General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20265 min read

Young and Dangerous: The Prequel (新古惑仔之少年激斗篇)

Young and Dangerous: The Prequel (新古惑仔之少年激鬥篇) is a 1998 Hong Kong action film directed by Andrew Lau Wai-keung that recounts the teenage years of Chan Ho-nam and his friends before they became the triad figures of the Young and Dangerous series.¹^•² It premiered in Hong Kong on 5 June 1998, less than half a year after the fifth mainline entry, 98 Gu Huo Zhi: Long Zheng Hu Dou, and served as the film debut of Nicholas Tse Ting-fung.¹^•²

Key fact	Detail
Original title	新古惑仔之少年激鬥篇 (English: Young and Dangerous: The Prequel)¹
Hong Kong premiere	5 June 1998¹
Director and script	Andrew Lau Wai-keung; script by Manfred Wong (with Cow Man and Chau Ting credited on some listings)¹^•³
Lead cast	Nicholas Tse (Chan Ho-nam), Sam Lee (Chicken), Shu Qi (Fei), Francis Ng (Kwan), Daniel Wu (Big Head)¹
Setting	Hong Kong, 1989; 17-year-old Chan Ho-nam and his childhood friends drift into the Hung Hing triad under Uncle Bee⁴
Rating and runtime	Hong Kong Category III; runtime reported as 1h 55m, 115 minutes, and 117 minutes by different databases¹^•⁵^•⁶
Hong Kong box office	HK$2,353,800, placing around 100th for the year⁷

Spoilers

Plot

The story is set in 1989. Chan Ho-nam, Chicken, Pou-pan, and Chau-pan are childhood friends living in a new housing development, spending their days on music and first loves.⁴ When classmates harass Kelly, a girl Ho-nam likes, he intervenes, and a running feud with the gangsters follows; the friends are arrested after a brawl, and the Hung Hing society bails them out.⁴ Feeling out of place at school and abandoned by family, Ho-nam chooses the triad path, and the group fights rival Tung Sing gang members to make a name for themselves, only to be betrayed by Kwan and left in danger.⁹

Place in the series

The Young and Dangerous films, directed by Andrew Lau and based on Cow Man's comic Rascals (also known as Teddy Boy), were commercial hits between 1996 and 2000, with the mainline series running to six installments alongside spin-offs.⁸ The prequel arrived as a derivative work within that run: after the fifth mainline film opened in early 1998, this spin-off followed within the same year.²

Because the main films had already shown the adult characters, the prequel recast the roles with younger actors. Nicholas Tse played the teenage Chan Ho-nam, Sam Lee played the young Chicken (Chiu Shan-choi), Benjamin Yuen Wai-ho played the young Chau-pan, and Yu Ka-ho played the young Pou-pan; the fifth member of the comic's gang, Dai Tin-yi, does not appear in his youth.²^•³ Francis Ng, who had played the villain Kwan in the 1996 original, returned as Kwan, and Frankie Ng Chi-hung played Brother Bee (Uncle Bee), the Hung Hing figure the boys follow.¹^•⁶

Production and cast notes

A debut under age restrictions. The film was Nicholas Tse's first movie. He finished shooting while still under 18, so he was not old enough to buy a ticket and watch his own Category III film in a cinema, and his first on-screen kiss went to Shu Qi.² The production companies were BoB & Partners Co., Ltd. and Fitto Movie Co., Ltd., with Gala Film Distribution handling release; Manfred Wong and Wong Jing are credited as producers.¹^•¹⁰ Tse also performed songs on the soundtrack, including "Open Day" and "Living Volcano".¹

Reception

The film earned HK$2,353,800 in Hong Kong, a modest figure that placed it around 100th for the year, far below the mainline entries.⁷ Reviewers and viewers have generally described it as darker than the films it precedes: Rotten Tomatoes' audience summary notes that with most of the comic-book feel gone, the prequel "tells a much darker tale than its predecessors, focusing on the hard knocks rather than the bling and glamour of triad life".¹¹ On IMDb it holds a 7.1 rating, and JustWatch lists an IMDb score of 6.1.¹²^•⁶

The film also sits awkwardly with one later series entry: a reviewer for hkfilm.net notes that Those Were the Days, a later spin-off, has Ho-nam joining the triad first, whereas the prequel had Chicken being the first of the group to join.¹³

Overseas release

In Japan the film opened on 23 September 2000 through Gaga Communications under the title Garasu no Generation / Hong Kong Shonen Gekitōdan (硝子のジェネレーション／香港少年激闘団), presented as a side story to Lau's Young and Dangerous series depicting the protagonists' youth.⁵^•⁴ A Blu-ray edition was released in Hong Kong on 4 June 2022.¹

Context

The Young and Dangerous series was controversial for glamorizing triads with a youthful, "hip" image, appearing at the same time as a triad push to recruit members from public schools in late-1980s and 1990s Hong Kong.¹⁴ Within that franchise, the prequel's turn toward grit rather than glamour is the trait most often singled out in retrospective commentary.¹¹

References

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026