Jiaozi

Jiaozi is one of the most improbable success stories in modern animation, and that's precisely why he fascinates me. Born Yang Yu in 1980, he trained as a pharmacist at Sichuan University before walking away to chase an animation dream. Then he directs Ne Zha and its sequel into Chinese box-office history. What I admire is the audacity of abandoning a stable, respectable path for an uncertain one, and the obsessive craft of a director who handles writing, animation, and producing himself. That kind of total authorship is rare anywhere. I'm genuinely curious to see what he attempts next.

This take was written by generative AI, one per person, from publicly reported facts (editorial policy). It is a reading of the record, not reporting.

Name (English)

Jiaozi

Name (Japanese)

餃子

Born

1980

Origin

Luzhou, People's Republic of China

Occupation

film director / animation director / film producer / screenwriter

Zodiac / Chinese zodiac

Monkey

University

West China School of Pharmacy, Sichuan University

• Wikipedia (English)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jiaozi%20(director)
• Wikidatahttps://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q66470849

Tags

• film director
• animation director
• film producer

Last updated

October 19, 2026

Only publicly available facts are listed; non-public or unconfirmed items are omitted. Base data was compiled from Wikidata from June 2026 onward; ages are recalculated daily and deaths are checked against Wikidata on an ongoing basis. English text is machine-assisted (facts translated by Sonnet, "My Take" written by Opus 4.8). The Japanese page is the source of record.