Prison life is a popular theme this fall, and the latest drama series to utilize it is "Mori no Asagao" ("Morning Glory in the Forest"; TV Tokyo, Mon., 10 p.m.), which centers on the relationship between a rookie prison guard and a man on death row.
Naoki (Atsushi Ito) is the newest employee in a detention center, and his first assignment is death row. The job makes him uneasy, and he constantly dwells on the prisoners he sees there, people who just wait, not knowing when they will be called to the gallows.
Suddenly, there's a new face in the cell block, a man named Mitsuro (Arata) who is being detained as a suspect in a murder that has shaken society. From what the media is saying, Mitsuro killed to take revenge for his parents. Naoki is even more perplexed now. When he was a child, Naoki and Mitsuro were members of the same baseball team.