Hikaru no Go is a new Chinese TV series that premiered on October 27, 2020 and just finished its run of 36 episodes on November 26, 2020. It is a story based on the Japanese manga series from 1999-2003 centred around the Chinese board game Go 圍棋. It has a Douban television ratings of 8.4 (76,864 votes at the time of writing of this post) currently, so I decided to watch the series yesterday. Episode 1 has already got me hooked, so that’s a good sign for me to continue watching the rest of the series. By the way Hikaru no Go ヒカルの碁 was also made into an anime series in Japan in 2001 and that original series has a Douban television ratings of 9.2 (47,358 votes as of the writing of this post). The theme songs to the new series are embedded below, but most are just lyrics version…
Update December 7, 2020: Can’t believe I managed to binge-watch all 36 episodes in one week! The series is that good that I can’t wait to watch the next episode after finishing each episode. No wonder it has an 8.4 ratings at Douban! Even one of the hottest series from last year, The Untamed, only has 7.7 ratings, and one of the best series from earlier this year, Winter Begonia, only has an 8.1 ratings. The plot in Hikaru no Go moved along nicely and there is virtually no filler scenes, so you are kept interested all the way. Just like Winter Begonia where Peking Opera was the background as I don’t like Peking opera but I still enjoyed that show, you don’t need to understand the Go chess to enjoy the show. So don’t be put off by the Go games. Although it is not a BL drama, there is a strong hint of the attraction between the two protagonists, especially during the last two episodes. Also I can’t help shipping the two male teachers at the training school who acted like two old married couples, LOL… As I have not read the original manga, I don’t know if there was BL elements in the original manga but as I was watching the series, I get the feeling that the makers of the series tried to inject suggestion of BL elements in the show! Anyway I would still highly recommend this series, and I am tempted to re-watch the whole series again!
我們的冒險 – 曹寅
星辰之下 – 韓沐伯
永遠的明天 – 劉心
重生 – 耿斯漢
Below is the trailer…
Below are the 7 official episodes currently available on YouTube… However episodes seemed to have been chopped without the closing credits and episode 2 seemed to be short by about 15 minutes? All 36 episodes are also available at iQIYI but loading takes a long time, and at the moment episode 31-36 are for VIP only, hopefully they will be free after a few weeks… So I am watching by some other means without English subtitles which at least have complete episodes, haha…
Episode 2, Episode 3, Episode 4, Episode 5, Episode 6, Episode 7
Corner Café 
It’s sooo gooood. Thank you for the small review
Comment by Taiwo Adekanmbi — December 19, 2020 @ 7:22 pm |