Cancelled drama’s accused misogyny speaks to wider issue of female objectification in China’s pop culture
- Gentlemen of Eastern 8th, a drama about a group of Chinese men in their 30s, has received scathing criticism online for its ‘discriminatory’ portrayal of women
- Star and producer Zhang Han has made a career out of playing the ‘overbearing man’, but the archetype has become a way for men to bully the weak, an expert says
A Chinese TV series about the careers and love lives of four men in their 30s was pulled from the country’s streaming platforms on September 26 after a wave of backlash on social media, in which commenters accused the show of being misogynistic and sexually derogatory.
In one episode of Gentlemen of Eastern 8th – staring and produced by Chinese actor Zhang Han – the line “injured women are the most terrible animal, they have been bleeding for 10,000 years, yet they won’t die” enraged some netizens, who regarded it as a dig at female menstruation.
Various other interactions between the male and female characters in the Shanghai-set romantic drama were also called out for having strong sexual undertones.
“It’s hard to believe that this was produced in the 2020s,” says Lesley Lu, a 26-year-old Beijing resident working in international public relations. “The very fact that it can be broadcast makes me wonder about the overall level of education of the Chinese entertainment and film industry.”
On Douban, a Chinese social media platform and review site, Gentlemen of Eastern 8th scored an abysmal 2.1/10, with 96.9 per cent of the reviewers rating it just one star.