The upcoming live-action Dragonball movie starring Chow Yun Fatt, Justin Chatwin, James Marsters and Emma Rossum may not be too bad after all ;-)
According to this site, a reviewer who claims to have watched an early version of the movie wrote that the best parts included the action ("awesome"), James Marsters as Picollo, Justin Chatwin as Goku and Emma Rossum as Bulma. The worst parts were the story, Jamie Chung as Chi Chi, Chow Yun Fatt as Master Roshi ("acted like Mr. Kesuke Miyagi") and the CGI dragon. Overall the reviewer gave the movie a decent 6.5 out of 10.
Well, the movie is set for general release in April 2009 so we will know by then just how good or bad it is. But until then, check out the trailer here.
Source: http://kotaku.com/5069084/first-dragonball-movie-review-not-a-disaster, http://www.aintitcool.com/node/38877, http://splashpage.mtv.com/2008/10/03/new-dragonball-trailer-goes-online/.
Image from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragon_Ball_film
Tags: Dragon Ball, Dragonball movie, Chow Yun Fatt, Justin Chatwin,
James Marsters, Emma Rossum, Upcoming Movies, Manga, Anime.
Early Review and Trailer Of New Dragon Ball Movie
Korean Hana Yori Dango Cast Confirmed
The main cast of the Korean version of the hit manga Hana Yori Dango (Boys Over Flowers) has been announced. Playing the female lead character of Makino Tsukushi is the very sweet Goo Hye Sun (of Pure 19 and King And I fame). And the super rich boys of her school a.k.a. F4 consists of Lee Min Ho (as hot-headed F4 leader Domyouji), Kim Hyun Joong from boy band SS501 as the quiet Rui, Kim Bum as Soujiro and Kim Joon as Akira.
As the story's setting has been changed to Korea, there will be some changes in the storyline and character names. Makino is now Yeon Woo, the daughter of the owner of a dry cleaning shop. Domyoji is Goo Joon Pyo, Rui Hanazawa is now Yoon Ji Hoo, Sojiro is So Lee Jung and Akira is Song Woo Bin. For a comparison between the manga, Taiwanese, Japanese and Korean versions of F4, check out this blog post.
The drama serial is scheduled to be aired in December this year.
More info on Hana Yori Dango and other Korean drama series news can be found at my previous blog post here.
Source: http://sookyeong.wordpress.com/2008/10/06/korean-hana-yori-dango-main-casts-confirmed/, http://coolsmurf.wordpress.com/2008/10/02/male-casting-for-korean-hana-yori-dango-revealed/
Tags: Hana Yori Dango, Korean drama, Goo Hye Sun, F4, Boys Over Flowers, Lee Min Ho, Kim Hyun Joong, Kim Bum, Kim Joon.
From Manga To Idol Drama
Japanese anime and manga have always been extremely popular in East Asia, especially Taiwan and Hong Kong. Popular manga titles in Japanese have been known to fly off the shelves of bookstores faster than books published by local authors in the local language. Many people flock to language schools to learn Japanese for the sole purpose of reading untranslated manga and watching Japanese anime and drama. In fact, I personally feel that anime and manga have a greater cultural impact in East Asia than cartoons from Disney or Warner Bros.
Especially in Taiwan, the Japanese love of all things "kawaii" (cute) have so successfully taken root that many of the pop stars or actresses that have became famous in the last 4 to 5 years look very much like shojo manga (young girl's manga) characters themselves - big round eyes, long hair, peachy complexions, super sweet smiles and slim girlish figures... Classic examples include Jolin Tsai, Cyndi Wang and Rainie Yang...
Adaptations of popular Japanese manga into Taiwanese "idol" dramas are also extremely common. The only "localization" done is usually that the setting of the story is changed to Taipei instead of Tokyo. The names of the characters are more often than not the same... even if the Japanese names sound strange in Chinese. A good example is Meteor Garden's "Dao Ming Si", in the Taiwanese adaptation, the character's surname becomes "Dao Ming" and his given name becomes "Ah Si" which is a direct translation of the character's surname Domyoji in the manga.
Examples of manga that have been made into Taiwanese idol dramas include:
Meteor Garden 流星花園 (2001)
Based on manga Hana Yori Dango
Starring Barbie Hsu and pop group F4 (Jerry Yen, Vic Zhou, Ken Zhu and Vanness Wu)
Peach Girl 蜜桃女孩 (2002)
Based on manga Peach Girl
Starring Annie Wu and Vanness Wu
Marmalade Boy 橘子醬男孩 (2002)
Based on manga Marmalade Boy
Starring Stella Huang Xiangyi and Ken Zhu
The Rose 薔薇之戀 (2003)
Based on manga Bara No Tame Ni (薔薇のために) by Yoshimura Akemi
Starring Ella (from pop group S.H.E), Zheng Yuan Chang and Jerry Huang
Mars 戰神 (2004)
Based on manga Mars
Starring Vic Zhou and Barbie Hsu
It Started With A Kiss 惡作劇之吻 (2005)
Based on manga Itazura Na Kiss (イタズラなKiss) by Kaoru Tada
Starring Ariel Lin Yichen and Joe Cheng
Devil Beside You 惡魔在身邊 (2005)
Based on manga Akuma de Soro
Starring Rainie Yang and Mike He
Tokyo Juliet 東方茱麗葉 (2006)
Based on manga Tokyo Juliet
Hanazakarino Kimitachihe 花樣少年少女 (2006/07) (picture)
Based on manga Hanazakari no Kimitachi e
Starring Ella (S.H.E), Wu Zun and Jiro Wang
As you can see, creating idol dramas based on manga is really common. One reason could be that the ratings for such dramas are usually pretty good as there exists a ready audience from fans of the popular manga and also because the boy-girl relationship issues in manga suit the Taiwanese idol drama genre to a tee.
So... expect more such manga/anime based drama serials in the years to come...
Tags: idol drama, Taiwanese drama, Chinese drama series, drama serial, manga, anime, shojo manga
