#kunsposts

first of all, we got a new concept poster for three-body: the dark forest.

and then, besides yu hewei being shi qiang which we already know, they announced zhang beihai's actor which is going to be duan yihong. i know duan yihong has been one of the netizens' most nominated candidate for zhang beihai, and i think it's a good choice. he's a good and skillful actor, so no complaint from me.

luo ji's actor was not announced, and it looks like that it's a really tough job picking an actor for him lol. honestly i don't think any of the netizens' most nominated candidate works, and i can't think of anyone myself actually. this is why i think they might be better off picking a lesser known but very fitting young actor.

they kept the same producer bai yicong, and the same scriptwriter tian liangliang, but they did not announce the director. i made a post last year about a rumor saying that the producer had some disagreement with director yang lei and they had a falling out, so the production team might switch to a new director for the dark forest. i think the rumor might be true because there's no point in not announcing yang lei as the director if he's indeed the director.

ever since some point in 2025, i stopped seeing yang lei talking about the dark forest. he kept mentioning season 1 and the spinoff show in interviews, but nothing about the dark forest. honestly, things are not looking good if they really changes the director.

now on to the spinoff show. nothing much is updated, but the show's official weibo account made its first post on june 24 to announce director yang lei, and our cast yu hewei and zhang luyi. there's nothing new, but i mean, if the spinoff show can announce yang lei without any issues, why couldn't the dark forest also announce yang lei???

the last time i heard about the shooting schedule for the spinoff show is the 4th quarter this year. and let's hope that there's no further delays. we need our dashi and miaomiao back so badly.

i do know that the spinoff show has been on yang lei's mind all the time no matter what. in a recent podcast for his other show swords into plowshares, the host mentioned that fans of that show were eager to share head canons and create shipping related fan works. and yang lei answered that he's seen that before in the red (another show he worked with zhang luyi) and three body LOL. so i don't think we need to worry about shiwang not being shiwang enough in the spinoff show. yang lei is fully aware of how much we ship them.

and he's their biggest fan. he mentioned that he's been talking to swords into plowshares' scriptwriter about the three body spinoff show, and turned him into a fan LOL.

In celebration of the Children's Day on June 1st in China, Three-Body community's weibo account posted this art of main Three-Body characters being 7-year old in school.

Look how adorable they are! Ye Wenjie is about to receive her first message from listener 1379 via that paper plane. Luo Ji is drawing the solar system and holding a book that says "宇宙社会学/Cosmic Sociology". Zhang Beihai is the one who's eager to speak up (not sure if he's asking a question or answering one). I think those are Wade and Yun Tianming on the blackboard in the back of the classroom.

this is the shiwang part from wang miao's year-in-review.

and shi qiang's year-in-review is really flooded with shiwang agenda:

last but not least, I FREAKING CAN'T BELIEVE THEY PUT THIS IN THE VIDEO. THIS IS NOTHING BUT PURE ROMANCE. THIS IS ROMANCE AT ITS BEST:

they really down right put miaomiao's crying face in there, and tell us that is a unique and beautiful sight that shi qiang wants to look at for the entire night. I CAN'T...this is the kind of shit that you put in a love letter!!! I REALLY CAN'T!!!

i know what you are thinking about. being on the 2026 list doesn't necessarily mean that the show will air in 2026. but it's really good to be on the list (just look at all the weibo bragging posts for the shows that got on the list lol) because it means the show will likely air on the biggest 2 tv channels cctv 1 or 8 (eg. for your reference, all of yu hewei and zhang luyi's 2025 shows got on the list last year). since CMG doesn't often pick 12-episode mini series as a major drama, i'm just extra proud of our show. considering the premise and the cast and crew for this drama, it just guarantees quality.

this announcement with the cast on the poster is meaningful because a while ago, there was a rumor going around saying that yu hewei might not play shi qiang in the spinoff show anymore. i never believed it, but some fans were still anxious. whoever started the rumor probably didn't know that yu hewei actively came to the producer for the role of shi qiang in season 1 even before the team picked the director. this man loves three-body and shi qiang, and nobody can take the role from him. AND everyone and their pet hamsters know that there's no point in making this spinoff show if you don't have yu hewei and zhang luyi playing shi qiang and wang miao. their chemistry is literally THE selling point.

since season 2 of three-body is not on the list, i feel maybe CMG knows more about their filming plan than we do, so i really hope being on the list means the shooting will start soon this year. maybe after yu hewei finishes the super long tv show that he's filming, and zhang luyi finishes the new movie that he just started working on, they might finally have time to do the spinoff show🤞.

lastly, three-body's official weibo also posted about the spinoff show being on CMG's major drama list (told you it was worth bragging), and i kinda like the description they posted, and i want to end the post with it: "building faith with friendship, fighting the unknown with bravery, shi qiang and wang miao the golden partners back in action again, together they resolve the major crisis humankind face."

it seems that the fallout between producer bai yicong and director yang lei was caused by the disagreement in the use of ai in the dark forest. another rumor says that the team already had a luo ji actor, but after yang lei and his team decided to leave the project, that actor also decided to leave, which was a bad sign because it means that he didn't think the replacement could be good enough.

a third melon is that they actually settled on the director and luo ji actor, but they are waiting for an event in october to announce it.

most hardcore three body fans are very worried. it's not looking good without yang lei. historically speaking, it's already hard for the 2nd season of a cdrama to surpass the first season, and it almost guarantees a fail when the later season of a show changes main production team/cast.

i also feel that there's almost no chance of yang lei returning to the dark forest anymore because after magnolia awards, three body spinoff show's official weibo made a post about the achievement that the spinoff's production team made on magnolia awards. honestly, they are just bragging to bai yicong about how good yang lei's team is. the spinoff show has better director, visual director, and cinematographers which the dark forest probably won't have.

i honestly don't know how we got to here. this is such an important project, everyone should have just tried to be adults and work together to make a good show instead of pushing good fit away like that. we all hope that the dark forest can compete with netflix's 2nd season, but i don't know anymore...

so in mid march, sichuan film production companies went to an event in hong kong, and they showed some of their future projects. one project is a movie about the famous poet from song dynastic, su shi (su dongpo).

in the presentation, they basically photoshopped their dream cast for the film lol. we have zhang luyi playing an emperor again lol (emperor shenzong of song to be exact), and yu hewei playing sima guang, a high ranking official. historically they had a complex relationship. the emperor really appreciated the talent of sima guang, but they had different political ideologies and often disagreed with each other.

i mean, these are just intended casting, so we don't know if they will accept the roles at all. but this dream cast is totally A+, and i can see the ambition the production company has, like what it says in the bottom left of the presentation "top-tier production. timeless classic. international impact".

us three-body and shiwang fans have always been wondering what's the next non three-body project that zly and yhw will work on together, and we are already seeing production companies wanting to cast them in the same project.