[This article comes from the WeChat public account "Film and Television Dutongue" and is reprinted by The Paper with permission. Please contact "Film and Television Dutongue" for reprinting. 】
"Do Douban's 8-point dramas still have credibility?" "Why have Douban's ratings become a battlefield between fans and blacks?"
With "I Have a Friend", "Nine Righteous People" and "Secret Agent" successively receiving Douban scores of 8.0 or above, there have been 8 dramas with 8 or above scores since the summer season, and 21 dramas have achieved this result during the year. It has far exceeded the 16 movies in 2022 and the 13 movies in 2021. While people are rejoicing at the improvement in the quality of domestic dramas, they inevitably bring the topic of "Douban score inflation" to the forefront.
Another visible fact is that the public influence of Douban ratings is gradually declining. "I Have a Friend" got an 8.5, "Broker Elite 2" got an 8.6, and "Acacia" got an 8.6... But you will find that the feedback they receive from the public is limited. Most of the dramas with a score of 8 or above did not translate into wider dissemination. In the end, they only gave more confidence in publicity and made the main creator's resume more beautiful.
If we introduce the reference system of the number of people scoring on the basis of the scoring, can we draw a relatively accurate conclusion on the degree of influence? That's not necessarily the case. If the leading actors of "Lotus House" and "I Have a Friend" are swapped, the number of ratings for the latter will probably increase. The role of fans will be revealed.
Putting aside these discussions, if you look at Douban's standards for high-scoring dramas, you will find that not only are the people surfing the Internet changing, but the tastes of those who rate them are also changing. What is behind the inflation of Douban ratings is the long-term effect of the works.
The barrel principle in traditional management believes that the amount of water in a barrel does not depend on the long board of the barrel, but on the short board, and water can be filled up to the height of the short board. The long board theory is also called the anti-barrel theory, which believes that we should not pay too much attention to the short board of the barrel, but should focus on the long board of the barrel.
In today's Douban evaluation, if a certain aspect of a drama, such as the graphics, emotions, or even the appearance of the actors, is particularly outstanding, there is still a chance of getting a high score even if it does not even understand the most basic film and television narrative.
This may be the answer to another topic that people are talking about right now: Why do the works of veteran directors who have been working in the industry for decades often fail to beat new directors on Douban ratings? Why are more and more new directors becoming “Internet celebrities”?
There are few creators who don't care about the Douban score of their works. Didn't Xin Shuang cry for half an hour when he learned that "The Long Season" scored 9.0? It may be difficult for the common sense that only focuses on film and television production to become popular with current audiences. It is equally important to understand people's scoring psychology and process.
Before a more authoritative and recognized scoring platform replaces Douban, we still have to talk about it. We might as well use these high-scoring dramas this year as a basis to see their "longboards" in the eyes of Internet culture.
01 Interaction
The interaction mentioned here refers not only to the interaction between the series and the audience, but also to the interaction between characters. The former is a state, the latter is a feeling, and the key is, I think, nature.
Male viewers rarely tolerate homosexuality in dramas, and female viewers also have a rebellious attitude toward the mass-produced industrial saccharin and the creator's deliberate design. If they want both groups to buy into it, the most convenient way is to eliminate it.
Three years ago, the high-scoring martial arts detective drama "Xia Jian Wan Shi" used sand sculptures and unique painting styles to eliminate the discomfort caused by the forced interaction between Jian Wan Shi and Zhao Wo. This year's "Lotus House" uses the passion of the second grade The tone of the film makes the mutual exchanges between the three male protagonists interesting and funny. When Di Fei said such suggestive words as "I don't need a woman's service", the "addict" went crazy, and those who are not addicted to CP may be afraid He also laughed out loud.
Many viewers who gave "Lotus House" five-star reviews mentioned the joy of watching the drama: the interaction between the three men was particularly interesting, some of the plots were really funny, and the emotions were surprisingly well captured.
In the comment section of "Under the Stranger", we occasionally saw the audience's dissatisfaction with some of the casting choices, but even so, they still gained the happiness of eating CP.
Wang Ye only said to Zhuge Qing, "Have you ever been defeated?", which made people get the strange bond between the Taoist Priest and the worldly male star; The innocent boy Jia Zhengliang threw away 500 yuan, and Feng Baobao was seriously injured because of Zhang Chulan's casual request for "punishment"... The teenagers in the hot-blooded comics come to the drama, and their sense of middle-class status sometimes makes people embarrassed. It's unnatural, but this kind of neutrality eliminates other unnaturalness.
You don’t press the head of the audience to take a bite, but they take a bite. This is effective interaction.
02 respect
In the eyes of the original writers, no matter how good the screenwriter is, he cannot add points to the "masterpiece" in his mind. All original plots are self-righteous "additions", so they always need an attitude, and this attitude is respect.
The key word in the comment area of "Under the Stranger" is "repeatedly jumping horizontally". Some people said "99 points for the first 26 episodes and 0 points for the last episode", and some people said "repeatedly jumping horizontally between branches and crotch pulls". Some people said, "I admit that I spoke a little too loudly before," while others said, "The parts that are not made up are very good," to praise its restoration of the original work and deny its original plot.
Similarly, in the eyes of the audience, the highest evaluation of the drama version of "The Three-Body Problem" is "a book-style adaptation". After this foundation was established, there was further recognition of the character creation (there were also complaints and criticisms at the beginning).
For a wider audience, they also need to see the creator's respect for the work and the audience, that is, "whether they have carefully figured out the preferences of young audiences."
The game world built in "Agent Mission" is much more refined and beautiful than real VR games. The detail processing is rare on the screen. The game plot design is convincing, so the high praise comment in the comment area really speaks out what people feel. : "Baogang, you are so wet that it scares me." It seems that only this kind of affectionate address can further express the audience's joy and recognition of the director.
Even in a short-lived family drama like "Glory of Our Fathers", those suggestive and foreshadowing scenes have been said over and over again.
In fact, when we talked to some creators, they also mentioned that "the current audience is scary, and they can find out no matter how secretive the creator's design is."
Therefore, the word "respect" may seem vague, but in the comment area of the high-scoring drama, the audience's description of it is specific to all aspects.
03 nostalgia
In the past two years, one phenomenon worthy of attention in the entertainment industry is the emphasis on emotions. In other words, the creative trend is such that works that can make people temporarily forget the present and return to the past can often win favor in the market.
"Glory of Our Fathers", "The Long Season", "Once Upon a Time", "Hurry", "13 Years of Ashes"... these dramas, which seem to have very different genres, have conquered a group of audiences with the same nostalgic temperament.
Some people were moved by the living conditions of forestry workers in "The Glory of Our Fathers", some were moved by the atmosphere of the era created in "The Long Season", and some were moved by the "When I Was a Young Man" and "The Days of Chasing the Light" When watching TV dramas to recall their youth, some people experienced the rush of the times in "Hurry" and "13 Years of Ashes".
Randomly excerpting two hot comments from the comment section can sum up the status of this type of drama in the minds of the audience: "As for the stories about the Flying Immortal Crossing the Tribulation Jinjiang Literature, a hundred and eighty episodes are not as good as the one where the male protagonist failed the college entrance examination and was caught in the rain." "It makes people sympathize"; "The subject matter and writing method are more suitable for Chinese babies' constitution" "I like this rhythm, like a broad river of destiny, flowing slowly, quietly and rhythmically into the future".
04 Settings
Last year, when we took stock of the film lists of the four major video platforms, we came to the conclusion that whether to be realistic or surreal will become a must-answer for drama creators. The former emphasizes seriousness and resonance, while the latter emphasizes novel settings and rejects boring routines.
"Agent Mission" does not follow the common life flow of special situation themes, and introduces VR games to build an unprecedented anti-espionage struggle. In addition to the superficial characteristics of "virtual games + reality", we should also see what achievements it has created have been The audience recognized and accepted it.
Some people say that in a film with such a serious subject matter, the style becomes cheerful because of the inclusion of games. Watching Huang Zicheng perform various cross-dressings and drive exotic luxury cars in the game produced a strange visual beauty, especially the episode where he transformed into a female geisha boss was hilarious.
Others say that since the audience has become familiar with the scenes in film and television cities across China and is suffering from visual fatigue, "Secret Agent" provides another solution, which is to drag actors into the game and install them with exaggerated and weird decorations to form a game. The cyberpunk style can also bring freshness to the audience.
"Ancient Acacia" is so unconventional that it allows the audience to see that ancient puppet theater can have more innovations and more pursuits. They said, "In a situation where fairy tales and ancient puppet dramas are becoming more and more homogeneous in appearance and connotation, "Ancient Acacia" is a breath of fresh air, with exquisite service and ancient style in tone, composition, and mirroring. It has ancient charm and the setting of reverse time and space travel is a big breakthrough and it is not out of the ordinary.”
In addition, the first episode is marked as "Episode 14: This is the first episode", and the last episode is marked as "Episode 1: The finale" is also eye-catching - this kind of ingenuity and Bold design is the way web dramas should be played.
"Nine Righteous People" brings the time and space of female suspense dramas back to ancient times, allowing new breakthroughs in the scale of this genre. The parallel writing methods of the upper and lower columns not only make people feel the bone-breaking pain beyond the past, but also provide Get instant pleasure. A sentence in the comment area can reflect the deep affection of the audience: Respect Rulan, respect Wanwan, respect the lamp lit by firewood, and respect hundreds of millions of lamps.
Not to mention fantasy dramas like "Under the Stranger" where costumes are worn. The sense of contrast and immersion is something that costume fantasy dramas cannot provide.
05 Essence
When people talk about a film and television work, they most often discuss whether its story, situation, and actors' performances are real, as if "real" is a self-evident and eternal criterion. However, literary and artistic works should not just stay on the superficial reality, but should be based on the description of the nature of the world and thinking about society.
Just like "The Long Season" is a suspense drama, but people left comments like "What's interesting about it is not the murder, but the fate. The fate of the big factory, the fate of the Northeast"; "The Destroyer Elite 2" is It is a sitcom, but the audience said that it is "full of reflections on reality and the future" and that it is "a rare drama that dares to tell the truth"; "The Three-Body Problem" does not bluntly pay homage to the narratives and narratives of great powers that have been popular in recent years. It's not about the feelings of family and country, but it's full of serious historical review and realistic reflection.
This makes them surpass ordinary dramas in terms of seriousness and thoughtfulness, and it is they that constantly remind every rater to reveal the writing behavior and meaning of the work, which is the meaning of our ratings and comments.
In less than a year, 21 dramas with a score of 8 or above were produced, and more than 60 dramas with a score of 7 or above were produced. This is indeed a rare phenomenon in the Chinese drama market. Some people say that this is the result of Douban's commercial operation, but if you eliminate interference and resistance, and go around the comment areas of various high-scoring dramas, you can still find their "long board" value, whether it is in terms of serving the audience or From the perspective of encouraging oneself, it has enlightening significance.