The K-drama remake of Taiwan dramas trend isn’t over quite yet. On the heels of the remakes of My Queen into Witch’s Romance as well as Fated to Love You, up next is the critically acclaimed hit TW-drama In Time With You (I Might Not Love You). I’m not surprised in the least, ITWY was a hit when it aired, rocketed Bolin Chen to popular new heights from his indie movie roots, and created tons of memes about the dreamy beta-male that will forever be there for the alpha girl he secretly loves. Doing the remake is production company IWill Media which did When a Man Loves with Song Seung Heon and Shin Se Kyung.
The remake is prepping for a mid-2015 release and currently there is no word on which network it will air one whether one of the Big Three or end up a cable drama. While I love Ariel Lin and Bolin Chen, not to mention found Director Winnie’s directing in ITWY absolutely phenomenal, I hated the drama back when it aired. I had such high hopes and do appreciate how well made and acted the production was, but good god did I loathe Ariel’s Chen Yo Qing and no matter how wonderful Bolin’s Li Da Ren was I couldn’t get behind the coupling. I’m game for the remake to maybe fix the issues I had with the original.
It’s basically a given that the two leads of Korean ITWY are going to need the same insane chemistry between Ariel and Bolin, and hopefully have the same nuanced acting chops as well, in order to even come close to the original in terms of really bringing the characters to life. This story relies not on situations or tropes but on really subtle and long simmering emotional threads.
I doubt this casting would ever come true for me, but if Kim Bum and Kim So Eun were cast as the leads in this drama I would surely tune in. They have great chemistry and it would be a new type of role for Kim So Eun because she has never played an alpha-type of female
ooh Kim So Eun would be a nice choice. the male lead can be Lee Seung Gi or Kim Soo Hyun maybe? the 2nd male lead can be Song Jae Rim! 😀
Nope nope nope NOPE! No Song Jae Rim! Absolutely BIG NO NO. Don’t ruin the image of my Prince Charming with the Dbag character.
This. Kim Bum and Kim So Eun casting would definitely be daebak. ❤
ITYM remains as one of my favorite tw dramas. The reply 1997 pair would work here
NOOOOOOO….I loved You Qing and Li Da Ren and I don’t want anyone to ruin these characters. Also the directorial style of Director Winnie is so unique, they’d have to get someone really good to make it a seamless adaptation, I can only think of a handful of directors (Kim Yoon Cheol and the Coffee Prince PD) or screenwriters (Pak Yeon Seon perhaphs?) that could maybe make it work.
Same here. Not so sure about this….. :/
I really loved Time With You. I’m not a big fan when Korean adapts T- or Jdrama. But for this one, the story is simple (any strange character or weird scenes) so it would be interesting. For the actors, I want to see a new couple and not a couple we already saw in another drama. The choice of the actrice will be major.
ITWY is my favourite tw drama of all time. Korean adaptation? Nooooooo!
Both times Ariel Lin & Bolin Chen worked together, Ariel got awful characters. Who knows why, but I hated her in Lovesick and ITWY was really goood but still I got pissed off by Yo Qing. I hope I like the leads for the remake because even so I loved ITWY and yes, Bolin & Ariel had an amazing chemistry.
Surprising that Koala dislikes the drama because writing,acting,directing wise it is by the most impressive TW drama i have seen. I too had issues with the heroine, she was hard to like sometimes. Doing foolish things with terrible men.
For me K-drama remake will never exist in my eyes. I will avoid it totally.
I loved ITWY…even when You Qing went back to that horrid dude I could understand why even if I didn’t approve. Da Ren was making me angry with that clingy girl too lol
I was just glad she’d already chosen a different path when she discovered dude hadn’t changed
I loved ITWY! The middle dragged and YQ had a bad attitude, but I heart heart the dialogue! A very beautiful job done by Winnie too! I hope the remake is just as awesome or even
better. Please cast great leads Korea!!!
woohhh, one person who feels the same as I…. Ariel’s character totally got on my nerves by the end and Bolin’s needed a backbone – and simply deserved better than Yo Qing.
I think it’s perfectly suited for a remake, but I’m not sure I’m confident they’ll fix those issues. K-dramas love their alpha-ego heroines at times, see everything from My Sassy Girl to forthcoming Today’s Love. Of course, they love the very opposite as well with arrogant chaebols and candies that bow to everything…
I liked it well enough, but he was a bit too passive and the ending left me dissatisfied. There was a lot of built up, but when they finally ended up together you didn’t really see it happening.
In Time with You is one of my favourite TW dramas. Glad it is getting recognized in Korea too. I actually liked both You Qing and Da Ren, both have flaws but that makes everything more realistic and Ariel and Bolin’s chemistry made the couple more likeable. I wonder which drama will be get a remake next Autumn’s Concerto?
I didn’t know about this drama but for what i heard to a friend, it’s a super good drama at all. Maybe I’ll watch this first and I do hope that when they make the Korean version on this, don’t waste it lol!
I really liked ITWY because of, duh, Bolin Chen being the most beautiful man ever.
And I liked the OST, and that BC sang on it. I listen to that on my every day playlist. Love the mandolin. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kSBjhVMkWTc
I can understand why so many didn’t have patience for YC, but Li Da Ren loved her no matter how much he should have come over to the States to meet me!
Oh yea…the music was awesome! I wonder if they’ll have him sing a Korean version??
Never mind lol! I was thinking of a different drama! For some reason I was thinking that “come back to me” by Bii was from the ITWY ost.
There is really nothing to fix with the story; it is what it is with Bolin’s character not having the gut to confess his feelings in fear of losing their friendship and vise versa with Ariel’s character. If you change that, then the whole drama is over in 10 episodes. But there’s one change I would really love; instead of making Sunny’s character a cheater at the end, I would really love it if Ariel’s character does the breaking up knowing that they don’t really fit, instead of being given an easy way out. That really pissed me off!
meh, I can only watch a story told once. I hate remakes.
Second! So True! Usually remake only targets on those which are legendary or good enough. So what’s the point to watch remakes? This is not like remaking 50-60s films with more filming high tech and screen editing. When was ITWY aired? Only less than 10 yrs ago right?
I don’t enjoy remakes of Taiwan drama, tried Korean Fated to Love You remake and as much as I love Jang Nara, I just can’t finished the drama. Also, are there no more creativity in the entertainment world, why so many sequels and remakes??
Same here. K version of FTLO failed me after ep 1.
*FTLY
can i hope for Soong Joong Ki to play Bolin Chen’s character… he’s going to be back from the army mid 2015 right?
Yay for Jongki, esp. with Moon Chae Won. They will make a perfect couple!
For some reason I am hoping that the offer gets extended to Yoon Eun Hye and Gong Yoo and/or Kang Ji Hwan.
For some reason I am hoping that the offer gets extended to Yoon Eun Hye and Gong Yoo and/or Kang Ji Hwan. That’d be a Christmas miracle. 😀
I would definitely not count on the Kdrama to fix your gripes with the original (which I completely share – I loved how Ariel looked in that drama, but omg I wanted to strangle You Qing at times, especially during that LOONNNGG Ding Li Wei arc). My experience with the remakes so far is they tend to stay very close to the original, keeping the most frustrating moments and often making them worse, for instance Fated to Love You and Witch’s Romance. I’m preparing myself for lots of Ding Li Wei and You Qing bitchiness in the Kdrama version.
The only gripe I had with the show was that You Qing’s fiance being caught in the act of cheating was such a cop-out to allow the otp to be together. Doesn’t feel that organic. For her to find him cheating AFTER they got married might be more realistic.
Maybe the Asian mentality of the girl being less pristine after being with another man comes into play again, so the OTP must get together while retaining their pure self.
Yep your conjecture about Asian mentality hold true mostly to the mainstream. Being a two timer is by no means socially acceptable by most Asian girls, regardless of being in the context of marriage or not.
Typo – *holds* true
Seriously, I only have one word. REALLY????!!!! I don’t think I’ll be hyped by this Korean remake. TW version is already legendary. What could be even better unless the remake deviates a lot from the original plot line????? But then I’d not call that remake…
I love ITWY…
if korea’s gonna make a remake of this one..
it would be really challenging to find a pair that would really match up to ariel and chen bolin’s chemistry…
I’m not sure about this one. I absolutely love ITWY, for all its flaws, and am hesitant to see it remade. On the minus side, Witch’s Romance sucked the life out of My Queen, but on the plus ide, the unspeakably awful FTLY became a gazillion times better in its Korean remake, stripped of the brutish chauvinism of Ethan’s character, and having a real dancer/actor in the second lead, who was not a deliberate baby-killer. So my current tally of K remakes from T Dramas stands at “1 that was limp compared to the original I liked” and “one that I lvoe from an original I loathe”. On balance, my preference would be for them not to remake ITWY, but if they do, I hope it’s much shorter – the biggest flaw of the original for me was its non-existent editing and subsequent draggy pace.
Kim so eun for the female lead…
Ehh, don’t watch the korean remake. It was a huge disappointment.