The Journalist: Japanese Series about Corruption and the Importance of the Press!

The positive and additional aspect of watching a series from a foreign country besides being entertained is that you get an insight in the country’s culture, values, and customs. Aspects which can seem strange to an outsider. This experience I got when I watched the Japanese series The Journalist on Netflix.

The plot is in short about a stretch of land around a school which has been sold too cheap. However, this sale involved the Japanese Prime Minister and his wife. Furthermore, at the same time another high-ranking politician is being investigated for having been involved in a startup company that has received large sums of illegal money from the government.

The main character in the series is The Journalist, Anna Matsuda who has created a name for herself as a deep digging journalist at the paper Totou. She has reputation of someone no being afraid of asking all the the annoying questions to the politicians. Little by little  Anna Matsuda gets suspicious about the selling of the land and the illegal means to the startup company. She decides to follow up on the leads.

Simultaneously we follow a low-ranking civil servant. He is ordered by his superiors to erase and alter important information in documents which concern the sale of the plot of land. It’s crucial that the PM and his wife are no longer mentioned in the documents. The truth is twisted and turned. And where are the police in this case? Well, they do not wish to spend time investigating the allegations about fraud.  

The document alterations prove to be too much for the poor civil servant, and he commits suicide. As we are in Japan honor and loss of face means terribly much. And now the action takes off. The wife to the deceased and her nephew enter a collaboration with Anna Matsuda so they can get the truth out in the open and published and also bring justice back into the Japanese society. How the fight ends? Well, I am not to tell you. But watch the Journalist. You won’t be disappointed.

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