A special episode of the NHK Taiga drama " UNBOUND (Berabou) " (General TV, Sunday 8pm and others), starring actor Ryusei Yokohama , called "Arigatayama Special" was broadcast on April 27th. At the end of the episode, a preview was given of the appearance of Kitagawa Utamaro, played by Sometani Shota, as "the future UNBOUND," garnering attention from viewers.
"UNBOUND (Berabou)" is the 64th taiga drama, depicting the life of Tsutaya Juzaburo(or "Tsutajyu" for short), who is said to have built the foundations of Japan's media industry and pop culture. The script was written by Yoshiko Morishita, known for "Drama 10 'Ooku'" which was broadcast on NHK two years ago and became a big hit.
The special program looked back on famous scenes from the drama along with over 1,400 messages received from viewers, ahead of the start of a new chapter in which Tsutaju (Yokohama) will be fully operational as a publisher.
The cast included First Summer Uika, Miki Mizuno as Ine, Toshinori Omi as Houseidou Kizo, and Aoi Nakamura as Jirobei. A special interview with Yokohama and Ken Yasuda as Ken Yasuda Gennai was also introduced.
In "The Future of UNBOUND," new characters such as Tagasode played by Haruka Fukuhara , Ota Nanpo /Akaryo Shikata played by Kenta Kiritani , and Tei played by AI Hashimoto were also introduced. Furthermore, Tsutaju was shown shedding tears as he said, "I will make you the greatest artist of our time."
On social media, comments such as, "Perhaps those final words were directed at Karamaru?", "Is Karamaru back?!", "'I will make you the greatest artist of our time' again. I wonder if Utamaro = Karamaru after all", and "You can be sure that the one who said 'I will make you the greatest artist of our time' was the returned Karamaru, Yoshiko Morishita" were posted one after another.
