2026-07-18

July 17 Short Drama Top 10: Jianzong S2 Tops Hongguo as AI Claims Seven Slots

The July 17 Hongguo heat snapshot puts Jianzong Season 2 first at 70.87 million, with AI/manhua titles taking seven of the ten named slots and three live-action niches holding the rest.

Short Drama Daily Top 10 @gritty

The July 17 snapshot: AI sequels take the front row

The latest public Hongguo heat snapshot puts AI/manhua short dramas in seven of the ten named positions. The two seasons of 咱家剑宗团宠小师妹 occupy the first two rows at 70.87 million and 70.26 million heat, while 万妖图录传第八季 holds third at 67.96 million. The best-performing live-action title is 勇敢后妈，专治不服 at No. 4. 1

This is a Hongguo-led ranking, not a fully normalized all-platform index. A same-day Baijiahao article corroborates the leading AI stack and the No. 4 and No. 5 live-action/AI positions, but its lower-third descriptions conflict with the complete ten-row list in the public snapshot, so this issue follows the latter rather than mixing two different board states. 2

Public Douyin material adds qualitative context for the No. 1 title, including its 300-episode first season and 228-episode second season, but it does not provide a comparable platform-wide play-count snapshot. I could not verify a dated, public Kuaishou board that could be merged without inventing a cross-platform score; Kuaishou is therefore a disclosed coverage gap rather than a silent omission. 3

Top 10 at a glance

Heat values below are the chart's 万 readings converted to millions. All ten rows are Hongguo chart entries; the type labels distinguish AI/manhua from live-action where the public record supports that distinction.

Rank	Drama	Genre / format	Platform	Episode count	July 17 heat
1	咱家剑宗团宠小师妹第二季 \Zan Jia Jianzong Tuan Chong Xiao Shimei S2	AI manhua; cultivation fantasy	Hongguo	228	70.87m 1
2	咱家剑宗团宠小师妹 \Zan Jia Jianzong Tuan Chong Xiao Shimei S1	AI manhua; cultivation fantasy	Hongguo	300	70.26m 1
3	万妖图录传第八季 \Wanyao Tulu Zhuan S8	AI animation; xianxia monster-slaying	Hongguo	Not stated in the opened metadata	67.96m 1
4	勇敢后妈，专治不服 \Yonggan Houma, Zhuanzhi Bu Fu	Live-action family romance / healing	Hongguo	71	65.25m 1
5	发配边关，罪妻开荒养出战神第八季 \Fapei Bianguan, Zuiqi Kaihuang Yang Chu Zhanshen S8	AI manhua; historical farming and comeback	Hongguo	43*	63.72m 1
6	八零团宠：爹爹入赘我暴富 \Baling Tuanchong: Die Die Ruzhui Wo Baofu	Live-action family / rural rebirth	Hongguo	105*	62.21m 1
7	雾潮燃欲 \Wuchao Ranyu	Live-action urban workplace romance	Hongguo	Not stated in the opened metadata	62.15m 1
8	傻女重生记，睁眼后盖房发家 \Sha Nü Chongsheng Ji, Zhenyan Hou Gai Fang Fa Jia	Chart-classified AI/manhua; transmigration / family	Hongguo	171*	61.26m 1
9	都重生了，谁还装富二代 \Dou Chongsheng Le, Shui Hai Zhuang Fudai	Chart-classified AI/manhua; urban rebirth	Hongguo	69*	61.08m 1
10	予你情深，侵入余生第三季 \Yu Ni Qingshen, Qinru Yusheng S3	Chart-classified AI/manhua; emotional rebirth	Hongguo	79	60.21m 1

* Episode counts marked with an asterisk come from a concrete listing under a shortened or alternate title and are not presented as a fresh Hongguo release-card field.

The individual read

1. 咱家剑宗团宠小师妹第二季 — S2

The sequel's 70.87 million heat gives the board its clearest headline: a long-running AI cultivation serial can now open at the very top rather than merely fill the lower half. A public Douyin post identifies the season as 228 episodes and describes the franchise as AI animation, while the chart itself shows S2 only 0.61 million ahead of its predecessor. That near-tie suggests franchise carry-over is doing as much work as launch novelty. 3

The useful signal for producers is not simply that an AI title won. It is that a recognizable serial world now has enough accumulated audience memory to turn a sequel into a two-row event.

2. 咱家剑宗团宠小师妹 — S1

Season 1 remains at 70.26 million, effectively matching S2 and making this a paired-IP takeover rather than a one-off sequel spike. The same public Douyin record gives the first season as 300 episodes and uses 国漫, AI动漫, and AI短剧 tags, which makes the format legible even outside the Hongguo chart. 3

Its No. 2 position also changes how to read the chart's AI share: the category is not only producing fresh entries, but keeping older seasons visible beside their continuations.

3. 万妖图录传第八季 — S8

万妖图录传第八季 is the chart's third title at 67.96 million. The opened Baidu Baike entry classifies it as animation, places its Hongguo premiere on July 11, and describes a new 归墟 arc built around an ancient taboo, a hidden enemy, and mysteries accumulated across seven seasons. 4

That is a different retention mechanism from the Jianzong pair: the hook is serialized lore and a new arc, not just a same-world sequel label. The public metadata reviewed here does not state a total episode count, so the table leaves that field explicit rather than borrowing a count from another season.

4. 勇敢后妈，专治不服 — live action

At 65.25 million, this is the strongest live-action title on the board and the only non-AI entry in the top four. A Sina viewing note lists 71 episodes and describes a family-centered story in which a woman becomes a fake wife, helps a withdrawn child, and brings warmth into a tense household; the note also records a personal rating of 7.5/10, which is a viewer signal rather than a platform score. 5

The buzz driver is therefore broader than a romance pairing. It is a compact package of fake marriage, child repair, intergenerational conflict, and a heroine who solves problems directly. In a chart crowded by high-volume AI fantasy, that family-healing lane is the live-action counterweight.

5. 发配边关，罪妻开荒养出战神第八季 — S8

The eighth season sits at 63.72 million, only 1.53 million below No. 4. A concrete iQIYI listing for the same season under the alternate lead word 荒年 identifies 43 episodes and describes an exiled woman using a wood-based ability, farming, herbal knowledge, and household rebuilding to survive at the frontier. 6

That repeatable exile + farming + female comeback engine helps explain why the franchise keeps returning to the board. Its AI/manhua identity is not merely a visual label here; the season system and serialized premise make the title unusually easy to extend.

6. 八零团宠：爹爹入赘我暴富 — rural family rebound

The No. 6 title is the first live-action entry after the two front-runners and registers 62.21 million heat. The opened Baidu Baike record uses the shortened title 爹爹入赘我暴富, calls it a 105-episode brainwave short drama, and centers on a reborn daughter who arranges a new family around her father and a hunter. 7

Its appeal is a family-repair fantasy rather than a boardroom fantasy: the heroine changes the household's starting conditions, then lets affection grow through rural life. That gives live action a different route into the same high-retention territory as the AI titles: a clear premise, repeated domestic obstacles, and a long runway for small reversals.

7. 雾潮燃欲 — the new live-action challenger

雾潮燃欲 enters the public ten-row list at No. 7 with 62.15 million heat. Its Baidu Baike entry identifies Wang Yiran and Shi Tong as leads, places the title on Hongguo, and frames the story around a controlled corporate leader who stops for an independent surveying-department deputy director after a rain-soaked breakup. 8

The specific buzz mechanism is the contrast between a familiar CEO setup and a more adult, workplace-centered emotional rhythm: the signature gesture is not instant possession, but a normally immovable man making room for someone else's vulnerability. It is also the chart's clearest same-week proof that live action can still break into an AI-heavy board when the pairing and a memorable scene arrive together.

8. 傻女重生记，睁眼后盖房发家 — the lower AI/manhua lane

At 61.26 million, this title is 9.61 million behind the leader but still above the 60-million line. The opened Baidu Baike entry for the base title 傻女重生记 classifies it as a 171-episode transmigration short drama; the chart uses the longer 睁眼后盖房发家 label, so that expanded title and the metadata entry are not treated as perfectly identical release-card strings. 9

The defensible read is about depth, not a claimed causal metric: the title gives the AI/manhua cohort another long, familiar rebirth-and-household lane below the headline franchises. The public sources checked do not expose a separate Douyin or Kuaishou play count for this row.

9. 都重生了，谁还装富二代 — urban rebirth

This entry is No. 9 at 61.08 million, just 0.18 million below No. 8. A Sina short-drama listing records a 69-episode second-season entry under the full title 都重生了，谁还装富二代啊第二季; the chart's shorter label is retained in the table for readability. 10

The title itself makes the positioning clear: it reverses the fake-rich-kid fantasy into a rebirth premise about refusing to perform wealth. In a board otherwise dominated by cultivation and family healing, that urban identity-and-status hook gives the AI/manhua side a contemporary lane.

10. 予你情深，侵入余生第三季 — the cutoff survives

The final row still reaches 60.21 million, only 0.66 million above the 60-million threshold set by the public snapshot. A concrete Sina page identifies the third season's 79th episode, which supports the 79-episode count used here; it does not provide a comparable independent play-count signal. 11

Its value to the day's read is structural. The cutoff is not a random new title: it is another numbered continuation, showing that serial familiarity is helping the AI/manhua group maintain a deep bench even when the top of the chart is already crowded.

Three patterns in the July 17 board

1. The top is now a franchise stack

The first three rows are all AI or animated serials, and the first two are adjacent seasons of one title. 万妖图录传第八季 adds a second established world immediately behind them. The competitive unit is no longer just a single short drama; it is a recognizable IP with enough episodes, arcs, and repeat characters to keep several releases visible at once. 1

2. Live action is surviving through specific emotional texture

The three live-action entries are not generic placeholders. 勇敢后妈，专治不服 leans into child-and-family repair, 八零团宠 into rural household rebuilding, and 雾潮燃欲 into controlled adult workplace romance. Their combined presence is small, but the lanes are differentiated enough to avoid competing with AI fantasy on the same terms. 5 7 8

3. The board is compressed below the leader

The gap from No. 1 to No. 10 is 10.66 million, and rows 6 through 10 sit within 2.00 million of one another. That compression matters more than the exact order of the lower rows: a single sequel launch, a strong live-action scene, or a new cross-platform signal could reshuffle the cutoff quickly. For now, the cleanest conclusion is that AI/manhua owns the depth of the July 17 Hongguo board, while live action still owns a few clearly identifiable audience niches.