The new TV Asahi drama Mars: Zero no Kakumei ( simply, Mars in the West) gives STARTO idol Shunsuke Michieda (fondly called Michi) the chance to play a character unlike any I’ve seen him do before, the mysterious Zero Mishima. 

A nineteen-year-old transfer student, Mishima is a natural blonde gifted with the power of persuasion. His dream is to break down the oppression of the world made by the “adults” and rebuild it for them, the young. As Mars, a naked wolf, he’s recruited young people to his cause through social media. But several months ago Mars vanished without a trace or hint as to why.

Aizawa Konichi (Rihito Itagaki), whom Mishima nicknames Icon, took Mars’ disappearance harder than most. Bullied and harassed, Mars was his the one joy in his otherwise doomed existence. Mishima meets him the morning he’s going to kill himself by walking into traffic.

Little by little, Mishima recruits others to his cause, and together they expose the school counselor as a drug dealer, who’s getting students hooked on a hallucinogenic called “F”. It’s not until everything for the teacher has gone up in flames that he reveals himself to be Mars. 

However, his goals are not as altruistic as he leads his new group to believe. Mishima lost someone important to him and one of the group members is responsible for her death. 

Of his role Michi says: This is my first lead role in a primetime serialized drama, so every day on set I felt a great sense of responsibility and pressure to do it well. But on the other hand, I never got to see the final cuts for most of the episodes, so I’m really looking forward to enjoying them with all of you! Also, this sort of acting opportunity–being so different from my real self and most of what I’ve done before–has always been a dream of mine; so I really hope that having new episodes of Mars will be something you look forward to each week as much as I am!

Mars can currently be viewed on the Rakuten Viki app for international audiences in over 200 countries and territories!

More Mars soon so..

Stay Tuned!