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The story
The second season of TBS’s Sunday Theater drama “VIVANT,” starring Masato Sakai, wrapped up on November 8 with an average household rating of 21.8% (Video Research, Kanto region). That beats the 18.8% series-high set by the first season — the one dubbed a “social phenomenon” back in 2023 — making it the franchise’s first time breaking into the 20% range. A movie adaptation is slated for release next month. Reaction on 5ch was split: some posters praised the ratings jump, while others groused that the hostage-rescue arc, dragged out over nearly an entire cour (roughly three months of episodes), got crammed into the show’s actual core story only in the last couple of episodes, and that the mastermind’s exit felt rushed and anticlimactic.
“VIVANT” Finale Rating Hits Series-High 21.8%, Beating Previous Best of 18.8% for First-Ever 20%+ Result — Movie Out Next Month
Episode 24, the Season 2 finale of TBS’s Sunday Theater drama “VIVANT” starring actor Masato Sakai (53), aired on the 8th, drawing an average household rating of 21.8% (Video Research, Kanto region), it has been learned.
Season 2 is the sequel to “VIVANT,” which touched off a social phenomenon three years ago.
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Original article here
What people said
Kaoru suggests going to Jamiin and Balka
First meeting with Beki, and that mysterious gap in time
The kiss was just to dodge the topic of her parents
With the juice thing, seems like she knocked Nogi out and did some work while he was asleep
Kaoru turning into a hysterical mom once back in Japan
If he fell for the juice trick, Nogi's an amateur
Nogi: "Kaoru-chaaan"
Kaoru: "Oh stop it, VIVANT~" (punning the show's title into her line)
Nogi: *boing*… zzz (keels over, out cold)
Kaoru: "Heehee, I'll just take this data, thanks~"
VIVANT was ridiculously good
Don't you read the 'T'?
Season 2 I pretty much watched out of momentum
Don't play it cool with 'momentum'
It's because it's good
If it were boring, people wouldn't watch
Yesterday even Tetsuwan DASH and Itte Q! couldn't counter VIVANT's pre-finale special
Did TBS just blow clean past Nippon TV?
No way
TBS's Mondays are such garbage
and Thursdays are awful too
especially after they hyped it all day
The rival network is just being too slack
They should've thrown a show with a 200-million-yen budget up against it
I doubt the promo was really aimed at boosting VIVANT's own ratings
they were probably riding VIVANT's coattails to boost other timeslots instead
TV really has fallen off
Well, what happens once you add in TVer streaming numbers too?
Ratings these days only pull about half what they used to
Double the number for dramas and it'll make sense
Up through the '90s, 20% was about a passing grade
Even adding those numbers in, would it hit 30%?
With Video Research's 'total viewership rating,' I think it'd get to around 30%
This season didn't even have a real twist either
I think she's a Russian intelligence agent
Nogi: "Ohh?!"
They each know the other's hidden side
but once the case is solved, they just go back to being a normal married couple like nothing happened
It's on U-NEXT. Has 2x speed playback too, nice and comfortable
The Central Special Task Force, which never even showed up before, just shoots the bad guy and it turns out 'it was all a setup by our own side' — boom, plot resolved lol
Like, what even was that
Even the actor himself reportedly said
'I just got shot dead by some random stranger lol'
so yeah
Honestly if you like this kind of thing there are American dramas that do it way better
not some cheap knockoff like this
If they hadn't dragged out the rescue part in the middle, it could've wrapped up fine within the drama as-is
they forced the rescue to drag on forever and it was so obvious and annoying
This coming Sunday it's the 'Asia Professional Baseball Championship Final' from 19:00 to 22:00
Next January's slot is 'Mr. MYSTERY?'
https://www.tbs.co.jp/mrmystery/
Baseball again, huh
VIVANT's over now so they can't steal its ratings anymore
in the end was it really just a whole cour spent getting a captured ally back?
They touched on the episode that's actually the core of Season 2 in like the last 2 episodes, but that's what should've been the main focus all along
they'd already gotten like 80% of the way through the rescue by then
let him talk more trash before that
Anago-san also had zero presence, total nobody vibes
The actor himself reportedly said, 'Who even is that guy who just showed up? What's going on?' lol
The ending wrapped up way too neatly
content-wise it was basically done in the first 30 minutes and the rest was just flashbacks lol
Background and Key Points of This Topic
“VIVANT” Season 2 is the sequel to Season 1, which was dubbed a “social phenomenon” back in 2023, and was conceived as an espionage drama built around overseas location shoots — a rarity for the Sunday Theater slot. The finale’s 21.8% is a number that slot hasn’t posted in years, but on the thread many posters felt underwhelmed given the “sequel to a social phenomenon” marketing angle, saying things like “is this really all it is?” The debate centered on two main points: one was how to read the rating itself (some noted that terrestrial-broadcast individual ratings have been gradually declining since the 2010s, and that the picture looks different once you factor in “total viewership,” which folds in catch-up viewing on services like TVer); the other was the construction of the final stretch, where complaints piled up that the hostage-rescue arc — which ate up a full cour — only connected to Season 2’s actual core story in the last two episodes, and that the mastermind’s handling felt rushed too. This may be hard to appreciate for anyone unfamiliar with Season 1, but this kind of split reaction to a “last-minute payoff” is a common phenomenon in long-running series, and this is a textbook case of it.</analysis>
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*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Entertainment & Sports News+) thread “[Ratings] “VIVANT” starring Masato Sakai — finale hits series-high 21.8%! Topping previous best of 18.8% for first-ever 20%+, movie out next month.”
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