Written by丨Chen Tong

Editor丨Meiqi

Entertainment Value Officer Interpretation:

ID:wenyujiazhiguan

At the end of 2020, the hit of "Chess Soul" made the live-action comic drama a hot topic of discussion in the industry, and since then, China's comic reform has not only had a new benchmark, but also stood at a new starting point.

Starting from 2021, "Once upon a time there was a Lingjian Mountain", "Dali Temple Shaoqing Tour", "Youth Song Xing", and the drama version of "Under the Stranger" have been out of the circle one after another, and have been recognized by the market and the audience. From group ridicule to "true fragrance", the counterattack of the live-action manga has opened up a new pattern. Especially the drama version of "Under the Alien", after the end of Douban's 8.1 score last year, there is still a lot of stamina, and its actors, main creators and plots and other topics continue to be active in the public's sight, and no one has broken the record of the highest score of domestic dramas created by it.

Just when everyone thought that the live-action comic had entered a relatively mature and stable creative cycle, this year's two blockbuster works poured cold water on the genre head-on. The film version of "Under the Stranger" directed by Wu Ershan, as a seed player in the summer file, caused criticism from the audience after its release, and the box office results were also not satisfactory. "Fox Demon Little Red Lady· Moon Red Chapter", which was launched in June, has always been one of the most anticipated dramas by the audience this year, but after the broadcast, this drama has gradually become a mute, and the number of viewers of a single episode has dropped sharply from more than 400,000 in the early stage to 40,000 in the later stage, falling off a cliff, and finally Douban ended with a score of 5.3, failing to have a miracle of Jedi recovery.

The ups and downs of the quality of the work and the reputation once again prove that this genre is still the hardest hit area of the "overturning" of film and television dramas.

What minefields do the two new comics fall into?

"The "Shanghai Fortress" in the comic reform industry", this is the evaluation given by many viewers after the release of the movie "Under the Alien", which is not very hurtful but extremely insulting.

After the second brush, I re-examined the various criticisms and ridicules of "Under the Alien" on the Internet in a calmer mood, and while admitting that the movie does have many shortcomings, we should not avoid a lot of exaggeration and abuse mixed with the trend. The live-action manga itself is a black physique, many original fans pick thorns with a magnifying glass, and passers-by are easy to follow the trend and complain, and the slightest carelessness will cause bad reviews on the whole network.

Comparing the original book and the drama version, the movie "Under the Inhuman" uses two hours to tell the plot of Zhang Chulan before participating in the Inhuman Competition, mainly the story of Zhang Chulan and Feng Baobao, and then the story of the battle with the four madness. The firepower of the online attack movie "Magic Reform Original" and "Plot Shrinkage" is very fierce, but objectively speaking, due to the limitation of the length of the movie, it is impossible not to delete the original work, director Wu Ershan's narrative ability is remarkable, and the memories are presented in the form of animation, which concisely and clearly explains the past of Zhang Chulan and his grandfather, Feng Baobao's origin, and how Feng Baobao protects Zhang Chulan and other original plots.

In the eyes of the entertainment value officer, the plot flaw of the movie "Under the Alien" is not the "magic change of the original" and "plot shrinkage", but the lack of novelty and ups and downs.

After the secret of college student Zhang Chulan's stunt was discovered, it attracted the competition of various forces on the rivers and lakes, and after overcoming many difficulties along the way, he gradually approached the truth of the murder of his grandfather, and finally defeated the villain with great luck. Such stories are ubiquitous in martial arts novels and Western superhero films, lacking highlights.

At the same time, the movie "Under the Inhuman" also lacks charming characters, and all members are reduced to paper-based narrative tools, and the plot is greatly compressed, making the original single character motivation even more thin and dull. The core of the character creation in the original book is to let people see how the protagonist Zhang Chulan, as an alien with a special background and ability, grows up and faces in this complex environment of symbiosis between people and aliens. Due to the deletion of a large number of small details of the side portrayal of the characters, the growth and arc of the male and female characters are not obvious enough, and the characters become thin and stiff.

In terms of visual effects, it can be seen that the creator used a lot of unrealistic lighting and scenery in order to restore the texture of the comics, but because it is neither close to realism nor comic, there is a cheap taste everywhere, and a huge number of full-medium character shots and poor camera movement are thousands of miles worse than the static storyboard of the original work. The AI animation in the movie has also caused a lot of controversy, and most viewers think that such a creative idea does not add points to the movie, but seems abrupt and perfunctory.

Similar to the movie "Under the Alien", the failure of "Fox Demon Little Red Lady · Moon Red Chapter" also focuses on the three dimensions of plot, characters and visual effects. After the broadcast, there were more and more complaints about "boring", "low plot", "baby fairy", etc., and many viewers thought that this drama was a simple splicing of the plots that may appear in various ancient puppet dramas, and the plot was completely a running account. The growth and change of the characters have no obvious context and logic, lack of personality and charm, and it is difficult for the audience to substitute and empathize. In terms of special effects, this drama is also relatively rough and distorted, which reduces the overall look and feel of the series.

Adapt to the original work, reasonable innovation

It is not difficult to see from the many positive and negative cases of live-action manga in recent years that adaptation is the most important and the most difficult mountain to climb in front of manga dramas. The so-called adaptation includes not only the adaptation of the plot, characters and casting, but also the resonance of the original work at the level of emotional core.

For a successful comic work, the most basic thing is whether it can have a standable world view and characters that impress the audience, and in the process of live-action adaptation of film and television dramas, no matter how deleted and trade-offs, the worldview, temperament, character design and story core of the original work cannot be magically changed, which has been verified by users and the market.

The success of the drama version of "Under the Alien" is precisely because it respects the essence of the original work. In terms of plot choices, the drama version of "Under the Alien" chooses to retain the secret of the Jiashen Rebellion and the truth of its extended "Qi Body Origin", and Sister Bao'er's life experience as the three "hooks" to promote the narrative, and retain the most bright structure of the original work to the greatest extent. At the same time, the series cleverly pre-empts the important characters who appeared in the second half of the original work, such as Taoist priest Wang Ye, and uses the relationship between ordinary people and strangers to promote the development of the plot in advance, which naturally brings out the content structure of the original work.

The character and real-life adaptation of the drama version also successfully avoided the minefield of the movie version, "Don't shake Bilian Zhang Chulan, and Zhang Lingyu with one thought." Don't listen to the gossip Zhuge Qing, and he is as poor as the king. "This familiar slip of the original book is still smooth in the live-action version, and the role is restored enough.

What's more, the characters in the drama version have internal logic and growth arcs, and like the original book, every character in the play is imperfect, and there are various character flaws, whether it is Zhang Chulan, who has a scattered and chaotic personality at the beginning, or Wang Ye, who is too sober, they all have the most true temperament. In the midst of setbacks and grinding, the teenagers gradually grew up, bottomed out, and stimulated their potential "Qi" little by little in the crisis and responsibility, and then went to find different "Taos". The most real and down-to-earth "Inhuman Heroes" can resonate with young people in real society.

On this basis, live-action comics need to innovate in line with the laws of film and television creation, build a clear story structure, and replace the bridges suitable for the performance of the series. The second dimension has the unique style of the second dimension, if you blindly copy the original two-dimensional work to the three-dimensional world, and bluntly meet the so-called god restoration needs of the original fans, it can often only be reduced to four dislikes.

In the process of live-action adaptation, "Youth Song Xing" moderately added more imagination and growth lines, reinterpreting the martial arts scenes and chivalrous spirit. Such a change breaks the stereotype of the sudden upgrade of mortals in the original book, and gives the transformation of the characters a more realistic logic. And it is precisely because of the emotional impact of the interweaving of youthfulness and chivalry that it has a strong attraction and sense of substitution for fans of the show, and finally drives the series to successfully go out of the circle.

The key to the success of "Chess Soul" is also a unique innovation on the basis of respecting the original work, and the drama version cleverly replaces the exaggerated Japanese elements of enthusiasm and secondary two in the original book with the common memories of the post-80s and post-90s youths, and the Chinese-style campus life around the college entrance examination and club activities, the details are convincing, and at the same time, it also increases the Chinese-style relationship between father and son, mother and son, and master and apprentice, and strengthens the emotional context of growth and family. After localization and adaptation, "Chess Soul" is very humane and down-to-earth.

In fact, there is no problem with the adaptation itself, from comics to movies or TV series, it does need to be changed, the key is to be able to convert the comics to film and television dramas without any sense of disobedience, and be loyal to the original work while reasonably innovating, this balance tests the main creator's understanding and refining ability of the core of the original work, and it is also the biggest problem in front of the live-action comic.

value needs to be expanded,

The live-action manga is still in the trial-and-error stage

For a long time, it has not been easy to change live-action comics, and it is often unpopular with both original fans and film and television audiences. But compared with previous years, the film and television dramas in the past two years have shown a prosperous state, although "manga is easy to pounce" seems to have become some kind of "curse", but in the pounce after pounce, the major platforms are still vying for layout, this blue ocean is rapidly becoming red, and the market is approaching saturation.

At present, there are more than 30 live-action manga works to be broadcast or in preparation, and the three major platforms of Aiyouteng are "Nana", "League of Legends", "Spirit Cage", "Legend of the Dark River", "Dartman", "Fox Demon Little Red Lady· King's Power Chapter", "Fox Demon Little Red Lady· Bamboo Industry Chapter", "Open Painting! Girl's Manga and other works will meet the audience one after another.

The reason why live-action comics are becoming more and more frustrated is that, on the one hand, because Generation Z has now become the main consumer force, and it has a huge overlap with the audience of animation IP. On the other hand, with the development of the head online IP one after another, the popular comic IP with diverse types, rich numbers and massive fans is more cost-effective, providing considerable imagination space for the creation of film and television works, and has naturally become a key track for major platforms.

On the other hand, film and television have further enhanced the commercial value of animation, and live-action comic works have made animation no longer limited to the two-dimensional field, breaking through the boundaries of niche carnival subculture. Now, the adaptation of head animation works into live-action dramas is almost the only way to build an animation IP industry chain.

Although the number of successful live-action manga works has increased in the past two years, the realistic problems that are difficult to break the dimensional wall and the unabated status quo of overturned works have also repeatedly shown that domestic live-action manga is still in the early stage of trial and error exploration. Judging from the fatal causes of overturning in recent years, the reasons for the real-life manga to hit the street cover all aspects of the entire industrial chain. From the selection of IP, to the adaptation of the creator, to the icing on the cake of post-production, mistakes in every link may lead to failure.

On the whole, due to the immaturity of the IP industry ecology and the imperfect process system of manga dramas, it is more about "crossing the river by feeling the stones" in terms of how to grasp the audience's psychology, how to break the wall from the second dimension, and how to formulate a business plan that matches the comic IP. How to broaden the seemingly narrow "track" and precipitate a relatively mature and stable adaptation methodology has become the key to the continued progress of live-action comics.

At the same time, the value of mangai products also needs to be further expanded, and a more systematic production process and planning are required. Only by developing and forming a closed loop in the future of the adaptation of the same comic IP, animation, movies, TV series, and games can the value of IP be mined in multiple dimensions and the deep coupling of different forms of works can be promoted.

In the final analysis, live-action comics still need to find a clearer direction for film and television development and form a matrix of masterpieces, so as to bring enough confidence to the audience and the market. Compared with the large-scale manga industry in Japan and the United States, China's live-action manga is still being explored, in this year's manga year, after the successive failures of the two new works, we look forward to Q4 can appear comparable to the drama version of "Under the Alien" A new hit, which will raise the ceiling of the industry again.

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