Film and variety, who is his father？
Author | Li Na Mao
Editor | Li Chunhui
The variety show in 2021 is not easy. There were no explosions in more than 50 music ensembles, and the draft variety show was stopped halfway. The love ensemble and slow ensemble were silently broadcast, and the outdoor variety show even became a problem because of the epidemic.
There is also no big explosion in overseas variety shows. South Korea is still the dominant program of those old-fashioned programs, and the women’s group show "Plante 999", which brought players from China, Japan and South Korea, failed to arouse heated discussion in the three countries as expected. Under the overall downturn, the derivative variety shows of the two series are still quite eye-catching.
One is from the popular Korean drama "The Wit Doctor’s Life". The play premiered in 2020 and ended completely after two seasons. However, the audience was reluctant to part with the "Doctor Five", so the derivative variety "Wit Camping Life" appeared, and the response was quite good. This year, there was "Wit Mountain Village Life" to entertain the audience.
Another popular variety, I won’t hurt you, comes from the hot Korean drama "Top Floor" last year.. In the play, three bad men, Yan Jijun, Tae-gyu Bong and Yin Zhongyu, set out on a journey of atonement in a country house called "secret base" to entertain friends and show their faces different from those in the play. Of course, other leading actors in "Top Floor" are also invited.
It is logical to combine drama with synthesis and eat more than one fish. There have been many attempts in China, but they are not too successful. Which side should go first, film and television or variety show? How to derive can we truly empower each other in two ways instead of consuming goodwill?
The drama reform of "can’t afford to help"
Next door, South Korea’s derivative variety shows have a good reputation and broadcast volume, and "Wit Life" even has a trend of regular variety shows once a year. However, domestic derivative variety shows are always limited to small circles.
To put it bluntly, the audience is still very enthusiastic about the reunion of the hot drama actors. "Ace to Ace" is not eaten for so many seasons by playing "sentimental cards". In the early years, the special programs of "Art Life" such as "The Red Chamber" and "Journey to the West" can also be broadly regarded as the derivative content of the drama series.
Apart from the reunion of big dramas, "choosing the people in the drama" based on the drama series is also a variety of derivative dramas, such as Looking for Zi Ling by Hunan Satellite TV and Man in a Dream of Red Mansions by Beijing Satellite TV. However, with the comprehensive development of draft variety, this kind of casting variety gradually disappeared in the market.
Strictly speaking, the domestic drama derivative variety show was born two years ago.In 2019, Z.TAO and Sophie starred in "Hot Blood Boys" broadcast, and iQiyi launched a derivative variety "Help! I’m going to work, which became the first real drama derivative variety show in China.
Although the "first file" halo was born, the performance of "Help" is not satisfactory, and many people have never heard of it. Probably due to inexperience, Help Me takes Liu Yuning, one of the leading roles of Hot Blood Boys, as the sole protagonist of the variety show, and only VIP can catch up with it, which makes it more like a personal fan show.
Also in 2019, The Untamed, a blockbuster drama, also launched a derivative variety "Teenagers Listening to Learn" at the end of the year. Supposedly, there are many girls who are in love, but "Listening to Learn" has little volume.
On the one hand, the variety show has been on the line for several months after the series was broadcast, and some of the drama powder has already found another wall; On the other hand, there are five episodes, and the first two episodes are mainly about concert tidbits. This is not so much a variety show, but more like a hodgepodge of shooting tidbits and cast building.
In 2020, the derivative variety of drama series began to explore more abundant forms of expression, and "The Temples are not Begonia Red" is a typical example.
The core of "Temples" is Peking Opera. A week after the series was broadcast, a Peking Opera talk show called "See you on stage" was launched. Wang Peiyu, the boss of the famous old woman, is the main MC of this program.
"See you on the stage" is not a great success. Boss Yu is in town to ensure the quality of the program, but the program itself has little connection with the drama series, and it makes sense to say that it is an independent program, but this practice undoubtedly wastes the drainage advantage of the drama series IP.
In a number of derivative variety shows,The spin-off program "Stewed Sydney with Rock Sugar and Love Beans" of the sweet drama "Stewed Sydney with Rock Sugar" is similar to the production idea of Korean spin-off variety show.The leading role of variety show is the leading role in the drama, which shows the other side of the leading roles through different themes in each issue, provides after-sales service for the audience and tries to extend the influence of the drama as much as possible.
However, the audience of Xiaotianju is limited, and the program duration is limited in the form of micro-variety, and there are too many contents to be carried-CP after-sales, popular science of skating, the other side of actors, youth culture, etc., which make the program content too fragmented.
A comprehensive reform drama that "can’t get through"
Basically, the variety show derived from drama series didn’t make a noise among the masses, and many people didn’t even know there was such a variety show. In contrast, variety derivative films are "famous". Although it is a bad name, for example, the famous "variety movie" of that year.
The earliest variety movies can be traced back to the era of fast men.07 Fast Boys were so popular in the country that only 05 Super Girls could wrestle with them. Mango knows how to eat more than one fish, so in 2009, it launched the variety derivative film Le Huo Boy. Unfortunately, there was a gap of two years between the release of the film and the explosion of the program, and the film ended up with a dismal box office of 3.27 million.
During the four years from 2009 to 2013, several variety movies were born one after another: Let’s Date, a movie of the same name derived from the blind date program; The Voice of China, an explosive sound synthesis, turned around for you; and the New Year comedy Happy Home, starring five hosts of Kuaiben. Several films have poor word-of-mouth box office. Happy Home broke 80 million yuan in the first week, but it has become a recognized bad film, and there are still sequelae.
It was not until 2014 that the derivative film of the same name "Where is Dad?" was released that it was a turnaround, and the 700 million box office is still the leader in this kind of film.
With 2014 as the peak, the subsequent variety films continued to decline. Although the box office of Running Man’s "Extreme Challenge" movies of the same name has exceeded 100 million yuan, the score is basically below 5 points. The comedy variety "Happy Comedian" adopted the mode of original crew and foreign aid, and invited Mr. Bean and boxing champion holyfield to help out, but the box office was still bleak.
There are some problems such as a relatively long production cycle and not all variety audiences are willing to pay movie tickets for MC. What about the performance of the comprehensive reform drama?
Diors man is the best performance in the comprehensive reform drama. The play is derived from the talk show "Dapeng Ba Ba", but strictly speaking, "diors man" is not a drama series, but more like a combination of talk show and sitcom.
The new love era, a derivative drama of If You Are the One, is also remarkable. However, the relationship between this drama and dating programs has been very weak, and Morphy, Le Jia and other program hosts only showed a small face in the drama.
As for The Number One Suspect derived from The Star Detective, I am a big star derived from The Big Coffee Show, and The Adventures on a Journey to the West, etc., there were fans who contributed to the viewing, but all of them had poor reputation, which was purely a consumption of IP.
It is not difficult to find that the variety derivative films with good performance basically have little to do with the original IP, and the deeper the bundle, the worse the performance. Obviously, the variety show is very popular, and MC also has an audience. Why is it "paste" when it is adapted into a film and television work?
On the one hand, the derivative dramas in recent years have the problem of shoddy and chopped leeks. Especially the film and television works derived from the talent show, the show people themselves have no acting skills, and forced to go into battle can only be a word-of-mouth rollover;
On the other hand, just as many variety café s turn their heads to play TV series, which makes people feel like a play, the audience has accepted MC’s design in variety shows, and has a preconceived impression. When watching derivative films, it is difficult to get into the play again.
Who comes first in drama synthesis?
The combination of drama and synthesis is the inevitable pursuit of industrial efficiency. From the feedback of overseas and domestic markets,Drama derivative variety seems to be more logical than variety derivative film and television.It can further expand the influence of IP itself while providing after-sales service for drama powder, and even realize independent walking of derivative variety.
In China, it can be said that there is rich experience in the variety show derived from sentimental cards. At present, most of the dramas that join the sentimental derivative package are childhood memories. In fact, new dramas can also be sold in this way.
What the audience of this kind of program wants to see is nothing more than those unknown interesting things when the crew filmed. Nowadays, many online dramas are releasing this kind of content by shooting tidbits and actors’ eggs in order to keep the drama powder. But this method is enough for solid powder, and the effect of new absorption is average.
What kind of drama derivative variety, which can both strengthen the powder and attract the newcomer into the pit, might as well take Han Zong as a reference.
Wit Doctor’s Life and Top Floor are both explosive dramas in Korea. The former takes the quality route and has always enjoyed a good reputation. Although the latter has no logic, Jin Shunyu’s screenwriter is well versed in the audience’s psychology, and the viewing situation is also remarkable. As a derivative variety of hot dramas, Wit Life in a Mountain Village and Won’t Hurt You have their own attention.
In terms of content, these two derivative variety shows have achieved "no special supply", which is the reason why they can capture the audience to the maximum extent.
Many derivative variety shows will position themselves as "after-sales drama powder" in their creation, which will shut out the audience who have never seen the drama, and finally become a small group of people to entertain themselves.
There are also some derivative variety shows that always hope to let the audience learn something when making, so they add a lot of popular science content and invite experts to sit in the town, which may even dissuade some drama powder. "Watching variety shows is for recreation. I want to watch CP giving candy in the play and don’t want to learn knowledge." Some viewers said so.
There should be mutual echo between derivative variety and drama series. For example, the main MC of "I won’t hurt you" is the "bad men" who make people hate their teeth itch in "Top Floor", so when making the program, the main line is "the national representative villain three brothers’ plan to find their true colors"; In The Wit Doctor’s Life, the friendship of five people is the highlight, and the derivative variety show also revolves around the "friendship of five people".
Derivative variety and drama series should not be tied too closely. Although "Life in the Mountain Village" and "I won’t hurt you" have main lines echoing the drama series, the specific contents are centered around the popular lifestyles such as picnics and camping, which have little to do with the drama series, even those who have never seen the drama will not be dissuaded.
In addition, because there are enough conflicts in the drama, the pastoral slow variety is more suitable as a form of derivative variety. In the play, CP’s casual physical contact when working together is enough to make the "drug-taking chickens" scream and send sugar; The slow country life is also a kind of slow enjoyment for the ordinary audience.
In recent years, many viewers have been deeply involved in the play, and even went to the actor social platform to insult hundreds of things. Slow variety shows are more convenient for the audience to discover the other side of the actors. Zhou Dantai, who is cunning and fierce in "Top Floor", has been scolded, but after "I won’t hurt you" is broadcast, who can not like Yan Jijun who works silently and is reliable and cute?
For our favorite drama, we always hope that it won’t end, that it can go on all the time, and that these people can stay together for a long time. Hard candy gentleman throws a brick to attract jade. I think sitcom is very suitable for drama reform. For example, The Story of the Cooking Squad, such as Legend of Wulin, such as ipartment, if these people can gather together another variety show, wouldn’t it be a dream come true for many people?