TV drama on rural China's transformation twice tops popularity chart

"Minning Town," a TV drama revolving around poverty eradication, has twice topped the weekly popularity chart for Chinese-language TV series on the review platform Douban.

Set in northwest China's Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region from the 1990s to the present day, the production shows how villagers from Xihaigu, one of the country's most uninhabitable areas, have triumphed over destitution under the guidance of China's poverty alleviation policies and with assistance from the coastal province of Fujian.

The Chinese title "Shan Hai Qing" roughly translates to "Mountain and Sea Love," which in itself implies the joining of hands by Ningxia and Fujian.

Produced by Daylight Entertainment, the company behind many popular Chinese TV dramas, the star-studded show soon became an online sensation and won praise from media outlets and Internet users alike following its release on January 12.

It has won the top spot on Douban's weekly popularity chart for Chinese-language TV series for a second time, boasting a rating of 9.4 out of 10 based on more than 150,000 reviews, according to the latest rankings.