Team Batista no Eiko
Posted on April 4th, 2009
Team Batista no Eiko
[Rating: 8/10]
Genre: Medical Drama, Suspense
Taguchi Kohei, a bumbling doctor is sent to investigate a string of mysterious deaths that revolve around a reputable team of surgeons who perform the highly-risky batista heart operations. Were the deaths simply due to natural causes or is there a murderer amongst the team? And can Guchi prevent his own growing sympathies towards the team from getting in the way of his investigation?
This show was rather intriguing. Unlike Iryu (Team Medical Dragon), there was more emphasis on individuals than that of promoting team spirit which was interesting to see for a change. If not for the main protagonist, the whole show would have a rather solmen air about it, so I think that it balanced out nicely. It focuses mainly on the investigation and the team with the rest of the hospitable barely appearing at all. The entire show was filled with twists that made me think and rethink the identity of the murderer, or perhaps there was no murdere at all and perhaps the operation only worked on children and not adults. And when the truths were revealed one by one, they weren’t anything like I expected, and the characters being ambiguous in their motives also added to the tensions. I thought the ambiguity of the characters made the show stand out from other medical shows I’ve seen. I wouldn’t say the cast was stellar but they played their parts well enough, definitely not sloppy at all. I can’t say that I like any character in particular but cast-wise, Nakamura Toru was awesome as Shiratori, I think he outshone Taguchi Kohei even though the latter is the main character. A notable role would have to be Shirota Yu as Himuro the Anaesthetician (did I spell that correctly?), I did pity the guy despite what he did, the scene of him eating with Guchi’s family just gave me the warm fuzzies. He did not deserve to get offed like that, but what can I can, karma comes back with a vengence. Personally I feel that was Shirota’s best performance to date, followed by his portrayal of Mariya in the detective drama Koshonin, he plays the misunderstood, underappreciated character pretty well. Team Batista no Eiko is definitely interesting and original compared to the more popular medical series, but it may not be everyone’s cup of tea.
Filed under: ** jdrama, medical, suspense