Meteor Garden (2018)

Disappointing Hanadan Adaptation!

As a manga purist and a huge fan of Meteor Garden (2001) and Hana Yori Dango (2005), I really tried giving this drama a chance since many people claimed it closely follows the manga. However, in addition to stripping away what made HanaDan a great story - a strong girl who withstands class issues and bullying and transforms the most violent and troubling guy into a human being - this adaptation was reduced to just a mediocre tale of an arrogant jerk and a normal girl who occasionally have unpleasant interactions.

Because these crucial elements were missing, neither the characters nor the love story were convincing to me. I understand China's censorship laws and all, but even with those constraints, the writing fails to build a coherent story that makes sense and lacks meaningful developments. Additionally, the acting and dubbing were major turn-offs. I tried skimming through a couple of episodes, but it didn’t get any better. This is like HanaDan for kids at best - if you prefer a good story, stick to the 2001 Taiwanese version or the Japanese version. Otherwise, skip this one.

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I know that rarely I like shows from China, at this one was the one that I've really hated.
Overexaggerated acting is a thing that I hate in Chinese shows, and this one is full of it. Even the scenes are beautifully shotted the story is predictable since the beginning, I mean, this show is literally everywhere on the internet and even people who never started it, knows the ending...
It is the classic drama with the poor girl and the beautiful rich boy with his whole gang of majestic friends, I found the second couple to be pointless and boring most of the time...

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Ya'll... Listen up. This drama is really cliche and hard to get through. The storyline was not interesting or realistic enough for me to actually enjoy. The actors/actresses are good looking, however their acting was unnatural. There are many scenes with sexual harassment. As a female myself, this drama makes me go "Nope. No. I can't watch this anymore." The F4 leader has immature and physcopath-like tendencies in my opinion. Overall, it was one of the most cliche and annoying dramas i have watched yet. It is a shame that Yue Chen was in this drama because A Love So Beautiful was an excellent drama...

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It was ok for about a couple of episodes until I reached that horrible and terrifying rooftop scene. After that I couldn't continue the series. I watched the next episode hoping that they were going to address the sexual assault and sadly they continued on like nothing happened. I'm fully aware of the Boy's over Flowers legacy and heard how it was even worse in the manga, but still this is 2018 they could of done something different and omit those horrendous scenes. As someone stated earlier, this drama was a huge letdown when comparing Shen Yue's role in A Love so Beautiful, which was a lovey and relatable show that allowed the main female lead to grow into her own person.

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My expectations were way too high. TW: Don't read if you don't criticism well.

Before I dive in, here are some things I want to stress about a 10/10 drama for me. It has to be captivating from beginning to end; it has to have a high rewatch value; it has to not have a part where I want to spam the "skip 10 seconds "button. <-These are just some of my standards. I am someone who doesn't like recommendations as I get expectations. Other than Untamed, I got high recommendations for this drama.

I don't know if the reason I don't like this dramas is because my standards have been raised my K-dramas (I just started writing reviews so you won't find that many reviews for K-dramas). I recently heard that there were three versions of the drama (Korean, Chinese, Japanese). The Korean version, Boys over Flowers, is on my watchlist, but I have heard very split opinions on it (either very good or very bad). As one of my few watched C-dramas, I wouldn't say I'm particularly fond of the amount of episodes in C-dramas. I prefer the Korean standard: 16 episodes, 1 hour long each. As for the story, I wouldn't say it's half bad. It was VERY predictable for the five episodes that I watched though I might have judged it early. It's the typical "short poor average girl with tall handsome rich dude" storyline. The main reason why I dropped this title is because I came for Dylan Wang, but his character's personality [and hairstyle] was complete trash. I am currently watching another title with the female lead: A Love so Beautiful (which I think I will drop soon). Though C-dramas are known to be the most realistic of the three genres (K-dramas, J-dramas. C-dramas), I found this so CRINGE and not realistic AT ALL.

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nope

I am not sure if it was a good idea to remake Hana Yori Dango into another live-action. Cliche plot and ridiculous storylines about bullying made this story hard to follow. Fortunately, the writers toned down the bullying in this version, but it did not improve the plot.

One of the major issues that plagues all of the live-action version of this drama is the fact that none of them show genuine romantic chemistry between the two main characters. There may be justification for it because the story is set in high school, so it can't be too mature. However, this version is set in college so the characters older. Yet, romantic interactions are still dry and uninteresting. The female lead acts like the male has the plague every time he comes near her. There is nothing to look forward to in their scenes together.

If there is another live-action remake of this manga, I hope the writers show real chemistry between the main couple or stay completely away. We don't need another live-action cringe with more of the same.

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