Song Couple (Photo : YouTube - Drama Mania)
It is almost six months since episode 16 of “Descendants of the Sun” aired over KBS 2TV in South Korea and iQiyi in China. But despite the lapse in time, Song Joong-ki, the lead actor of the blockbuster military-medical drama, remains the most popular actor in South Korea and China.
AllKpop reports on Thursday that the Baidu Chart – based on data from live searches on China’s equivalent of Google – showed that the 31-year-old actor topped the list for the male category. He was number 1 despite his lesser visibility since Song Joong-ki is busy filming the movie “Battleship Island.” His name was searched almost 10,000 times on Baidu for the period covered by the chart.
The name of second placer Lee Jong Suk, star of the hit webtoon “W Two Worlds,” was searched almost 7,000 times, while it was almost 6,500 times for Ji Chang Wook in third place and almost 5,000 times for Lee Jun Ki in fourth place.
In the female category, YoonA topped the Baidu Chart for both actress and singer categories because of the debut of the Chinese drama “God of War, Zhao Yun” where she is a cast. The drama got very high ratings when it was shown in the Asian giant. In second place for both categories is Victoria of the girl band f(x).
But at the Star Ranking of Sina in China, it were Lay, Victoria and G-Dragon who ruled the chart. It seems EXO’s recent public exposure has helped the boy band because member Sehun jumped to 46th place amid shooting the Chinese web drama “My Dear Archimedes,” while the band just held a concert in Hangzhou on Sept. 30.
For Korean dramas, “Cinderella and Four Knights” got the highest rank, while “Lucky Romance,” which stars Hwang Jung Eum and Ryu Joon Yeol, placed fourth.
Apparently, China’s ban on Korean stars due to Seoul’s deployment of the U.S. Terminal High Altitude Area Defense is not working because aside from the Hallyu stars in Baidu and Sina’s charts, “Descendants of the Sun” actress Song Hye Kyo also won on Sept. 24 the “Goddess of Asia” title by overtaking Chinese actress Zheng Shuang in the online voting contest.
In late September, Song Joong-ki was also named as the most influential person in the Korean entertainment industry.
