Three new titles are blazing the trail to start the year — iQIYI Animation is the one to watch this Spring Festival season!

Author / Huiye

Edited by < Reliable Editorial Desk >

Spring Festival is just around the corner, and the entertainment world is buzzing with excitement! Movies, TV dramas, and variety shows are all going all out to bring everyone good fortune for the new year. This year, Chinese animation has entered the fray in a high-profile way, delivering surprise after surprise right out of the gate and becoming an eye-catching force that cannot be ignored in the Spring Festival season.

iQIYI's animation lineup is fully "armed to the teeth": three new titles—The Great Ruler Season 2, How Dare You? Season 2, and Ze Tian Ji—have launched one after another with impressive results, and together with hit series like Nine Yang Martial God, Love Between Fairy and Devil Season 2, and Peerless Pill God, they have completely filled the watchlist of Chinese animation fans for the entire Spring Festival.

Just press the remote, turn on the screen, and the "Manchu-Han Imperial Feast"-level animation banquet prepared by iQIYI Animation is guaranteed to satisfy! This Spring Festival, if you love anime, you're in luck!

Right after New Year's Day, iQIYI Animation's Spring Festival slate began rolling out. On January 9, The Great Ruler Season 2 returned at max level. As a classic IP from Tian Can Tu Dou's universe, its premiere delivered the first全网 hotspot for Chinese animation in 2026 (the first full-web buzz moment for Chinese animation in 2026). The playful and lively Xiao Xiao made her entrance, calling Xiao Yan "daddy" and Cai Lin "mommy," then adding "Xun'er mommy"—directly pushing The Great Ruler Season 2's on-platform heat index past 5,000 and sparking flood-level discussions across Weibo, Douyin, Bilibili, and other platforms. With its faithful recreation of the original characters and emotions, The Great Ruler Season 2 quickly captured the hearts of core viewers and successfully joined the mainstream ranks of platform-level annual series competition.

Many netizens spontaneously created fan works, hailing Xiao Xiao as "the strongest star kid" and teasing Xiao Yan as a certified "daughter's slave" in The Great Ruler. Some creators even watched the show together with their 60-year-old fathers, and had the "Flame Emperor" Xiao Yan turn "commentator," breaking down The Great Ruler Season 2's iconic return scenes. Reportedly, Lin Dong, the Martial Ancestor and another major male lead of the Tu Dou universe, will also appear in episode 59 of The Great Ruler Season 2, joining this "max-level reunion." Fans across the web are already gearing up, waiting for every Friday to open iQIYI and dive into immersive binge-watching mode.

Speaking of fan creations sparking a site-wide binge-watching wave, How Dare You? certainly has plenty to say. Whether it's "How are you?", "SOS," or hotpot dipping, everything takes you back to that summer of 2024 when the first season premiered. Now How Dare You? Season 2 has made a surprise return—before its premiere, on-platform reservations exceeded 1.5 million, and within just 5 hours of its debut it broke iQIYI's original animation surge record, with a heat index as high as 5,264, sweeping TOP1 on the platform's overall chart, animation chart, and multiple other rankings, while also storming the trending lists of Weibo, Douyin, Kuaishou, Xiaohongshu, and more, with tremendous momentum.

To express their love and support for the "Yu-Dan CP," every episode's bullet comments are filled with fans' passionate confessions. Messages like "Yu-Dan 99," "Sister Yu, Boss Dan, your soldier has arrived," and "Ahhh so sweet!" paired with pink heart-effect bullet comments push the sweetness to the max. Social platforms are full of enthusiastic unpaid recommendations—high-sweetness iconic moments like "She is my driftwood" and "I am Zhang San, your wife Wan Yin" have been widely circulated after fan edits, with people recommending: "The world is in chaos, but Yu-Dan's heart never changes" and "Greatness needs no words." Some netizens even made "Boss Dan's life" mashup videos set to Zhou Shen's songs, showing just how beloved this show is. With this level of buzz, not watching it would truly be "how dare you" indeed.

After watching a hot-blooded youth's growth story and a transmigration-into-a-book romance, it's time to try a new flavor. Ze Tian Ji, which premiered on January 31, offers viewers a kind of "emotionally stable" satisfaction. Upon its premiere it topped iQIYI's fantasy Chinese animation heat chart at TOP1. With a single line—"Only by following your heart can you defy fate"—Chen Changsheng brought book fans carrying 12 years of nostalgia back to their youth. The young boys and girls who once followed the novel's serial updates can now open iQIYI and see all their imaginings of the book's story finally come to life as dazzling visuals.

The two-way connection between the work and its audience is vividly embodied in Ze Tian Ji. Netizens have been reminiscing on social platforms about their history with this IP: "2016 to 2026, ten years together" and "I love Ze Tian Ji, because I too am living by following my heart." After watching the animation, fans have been generous with praise, saying the production team "truly understands Mao Ni" and "truly understands nostalgia." As the "white moonlight" of a novel with over 10 billion clicks, the reboot of Ze Tian Ji as a 3D animation has also won countless accolades: "Congrats on winning the resurrection match, the 3D remake is amazing" and "Finally here—catching the 3D era is a blessing." Riding on this word-of-mouth, Ze Tian Ji scored 12 hot searches across the web during its premiere week, with short-video topic views exceeding 1.5 billion, comment sections bustling non-stop as the buzz kept fermenting.

Every good Chinese animation has its own strengths, but for seasoned anime viewers facing the question of "which one to watch," the answer is inevitably "I want them all." All three flagship Chinese animations are iQIYI Animation originals, and their staggered premieres have kept fans happily busy—liking, commenting, and playing with memes everywhere, with messages like "Support them all!" and "Hurry up and add more episodes!" carrying the lively vibe of Spring Festival house calls, making this Chinese animation Spring Festival season all the more festive.

The current development of the Chinese animation market still relies heavily on word-of-mouth fermentation and spread. The reason these three iQIYI Animation titles have won so many fans lies in the production teams' meticulous craft and full sincerity—it is precisely this reverence for content that has earned the audience's enthusiastic response.

The Great Ruler Season 2 builds on its predecessor's strengths with a dual upgrade in both production and storytelling. From character modeling and fabric textures to action details and micro-expressions, the new season feels even more realistic. In terms of special effects, The Great Ruler Season 2 breaks away from the traditional line-and-light combat style of xuanhuan animation, using richer and more varied pattern designs to recreate classic skills from the original work such as the Luoshen Sword Art and spirit arrays, creating an immersive viewing experience.

Beyond visuals on par with top annual series, The Great Ruler Season 2 has precisely grasped what viewers love to watch. The protagonist's revenge never drags, his appearances never stall the plot, the pacing is brisk and clean, with dense yet natural payoff moments. The powerhouse pairing of Mu Chen and Luo Li sweetens things up constantly—their pure-love interactions strike the perfect sweetness level, making viewers screech "sharp explosions" in the bullet comments, crying that they're "shipping it like crazy." The youth's hot-blooded growth is interwoven with the flutter of young romance, delivering both hype and tears, so fans of every age group can find resonance in it.

iQIYI Animation has not only maintained the quality of its annual series—the standard of its seasonal sequels is just as high. How Dare You? Season 2 carries on the brilliance of the first season: the "Yu-Dan couple" takes the stage in style, step by step escaping Beishan and locking horns with Prince Duan. The nested transmigration plot takes a brand-new turn—after the Empress Dowager's passing, the classic imperial intrigue storyline grows ever more thrilling. At the same time, the "Yu-Dan CP" daily interactions are full of highlights; the intimate scenes no longer just brush the surface, with both sweetness and tension upgraded.

As one of the rare animations using 3D-rendered-into-2D technology on the market, How Dare You? Season 2 has a distinctive visual style combining the strengths of both 2D and 3D. Scene art leverages Unreal Engine technology to optimize lighting, rich in detail without feeling cluttered. Character design blends 3D performance with 2D linework to create especially expressive facial acting, ensuring the tyrant and the demon consort are never mere descriptions but vivid, three-dimensional drama kings and queens.

Reportedly, How Dare You? Season 2 will reach its finale this season, with Wan Yin's big-heroine aura beginning to emerge. Where will Yu-Dan end up amid the mix of sweetness and heartbreak? What awaits supporting characters like Prince Duan, Xie Yong'er, Aunt Bei, and A'Bai? All the answers viewers crave are about to be revealed. As one of the rare female-oriented Chinese animation works on the market, How Dare You? Season 2's strong start and continued rise is refreshing multiple records for shoujo-oriented Chinese animation.

Beyond sequels with accumulated buzz, Ze Tian Ji—the first all-new IP animation iQIYI launched this year—equally showcases the platform's production quality and dedication. The moment protagonist Chen Changsheng appears, he shatters the usual stereotype of xuanhuan protagonists: unlike the "conquer the world with brute force" formula of most fantasy animations on the market, Chen Changsheng breaks through with wisdom, resolving crises with his knowledge and clear-minded outlook, brimming with personal charm. His life philosophy of "following your heart, defying fate" reflects a portrait of our times—young people's self-awakening, staying true to themselves, and pursuing personal growth. No matter the predicament, he always relies on his own knowledge to find solutions, and this clear-headed approach to life perfectly aligns with the internet's current core topic of "personal growth," making it easy for viewers to resonate with.

From a green-robed young Taoist entering the Divine Capital, to growing into the youthful dean of the National Academy, Ze Tian Ji naturally weaves Confucian-Daoist traditional Chinese cultural concepts into its plot progression. Knowledge and philosophy are often abstract and hard to grasp; integrating them into animation especially tests a production team's imagination and creativity. In episode two, the scene where Chen Changsheng enters the sea of stars to light up his fate star can be called a new iconic moment in the realm of Chinese-aesthetic animation. Using elegant guofeng aesthetic elements like ink-wash gradients and gold-and-blue landscape painting, combined with experimental music design, the production team sketched out a richly layered audiovisual spectacle.

Three hit animations launching one after another, each a masterpiece—iQIYI Animation is really going big to start the year.

Whether you're a fantasy fan who loves hot-blooded growth stories or a female viewer drawn to unconventional narratives, iQIYI Animation's Spring Festival programming strategy covers virtually every core audience segment of the Chinese animation market. The popular Chinese animation genres currently on the market are all assembled on iQIYI; this content matrix of diverse genres both meets different users' individual tastes and offers viewers accustomed to a single genre a seamless way to try something new.

Beyond the three flagship titles premiering in succession—The Great Ruler Season 2, How Dare You? Season 2, and Ze Tian Ji—iQIYI Animation has multiple fresh, hot series airing simultaneously, enough to fill viewers' entire Spring Festival holiday with binge-watching and completely banish any content drought. Nine Yang Martial God updates steadily every week, as protagonist Ye Yunfei is reborn with cheat-level powers and descends the mountain like a returning king, letting you enjoy the invincible satisfaction of a new-generation "face-slapping Heavenly Emperor." For a taste of "calling in the troops" lighthearted comedy, check out Love Between Fairy and Devil Season 2, where Little Orchid and the Devil Lord Dongfang Qingcang set off once more to unveil the mysteries of the three realms' reincarnation. And if you prefer a double track of pill refining and monster slaying, don't miss the classic fantasy Peerless Pill God, which just wrapped up this week—herb gathering and pill refining alongside thrilling monster battles, plus delicate emotional entanglements, satisfying every kind of viewer's watching preferences.

At the start of 2026, iQIYI Animation has kept up the momentum with move after move, showcasing a fresh new-year energy. Launching three hit titles at once while keeping multiple works on air reflects both the foresight of the platform's past strategic planning and years of solid accumulation. Notably, after the How Dare You? animation blew up, the IP has already achieved multi-format development: the short drama version set a Maoyan short-drama category heat record on its release day, and the long drama version starring Wang Churan and Cheng Lei premiered today, becoming another benchmark for iQIYI's "animation-drama synergy."

At this key Spring Festival juncture, the bold and aggressive iQIYI Animation has won users' favor with abundant content supply and earned positive market feedback from this wave of buzz. After this campaign, it may well usher the platform's Chinese animation business competition into a new stage. At least for now, with the strength to command the Chinese animation audience's entire Spring Festival, iQIYI Animation's 2026 is off to a beautiful start.