This post has a lot of spoilers only open if you don’t mind them.
Summary
The live action was so crazy good compared to the anime. I loved all of it and its entirety but there were some stuff that really threw me off. Not like in a negative or bad way.
(I will use the regular character names from the anime since its obvious who is who).
I think mitani liked akari? I doubt anything ever happened between them but I felt myself oddly rooting for them as a couple just because I felt bad for akari.
The biggest thing that really threw me off was… like OH MY GOD DID WAYA ACTUALLY QUIT BEING PROFESSIONAL? After that I pretty much felt a little betrayed it honestly reminded me how amazing the live action is even though its obviously not a good thing that he quit being professional.
Notable things that I think made this also more amazing was the monks temple and that sai found the divine move in hikaru’s move.
The ending was amazing and I really loved it compared to the anime show casing akira and hikaru that they are eternal rivals.
I think the only thing I was disappointed about in the entire live action was that hikaru vs suyong was really underwhelming which they clearly made it that way.
The live action is WAY better then the original. And, I would say its even 10x better if you have seen the original because you can acknowledge every part the live action did better LOL.
But, if you are going to watch one then its good you picked the live action!
I’m at eps 10 now and find it hard to continue watching.
The live action show me a Chinese pro world that’s shallow, flashy and full of drama. The director obviously knows how to make a good drama, and also know how Go works and studied the origin throughout. But the creators of live action lack one very important thing: love and respect toward Go.
Sai in original always give the feeling that he “knows more than he’s willing to show”, while in live action version he give me the impression of someone who’s childish, short-sighted and full of himself.
Touya Meijin in live action is a good one though, I really like him, especially because he is his own character instead of a “clone” of Touya Meijin in original. Actually I feel he deserve to be called by his name instead of “Touya Meijin equivalent”, but I don’t know how it’s written in English.
Hm really? I have a very different opinion for sai
I actually thought sai was more childish in the anime. I think you mean that they high lighted the whole cry and throw up thing more in the live action? I personally found that very miniscule otherwise I would have to disagree quite a lot. Especially if you are only on episode 10. In the anime sai whines an immense amount to play even up till his disappearance.
In the live action he does not do this except before “hikaru” becomes insei. Even then the amount sai whines in the anime is immense compared to the live action.
As for “love and respect towards go” I didn’t feel differently for the anime or the live action. Though I will say in the long scheme of things I do think the live action captured the essence and love for the game better then the anime. But, I wouldn’t say the anime didn’t. This also could have been because in the anime they don’t focus on japanese culture very much and only the culture of the game while in the live action they focus heavily on the culture of chinese and the game.
I asked my wife if she’d like to take a look at the live action, we just watched the first episode.
She was first engaged by the great filming, then entranced and entertained by the characters, and realised she knew nothing about Go and started learning through watching.
I actually wasn’t originally planning to watch the live action I heard about it and put it off for a couple days then I read some reviews and the amount of support from people who had never touched the game before said a lot of beautiful things about it which made me want to check it out. After a few episodes I was instantly hooked LOL.
