This is exhausting. It forces the viewer to act like a detective, assembling meaning from shrapnel. This is why many Western viewers complain of headaches after watching Japanese TV movies. That is not a headache. That is Hard Entertainment working as intended.
Producing a two-hour TV movie in Japan costs approximately ¥40–60 million (USD $300,000–450,000)—a fraction of a theatrical film or a 12-episode drama. Hard entertainment optimizes this budget: