**UPDATED** HK Television Wars Update: ATV making a comeback!

**12/24/17 Hot off the press update -- Soooo.....things are starting out on the wrong foot already.  Turns out that ATV won't be able to remake MDWAV because the rights to that series (along with a bunch of other popular ATV classics) was sold to Fox Networks.  Fox released a statement today (yesterday) stating that they hold the rights to MDWAV and ATV would be infringing on copyright if they were to remake the series without Fox's consent.  ATV's CEO Ng Yu was asked about this today and he said that it is true that most of ATV's series were indeed already sold to other companies (including TVB, Fox, HMV, Sohu, etc.) and that it was a misunderstanding on their part, as the records are really messy and they are still going through them.  He said that they are in discussions with Fox right now on possible collaboration with the remake but if that doesn't pan out, they have other series they can look at remaking instead.

What a mess!  I mean, how could ATV not know that the rights to the series was already sold to Fox?  And then to announce plans for a remake as though ATV still owned the rights?  This definitely doesn't look good for ATV, especially with their already previously tarnished reputation....

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Ok, so seeing that I haven't updated HK television-related stuff in awhile and we're coming up on the end of the year, I figured it was time for a mini "recap" of some of the major things going on in the HK television industry as of late.  This will be a quick, relatively short post (yea, I know, departure from my normal "War and Peace" style, but hey, I'm busy and in a crunch for time this month).

I don't plan on talking about all the TV stations, as I don't really have time for that right now (maybe I'll do a year-end recap later – we'll see), so I'll just focus on one major "hot off the press" HK television news for now.

The big news this weekend was ATV announcing their official comeback.  No, they didn't get their license back.  Rather, they are returning as an internet TV station where their programs will be available to watch via mobile platform (phone and tablet app) as well as via OTT (Over-the-Top) TV set boxes.  The new owner is a Mainland businessman with (supposedly) boatloads of money and he has hired quite a few big name industry veterans to head the station, including former TVB (and EEG) director of operations Ng Yu (he will be CEO), former TVB top exec/manager Peter Au, retired former TVB director of promotion and marketing Tsang Sing Ming, and former TVB (and subsequently NowTV) head of variety shows production Ho Lai Chuen (who is supposedly serving in the capacity of "consultant").  Also, they have a new logo now and I believe their official name is called "New Asia TV"….

In terms of artists, Ng Yu announced that everyone signed a "per series/show" contract only and are essentially free artists who can work for whichever station they so choose.  They will not be doing artist management in the beginning – instead, they intend on cultivating newcomers by having them work with experienced artists, then they will pick out the ones who are good and sign them to long term contracts (interesting strategy).  There were boatloads of former ATV and TVB artists who attended the official press conference this weekend (note that the official re-launch date isn't until January 29^th – they are just making all the announcements 1 month early), most notably Stephen Chan, Margie Tsang, Wong Hei, Spencer Leung, Joyce Chan, Anne Heung, Queenie Chu, Cillia Lok, Jacqueline Chu, ATV veteran Lau Shek Yin, etc.  Supposedly these artists are only a few of the over 100 artists + behind-the-scenes crew that ATV currently has working for them. 

Programming-wise, the biggest highlights are Stephen Chan hosting the 2018 version of "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" – of course, he's got pretty big shoes to fill considering how popular that game show was back when Kenneth Chan hosted the Chinese version on ATV many years ago (and no, I highly doubt Stephen Chan will be able to invite the "A-list" guests that Kenneth was able to back in the days when he hosted).  The other big highlight (on the variety show side) is that they will have a live variety program that will air every night Monday thru Friday – the show is called "See You Tonight" (and yes, the similar-sounding name to TVB's iconic live variety show EYT is probably deliberate) and will consist of one episode a night with a different theme each night hosted by different artists.  Spencer Leung, Joyce Chan, and veteran radio host Sarah Lee will host the Monday entertainment news-themed edition (Spencer said that for the first episode, he will be inviting 2 of his "enemies" whom he hasn't seen in a long time on to the show to have dinner with him – he also said he can't guarantee their won't be arguing or fighting so he advised audiences to tune in to see what happens).   Wong Hei and Anne Heung will be hosting Thursday nights, with the theme being travel and food, while Queenie Chu, Cillia Lok, and Margie  Tsang will host Wednesday nights where the theme will be fashion / lifestyle.  Lau Shek Yin will host Tuesday nights with the theme being HK current affairs and societal concerns.  I didn't catch who will be hosting Fridays though – will update once I find out.  

I'm sure the biggest question on people's minds is whether ATV will be filming series.  The answer is yes – the 2 "big productions" they already have in the works is a television version of the iconic HK movie "A Better Tomorrow" (yes, the movie that starred Chow Yun Fat in one of his most famous roles ever, "Mark Gor" – it also famously starred Leslie Cheung and Ti Lung) and also, a remake of ATV's classic hit "My Date with a Vampire" (I was never a MDWAV fan but those of you who are/were, feel free to comment how you feel about this news – good? Bad? Indifferent?).  Cast won't be announced until later, though in terms of MDWAV,  I highly doubt that any of the artists who were involved with the original will be participating in this new remake version.  Also, Ng Yu had done an interview last week (prior to this weekend's press conference) where he pretty much already confirmed that all of their "self-produced" series will be collaborations with Mainland – meaning produced with Mainland money, feature Mainland artists, and overall be geared toward Mainland audiences.

Lastly, the question of the day from reporters during the press conference was whether there would be a repeat of what I like to call "Salarygate" – remember those 4 to 6 months where ATV failed to pay their staff's salaries, resulting in hundreds of ATV staff having to apply to the Labor Department and also take ATV to court to recoup their lost wages.  Ng Yu confirmed that there will absolutely NOT be a repeat of that, as one of the pre-requisites for him agreeing to be CEO (keep in mind that he had retired from EEG last year) was that the owner must put staff salaries first and foremost.  He said the current owner of ATV has tons of properties and business and money is not an issue…in fact, he said that the owner plans on investing 400 million HKD the first year to make sure all relevant and necessary production costs, salaries, expenses, etc. are covered.

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To be honest, I'm not sure how I feel about this whole ATV thing.  In my book, that station's reputation is so tarnished already that it will essentially take Herculean effort to truly re-establish themselves as a possible force to be reckoned with in HK audience's eyes.  Personally, even after their announcement, I wasn't all that excited about their programs, as there really wasn't much that interested me except for that "See You Tonight" variety program that I might possibly watch, mostly out of curiosity to see whether it will truly be an "original effort" or merely a copycat of EYT (long-time TVB fans will probably remember that Ng Yu is still considered the "father of E.Y.T." and is largely credited with making that show the success it was for so many years, so it's hard for me to believe there won't be 'E.Y.T.' influences in the show).  The 2 series they announced so far I'm definitely not interested in – as I said above, I was never a fan of MDWAV so I could care less that they are doing a remake of it, but I did love the movie "A Better Tomorrow", which is one reason why I don't want to watch the ATV remake version because I know for sure they are going to butcher it (come on now – I don't care who they end up casting, no one is ever going to surpass Chow Yun Fat's iconic performance in that movie!).  With that said though, one thing I will say is that if the powers-that-be at ATV have been paying attention to entertainment news the last couple months, they perhaps would've heard the iconic film's director John Woo recently reveal that actor Mark Cheng was originally slated for the role of 'Mark Gor' but he turned it down due to scheduling conflict, so Chow Yun Fat got picked for the role (CYF was known as "box-office poison" at that time – he was a huge television star, but movie-wise, practically every movie he had made leading up to that movie had bombed).  To me, it would be interesting (and probably a huge talking / selling point for ATV) if they were to cast Mark Cheng in the lead role for the TV version – in a way, giving him a chance to fix a previously "missed opportunity"….but this is just me putting in my two cents…I actually have no idea who ATV is going cast in either series.

Concluding thoughts:  Basically, my approach with this ATV comeback thing is "wait and see".  As I said above, I'm not excited for any of their programs or artists.  On the contrary, I'm actually more excited about the internet series from other lesser name (in HK at least) production companies:  namely, OCTB season 2 (which will start filming next month) and also both of Fox Asia's HK series "Trading Floor" and "Stain'd".  The trailers for both series have been out for awhile already and even though both were only a few short seconds, the little I saw already blew TVB series out of the water big-time.   I read in the news that they recently did a special director's cut of "Stain'd" where they edited all 5 episodes into a movie length film and debuted it at the Macau Film Festival, where 2 of the series' stars Kara Hui and Tse Kwan Ho as well as director Patrick Kong were in attendance (the other lead, Anthony Wong, was not in attendance) – the film version was supposedly quite intense and gory (the story is based on a real life HK murder case – the infamous recent case of a teenager who hatched an intricate plot to kill his parents and dismember their bodies, then blamed the killings on the mentally ill friend who  had assisted him).  With 3 award-winning A-list actors leading the series, no doubt the acting will be top-notch!  "Trading Floor" also I'm excited about, mostly because of the cast (again, award-winning movie actors Francis Ng and Liu Kai Chi), plus the producer is none other than Andy Lau – the "big names" attached to the project and the guaranteed top-notch acting are enough to get me absolutely interested!

NEWS update: ATV to make a comeback in 2018

It has been more than a year since ATV lost their free-to-air TV license and officially closed up shop.  From the moment they closed, there were already rumors that they would “come back” some day – one rumor was that they were going to submit an application for a license again while another was that they were going to “change format” and return in a different capacity.   Up until this point, there was never much merit to the rumors, especially since majority of what was being told to the public was coming from the mouth of ATV’s former chairman Nick Ip Kar Bo (who already proved himself to be a weak puppy through his constant regurgitation of whatever ridiculous assertions that ATV’s higher ups at the time had him relay).  Even up until last week, when Nick Ip attended an event for Creation TV (the Christian television channel that he has officially joined as chairman), he was still talking about the possibility of ATV returning.  While I still don’t give Nick Ip’s words much merit (since he has a bad reputation in my book), there is actually some truth to the rumors this time in that there is now official confirmation that ATV is returning, albeit Nick Ip isn’t really involved.

I had actually read about ATV possibly making a comeback in a few news articles last week, but at the time, didn’t have the details.  Now I have more info so I wanted to get this blog post out there to share it.   The latest issue of Mingpao Weekly magazine (published this past weekend) had an article that spells out some of the details, including an interview with the person who will be the new ATV chairman.

My two cents:  Personally, I’m not sure how well ATV will fare coming back as a web channel given all the competition in this arena as of late (in addition to TVB, who officially entered the web channel arena last year with myTV Super, there’s also ViuTV, which has their own web streaming platform, and also “outsiders” such as Fox Asia and Netflix, plus the plethora of production companies that have been making web series and putting them on various streaming platforms such as Youtube).  To me, if ATV wants to make a successful comeback, the first thing they need to do is change their name….keeping the same name will conjure up memories of the old ATV and with the horribly damaged reputation that station had, it will be harder for HK audiences to accept them without blemish.  For right now, I’m going to take a “wait and see” approach, as there hasn’t been a whole lot revealed yet in terms of artists and also programming / content – both of which we all know are critical to success.  Since the “launch” is tentatively scheduled for some time in January, I’m pretty sure we will hear more details come out in the next two months.

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Below is the article along with a brief summary of the main points from the original article (note that this is NOT a direct translation – it is basically me pulling out the main points from the article and summarizing them here).

Source:  Mingpao Weekly magazine, Issue #2556

(published November 4, 2017)

Main highlights:

-          ATV will be officially returning to TV screens in January 2018.  They will be returning as a web channel that can be accessed via Internet platform as well as mobile devices (via a specially designed app).  TV audiences can access their channel via a set-top box, but with a paid subscription (which is essentially the exact same OTT – Over the Top – method that TVB’s myTV Super utilizes currently). 

-          The new chairman of ATV will be Ng Yu (吳雨), who retired from his executive-level position at EEG last year.  As most people may already know, Ng Yu also used to be one of the top executives at TVB (back in the 80s and 90s) and has many years of experience in media management, so in a way, he’s the perfect candidate for the job.  Though another company will officially be heading up the venture, they recruited Ng Yu for the role of chairman with the promise that he will be the one who calls all the shots.

-          Aside from Ng Yu, the executive team for this new ATV venture consists mostly of former TVB and EEG people, including:  former TVB Assistant Manager Peter Au (歐偉林), former TVB senior producer Fred Lam (林嘉穎), former EEG artists’ department manager Roger, and also Ng Yu’s long-time secretary Pauline.

-          As of right now, there are already over 100 employees working for this new ATV.  Majority of the employees are former ATV staff (i.e. all the behind-the-scenes people such as makeup artists, costume, PAs, etc.) but due to his connections, Ng Yu was also able to recruit artists and behind-the-scenes staff from both TVB and EEG as well. 

-          Ng Yu stated that they are planning to bring ATV back in its entirety in that they are going to produce TV series (and also purchase series from other countries to air on their channel), variety programs, news programs, and also revive the Miss Asia pageant.  However he said that the Miss Asia pageant this time around will be very different from the past, as he didn’t want all the issues that used to plague the pageant to follow them.

-          Supposedly, Ng Yu is already in talks with a few well-known artists to collaborate with him at this new ATV (most of the names are former ATV artists).  Some of the rumored names include:  Jaclyn Chu (朱慧珊), Eva Lai (黎燕珊), Margie Tsang (曾華倩), Kenneth Chan (陳啟泰).