It may sound cliché, but Japanese people really do love their fish. If Japan has the best and freshest fish in the world, then Tokyo's Tsukiji Fish Market is where you're most likely to find them. It's the home of Japan's biggest daily fish auction, and it's a place of fierce competition between fish merchants that have been in the business for generations. Based on a comic series, The Taste of Fish follows businessman Shuntaro, who has a successful career in a trading company and is in a steady relationship with girlfriend Asuka. One day, Shuntaro has to help out at the fish wholesaler store run by Asuka's father, and he immediately falls in love with the world of Tsukiji Fish Market. Soon, Shuntaro quits his job and devotes all of his time to running the business while learning about the market's fascinating set of long-standing traditions. However, he must first also learn to distinguish the tastes of different fishes before he can survive in the competitive world of Tsukiji.
The protagonist is a woman (Hiroko Yakushimaru) who is a sales manager at the Japanese branch of a famous French shoe brand. The protagonist is obsessed with a Hong Kong singer called Eakin Cheng and frequently goes to Hong Kong. However, she herself has an ambition to change the company's marketing policy (and if she can't change it, she will launch a new brand herself), so she goes to Hong Kong to plan this and that. However, this comes to light, and as it goes against the wishes of the head office, a feud is brewing between the two.
Attorney Asabuki Riyako goes to Ginza with her husband Kunio, where she almost has her handbag taken by a young boy. The youth had been involved in a murder case six years earlier. Yabuhara, the chief counsel at the firm Asabuki works at, was in charge of the case.
잘나가는 시나리오 작가인 하라다는 이혼한 아내와 관련한 일로 큰 충격에 빠진다. 인생의 허망함과 삶의 참 의미를 고민하던 하라다는 한 공연장을 찾고, 이곳에서 우연히 만난 젊은 커플과 가까워진다. 그런데 이상하게도 두 사람은 30년 전 돌아가신 하라다의 부모님을 떠올리게 한다. 현실과 비현실이 뒤섞여 따뜻한 감동을 선사하는 드라마.
억척스러운 아내 오우메와 함께 인쇄소를 운영하는 소키치는 고단한 인쇄소 일에 지쳐있던 와중에 키쿠요를 만나 외도를 하게 되고 세 아이를 낳게 된다. 경제적인 도움이 전혀 없는 소키치에게 진저리를 치는 키쿠요는 결국 오우메 앞에 나타나고 세 아이를 맡겨놓고 종적을 감춘다. 금전적인 어려움을 겪고 있던 이들 부부에게 세 아이는 큰 짐이 된다. 세 아이를 어떻게든 돌려보내라는 오우메의 등쌀에 못이겨서 갈팡질팡하던 소키치는 자의반 타의반의 사고로 막내 아이가 죽음에 이르게 되자 남은 두 아이를 직접 처리할 결심을 한다.
