Review: Coroner’s Diary (2025) 朝雪录
Summary: Shen Wan ft Li Lan Di’s parents are brutally murdered in front of her eyes. She embarks on a journey to avenge their deaths. Assuming the identity of Qin Wan, she uses her top tier medical skills to become a coroner. Along with Yan Chi ft Ao Rui Peng, son of the Prince of Rui, they solve many mysteries that even connect back to the palace and the Emperor
Platform: IQiYi
Episodes: 38
Airing Date: July 16, 2025
Final Rating: 6.5/10 – A fast paced costume detective romance drama with elements of greatness but was muddled in too many tropes that led to unfinished/questionable storylines. The first 2 cases were nail biting but the drama couldn’t keep the momentum particularly as the group headed to the Capital. It’s a decent summer drama, but not great.
Trigger warning – this drama can be quite gruesome with some of the cases.
shen wan 沈莞 li lan di 李兰迪
Medical prodigy. Seeking to avenger her father's death
yan chi 燕迟 ao rui peng 敖瑞鹏
Son of the Prince of Rui
Yue Ning 岳凝 Shen Yu Jie 沈羽洁
Princess, Close friend of Shen Wan
Yan Li 燕离 Yu Cheng En 余承恩
Friend of Yan Chi, ignored member of the royal family
Plot Overview
Li Lan Di plays Shen Wan, a young woman who was trained in the Medicine King’s Valley. She witnessed the death of her parents before her eyes. Not only her parents, but also Mr. Qin, a close family friend. Though her parents didn’t want her to seek revenge, she cannot let her parents die in vain. She takes Mr. Qin’s daughter’s identity. They were together at the Medicine King’s Valley but Miss Qin succumbed to her illness. Shen Wan assumes the identity of Qin Wan and joins the Qin family in order to gain the opportunity to return back to the Capital to investigate her parents death.
While acting as Qin Wan, she encounters a brutal murder. Using her exceptional medical skills to act as a coroner, she steps in to help solve the murder. She encounters Yan Chi, ft Ao Rui Pung. The son of the Prince of Rui. He wants to overturn the conviction of the Prince of Jin which is tied to Shen Wan’s father’s death as well. The two work together to solve many crimes and head back to the capital where they uncover even more clues as to the mystery of the Prince of Jin that ties back to the Palace.
Overall Thoughts
This drama aired in the second half of July to basically no competition in the summer costume romance niche. As such, it breached 10,000 on iQiYi’s popularity index, peaking at over 10,300 which based on those numbers alone is an impressive feat. It also had close to 30% market share during its airing period.
However, this drama definitely undershot my expectations of a 10,000 popularity index drama. There were some thought provoking cases, beautiful costumes and decent acting, particularly from the main female lead Li Lan Di, but my overall viewing experience felt that it was an ok drama, not great. Good for some popcorn filler for the summer with some hair raising chills and a heavy dose of romance but not a drama to think too closely about.
It felt like the drama tried to stuff as many different tropes into it as possible to see what would stick but not all of them were done well. Apparently the cases were drawn heavily from the book the drama was based on but I am questioning the execution of some of the other components. Namely, the romance parts of the drama and the female centric conflicts which felt really under baked in the show.
Interestingly, Ao Rui Peng’s management company on July 31st issued an apology for bungling the marketing of this show during its airing for Ao Rui Peng. Given that it was a 10,000 index show, the fans were expecting Ao Rui Peng to “explode” in popularity but that did not happen. The apology covers the fact that they were unable to facilitate a positive “drama chasing” experience, were unable to effectively highlight the strengths of Yan Chi (Ao Rui Peng’s character) and had poor communication with their fans which prevented better connectivity with them
Given that the reception or viewership of this drama is also lower than some prior 10,000 index dramas, Coroner’s Diary also instigated further questions into what goes into iQiYi’s popularity index. Many of the comments online question the veracity of the index and I’m seeing comments saying they think Coroner’s Diary’s achievements are fake. Possibly in response, on July 30, iQiYi posted an infographic explaining what goes into the index. I’ll leave it to you to think whether this drama deserves such a high popularity index score. At it’s peak, this drama places 6th in overall history for iQiYi’s top popularity index dramas.
What Needed Work - Spoilers Ahead
- Unfinished case resolutions – The various cases for this drama are chilling and grotesque. I did laugh at the numerous individuals that would wretch and throw up at the sight of Qin Wan cutting up the different bodies. I won’t get into whether or not the cases were realistic or if there were flaws in how the cases themselves were. The problem is that several don’t fully answer questions as to what happened, the motivation, or the aftermath. The plot just moves on to the next thing and we essentially forget everything that happened. Some examples that come to mind are 1) the 3rd case with organ harvesting. There’s someone who’s body was stolen so someone else was using the body of a character but that character was still around as basically an invalid? What happened to that character after the case ended I don’t think was ever fully resolved. That character came from a wealthy family. Was there ever any lasting impact? This character was basically forgotten. And 2) After the 2nd case, we see just how awful the 3rd uncle of the Qin family was. My question was, how was it possible that the rest of the Qin family able to walk away relatively unscathed. It just seemed really rather hasty of a resolution for such heinous crimes. The drama moves at such a fast pace that rounding out these stories didn’t happen cleanly
- Jarring criminal case to romance cuts – Look, I’m all for a ship worthy romance and the chemistry between Li Lan Di and Ao Rui Peng was decent. But the drama REALLY wanted to emphasize the romance part or the drama and interspersed the lovey dovey portion of the relationship in between more serious crime solving aspects of the show. For me, that undercut quite a bit of the momentum and intensity from the drama so the pacing felt off. I feel like I almost need to rewatch the show in 2 cuts. One where I just see the crime solving aspect of the show, the other is just the romance part. You can’t keep the momentum when you’re searching for a serial killer but then for half an episode, the main leads are going on a late night date.
- Unnecessary storylines – This drama incorporated tons of romance, a bit of political machinations, and some palace/family drama into the plot which made the crime solving component less effective. This was more prevalent when the group entered the capital. The 5th sister was hell bent on injecting some “palace drama” antics into the show and she was soooo dumb. She had the script of the Story of Ming Lan while Qin Wan/Yan Chi were off doing their own thing. Her plot points seemed quite meaningless after the 3rd case and basically was added fodder for some type of level 1 conflict. Meanwhile, I have no idea why the 6th sister needed to be part of the entourage. She had a romance story line that was not fully explained or fleshed out. Did the cast just want to force another pairing? The 9th sister too. I never fully understood her motivations for wanting to marry the Crown Prince. There were many characters in the second half of the drama that were unnecessary and could’ve been cut out or else fleshed out.
- Preaching Justice In the Ending– One of the main criticisms of the show I saw online was how preachy Qin Wan would be to the main perpetrators. She would often monologue about how justice should be carried out. I personally didn’t mind it that much UNTIL the ending. Man. I was really quite frustrated at the ending. In the final conflict, Qin Wan and Yan Chi talk back someone from killing someone else, only to be killed BY that 2nd person. I actually screamed at my computer screen and was like “DUDE GUYS COME ON”. I don’t know what the point of that was then. The 2nd guy was going to die anyways and maybe you could’ve gotten more answers out of the 1st guy or at least had the justice system take care of it like the drama kept preaching.
What I Liked -
- First 2 cases: The first 2 cases for the drama I thought were the best because the bulk of the storyline was focused on solving cases. The cases are rather gruesome with a beheading and several skeletons so fair warning for those who are squeamish. I would also note that the cases, the 2nd one in particular, was quite deplorable for what happened. Li Lan Di’s Shen Wan showcased her attention to detail, professionalism and focus on a fact base approach. These cases were thrilling and fast pace which kept viewers engaged while trying to figure out the culprit. Yan Chi and Shen Wan immediately fell in synch with each other to become a formidable pair.
- Li Lan Di: I’ve quite enjoyed Li Lan Di over the years and this drama was a good step in the right direction. She has that ability to be a ray of sunshine on screen. But beyond that, I thought that her enunciation was actually pretty decent, especially when she was reviewing bodies for a case. She was able to recite long monologues of her medical examination with crisp enunciation. Between her and Ao Rui Peng, I thought she was more effective at being Shen Wan than Ao Rui Peng was at being Yan Chi. I wanted to see her evaluate bodies and perform medical procedures. Yan Chi was a good helper, but his role was more effective as the love interest.
- Beautiful hair and costumes! This summer has been full of costume dramas with beautiful costumes and hairstyles. I really liked Li Lan Di’s outfits for this show and her hairstyles were youthful but elegant. The details and coloring were fantastic. My favorite hair decorations were the ones with pearls scattered throughout when they attended a banquet in the palace Though I feel like Yue Ning had the prettiest hair styles and accessories in the show.
Let me know what you think!
Karen