General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20266 min read

Are You the One (柳舟记)

Are You the One (柳舟记) is a 2024 Chinese costume romantic comedy television series adapted from the web novel Jiao Cang (娇藏) by Kuang Shang Kuang Jia (狂上加狂). It stars Zhang Wanyi as Cui Xingzhou, the Prince of Huaiyang, and Wang Churan as Liu Miantang, the female leader of the Mount Yang bandits, in a story of mistaken identity and a fake marriage between two adversaries.¹^•² The series ran for 40 episodes on Tencent Video from August 12 to September 1, 2024.³

Key fact	Detail
Original title	柳舟记 (Liu Zhou Ji); alternate titles include 娇藏, 海棠笑春风, and 柳下正停舟⁴
Source	Adapted from the novel Jiao Cang (娇藏) by Kuang Shang Kuang Jia, a popular title on Jinjiang Literature City¹^•⁵
Broadcast	40 episodes, Tencent Video, August 12 – September 1, 2024, daily at 18:00³^•⁴
Directors and writers	Directed by Liu Guonan and Cong Xiao; screenplay by a six-person team led by chief writers Zhao Tianyou and Ying Zhinan¹^•⁶
Lead cast	Zhang Wanyi (Cui Xingzhou), Wang Churan (Liu Miantang), with Liu Lingzi, Chang Huasen, Zhang Chi, and Yuan Yuxuan¹
Reception	Douban opening score of 8.0, the highest for a 2024 costume romance drama at the time; Tencent Video heat exceeded 27,000⁶^•⁷
International release	Streamed as Are You the One on Rakuten Viki, WeTV, and Netflix; released in Japan as 柳舟恋記～皇子とかりそめの花嫁～ in 2025²^•⁸

Spoilers

Plot

Cui Xingzhou, the young Prince of Huaiyang, has made eliminating the bandits of Mount Yang his mission. Liu Miantang is the bandits' female leader, who leads the people of Mount Yang in punishing the wicked and upholding justice. After Liu Miantang is severely injured in an attack and loses her memory, Cui Xingzhou rescues her. He mistakes her for the favorite concubine of Lu Wen, the Mount Yang chief he has long pursued, while she mistakes him for her husband, a merchant named Cui Jiu.⁹

Cui Xingzhou decides to turn the situation to his advantage. Posing as the down-on-his-luck merchant Cui Jiu, he lives with her as a fake husband, hoping to lure Lu Wen into the open. The scheme does not achieve its goal; instead, Cui Xingzhou gradually falls in love with her. Liu Miantang, though amnesiac, remains shrewd: she opens a porcelain business that thrives, and she grows suspicious of her "husband's" theatrical behavior.⁹ Reviewers noted that the drama stacks familiar elements, including marriage before love, amnesia, hidden identities, and a cat-and-mouse game, but uses them with an anti-formula touch: the heroine loses her memory without losing her intelligence, and both leads conceal second identities, so each is secretly the other's long-sought adversary.⁵

When the deception is exposed, the relationship faces a crisis. The two eventually choose honesty, and in a time of political turmoil they help the imperial grandson Zi Yu purge rebels and stabilize the court.⁹

Production

The project was registered in 2023 as a 40-episode television adaptation of Jiao Cang; an earlier plan had divided the story into two web series, Haitang Xiao Chunfeng (28 episodes) and Liuxia Zheng Tingzhou (25 episodes).¹⁰ Filming ran from approximately August 10 to December 21, 2023.¹ Gao Chen served as chief producer and artistic director, and the production company was Beijing Xi Yue Jia Xing Film and Television Culture Co., with Tencent Video as the exclusive streaming platform.¹

The six-person screenwriting team, formed years earlier as a collaborative studio, spent about three years developing the adaptation. Chief writers Zhao Tianyou and Ying Zhinan described the novel's balanced male and female leads as the quality they most wanted to preserve; screenwriter Zhang Maidi said the team wanted a grounded love story full of everyday market-town life.⁶ The directors, Liu Guonan and Cong Xiao, described their approach as "classical realism": opening the story in a measured, everyday register, building rounded characters, and using the canal-town setting of Lingquan Town, with added greenery and water features, to create a lived-in period atmosphere.¹¹

The opening theme is "Xing Zhou Wen Liu" (行舟问柳), performed by Zhou Shen, and the closing theme is "Guang Yin Nuo" (光阴诺).¹

Reception

Audience and critical response. Before release the drama drew 3.88 million reservations on Tencent Video, and on its premiere day it topped the platform's popularity surge chart; its heat score later passed 27,000, entering Tencent's top-tier club.¹² Its Douban opening score of 8.0 made it the highest-rated costume romance drama of 2024 at that point, though the score later slipped to 7.9, which cost 2024's costume dramas their only 8-point title.⁶^•¹³ On Rakuten Viki it holds a 9.5 rating from about 34,150 users, and on IMDb 7.7.¹⁴^•¹⁵

Commentary in Chinese media was divided along two lines. Xinhua and other outlets praised its relaxed "slice-of-life" pacing, its depiction of a mutually supportive couple, and a female lead written as clear-eyed and independent, calling it a differentiated entry in a crowded costume-drama field.¹⁶ The scene in which the bound character Zhao Quan simply spits out his gag cloth trended online as an example of a drama that "respects the audience's intelligence"; the moment was an on-set improvisation by actor Zhang Chi.⁶ Other critics found the series dull: a Pengpai News review argued that the novel's relatively fresh premise had been flattened by formulaic costume-drama production, noting that the show's daily effective play counts often fell outside the top three.¹⁷ Industry analysis reported that its average per-episode viewership during the hot broadcast window did not exceed the 20-million threshold that had traditionally marked a costume-drama hit, in a summer 2024 season that produced no breakout costume romance.¹⁸

Awards. In May 2024, before broadcast, the series won the most-anticipated drama award at the seventh Golden Bone Blossom Network Film and Television Festival. In November 2025 it received the Chinese culture international communication award at the Chinese-American TV Festival.¹

Distribution

Beyond Tencent Video and its overseas service WeTV, the series streams on Rakuten Viki (free with ads in some regions) and is listed on Netflix, where it is cataloged as a 2024 romance period piece.²^•¹⁵^•¹⁹ In Japan it was released under the title Ryūshūrenki: Ōji to Karisome no Hanayome (柳舟恋記～皇子とかりそめの花嫁～), with exclusive early streaming on U-NEXT from May 2, 2025, and a three-volume DVD set released between April and June 2025.⁸

References

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 21, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026