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Hikaru Utada Performs Image Song for Live-Action Boys Over Flowers Season 2
posted on by Jennifer Sherman
The official website for the live-action series adaptation of Yoko Kamio's Boys Over Flowers Season 2 (Hana Nochi Hare ~HanaDan~ Next Season) manga announced on Friday that Hikaru Utada will perform an image song for the series. The song will mark her first work for the franchise in about 11 years.
Utada performed the song "Flavor Of Life -Ballad Version-" for the Hana Yori Dango 2 live-action television series that premiered in 2007.
The website also announced on Wednesday that Takashi Sorimachi will play protagonist Oto Edogawa's father Makoto. In the image below, Makoto appears with Oto (played by Hana Sugisaki) and Yukie (played by Momoko Kikuchi), Oto's mother.
Additionally, the website announced on Saturday that David Ito and Sumie Sasaki will return as the private secretary Nishida and head maid Tama, respectively. Ito first appeared in the role in the franchise's 2005 television drama, and Sasaki debuted in the role in the 2007 sequel.
The series will premiere on TBS' Kayō Drama (Tuesday Drama) time slot on April 17 at 10:00 p.m. Kamio drew a special chapter for the original Boys Over Flowers in this year's ninth issue of Shueisha's Margaret magazine, which shipped on Thursday. The chapter has a "celebration" theme.
The previously announced cast members, from left to right in the front row of the image above, include:
Front row:
- King & Prince's Shō Hirano as C5 leader Haruto Kaguragi
- Hana Sugisaki as the protagonist Oto Edogawa
- Taishi Nakagawa as Oto's fiancee Tenma Hase
Back Row:
- Jin Suzuki as C5 member Issha Narumiya
- Marie Iitoyo as Megumi Nishidome, a popular model who transfers to Eitoku Academy to get closer to Haruto
- Tatsuomi Hamada as C5 member Kaito Taira
- Mio Imada as C5 member Airi Mayu
- Keisuke Nakata as C5 member Sugimaru Eibi
Other cast members announced in March include:
- Ruruka Kinami as Arisa Konno
- Keiko Horiōchi as Miyoko Hase
- Tet Wada as Kazuma Hase
- Kōtarō Shiga as Kōzō Kobayashi
- Kasaki Takao as Rie Hase
- Ken'ichi Takitō as Iwao Kaguragi
- Momoko Kikuchi as Yukie Edogawa
- Riku Kashima as Jin Konoe
The King & Prince idol group's debut song "Cinderella Girl" will be the series' theme song.
The story of the manga is set at Eitoku Academy two years after the legendary F4 group graduated and follows the next generation of characters. The drama, however, will change the story to take place 10 years after the F4 graduated.
The manga debuted in Japan on Shueisha's Shonen Jump+ app in February 2015, and Shueisha published the ninth compiled book volume on April 4. Viz Media is publishing the manga as a free simultaneous digital release.
The original Boys Over Flowers manga followed 16-year old Tsukushi Makino, a bright girl from a middle-class family who gets accepted into the ultra elite Eitoku Academy. She finds herself on the bad side of the school's F4, the four most elite male members at the school. The manga has more than 64 million copies in print.
The original Boys Over Flowers manga has already been adapted into Japanese anime, a 1995 Japanese live-action film, and a more well-known 2005 Japanese television drama, the latter of which spawned a sequel and a hit film. Taiwan also remade the manga into a live-action university drama titled Meteor Garden. Crunchyroll streamed a Korean live-action adaptation in 2011. A Filipino company announced in November that it would produce its own adaptation. A stage musical adaptation ran in Japan from January to February 2016.
Sources: Comic Natalie, The Mainichi Shimbun's Mantan Web
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