[Drama] AKB48 - 35th Single 前しか向かねえ Mae Shika Mukanee

Just like the previous two singles released, AKB48 have included a 22 minutes short drama in this single as well. But unlike the last two drama, this one was filmed with a higher budget that can be aired as a featured film in the cinemas in my opinion, and with an interesting plot line of the Earth (or Japan, since we do not know if this is international wide or not) being in an apocalypse of some sort (Might be a zombie or disease apocalypse,but we will never know). I reckon AKB48 and any of the other sister groups should include a short drama or something similar in each of their singles, since this can let the girls practise their acting skills, but that is only if they have the time and resources to film.

Anyways... It will be me again, TAKA, doing the pleasure of writing the review for this single's drama, even if I'm not that good at all in writing a review since I'm bad at trying to convey what I think.

*SPOILERS AHEAD*

*PLEASE DON'T SCROLL DOWN IF YOU DON'T LIKE SPOILERS*

*P.S. The review will be my perspective of the drama and I may say something that you guys will not agree with and perhaps set off some disagreements. If that is indeed the case, please don't bash me.*

From the beginning, we can see our senbatsu members in somewhat ripped and dirty clothing, following by a long shot of Mayu holding what I suspect is a M16 rifle?. This suggested to me that something had happened to Earth, perhaps a Zombie (or any kind of creature) apocalypse since it required the members to have some sort of a weapon to protect themselves, especially what they are wearing as well. Well... except for Kojiharu who is wearing high heels and a dress like she was about to go on a date... LOL!
I'm not that professional when it comes to guns but I still know a few from playing games such as Resident Evil series and so on, so if that is not a M16 please correct me!! And I love love LOVE the story line of an apocalypse!!!
 

After walking for a while, we come across three abandoned cars. What I thought of first was.. "Man they seriously spent quite a lot of money in producing this drama" because of the cars they have to be damaged and the epic soundtrack in the background.
But why haven't we seen any sign of zombies or any creatures....!? I'm really expecting some sort of battle scene here...!!
 

So Mayu and Yuko approaches to the nearest car to check if there is any sign of unknown creature. One thing I find weird is why is Mayu the one backing up Yuko, because usually in this situation, it would be Jurina to follow Yuko and Mayu staying back with the group since she is the one in the back protecting the members in the beginning and the one with the most powerful gun which would be very handy when there is a pack of unknown creatures incoming. If there WAS a creature in the car, then Jurina's weapon which is a knife would be more useful since it wouldn't make any noise and waste any ammo. And also why did Yuko take off her jacket... I know she looks really cool when she does that but when it comes to unknown creatures like zombies which can spread the disease by just a small scratch, an additional jacket would act as a protection from getting the disease. Well... these are just the little flaws I found from this scene, but it doesn't really matter that much.
I think I played too much of those zombie games that whenever I see anything that is dangerous, I just can't help but comment on it.... And I'm guessing the pistol Yuko is holding is the Beretta M9??? and man... look at Yuko's muscles~~
 

This scene is pretty stupid as well. Yes, using a knife is pretty cool and all but just randomly stabbing it into cargo load of a car is stupid and this just shows me that in this drama, her character is pretty reckless and does things without thinking and planning ahead. Jurina might be thinking that there might be some unknown creatures hidden under the covers so she should double check by stabbing first, but what happens if it is actual humans hiding underneath those covers and you have just mistakenly killed these people...? She should think first before doing what she wants to do. On the other hand, Mayu did the right thing by immediately backing Jurina up just in case unknown creatures suddenly pops out.
Even if I said all that bad stuffs about Jurina's character here, she still look soooo damn cool here..!! Especially with a knife~~~ 
 

Yuko choose to go to Seito while Jurina think that they should head to Heijou. I think that both of their decision are appropriate since Seito is the closest place they could go to search for more food and find some shelter, and Heijou is where the rescue team are based in. Later on we found out that Seito is actually taken over, so Yuko decides to go the base set in Kainan. Jurina and Yuko had a little bit of disagreement here since Jurina thinks getting to the official rescue team will save them from this problem, and Yuko was considering about the group's safety and conditions first. Can't blame them both for fighting since it's neither's fault...（￣ー￣）
Ignore if you're not a Jurimayu fan, but man I love how Jurina just listens to Mayu when she stopped them from fighting~~ (ﾉ≧∀≦)ﾉ
 

Because Yuko and Jurina have different place they want to go, so they have decided to go their separate ways. The director did pick the members correctly since Yuko is only trying to find a place for them to take a rest and perhaps find some resources first, injured members like Paruru and Yuihan stayed with Yuko and Sasshi well... She just decided to stay. While Takamina and Kojiharu are both fine, so they decided to follow Jurina to find some help for the group.
If I was in this situation, it would actually be hard to decide who to follow... But I guess I would follow Jurina since she is my Kamioshi~~ And Yuko, I don't think you should trust a kid with handguns.....
 

Mayu decided to follow Jurina, Takamina and Kojiharu because she is worried about them by themselves. Mayu's character in this drama is pretty smart and she knows what to do in a situation like this, for example like giving her semi-auto rifle to Yuko since a gun would always be an advantage when it comes to combat with zombies.
Another warning for those who doesn't ship Jurimayu... It is also because management and Aki-P is a massive shipper for Jurimayu, that's why they can't separate them and Mayu just has to follow Jurina~~
 

Another point I find weird especially in a situation like this... Why would you camp outside with fire on and expose yourself to the enemies?? Do you want to attract the unknown creatures to you and seek your own death? especially with Yuko being the only one with a weapon... You can totally just find some buildings, or hide inside cars, or somewhere that is not out in the opens... Have you guys ever see in a game or movie or drama that the characters camp outside in these sort of situations?? Maybe there is and I might be wrong so correct me if you feel like it but I wouldn't do this at all...

Finally Yuko and them arrived at the base set in Kainan and they found some decent amount of food and water...!!! I'm glad that they found somewhere where they can relax (well.. not exactly because they always have to be cautious) and regain their energy, but as a reviewer's point of view... Have you ever wondered why is there so many food and water just lying there for you to grab? You guys might find me annoying now, picking out all these flaws in the drama, since they are just little flaws that doesn't matter at all and I'm ruining the fun and suspense of this drama for you, but aren't you a little bit curious that with all these food placed neatly on the table, where the original survivor went?? I just find it a bit odd that they would leave this large amount of resources... There are sure a few explanations such as perhaps they just went out to find more resources but then got attacked by the unknown creatures and never came back safely. But normally some would stay put to keep an eye out of the base and resources. With all that said, I'm still happy that Yuko and them are in safety. (￣ω￣)
 

Kojiharu and Takamina sent out help messages to Yuko, so then they went to rescue them. Yes, rescuing them and taking them to safety would be the top priority, but wouldn't you normally ask what happened to them and where is Jurina and Mayu...??
That is why Kojiharu you shouldn't wear high heels and high class clothing.... No offence but you will just be a burden to others in this case...
 

Takamina brought out the two bandanas which belongs to Jurina and Mayu and said that "because of protecting us, them two...." She never actually said what exactly happened to both Jurina and Mayu, but I think most of us suspect that because of protecting Takamina and Kojiharu, Jurina and Mayu lost their life to the unknown creatures...
I totally refuse to accept that Jurina and Mayu just died like that, because c'mon... Jurina is a fighting machine like the character Center and Nobunaga and Mayu is very smart like Nezumi, so she wouldn't lose to the unknown creature like that *snaps finger* And especially Takamina didn't even say "Oh because of protecting us, they lost their life to the unknown creatures blah blah blah...." I can totally imagine it to be like this...
Jurina & Mayu takes off their bandana and said : "We will hold them off for as long as we can, so you guys just leave now and take these to Yuko."
Something like that ↑↑↑  (≧▽≦)
 

I didn't really get how there is just a tree with keys hanging from it somewhere within this base, but I guess they gotta link it back to the song so this is actually not a bad idea.
This scene is also executed really beautifully with the dim blue lighting focusing on the keys and Yuko. Nice use of lighting right here.

This is something that I have to point out... This scene is when Yuko is trying to correct door to the XXXV key. I reckon this scene is really smart, because when I was watching it, I was thinking that looks familiar... And when I flip the image on the left vertically 180 degrees, the word says "Sayonara Crawl" which was indeed the 31st single...!! 

Upon walking inside the doors of room XXXV, the room is set out like the above image which I think is a pretty cool setting that suits the atmosphere of the drama alot .

Yuko then stands on the stage, the next thing that happened is suddenly there is a large crowd of people standing and all shouting out "Yuko! Yuko chan!". There are many different settings you can see from this scene, maybe Yuko is remembering and missing her life, the life of being an idol, before all of these happened. Or it might be that this is all a dream and Yuko is just imagining all these place with the keys and stages up, which is what most of the fans think, but my opinion is that it is the first setting where she used to be an idol.
I seriously don't like that costume for the MV at all...

Wait.... Didn't Takamina say that Jurina and Mayu died because of protecting them (she didn't exactly say it but we assumed that was the case), but they are standing side by side right in front of out eyes...!? For most people that think Yuko was just imagining all the stage scenes up, will probably think that she imagined Jurina and Mayu are still alive. But to me who reckons the setting is Yuko as an ex-idol, of course Jurina and Mayu survived the attacks from the unknown creatures and was able to retreat back to Kainan to meet up with Yuko and the others. If that was indeed the case, wouldn't they meet up with others first and not Yuko since she is somewhere away from the group? But then it could also be that the light from the room was what Jurina and Mayu saw first when they first entered Kainan. 
Oh well~ As long as Jurimayu is together then I don't mind anything else~ (ﾉ´ヮ´)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧ And look at how Mayu is supporting Jurina by letting her arm rest on her shoulder~ This feels so nostalgic because there is a scene like this in Majisuka 2 as well when Nezumi helps Center~~ Look at them two~ Ahhh my holy OTP.... (ﾉ´ヮ´)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧
 

This scene was shown after the full version of Mae Shika Mukanee, and was probably the most important scene throughout the whole drama in my opinion. Just right before the MV, we saw Yuko taking the key that has the roman numeral of 35 because she is the center of AKB48's 35th single, and now we see Yuihan and Paruru walking towards the tree of keys. A close up shot of Paruru was used and even though it wasn't that clear but we can see her holding the key that has the number 36 (XXXVI), so is this foreshadowing that she will be the center for the incoming summer single...?? We still do not know what number key Yuihan took, but it is also hinted that she might become a center for a single. We still don't know if this actually means that Paruru will center the next single, or it might even be a multiple center again like last year with Mayuyu, Yuko, Paruru and Tomochin. We will just have to wait and see~
I actually want Mayuyu to properly single center a single, but I don't mind multiple centers as well.

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There you go with my review of this single's drama~ It actually ended up being a super long post... I didn't think that I would have this much to write about but I guess not ahahah...
Anyway, I reckon this single's drama's standard is way above the previous dramas that was included in a single. The best in my opinion, because the drama was filmed and executed professionally and the background soundtracks were conducted beautifully. I'm also kind of disappointed that they didn't include any battle scenes, but I guess it is because AKB48 has a variety of fans from children to elderly and it wouldn't be appropriate if they included such scenes so I guess it is okay... Oh well~
I will probably stop here since I did type quite a bit and I'm a bit exhausted from uni... I will probably not post as much since uni has started for me but I will try to post at least some things. (This post is actually me procrastinating and not wanting to do any homework... Maybe I'll actually post more due to procrastination)

So until next time...
Peace out (・∀・>) 

Categories: AKB48, Drama, Mae Shika Mukanee, Review, TAKA