Asian Addicts Anonymous

Welcome to this week’s edition of streaming updates for Asian dramas, movies, and anime. I can’t believe it’s already September. Where is this year going?

In simulcasts, Crunchyroll has added anime One Piece – Episode of Sabo. New additions to their streaming catalog (not simulcasts, but completed Japanese drama and anime) include Saito Takumi’s Doctor’s Affairs; Yu-Gi-Oh! GX Season 1; Ceres, Celestial Legend (subbed & dubbed versions); Cardcaptor Sakura: The Movie; To Love Ru; Motto To Love Ru; and To Love Ru Darkness.

DramaFever adds new Korean drama starring Hallyu actress Choi Ji Woo, Twenty Again. This series follows Ha No Ra who married young and could not go to college. Thus when her son starts attending college, she starts attending herself, but things get complicated when both her spouse and her first love become her professors. In the movies department, Jiang Wen and Chow Yun Fat’s Let the Bullets Fly is now available. The movie focuses on a struggle for crooks to take over governance of Goose Town. In non-Asian related news, DramaFever adds 2009 BBC drama Emma starring Romola Garai in the titular role. It’s not a bad adaptation of Jane Austen’s book. I’m not 100% certain I liked Romola’s portrayal, but hey, Johnny Lee Miller is always a great actor to feast your eyes upon. He’s done a few Jane Austen movies himself.

Hulu adds Gatchaman CROWDS Insight to their anime library. The Gatchaman are back and fighting a new enemy using people for evil purposes. Also added is Cat’s Eye about a famous painter who went missing and how his daughters become art thieves to ascertain his whereabouts. In the drama department, Hulu adds DramaFever title Twenty Again.

Netflix adds anime Princess Arete about a young princess imprisoned by an evil sorcerer who fears she will steal his eternal life. Nothing new in the drama or move department beyond the usual influx of Spanish-language dramas.

Viki adds Taiwanese drama I Am Sorry, I Love You about a young man who dies and watches over his girlfriend as she comes to terms with his death an what it means for her.

KBS World TV is also now streaming currently airing Korean drama All About My Mom on their official YouTube channel. Plus, they are now streaming 2010 drama God of Study/Master of STudy starring Kim Soo Ro, Bae Doo Na, and Yoo Seung Ho. This Korean drama is based on a Japanese drama in which a lawyer starts teaching at a high school in hopes of getting his students into a top university. Both seasons of Jungle Fish are streaming (not yet complete). The first season was only 1 episode in 2008. The second season had 8 episodes in 2010. The focus on the drama was really high school and some very real problems that go on (from falsifying grades, etc.). The final older drama currently streaming is Park Min Young’s 2007 drama I Am Sam/I Am Your Teacher in which an incompetent homeroom teacher is forced to undertake the education of the underachieving only daughter of a dangerous mob boss.