Hana Yori Dango Live Action Japanese TV Dramas and Movie!

Big News! They FINALLY made a Japanese live action drama for HYD! And they managed to get one of my very favorite people, Matsumoto Jun (from the group ARASHI, and star of another most excellent drama, Gokusen) to play Doumyouji! Yay! Another awesome guy, Oguri Shun (also from Gokusen) is playing Rui. Oh, also... They actually got the superpopular MATSUSHIMA Nanako to appear as Doumyouji Tsubaki! It is fun to watch her stomp on MatsuJun :P

There are 2 seasons of the Japanese HYD drama. The official website for the HYD jdrama Season 1 is here. Season 1 ran from October 21, 2005 to December 16, 2005 for a total of 9 episodes. (ONLY 9 EPISODES??) Yet they managed to do an admirable job at squishing the storyline! Even though the J-drama was brief, it touched upon many memorable HYD moments, including the Miss Teen of Japan competition which they didn't even cover in the anime! The opening theme song for this drama is "WISH" by ARASHI, and the insert song is "Planetarium" by Otsuka Ai.

INOUE Mao as MAKINO Tsukushi	MATSUMOTO Jun as DOUMYOUJI Tsukasa	OGURI Shun as HANAZAWA Rui	ABE Tsuyoshi as MIMASAKA Akira	MATSUDA Shouta as NISHIKADO Soujirou
SATO Megumi as SANJOU Sakurako	SADA Mayumi as TOUDOU Shizuka	NISHIHARA Aki as MATSUOKA Yuki	FUKADA Aki, SETO Saki, and MATSUOKA Emiko as AYUHARA Erika, ASAI Yuriko, and YAMANO Minako

A Region 2 DVD box set of the HYD drama was released in Japan on March 10, 2006. Because it is Region 2, it does not have English subtitles. It is a 5-disc set in a nice box. Amazon Japan sells it for 15,960 yen (ouch!). The first 4 discs contain 2 episodes each, while the last disc has the final episode plus a bunch of specials including a "making of" featurette, textless opening sequence, and interviews, and much more.

SEASON 2 -- Season 2 of the HYD drama ran in Japan from January 5th, 2007 to March 16, 2007, for a total of 11 episodes and one short special. The opening theme song is "Love So Sweet" by ARASHI, and the insert song is "Flavor of Life" by UTADA Hikaru. Season 2 reunites all the cast from season 1 plus a few new actors playing some familiar characters. Season two brings to life more of the great storylines from the manga, including the Junpei arc, the Sara storyline, Tsukushi in NY, and the Maid arc. I am still sad that poor Kazuya-kun has not appeared in the Jdrama OR the J-Movie. Yeesh, that boy gets no respect! ;_;

MATSUSHIMA Nanako as DOUMYOUJI Tsubaki	KATO Natsuki as OOKAWAHARA Shigeru	IKUTA Touma as ORIBE Junpei	KANJIYA Shihori as HINATA Sara

The Region 2 DVD box for HYD season 2 came out on July 11, 2007. It features another nice box, similar in style to the first season. Amazon Japan is currently selling it for 19,152 yen (again, OUCH!). This set has 7 discs. The extras include a directors cut where some scenes have extra minutes that were not in the original TV broadcast, tv ads, and a big pile of behind the scenes stuff. I wish I could afford this set ^^;

This 57 minute special DVD follows the adventures of Tsukushi and her family and the HYD2 cast in New York. HYD series 2 opens with several scenes filmed on location in NY, and it looks like the cast had a great time while they were there! They talk about shopping in NY, places to eat, and tour the city, giving Japanese fans an idea of what NY is like.

Hana Yori Dango Live Action Movie (1995)

In 1995 a live action movie for Hana Yori Dango was released. It stars popular actress Uchida Yuki in the role of Makino Tsukushi. The movie is pretty interesting, if a bit (well, okay, VERY) cheezy. The plot of the movie pretty much follows the storyline that runs in the anime, however events happen in a different order, or things that happen at seperate times in the anime occur at the same place/time in the movie.

The acting I found to be very overdone as well, but even though it is high cheese, it is still kinda fun to watch. Some characters from the anime, namely Kazuya, Makiko-chan, and Tsukushi's family, are not present in the movie. Sakurako is present, but her role in the movie seems a lot like Asai's role in the anime. (I was amazed when I realized that the actress Norika Fujiwara plays one of the three bully-girls in the movie. She is very popular now)

The abuse Tsukushi takes in the live action movie is very similar to what she gets in the anime, however there seems to be even more of it! Some of the more severe incidents that occur in the anime do not happen in the movie, but the opening credits of the movie alone show Tsukushi being hazed in all sorts of ways. Tsukushi comes off as more wimpy and wishy-washy in this movie, I think.

Some other details differ between the anime and live action movie. The movie has Shizuka just returning from America, not France. The actress who plays Shizuka (Marie Eguro), speaks perfect English, with no trace of an accent. It is kinda neat to see Shizuka make her long speech in English. I wonder about her Japanese though. It sounds somewhat accented, like an American speaking Japanese.

The F4 in the live action movie are very similar to what they are like in the anime, behavior wise, though I think Rui comes off as being a bit nicer in the movie. Rui is played by the now super-popular actor Naohito Fujiki. Hana Yori Dango was his debut movie. Doumyouji is appropriately arrogant. (But please, can someone buy him a shirt?? Or at least anything but those Speedos ^_^;;;) He is pretty cute though! He was played by Shosuke Tanihara. I have seen him in several TV dramas lately! I swear, he is in everything now! For example, he was in another live-action adaptation of a manga- Gokusen 2. He played Yankumi's love interest ^_^ But my favorite of his recent series is definitely Mop Girl. He was so awesome in that! He looks a lot better now, I think ^_^

The Opening Song for the movie is 'Baby's Growing Up' and is sung by Uchida Yuki, who plays Tsukushi. The Ending Theme is 'Overnight Sensation' by the Tetsuya Komuro-produced group 'trf'. They perform the song in the movie (as everyone breaks out into a choreographed dance number... >_< )

I have made a screencap gallery of images from this movie. Please excuse my comments under each image, I just couldn't resist. They are stupid, I know ^_^;; As for where to GET this movie... I am sorry, but I can't send it to you. There used to be a really poor quality version on YouTube somewhere. As far as I know, this movie has not been subbed in English, but really, if you have read the manga and watched the TV dramas, figuring out what is going on is NOT difficult :) I bought my copy from Amazon Japan where it is about $26 plus shipping. If you really want to see this movie, I suggest you get it from there.

Hana Yori Dango Live Action Movie (2008)

The "Hana Yori Dango Final" movie has a June 28, 2008 release date in Japanese theaters. HYD author Kamio Yoko helped work on the plot, and once again the main theme song, "One Love," is provided by Arashi. aiko will perform the insert song. Something I am happy about is the fact that Naohito Fujiki, who played Rui in the 1995 HYD movie, has a small role in this new movie. Cool :D That is kind of a nice way to come full circle there! (And he has better hair now...) "Hana Yori Dango Final" takes place one year after the end of the 2nd TV series, and follows Doumyouji and Tsukushi as they have more crazy problems. On the Friday before the release of the movie, a TV special will air featuring the cast and Arashi, and will include a new mini-special which sort of acts like a prelude to the movie somehow. I look forward to seeing this!

Meteor Garden

Meteor Garden, or Liu Xing Hua Yuan, is a live action version of the Hana Yori Dango story that was made into a TV series in Taiwan. (live-action adaptations of shoujo manga are popular there. There are also live-action dramas of the manga for Mars, Peach Girl Akuma de Sourou, Itazura na Kiss, Bara no Tame ni, and Marmalade Boy) In Taiwan the HYD manga is called Meteor Garden, so the TV series took that name as well. Meteor Garden totals 2 TV series, and set of side-story specials called Meteor Rain. The show was very popular and influential all over Asia, and the guys who were cast to play the F4 have become huge idols. They even record music as a singing group, also under the name of F4. The popularity of the series has even resulted in the show being banned in China (for fear of it promoting negative feelings between the classes, if I remember correctly).

Meteor Garden follows the HYD Anime and Manga very closely for a while, and then goes off into different directions. Some changes were made (for example, all the characters attend Ying De University, not high school) but so many other things follow the original closely in the first series I was amazed! The second series strays a bit more than the first, and I have heard it is pretty awful.

The Cast: HYD Name/Meteor Garden Name : Actor Name

I am tempted to remove this cast list because a lot of people have emailed me with 'corrections' to the spelling of the names on the cast list, and everyone gives me DIFFERENT versions of the names! I am getting a little confused :) I'm not Chinese (or even Asian at all for that matter...) so I have no idea who is correct ^_^;;;; I will just stick with what I have here.

Meteor Garden has also aired in Japan, and I think its popularity there is what prompted Japanese producers to make the Japanese live action TV series.