#ikeido jun

The middle-aged and elderly women working at the sewn-products division toil morning to night — with many scenes depicting overtime work — to develop the running shoes. The company is desperate to develop footwear that can endure the punishment of a professional marathon. Despite having household chores, children and other home responsibilities, many of the women stay until late at the factories working on sewing machines to create prototypes of the new shoes. Some of the women gripe, but in the end they all decide to do successive nights of overtime.

What’s worse, they don’t get paid for it. Unpaid overtime is known as sābisu zangyō (“service” overtime). Miyazawa apologizes to his workers, but says: “We are close to developing the shoes and I’ll pay as soon as we get a loan from the bank. Please put up with this just a bit longer.”

In the end, the workers accept the president’s sincerity and continue to work overtime for free. The message is about the beauty of the workers and the president of a small business coming together as one to accomplish a great feat. The scene where the workers accept the president’s apology ruined it for me. From that point on, I lost all respect for the show and could no longer enjoy it.