2021 has been dubbed as the year of 耽改101, translated literally as “BL Adaptation 101”, in China due to a larger number than previous years of Chinese bromance TV series adapted from BL novels. The first-cab-off-the-rank Chinese BL adapted TV series for the year went online very unexpectedly without much ado on February 22, 2021. The trailer of the 36-episode webdrama, Word of Honor 山河令, premiered that afternoon with the announcement that the series would premiere that evening at 1800 hour online!
My Heroic Husband 贅婿 is a new Chinese webdrama that started airing on February 14, 2021. The closing theme song, Prelude to Water Melody 水調歌頭, is based on a famous poem from the Song Dynasty (960-1279) written by Su Shi 蘇軾 (1037-1101), better known by his pseudonym, Su Dongpo 蘇東坡. The poem, 水調歌頭·丙辰中秋 has been used as lyrics to quite a few songs previously, this is a new tune composed especially for the closing theme song for this TV series.
TTV Super Star is an annual Lunar New Year concert from Taiwan. This year’s line-up includes Jam Hsiao who opened the concert and JJ Lin who performed to close the concert. Below are some performances from the 2021 TTV Super Star concert.
Season 2 of The Treasured Voice 天賜的聲音 started airing on January 15, 2021 with Tiger Hu 胡彥斌, Angela Chang 張韶涵, David Tao 陶喆 and Cannon Hu 胡海泉 as this season’s music partners. Jeff Chang 張信哲 was on the schedule as one of the main partners this season, but so far he has been absent, so I hope Jeff may come on in later episodes. After watching a few episodes of Season 1 last year, I’m still very confused with the concept of the show, LOL… Apparently it is to find a duo with a golden song at the end, but since they are just singing familiar popular old songs, what’s the meaning of “golden” song? But what the heck, I won’t waste time thinking, just sit back and enjoy some of the songs in each episode whatever the concept of the show is!
A Writer’s Odyssey 刺殺小說家, a.k.a. Assassin in Red, is a new Chinese movie set to premiere on February 12, 2021 for Chinese New Year. This is the theme song Parallel (or Parallel Universe 平行世界), written and sung by G.E.M.
Lovely Writer (數到十就親親你) is a new Thai BL series which will premiere on February 24, 2021. The Thai name of the series, นับสิบจะจูบ, actually means Dozens of Kisses, so you can see where the lyrics of the theme song came from… This show looks like a fun TV series from the trailer, so I’m looking forward to it!
A Trip with Your Wife 《跟你老婆去旅行》 is a new Taiwanese movie set to premiere on February 10, 2021 for the Chinese New Year. I just heard the theme song earlier today which sounded quite heartbreaking, but then when I searched out the trailer for the movie, I found out it is actually a dramedy, LOL… Here’s the theme song sung by Jam Hsiao.
Heaven Official’s Blessing 天官賜福 is a Chinese anime TV series that aired from October 31, 2020 and finished its first season on January 2, 2021. Season 2 is expected to air this year. The anime is based on the BL novel by 墨香銅臭 (Moxiangtongxiu), the author who also wrote the novel that the 2019 TV series, The Untamed 陳情令, was adapted from. Heaven Official’s Blessing is also expected to be filmed into a live action TV series this year. Below are the songs from the OST of the anime series.
Having spent the last couple of months reading the 188 BL series with a bastard protagonist in each novel, I’m now a bit not used to reading two young, but kind-hearted protagonists with hard and quite sad lives… I have just started on the first few chapters and already felt very attached to the two protagonists! If you love Saye 撒野, I think you will like this BL novel too, with very similar beginning, but not surprisingly both these novels are written by the same novelist, Wuzhe 巫哲. A Lucky Coin is the story of an unschooled, tall 17-year-old who lives a gypsy life of travelling all over the country with his father who has a mysterious job, and both have just arrived to a new city. He met, rescued and befriended a small and quiet, stuttering 14-year-old (? the novel just stated that he is in the second year of high school) who was being bullied by his classmates… I read the synopsis and apparently, there will be mysteries (my type of story, hahaha…) surrounding the disappearance of both their fathers, and they will separate and meet again later… As usual, now that I know there are audio dramas of Chinese BL novels, I’m now needing theme song to listen to while reading the novel, so here it is, the theme song from the audio drama of A Lucky Coin…
Corner Café 