Review of Tokyo Camouflage Hour / トーキョーカモフラージュアワー

If you’re new here, and stumbled upon this blog through the mythical powers of the Internet, welcome! I know a lot of visitors to my website are people who randomly come upon this website through search engines like Google, but I also do have a lot of visitors who come back. Regardless: my name is Ashley, and I started this blog in order to keep track of everything I’m coming across in the world.

I recently fell into a spell of unemployment probably during the worst time to be unemployed, as it was very hard to find a job. I was applying to hundreds of jobs, getting interviews, but no offer was manifesting for me in the near future. So during this time, I had a lot of free time, and spent a good chunk of it chipping away at the blog.

I’ve been really catching up on my television shows during this time, as I feel like I would actually go insane if I wasn’t doing something besides applying to jobs, freelancing, and working on the blog. I came to realize during this time that if I didn’t have something dedicated to do and a purpose, I would actually go insane in a way that isn’t productive. I need to have a purpose, and working has been a way to find that.

Although this blog post is coming out much later than when I’m typing it, I am happy to report I did find a job and will be starting soon! But before I began to get caught up in the throes of capitalism yet again, I was still having a grand time clearing through my watch list of Japanese dramas. They’re typically short and very to the point, which makes them a good choice for when you don’t want long-term commitment.

Today’s blog post is about a very brief Japanese show: Tokyo Camouflage Hour. It’s a typical Japanese show in many different ways, but we’re going to get into that more in the meat of this blog post. I think it only took me around one weekend to finish this show, with only one or two episodes being watched on the Monday after.

Let’s get into the review! I don’t want to keep rambling too much in the introduction, as that’s not what people are here for.

Moving from the countryside to Tokyo, one salaryman finds a new shot at love.

Our main character in this series is Utsunomiya Hiroto, who, at the beginning of the series, has been given a proposition. He has the chance to leave Yamagata, where he’s from, behind and move to Tokyo for work. He’ll get a decent salary and the option to live his life more freely than he has at home, and he decides to take this once in a lifetime opportunity.

He rents an apartment in a more expensive neighborhood after realizing it would look better to other people, especially someone who might find themselves in his apartment looking for something sexual. And while he might look more obviously like someone from the countryside at work, he does find someone he’s interested in.

Enter: Sone. She’s an older woman (but not really older—I had some questions about that) and probably not someone he should be with, but that’s what draws Hiroto in even more in the end. Her personality is a bit more loose (not in the sexual way) and carefree, which is the exact opposite of the way Hiroto is portrayed in the series.

While those two do their intricate dance, other things are happening in the show as well. These two are the main leads in the end, but there are some subplots that are sped through. This is a Japanese drama after all—we only have a brief number of episodes to get all of the plot points out of the way.

On the other side of that romance story is the tale of Meguro and Ryo. Meguro is a salary worker who finds herself tangled up with the bartender Ryo. Ryo is very clearly a playboy to outside viewers, but Meguro has fallen for him hook, line, and sinker. She’s willing to believe that they might have a real relationship.

But when she comes to question that notion she’s believed in, it causes some major friction between the two. Ryo is such a smooth talker and able to get what he wants, so will Meguro be wrung back into his intricate web, or will she finally break free of the toxic relationship? Watch it to find out!

Overall Thoughts

I think people are either going to love or be apathetic towards this show. I haven’t watched a ton of Japanese dramas in my lifetime, although I aspire to watch more, but I find that this was more typical of the conventions of the genre, and that while it wasn’t super unique in the end, it was memorable in different ways.

Tokyo plays a character in this, which is something that I find interesting in both literature and film. It’s a massive city and these characters are pretty much ants interacting with each other in labyrinth of its streets, making the city itself a force to analyze and consider the themes within.

I love content that uses space and place like this, so this was right up my alley. I didn’t care for the male and female lead’s relationship as much as the side plot (I would watch an entire show around that if we’re going to be honest), but I enjoyed it enough to keep going with this show.

Watch it if you’re interested! I don’t regret watching this at all, but also don’t know if I would return to it in the near future.

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