General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20266 min read

The Golden Eyes (黄金瞳)

The Golden Eyes (黄金瞳) is a 2019 Chinese urban adventure web series adapted from the novel of the same name (also published as Dian Dang, 典当) by the online writer Da Yan (打眼). It follows Zhuang Rui, a pawnshop clerk whose eyes are injured by a flying jade fragment in a robbery and mutate, giving him the superpower called the "golden pupil" (黄金瞳), and launching him into an adventure story built around antique appraisal.¹

Key fact	Detail
Original run	February 26 to May 22, 2019, streaming exclusively on iQiyi; 56 episodes²^•³
Source	Novel The Golden Eyes by Da Yan, a male-oriented web novel of about 4.13 million characters¹^•⁴
Lead cast	Zhang Yixing as Zhuang Rui, Wang Zixuan as Miao Feifei, Li Liqun as De Shu, Wang Yuexin as Huang Fu Yun, Chen Jiawen as Qin Xuanbing²
Key creatives	Director Lin Nan; chief planner Nanpai Sanshu; chief producers Bai Yicong and Li Liying; chief screenwriter Zhang Yuan'ang⁵
Production companies	iQiyi, Tencent Pictures, and Linghe Culture⁵
Reception	Douban rating of 5.3; polarized reviews of the lead's acting and of the scale of adaptation⁶
Second adaptation	A new web series version began filming in Chengdu on October 18, 2026, for Tencent Video⁷

Spoilers

Premise

Zhuang Rui is an ordinary employee at a pawnshop. During a robbery he is struck in the eyes by shards of jade, and after recovering he finds his vision has changed: the "golden pupil" lets him see through objects to their true nature, revealing what is hidden beneath an antique's surface.¹^•⁸ In the drama the power is given six functions, including rapid reading, a panoramic mode for checking whether a building is safe, judging food quality, reading safe combinations, navigation, and seeing an object's history during appraisal; in effect clairvoyance plus X-ray vision.⁶

The story moves through ceramics, bronzes, and high-stakes jade gambling (赌石) (buying uncut jade stones, betting on their unseen contents), and the series mixes adventure, suspense, light comedy, and traditional Chinese culture.²^•⁹ Objects featured during the run, such as the Sanhe Liu gourd, Zhu Kexin's zisha teapots, and Huizong-era Ru ware with its sky-blue glaze, were used to showcase traditional craftsmanship.¹⁰

The source novel

The novel belongs to the male-oriented "shuangwen" (爽文) genre, in which an ordinary protagonist powers up without setback: after gaining the golden pupil, Zhuang Rui succeeds at every appraisal, accumulates wealth, discovers he is descended from a founding figure of the People's Republic, opens a museum, keeps an eagle and a gorilla, marries a beautiful heiress, and rises to the top.¹ Its distinguishing feature is the appraisal thread: the author Da Yan worked in the pawnshop trade for years, and the novel's antique knowledge, including many obscure corners of the field, gives it an informational appeal that separates it from pure fantasy power-fantasy fiction.⁸

Adaptation choices

Rationalizing the power. Producer Bai Yicong bought the screen rights in 2012 but did not begin work until 2015, when he found the original characterization and plot unsuitable for the screen. The team deleted the novel's more exaggerated material, in which the golden pupil works as an X-ray and CT scanner and can locate centuries-old shipwrecks from a beach. To make the power plausible they added a frame story drawn from Liaozhai Zhiyi, in which the poor scholar Feng Quan gains a discerning eye after saving a turtle spirit, using a historical tale to validate the golden pupil's possibility.¹

The drama also limits the power itself. Zhuang Rui identifies artifacts mainly through knowledge of jade and other materials, using the golden pupil to confirm a judgment rather than replace it, and the power sometimes fails and carries a "backlash" (反噬) cost, a limitation the screenwriting team added.¹^•¹¹ Chief screenwriter Zhang Yuan'ang said much of the novel could not be filmed: the original power had xianxia-style fantasy elements such as absorbing spiritual energy from antiques to heal people, plus worldwide adventures with gorillas, Tibetan mastiffs, giant octopuses, wealthy clans, and Tibetan religion, all of which were cut.¹¹

The romance line. The most heavily changed element was the love plot. The novel's heiress Qin Xuanbing, devoted only to the hero, was judged too much a pure male-fantasy figure, so her storyline was removed; Zhuang Rui instead shares adventures with the ordinary policewoman Miao Feifei, played by Wang Zixuan, though the two remain partners rather than lovers.¹

Production

Zhang Yixing's scenes wrapped on June 5, 2018, with the full crew wrapping the next day. The production took more than a year from preparation to wrap, involved over 1,300 cast and crew, and traveled 25,000 kilometers at locations in China and abroad. Zhang performed his own high-difficulty action scenes without a stunt double.⁵ The series was produced by iQiyi, Tencent Pictures, and Linghe Culture, the team behind The Mystic Nine (老九门).⁵^•⁹

Distribution was arranged before broadcast: rights were sold for Southeast Asia and the Americas, and after the mainland China and Taiwan debut the series was scheduled on Malaysia's Astro, Singapore's StarHub, and Rakuten Viki, with releases confirmed for Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand, and South Korea in localized versions.⁹

Reception

The premiere drew wide attention, with related topics trending on Weibo, and the series topped Maoyan's all-network heat ranking for consecutive days after its February 26 debut.⁸^•¹¹ During its run, keywords such as "golden pupil aftereffects" trended on Weibo, and at its conclusion the series held first place in both iQiyi's web drama heat ranking and Baidu's index, as well as the Maoyan and Yunhe web drama charts.¹⁰^•¹²

Critical response was mixed. Reviewers argued the adaptation amplified the novel's weaknesses and discarded its strengths: in the drama, appraisal scenes are resolved with a special-effects flash of the eyes, so viewers lose the antique knowledge that made the novel distinctive, and one report concluded the series had little to do with appraisal after adaptation.⁸^•⁶ The Lianhe Zaobao review judged that the changes alienated both audiences, driving away male viewers with the idol-star-centered logic while offering women no substantive romance.⁶ On Douban the series scored 5.3.⁶

Zhang Yixing's performance divided viewers: some called his Zhuang Rui wooden and under-acted, while fans saw clear improvement over his role in The Mystic Nine. Bai Yicong attributed the growth to his work with Huang Bo on the film The Island (一出好戏) and said he was developing into a good actor; director Lin Nan called his performance that of a genuine young actor, independent of his idol status.¹^•⁶

Second adaptation (2026)

A new web series version of The Golden Eyes began filming in Chengdu on October 18, 2026, with a 65-day shooting schedule. It stars Zheng Yicheng, Gai Yuexi, and Huang Tingting, is directed by Li Donglin, produced by Chengdu Film Group and Yuewen Group, and will stream on Tencent Video.⁷

References

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