Text | Ling Hu Boguang
The Hollywood blockbuster "Black Panther 2" has been released for 10 days, and the box office has not exceeded 100 million. At the same time, the box office of the film ranks seventh, if it can't beat "The Wandering Earth 2" and "Manjiang Red", even the controversial "Nameless" and "Deep Sea" of domestic films have not been beaten.
The film's prediction of the total box office in China has just exceeded 100 million, which is indeed a bit miserable. You must know that this film is the first Marvel blockbuster to return to the mainland market after 3 years, which is a Hollywood blockbuster that has swept the world (although the Chinese box office of "Black Panther 2" is not good, it is good at the world box office).
At the same time, the annual Super Bowl is held in the United States, and the movie routine is promoted first. The Hollywood blockbusters that have been trailers in recent days include "Transformers 7", DC's "The Flash", Family Man "Fast and Furious 10", "Indiana Jones 5", "Guardians of the Galaxy 3" and so on.
I don't know if you found a phenomenon that you haven't found, that is, under the preview of the major domestic Internet platforms. If it is a foreign blockbuster, it is a sound of expectation (occasionally a little ridicule), but if it is a domestic movie, there is a similar scolding plagiarism, there is a bad special effect scolding traffic, and there is no need to mention the traffic.
The result? We also don't predict the quality of this Super Bowl Hollywood blockbuster, after all, it is not reliable that the movie has not been released. But according to the quality of Hollywood blockbusters released in recent years, it is basically full of effects when the trailer is made, netizens have various expectations, and they have complained after the movie was released.
As for the reason, it is the same as the "Black Panther 2" that is being released, including the previous "Avatar 2". Now the problem of Hollywood blockbusters is really getting worse, and it is probably really about to "die".
The box office in 7 days did not break 100 million, why is "Black Panther 2" so crotch pulling compared with "Avatar 2"
is also a Hollywood blockbuster, "Avatar 2" has a lot of complaints on word of mouth. But its box office results are much better than "Black Panther 2", with a box office of 1.67 billion in China, while the world's box office exceeds the $2.4 billion of "Titanic", but "Black Panther 2" is more than a little and a half.
To say that the big IP Marvel and Black Panther are also big IPs, to some extent much more correct than "Avatar".
This reason is probably an author-type technology special effects blockbuster, which is still much stronger than the IP superhero movies of the commercial assembly line. What's more, compared to the quality of the plot alone, "Avatar 2" is just old-fashioned, and "Black Panther 2" and Marvel movies at this stage, the entire superhero movie, like most Hollywood blockbusters, is really bad.
"Black Panther 2" is really difficult to say, such as casually saying a few plots, it is really more illogical than "Avatar 2".
The Queen of Wakanda actually drowned in her palace? And to save the little girl, the little girl survived, and the queen died? After Su Rui entered the realm of ancestors, he met the money leopard, and he blamed the money leopard for burning all the heart-shaped grass, resulting in the death of his brother and the death of his mother.
She was able to have such a good relationship with the little girl who created the vibranium detector, and it can be said that this war was caused by the detector made by the little girl, because the detector detected the vibranium of Talokan.
And everyone is willing to listen to Su Rui's opinion, not because Su Rui's opinion is very good, but because Su Rui has lost a lot, so everyone is willing to listen to Su Rui's opinion.
In the end, Aquaman and Su Rui fought, and Su Rui actually chose to let Aquaman go, let Aquaman withdraw his troops, saying that he could protect Talokan. As a result, Su Rui, portrayed before this, is the kind of image that wants revenge and is carried away by revenge.
The female general of the sea king said: I follow you faithfully, and you have submitted to Wakanda. Aquaman said that Wakanda would also be attacked, and Wakanda would come to us when the time came.
As for the various most developed countries on the planet in the film, it turned out to be two tribes fighting. Finally, all kinds of high-tech spears, daggers and weapons go to the group fight. All kinds of political games, character building, and the logical support of the story plot are all like child's play. These are entangled with the zzzq flooded in Hollywood now, and the movie will naturally become more and more ugly.
Although "Avatar 2" also has this set, but we look back now. It is still the world's top at least at the technical level, and it may not be so obvious because it is the Na'vi who engage in ZZZQ, and these combined with Cameron's technology and first sentiment still make audiences around the world quite buy.
However, even if it is "Avatar 2" with good results, we will find that Hollywood blockbusters are not very good.
When Marvel DC, well-known IPs constantly fried cold rice? I knew Hollywood blockbusters were dying
You can still complain about the problems of "Black Panther 2" and "Avatar 2" themselves. And in recent years, Hollywood blockbusters have become more and more flooded with zzzq, industrial assembly line production, etc., which infringe on the character logic of a normal movie, the narrative plot, including the special effects are getting worse and worse now.
Strictly speaking, these are still just the phenomenon of Hollywood blockbusters getting worse, not the cause. The fundamental reason should be the birth of "Iron Man" in 2008, with the rapid growth of the Marvel universe into a giant beast for ten years, resulting in Hollywood blockbusters flooding various universes, and every year when blockbusters are full of sequels, prequels, sequels, reboots, and derivative film and television dramas of well-known IPs.
Although it had reached its peak in "Avengers 4", I knew at that time that Hollywood blockbusters were about to die.
The fundamental logic behind this is that the current US film and television industry chain is no different from China's traffic economy in previous years. This can be extended to the practical aspects of the US national strength, cultural self-confidence and social environment behind it.
I think back then, when I watched "Saving Private Ryan" for the first time, the strings and the deep trumpet, Tom Hanks sacrificed at the end of the film, and the camera came out of Ryan's memories again, hugging with his family, and the flying stars and stripes, which made me get goosebumps. The problem was only learned after the hype that "Saving Private Ryan" was filmed as if it was in documentary mode on the surface, but most of its plot was made up, without any real story as a prototype (except for the landing part).
The real situation is that there were indeed cases in the United States where all five brothers in the family died in World War II, but the US government and military did not send people to the rescue! No one was sent to the rescue! No one was sent to the rescue! These soldiers are just consumables in the eyes of the US government, will you ride more consumables to save one?
Hollywood blockbusters of modern warfare such as "Field Platoon", "Apocalypse Now", "Full Metal Shell", "Forrest Gump", "Saving Private Ryan", "Schindler's List", "The Pianist", "13 Hours of Crisis", "Green Zone", "Body of Lies", "War Horse" and so on, it is still a good film to watch today.
But nowadays, many thoughtful screenwriters, directors, and actors in Hollywood in the United States have turned to making TV series. There are naturally few good movies, and the traditional Hollywood cinema line model has lost to the Internet, to Netflix, HBO, Amazon and Apple TV. It lost to Marvel, DC and Disney commercial blockbusters.
I occasionally watch Hollywood movies, but with the collapse of the lighthouse ideology and "universal values", there are really not many American blockbusters that can enter my eyes. Especially war movies, the kind of war blockbusters with the main theme of the United States, are really too lazy to watch.
Cinema used to be an art, and everyone entered the cinema with a strong sense of ritual to sit in rows and watch movies like watching a song and dance concert. But with the development of the epidemic, limiting the sustainable development of the traditional theatrical film industry, today's movies have degenerated to Netflix to watch at home, without a sense of ritual, the movie is just a popular cultural product, essentially no different from computers, console games.
DC rebooted again, Marvel is getting worse? Are Hollywood blockbusters still worth looking forward to?
The real core behind is that after these years of development, the unity of values in the United States and even Europe and the United States has been seriously damaged in the past ten years, and it is difficult to unify opinions. If it is Hollywood in the past, in the face of this kind of thing, there must be all kinds of voices, giving the public a very neutral view of Hollywood's position.
Then, under the packaging of this look and feel, a series of films with different specific content and different but consistent core concepts are launched quietly but tacitly. Hollywood has long been unrivaled in this regard, and can very skillfully and closely design a variety of artistic expressions with great persuasive and assimilative power.
But the cornerstone of all this is the macro-unity of values in American society as a whole. Only when the macro is unified can various micro different opinions become a hundred flowers.
The "authority" of the Academy Award comes from the "personalized" interpretation of the Academy Award, which has been closely attached to the premise of "loyalty" to Western culture for more than 90 years, and is more carefully considered, just like the relationship between vines and trees. The "authority" of the Academy Award is closely related to the adjustment of mainstream Western values and the macro-unification of internal consensus.
When Western culture is consistent enough and dominates overwhelmingly mainstream and will not be swayed by other secondary genres, the "authority" of the Academy Award can be reflected, and the higher the degree of recognition. When you look at this, you can understand why the Oscars have become increasingly controversial over the past few years.
But now, the foundation of the unifying values that originally underpinned Hollywood has been shaken.
In the past many years, the Oscars have been valued because they can represent the majority of ideas in their own cultural environment, have a dual meaning of practicality and ritual, and are of great reference value for filmmakers. And when this reference value is lost, it is because the object to which Oscar is attached is no longer stable.
Hollywood blockbusters are getting worse and worse, which not only shows that people's lives are in question as the most developed commercial society in the world. This pop culture is a shadow of people's spiritual life.
This shows that the mainstream Western society has begun to be confused about the definition of the state and justice. People no longer know what a state is, what justice is, and therefore what a hero is; I don't know how to redeem myself in these chaotic times, let alone save the world.
The old Western values are dying, new values have not yet been born, and people do not know the direction of development, and they do not know where science and technology will go today. Finally, the creation fell into the identity debate of identity politics, and the commercial social attributes were brought into play to the maximum assembly line.
In this way, can Hollywood blockbusters not suck?
First "Avatar 2", now "Black Panther 2", why did Hollywood blockbusters fall off the altar?
Finally, I personally don't like Hollywood blockbusters very much since "Fast and Furious 8", this series of movies made me deeply aware of how strong American individual heroism is, in order to highlight the aura of the protagonist, how many people are injured or even killed, how many cars are scrapped is not a thing.
At least for someone like me, who has been deeply influenced by Chinese collectivism since childhood, it is really unacceptable.
But it was still the peak of Hollywood, the peak of Marvel and superheroes, and everyone was reveling. As a result, the epidemic has reduced the production of Hollywood movies, and at the same time made me realize the fact that Hollywood's assembly line blockbusters can only keep the audience fresh if they are constantly released, and the constant impact can keep the audience fresh about them.
But if you play like this, sooner or later you will go crazy, in fact, it has really become more and more serious in recent years.
Of course, with the accumulation of national strength of the United States and the West, this Hollywood blockbuster can survive for many years, and this is only a commercial blockbuster, literary films and some genre films are still doing well, even commercial blockbusters have a lot of Chinese films worth learning. But in the eyes of many Chinese audiences, I believe that it is really dying.