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The story
NHK’s serialized morning drama “Kaze, Kaoru” wrapped up on September 25 with its finale (episode 130), pulling a household average rating of 14.5% and an individual rating of 8.0%. The series average from the first episode to the last came in at 13.8% for households and 7.6% for individuals — beating “Omusubi” (13.1%, late 2024) and “Welcome Kame” (13.5%, late 2009), though it only tied “Tsubasa” (13.8%, early 2009). On 5ch’s Geinou/Sports Breaking News+ board, commenters looked back on the double-lead drama starring Mikami Ai and Kosaka Juri, with some praising how “it got good once the nursing school arc started,” while others pointed out that “it lost steam in the final stretch” or that “it leaned too hard into romance and family drama instead of its core premise” — leaving opinions on the show’s overall quality divided.
Mon, Sep 28, 10:01 AM
Episode 130, the finale of NHK’s serialized morning drama “Kaze, Kaoru” (airing Mon-Sat at 8:00 AM), starring actresses Mikami Ai and Kosaka Juri as double leads, aired on the 25th. Video Research announced on the 28th that the household average rating came in at 14.5%, with an individual rating of 8.0%. The series average from the first episode through the finale was 13.8% for households and 7.6% for individuals. (Figures are for the Kanto region.)
As a household series average, this topped “Omusubi” at 13.1% (late 2024) and “Welcome Kame” at 13.5% (late 2009), but only matched “Tsubasa” at 13.8% (early 2009).
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Original article here
What people said
Yeah, nobody wants a messy soap opera first thing in the morning.
It was a messy soap opera right up until she ran from her husband.
Lol
It's basically 'The Poe Clan' (a classic manga about ageless, vampire-like immortals) lmao
The cast was full of popular actors, but Nonji's script was just too awful.
but for some reason it stalled out hard again in the back half, with the last month going nowhere, lol
Still, having a clearly 'good' stretch at all makes it way better than 'Omusubi.'
In 'Omusubi,' the Ayumi storyline was more interesting than the Yui storyline
especially the part where the meaning behind that oddly specific 'Fullmetal Alchemist' rule gets revealed
She had a certain elegance that made her a good fit for a morning drama.
I watched it wondering if this was even made as a proper drama — out of the corner of my eye. Anyone who watched it seriously must be exhausted.
Fine, she didn't die like she did historically, but Tamaki's presence and her career-path subplot just dragged the story down…
Whether they kept her alive or killed her off, couldn't they have handled it a bit better?
Even if she wasn't going to become a nurse, I feel like she could've at least aimed for some job connected to nursing, medicine, or English…
Why'd they have her pick a career that just fades into nothing?
Given how it turned out, maybe it would've been better to bring in the son too and kill him off to build up some real drama…
A cartoonist, huh…
Still better than going from parasite research to working at a mahjong parlor, I guess
If I remember right, she actually died young in real history.
If they were going to shoehorn Shimaken's illness in right up to the end anyway, they should've used that screen time on this storyline instead and had her fully recover.
but they spent way more time on romance and family drama than on that.
Naomi started out as this twisted, nasty woman muttering insults in English,
but by the end she'd become a clear-headed, understanding, highly capable veteran nurse,
and her acting really grew into the role too. Honestly it's like she swapped personalities with her early self.
My take is that once she became a nurse, her blunt, no-nonsense personality got reframed as 'rational,' and being valued by those around her is what changed her over time.
Ōzeki Wa was apparently nicknamed the 'crybaby frog,' so I expected someone with really intense emotional ups and downs and a more turbulent life, but both the emotions and the story ended up feeling flat.
I thought the real historical figure actually lived a life that would've made for better drama material.
Naomi's arc, meanwhile, is almost entirely made up anyway.
She might turn out to be the rightful successor to Matsuzaka Keiko and Nakama Yukie.
Matsuzaka Keiko really has that sensual charm, doesn't she
— a mature kind of beauty, I guess.
Idols always seem stuck being childish, which is kind of embarrassing.
An overly intense story first thing in the morning would be rough, so maybe that's about the right level.
There have been morning dramas that collapsed from cramming in too many wild plot twists, after all.
Background and Talking Points
Today’s NHK morning dramas are a far cry from the era when household ratings above 20% were the norm — the last several installments have all hovered in the low teens. The figures cited in the article — 13.1% for “Omusubi,” 13.5% for “Welcome Kame,” and 13.8% for “Tsubasa” — serve as the benchmark within that declining trend, and by that measure, “Kaze, Kaoru”‘s 13.8% is nothing to scoff at. What divided opinion on the thread wasn’t the rating itself so much as a question of craft: why the gap between the show’s engaging stretches and its dull ones was so wide. Some say it picked up once the nursing school arc began, while many others point to the final stretch stalling out, and some argue the double-heroine structure spread the story too thin. It’s an episode that, beyond the raw numbers, reveals the ups and downs in how the show was received over its run.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Geinou/Sports Breaking News+) thread “NHK Morning Drama “Kaze, Kaoru” Finishes Finale With a 14.5% Rating… Series Average of 13.8%, First Time in the 13% Range Since “Omusubi”.”
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