We can’t believe it, but it’s almost October! As usual, here’s a quick look at what’s happening for heat indexes to start us off…
- 🎢 In Between, our favorite messy drama about cheating, has had an interesting week, to say the least. The drama (Tian Xiwei, Xin Yunlai, and Zhou Yutong) was this close to breaking 9k on Youku’s heat index and got all the way to 8.9k… before free falling to 7.9k over the next couple days. It looks to have plateaued around 8.1k, but it’s anyone’s guess whether it goes up or down from here.
- 👮 Chen Zheyuan‘s Dark Night and Dawn, with Nie Yuan and Xing Fei, has been on less of a heat index rollercoaster. It managed to break 8k and has been hovering right around there since.
- ❓ None of the new dramas last week have exploded from a heat index perspective. You Are My Lover Friend (Zhang Xincheng, Wang Yuwen) is hanging around 23k on the Tencent heat index scale. Ao Ruipeng’s new supernatural drama, Hero is Back, has been pretty sluggish and around Youku’s 6k mark, just like xianxia Echo Of Her Voice (Kiki Xu, Wei Zheming).
- 🔚 The recently aired side has some better news. The ensemble drama, Born To Be The One, led the pack with a Douban of 7.4, a very strong showing from Yin Tao, Lawrence Wang, Zhang Ruonan, and Zhang Zhehua. It was closely followed by The First Shot (Johnny Huang, Wang Ziqi, Xie Keyin) at 7.1.
- 😐 On the other hand, slice of life Wind Direction had a Douban rating of 6.1, possibly because of a controversial ending (minor spoiler: the drama takes a turn into the tragic side). Not terrible, but not the best outcome for stars Sun Qian and Zhai Zilu.
Summer may be over, but this week still had quite a few melons 🍉 …
- 🍈 Some interesting news coming out on Chasing Jade or 逐玉. Though everyone thought that Tian Xiwei and Zhang Linghe would be confirmed during iQIYI’s conference last week, it passed without an official announcement. Still, the two remain pretty heavily rumored for it, with a new melon circulating that Zhang Linghe will be first billed.
- 🤞 Lu Yuxiao might be starring in a modern drama for the first time in a while! There’s a new melon out reuniting her and Mao De Shu (also known as Cattree), director of Lu Yuxiao’s 2022 drama See You Tomorrow. These days, Cattree is most recently known for last year’s hit, When I Fly Towards You.
- 😬 Bai Lu and Wang Xingyue’s boss, the very controversial Yu Zheng, posted a long Weibo post that has fans of both up in arms. Long story short, he said that he liked the script for 唐宫奇案 (Tang Gong Qi An, translation: The Mysterious Case of Tang Palace) to the point that he signed Wang Xingyue up without informing him… and while Bai Lu hasn’t decided whether to join yet, he believes she would make the right choice to help her good friend out.
- 🚓 Xu Kai wrapped up Fire Investigator just last week, and it looks like he’s already heading into his new role in a couple months. He’s rumored to be joining crime and suspense drama 方圆八百米 (Fang Yuan Ba Bai Mi) with Ding Yongdai.
- 👀 Is Song Zuer finally going to make it out of her tax investigation hiatus and come out on the other side?????? This would mean that her long-awaited drama with Ren Jialun, The Demon Hunter’s Romance, can finally air, and we have started seeing melons that it’ll be broadcast later in the year. But all of this depends on the government clearing Song Zuer (which hasn’t officially happened yet), so take any rumors with a grain of salt.
- 📈 We’ve also got two up and coming stars potentially in a new historical drama together: Zhou Keyu and Xu Ruohan are rumored for 一枕春华 (Yi Zhen Chun Hua). Both of their filmographies overwhelmingly lean toward the modern side, so if true, this would be a new setting for both.
On the entertainment side, we’re in the last couple weeks of fashion week and taking a look at some film festivals…
- 👗 We’re in the home stretch of fashion weeks! We had quite the roundup of stars, including Tang Yan looking golden on the L’Oreal runway. Yang Mi pulled double duty at the Loewe and Christian Louboutin shows. Dior featured Dilraba, Zhou Ye, and Deng Wei, while Gong Jun made an appearance at the Messika show in a great suit (and a very bare-chested one, we might add).
- 📽️ Ni Ni is in Europe for the San Sebastian International Film Festival! Her new film, Bound in Heaven, is the only Chinese film in the festival. She may be missing fashion week, but never fear, she still got her fashion moment in Gucci and Carolina Herrera.
- 🎞️ In other film news, Zhao Liying and Xin Zhilei’s new film, The Unseen Sister, premiered during the 37th Tokyo International Film Festival. The Unseen Sister is actually based on the same novel as Zhao Lusi’s recently filmed drama, Love’s Ambition, although it looks like they’ll be taking very different approaches.
- 📰 Liu Yifei has scored another big cover in Marie Claire China’s October 2024 issue in some crazy sculptural pieces. She’s joined by Jing Boran, who also got a separate October cover with some decidedly different vibes.
- ⌚ Checking in on sponsorships for the week… first up is Wu Lei, Huawei’s Global Spokesperson for the Sports and Health line. Wang Yibo joins him on the tech side as the new brand spokesperson for Edifier audio equipment. On the opposite side of tech, Wang Xingyue became brand spokesperson for Joyoung Soymilk with possibly the most intense ad you could ever have for soy milk.
And rounding us out with some updates on the C-Drama Airing Schedule…
- ✅ We’ve got a few confirmations on melons (love to see it)! First up is Yang Zi’s 家业 (Jia Ye, translation: Family Business), officially confirmed with a video messages from Yang Zi and her male lead, Han Dongjun. Joseph Zeng also started filming Hong Kong drama 刍狗之血 (Chu Gou Chi Xue) with Nick Cheung and Myolie Wu, while Guo Qilin and Sandra Ma are confirmed for 迷径之上 (now named The Garden of Missing Paths)
- 🔍 A new drama for Luo Yunxi is in the works, named The Truth Within. This drama looks like a suspense drama, a pretty big shift from his recently wrapped xianxia, Shui Long Yin. He’ll be joined by Jiang Qilin and Liu Yase.
- 🩺 Sounds like Zhang Linghe will be back on our screens soon, and for his first modern drama of the year! His drama with Xu Ruohan, The Best Thing, is rumored to air at the end of the year. Check out Zhang Linghe as a handsome Chinese medicine doctor in the new trailer that just dropped here.
- 🔜 Good news for anyone in a Bai Lu drought: her drama with Ou Hao, Northward was heavily rumored to air over the summer, but iQIYI’s recent conference suggests that it’ll be Q4 2024. Moonlight Mystique with Ao Ruipeng is set to follow soon after in Q1 2025.
- 🆕 Ren Jialun has started his next drama! He’ll be joined by Wang Herun in the xianxia drama, The Perfect Match (佳偶天成 or Jia Ou Tian Cheng). The director is Guo Hu, who last directed Ren Jialun in One and Only.
