Review: A Dream Within A Dream (2025) 书卷一梦
Summary: Accidentally waking up in the screenplay world of a drama she’s about to film, Song Xiao Yu ft Li Yi Tong realizes she must act out all of the key scenes in the screenplay in order to survive. Problem is, in the original screenplay, main male lead Nan Heng ft Liu Yu Ning causes her serious heartbreak and eventual torture. She must find ways to change her future in this screenplay world
Platform: Tencent, Jiang Su Television
Episodes: 40
Airing Date: June 26, 2025
Final Rating: 7.2/10 – A silly, often times ridiculous drama that jokes about all the tropes of Chinese costume romance dramas. It’s uneven in pacing and in tone but is entertaining enough especially for a binge watch. The emotional punches from the main male lead is the most engaging piece of the story and the construct of this “screenplay” world drive home a more interesting ending.
Song Xiao Yu/Song Yi Meng 宋小鱼/宋一梦 li yi tong 李一桐
Actress that woke up in a romance drama screenplay as the female lead
nan heng l南珩 liu yu ning 刘宇宁
Ruthless 7th prince
song yi ting 宋一汀 祝绪丹 zhu xu dan
Song Yi Meng's sister
shang guan he 上官鹤 wang yi lun 王以纶
Nan Heng's friend, second in command at Can Jiang Yue
Plot Overview
In modern day, actress Song Xiao Yu ft Li Yi Tong accidentally enters the fictional world of a historical romance screen play where the story line is that she falls in love with the main male lead who uses her, cheats on her and doesn’t mind seeing her abused and killed. This was the original screen play at least.
When she realizes that she fell into this screenplay world, she tries to change her fate by instead of marrying the main male lead Nan Heng ft Liu Yu Ning, she marries the second male lead but she ends up in a never ending loop where she dies before being able to do so. She finally realizes that it’s because no matter how hard she tries, the screenplay is going to push her to the main male lead, Nan Heng. She must go through various key scenes in the screenplay. There are many people in the screenplay who are specified storylines – some suffer the challenges of being in the palace, of being in a wealthy household, of wanting power, of wanting love and freedom etc etc. Song Xiao You wants nothing more than to just hang out but is swept up in the screenplay and storyline of the ruthless and bloodthirsty Nan Heng.
Overall Thoughts
This drama is another win for Liu Yu Ning. It breached 9600 on iQiYi’s popularity index and although just off of the 10,000 threshold, still got decent buzz online and healthy online viewership. For female lead Li Yi Tong, this is definitely a great showing for her. She’s struggled to headline a hit despite being in many dramas over the years and this is finally a drama that put her on the map. Is this an explosive hit? No. But it’s a decent showing.
This is a fun and silly drama that is perfect for the summer. I think Li Yi Tong had a blast acting in this show. It’s hard not to. You get to call out all the weird tropes in Chinese dramas these days and be as ridiculous as possible in various scenes. She died a million times in the first few scenes when she was sent into the world which certainly was a highlight at the beginning of the show.
Is it the best drama out there? Not by a long shot. The first 10 episodes of the drama I really struggled with because the drama couldn’t figure out how to balance the comedy with the political scheming and then romance. A lot of the romance tropes felt ham fisted in to extend episode lengths. I do think this could’ve been a 30-35 episode drama if many of those scenes were cut out. Perhaps the point was to show that this IS supposed to be a silly drama but the juxtaposition didn’t necessarily work.
However, it was definitely entertaining. The best parts of the show were the scenes that brought out deeper emotional ties for the main male lead Nan Heng and female lead Song Yi Meng, because only then, do you care about the main couple and feel invested. The first 10 episodes didn’t really bring out that chemistry. If I were to say what I thought about the drama, ep 1-9, meh, 9-16 GREAT, 16-34 fine, 35-ending – GREAT.
What I Liked - Mild Spoilers Ahead
- It’s just tons of fun! What’s not to like about a story that calls out the fact that many tropes are ridiculous. It’s not the first drama to have the main female lead fall into a screenplay world and she has her modern day memories, but I would say this is another take. The whole premise is that there are “gou xue” or dumb tropes from the original screenplay. This gives plenty of opportunity for us the viewer to see how silly they are and what Song Yi Meng can do to work around these silly tropes. One of my favorites was that she and Nan Heng were backed into a corner off the top of a cliff. She adamantly decides to jump off the cliff with him despite his reluctance because she just says that they’re the main couple in the drama and the main couple never dies after falling off of a cliff. It’s just how it is. Sure enough, they don’t die. Plus, we see Nan Heng recovering from being severely injured with nary a problem. You know. Just that plot armor for the main male lead. Plus, we get to see many of the modern day Chinese drama related lingo being used in this drama. If you are confused by something, let us know! Maybe we’ll do a podcast episode on it.
- Amazing side characters! The drama does manage to create more multidimensional characters across the board. Though she was not present much for the first half of the drama, Song Yi Ting’s character is such a badass. She is way more intelligent than Song Yi Meng, is skilled in many talents and has that “I’m a strong independent woman” mindset. She is definitely the main character of her own story and doesn’t need to play second fiddle to anyone.
- Many people online thought that the 18th prince would turn evil but he is actually quite self aware of his shortcomings. I mean, he’s played by Chang Long who is typecast almost in this jokester role so how can he be THAT evil. Song Yi Meng’s father is someone who is known for not taking sides but he has his own righteous view of the world and does dote upon his daughter. The list goes on.
- Beautiful costumes – I absolutely adored Song Yi Meng’s outfits in this drama. It’s clear that this is not based on any particular dynasty so the costume designers got to be more unique with the outfits. I actually quite liked that because you are NOT restricted to being historically accurate, you can be more outlandish. I loved Song Yi Meng’s red and white outfit with red flower petal designs all over her shoulders.
- Nan Heng/Li Shi Liu – Is it just me or does Liu Yu Ning now have somewhat of a “type” of character he plays. In this drama and in Prisoner of Beauty, he is initially portrayed as a ruthless/scheming killer but then you peel back the layers and you see a kind hearted man who shows undying devotion to his wife and family. They both lead armies and both are princes/kings. We’ll leave that aside. Nan Heng’s story is definitely more engaging as a character than Song Yi Meng who was, for all intents and purposes, plopped into this world. I was more invested in Nan Heng’s backstory and how he handles the pressure from his father while also dealing with the unfairness he feels. He is also the brave one of the pair. As Song Yi Ting says, he took 99 steps out of 100 to walk towards Song Yi Meng. He is the one who knows to fight against so called fate. Without Nan Heng’s willingness to take destiny in his own hands, Song Yi Meng would end up replaying the unpleasant storyline of the original script all the way to the end.
What Needed Work
- Song Yi Meng’s Intellect – Perhaps the drama was trying to play a lot of things for laughs but the main female lead’s intellect was definitely not up to snuff. It kills me that she could not figure out that Li Shi Liu and Nan Heng were one and the same. Does the mask have some type of voice altering capability a la Batman so you can’t hear that the 2 have literally the same voice? And Nan Heng and Li Shi Liu are both extremely tall. That’s the whole point for actor Liu Yu Ning. How can Song Yi Meng not notice anything? Furthermore, there were so many things that changed from the original screenplay as Song Yi Meng lived through the plot. I felt rather exasperated when she was unwilling to 1) communicate with Nan Heng and Li Shi Liu about what was happening and 2) unwilling to think about how to change the story given many changes had already occurred. The end result is that she seemed much less effective and interesting than Liu Yu Ning’s Nan Heng/Li Shi Liu who was definitely carrying the show from an emotional investment perspective. Song Yi Ting was even more willing to listen to Nan Heng than Song Yi Meng. While yes, that came up later as a whole conflict of why Song Yi Meng doesn’t believe anything Nan Heng says and is something she needed to work on, her own stubbornness to not look beyond the script blinded her to certain alternatives.
- Uneven tone – My biggest criticism of the drama is that it always tried to add some funny moments into generally serious scenes which often seemed out of place. Fu Gui, many members of Can Jiang Yue and even Song Yi Meng herself were the jokesters of the show. While several scenes like Song Yi Meng dying numerous times and Song Yi Meng misunderstanding Li Shi Liu and Shang Guan He being amorously linked were genuinely laugh out loud funny, there were small scenes that were added that just felt unnecessary. Many of the jokes cut the emotional intensity of a line delivery which then also broke up the pacing of that scene. The story felt more balanced later on when Song Yi Meng became more integrated with Nan Heng’s universe but particularly in the first several episodes, she is the funny person while his side of the world should be serious. His joking team cut his effectiveness as a leader.
Let's Talk About the Ending - MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD
In the last episode we learn that this drama was indeed a dream within a dream. That there was not just one screenwriter, but instead there were 2. For folks that don’t know, the chubby female screenwriter in the last episode is a character in another drama where she was also a screenwriter and responsible for changing scripts based on ridiculous demands of the cast and director.
I personally don’t know how I feel about that ending. There are many theories about this ending and what it means. From my perspective, one of the key themes of this show is that even in this “screenplay” where everyone is just a zhipianren or just a paper character, these characters want to have the ability to change their fate. Keeping one’s destiny in one’s own hands is what Nan Heng was fighting for the entire second half of the drama when he finds out he’s just a story character. In the big conflict at the end of the drama where all the various characters come to life to show that they are more than just a no name character, this conflict added a lot of heart to the world. My takeaway there is that every person is the main character in their own story. Every person has a worthy story to tell, regardless of what job they have, what backstory they have in a broader context.
However, by showing that there was ANOTHER screenwriter holding the pen to me means that Song YI Meng and company never truly took the reigns of their own lives. Instead, they were perhaps added more color and depth to these characters by this other screenwriter, but ultimately, their fate is still not in their own hands. Nan Heng’s last words were that he will continue to fight to direct his own destiny is fair but shouldn’t have been necessary. The additional screenwriter almost felt like just another plot twist to add more shock value. Feel free to jump in to let me know if you have another interpretation.
I loved the “happy ending” of this story before we found out about the “real” screenwriter.
I also don’t know how I felt about the final scene where Song Xiao Yu returned to modern day. Her fictional world was so real. She had a loving family, a loving husband and amazing friends. She was in her utopia and happily ever after. Coming back to the present and then having Nan Heng return…yes…that was cute and really sweet but then brings the story back to the “real” present day where there are lots of “real” conflicts waiting for them.
There are many debates online right now on whether or not Nan Feng, the actor, is actually Nan Heng and vice versa, and then questions on how Nan Heng was transported to this world. There was a teleportation screen that Nan Heng walked through to show there was something weird going on. Maybe the 2 are able to go back and forth between worlds? I don’t know if there is a right answer.
Regardless, I appreciate that we got the “happy ending” in the drama but also in present day but I don’t know if it was fully necessary.
What do you think?
Karen