Silent (2022)

Frustrating

I have mixed feelings about this one. There was things I liked about it but also a lot I didn't. I didn't like the pity party Soe had going for himself the entire story. That wasn't resolved until the last episode. Call me an insensitive jerk but I just wanted to shake him and tell him to get over himself, a lot of people had it way worse than him. I loved Aoba. She tried so hard to be in his world and to understand him. I felt really bad for her because she didn't have a choice in anything. I also like Minato, he was a very selfless person.

In general it was a very slow going story. It took me like 9 months to watch the first 6 episode lol, though I did binge the second half. I don't think I'll ever watch it again, but I don't say it was a waste of time because I did enjoy it in general. Definitely overrated though.

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Grief, healing, and connection (minor spoilers)

I didn't see many comments on this aspect of the show, so I wanted to offer my experience.

While the spotlight may have been on the romance between Aoba and Sakura, for me the message of the show was grief and healing-- Sakura's grief around losing his entire sense of normal, and the grief of those around him, struggling to support and understand while recognizing how difficult it is for those who haven't lived that experience to truly empathize.

Each of us has our own lived experiences, which bring their own preconceptions, biases, privileges, and defense mechanisms to all of our interactions. It is this difference in lived experience that is harder to overcome than any language barrier, cultural barrier, or stereotype. At the same time, the process of understanding that and working to connect with others in spite of this (or maybe because of it) is what makes us human. To me, that was the message conveyed through the stories of the various characters, more than the love story and more than the idea of overcoming language barriers (which I can understand as a takeaway, but was not personally what I experienced in watching).

SPOILER

Sakura came face to face with this struggle in a unique way, when he lost a major piece of what he utilized to connect with the world (through hearing, music, and by extension sports in the way he was used to playing them) and he took several years to go through the process of grieving that loss and the loss of the life he expected to live before beginning to fully reconnect with himself and with the world--part of that through meeting Momose and part of it through revisiting his relationship with Aoba.

END SPOILER

I admit that the lived experience that I bring to my viewing is rooted in processing my own grief around coming to terms with a (in my case invisible) disability, and while I do not pretend to understand what Sakura's character experienced, I found his character's actions relatable and felt a sort of catharsis through watching his journey. Watching Sakura's character helped me in my own journey of healing, and his comment in the final episode:

SPOILER

 (paraphrase)青葉の言葉をもう聞けないけど、見えるようになったのは嬉しい。　
I may not be able to hear your words anymore, but I am so glad that I have become able to see them

was a strong testament to the fact that while our lived experiences may all be unique and our sense of normal may change over the course of our lives, it doesn't change the fact that the life each of us experiences is equally beautiful and full of possibility.

END SPOILER

While I cried in almost every episode, I didn't find this show tragic or heartbreaking. The writing was impressive and nuanced. While I focused a lot on Sakura's character here, I found the full cast of characters and sub-characters to be greatly relatable in their own ways. There was courage and imperfection in each of them, which made them all uniquely human.

The acting was incredible, Kawaguchi Haruna is unsurprisingly a strong lead, and Meguro Ren secures his place as Japan's next rising star. The music was perfectly timed, and Official HIGEDANdism's Subtitle is another masterpiece.

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this drama is very quiet

not far from the title, the drama is very calm and quiet. how he portrays ( sorry ) a special needs person is great.I was really swept up in this drama, the story that was given was tiring (in a positive context), what I wanted to convey and what I had to feel I got it all. The storyline that is presented is also not boring, and even though at the beginning I said this was a quiet and calm drama, the existence of an ost in this drama made me even more interested in the story. this is the prettiest and calmest drama I've watched, I got a lot of messages from this drama.

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If you want to cry every episode of a series, this is for you.

HONEST REVIEW: I literally cried in every episode in this drama. Like, I have never done that before! Although yes, this is not the most heartbreaking, tear-jerking drama I have ever seen but - I'm utterly speechless for this. Honestly, I didn't like Japanese drama that much before because their acting feels fake (just for me for the dramas I have watched, not generalizing) but this, I felt like I was watching it live. I have so many things to say. At first, I was confused about who will she end up with because even though it's a shoujo manga typical plot of love triangle, they keep confusing the viewers, including me. Everytime someone cries, I also cry. IT JUST FELT SO REAL. I'm telling you, I have never been grateful in my whole life that I am blessed with a normal life. This drama made me feel things. It even inspired me to learn sign language. In conclusion, I can say that this is my most liked Jdrama so far. I love them TT

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Não me prendeu!

Me peguei assistindo depois de ver o clássico Tell me that you love me, por ter uma temática onde umas das partes perdia a audição.

Havia lido algumas críticas positivas, contudo o enredo não me prendeu. Eu achei muito cansativo, pra falar a verdade. Não gostei muito da atitude do prota, sei que ele estava passando por um momento delicado na vida, mas ele tinha que ter deixado ela escolher como eles iriam manter o relacionamento, e não ter decidido tudo sozinho. Achei isso egoista da parte dele. E mesmo depois de tudo isso ela decide se aproximar dele, se integrando a sua nova forma de se comunicar.

Fiquei supresa quanto ao amigo dele e o que se tornou depois namorado da Prota, por um momento, mesmo a amando ele sabia que o amor dela não era completo com ele. Então decidiu não pressiona-la, fazendo com que ela perseguisse o Prota sem qualquer culpa.

Acredito que a história poderia ter sido melhor. Não me atraiu muito.

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calming and realistic

Recently been into the calmer and day-to-day life genre and this drama was exactly that. The plot doesn't have a lot going on, the frame of time takes place within the span of a few months. Overall the drama felt therapeutic for me, it was comforting although I did shed a few tears along the way in some episodes.

Plot is mainly about how the ML (who became deaf) reconnects with people of his past and there's a lot of complicated factors and barriers that each character needs to overcome. I liked all the characters, there's no one really to dislike, however, I don't think that Minato's reason in breaking up with Aoba was reasonable ._. they were honestly a pretty good pair already but anyways~ I'd recommend this series. Acting 10/10 and soundtrack 10/10 as well :)

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I hope more series will be made with these topics

It was very special and beautiful
One of those series that you drown in, full of feelings, love, friendship, life

The theme of the series was wonderful, very beautiful

It was very valuable. Personally, I have not seen a series whose main theme is this. You can never understand all the problems of these loved ones, but the fact that we see a corner of their difficulties gives us a better understanding and knowledge of them.
Spoiler
I loved the sequences where they talked to each other in absolute silence, it felt very special. In most of the scenes, soft music with sign language was played, but the places where this music was not present had a very strange feeling and were more beautiful. The only thing that made it less realistic in my opinion was Minato's method. And Tsumugi ended the relationship, I can understand that Minato ended the relationship because of his two friends, but I can't accept that Tsumugi left with Sakura immediately after his cut.It would make sense if she had no feelings for Minato, but as she said in the dialogue, she loved Minato too. No matter how much he loved Sue, he couldn't forget someone he loved so easily in one day. I think it would be better if there was some time between the breakup and the new relationship.
Of course, I say that this series was so special and meaningful that you can ignore this problem. I loved the character of the sign language teacher. His relationship with Nana was very beautiful. Nana was also very nice.


The games were also very beautiful, especially the role of Sakura, she conveyed her emotions beautifully, whether she was happy or sad, or when she wanted to understand what she meant to others.

I hope more series will be made with these topics

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Poor emotions from the freezer.

Quite without discussion of the whole misery here are some small remarks. Sorry for everything:

In a pub, Momono Nan insults Togawa, whom she barely knows, as an idiot and a fool. In episode 10, she insolently and impudently interferes in his private relationship affairs. Then she explains what he has done wrong.
Is it permissible in Japan to interfere in other people's affairs in such an insulting way and leave the restaurant without a black eye? Or is this the inspiration of incompetent writers? Here, in the West, at least many would advise her to mind her own business.
But the embarrassing relativization of the inexcusable impudence follows immediately, of course. All in good fun, right? And thanks for the fish.

Enough grumbling, by the way, I don't want to discourage anyone from watching a moderately exciting, often slow-motion film. The romances are also unexciting. Somehow the young people are always terribly sad and depressed. Have fun, one wants to shout at them, party, make love and let the good times roll!

And we learn that a disability, which is relatively easy to integrate into everyday life, seems to be a huge problem in Japan.

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Profound, Sublime and Saudade!

I admit I am not frequent JP drama watcher in fact I have mostly watched my eternal love Haruma’s series only. But I was looking for a JP series that could beat my heart. And Silent did that. When I saw the trailer, it skipped my heart.

Silent for me hit the most as it has the elements I want to watch, happiness, nostalgia, innocence, cry, tears, love, longing, sacrifice, and then love again. I am only in the beginning of the series, and we all know how the journey is going to be for ten weeks.

The leads are magical, their connection and chemistry are instant and electrifying. The separation and sacrifice are enough to move you in tears and sadness.

The plot is simple, nothing difficult, it entails a story of school sweethearts who are separated for years when a boy breaks the heart of a girl, he loves to death and disappear. But then as fate would have it, she meets her first love again and now moved on with her marriage happening anytime soon to one of their common friends, she discovered a heart breaking and life changing truth behind his departure and everything changes from that moment forward.

The cinematography, the classic JP style of yellow-hue colouring, editing, music and filming is poignant, sublime filled with sheer nostalgia.

The acting is what takes the cake, super calm, authentic and very warm. Both leads, are very subtle in their dialogue delivery and has embodied their character perfectly. First episode was enough for me to decide that quality is not going to drop and will never change.

I moved to tears with scenes that weren’t even sad, because each action of boy had sadness in it, his love for her was so strong that leaving her made it easy. Although leaving is never easy but you have to be strong enough to sacrifice when you know nothing good will come if you continue, but in doing so the only mistake a person does is that they decide for the other person also, they don’t ask their opinion and leave them hanging behind without any explanation.

Leaving someone for the sake of their happiness has never benefited the person who is left behind. It is not an act of selflessness, it is in fact a punishment bestowed on a person who is oblivious to why they are left behind.

I am hoping for a happy end, but the journey to whatever end has been written is profound, sublime and saudade.

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