Meteor Garden fans, the moment you’ve been waiting for is finally here.
Television station ABS-CBN announced yesterday that the Chinese remake of Meteor Garden will be shown on its airwaves come Aug. 20. The television station made the announcement via a trailer posted on their official YouTube channel.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kSiJZ0lGnZw
The Taiwanese version of Meteor Garden was a smash hit when ABS-CBN aired it in 2003. Starring Barbie Hsu, Jerry Yan, Vic Zhou, and Vanness Wu, it was the first drama to be produced that was based on the manga Hana Yori Dango (“Boys Over Flowers”).
After which, it was followed by the Indonesian, Japanese, and Korean versions, making the Chinese remake the fifth live-action adaptation of the popular manga.
It tells the story of Shan Cai, a girl who gets the attention of F4 — a clique made up of the most popular and richest boys in school — and falls in love with the leader of the group, Dao Ming Si.
Similar to the Taiwanese version, ABS-CBN will dub the series in Tagalog. The TV giant has rights to air the 2018 version in the Philippines, while in other countries including the United States Meteor Garden has been available on Netflix since July 13.
The Chinese production stars actress Shen Yue (A Love So Beautiful) who plays the heroine Shan Cai.
The posse of entitled kids known as the F4 comprises of Dylan Wang (as Dao Ming Si), Darren Chen ( as Hua Ze Lei), Connor Leong (as Mei Zuo), and Caesar Wu (as Xi Men).
And this early, netizens already have a thing or two to say about the show.
A netizen by the name of Coen Wang already had a clear idea of what the new show is like.
“[It was] made with less violence, less bullying and a feistier heroine. Surely the 2001 version is an iconic one and can never be replaced, the 2018 version is not made to replace the 2001 version. This drama has its own style.”
He adds: “They have also change[d] the concept around the Red card into an invitation to a card game instead of being a target of bullying in the school. I think they nailed the casting too, all the characters played their characters so well. I get that this remake has diverted from the original manga version, but I’m glad they did change some things a bit to make this story better & more realistic.”
Another commenter with the name Jughead noticed that the one dubbing Hua Ze Lei’s voice sounds like he has a cold.
“The one dubbing Dao Ming Si’s voice is too nice, but it’s okay too, he sounds handsome,” Jughead added in Filipino. “I like the one who voiced Shan Chai [in Filipino], it’s very spunky, like it was made for Shan Cai.”
Another user, Joyce Ly, didn’t like the voice of the actor who dubbed the lines of Dao Ming Si.
Queenie Mapula seems like she’s excited.
She wrote: After the long years, Meteor Garden is back. It’s been long years (sic) we watch (sic) on ABS CBN and now we are going to watch again and this time, new casts (sic)!”
What do you think about the new version? Share your thoughts by tweeting to @CoconutsManila.
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