uchino) and the crime lab team attempt to solve a serial murder case with a killer who seems to kill indiscriminately....
When eight-year-old Tistou is sent home from school after being unable to stop falling asleep at lessons, his father decides that he will continue his education by learning from observation of real life, and where better to start than in the garden! With the gardener Mr. Moustache, Tistou discovers he has a remarkable gift—the green thumbs: everything he touches grows into beautiful plants. His next lesson is with the stern Mr. Turnbull, manager of his father's armament factory who takes Tistou...
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Referred to as the Pearl of the Orient, supermodel Miori Reiko has had her fair share of scandals due to her eccentricity and her wild love affairs. One day, Reiko is found dead in her apartment by her housekeeper, Ota Michiko. The medical examiner found traces of potassium cyanide in her body, which kick-started a major police investigation into her death. Who is the true murderer of Miori Reiko?...
Osome is a geisha and spy in the Tokugawa period. When she was very young she lost her family to a terrible fire and continues to search for her surviving brother. Along her journey she discovers much of her family history and gains new friends....
"Tales of the Bizarre: 2024 Summer Special" (世にも奇妙な物語 '24夏の特別編) aired on Fuji TV on June 8, 2024, featuring four intriguing stories: 1. "The Mansion of Remembrance" A woman awakens in a mysterious mansion after an accident, encountering residents with fragmented memories. 2. "Tomobiki Village" A university student visits a secluded village for a friend's funeral, uncovering eerie traditions and hidden truths. 3. "Treasure of Humanity" An artist is recruited by a global organization to pres...
This film is adapted from the novel of the same name, which tells the story of a new writer, Kayo Nakajima, who debuted with the worst debut in history by winning an award with a former idol. Afterwards, she was caught in a series of troubles, such as "having her single volume of books blocked from publication", "quarreling with a well-known writer", and "being betrayed by the editor".However, eventually, Kayo gradually opened up a path of her own with her ambition and wonderful creativity....
With a mixture of drama, warlords, battles, love, tragedy all set with great music, this made for television movie has it all. Showing the rise of Tokugawa Ieyasu as portrayed by Matsudaira Ken (Abarenbo Shogun) this stunning portrait of an exciting era shows how the influence of three women played a pivotal role in the formation of the Tokugawa Shogunate. Brilliant performances by Nakamura Atsuo (Cold Wind Monjiro) and Nakamura Tamao (widow of Katsu Shintaro) highlight this production as such...
A drab middle-aged man with thoughts of committing suicide and an extraordinary child prodigy plan a fake kidnap in exchange for a ransom of 10 billion yen....
Three stories from Shiratsuna Island: "Mikan no hana" Shiratsuna Island is the only remaining island city in Japan, but it is being merged with a city on the opposite shore. Housewife Misato Tomita lives on the island. "Umi no hoshi" Yōhei Hamasaki, who was born on Shiratsuna Island, lives in an apartment in the outskirts of Tokyo with his wife, Tomomi, and their son, Taichi. "Kumo no ito" Popular artist Hirotaka Kurosaki, who is a native of Shiratsuna Island, goes back to his hometown aft...
Fukuzawa Yukichi opens a school for samurai, who aim to learn Dutch language, most common for overseas trading. But when he was in Yokohama he learned that English language is one way more global one. His struggle against patriarchal mindset leads his school to become one of the oldest universities in Japan....
Young film star Ken Mihara is about to fall from stardom. His rise as a celebrity is solely credited to his onscreen counterpart, Keiko, who recently announced her retirement from acting in order to get married. Feeling frustrated and helpless, Ken turns to alcohol as he begins to provoke fights, attempts to lure a girl into bed, and argues with his wife, who came to visit him at the studio. All she says is thank you and leaves Ken puzzled. Ken Mihara, once a budding young star, takes a job as a...
When Mio was young, she lost her parents in a great flood and also became separated from her best friend Noe. Afterwards, Mio found her talent in cooking and eventually became a cook. Meanwhile, Noe has become an oiran (high-ranking courtesan)....
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Tamura Masakazu plays Shohei Yamauchi, a freelance reporter obsessed with finding out the truth about a traffic accident in which his beloved daughter died. Judging by the photo of the accident, which appeared in the news described by photojournalists as "one coincidence in a hundred thousand", and the survivor's testimony that "I saw a red fireball" immediately before the accident, the circumstances of the accident are questionable. The film is based on a late masterpiece by Seicho Matsumoto....
MEINICHI Directed By Tomoyuki Akashi Cast: Sayaka Yamaguchi, Asami Mizukawa "Maybe father was right. Maybe we should not have moved into that house..." When Minako loses her boyfriend in an accident, her sister tries to cheer her up, though sinister forces would have it otherwise... CRUEL KIDNAPPING: Directed by Tomoyuki Akashi Cast: Toru Masuoka, Renji Ishibashi As Toshio struggles to make ends meet, his daughter is kidnapped and a ransom note arrives. Desperation leads him to a cruel pl...
Based on novel 1962 "Kyukei no Koya" by Seicho Matsumoto. A serial murder occurs around the heroine Kumiko because she finds evidence that her father, who should have died, was "alive." Set in 1945, near the end of WW II, Kenichiro Nogami is reported to have died in a Swiss hospital. In fact, he is working behind the scenes to save Japan from destruction. For this cause, Kenichiro Nogami has left behind his wife and nation to work in hiding....
Ex-bandit Komakichi has a random encounter with an ex-ally, Matsuzou. Seeing each other for the first time in 35 years, the two drink and talk about their past, without revealing their current lifestyles, Matsuzou then recounts an odd story... The doomed reunion slowly steers the old bandits toward a life-changing event....
A set of twins -- one a hard-working student and the other a drifter -- team up with a dropout to unlock the secrets of the universe and to build one of their own....