Huayu 05, our science fiction movie universe

Chapter 686 Break! Break! Break!
A binary opposition is undesirable; problems should be addressed dynamically during construction and development.

This is the core of Galaxy Pictures' new version of the "Nezha" series.

It is no longer simply a rebellion against patriarchy and the system, as depicted in the traditional story of Nezha, where the child cuts off his bones to return to his father and his flesh to return to his mother.

Instead, it represents a completely new ideological core that is more suitable for contemporary society and Chinese culture, and will also form a Chinese story structure that goes a step further than the original "Ne Zha".

In fact, in Wang Hao's view, the Nezha in the original story by director Jiaozi rebelled for the sake of rebelling, which actually occupied the ecological niche of monkeys.

Yes, although Nezha, Sun Wukong, and Yang Jian have always been jokingly referred to by Chinese netizens as the three traitors of Heaven, in reality, the core of their rebellion and the underlying logic are different, and the degree of their rebellion is also different.

Sun Wukong's rebellion represents the awakening of free will.

As a stone monkey born of heaven and earth, his challenge to the Heavenly Court is essentially a natural rebellion against the "constraints of rules".

Whether it's causing havoc in the underworld or shattering the heavens, don't just focus on how chaotic the chaos is; the core demand is always to break free from shackles and pursue a free and unrestrained state of being.

Even when he was recruited by the Heavenly Court and became the Keeper of the Heavenly Horses, and later assigned to guard the Peach Garden, he was still constantly fighting against the system, authority, and discrimination.

This is why Sun Wukong's rebellion was the most intense and highest-level among the three traitors, even attempting to overthrow the Jade Emperor. It was unprecedented in the history of rebellions in Heaven, prompting the Buddha to personally intervene and quell the uprising.

This is why Sun Wukong is the most famous and beloved figure in Chinese folklore.

Because when he was the Great Sage Equal to Heaven in the early stages, his resistance was the most thorough!
In contrast, Yang Jian's resistance manifested as a strategic subversion within the system.

As the Jade Emperor's nephew, he had to maintain his identity as the God of Justice while secretly plotting to rebel against the corrupt order of the Heavenly Court.

Its action logic combines forbearance, strategy, and protection of family ties, showcasing the complexity of a structural rebellion.

Because it was a structural rebellion, Yang Jian's resistance was the least popular, pleasing neither side.

The establishment believed he was rebellious and untrustworthy; the resistance believed he lacked fighting spirit and would only compromise.

However, Yang Jian's resistance was still within the limits of his own power.

Nezha, especially the traditional version of Nezha, is actually the least resistant of the three traitors.

Why?

In traditional stories, Nezha is portrayed as rebelling against patriarchal authority and the system.

But in reality, his act of rebellion was nothing more than returning his bones to his father and his flesh to his mother.

what is this?
This still revolves around the traditional Confucian concept of ruler-subject and father-son relationships.

The most outrageous thing you, Nezha, did was rebel against the concept that "our bodies and hair are given to us by our parents and should not be harmed."

If you're so capable, why don't you chop down Li Jing?

No, Nezha would cut himself but not Li Jing.

This is similar to how in modern society, when a child is mistreated by their parents, they don't know how to fight back, argue, or defend themselves. Instead, they jump off a building, thinking, "I'm going to make you regret this for the rest of your lives." The thought process is actually quite similar.

As for when Nezha will chop down Li Jing?

Only after abandoning his physical body and transforming into a lotus incarnation, thus severing his blood ties with Li Jing as father and son, did they begin to hunt him down.

Even so, he was still thwarted by the exquisite pagoda of the Taoist Ran Deng, and his attempt to kill his father was never successful.

Therefore, among the three traitors, the one everyone likes the most is still the Monkey King.

As for Nezha, even with the promotion of Shanghai Animation Film Studio's "Nezha Conquers the Dragon King" and "Investiture of the Gods," the public, especially young people, don't really like him very much because his rebellion is neither resolute nor thorough.

The "Demon Child" version of Nezha by Jiaozi is actually an adaptation of the old version, which upgrades his rebellion from the original anti-patriarchy to anti-prejudice and anti-system.

But that was only the first "Ne Zha".

In the second film, "The Demon Child Conquers the Dragon King," this rebellion was downgraded to a simple conflict between good and evil.

Yes, despite the word "demon" in Nezha's name, and the fact that he is the reincarnation of a demon, people watching this animation and immersing themselves in it never feel like they are bad people.

People can actually tell the difference; they know that Nezha is good and Wuliang Xianweng is bad.

Nezha's goodness is merely a facade masked by his mischievous behavior.

As for the Boundless Immortal, he was nothing more than a villain disguised as a good person.

Of course, even with some issues in the story's logic and core themes, "Ne Zha 2," directed by Jiaozi, still achieved remarkable success.

The problem lies in the story design; that's a matter of ability, a lack of skill on the part of their creative team. However, their attitude is correct.

People go to the cinema to watch "Ne Zha 2" not to be educated, but mainly to relax and have fun.

Therefore, the extreme use of special effects in the film showed the audience sincerity, and they were less critical of the flaws in the plot.

The only problem is that the second movie satisfied the audience with its sincerity and special effects, but what about the third movie?

If the plot doesn't evolve and just keeps repeating old tropes, audiences will eventually get tired of it. The plot design of "Ne Zha 3" is definitely more difficult than that of "Ne Zha 2".

Fortunately, the new version of "Ne Zha 2: The Demon Child Conquers the Dragon King" is still directed by Jiaozi, and the mature screenwriting team from Xinghe Pictures is also involved in the production process.

Furthermore, the entire Nezha series and the subsequent Fengshen series were all decided and finalized by Wang Hao.

Therefore, this new version of "Ne Zha 2" not only inherits the advantages of Wang Hao's previous version of "Ne Zha 2", but also strives for excellence in the plot, making the story more memorable.

This improvement in film quality translates into tremendous box office success.

On the 10th day of its release, "Ne Zha 2" still grossed a staggering 5.4 million yuan in a single day, while the second-ranked film during the same period, "Hi, Mom," only grossed 1.8 million yuan in a single day.

On this very day, the official account for the movie "Wolf Warrior 3" released a congratulatory video. In the video, the Wolf Fang Squad, led by Wu Jing, was conducting a handover ceremony in the military camp, and the recipients of the handover were none other than Nezha and Ao Bing.

The two animated characters happily accepted the banner embroidered with "66 billion" and "Third in Film and Television" from Wu Jing, jumping and skipping with joy.

Wu Jing, Xie Miao, and other members of the Wolf Fang Squad all shared the video on their own accounts and congratulated "Ne Zha 2" on its achievements.

In addition, as a result, Taopiaopiao.com's final box office prediction for "Ne Zha 2" is no longer as stingy as before, adding only a little bit at a time.

The trend system predicted that the final box office of "Ne Zha 2" would reach an exaggerated figure of 100 billion.

According to the system's algorithm, "Ne Zha 2" has already grossed 66 billion yuan in just 10 days, and it's not impossible for it to gross another 34 billion yuan.

Some fans of "Ne Zha 2" are very happy about this, because they also contributed to the success and achievements of the film.

Many movie fans even went back to the cinema to watch "Ne Zha 2" a second, third, or even fourth time, just to express their love for the film.

Of course, the soaring box office of "Ne Zha 2" has also affected the interests of another group of people, making them start to speak sourly.

Among them were competitors of Xinghe Pictures, who couldn't stand seeing Xinghe Pictures achieve amazing results again, so they started to launch an online army to smear the movie "Ne Zha 2".

There are also those who can't stand seeing Chinese films do well. Seeing that Taopiaopiao.com has predicted that the total box office of "Ne Zha 2" will reach 100 billion RMB, a figure that is so exaggerated that it even surpasses many Hollywood blockbusters, they naturally couldn't help but make sarcastic remarks online and find fault with "Ne Zha 2".

Unlike the previous group, they didn't receive payment for their online trolling activities; they brought their own supplies. However, their enthusiasm for fighting far surpassed that of the former, and they enjoyed engaging in heated online battles with supporters of "Ne Zha 2."

Unfortunately, the voices of these people who belittled "Ne Zha 2" not only failed to affect its box office performance, but on the contrary, their presence actually united many patriots and "Ne Zha 2" fans, and they also put more effort into this film that is likely to set a new record in Chinese film history.

As a result, on the 11th and 12th days of the film's release, "Ne Zha 2" achieved an astonishing increase in daily box office revenue, with both days' daily box office exceeding 6 million RMB, even higher than the previous day's 5.4 million RMB.

Moreover, just 11 days after the release of "Ne Zha 2", the official account of the movie "Operation Red Sea" also released a congratulatory video on various platforms, just like "Wolf Warrior" and "The Martian".

In the video, on the sea, Nezha and Ao Bing, who had transformed into dragons, were playing, but ended up accidentally wandering into the Zhongsha military base.

At the base, they saw China's submarines, aircraft carriers, and airplanes, and were then stopped in front of a square.

What stopped them was a giant mech called "Longbo".

Just as Nezha and Ao Bing got into position, thinking they were about to have a big battle, the giant mecha stretched out its huge steel hand, let the two of them stand on its hand, and then lifted them high above its head. At the same time, a row of Chinese fighter jets flew over the sky, leaving behind colored smoke that formed the number "71 billion".

This number represents the final box office of "Operation Red Sea," and also symbolizes its status as the second highest-grossing film in Chinese film history.

At this point, only "The Three-Body Problem" remains before "Ne Zha 2".

It is currently the highest-grossing film in Chinese film history, with a total box office of 81.72 billion RMB since its release.

However, this number is far from being significantly different from the box office performance of "Ne Zha 2".

Because on its 12th day of release, "Ne Zha 2" had already grossed over 78 billion yuan.

On its 13th day of release, "Ne Zha 2" once again garnered 4.3 million RMB in box office revenue with 57.5% of screenings and 29.9% occupancy rate.

With this added, on its 13th day of release, "Ne Zha 2" had already surpassed 83 billion yuan in total box office revenue.

Now, the title of "Ne Zha 2" as the number one film in Chinese film history is almost well-deserved.

That evening, the official account of "The Three-Body Problem" released a congratulatory video.

However, unlike the congratulatory videos of the previous films, this video features more than just the main actors from the movie in the Three-Body Dream Space.

Wang Jingchun, Wu Jing, Wang Baoqiang, Jing Tian, ​​Zhang Yi, Wang Zhi, Song Zuer, Liu Yifei, Ning Li, Shu Chang, Wan Qian, Aaron Kwok, Jackie Chan, Pan Yueming, Bai Jingting, Liu Haoran, Masami Nagasawa, Satomi Ishihara, Ma Dong-seok...

Even well-known Hollywood actors such as Christian Bale, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Johnny Depp appeared in the video as characters from the [Galaxy Cinematic Universe]. Nezha, holding the Fire-Tipped Spear, stood on the dragon head that Ao Bing had transformed into, soared into the sky, and directly popped the three suns above his head like popping balloons, turning them into a rain of fire.

These fiery rains also contributed to the figures of "82 billion" and "the highest in film history".

That evening, the Chinese internet was almost entirely filled with news about the video and "Ne Zha 2" becoming the highest-grossing film in Chinese film history.

Many people discussed this extensively, while many more applauded and cheered.

Because they are undoubtedly witnessing history, witnessing the cultural undertakings of China finally reaching a new level.

And the key point is that this is far from the box office limit of "Ne Zha 2".

On the one hand, it has only been released in the country for 13 days, and the entire release period is not even halfway over.

On the other hand, this only represents the domestic box office.

It's worth noting that Wang Hao's previous film, "Ne Zha 2," only grossed $6 million overseas.

The problems are multifaceted: some films only have subtitled versions and no English versions; some distribution companies are not effective in their promotion; some foreigners are not interested in Chinese culture; and some face discrimination and suppression from certain forces.

But things are different now. The producer of "Ne Zha 2" is Galaxy Pictures, which is backed by Galaxy Group, a large multinational cultural enterprise.

Over the years, relying on the major IP of the "Galaxy Cinematic Universe", it has made extensive progress overseas and has many partners. Its channels have been opened up in terms of censorship, distribution and theaters.

Moreover, even though the influence of Galaxy Group's works in North America has declined in recent years due to political reasons, the East Asian cultural sphere, which they have cultivated for a long time, is still a huge market.

In fact, on the 10th day after "Ne Zha 2" was released in China, it had already officially landed in Hong Kong.

At the premiere of "Ne Zha 2" in Hong Kong, the local film industry peers gave it a lot of face.

The four heads of Oriental Film Production, Lai Sun Group, Sil-Metropole Organisation, and Eagle Group, as representatives of the cinema chains, almost all attended as officiating guests.

Meanwhile, most of the well-known artists in the Hong Kong film and television industry, led by Jackie Chan, also came to show their support. The Hong Kong premiere of "Ne Zha 2" can be described as a gathering of stars and a lively event.

(End of this chapter)