Ryoko Yonekura returns as the genius freelance surgeon Dr. Michiko Daimon in a special two-hour installment of “Doctor X” (TV Asahi, Sun., 9 p.m.).
Michiko happens to be in Kanazawa when national politician Aiko Ichinose (Kayako Kishimoto) collapses on the street after an intimate interlude with a man who runs away from her prone body. The doctor understands intuitively that Ichinose is in grave danger and accompanies her by ambulance to the Cross Medical Center, which happens to be the country’s leading institution for testing vanguard drugs.
When they get there, the head of internal medicine tries to persuade Michiko to forego surgery on Ichinose so that they can try out one of their new medications, but the doctor won’t have it. She immediately operates on the MP, while the head of the hospital, Dr. Kantaro Cross (“Beat” Takeshi Kitano), observes on a monitor.
In the new comedy-mystery series “Kami no Shita o Motsu Otoko” (“The Man With the Divine Tongue”; TBS, Fri., 10 p.m.), Osamu Mukai plays Ranmaru, a wandering soul who is blessed with a tongue that can sense things mere mortals can’t. His vocation is visiting hot springs that are not generally known by the public. His purpose, however, is to find the legendary mysterious “hot-spring geisha,” Miyabi.
In episode 1, Ranmaru meets Hikaru (Fumino Kimura), an antiques dealer who travels the length and breadth of Japan looking for rare items, and her “strange creature” of a companion, Kanji (Jiro Sato). When Hikaru hears of Ranmaru’s quest, she offers him a ride in her broken-down car, and they head off to Yunishigawa Hot Spring in the Oku-Nikko region of Tochigi Prefecture.
CM of the week
Kagome Freshman salaryman Kento Yamazaki is having lunch in the company cafeteria with his colleagues, who all seem to be wild animals — and not just animals, but herbivores, munching on leaves and stems, while Yamazaki yawns in front of his laptop, holding what looks like a hot dog. Suddenly, a female figure comes sauntering in and everyone becomes agitated. “It’s the carnivorous woman!” they whisper nervously. She’s actually a cheetah, but instead of pouncing on Yamazaki, she offers a container of Kagome’s Yasai Seikatsu “100 vegetable” drink, which seems to perk him up. In the background we see the cheetah woman licking her lips. What is she having for lunch?