Bilibili’s Adaptation of ‘The Three-Body Problem’ Gets Mixed Reviews

On December 10, the first two episodes of the long-awaited animated adaption of celebrated sci-fi author Liu Cixin’s novel The Three-Body Problem finally dropped on Bilibili, one of China’s top streaming platforms, after five years of work.


The series, which will span a total of 15 entries, saw its third episode debut online on December 17.


Produced by the Chinese animation studio YHKT Entertainment, the series’ first three episodes have been watched by millions of sci-fi lovers and — so far — the reception is mixed.

Originally scheduled to be released on December 3, Bilibili’s The Three-Body Problem series was postponed a week without explanation. Understandably, fans excitedly tuned in as soon as the first two episodes were out, contributing more than 100 million views on the first day alone.


At the time of writing, the show’s first three episodes have been viewed more than 180 million times, with 716,000 bullet comments.


Before the debut, Bilibili released two videos to tease fans: one text-on-screen video with Liu’s narration and another featuring popular Hong Kong singer-songwriter G.E.M.’s voice in the theme song Wallfacers (music video below).

The animated series follows the storyline of The Dark Forest, the second book in the Remembrance of Earth’s Past trilogy. (The Three-Body Problem is the first novel in the series, and its title is popularly used to refer to the trilogy.)


While some viewers claim the series doesn’t live up to the book, many fans still applauded the animation for adhering to the original story and its fast-paced narration. Extra details and explanations are added so first-time viewers can follow the plot.


The show’s rating on Douban, an IMDb-like platform in China, currently stands at 6.5/10, with many users expressing disappointment about its computer-generated imagery (CGI).


One user on Douban wrote: “It looks like something from 20 years ago. Online games distributed by a mid-sized publisher can produce better visual effects than this.”


the three body problem bilibili


With only three out of 15 episodes now out, Bilibili presumably remains optimistic about winning over the naysayers, considering the platform sees the series as a milestone piece in China’s thriving and ever-expanding animation industry. According to a press release that Bilibili shared with RADII, the total output value of China’s animation industry in 2022 exceeded 221.2 billion RMB (about 31.8 billion USD).

Unexpectedly, the launch of Bilibili’s new animated series has brought a nearly decade-old fanmade adaptation of Liu’s work back into the spotlight: The Three-Body Problem in Minecraft. The animated series ran for three seasons, and its visual design and presentation were inspired by the sandbox game Minecraft. Each season has 11 episodes clocking in at 20 minutes each.


Despite the fact the first season was primarily made by one person and had extremely low production quality, it attracted the attention of sci-fi fans. Across all three seasons of The Three-Body Problem in Minecraft, viewers applauded the series for its fast pacing and faithful adaption of the source material. Fans also praised the series’ later episodes for their strong production quality, and all three seasons hold impressive scores of 9.4 or higher on Douban.


The first two seasons are available on YouTube with English subtitles.

And luckily for fans who are unsatisfied with Bilibili’s adaptation or the Minecraft-inspired series, streaming giants Netflix and Tencent are currently producing their own series based on Liu Cixin’s award-winning novels.


All images via Bilibili

As Zero-Covid Measures Relax, Chinese People Are Eager to Travel

The hypothetical ‘Great Wall’ between China and the rest of the world may soon come tumbling down. On Wednesday, December 7, China Central Television (CCTV) dropped a bombshell of an announcement: The Chinese government had confirmed 10 new measures pertaining to the Covid-19 pandemic.


For anyone who has been living under the shadow of the country’s strict zero-Covid policy, reading the said list is enough to make one emotional.


From scrapping the need to present QR codes in public spaces to allowing home quarantine instead of being corralled into makeshift hospitals, the new guidelines feel like Christmas come early — especially for those in China with cabin fever.


As a matter of fact, a Chinese multinational online travel company has seen an unprecedented amount of traffic on its website since the official news broke.

According to an inside source at Trip.com Group, on the very day that the ‘10 New Measures’ bulletin broke, searches for domestic routes on the company’s platforms increased by 74% compared to the previous week. In fact, the travel company detected even more traffic on that day than during the same period in 2019, before Covid-19 was even ‘a thing.’


Interestingly, since November 30 and even before CCTV’s broadcast, Trip.com Group observed a sustained interest in international routes. However, it wasn’t until the news dropped that searches in this category reached their peak in the past month (between November 13 to December 12).


Trip.com Group, zero-Covid, china travel

Rail travelers wait at a large railway station in the East China city of Hangzhou to board a train to take them home for the Chinese New Year holiday in 2019. The travel rush that precedes and follows the celebrations is often called the “most crowded travel season in the world”


Additionally, Chinese netizens have been doing their homework on internal flights scheduled for the upcoming Spring Festival (or Chinese New Year) holiday from January 21-27, 2023 — searches during the week of the announcement increased by a whopping 172% compared to the prior week.


Meanwhile, inquiries about inbound and outbound international flights respectively rose by 113% and 95%, and bookings increased by 60% and 83%. We’re on the same page… Take our money, and let’s hit the road!


Images via Depositphotos

13 of China’s Best Stand-up Comedians are Heading to North America

On December 10, Canada-based agency Lima Media announced they would collaborate with Li Dan and his Xiaoguo Culture Company to host a stand-up comedy tour in North America from January to February next year.


Xiaoguo Company released more details about the tour on December 14, revealing that the group will be divided into smaller teams and visit 13 cities in Canada and the United States: Toronto (January 19 and 21), Montreal (January 20), Calgary (January 24), Vancouver (January 25), Seattle (January 27), San Francisco (January 28), San Jose (January 29), Houston (February 2), Los Angeles (February 3), Washington D.C. (February 5), Boston (February 8), New York (February 10), and Chicago (TBD).


Presale tickets were released on December 13, and regular tickets will be available from December 17.


The agency also revealed the 13 Chinese comedians who will join the tour (shown on the poster below), including Li Dan himself and controversial comic Yang Li.


Chinese comedy li dan

Image via Lima Media


Li Dan is a stand-up comedian, the co-founder of Xiaoguo Culture Company, and curator and host of the stand-up comedy competition show Rock & Roast. Many credit him for making stand-up comedy mainstream in China.

Another famous Chinese stand-up comedian, Chizi, will also tour North America early next year alongside Chinese American biochemist and comedian Joe Wong. Chizi used to work with Xiaoguo but went solo in 2019.

Organized by Infinite Entertainment, Chizi’s tour will visit Vancouver, Toronto, New York, San Jose, and Los Angeles in February 2023. YouTuber UnicornShow will also appear on the tour as a special guest.


Cover image via VCG

High Schooler Designs Stunning Digital Dresses for Chinese Pop Idol

How did you hone your skills to prepare yourself for your current line of work? A 17-year-old student in China has jump-started her career as a fashion designer in the metaverse.


Alice Miao (苗聖愛) first started posting her creations on the Chinese lifestyle platform Xiaohongshu when she was in the 11th grade. She has long been interested in the crossover between cyberpunk and Y2K style.


A believer in the metaverse’s great potential, Miao decided to dip her toes in the immersive virtual world via one of her long-standing passions: fashion design.


Y2K, drawing

Some of Alice Miao’s sketches incorporating the Y2K style. Image via Xiaohongshu


After teaching herself how to use software like Style3d and Nomad over a winter break, Miao started to design clothes. Much of her inspiration comes from her favorite movies and animes, such as Ready Player One and Neon Genesis Evangelion.


NFT, fashion design

Miao modeling one of her designs. Image via Xiaohongshu


Miao then started a new account on Xiaohongshu, specifically to showcase her digital fashion creations, and soon gained a following.


She has started to sell some of her digital works, which are reasonably priced: 55 RMB (about 8 USD) for one photo and 89 RMB (around 13 USD) for two. She superimposes her designs onto the provided portraits of her clients, mostly international students and fashion influencers.


She told The Paper, a Chinese digital newspaper, that she has made 8,000 RMB (around 1,150 USD) since March 2021 — a small fortune for a high school student.


She has since partnered up with Xiaohongshu’s NFT platform R-Space and released three collections consisting of 170 NFTs altogether. The digital fashion designs combine Chinese aesthetics with the West’s resurgent Y2K style. One of the collections, which encompasses 50 NFTs, has sold out.


Her work also appears on Wearwant, a global digital fashion retail company based in the U.K.


NFT, digital fashion, Xiaohongshu

Three NFT collections Miao has put out in collaboration with R-Space. Image via Xiaohongshu


Little did the young digital fashion designer realize that her work would catch the eye of celebrities. Xu Yangyuzhuo (许杨玉琢), a member of the Chinese idol girl group SNH48 (which was formerly attached to Japan’s AKB 48), came across Miao’s work and commissioned two pieces without realizing that the artist was a high school student.


The idol posted three photos of herself in the commissioned dresses on Xiaohongshu and expressed her amazement at how well the designs turned out. She was also shocked to learn that the artist is only 17 years old.


“This is so amazing. I’m truly shocked. What was I doing at that age?” said Xu.


SNH48, AKB 48, gril group, idol

Chinese idol Xu Yangyuzhuo wearing Miao’s designs. Images via Xiaohongshu


Miao is over the moon to be receiving recognition, especially from public figures like Xu, whom she looks up to.


However, she doesn’t feel that her life has significantly changed since her digital designs blew up. She deems herself a typical high school student, who worries about exams and college applications.


Miao is now taking some time away from fashion design to focus on getting into China’s top art schools.


Cover image via Xiaohongshu

China Closes in on AI Artwork, Requires Watermarks in 2023

Pranksters who love duping their friends or members of the public with AI-generated videos or deepfake images had better do so before the turn of the year.


From January 10 next year, all unverified AI-generated media will be banned from the Chinese internet.


According to a new regulation published by the Cyberspace Administration of China, anything created using ​​“deep synthesis” technology will be heavily scrutinized by the government.


All platforms providing such services will need to be registered with government agencies. Additionally, all users must verify their identities using their Chinese mobile phone numbers and national ID numbers.


AI art will also go through censorship and must have clear labels, such as watermarks.


The administration claims that authorities will put the upcoming ban in place to crack down on distributing illegal and harmful information, including AI-enabled internet scams and identity theft.


AI generator, Artbot, censorship

An example of AI art created by ERNIE-ViLG using the keywords ‘RADII,’ ‘Gen Z,’ and ‘China’


AI has been a hot topic in China this year, especially with AI art trending on Chinese social media platforms (some with disastrous effects). Baidu, a Chinese tech giant and the top search engine in the country, even developed its own AI artwork generator called ERNIE-ViLG.


AI artwork’s boom in popularity has also been raising concerns about the technology’s disruption on creative industries.


Most recently, ChatGPT, a chatbot developed by OpenAI, has stirred discussions on Chinese social media sites even though the platform is inaccessible to most users in the Chinese mainland without a proxy server.


Cover image via Depositphotos

Women-only Gyms are Exploding in Popularity in China

The 2021 TikTok trend #WomensOnlyGym is making a comeback, but this time in China: On December 8, a women-only gym opened in the country’s central Henan province and quickly became a trending topic on the Chinese microblogging platform Weibo. At the time of writing, a related hashtag had generated 150 million views.


@clubenhergy FREE CLASSES this weekend to celebrate our 1 YEAR! 🥳⚡️ #torontogym #womenownedbusiness #womensonlygym ♬ ALIEN SUPERSTAR – Beyoncé

“Gyms exclusively for women give ladies more freedom, and they can wear whatever they want. My intention was to encourage more girls to know and fall in love with fitness and meet more like-minded friends,” one of the two female founders told a Chinese media outlet.


female only gym

Image via the gym’s Xiaohongshu page


It is not the first female-only fitness club in China, however. Thousands of posts pop up when searching ‘women’s gym’ on China’s Instagram-like platform Xiaohongshu.


Such facilities have mushroomed across the country in recent years, including in metropolises like Beijing and Shanghai and lesser-known cities (in the West, anyway) such as Qingdao, Tianjin, Wenzhou, Shantou, Shenzhou, and Shenyang.


Many feature social media-worthy interior design, skincare and makeup products, and workout classes more friendly to women.


female only gym

Inside one such gym called YTWD. Image via Xiaohongshu


These ‘female gyms’ emerge as more women in China embrace workouts and fitness culture. Many female celebrities and influencers have also actively shared their workout routines on social media, encouraging even more women to get active.


According to a 2022 report from the Chinese fitness chain LeFit, 54% of their members identify as women, and they are overall more active than men. Moreover, female members are twice as likely to pay extra and hire personal trainers.


While women are becoming more visible in gyms that used to be dominated by men, there is also increasing concern over sexual harassment and ‘gymtimidation’ by zealous ‘fitness fanatics.’


“I think it’s a brilliant idea! I’ve encountered many men who always occupy the equipment in the gym, and sometimes they’re not even training, but just chatting or taking selfies of their muscles,” shared a female sports influencer.


However, some have also questioned whether these gyms are gender-inclusive for members of the queer and transgender communities. Policies almost certainly vary from gym to gym and in different regions. Still, RADII can report that one women-only fitness center we reached out to in the city of Fuzhou in southeastern China does welcome transgender women as patrons.


An additional beef highlighted by some netizens is that while many clubs label themselves as female-only, they only employ male fitness trainers. Nevertheless, women’s fitness clubs are still expanding across the country.


Cover image via Depositphotos