AI firm Utopai Studios and the Chinese production company Huace have teamed up for a fully AI-generated adaptation of the Chinese literary classic “Journey to the West,” the first project in their strategic partnership.
“Journey to the West: The Lost Five Hundred Years“ will explore the “untold origin” story of how the 1592 mythological book’s protagonist — the imprisoned Monkey King, Sun Wukong — would grow to protect a monk, Jin Chanzi. Utopai did not immediately disclose whether any directors, writers or actors were attached to the project.
Huace will produce the series using Utopai’s AI storytelling platform PAI, while Utopai will retain the distribution rights outside of China. The two envision the show as an engine for a franchise spanning broadcast, streaming and theatrical platforms.
“’Journey to the West’ is not only one of China’s most beloved cultural treasures — it is one of the great mythological universes in world entertainment,” Utopai CEO and co-founder Cecilia Shen said in a statement. “With Huace, we have the opportunity to build a bold new interpretation of this story, beginning with the untold emotional origin of Sun Wukong and the companions who would one day change the course of the journey west. This is exactly why we built Utopai Studios: to help partners unlock iconic IP, expand worlds at franchise scale and bring ambitious stories to life in ways that were not possible before.”
“’Journey to the West’ is a story Chinese audiences have lived with for generations, and it deserves to be reintroduced with scale, emotion and imagination,” Huace Group CEO Binxing Fu added. “By partnering with Utopai Studios, we can bring this mythology into a fully AI-generated animated format while preserving the cultural depth, emotional power and sense of wonder that have made the story endure for hundreds of years. This partnership also gives us a path to build the property across animated series and theatrical opportunities for audiences around the world.”
The announcement comes weeks after Utopai unveiled the second version of PAI, claiming it could help the production process for content by “preserving narrative context, maintaining consistency across extended sequences, and giving creators more granular control over the creative process,” Zijian He, Utopai’s chief scientific officer, said in a statement.
“With PAI 2.0, our goal is to help catalyze a ‘Claude Code moment’ for media generation,” He added.
Utopai earned the support of NBA stars Carmelo Anthony and James Harden, with Anthony investing in the firm through his production company Creative 7 and joining Utopai as a strategic partner. Harden also produced an animated short using PAI’s first edition in April based on his beard.
Deadline first reported the show’s development.
