Sean Akizuki's East Asian Drama and Movie Blog

Image Source I was thinking about two shows with some similarities namely Westside Story and The Outsiders . I think of Ady An who is eight years older than Esther Liu. Esther was still a teenager by then so I wonder how did she even finish school? Also, wouldn't she be JAIL BAIT that time? I remembered the joke of calling Mana as jailbait in Kamen Rider Agito considering I was still in high school when it first aired. Think about it - Westside Story aired in 2003, The Outsiders aired in 2004, and both actresses starred in Chinese Paladin in 2005! Then, I heard that Esther got a more demoted role due to her age (which I think was appropriate) since Ady had more acting experience. Ady was more professional by then to play such a tough character. I watched both shows dubbed in Tagalog. What amazed me were the roles played by both girls. Ady is pretty much a Dawson casting (she was 24 at that time) because she was an adult but her role was that of a 17-year-old. Esther, on the ...

Westside Story has some possible pairings going on. I'd like to think of a not-so-intense love triangle between Xing Wang, Ya Yu, and Yu Li. There's also a possible love triangle between Shin Ho, Yu Li, and Xing Wang. In the Tagalog dub done by ABS-CBN, you may remember them as Warren, Adrian, Jayme, and Joanne - names I'd like to ditch after watching more of the original Chinese audio. I thought of the love triangle scene. I think of the scene where Xing Wang becomes different types of people and stalks Yu Li. There's the subplot that made everyone think that Ya Yu had accidental incest with Yu Li (suggesting that they were paternal half-siblings) but it was later disproven. Xing Wang knows the real truth but lies to Yu Li about Ya Yu's father. Jealousy much? Xing Wang isn't too happy with Shin He because she's prostituting herself to feed her siblings. This moral grayness in the story is similar to The Outsiders which came a year later. Funny how Esther...

I remembered watching Westside Story on ABS-CBN back in my college days. I always felt the Anime feel was there. Meteor Garden  wasn't the only cast that had the Anime hairstyle. It's very easy to think people copied F4 when F4 was actually copying the Anime hairstyle from JAPAN. If you take a look at it at surface level - it looks like a J-Drama based on a Manga but it isn't. Instead, what really inspired the show itself? Manga is a Japanese invention but guess what? Soon we had Manhua (or Manhwa in Korean) as a result of the Japanese Manga. Taiwanese and South Korean got inspired to make their own versions. The very source of Westside Story is from a Taiwanese comic book that clearly drew ideas from Japanese sources. That would explain why the characters look very Anime-like. The looks are very Anime-ish and the situation could've easily been transported from Taipei to Tokyo. I thought it was based on a Japanese Manga or Anime, I googled looking for the source. Unli...

Granted, Westside Story was a show that took place 16 years ago so my memory is vague. As I just started to rewatch it, I think about watching it because I missed some episodes due to having to study for exams. Now, the rewatch with the ORIGINAL Mandarin audio makes me cringe thinking about how horribly ABS-CBN does its dubs (and GMA-7 is no less guilty either). I remembered the F4 vs. 5566 fan wars when  the Chinese theater popped into both ABS-CBN and GMA-7 . I wanted to enjoy both though  My MVP Valentine  wasn't exactly my sort of thing yet.  Westside Story  came and the show as promoted on  Dolphin Bay  which aired at GMA-7 at that time. ABS-CBN would later air  Westside Story . Both networks were at frequent competition over the shows they aired. I just watched  Westside Story  for the heck of it because it was a well-talked show. Peers of mine, Tsinoy or not, were watching it as if it were an Anime-based show. Though one thing...

I could remember watching Westside Story dubbed in Tagalog in ABS-CBN. It would look like a J-Drama on the surface BUT it's actually Taiwanese. Granted, I saw My MVP Valentine dubbed in Tagalog first on GMA-7 so I automatically knew it was Taiwanese and not Japanese. Those were the days when I still was indifferent to the robotic Tagalog dubs done by both networks. 5566 really had some good music which I enjoyed alongside F4 and other Taiwanese singers - way back before there were translations online. I just hummed along with the song without understanding a single word. I even wonder how Filipino fans of the show reacted to it. College exams were one thing that got in the way so I watched it on a very irregular basis. There wasn't any Netflix or similar services back in the 2000s. The digital subscriber line or DSL was very expensive back then. It was a limit I had to face. I had to really study for my exams or flunk right? I remembered having a crush on the female characte...

Westside Story, perhaps my favorite 5566 drama of all time.  I would like to give credit that without "My MVP Valentine" but there is something about Westside Story that made it my favorite.  So where does it start?  So it feels like Anime but there is no Anime, it seems that Taiwanese people prefer live over animation and this show does it quite right.  It has the Anime feel without the need to be animated.  And yup this show caused me to like watching live shows more than Anime. The characters of the script You Ya Yu (acted by Tony Sun) is one who lives with his delusional mother Yao Lan Lan (acted by Zhong Qin) and his maternal half-brother You Ya Wa (acted by Wu Huai En) who was born from an unknown man.  Well from an irresponsible mother who is obsessed with Hello Kitty stuff, it does get more disturbing than funny.  Then there is Xing Wang (acted by Wallace Huo) who is a young genius bored with life, the feisty Lan Yu Yi (played by my favorite ...