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The Twisted Path of an Old Drama: Stairway to Heaven Chinese Dubbed Version Watch and Test
Yesterday, on a whim, I wanted to revisit "Stairway to Heaven", which I cried my eyes out over back in the day. It turned out that the familiar Chinese dubbed version that was shown on TV when I was a kid is not as simple as clicking on a video site and searching for a name to watch it now. It's been a long time coming, and the resources are scattered all over the place. Especially that particular Mandarin dubbed version, it's like playing a scavenger hunt.
I first rushed to a couple of big mainstream platforms. Love Qiyi, Tencent, Youku, the library is big enough, search for the name of "Stairway to Heaven", and all that popped up was the original Korean version with Chinese characters. Picture quality is much better than the TV back then, but the flavor is not right ah! Kwon Sang-woo's heartfelt "Jung-soo ah", Choi Ji-woo's tears, and the lack of the familiar Mandarin dubbing made it feel like stir-frying without salt, and it always felt a little less interesting. I tried to rewatch the first episode, listening to the original Korean dub, but the Chinese lines I remembered were automatically played in my head, which was awkward.
Undeterred, wondering if I'm not searching the right way. Change key words! "Stairway to Heaven Mandarin version", "Stairway to Heaven Chinese dubbing" ...... The result is either jump to the original version, or out of a bunch of inexplicable mixed cuts or commentary video. When I clicked on a few videos with "Mandarin" in the title, I listened to them, but they were either in Cantonese (which is a big difference) or the sound quality was so bad that it sounded like it was recorded on a landline, and the noise was so loud that it overpowered the human voice. The most devastating thing is that I found one that claimed to be in Mandarin, and after five minutes of broadcasting, it suddenly changed back to Korean, and I was so angry that I almost turned off my computer.
You can't count on the big platforms, so you have to go into the nooks and crannies. I remembered that in the past, there were some forums or small websites specializing in old dramas and cold dramas. I looked around and found a resource site, which was categorized quite finely and labeled "Classic Korean Drama Mandarin Dubbed Collection". I clicked in with excitement, and "Stairway to Heaven" was on the list! It's labeled "Taiwanese Dubbed in Mandarin". I clicked on the link ...... and it either didn't work or I had to register a bunch of accounts, follow the public number, and then jump to seven or eight pages, and finally the pop-up ads were even bigger than the video window. Tossing half an hour, barely clicked on an episode, the picture quality instantly pulled me back to the era of VCD, paste Choi Ji-woo's face is almost impossible to see the five features, the sound is also with the sound of the current ziZi. This is not watching a drama, it's like archaeology! Free is really free, but this experience ...... Forget it, eyes can not stand.
After all this, it turns out that if you want to watch that classic Chinese dubbed version of Stairway to Heaven comfortably and smoothly in HD, the free lunch really isn't good. Either you have to put up with the crummy picture quality and annoying ads, or you have to rely on your luck to poke around in your personal resources. If you're like me, you just want to get back to that feeling from back in the day, have a bit of a requirement for picture quality and experience, and don't want to toss too much at it, I finally realized that it's stillTencent videoSlightly more reliable. Although it's mainly in Korean as well, if you look hard enough (sometimes hidden in the nooks and crannies next to the selections, or scroll down more for recommendations), it has some episodes that offer a Mandarin dubbed audio track! Be warned though, not all episodes are available, and the quality of the picture varies; some episodes work fine, others may only be in Korean. It's probably one of the most hassle-free and relatively watchable options out there.
Seriously, after looking around, the biggest feeling is that the copyright of the classic dubbed versions of these old dramas is too confusing. The versions that were broadcast on TV back then are now in every corner of the Internet, with no guarantee of picture or sound quality, and the platforms themselves probably don't even know what they have in stock. If you want to relive your childhood memories, you'll have to rely on luck and patience. If you really can't find a satisfactory Mandarin version, you may really have to consider getting the DVD of that year (if you can still find it), or ...... just use your fuzzy memories to make up that sound! After all, the story of Shizushu and Seijun, close your eyes and the voice rings in your head.