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The type of manhwa you'd see being adapted into live action.

All aspects are to par with your typical korean dramas with the male characters being all beautiful to the eyes & story that is carefully calculated to manipulate--hm, I don't think this is the correct word to describe it--oh, please, target viewers into their liking. Oh, and of course I am part of their target viewer. Lord, if only I was lucky enough to have such a fateful encounter in life. *sighs*

Story: 7. Seen enough stories about encounters between strangers that ultimately be continued to fulfill each of their own needs. Specific josei genre with ... both leads already settled on their own & working everyday for a living, but have this “missing thing” in life. But it lacked a bit of detail, I guess to speed up the story.

Art: 7. Yeah-ok pretty manhwa style, especially the males are all good-looking. Backgrounds are templates.

Character: 8. Relatable. Sometimes boring because it’s just too relatable (why is relatable boring? I don’t know.) but that's just how most people are in life so I accept. There aren’t any rash decisions and pretty ok-realistic to me. Oh, and there’s a gay character.

Enjoyment: 8. The author is a tailor, she (he?) knows how to knit an overall cute story. It’s simple, it doesn't have many chapters, and it worked towards delivering the core of the story enough to be finished overnight.


It was still a satisfying late-night escape.

I don't easily look down on people based on what they are, or what they do. It's the attitude and the way of thinking that I rather look up to. Whether they do good things or bad things, I think it's only a matter of context (the percieved "good/bad things" itself may differ each person, depending on their principal values). Maybe we end up choosing the same path if we were in his/her condition. Maybe we fall into a much darker pit. No one knows. But the two things I mentioned, it's what differentiate the true, "good" person from the other.

In my life of watching ... anime, I've never seen anything as comforting as it is depressing and as real as watching NANA. The feeling of love, anger, betrayal, pride, fear, sympathy and regret I received from learning both the lead characters, living the "determining stage of life" that is the transition into adulthood, gave me chills and warmth throughout the course of the series.

NANA is a 2006 anime adapted from a manga written and illustrated by Ai Yazawa. It tells about the chance encounter of Nana Komatsu and Nana Osaki, later about their friendship and each of their own lives. The two met on a fateful night in a bullet train to Tokyo, and sat next to each other. Hachi (lets just call the first girl this) came to Tokyo to finally meet her boyfriend, Shoji, though honestly it seems like she came just to find "love" in general. Nana on the other hand came to Tokyo to become a rock star. Both have same name, same age, same destination, and same motive: to start a new life.

Nana Komatsu, an air-headed girl from a small town up in northern Japan (I guess Tohoku region? It's never explicitly stated) who finds "love" as much as people do their laundry. I hate this girl. Ya, she's got the appeal, but blatantly speaking she really gave me frustration almost every 2-3 episodes, if not every episode, for all her "wishy washy" attitude when deciding about anything and still regret it after. I honestly couldn't care less about her desire for love, "doing it" every time she thinks she's found "the guy"; but the repetitive mistakes she made after finding out "it wasn't really what she wanted" really ticks me off.

Then there's Nana Osaki, also from a small town in northern Japan, who wanted to become a rock star. Back home she already made a name for herself together with her band called the Black Stones, until one of the members decided to leave and join a soon-to-be popular band in Tokyo. This caused conflict and later hiatus, and was devastating for the band at first. But Nana quickly stood up and continued to chase her dream.

Hachi and Nana coincidentally met again when they were looking for a place to live in Tokyo, and, as fate would have it, decided to live together (Yes, Hachi ultimately didn't live with Shoji. Say this was the first drama of many). The two bear different personalities, yet it's what made them so close. I like how their apartment became the "connecting hub" of different people and friends, and how they became a host of many moments and stories, past and present (and future), all mashed in one room. Outside, they have their own different lives, doing different things, interacting with different people. But when they get home, it's their world together. It's fate--one of the things that made me like this series.

Every season never cease to astound me, like riding a never-ending roller coaster. One time it made me so frantic I felt like flipping a table. And the fact that it was left hanging upset me even more. But if it were to resemble life, it would never have a "true ending", it'd keep moving and changing every time as long as you live. It's 47 episodes long, but I highly recommend people watching.