is a

Japanese television drama , also called or J-drama, are television programs that are a staple of Television in Japan, Japanese television and are broadcast daily. Format All major Television networks, TV networks in Japan produce a variety of Drama (genre), drama serie ...

which ran weekly for three months in 2003. The drama, which stars

Kazunari Ninomiya , often called , is a Japanese singer, songwriter, actor, voice actor, presenter and radio host. He is a member of the Japanese idol group Arashi, group that is under agent contract with Starto Entertainment. Early life Ninomiya was born in Kat ...

Arashi is a Japanese boy band consisting of five members formed under the Johnny & Associates talent agency. The members are Satoshi Ohno, Sho Sakurai, Masaki Aiba, Kazunari Ninomiya, and Jun Matsumoto. Arashi officially formed on September 15, 199 ...

and

Tomohisa Yamashita , also widely known as , or Tomo, is a Japanese singer, actor, and TV host. Yamashita joined the Japanese talent agency Johnny & Associates as a trainee in 1996 and made his small acting debut for NHK's ''Shonentachi'' (1998). He made his musi ...

NEWS News is information about current events. This may be provided through many different Media (communication), media: word of mouth, printing, Mail, postal systems, broadcasting, Telecommunications, electronic communication, or through the te ...

, centers on the lives of the last four virgins left in their highschool as they struggle to lose their virginity over their final high school summer vacation. A 6-DVD box set featuring all eleven episodes, as well as six individual volumes, were released in Japan on December 18, 2003.

Plot

Four schoolboys find themselves the last virgins left at school. During the summer holidays, a girl they knew as children 11 years ago, moves back to the neighborhood. Despite their childhood attraction to her, they realize she is a mere shadow of the "princess" they all thought they knew. This story of summer—love, friendship, school, family, the hypocrisy of adults, complications of life, experience and failure—is set in an everyday shopping district and shows the clumsiness of children who have developed a little later than their peers.

Setting

The story takes place in the

Shinagawa is a special ward in the Tokyo Metropolis in Japan. The Ward refers to itself as Shinagawa City in English. The Ward is home to ten embassies. , the Ward had an estimated population of 380,293 and a population density of 16,510 persons per ...

ward of Tokyo, although at least one location, namely the school, is actually in Yokohama.Stand Up!! Location Guide
/ref>

Main characters

Shōhei Asai (Shō-chan)

, nicknamed ''Shō-chan'', is the main

protagonist A protagonist () is the main character of a story. The protagonist makes key decisions that affect the plot, primarily influencing the story and propelling it forward, and is often the character who faces the most significant obstacles. If a ...

of the story, and often his thoughts are expressed by narration. He lives with his older sister Yuriko and his parents, who run a drugstore. At the start of the series, he is head over heels in love with one of his temporary teachers, the young Isuzu Mochizuki. His life starts to go crazy when an old childhood friend, Chie Ōwada, decides to visit the four long-time friends and moves into his house.

Kengo Iwasaki (Kenken)

is a

railfan A railfan, train fan, rail buff or train buff (American English), railway enthusiast, railway buff, anorak (British English), gunzel (Australian English), trainspotter (British English) or ferroequinologist is a person who is recreationally in ...

, knowing the schedule of all the trains passing through the suburb by heart. He lives with his single mother, Kimiko, who runs a

love hotel A love hotel is a type of short-stay hotel found around the world operated primarily for the purpose of allowing guests privacy for sex. The name originates from "Hotel Love" in Osaka, Japan. Although love hotels exist all over the world, the ...

which she bought with the

divorce Divorce (also known as dissolution of marriage) is the process of terminating a marriage or marital union. Divorce usually entails the canceling or reorganising of the legal duties and responsibilities of marriage, thus dissolving the M ...

money. The four boys often hang around there, playing

karaoke is a type of interactive entertainment system usually offered in nightclubs and bars, where people sing along to pre-recorded accompaniment using a microphone. Its musical content is an instrumental rendition of a well-known popular song. I ...

or evesdropping on the paying customers. Kenken is the only one of the group who, at the beginning of the series, has a girlfriend: Sonoko Fujisawa.

Hayato Udagawa (Udayan)

is a member of the high school band. He is the one the girls (especially the group of four he calls the ''Amazones'') pick on most, to which is added that his self-confidence is a little lacking, and that he has a certain affection for peeping under girl's skirts. His parents run a

grocery store A grocery store ( AE), grocery shop or grocer's shop ( BE) or simply grocery is a retail store that primarily retails a general range of food products, which may be fresh or packaged. In everyday US usage, however, "grocery store" is a synon ...

in the shopping district.

Kōji Enami (Kō-kun)

is the sports ace of the group. He's on the school soccer team and is known for often letting out his anger that way. When talking to girls he often starts to mumble incomprehensibly, turning down all offers from them. His father, who is also the

chairman The chair, also chairman, chairwoman, or chairperson, is the presiding officer of an organized group such as a board, committee, or deliberative assembly. The person holding the office, who is typically elected or appointed by members of the gro ...

of the local neighbourhood meetings, runs a small shop.

Chie Ōwada (Chie-chan)

is the "childhood princess" the 4 friends knew 11 years ago, up until she had to move away with her parents. There was very little contact between her and the boys during the time span, and she seems to hide a dark secret within her. It is later revealed that during her high school year, she had a crush on one of her classmates, but he took advantage of the situation, raped her and threatened to blackmail her. To escape this awkward situation, and the rumors that soon started to spread, she set out on her journey to Togoshi, to meet her old childhood friends.

Minor characters

* – Yumiko Shaku * –

Koji Matoba is a Japanese actor and ''tarento Television personalities in Japan, known as in Japanese, are celebrities who regularly appear in mass media in Japan, especially as panelists on variety shows. During the Golden Age of Hollywood, bankabl ...

* – Takako Kato * –

Rio Matsumoto is a Japanese actress, model and singer. She has had a prolific career in television drama series since the mid-1990s and since 2003 has also been in several films. She was formerly known as Megumi Matsumoto (松本恵). Acting career Televis ...

* –

Takashi Tsukamoto is a Japanese actor, singer, and model. Music career Tsukamoto has released three single CDs: "Itsudemo Boku wa" (いつでも僕は, Anytime I am...), "Hitorigoto" (ヒ・ト・リ・ゴ・ト, Soliloquy), "New Morning". Film career Tsukam ...

* – Becky

Staff

*Screenplay - Arisa Kaneko *Producer - Akihito Ishimaru *Director - Yukihiko Tsutsumi, Arata Katō, et al. *Planning - Hiroki Ueda *Music - Audio Highs *Theme Song - by

;Production *Line Producer - Ryūji Ichiyama *Assistant Producer - Tatsuya Ogishima , Masaru Motoyoshi , Kei Sugimura *Assistant Director - Yūichiro Hirakawa , Masaaki Nando , Masanao Takahashi , Jun Shiozaki , Masaaki Suzuki *Executive Producer - Shingo Nakagawa *Chief Producer - Shin'ichi Mikami , 清藤唯靖 *Advanced Production - Ikumi Uematsu , Yoshihiro Inui *Production Record - Ayako Okudaira , Kosuzu Tanaka *Program Desk - Michiko Ozawa *Organization - Masaaki Tsuru

Episode list

Notes

, who plays Kengo (Kenken), is a Japanese idol. He is a former member and leader of the popular J-pop group

. *

, who plays Shōhei, is a member of the Japanese boy band

, which performed the title song for the series. *The first episode starts with a fast zoom-in from space to the rooftop of the school in Shinagawa-ku. However, if one compares the scene to a real satellite view of the same area (using, for example,

Google Earth Google Earth is a web mapping, web and computer program created by Google that renders a 3D computer graphics, 3D representation of Earth based primarily on satellite imagery. The program maps the Earth by superimposition, superimposing satelli ...

), it is clear that, although there actually is a school at exactly that location, it's not the one we see in the opening. *

Hiroki Narimiya (born September 14, 1982), better known as , is a Japanese actor. Early life He was born and raised in Tokyo, Japan. His parents are from Okinawa Prefecture. His parents divorced when he was young, and in his third year of junior high school, ...

, who plays Hayato, and

Shun Oguri is a Japanese people, Japanese actor and Voice acting in Japan, voice actor, son of stage director Tetsuya Oguri, and the youngest of 3 siblings, including older brother Ryo, who is also an actor. He started in small roles as extra in the works ...

, who plays Kōji, have both acted with

Jun Matsumoto is a Japanese singer, actor, radio host, and model. He is a member of the boy band Arashi, and is Arashi's concert producer as well as production advisor for other groups. He is best known to Japanese television drama audiences for his portraya ...

, another member of

, in other famous Japanese dramas; Hiroki Narimiya in

Gokusen is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by . It was serialized in Shueisha's ''You'' from 2000 to 2007, with its chapters collected in 15 volumes. The story follows Kumiko Yamaguchi, the granddaughter of a yakuza boss and tea ...

and Shun Oguri in

Hana yori Dango is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Yoko Kamio. The story takes place in the fictional Eitoku Academy, an elite school for children from rich families. It tells the story of Tsukushi Makino, a girl from a middle-class ...

Hana yori Dango Returns is a Japanese television drama series broadcast on Tokyo Broadcasting System, TBS in 2007 Japanese television dramas, 2007. It is the sequel to the 2005 TV series ''Boys Over Flowers (2005 TV series), Boys Over Flowers'' based on Boys Over Fl ...

and ''Smile''. *''Stand Up!!'' has a similar premise to the film ''American Pie'', with four young men struggling to lose their virginity in their final year of high school.Those were the days
June 29, 2003. ''

The Japan Times ''The Japan Times'' is Japan's largest and oldest English-language daily newspaper. It is published by , a subsidiary of News2u Holdings, Inc. It is headquartered in the in Kioicho, Chiyoda, Tokyo. History ''The Japan Times'' was launched by ...

'' Online *In Episode 1, when Kengo (

) orders French Toast in a diner, the chef Hiromi (Gekidan Hitori) insists that the correct name is “Freedom Toast!” This is a reference to an American controversy over France’s opposition to the Iraq War, in which the U.S. Congress officially renamed French Fries and French Toast ''Freedom Fries'' and “Freedom Toast” in Congressional cafeterias.

References

External links

* (in Japanese) * in the TBS Program Catalog (in English) * {{IMDb title, 0425717 2000s sex comedy television series 2003 Japanese television series debuts 2003 Japanese television series endings Japanese comedy television series Kin'yō Dorama