Hanayori Dango

HaNAYORI DANGO

Japanese name: Hana Yori Dango
English name: Boys Before Flowers
Dates: September 8, 1996-August 31, 1997
Number of episodes: 51
Production Company: Toei Animation
Creator(s): Kamio Youko
Series Director: Yamauchi Shigeyasu
Voice Actors (regular characters): Maki Mochida (Tsukushi Makino), Naoki Miyashita (Tsukasa Doumyouji), Kouji Yamamoto (Rui Hanazawa), Youta Mochizuka (Akira Mimasaka), Yoshihiko Akaida (Soujirou Nishikado), Kanako Tobimatsu (Yuki Matsuoka), Ietomi Yoji (Kazuya Aoike), Keiko Imamura (Shizuka Toudou), Fuuko Masaki (Makiko Endou)
Genre(s): high school, romance

Hana Yori Dango is the story of Makino Tsukushi, a 16 year old girl from the wrong side of the tracks who is a student at Eitoku Gakuen, a very exclusive school that is attended by the richest of society's children. Tsukushi, shy at first, feels uncomfortable and out of place amongst the rich, snobby kids at her school and she cannot wait until the time, two years later, when she will graduate. However despite finding a new friend to talk to at school, Tsukushi's problems at Eitoku take a sudden turn for the worse when she crosses the path of the F4.
The F4 are the 4 richest guys at Eitoku Gakuen, and for all intents and purposes, they rule the school. They wander around the campus unchallenged by teacher or student, they flaunt the school dress code by not wearing their uniforms, and never seem to go to class.

The F4 are:
• Hanazawa Rui, 18, scruffy reddish-brown hair.
• Nishikado Soujirou, 18, short, straight black hair.
• Mimasaka Akira, 18, long wavy brown hair.
• Doumyouji Tsukasa, 17, short dark hair curly on top.

Doumyouji Tsukasa is the leader of the F4, and the one with the shortest temper. He rules the school by intimidation. The entire student body is either afraid of him or in awe of him. Doumyouji has been known to terrorize any poor student is who is unfortunate enough to fall in his path. What he does (with the support of the F4) is place a red tag in the locker of the intended victim. The red tag is a sign to the rest of the school that the victim has somehow offended the F4 and is now a target for their abuse. The whole school unites to make the victim's life hell. Just such a thing happens to Tsukushi

Tsukushi stands up to Doumyouji while defending her friend Makiko, who had fallen down some stairs and had landed on the angry Doumyouji. Doumyouji decides to red tag Tsukushi's locker, and this prompts the entire school to heap abuse on her. At first, Tsukushi is afraid of Doumyouji and is intimidated by the F4. She runs away from her attackers. However when she is confronted by Doumyouji, her fighting spirit comes to life, and she decides to do the unthinkable: Challenge the F4! Tsukushi declares that she will not take any crap from the F4 and the rest of the school, and vows to fight back. She declares war on the F4 with a red tag of her own. Tsukushi is a strong girl, not given to backing down from a challenge
Tsukushi's unexpected resistance piques Doumyouji's interest. Her strength proves to be attractive to him, and he ends up having a crush on her, even though they are 'at war' with each other. Tsukushi, on the other hand, does not seem to be that impressed with the rich, arrogant Doumyouji, and instead finds herself attracted to another member of the F4, the quiet, sensitive violin player, Hanazawa Rui. This sets up an explosive triangle of love and hate relationships, as Tsukushi finds herself in the middle of a tug of war between Rui and Doumyouji.Tsukushi has to face the pressure of the school's rapidly shifting opinion of her, her status as a poor girl in a rich school, and her attraction to a cool but mysterious guy (Rui) while at the same time dealing with the advances of Doumyouji

I used to watched meteor garden years ago. I have to rush home to watch it and if I have class I’ll ask my sister what happened. It’s the same now in boys over flowers that’s been made in korea. (I just bought a cd though so I’ll be able to do a marathon and watched it the whole day. After watching it I also bought the hanayori dango (japanese). At first I was bored but as the story progress I got hooked by it. I think the writer and the director deliver the story well. I really feel what the character is trying to convey. It was really touching happened in the end specially when Doumyouji remembers who Tsukushi is in his life. I even downloaded the OST flavour of life by UTADA Hikaru as my ring tone. 
The story was funny and I feel tears brimming in my eyes in some scenes.:) I’ve watched this 5 times now! A friend recommend this to me years ago but I thought its not good and I only got started to watch Japanese movies/tv series when she let me borrowed PRIDE. I should have listened to her. I like this one more that MG and BOF. MG1 is okay and the scenes are great. They wrecked it when they made MG2. I stopped watching it after that.

So guys, give this one a chance! Please watch it!