‘The Golden Medal Lawyer,’ China’s adaptation of ‘Suits’?

USA Network’s signature legal drama Suits, which debuted in 2011 and came to an end in September, 2019 after nine seasons, was quite well received in China. On Chinese media review site Douban, each season of the show have scored between a 7.6 to an 8.5 out of 10.

Promotional material for The Gold Medal Lawyer Photo: Maoyan

On December 20, 2019, Chinese TV series The Golden Medal Lawyer hit small screens in China. With memories of the US show still fresh in their minds, many viewers in China couldn’t help but compare the new show to Suits given their similar themes. The 48-episode TV series, of which 30 have been released so far, is being aired on online streaming platforms iQIYI and Tencent, as well as two television channels: Dongfang Satellite TV and Beijing Satellite TV.

On Sina Weibo, a TV critic with about 2.84 million followers launched a poll about The Golden Medal Lawyer on Saturday. More than 3,000 people said the show is great, about 1,000 voted that it was terrible and nearly 2,000 said they haven’t seen it. On Douban, the show currently has a 5.2/10 from nearly 28,000 reviews.

Many Chinese viewers seemed to be unhappy about the show’s strong resemblance to Suits, criticizing its lack of originality.

Promotional material for Suits Photo: Maoyan

“A recreation of the stage scenery of Suits? A reproduction of characters? Even the cinematography is way too alike? I actually thought Jin Dong (the leading actor of The Golden Medal Lawyer) was sitting in Harvey’s office when I first watched the show,” wrote one netizen on China’s Twitter-like Sina Weibo.

Some viewers even began wondering if the new show was an official adaptation or perhaps the result of outright plagiarism. So far, there hasn’t been any official statement regarding whether The Golden Medal Lawyer has acquired the copyright to Suits, which has further aggravated netizens.

Some viewers have criticized the show saying that if it is an official adaptation, it doesn’t appear to be a very good one.

“Wang Qinian was Louis, Luo Bin was Harvey and Li Na was Donna. [The Golden Medal Lawyer] didn’t even bother to change the tone of the story. It simply transferred the backgrounds and characters [to China] without any alterations. The humors and witty puns have all been lost. To summarize in one word: ‘awkward,’” commented Sina Weibo user Daisy_Pil.

Online discussions calling for better quality domestic dramas have also criticized the show for a lack of authenticity, accusing it of quoting articles and laws that don’t actually exist in China and forcefully fabricating a so-called elite life of lawyers which is far from the life of most lawyers in the county.

Source：Global Times

Editor：Vapor