Marvel dumb, is there still a drama in "The Big Year of Imported Films"?

Author| clearly

Edit| fig

Following "Black Panther 2", which has been released for more than half a month and has just exceeded 100 million at the box office, "Ant-Man and Wasp: Quantum of Solace" (hereinafter referred to as "Ant-Man 3") is also muted.

As of press time, the box office of "Ant-Man 3" is only 220 million, and the predicted box office landing point of Maoyan Professional Edition has been lowered from 300 million + to 200 million +, and on the seventh day of release, the position of the single-day box office champion has given way to the old Spring Festival film "The Wandering Earth 2". Considering that the box office of the previous works of the two Marvel blockbusters was 662 million for "Black Panther", 670 million for "Ant-Man", and 831 million for "Ant-Man 2", this result can be described as shrinking by more than two-thirds. The reputation is also slightly tragic: the Douban score of "Black Panther 2" is only 5.4 points, and the Douban and Maotao scores of "Ant-Man 3" are only 6.1 points, 8.8 points, and 8.7 points.

This makes the 5 imported films that will be ushered in in March, including the more heavy-weight two, the DC blockbuster "Thunder Shazam! Wrath of the Gods" and Makoto Shinkai's new film "Journey to the Bell Buds" are also less optimistic.

It is rumored that this year's box office goal is to "ensure 50 billion and strive for 60 billion", the task seems to be a little arduous, the start of the Spring Festival file is red enough, but hidden dangers such as the shortage of domestic films and the lack of strength of imported films still exist. From the beginning of the year to now, a large number of imported films have been finalized, but there is a lack of 1 billion + heavyweight players, what is the problem? Marvel collapsed, can "non-Marvel imported films" stand up?

Marvel Falls: Ragnarok

The ups and downs of the Marvel Cinematic Universe in China not only witness the different stages of development of the Chinese film industry, the speed of screen expansion and the progress of market outbreak, but also constitute a very important part of Marvel's own global conquest.

In 2008, Marvel's first phase of "Iron Man" became the first work to knock on the door of China, at this time the Chinese theater screen has not been expanded, "Avengers 1" mainland box office 568 million yuan, landed on the sixth annual box office, the second stage with the expansion of Chinese theaters, "Guardians of the Galaxy" and "Captain America 2" have gained a high reputation, "Iron Man 3" won the runner-up of the annual box office list, Marvel continues to attract fans, the box office continues to grow, laying the groundwork for the subsequent harvest.

After that, there was a well-known highlight moment, the third phase of 5 films broke 1 billion +, "Avengers 3" and "Avengers 4" both hit the box office, the latter even won a box office of 4.25 billion yuan, becoming the only imported film in the top 10 box office in domestic film history. In the fourth stage, the MCU showed more and more fatigue, temporarily parting to China due to the epidemic, humiliation of China and other reasons, and the problem that was once complained by the great director Martin Sicosese "Marvel blockbusters are not movies, but playgrounds" has also been increasingly exposed.

For many ordinary Marvel fans, it is like "after "Avengers 4", there will be no Marvel." Little A, who had the A2 symbol tattooed on his hand, watched most of the fourth-stage MCU movies that could not be released in China on the network disk, not only the viewing experience was discounted, but the quality also made him very dissatisfied.

(Houlang Film Drawing)

The reasons for Marvel's failure are complex and multifaceted, not only the factors of its own quality decline in the fourth stage, but also related to the loss of fans and the decline in Chinese fans' enthusiasm for watching movies in the past three and a half years. It is not difficult to see that the entire fourth stage of Douban score and IMDB score have declined, the former decline is more serious, three failed films, the only remarkable is the $1.9 billion + "Spider-Man: Homeless".

The box office potential of individual superhero films is not as good as that of superhero films such as Avengers, and Ant-Man and Black Panther are not heroes with a high fan base in the Marvel Universe; And the "Black Panther" series explores the issue of colored ethnic groups, and domestic fans have no feeling about it; The visual spectacle of the quantum field of "Ant-Man 3" has been affirmed, but the new villain "Kang the Conqueror" is too weak and has been widely complained about, and it is difficult to open the fifth stage; Unlike foreign fans who have the emotional bonus of the original comics, most domestic fans are purely Marvel, which began to contact Marvel from film and television, and the content tolerance is relatively lower. "Black Panther 2" related topics #No script can not be filmed# was on the hot search.

It is worth noting that the good reputation and high popularity of the fourth stage of Marvel derivative dramas seem to be completely separated from the movie. "WandaVision", "Loki", "Moonlight Knight", "What if...? has achieved a big hit, which is related to the strategic adjustments made by Disney to cooperate with the launch of Disney+.

Wen Wei Po's article "When the "Marvel Universe" Encounters the Law of Film Cycles" mentions: "The popularity of a specific film genre has the characteristics of periodicity: when the audience is tired of recurring narrative patterns, the genre falls into a trough, and it is necessary to wait for a new round of creative innovation and theme innovation before entering a new popular cycle... The cinematic universe, genre and IP all require constant self-repetition and self-referential in order to establish a solid brand and cognitive framework in the minds of the audience. Among them, the most obvious is the use of Easter eggs. However, as the number of films in this series increased, the criticism of the narrative and thematic formulas began to increase, and the tastes of audiences increased compared to the first few years. ”

For Disney, the Chinese market, which has the world's first number of screens, has a very important position. Former helmsman Bob Chapek has made controversial remarks about the Chinese market, and after the change of old manager Robert Iger, the outside world is also concerned about whether he can improve relations with the Chinese market.

And the top management has clearly recognized the quality degradation caused by the explosion of quantity over the past few years, as well as the undesirable consequences of over-tilting streaming series. Bob Iger, who returned as Disney's CEO, recently commented that Disney needs to better manage the output of IP content, hoping to focus on the quality of the screen, but also pay attention to controlling their costs.

Kevin Feige also clarified in an interview with "Entertainment Weekly" that the direction of Marvel dramas has changed, and the MCU episodes of the fifth and sixth phases will adjust their pace, the number of episodes launched each year will be reduced, and the broadcast interval will be longer. Whether the fifth and sixth phases of Marvel movies can be reversed by word of mouth will determine whether the box office, which has begun to decline, can recover.

Is there still salvation for imported films?

Marvel has entered the stage of "turning from prosperity to decline", so, can other imported blockbusters play? Can a batch film that has not appeared a blockbuster for a long time be able to run a dark horse?

In the past few years, almost every Marvel blockbuster has had an average box office of 600 million+. Three years later, its basic market has been cut off. "Black Panther 2" and "Ant-Man 3" provide reference samples for other Hollywood giants, IP influence, word-of-mouth blockbusters: most of the films will fall in the range of 100-300 million, and only the head IP can expect 500 million + and 1 billion + results. In the past three years, only "Avatar 2", "Fast and Furious 9", "Godzilla vs. Kong" and "Jurassic World 3" have been imported blockbusters of 1 billion + volumes.

In fact, purely from the perspective of quantity and supply, this year can be described as a big year for imported films, but in the context of the decline of imported films and the failure of Marvel, Hollywood's appeal has been greatly weakened. It is expected to introduce "Fast and Furious 10", "Transformers 7", "Mission Impossible 7", "Captain Marvel 2", "Aquaman 2", "Guardians of the Galaxy 3", etc., are IP sequels, from the perspective of IP influence, the box office of the previous work, there is an impact on the crown of imported films, 1 billion level strength is "Fast and Furious 10" and "Aquaman 2", of course, but also consider schedule, opponents, word of mouth and other factors, other attention is also DC's single superhero film "The Flash", Nolan's "Oppenheimer".

If nothing else, this year's batch of film box office champions basically locked in Japanese comic movies, Maoyan wants to see "Slam Dunk" with 210,000+ or "Journey to the Bell Bud" with 400,000+ people, in Weibo #Which foreign language film are you most looking forward to watching in the cinema #Vote, "Journey to the Ringbud" is far ahead, and "Slam Dunk" is also frequently mentioned in the comments.

In the past three years, the ceiling of the annual batch box office champion has repeatedly declined, all occupied by Japanese anime IPs, such as "Digimon: The Last Evolution" in 2020, "Doraemon: Walk with Me 2" in 2021, and "Detective Conan: Halloween Bride" in 2022, with box office 125 million, 277 million, and 201 million respectively. Small country films have not appeared for a long time, "Wrestle! The achievements of "Daddy" 1.3 billion and "Mysterious Superstar" 700 million + can no longer be copied, and the influence of Indian imported films is not as good as before.

The significance of imported films getting better box office is not only that Hollywood and foreign studios can make money, but also means to adjust the market, promote the overall environment to tend to a virtuous circle, complement each other with domestic films, and then promote the return of the long-lost cinema line during the epidemic and the recovery of the industry. In the past, in the off-season of the market such as March, April, November, and the school season, imported films filled the gap, continued to activate the market, brought a warm atmosphere, enhanced the audience's desire to watch movies, cultivated movie-watching habits, and promoted the normalization of moviegoing, rather than just "holidayization" under the condition of declining moviegoers. Although the entry time of "Avatar 2" at the end of last year was not good, it actually played a role in promoting the resumption of work in a large number of theaters and celebrating the New Year.

The box office ratio of domestic films and imported films has remained at 85%:15% for several consecutive years, and in the case of sluggish performance of imported films, it is bound to bring more pressure to domestic films. Too concentrated and uneven hot and cold schedules may be beneficial to the super head and popular schedules, while small and medium-sized films may become cannon fodder, just like this year's Spring Festival "Double Hero Fight" and "China Table Tennis" such frustrated people.

In recent years, the level of the domestic film industry has risen, and while favoring strong emotional resonance, the audience's desire for visual spectacle has not disappeared, which is still the advantage of imported blockbusters. In addition to returning to the content standard, imported films that have always been more passive in finalization and publicity may need to further increase publicity.

Recently, the "youth of generations" sentiment to the IP "Slam Dunk" finally announced that it was scheduled for April 20, which triggered a wave of screen brushing on social media. Will it have relatively impressive box office results?