It’s back! After three years, it’s time to give Nakama Yukie and the next crop of JE boys the bump again. Yankumi has returned to manage another unruly class of schoolkids, fall in love with another boring man and fight in either a warehouse or under a railbridge every episode. Don’t I sound impressed?

I read in all the D-addicts forum comments that Gokusen 3 was great. Tonight I watched it and while I could stand two seasons of the same-old same-old, a third time around is too far. It is flogging a dead horse. Even the main characters look directly influenced by MatsuJun’s ‘Sawada Shin’, except they share his hairstyle. I must admit I was faintly looking forwards to Gokusen 3; I had such fond memories of 1 and 2. I could just about bear the third installment until The Warehouse loomed onto the screen, all cavernous inside with nothing adorning the dusty ground apart from some iron poles that will later be used to beat up one of the 3-D students until Yankumi runs in to do her Yakuza thing. It is a continual source of mystery to me as to why they end up fighting in these conveniently placed warehouses that Yankumi can always find. It is as mystifying as the ‘drama run’, a convention of every drama that believes one can always find anyone within Tokyo’s sprawling mass merely by running around.

Then again, Gokusen must be doing something right. In it’s first week it got a 26.4% rating! I personally blame the adolescent Hey Say Jump fans tuning in to give their boy the boost in popularity stakes. Given the quality of the other offerings this Spring: Last Friends, Zettai Kareshi, Rookies and Hokaben, Gokusen’s high rating seems so very undeserved although it does admittedly have the widest appeal of all series this Spring. My mature adult eyes are blinding me to the obvious marketing winner that Gokusen shall be for NTV. Meanwhile I shall simply not watch and just moan for no reason instead.

Surely NTV cannot do a Gokusen 4…