Overall I’m not as big a fan of this season as the last because with only a couple exceptions it never really feels like we see these people becoming good friends who actually want to live together for a while.
I really felt that bond between everyone in Boys and Girls in the City, but here it’s just not the same and everyone feels more selfishly motivated.
Oh - it absolutely wasn't as good as the last one for us either - but it's still better than a lot of TV and still has a pace that is almost soothing to watch. I'd really love to see someone take the format and try it with some career motivated US residents to see how it translates. The lack of confessional style interviews is just so refreshing.
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#pipeCocky Stride, Musky odoursPope of Chili TownRegistered Userregular
Note I’m only a few eps into part 4 so this may change but I doubt it.
Taishi strikes me as a really gross dude. He’d be completely infatuated with a girl and then the instant another one showed up he’d move on to her immediately and completely ignore the girl who he was previously pursuing. I was so glad in part 3 when Cheri called him out for that.
Also he just...won’t leave.
I get that he’s a struggling actor and probably saw this as his chance to increase his profile in Japan while also getting a place to stay and getting to hang out with beautiful women, but come on man you overstayed your welcome like 10 eps ago.
I’m not far enough into this block of eps to see if things are different with Chikako, but I still just don’t like the guy.
See, I was ok with Taishi because it felt like he was just doing what so many others had done on this show: go on a bunch of casual dates. I agree that he didn't handle moving on well, but once Cheri pointed that out to him, he did get better.
P4 spoilers
Like, before Anna's goodbye scene, she has a talk with Taishi that feels like they got over those problems and were able to be friends.
Plus it doesn't help that Cheri takes a turn into real hypocritical bullshit rather quickly in P4, and Taishi is the one who comes out of it looking mature.
This is NOT how I expected this confrontation to go down.
Cheri just kind of railroaded everyone and didn't back down, and didn't even apologize to Mariko for the shitty thing she did, while Mariko apologized! And then she pulled the "I'm not the selfish one, you all are!" card, and somehow Taishi was the only one willing to speak up and call bullshit on it?
Somehow this episode made Taishi the good guy while making Wez and Ryo look like cowards, which I was NOT expecting.
edit: IT JUST KEEPS GOING
Literally now Chikako is catching strays from Cheri, and Cheri is literally out her saying she can never be criticized.
This last set of episodes has really turned me around on Wez, from thinking he's great to finding him to be real shitty.
I certainly wasn't expecting this conversation about Cheri's date with Eric to turn into Cheri suddenly struggling to hold back tears as she explains that she's hesitant to get into a relationship because she expects to have "social obligations" with "important men" in order to break into the real estate industry.
And pervy uncle definitely needs to tone down his constant "she's so erotic" talk Re: Chikako.
Now that I finished, I’ve started to think about final cast rankings, and I think I’m just gonna have to do it by tiers. I’m more mixed on everyone else, which makes rankings difficult.
I can't tell if Cheri is just shitfaced 24/7 or if her Japanese is just that bad.
EDIT:
I guess I missed the moment when Mila announced she was leaving. She seemed like she could have been interesting to have around more, but I can see how she felt out of place.
I can't tell if Cheri is just shitfaced 24/7 or if her Japanese is just that bad.
EDIT:
I guess I missed the moment when Mila announced she was leaving. She seemed like she could have been interesting to have around more, but I can see how she felt out of place.
Yeah she got there at the wrong time. I think she would’ve been really good with the original group.
I can't tell if Cheri is just shitfaced 24/7 or if her Japanese is just that bad.
EDIT:
I guess I missed the moment when Mila announced she was leaving. She seemed like she could have been interesting to have around more, but I can see how she felt out of place.
P4E6:
Mila was barely on the show and then left suddenly, with no explanation shown, but was noting how sad she was on her way out. Makes me wonder if she was asked to leave because they didn't feel like they were getting enough out of her for the show or something. I would have liked to see her more, so that was weird.
WOW Wez was a piece of shit to Anna in that goodbye!
That was seriously brutal. I mean, if he wasn't interested in her anymore, it's not like he has any obligation to return her feelings, but there are some ways to handle that tactfully and he trampled all of them.
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#pipeCocky Stride, Musky odoursPope of Chili TownRegistered Userregular
I...
did not read it that way at all.
For starters I'm convinced they were having casual sex ever since their date after his show.There was a bunch of time between then and when Anna left that Wez was just not around
Secondly, I'm also convinced that his "did you meet a cool guy?" series of questions was sarcastic,
and he was referring to himself, which she answered "I did meet this one cool guy" and then they both smiled.
I don't think it was brutal, I just think their entire relationship happened off camera.
GUY TIER
1. Guy - Guy is the best. Literally the only cast member this season that got up to Arman/Hansan levels for me this season. He just liked everything and everyone and his relationship with Niki was adorable.
THE PRETTY GREAT TIER
2. Avian - Avian was the best girl out of the original three, and really seemed like the mom of the group in a lot of respects, just being really mature in general. But she also got to launch a clothing line, and ended up in a relationship, so things worked out really well for her.
3. Niki - For someone who was on an obvious deadline of only having 2 months to be on the show, Niki made the most of it, and absolutely dominated the spotlight while she was there, but in a good way. Her relationship with Guy was absolutely adorable, and I really wished we had gotten more time with her.
4. Eric - This is a bit unfair, but Eric got some overtime on this show to raise his profile, and it paid off. He came back in Cheri's story, and really came off as a good guy. His story at the beginning was kinda boring, but I think it was more that he didn't really fit super-well with that opening group. Even then, in that first group he was definitely the older brother for the other guys, and it was kind-of nice.
THE TAISHI STORY TIER
5. Chikako - Chikako goes in front of Taishi because she absolutely saved his story, but also because she was really interesting and had her own rough stuff that she was going through. Like, her conversation with her ex-husband was brutal to watch, but a big deal for the show, and not something you see all that often in reality television.
6. Taishi - Taishi was good. He was such an actor in so many aspects, from the emotionality of his every decision, to his sword training, to "a love worth dying for." But, ultimately, Taishi was really supportive of everyone and wanted the best for them.
THE PRETTY GOOD TIER
7. Lauren - The first part and a half was definitely the Lauren Show in so many respects, because she tended to command attention for most of it. I thought she was overall fine,
and it was interesting to see a non-Japanese person on a show like this, and she won me over by the end.
8. Yusuke - Yusuke did not belong on this show at all. Like, personality-wise, he is not someone who should be on reality TV. But that made him fun to watch and root for, because you rarely see someone this out-of-their-depths on a show like this. His music was good, and I think everyone on the show really liked him, but you could actively feel how awkward he was through the TV screen at every moment.
9. Yuya - Outside of Avian, Yuya never grabbed me the way so many others did on this show, but in that relationship he was very entertaining, so it gets him this spot.
THE "I WISH WE HAD MORE TIME WITH THIS PERSON" TIER
10. Ryo - Ryo came super late, and was maybe the best person to be inserted in the house at that moment, as he was a vocal catalyst for the Taishi/Chikako relationship, and he actively seemed to care about everyone. Like everyone in this tier, I wish we had gotten more time with him, because when he came on, the show was almost consumed by the Taishi/Chikako and Cheri storylines.
11. Mariko - I felt really bad for Mariko, because she got thrown into an awful situation at the end, and her big moment was as a catalyst for the larger Cheri storyline. She also seemed similar to Yusuke in that she wasn't the greatest choice personality-wise for this show, but probably would have flourished in an earlier grouping.
12. Mila - Poor Mila. She really got a bad hand, as she was so much younger than everyone else outside of Guy, and Guy was gone so often at this point that she really felt isolated from everyone. She would have done better earlier in the season, when the cast skewed younger.
THE NOT-SO-GREAT TIER
13. Anna - This feels a bit mean, but Anna just seemed to be there for so much of the her time. Worse-still, her storylines tended to feature her in bad relationships, first with Taishi where she felt like she was ambivalent towards him, to her relationship with Wez where it felt like more interesting stuff was happening off-screen. At some point, I just stopped caring about her in any way, which dropped her down here (it also doesn't help that her last scene on the show was absolutely brutal).
14. Wez - Wez started out strong, but in typical Terrace House shitheel fashion, slowly turned to the bad. He really felt like he was there to promote himself, which, sure, but as the last part progressed, it became more and more obvious that he really didn't care about some of the other housemates. Even the commentators were forced to point out how little he was on the show after a certain point. There were also hints that he was in a casual relationship with Anna, but by the time that ended it felt more obvious that he was only into it for the sex and not much more, which was pretty shitty once it was revealed that Anna had delayed her trip because of him. Plus, personal opinion, his music wasn't very good.
15. Cheri - So much of Cheri was wrapped up in some hypocritical bullshit. Like, I thought her taking Taishi to task for his multi-girl dating strategy was a great start, but then she turned around and was actively making out and (possibly) screwing multiple guys. And the whole fight that dominated one of the last episodes was absolutely bonkers,
because she played the victim card to the point that she was perceiving slights at every turn, even going so far as to almost-unfriend Chikako because she dared not to agree with her. She brought up some interesting ideas, like how a girl like her is expected to entertain older men with money to move up in the profession, which is shitty, but she surrounded things like that with her own incredibly shitty behavior. More than anyone else on this show, I just started to dislike the moments that she was on screen, in the way that only happened with Makoto and Hayato last season.
For starters I'm convinced they were having casual sex ever since their date after his show.There was a bunch of time between then and when Anna left that Wez was just not around
Secondly, I'm also convinced that his "did you meet a cool guy?" series of questions was sarcastic,
and he was referring to himself, which she answered "I did meet this one cool guy" and then they both smiled.
I don't think it was brutal, I just think their entire relationship happened off camera.
It’s possible they just had an off camera relationship, but the way everything was presented suggested that he pretty much blew her off even though she hung around. The way he didn’t get up to see her out when she left was what stood out the most to me.
One thing I'm noticing with Aloha State is that it doesn't feel like we're seeing the members and their relationships as closely as Boys & Girls In The City. There, it seemed like we generally got to see most sides of what was happening, and any time there was a problem between the members, you'd see it develop, other than [late B&GITC spoiler]
Riko and Hayato's secret affair, which the other members knew about but completely blindsided the viewers.
Aloha State P4E9:
So this thing happening between Mariko and Cheri, and the others agreeing that Cheri doesn't seem very respectful, seems weird because -- other than her hypocrisy toward Taishi -- I haven't really seen friction between Cheri and the other members.
Or even how Mila's departure was so sudden and unexplained. She must have talked to the other members about it, but we didn't even see her tell anybody other than that phone call.
This Cheri/Mariko/Wez nonsense is the most manufactured nothingness. Clearly Aloha State needed some grass-fed steaks in the fridge to generate some authentic drama.
Part 4 ended up being the Taishi and Chikako show in the same way that part 1 was the Lauren show.
I was surprised to end up liking Taishi in the end. His overly dramatic personality made me cringe a lot, but I kind of respect that he just went for it all the time. He had me genuinely afraid that he was going to skip straight to a marriage proposal and go down in flames, but fortunately he didn't go THAT hard, and he seems to have found someone who appreciates his grand efforts. His sword practice in the Shinuhodo No Koi shirt was one of my favorite Aloha State moments.
It was interesting that Taishi and Cheri seemed at least tolerant of each other if not friendly at the end. It was nice that she joined them for Taishi's birthday toast - though it just contributed to the feeling I get that a lot of important things happened off-screen. Cheri never got to redeem herself in my eyes.
Seeing so many of the previous members again at the end was a very nice send-off for the show.
And I just want to take a moment to appreciate Ryo, who may have been the closest Aloha State had to Hansan, from helping and encouraging Taishi and Chika's relationship, to his chat with Cheri about trying to get along and smooth things over at the house. Even though he didn't have much time on the show, he seemed like a genuinely good guy, and appeared to invest a little more in his relationships with his housemates than a lot of the others have, at least as far as we were shown.
Looking forward to the next season!
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#pipeCocky Stride, Musky odoursPope of Chili TownRegistered Userregular
Ok I'm watching episode 10 and I've fuckin got some things to say
Cheri is seriously a god damn sociopath or something fucking hell. She has zero problem contradicting the way people should behave within the same fucking sentence, it's like she's putting on a cognitive dissonance seminar.
She literally said to several people that if they changed their behaviour she might be friends with them like it was a fucking warning. She is the head cheerleader.
#pipeCocky Stride, Musky odoursPope of Chili TownRegistered Userregular
The new house is amazing and I want to live there.
My wife has been keeping up with the promotion as it's about to start in Japan. Yamachan (the creepy uncle host) released a promo video recently where he said "Viewers will be pleased to know I basically hate everyone in the house right now"
Ok when I’m visiting my family over xmas I binge terrace house
Aloha Hot Takes
Lauren was my big favorite. I recall getting mad when Naomi was like “I talked to Avian and she says it’s not her, therefore it’s Lauren, but I can’t just talk to Lauren, because she’ll say it’s not her.”
Yusuke was cool but a pity. Ganbatte, Yusuke.
He likes to throw out that really high note a lot.
Taishi I was whatever on but began to hate since the “berate Yuya for suboptimal ganbatteing” and only hated more the more time went on.
Cheri is probably contemptible but she made Taishi super mad, which I appreciated very much.
Wez seemed like everything important happened off camera
Guy was adorable. He is going to go to the Olypmics but be disqualified because he’ll show up on the opposite coast, winds up winning the gold in some other sports by accident when trying to rush back.
No one else that remarkable.
In full agreement with yamachan that the punch bowl menu remained comically short.
Ep 4-10 more like Ep 4-10/10
My impression was Taishi was ultra pumped for turning the tables on Cheri ever since she called him out on his dating style. The Japanese feelings jam/interrogation trump card of “aren’t you just being selfish” had no counter for “yeah I’m super selfish, and, maybe crazy.” And everyone just buys it/loses interest. Except dear Taishi.
“Wez actually this is about you would you like to say anything” - (Oh no I haven’t been paying attention at all)“I think considering other people’s feelings is important” - Taishi dies inside is a great sequence and I recommend it highly.
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I really felt that bond between everyone in Boys and Girls in the City, but here it’s just not the same and everyone feels more selfishly motivated.
He's not great
but it's easy to see how he could be successful in Japan.
A native Japanese speaking, black hip hop artist is like finding a unicorn
Need some stuff designed or printed? I can help with that.
See, I was ok with Taishi because it felt like he was just doing what so many others had done on this show: go on a bunch of casual dates. I agree that he didn't handle moving on well, but once Cheri pointed that out to him, he did get better.
P4 spoilers
Plus it doesn't help that Cheri takes a turn into real hypocritical bullshit rather quickly in P4, and Taishi is the one who comes out of it looking mature.
3DS: 2981-5304-3227
Cheri just kind of railroaded everyone and didn't back down, and didn't even apologize to Mariko for the shitty thing she did, while Mariko apologized! And then she pulled the "I'm not the selfish one, you all are!" card, and somehow Taishi was the only one willing to speak up and call bullshit on it?
Somehow this episode made Taishi the good guy while making Wez and Ryo look like cowards, which I was NOT expecting.
edit: IT JUST KEEPS GOING
This last set of episodes has really turned me around on Wez, from thinking he's great to finding him to be real shitty.
3DS: 2981-5304-3227
BLACK MYUUUUUUUSHICK!
(This Instagram song is some of the lamest rap ever produced.)
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And pervy uncle definitely needs to tone down his constant "she's so erotic" talk Re: Chikako.
Need some stuff designed or printed? I can help with that.
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EDIT:
did not read it that way at all.
Secondly, I'm also convinced that his "did you meet a cool guy?" series of questions was sarcastic,
and he was referring to himself, which she answered "I did meet this one cool guy" and then they both smiled.
I don't think it was brutal, I just think their entire relationship happened off camera.
Need some stuff designed or printed? I can help with that.
1. Guy - Guy is the best. Literally the only cast member this season that got up to Arman/Hansan levels for me this season. He just liked everything and everyone and his relationship with Niki was adorable.
THE PRETTY GREAT TIER
2. Avian - Avian was the best girl out of the original three, and really seemed like the mom of the group in a lot of respects, just being really mature in general. But she also got to launch a clothing line, and ended up in a relationship, so things worked out really well for her.
3. Niki - For someone who was on an obvious deadline of only having 2 months to be on the show, Niki made the most of it, and absolutely dominated the spotlight while she was there, but in a good way. Her relationship with Guy was absolutely adorable, and I really wished we had gotten more time with her.
4. Eric - This is a bit unfair, but Eric got some overtime on this show to raise his profile, and it paid off. He came back in Cheri's story, and really came off as a good guy. His story at the beginning was kinda boring, but I think it was more that he didn't really fit super-well with that opening group. Even then, in that first group he was definitely the older brother for the other guys, and it was kind-of nice.
THE TAISHI STORY TIER
5. Chikako - Chikako goes in front of Taishi because she absolutely saved his story, but also because she was really interesting and had her own rough stuff that she was going through. Like, her conversation with her ex-husband was brutal to watch, but a big deal for the show, and not something you see all that often in reality television.
6. Taishi - Taishi was good. He was such an actor in so many aspects, from the emotionality of his every decision, to his sword training, to "a love worth dying for." But, ultimately, Taishi was really supportive of everyone and wanted the best for them.
THE PRETTY GOOD TIER
7. Lauren - The first part and a half was definitely the Lauren Show in so many respects, because she tended to command attention for most of it. I thought she was overall fine,
and it was interesting to see a non-Japanese person on a show like this, and she won me over by the end.
8. Yusuke - Yusuke did not belong on this show at all. Like, personality-wise, he is not someone who should be on reality TV. But that made him fun to watch and root for, because you rarely see someone this out-of-their-depths on a show like this. His music was good, and I think everyone on the show really liked him, but you could actively feel how awkward he was through the TV screen at every moment.
9. Yuya - Outside of Avian, Yuya never grabbed me the way so many others did on this show, but in that relationship he was very entertaining, so it gets him this spot.
THE "I WISH WE HAD MORE TIME WITH THIS PERSON" TIER
10. Ryo - Ryo came super late, and was maybe the best person to be inserted in the house at that moment, as he was a vocal catalyst for the Taishi/Chikako relationship, and he actively seemed to care about everyone. Like everyone in this tier, I wish we had gotten more time with him, because when he came on, the show was almost consumed by the Taishi/Chikako and Cheri storylines.
11. Mariko - I felt really bad for Mariko, because she got thrown into an awful situation at the end, and her big moment was as a catalyst for the larger Cheri storyline. She also seemed similar to Yusuke in that she wasn't the greatest choice personality-wise for this show, but probably would have flourished in an earlier grouping.
12. Mila - Poor Mila. She really got a bad hand, as she was so much younger than everyone else outside of Guy, and Guy was gone so often at this point that she really felt isolated from everyone. She would have done better earlier in the season, when the cast skewed younger.
THE NOT-SO-GREAT TIER
13. Anna - This feels a bit mean, but Anna just seemed to be there for so much of the her time. Worse-still, her storylines tended to feature her in bad relationships, first with Taishi where she felt like she was ambivalent towards him, to her relationship with Wez where it felt like more interesting stuff was happening off-screen. At some point, I just stopped caring about her in any way, which dropped her down here (it also doesn't help that her last scene on the show was absolutely brutal).
14. Wez - Wez started out strong, but in typical Terrace House shitheel fashion, slowly turned to the bad. He really felt like he was there to promote himself, which, sure, but as the last part progressed, it became more and more obvious that he really didn't care about some of the other housemates. Even the commentators were forced to point out how little he was on the show after a certain point. There were also hints that he was in a casual relationship with Anna, but by the time that ended it felt more obvious that he was only into it for the sex and not much more, which was pretty shitty once it was revealed that Anna had delayed her trip because of him. Plus, personal opinion, his music wasn't very good.
15. Cheri - So much of Cheri was wrapped up in some hypocritical bullshit. Like, I thought her taking Taishi to task for his multi-girl dating strategy was a great start, but then she turned around and was actively making out and (possibly) screwing multiple guys. And the whole fight that dominated one of the last episodes was absolutely bonkers,
because she played the victim card to the point that she was perceiving slights at every turn, even going so far as to almost-unfriend Chikako because she dared not to agree with her. She brought up some interesting ideas, like how a girl like her is expected to entertain older men with money to move up in the profession, which is shitty, but she surrounded things like that with her own incredibly shitty behavior. More than anyone else on this show, I just started to dislike the moments that she was on screen, in the way that only happened with Makoto and Hayato last season.
3DS: 2981-5304-3227
Aloha State P4E9:
Or even how Mila's departure was so sudden and unexplained. She must have talked to the other members about it, but we didn't even see her tell anybody other than that phone call.
I was surprised to end up liking Taishi in the end. His overly dramatic personality made me cringe a lot, but I kind of respect that he just went for it all the time. He had me genuinely afraid that he was going to skip straight to a marriage proposal and go down in flames, but fortunately he didn't go THAT hard, and he seems to have found someone who appreciates his grand efforts. His sword practice in the Shinuhodo No Koi shirt was one of my favorite Aloha State moments.
It was interesting that Taishi and Cheri seemed at least tolerant of each other if not friendly at the end. It was nice that she joined them for Taishi's birthday toast - though it just contributed to the feeling I get that a lot of important things happened off-screen. Cheri never got to redeem herself in my eyes.
Seeing so many of the previous members again at the end was a very nice send-off for the show.
And I just want to take a moment to appreciate Ryo, who may have been the closest Aloha State had to Hansan, from helping and encouraging Taishi and Chika's relationship, to his chat with Cheri about trying to get along and smooth things over at the house. Even though he didn't have much time on the show, he seemed like a genuinely good guy, and appeared to invest a little more in his relationships with his housemates than a lot of the others have, at least as far as we were shown.
Looking forward to the next season!
She literally said to several people that if they changed their behaviour she might be friends with them like it was a fucking warning. She is the head cheerleader.
TASHI was the only voice of reason. TAISHI.
I was fucking fuming listening to her.
Need some stuff designed or printed? I can help with that.
Takes place in Karuizawa, a town in Nagano
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My wife has been keeping up with the promotion as it's about to start in Japan. Yamachan (the creepy uncle host) released a promo video recently where he said "Viewers will be pleased to know I basically hate everyone in the house right now"
Need some stuff designed or printed? I can help with that.
Aloha Hot Takes
Yusuke was cool but a pity. Ganbatte, Yusuke.
He likes to throw out that really high note a lot.
Taishi I was whatever on but began to hate since the “berate Yuya for suboptimal ganbatteing” and only hated more the more time went on.
Cheri is probably contemptible but she made Taishi super mad, which I appreciated very much.
Wez seemed like everything important happened off camera
Guy was adorable. He is going to go to the Olypmics but be disqualified because he’ll show up on the opposite coast, winds up winning the gold in some other sports by accident when trying to rush back.
No one else that remarkable.
In full agreement with yamachan that the punch bowl menu remained comically short.
Ep 4-10 more like Ep 4-10/10
My impression was Taishi was ultra pumped for turning the tables on Cheri ever since she called him out on his dating style. The Japanese feelings jam/interrogation trump card of “aren’t you just being selfish” had no counter for “yeah I’m super selfish, and, maybe crazy.” And everyone just buys it/loses interest. Except dear Taishi.
“Wez actually this is about you would you like to say anything” - (Oh no I haven’t been paying attention at all)“I think considering other people’s feelings is important” - Taishi dies inside is a great sequence and I recommend it highly.
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You gotta work some internet magic but it's airing weekly on Netflix Japan with English subtitles
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Ami is utterly awful. Joyless. TV poison.
Yuudai is embarrassing to watch and even his mum and friends are sick of his shit.
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The Aloha State crew’s food was depressing.
The food does look better than it did in Aloha State
You'll get to experience the magic of Yuudai
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You will look back on this question and laugh
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