On February 17, the fourth season of Hunan Satellite TV's interactive music variety show "I Want to Sing with You" recorded the first episode in Changsha, and after 5 years, this "Xingsu Chorus" program was launched again. On February 1, the "2023 Hunter Recruitment Order for All Staff Acceleration" was released, after 7 years, this large-scale creative reality game show "All Staff Acceleration" that was broadcast for two consecutive seasons in 2015 and 2016 confirmed to restart, and by the time of publication, the topic of "All Staff Accelerated Confirmation Restart" on Weibo was read 140 million times, and netizens expressed great expectations.
The restart of old variety shows is becoming a new trend in the variety show market. The third season of the music variety show "Summer of the Band" released a band recruitment statement in August last year, announcing that it will be broadcast in 2023; "Venus Show 2022" (tentative name) has also announced a restart. The previously broadcast "Variety Big Coffee Show" season six, "Flowers and Teenagers Camping Season" and so on are also veteran reboot variety shows.
The restart of many veteran variety shows is imminent
Why did the variety show that has been off the air for many years meet the audience again? Some insiders said that these veteran variety shows have a good reputation and a fixed audience group, which is also the basic plate for the survival of a variety show. The predictability and stability of old shows are high, and at the same time, the difficulty of establishing new variety shows and highlighting the encirclement is also increasing, and the restart of old variety shows is a good choice.
In the discussion of "nostalgic variety shows" on the Internet, "I want to sing with you", "All members are accelerating", "Summer of the Band" and "Venus Show" are prominently listed.
"I Want to Sing with You" is an interactive music variety show launched by Hunan Satellite TV, which has been broadcast for 3 seasons from 2016 to 2018, from the initial large and small screen interaction, star chorus, to the third season to adhere to the creative direction of "grassroots elements", the program mode changes with the times, relaxed and novel, gaining a group of loyal audiences. Wang Qin, the general director of the program, said, "The old variety show has a natural attraction for the audience and has become a 'nostalgic symbol'. As a classic variety show, the program has matured in mode and content design, although the 'classic IP' temporarily withdrew from the TV stage, but 'classic never goes out of style', the audience's expectations, the market yearning, the two hit it off. ”
The program "All Acceleration" sets up that the "acceleration team members" must evade the pursuit of the "hunters" and complete the task as much as possible in a limited time and venue. The first season was designed by screenwriter Yu Zheng story, each episode has a theme plot, after the broadcast in 2015, the ratings were double-harvested, with a Douban score of 8.6 points, and more than half of the audience gave 5 points of praise. Some netizens said that "All Staff Accelerating" brings the audience a tense and exciting immersive experience through the setting of plot + variety show, theme + game, among which the hunting plot of "hunter" to "acceleration team member" makes people's blood boil.
Unfortunately, the second season of "All Staff Acceleration" in 2016 failed to continue the success of the previous season, and the Douban score dropped to 4.8 points. Many viewers believe that the tension and excitement of the second season of the hunt plot is reduced, the character design is biased towards cosplay (cosplay games), and the plot is slightly dragged and boring. However, even if the second season of "All Acceleration" did not continue after it was broadcast, it still made many fans worry about "difficult to settle".
The first two seasons of the original music variety show "Summer of the Band", produced by iQIYI and co-produced by Mi Wei Media, premiered on iQIYI in May 2019 and July 2020 respectively. The show is mainly based on the interpretation of representative Chinese bands, touching the audience with feelings, and the bands that have been dormant for many years have connected with fans through variety shows, and bands such as New Pants, Hedgehogs, and Pain Yang have come out of the circle. The first season of "Summer of the Band" scored 8.7 points on Douban, nearly 70,000 viewers gave 5 points of praise, and the festival has 11 issues, gaining 233 hot searches on the whole network.
In September 2021, Youku officially announced that "Venus Show 2022" (tentative name) is about to return, but the show has not yet met the audience. "Venus Show" is positioned as a "large-scale fashion culture talk show", which was broadcast on Oriental Satellite TV in January 2015 and announced that it would stop broadcasting in September 2017. This talk show hosted by the well-known dancer Jin Xing directly hit the hot spots of entertainment and paid attention to issues such as people's livelihood, and the topicality and ratings were eye-catching.
"Rebirth" is not easy
In addition to the above programs, in the Weibo topic #Which variety show reboot I want to see the most#, "Where is Dad Going", "Zhengda Variety Show", "We All Love to Laugh", "Very 6+1", "Love Laughing Conference Room", "I Love to Remember Lyrics", "The More Strategy, the Happier Happy", "The Wall is Coming" and other "ancient variety shows" have higher voices, which are variety shows called for restart by netizens.
For platforms and content production teams, restarting old programs can reduce publicity costs and trial and error costs. Whether the variety show of "investment first" can impress the brand owner is the key to whether it can be broadcast smoothly. In terms of credibility and reputation, the old IP undoubtedly has a value-added effect, which is unmatched by many new programs. This is evidenced by the slow comprehensive IP "Flowers and Teenagers Camping Season", which has returned after many years, and has won 12 brand sponsorships.
However, it is not impossible to copy the original model of classic variety shows, and the sigh of "nostalgia for success and nostalgia for failure" is not uncommon. Judging from the recent "resurrection" programs "Variety Big Coffee Show" season 6 and "Flowers and Teenagers Camping Season", the two shows have not been able to create the glory of the year again in terms of word of mouth and popularity, with the Douban score of the sixth season of "The Variety Big Coffee Show" only 6.0 points, and the Douban score of "Flowers and Teenagers Camping Season" 5.8 points.
In this regard, some insiders said, "The old variety show wants to 'shine' in addition to the 'continuation', and the difficulty is no less than developing a new show, because its propositional scope and creative space are limited." When the program team keeps doing a show repeatedly, how to enhance the freshness of the audience while ensuring that the program framework remains unchanged? How to cope with the increasing expectations of the audience? ...... These all need to be landed. ”
Wang Qin
Which is more difficult, making IP or keeping IP? Wang Qin believes that "the audience is more demanding. Restarting variety shows requires not only the 'nostalgia' that evokes feelings, but also a new 'inheritance' that grows with the audience and the times. Creating variety show IP requires innovation and operation capabilities, repeated research and creation, and development; Adhering to classic variety shows requires a new core of the times, with the reinvention of keeping pace with the times, the courage to start again, and the courage not to be afraid of failure, in order to ride the wind and waves in the thorny bush and kill the bloody road. ”
The veteran variety show that will resume broadcasting this year is also facing great challenges. You know, many viewers miss only the first season of "All Acceleration", and after the second season was "renewed", it was disliked by the audience, and the ratings and ratings declined. After the official announcement of the restart, many netizens left messages saying, "Don't do it if it's not the first season mode." ""Summer of the Band" awakens the audience's memories of rock and the spirit of rock, but there is a shortage of talents in niche categories such as rock, and how to break the bottleneck after the restart of the show and set the format and mode that can stand the test of time and the market requires more effort from the team.
Restart the way for variety shows to break through
How to meet the high expectations of the audience is a difficult problem that most veteran reboot shows must face.
"Reboot must balance both success and innovation." Wang Qin said that while adhering to the core of "star-prime interaction and national chorus", the new season of "I Want to Sing with You" presents the stage of amateur dreams, shows the story of amateur dreams, focuses on highlighting the value guidance between music and dreams, and tries content innovation and sublimation. "In the context of the increasing diversity of artistic creation and values, whether it is cultural programs or variety shows, it is very important to be able to give people spiritual comfort and value guidance. This is the value of the return of the fourth season of "I Want to Sing with You". ”
According to reports, in order to allow more music lovers to have a stage to sing happiness and express their dreams, the fourth season added a model of 100 people wanting to sing and guest chorus. Host Wang Han will also pay more attention to amateur guests this year, he will go out of the studio, to discover the variety of life, to listen to the voice of labor, invite amateurs on the stage, show a vivid spiritual outlook.
According to the announced information, the third season of "All Staff Acceleration" will invite 16 artists to open the survival game challenge, with new upgrades in scenes, rules and spiritual connotations, "subverting multi-time and space narratives, innovating game mechanisms and survival rules"; The third season of "Summer of the Band" also openly invited bands with lead singers, instruments, original and adaptation capabilities, and at least one original Chinese work, in an effort to discover more treasure bands and start a new season of music summer.
"Nostalgia is an element and a strategy. For the show, the use of nostalgic elements can have a multiplier effect with half the effort. However, nostalgia is not simple, and restarting variety shows requires deep insight into the psychological needs of the audience and social and emotional changes, in order to continue to grow deep roots and flourish. Wang Qin said that both the market environment and the potential of the program itself have given the former ace programs the opportunity to rejuvenate, and also opened a door for platforms, TV stations and advertisers to pursue innovation. In her opinion, restarting variety shows is not only about copying the original model, "For classics, is it prudent to maintain the original state, or bold innovation trial and error?" I am afraid that the answer can only be: change what needs to be changed, and keep what needs to be retained. Moving with the times"
Some industry experts believe that "IP manufacturing is from 0 to 1, and IP keeping is from 1 to 2." Whether it's from 0 to 1, or from 1 to 2, it's more important to make a good-looking, inspiring show. Because the audience does not ask 'what is your breakthrough', but cares about what surprises and emotions the show can bring. ”