Jack and the Beansprout after-thoughts

Watched Wildrice's Jack and the Beansprout a couple of weeks ago. It is the Singapore version of the original, but since it has to fit the local environment, the poor cow suffer from an identity crisis (have to be a dog in front of others and to bark as well) as well as an illegal pet (flats where can keep cows) and of course, the beanstalk became our most common 'tao gay' aka breansprout.

Very light hearted show, with kids in mind, and not forgetting the Singlish (the wah-lao, wah-biang, etc), as well as stuffs that we can identify like "ah long", "beer promoter" at coffeeshop, upgrading etc. Curious thou, why must Jack be protrayed as a "failure" (a boy who repeated his Sec 5 many times and in the end got expelled from school).

Of course, there are modifications to the original, the wife of the giant became the daughter (so that a love story can develop), the man-eating giant is Japanese and actually very gentle, the goose and the harp followed Jack willingly (not forgetting the goose told the harp that she is going to Jack's house = Jack's Place).

Like a typically Singaporean, money is never enough. We see Widow Neo squandering money to upkeep her appearances, instead of repaying the ah longs and then save it for rainy days. Therefore, Jack will have to go up the beansprout again and again just to satisfy his mum's ever growing appetite for glam outlook. Of course, since it was meant for the kids to enjoy as well, it was just subtlety brought up.

It will be much better if the show could start on time (so far, most of the shows I watch at the drama centre never start on time, including after the intervals), and the actors don't spent too much time to get the audience response, it gets a bit bored after a few tries.