Why Joyce Tang’s Scenes Were Cut in “Armed Reaction 2021”
Reaching the midway point of Armed Reaction 2021‘s <陀槍師姐2021> broadcast, Joyce Tang’s (滕麗名) character seems to have gone missing. Resuming her iconic role as Chan Sam Yuen from the classic 1990s franchise, Joyce’s scenes are surprisingly few in the fifth installment.
In the beginning five episodes of the drama, Sam Yuen appears as the superintendent of the Regional Crime Unit. Chief Inspector Mung Tan Sam (Moses Chan 陳豪) admires Sam Yuen after working together, and asks her out on a date. Sam Yuen breaks down when she realizes that she is unable to move on from her husband’s disappearance. Learning that she must let go, she decides to take a vacation to help her finally gain closure.
It is said that she will appear again in the finale of Armed Reaction 2021, but this totals less than 10 episodes for Joyce. Many view Joyce as an important leading character and the soul of the Armed Reaction series, so there is a lot of discontent over her lack of screen time.
Addressing the questions, producer Dave Fong (方駿釗) stated, “Joyce is a very important character in Armed Reaction. However, she also needed to film for Come Home Love: Lo and Behold <愛·回家之開心速遞>. It was hard [for her] to find time to film two dramas, but I already knew that when I reached out to her. She had also suffered a severe accident from skiing at the time.”
Joyce’s injury further complicated filming, as her action scenes had to be cut or altered. “Originally, she had fighting scenes with Him Law (羅子溢), but we changed that to a fight between Him and Moses Chan (陳豪). Other action scenes were changed or given to other actors. She also needed adequate time to rest after the accident, so her screen time is a little less than expected. We did not purposely cut her scenes, but this was the best solution given the circumstances,” the producer said.
Source: HK01
This article is written by Kiki for JayneStars.com.
It was a pretty good show. I enjoyed it even though I was very disappointed that Joyce was reduced to a side character. Chan Sam Yuen was my favorite character in the previous installments and I was very invested in her storyline. But I guess they didn’t have much confidence with Joyce headlining the series, so they decided to focus on all new characters, and her snowboarding accident further cut her scenes. But I hate the come home love excuse. Joyce is barely in the sitcom these days. Her storyline is nowhere near as prominent as it used to be. So I highly doubt it would’ve been a problem to fit Armed Reaction in her schedule if the producer truly wanted her in more scenes
K so I finished it last week because all the episodes were released to kill ratings (so dumb of tvb) so SPOILERS AHEAD.
I actually thoroughly enjoyed the series. It was funny, had a consistent storyline and a strong performance from the cast. I thought Him and Gloria did really well, I loved that friendship storyline with the other guy (honestly can’t remember his name but not tony). I also like the dynamics between Jessica and her subordinates (except bob, terrible actor tbh), I thought it was funny and sweet. Benz absolutely killed it for me and I enjoyed his scenes with Moses.
Tony was a terrible terrible terrible villain. Not convincing, overacting, lack of depth. He’s a terrible actor so no surprise but what a letdown for that storyline because it would have made it more interesting.
I grew up watching armed reaction and that’s how I learned to speak canto mostly lol so it’s one of my favourite series. I recently rewatched it all as well. The thing missing from this version was 1) JOYCE aka Chan Sam Yuen aka the main character for this entire series. I agree with the above, using the sitcom is an excuse and I’m sure if they wanted to, they would have been able to include her in more scenes even with her injury. Why bring her back if you don’t finish her storyline? Also where’s her son that she gave birth to in AR4?!?? Like no mention of him at all, only mentions ka ka who was murdered in AR3. So disappointing.
The other disappointing part is the lack of a strong, butt kicking, boss female presence because that is basically the whole point of the series. Instead we got Jessica as a insecure, cat lady who was afraid to shoot a gun. Like -_- again it’s supposed to be more funny, sitcom like but then don’t bring Joyce back because tying back to the original means some of those elements should carry over. That was really disappointing to me
@tt23 yeah so dumb! They brought back the daughter but where is the other son born in the AR4?. They could easily get a boy to play the role lol
@tt23 That’s too bad, maybe if they do a 6 they’ll fully bring back Joyce, she totally deserves and can carry being a lead in a show especially that one. Haven’t watched this yet, but not surprised TVB can’t seem to really make decent sequels anymore…