MOZU Season 2 - Maboroshi no Tsubasa (2014)

After being partially disappointed with the first season, I didn’t hold much hope for the second one. I was absolutely right with my judgment, Mozu Maraboshi no Tsubasa didn’t add much anyway.

Although this was shorter with only 5 episodes, it felt as heavy as the first season. The reason I gave Mozu no Sakebu Yoru a slack despite some displeasures was because the hope in the second season. The story was incomplete but alas, there’s a second season to make it up for it, the answers weren’t fully provided by TBS but WOWOW will do the job. That’s what most of viewers were thinking after finishing off the first part. It’s safe to say that they didn’t give answers, or better said not satisfying enough.

Mozu is one heck of a high-produced drama compared to other Japanese shows. It’s closer to films’ production value instead of TV dramas which unconsciously built tremendous expectations in viewers’ mind, thinking that this drama will actually change the concept of J-dramas’ making in the future. It’s neither the channels fault nor the audience fault either; it’s the freaking screenwriter’s mistake. This was adapted from novels’ series that were pretty famous so for the sake of dramatization, he could’ve just changed few details and everything would’ve been more than great. But no, he had his own philosophy that we were made to understand. I tried to cope along but that wasn’t fun at all.

Back to the second season, the plot took a major change but the lead’s chase after the truth was still the main point of the drama. A high-scale conspiracy again, a suspenseful race for the truth again, many questions again, too many suspicions again but the outcome was not satisfying…Again! When you play a mystery/suspense game with your audience then you have to put all your cards on the table by the end, this drama only revealed half of its cards by far. And the problem is, the revealed cards weren’t even a surprise. After watching the first season, it becomes so easy to predict the screenwriter’s pattern, which is quite irritating for the genre’s lovers. But thankfully, due to its short amount of episodes; the drama wasn’t slow like in the previous season. Or at least not unbearably slow.

The star-studded cast wasn’t put to its full use and I hate that! Come on, beside Nishijima and Ikematsu whose skills were used, Kagawa and Maki who were marked as main didn’t serve anything but the lead’s supporters. As if they were his cheerleaders or something. Give me a break! Such amazing actors could’ve been better used than that! Now let’s talk about characters, since the plot was too focused on revealing the truth, characters’ development was almost inexistent. Compared to the first season, Kuraki stayed the same without practically any change, Osugi is no different, Akebochi had the chance to change a little due to the events surrounding her but it wasn’t that obvious. Higashi became crazier and other added characters were absolutely useless most of the time.

The dark cinematography still captured me though, it was immensely used in this part and I completely appreciated it. The music note was no different from the first season.

Watch if:
-You liked the first season but don’t expect much.

Do not watch if:
-You didn’t like the first season. It’s a waste of time in that case.

I think a third season should be in the making for this drama, to provide explanation for unanswered questions that it. This season did answer some from the first part but it still left many things opened. Heck, it even added many others to the mysterious cloud.

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Has anyone noticed how fast Kagawa Teruyuki can speak?! In my review for season one of this series I said that I wanted to watch this story because of Hidetoshi Nishijima, however, the more I continued to watch this series the more I seemed to fall in love with Kagawa Teruyuki, Maki Yoko, Kohinata Fumiyo, Hasegawa Hiroki, Aoi Yu, Ikematsu Sosuke, Ito Atsushi, and Hirayama Yusuke!

The cast of this series was so perfectly brought together that the story seemed so insanely real and tangibly scary! I'm glad I have some new (and old) actors and actresses to follow, though it will be hard to follow this amazing story.

To be honest, and I think I've said this in my review of this series' first season, the genre type of this show isn't really something I normally watch; since I'm a huge chicken! Although, this story isn't as scary as it appears... At first, that is. This entire series is full of spooky and creepy feelings, not to mention the most mysteries and suspenseful twists and turns I have ever seen or read.

The story itself is very unique, something that is genuinely real and honest, and shows every bit of deep hidden darkness within humanity and everyone (no matter their lifestyle or career or 'status') within reality alike.

I won't say this is a hidden gem because I believe a lot of people love this series, as well as the special and movie, but I will say that I hope many more people try to enjoy this series for a long time! This story is superb and nothing like you've seen before, the synopsis and trailers do not give season 1 or season 2 any justice, so I really hope more people will take the time to enjoy "Mozu" series!!

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