The fourth episode of the drama series "The Hot Spot" (NTV, Sunday 10:30 pm), starring actress Ichikawa Mikako, was broadcast on February 2nd. In the episode, there was a scene in which Takahashi (Kadota Akihiro), an "alien" working at a business hotel, reveals the side effects of using his intellectual abilities, which caused a stir on social media.
◇The following contains spoilers.
In the fourth episode, Kiyomi (Ichikawa) bumps into her classmate Ayano (Kinami Haruka) at a local supermarket. When the two go shopping together and leave the store, they find that the electric bicycle Ayano was riding on has been stolen by someone. Ayano is furious and gives up, thinking it will be difficult to get it back. However, Kiyomi tells her, "Don't worry, we'll find it."
Then in the evening, when Kiyomi went to work at the hotel, she and Takahashi talked about the university they attended and learned that Takahashi had once used his ability to pass the entrance exams to medical school. However, although Takahashi had temporarily improved his academic ability and passed the exams, he said that he could not maintain his academic ability without his ability, so he dropped out. He went on to reveal that "if you improve your intelligence, one side effect is that your hair thins."
Later in the story, the hotel's water heater breaks down late at night, causing trouble with no hot water in the guest rooms. Kiyomi asks Takahashi to read the instructions, gain knowledge, and use his ability to fix the water heater, but Takahashi refuses to comply. As Kiyomi persists, Takahashi reveals the reason for not complying with her request, saying, "I think I told you earlier... a side effect of intelligence is that you go bald."
He added, "You can't repair a scalp. If this were a matter of life and death, I'd be willing to help even if it meant losing a little hair. But water heater breakdowns aren't common in hotels. Losing hair because of that would be really tough."
On social media, when the reason why Takahashi would not use his ability was revealed, comments such as "I couldn't help but think he didn't want to use it lol", "It would make you go bald", "It's so funny that a side effect of having an intelligence-related ability is going bald", "If only it wasn't something intelligence-related lol", and "'Because the scalp can't be repaired' is such a great line" were posted and became a hot topic.
