Various, largely Asian flavored

[dangermousie]

We went to Chicago for Mr. Mousie's birthday and it really was a blast. I really love that city. Amusingly, they had the Gay Olympics VII in the city that weekend and when we were checking in the clerk asked us if we were participants :P

In other news, we finally booked all our hotels in Japan. Including a ryokan stay in Kyoto. I am a bit nervous about the whole traditional thing (I don't want to muck up and be unintentionally rude) but we'll see and hopefully do our best. Though I am very tempted to try a love hotel for the heck of it :P

And booking the hotels reminded me of Japan (duh) which by circuitous logical processes led me to pull out the Japanese live-action (they are called jdoramas, right?) adaptation of Hana Yori Dango. I tried watching it ages ago, but it was right after the anime so it felt weird. It's quite enjoyable. Also, stars Matsujun who is apparently popular.

For those who've missed my long long LONG rambles about both the anime and the Taiwanese live action adapatation (just check the 'hyd' and the 'meteor garden' tags), the story is pretty simple, kinda a modern, crazy take on "Pride and Prejudice." Tsukushi is a poor student in a very rich school, fish out of water. She is also an extremely strong personality who, in defending a friend, comes afoul of F4, the gang of the 4 guys who rule the school. She fights back and in doing so captures the interest and then the heart of the F4 leader, Doumyouji. She, understandably, can't stand him.



I wonder why this manga is so popular: we have the anime, the Taiwanese adaptation (with a sequel!), the jdorama etc etc. I do think it's because it's not just a love story, but it has so many various ingredients: class issues (because of course, Tsukushi is poor an Doumyouji is super rich), a strong heroine not afraid to kick ass and take names (Tsukushi bossing Doumyouji is about the cutest thing there is), humor. But I can't speak for anyone else, for me the real appeal is the total fun the characters are. Doumyouji is rude, arrogant, bossy, not a genius, kinda a bastard (watching the beginning of this was interesting. I'd forgotten how much I hated him at the start) but with a really good taste in women, strength of will, loyalty and an amazing capacity for love. Tsukushi is incredibly blunt (watching the two of them battle it out is fun) and strong and interested in protecting the weaker or righting injustice, but also gullible, too quick to jump to conclusions and damnably indecisive when it comes to emotions (oddly, Doumyouji is the more mature of the two when it comes to relationships). So yeah, totally great to watch.

The jdorama version is fun, but the anime is still my favorite and I also like Meteor Garden better. Probably because those had much more time to develop the story (HYD jdorama is only 9 eps long). Also, I found some of the earlier bullying sequences a bit over the top (yes, even compared to MG and to HYD). I do find it interesting what they seem to have kept or excized so far. I haven't read much of the manga on which all of these are based (because I am peeved at the fact that HYD manga is done, at 35 volumes, but it's been translated only up to 14 here, last time I checked, and I can't find scanlations so there isn't any point), but I find it interesting that in the interests of time it looks like they excized most of the Ryo subplot (I guess they can always put it in, but they would have to do a breakneck pace). Also, just like in MG they merged the characters of the girl who Tsukushi protected, getting her in trouble and the cute conniving one who had an eye on Doumyouji and faked those photos with the 'foreigner' which led to Tsukushi beatdown and Doumyouji *sigh* rescuing her.

I haven't gotten that far in yet though. Just got to the point after their night together in an elevator (heeee).

Btw, catdecember (or anyone else), do you have any good jdorama or korean or taiwanese drama recs? And where to dl them? Angsty romance preferred.

I have also bought Vol 6 of Ouran High School Host Club manga because I am in such a withdrawal from the anime. I looooove the manga. So funny, I was laughing to myself on the plane, gathering plenty of weird looks. We finally meet Tamaki's family. His grandmother is utterly a dreadful cold bitch. I feel just horrible for Tamaki. True, I've seen a cold parent figure trope elsewhere, but somehow it feels worse with Tamaki because he is such a sweet, gentle, loving guy. Like kicking a puppy (to compare with HYD, which I mentioned above, Kaede, Doumyouji's mom, is a stone cold bitch way above grandma's level, but Doumyouji can take it and dish it out). And it didn't give me a high opinion of his Dad, for not standing up for him in general (if you want your son to live with you, as opposed to exiled, insist. Ditto about the mistress). Just like Haruhi thinks, I'd definitely hold a grudge. The thing that drives me crazy about parental figures like the grandma is something that is also prevalent in Bolly movies: if she changes her mind later, it's still not going to fix the years lost or the bad treatment recieved.

But hey, it got Haruhi to realize that she is glad Tamaki is the way he is and she fed him from her fork, while wearing a dress, at a party, in front of everyone (and I love that he held her hands as she had them around the fork, eeeeee), so no bad things without tradeoffs. Yay.

Tamaki might be straightforward and simple, but he is not an idiot. He just choses to focus on positive things. I was reminded of the anime episode where he was talking to the little kid who wanted to learn how to please a girl (that with a girl you love, you don't act as a host, you act as a man), with his telling Haruhi near the end of this chapter that he is himself before he is a Suoh and he is glad of that. The boy has his feet firmly on the ground when it counts.

Watching HYD and Ouran in proximity made me realize that Ouran is HYD's madcap, funny, lighthearted sibling. HYD is drama and Ouran is comedy, but the set-up, with the non-beautiful girl coming to the attention of the most popular group of guys in school, with them being super rich and her being poor, and the girl having a wacky family etc etc, is pretty similar. Heeee.

And last but not least, I meant to mention it for a while, I actually read two volumes of manhwa, a Korean version of 'manga,' called 'Can't lose you,' the plot of which just demands to be stolen and made into a Bollywood flick, as the heroine of it, Yoon, a poor but plucky and working hard to earn money school girl turns out to be a doppelganger of Lida, a shallow and spoiled heiress. Lida needs someone to pretend to be her as someone mysterious is trying to off her so she hires the heroine. And then there is Gil Gaon, a rising young politician, whose family wants to match him with Lida and for whom Lida has hots. Gaon is not interested in Lida because she is empty headed and empty hearted but then he meets the heroine and an OTP is born but he doesn't know she isn't Lida blah blah blah. The angst is going to be good.

Comments

[winterspel.livejournal.com]

I hope you don't mind if I give you some dorama reccs, and they're not even really mine.

I put together this Dorama Index for myself a little while ago, and I got some great reccs from others, so you may want to check that out. The best place to get doramas is from jdramas - everything is English subbed and most of the links are all still alive. Of course for torrents you can always go to d-addicts or this is the best site I've found that is a collection of most if not all of the subbing-groups with links to doramas and torrents, etc.

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

Thank you SO much! That is a great help!

[winterspel.livejournal.com]

You can also browse through jdorama.com - they have a large database of info on doramas, but they also have large forums which could be helpful for you. And d-addicts has not just torrents and subtitles, but also forums and other information. Their Mega-Faq might be very useful to you if you're getting started on downloading doramas (particularly in technical advice).

[callmecaito.livejournal.com]

Now I've gone and bookmarked all those sites. Damn it, being friends with dangermousie is risky business, you never know which obsession is going to start or be encouraged next. It's almost like its own fandom in and of itself.

[winterspel.livejournal.com]

*laugh*

Well, my original pusher was koalathebear who got me started on doramas, and then I got obsessed, and I've even uploaded a couple doramas onto jdramas! Ha!

The LJ comm is really the best - once you know what you want to watch, they have tags on their front page that will lead you to all posts that contains links to the dorama. You just have to join the comm, and you're good to go. Of course, make sure you read their FAQ because they do have rules, but they're very decent ones. :) HAVE FUN! I adore the world of doramas - it takes a little getting used to, but it's worth it for me. :)

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

Heh. I am the Black Hole of geekiness :P

[crumpeteer.livejournal.com]

I hate Tamaki's grandmother. There's no reason for her to dislike Tamaki as much as she does, especially when he's so eager to please. She's punishing him for his breeding, and there's nothing he can do about that.

I love when Tamaki breaks all rules of etiquette when he eats off of Haurhi's fork and he doesn't care. Not only does he not care, it makes him happy. While he's a drama queen and a scatter brain and a definite blond, there is a certain amount of untested steel to his character. He doesn't care what everyone thinks. And he is quite intelligent. He's the one who comes up with the practical (though wrong) solution to who was sending the notes.

And I still laugh at Hunny knowing so much about cyanide.

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

And I still laugh at Hunny knowing so much about cyanide.

The contrast between his sweet sweet sweet demeanor and the stuff he knows is quite hilarious (and he has the good taste to hate Tamaki's grandmother into the bargain).

I love when Tamaki breaks all rules of etiquette when he eats off of Haurhi's fork and he doesn't care.

I love that Haruhi overhears people going 'oh, it's so ill mannered blah blah blah' and she apologizes for offering the cake (or whatever it is) and he just goes ahead and eats it off her fork anyway. Though he clearly must have heard the comments and his fearsome grandmther is somewhere in the vicinity (who already thinks he is ill-bred) etc etc, and it's a mix of pleasure at Haruhi's offering, and not caring about what others think, and also I think, in some part, because she is embarassed and he doesn't want her to be.

What I love so much about Tamaki is that he is as good at recieving gifts or kind gestures as he is about giving. I also love that Kyouya was helping him, family-wise. It says a lot about Tamaki's sweetness that he has all these people wanting to protect him.

[crumpeteer.livejournal.com]

They make some comments about how "lucky" Tamaki is in his friendships, but it's not even so much that as it is he inspires loyalty in his friends. When the newspaper club went after him, all the boys in the club stood up for him. Tamaki is so genuine and good hearted that people really do want to be around him. It's a leadership quality that people over look.

I also love the twins mother.

[plazmah.livejournal.com]

LOL, I don't even know who Matsumoto Jin IS, much less being a fan of his!

*studiously ignores Ouran spoilers*

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

Sorry, got you confused with someone. But am too lazy to peruse the fan list ;p

[catdecember.livejournal.com]

i need to remember all the dramas that are romantic/angsty for you!

i want to read Ouran High School Host Club manga..... when i get $ and time!

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

Thanks!

And yeah, Ouran is great...

[catdecember.livejournal.com]

i want to get the manga really. but now i kinda want the anime too.

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

The anime is out on youtube :)