Review: Love shuffle

When you want to shake things up and see if the grass is greener on the other side: What do you do, you love shuffle the hell out of your shit. What do you do when your girlfriend refuses your marriage proposal? You love shuffle your shit? And what do you do when you've got a girl who is suicidal? Well...of course you love shuffle the bitch! Welcome to the world of love shuffling. A place where you can kiss and bang who you like, as long as it's in the name of trying to find true love. Damn, I need to find me a world like that! Until you or I find it, we'll voyeuristically enjoy the fantasy of it, which stars Hiroshi Tamaki.

4 strangers, all successful in their own respective fields have a chance encounter with one another in their complex elevator - only to find they all live on the same floor and also have one other thing in common: their relationships have gone a little stale and need livening up. They come up with the idea of love shuffling: switching partners in a bid to see if their significant other truly is the one for them, or if their live lives with somebody else.

Kei Usami (Hiroshi Tamaki) had has his marriage proposal rejected by his girlfriend (Shihori Kanjiya) who agrees to love shuffle in the hope she'll come to realize her own feelings for him. Airu is a guarded girl and hopes the love shuffle will allow her to find somebody she can open up to. She breaks up with her boyfriend Yukichi (Daigo Naito) in the hopes he'll find a girl who loves him, instead of pitying him as she's done for the past year or so. Ojiro is embarking on an affair with another man's wife (Hojiri Kojima). They're both loose, so really don't care about love shuffling: just as long as they can get some bump 'n grind out of it. And Masato comes into the mix of the love shuffle for seemingly different reason - doing it to aid his patient who he hopes will stop attempting to kill herself if she finds a love worth living for. The different reasons for the couples shuffling brings up some interesting moments and realizations for those involved - with the perceptions of what they thought love was and is changing with each shuffle. Along with their feelings for each partner.

Whilst Love Shuffle adheres to all of your standard J-drama staples, it actually breaks the mould on many occasions. All of the love shufflers lives are a bit of a mess, and don't fit the templates of standard J-drama characters other than being damn good looking. It's refreshing, because the characters all reflect a truer representation of the generation of mid 20 year olds living not only Japan, but in many metropolitan cities around the world. The older characters also break stereotypes by not being happily married with children. Reiko is in a broken marriage, spending little time with her husband and embarking on affairs, and Masato (Usa-tan) is bisexual. The great thing is that none of these factors are played off like big deals. They just help spin the story and keep things interesting.

The chemistry between the actors is electric. From the very first episode the sparks fly. You can tell the actors had fun with their roles and played off of one another, which helps give all of the characters an instantly likable quality. It's also great to see a drama with a proper ensemble cast. Hiroshi Tamaki could be centred as the lead, given that the story starts with him and his relationship with Mai runs through the entire story. But every actor gets equal screen time, and no one character is highlighted in particular.

Love shuffle is very westernized. The majority of the insert music is English (classic songs many know and recognize) and a lot of English gets thrown around during conversations and verbal exchanges. Even when you know there's a Japanese word for a particular phrase or term, characters will use the English one instead. We even get some white and black people thrown into the mix in one episode! Cool and refreshing. Characters also get to have a bit of sex and express wanting it rather openly, which again: isn't something you get with many J-drama's. We also get some kissing. Decent, realistic looking kisses. I'm talking actual pucker-ups with some head and jaw movement. Well...Shota Matsuda and Shosuke Tanihara step up to the plate as men and snog realistically, as do Hijiri Kojima and Yuriko Yoshitaka. But the rest of the cast still do the old stiff lips firmly closed as they press up against another, whilst the guy grabs the girls shoulders as she just slouches there like she's dead. You lot who have seen kisses in J-drama's know EXACTLY what I'm talking about. It's a shame the final kiss is more of the stiff, robotic kind. The poor girl just hangs there like the dude is sucking her soul out of her mouth. It pretty much kills the romance and the passion. If I'd finally found the ultimate love of my life and my soul mate you best believe I'd throw down the best kissing ever. RAW passion that throws it out there that the rawest sex is the next step.

Love shuffle is still distinctly Japanese, but again depicts perhaps a newer vision of what it's like being a 20 something in Tokyo. The western staples never feel contrived and highlighted. They instead just feel natural and organic, part of the whole world within Love shuffle.

Love shuffle is a great drama from start to finish, and it for the most part it ends the way it should have. Usa-tan's ending is a bit of a joke given what you find out about him within the later episodes. But everybody else has their love shuffles tied up in the best possible way. The stories conclude nicely, but there is a window left open for an special 'what happened after' episode. Which I'd welcome given how much I enjoyed the world of Love shuffle and it's characters.

After watching so many dark, depressing drama's, it's nice to watch something a bit more fun and light hearted which has strong western overtones: giving the whole drama an edge. If you've never watched a J-drama before, Love shuffle would act as a nice introduction - bearing familiarity because of the western stylings, but also being something that's still very much Japanese.