Guardian (web series)

Guardian
Also known asZhèn Hún
GenreScience fiction, Mystery
Based onGuardian by Priest
Written byQi Xiaoyu
Ye Fangzhou
Hua Liang
StarringBai Yu
Zhu Yilong
Opening theme"We Won't be Falling" by Chen Xueran
Ending theme"Just Cared Too Much" by Ning Huanyu
Country of originChina
Original languageMandarin
No. of episodes40
Production
ProducerZhou Yuanzhou
Production locationShanghai
Running time45 minutes
Production companiesShi Yue Film and Television, Zhe Jiang Sheng Xi Hua Shi, Tai Yang Chuan He Culture and Media, Huan Mi Culture and Communication
Original release
NetworkYouku
Release13 June (2018-06-13) –
25 July 2018 (2018-07-25)
Infobox instructions (only shown in preview)

Guardian (Chinese: 镇魂; pinyin: Zhèn Hún) is a 2018 Chinese web series starring Bai Yu and Zhu Yilong. An adaptation of the 2012 fantasy-danmei web novel of the same name by Priest, the series was released on the video platform Youku between June 13 and July 25, 2018.[1][2] The series follows Zhao Yunlan (Bai) and Shen Wei (Zhu), a detective and a professor who investigate supernatural phenomena. Though the novel depicts their relationship as romantic in nature, the web series depicts the relationship as a platonic friendship with homoerotic subtext in response to Chinese laws prohibiting depictions of same-sex relationships on television.[3]

The series was widely popular on the web, and received a total of 1.8 billion views by August 2018.[3] That same month, Guardian was pulled from Youku amid a crackdown on "harmful and vulgar" internet content,[4] but was later re-uploaded.[5]

  1. ^ "《镇魂》6月13日上线 白宇朱一龙热血集结捍卫初心" (in Simplified Chinese). People's Daily. June 13, 2018. Retrieved 2018-06-13.
  2. ^ "《镇魂》收官白宇发文感谢粉丝:这个夏天属于你们". Sina (in Chinese). July 25, 2018.
  3. ^ a b Zhang, Phoebe (4 August 2018). "Gay-themed drama is latest victim of China's drive to purge 'harmful and obscene' content from web". South China Morning Post. Retrieved 24 June 2019.
  4. ^ "<镇魂下架>报道". Qdaily (in Chinese). Archived from the original on 2019-10-23. Retrieved 2018-08-03.
  5. ^ Cite error: The named reference Upload was invoked but never defined (see the help page).