With its finale on Christmas Day, Cherry Magic (30歳まで童貞だと魔法使いになれるらしい, or チェリまほ in short) rounded off a bad year that was 2020 with its Japanese take on the emerging BL drama genre. It was as though spring came early, along with Cherry Magic’s storytelling filled with refreshing, cherry blossom bubbles.
Cherry Magic introduced us to Adachi, a virgin cum office worker, who acquired the magical ability to read minds through touch, when he turned 30. One thing led to another, and he discovered that Kurosawa, his colleague of 7 years had been holding a torch for him! *gasp!*
This storyline of one guy having a secret crush on a straight friend, and trying to make that straight friend like him back sure brings one’s memories back to Thai BL sensation 2gether The Series.
Rest assured that, unlike 2gether, Adachi in Cherry Magic knew about this crush in the first episode. By the 8th epsiode, he was already going steady with Kurosawa. Except that this was a weird CP who became “steady” before they had their first date. Kinda sound like Singaporean couples who would buy a house together before getting married.
The Finale of Cherry Magic
In my earlier post about Cherry Magic, I had only watched 8 episodes. By then, the fandom of Cherry Magic was waiting for the finale on the night of Christmas eve, which was to be followed immediately with 2 special episodes – supposedly taking place on Kurosawa and Adachi’s first Valentine’s Day.
Very much like 2gether, the lead up to the finale was full of sweetness from the interactions of the 2 protagonists. Sweetness, yes, but nothing more than a peck on the forehead in episode 3. Even that peck was a result of a drinking game among colleagues.
Considering that Cherry Magic was scheduled on TV Tokyo’s 1am time slot, which was traditionally allocated for dramas with explicit and raunchy content, fans began to wonder if the sexual tension between Kurosawa and Adachi would culminate into an explosion of steamy sex scene in the finale.
Again, like the high five in 2gether’s finale, Cherry Magic ended with not a single peck.
In other words, the most popular BL drama in the second half of 2020 did not have a single kissing scene.
This made 2gether, with a total of 3 kiss scenes, looked PG, or even R(A).
Refreshing The Cute Interactions of Kurosawa and Adachi
Like I mentioned in my earlier post, Cherry Magic’s producers had been constantly teasing viewers intimate interactions of all sorts between Kurosawa and Adachi. Basically, they had been doing everything every sweet couple would do, except for the ones fujoshis were longing for.
First we had the most explicit peck on the forehead. (oh yes, sorry for the spoiler alert, but yup, this peck is gonna be the most intimate interaction between Kurosawa and Adachi. At least based on what we see on TV… 😉 )
Then we had the near kiss with the water bottle drop inference of something good to come.
We also had that cheesy, yet wildy humorous scene when Adachi fainted, only to be caught by Kurosawa.
Following that, Kurosawa sent Adachi home to rest, only to trip and fall onto the latter’s bed. That moment when Kurosawa tried hard to grab the wall, but still fall into Adachi’s embrace probably drove many fujoshi off the edge of sanity!
But of course, most of the time, fans were just treated with pure sweetness. Sweetness like the fluffy pancakes of Osaka. Like just the both of them chilling in Adachi’s room.
Or Kurosawa picking the grain of rice off Adachi’s chin (and popping it into his mouth).
Or when Kurosawa couldn’t control himself from taking pictures of Adachi just being Adachi.
Hanging out at the fair…
Or Kurosawa reciting a poem in his mind about his shy angel Adachi…
There were 3 hugs in the whole of the series:
When Adachi accepted Kurosawa…
When Kurosawa helped Adachi fetch the application form for the competition…
And when Adachi “won” the proposal competition…
Other than that, there were 3 hand holding:
After they first went to help Tsuge look for Minato…
After their practice date at the playfair…
And on their first date…
The Scenes Closest to PG Rating for Cherry Magic Was Thanks to Kurosawa
To be frank, Kurosawa was the only one tainting what would otherwise be a purely child-friendly drama. Other than hinting for a “reward” from Adachi after their official first date, Kurosawa was also constantly expressing (openly and in his mind) how he found Adachi irresistable.
We had a look into Kurosawa’s fantasy of what would happen after their first date (which sort of led fans into believing they were gonna get the real thing after the first date actually happened in the finale)
Another fantasy of Kurosawa, when he succeeded in persuading Adachi to stay overnight at his place.
Since I mentioned 2gether at the start… So yes, Kurosawa was in a sense like Sarawat, the one with the dirty mind and always hinting to Tine/Adachi what they wanted to do with the latter.
And of course, Sarawat got to grab Tine’s boobs in the end.
The Eventual Build Up
The constant teasing by the producers led viewers to believe that the build up of sexual tension would eventually lead to something raunchy… Something explosive. Like a fountain bursting jets of happiness from the broiling water surface.
Finally, Cherry Magic fans could graduate into the ranks of TharnType and Why R U…
NOT!
First we had that morning after bed scene where Kurosawa and Adachi woke up on Christmas morning – with clothes on.
Kinda like when Sarawat and Tine woke up after a supposedly hot night.
Of course, that Christmas morning greeting was followed up with Kurosawa pulling the blanket over themselves, leaving fans to imply / wonder what would happen under the sheets.
Teaser of the Year
Cherry Magic closed the drama officially with the greatest teaser of the year.
Kurosawa was about to kiss Adachi in the office lift (how daring!), when the lift door closed at the exact moment their lips were about to touch.
Oh well!
In case you think the scene was cut off too quickly for you to figure out if Kurosawa’s lips touched Adachi’s, here’s the scene by scene screenshot by another user:
With 12 episodes of teasing, what’s another one to end off the series? I guess Cherry Magic in itself is the greatest teaser of the year.
But then again, for the final scene, I was half-expecting Rokkaku to appear to spoil the moment, like he always did.
Kudos to Third Wheel and Fujoshi
And speaking of Rokkaku, how could we forget how he always spiced up the moments (and helped the producers tease fans) by barging into what would be hot moments for Kurosawa and Adachi?
For his constant third wheeling, he sure deserved a notable mention.
And Cherry Magic would not be complete without Fujisaki, the fujoshi in the office who saw through everything!
In fact, if it wasn’t for her reminding Kurosawa and Adachi about their feelings for each other, they would not have found their ways back to each other, right?
And Fujisaki’s role resonated with thousands of fujoshi out there, rooting for Kurosawa and Adachi to become Kurodachi.
The producers sure made it a point to remind us that both Rokkaku and Fujisaki were instrumental in shipping Kurosawa and Adachi. Their fireworks display helped Kurosawa fulfil his promise to Adachi for a memorable first date!
Parting Words
2020 had been the year for BL, from Thailand to Philippines. Ironically, even though the BL genre originated from Japan with its expansive manga creations, the BL drama scene is just picking up steam over there. Starting with Ossan’s Love back in 2018 to Cherry Magic in 2020, Japanese BL has had a slow start.
Though the “intimate” scenes between Kurosawa and Adachi may seem mild by Thai BL drama’s standards, they were still moving in the right direction, given Japanese’s attitudes towards BL themes. This is most obvious in the fact that Cherry Magic was scheduled at a time slot in Japan when not many Japanese were expected to watch dramas.
1 am air time? It was as though the showrunners knew the only people who’d love Cherry Magic were those who were in the later time zones! a.k.a The Thais, Filipinos, Taiwanese, Malaysians and Indons!
Kurosawa and Adachi’s cute and sweet interactions built up to something mature, but of course, given how the producers filmed and edited the drama, fans were left to imagine the unthinkable.
In fact, the whole series would best be summarised by this collage:
Nope, none of the scenes above led to what your PG-13 minds were thinking. Kurosawa and Adachi were in their 30s, but they remained as pure as a 13-year-old at heart.
But I think the open ended finale was exactly the essence of BL. The BL genre started with fujoshi imagining unthinkable, blush-able scenes from what would be normal interactions of 2 friends. In Chinese, it was called “脑补” (or filling in the blanks with one’s imagination).
In limiting what was shown on TV, the producers of Cherry Magic were playing to the wildest fantasy of BL fans.
It was no wonder that no one complained about the lack of erotic scenes in Cherry Magic.
Or perhaps Cherry Magic fans were already desensitised. Unlike fans of Thai BL who were used to being bombarded with steamy bed scenes every other episode (in some dramas, every episode), people who were attracted to Cherry Magic were also the ones who liked the style of storytelling that was as clear and fresh as the wind in the spring.
Filled with the scents of cherry blossoms.
And to end this post, which finale scene would you prefer? The high-five scene from 2gether’s finale? Or the elevator almost kissing scene from Cherry Magic?
I believe many fans would choose the latter, because they can at least photoshop the scene into something they prefer!
Till then, try not to get BLown away!