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After 11 days of solid work, I finally started my holiday off by going to a play! Which was my first one in about 2 weeks! Seriously, stage-withdrawal-symptoms are real! I was having dreams of going to stages like EVERY night it was that bad xD
Stage Site here.
Dress Rehearsal video here.
I had speed read the manga in English and only volume one of it in Japanese before seeing the play. I was super excited because it was by a writer I love (she's also written MESSIAH! and we all know how much I love the Messiah series!) so I had high hopes for both the play and the manga; I was disappointed!
Synopsis (for the manga)
Japan, Year 2055, Old Tokyo. As the population continues drop due to a mysterious disease, through a certain incident, the fates of two youths, the orphan Noel, and Rikka, the heir of a distinguished Russian Mafia family, will cross… A thriller, depicting the tale of their "Bond of Blood"…
Cast
Rikka - Ueda Keisuke (known as UeChan)
Noel - Hirano Ryo
Sasha - Fujita Rei (known as Fajita Rei)
Cloud - Yamauchi Keisuke
Snake - Kuwano Kosuke
Olive - Fujiawara Yuuki
Wiwi - Karahashi Mitsuru
Black Santa - Nakamura Ryusuke
Pre-Play
I watched this at Tokyo Dome and because I'd finished work so early, I actually took time (for the first time ever) to properly look at and around Tokyo Dome City. Normally I'm too busy running to get KAT-TUN goods or I'm too busy running to Tenimyu to actually look at the place and it's actually a really nice location!
Once again beautiful flowers everywhere! xD During the run of Inferno it wasn't only UeChan's 27th birthday (September 5th) but it was also (either September 3rd or 4th) his 10th anniversary since his debut! So lots of flowers were around celebrating that ^_^
I was very surprised to find how BIG the theatre was! I knew Super Sentai performed here but it's like.... probably one of the biggest (in terms of seating availability) theatres I've been to! I was really shocked.
It also worried me that the place wouldn't fill up but I shouldn't have doubted cos the guys in this play are VERY well known and the theatre was pretty much full! ^_^ phew! I was sat behind two girls who were fangirling over Kuwano's bromides before the start of the play which made me happy. I've seen Kuwano pop up in quite a few things but I'm not his fan and I wasn't sure if he was one of the popular ones, so I was glad to see he had some love from the audience ^_^
The staging was very interesting. The audience seats went up while the stage had placed a chair on the bottom floor and then had staging and background on the stage. I was so curious about that chair... and I was shocked how much time they did end up on that bottom floor.
The Play Itself
First and foremost; if you enjoy Messiah (I still need to make a Series group post about it on here) then you're gunna enjoy Inferno! It has a lot of similar themes and tropes. There's a lot of action in both, there's a lot of mafianess in both, the music in both is very similar and to pull even more similarities; we have Fajita and Nakamura who star in both of them <3 the whole Rikka x Noel thing is very Messiah like also in that they live to protect each other and care deeply for each other on a slightly homo-implied level <3 it so cute!!! But we'll get to more of that later. It kind of reminded me of Makai Ouji as well for some reason... maybe because the stage set up is similar and Rikka and Noel remind me a lot of Dantalion and Wiliam; both relationships are very similar. Same could be said for Kuro and Ciel in Kuroshitsuji and some people has said Inferno is similar to Kuroshitsuji also. So yes Inferno is Messiah meets Kuroshitsuji meets Makai Ouji, okay? Okay! xD
( ( You're My Messiah - I mean Father ) )
Stage Site here.
Dress Rehearsal video here.
I had speed read the manga in English and only volume one of it in Japanese before seeing the play. I was super excited because it was by a writer I love (she's also written MESSIAH! and we all know how much I love the Messiah series!) so I had high hopes for both the play and the manga; I was disappointed!
Synopsis (for the manga)
Japan, Year 2055, Old Tokyo. As the population continues drop due to a mysterious disease, through a certain incident, the fates of two youths, the orphan Noel, and Rikka, the heir of a distinguished Russian Mafia family, will cross… A thriller, depicting the tale of their "Bond of Blood"…
Cast
Rikka - Ueda Keisuke (known as UeChan)
Noel - Hirano Ryo
Sasha - Fujita Rei (known as Fajita Rei)
Cloud - Yamauchi Keisuke
Snake - Kuwano Kosuke
Olive - Fujiawara Yuuki
Wiwi - Karahashi Mitsuru
Black Santa - Nakamura Ryusuke
Pre-Play
I watched this at Tokyo Dome and because I'd finished work so early, I actually took time (for the first time ever) to properly look at and around Tokyo Dome City. Normally I'm too busy running to get KAT-TUN goods or I'm too busy running to Tenimyu to actually look at the place and it's actually a really nice location!
Once again beautiful flowers everywhere! xD During the run of Inferno it wasn't only UeChan's 27th birthday (September 5th) but it was also (either September 3rd or 4th) his 10th anniversary since his debut! So lots of flowers were around celebrating that ^_^
I was very surprised to find how BIG the theatre was! I knew Super Sentai performed here but it's like.... probably one of the biggest (in terms of seating availability) theatres I've been to! I was really shocked.
It also worried me that the place wouldn't fill up but I shouldn't have doubted cos the guys in this play are VERY well known and the theatre was pretty much full! ^_^ phew! I was sat behind two girls who were fangirling over Kuwano's bromides before the start of the play which made me happy. I've seen Kuwano pop up in quite a few things but I'm not his fan and I wasn't sure if he was one of the popular ones, so I was glad to see he had some love from the audience ^_^
The staging was very interesting. The audience seats went up while the stage had placed a chair on the bottom floor and then had staging and background on the stage. I was so curious about that chair... and I was shocked how much time they did end up on that bottom floor.
The Play Itself
First and foremost; if you enjoy Messiah (I still need to make a Series group post about it on here) then you're gunna enjoy Inferno! It has a lot of similar themes and tropes. There's a lot of action in both, there's a lot of mafianess in both, the music in both is very similar and to pull even more similarities; we have Fajita and Nakamura who star in both of them <3 the whole Rikka x Noel thing is very Messiah like also in that they live to protect each other and care deeply for each other on a slightly homo-implied level <3 it so cute!!! But we'll get to more of that later. It kind of reminded me of Makai Ouji as well for some reason... maybe because the stage set up is similar and Rikka and Noel remind me a lot of Dantalion and Wiliam; both relationships are very similar. Same could be said for Kuro and Ciel in Kuroshitsuji and some people has said Inferno is similar to Kuroshitsuji also. So yes Inferno is Messiah meets Kuroshitsuji meets Makai Ouji, okay? Okay! xD
( ( You're My Messiah - I mean Father ) )
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**Credit to those who took the stage pictures! They are not mine.
Rating: 7/10 (<< I keep giving this rating a lot recently... am I geting harsh in my reviewing?!)
Overall: Inferno is a cross between Messiah (similar music score, lots of actions, guns etc.), Kuroshitsuji and Makai Ouji (due to Rikka and Noel's relationship being very similar to Kuro/Ciel and Dantalion/William). I was very impressed with the character development in this stage and feel they developed the characters a lot more than what's currently in the manga. I was impressed by the amount and difficulty of choreography and I was thorough entertained by the comedic moments. Ueda Keisuke is definitely my king in the 2.5 theatre world!
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