Spoilers! Watch it before reading on!
Boys Over Flowers is a Korean drama made in 2009, and I watched this show after I found out Meteor Garden 2018 was based on it. My initial impression was that the show was, well, disappointing. The characters yelled a lot and the audio quality was so bad that it would just hurt when they were loud. By the end of the show I'm not sure if the quality got better or I just got used to it, but it was no longer bothering me. The characters calmed down a bit too and there was less yelling.
I'm going to compare it to Meteor Garden here just because that's the one I watched first and also prefer.
The main character in BOF is Jan-di who at first is loud, angry and very expressive. It was quite different than Shancai's blank, naive expression. It took awhile to get used to but as she calmed down a little, fell in love and revealed her good heart I started to like Jan-di more and more. I noticed Gu Jun-pyo and Ji-hoo had very similar mannerisms to Daoming Si and Hauze Lei. Jun pyo had an arrogant but innocent way about him, and he would hug Jan-di in the same desperate way Ah Si did. Ji-hoo was a lot like Lei with his look of boredom all the time, sometimes revealing a little smirk or a huge, contagious smile (no in between) From the start I loved both these characters as they were familiar and just as lovable.
A difference that Ji-hoo had from Lei is that he came off as a lot more genuine and actually in love with Jan-di. Lei had lots of loving moments with her but then later would reveal that they just had a special friendship, or he was doing it to make Ah Si jealous. Ji-hoo on the other hand never left her side, supported her relationship with Jun-pyo but clearly wanted to be with her himself, and at the end of the series he offers her a ring from his mom and says he always wants her in his life. Boys Over Flowers actually contained a love triangle, whereas Meteor Garden you always knew Ah Si was the one for her, and when Shancai had a crush on Lei it was one sided.
F4 of Meteor Garden has my heart. In BOF they are still such good friends and there's less conflict between them, we even see them rescuing each other at times, but there weren't enough playful moments between them to really drag us in. For example, seeing them in class or the bridge room together, or when Ximen and Meizuo acted like Ah Si and Shancai holding each other to be warm and Lei pretended to be the fire. MG had bromances happening, with Ah Si and Lei sharing a bed and Ximen and Meixuo always knowing what the other is thinking. I love both F4s but the extra details in Meteor Garden just made them all the better.
As for the side love stories, I'm glad Woo-bin didn't have one in BOF like Meizuo has in MG. It wasn't a bad story, I liked how it showed Meizuo's character, but it was between a girl and a guy she used to know that we didn't have anything leading up to. They were introduced, had a sad love story, and then they were gone. It would have made sense if she was a main character in the show or at least had some episodes building up to this story. In BOF Woo-bin doesn't have his own love story, so there's no distraction from the better ones. Instead of a love story he has some gang stuff going on which. Way cooler.
In MG, Ximen and Xiaoyou had a really cute love story where they both change a lot before they finally get together. There's a lot of build up to them getting together so it didn't have the rushed feeling that Meizou's love interest did. But I did not like the awkward hotel scene. Xiaoyou was so sweet to him and he was trying to scare her away. BOF is the one I prefer here, with Yi-jung and Ga-eul having a better connection and Yi-jung treating her better than Ximen did. Also this versions Xiaoyou, Ga-eul was still shy but didn't always look like she was going to cry. She was hurt because she liked someone who didn't like her back, as anyone would be, but it didn't stop her from expressing herself or being hopeful. I love both of these couples but the Boys over Flowers version wins in this category!
The soundtrack for Meteor Garden was more prominent and likable. It's been a month since I watched the show and I have a good 10+ songs from the soundtrack on my phone that I still like listening to. The best part is some of the songs are sung by F4 themselves, or just one of the actors. My favourite is 'Don't Even Have to Think About it' which Dylan Wang, the actor who plays Daoming Si, sings. There's also an ongoing joke about how many times Say Something or River is played. None of the songs in Boys Over Flowers really stuck out to me, not to say they were bad, but I doubt I'll put any on my phone to continue to listen to and have all the feels from the show come back.
Compared to Meteor Garden, I didn't enjoy Boys Over Flowers as much but on it's own, I'd say it was good. The story has my heart, and there are even more versions of it out there, just waiting for me.
feel free to discuss with me below!
