"Fairy Tale King" Zheng Yuanjie's classic IP "Shuke Beta" is finally about to release its first big movie. On December 30, "Shuke Beta Pentagon UFO" will be officially released in mainland theaters.
The director and screenwriter of "Shukebeta Pentagon Flying Saucer" is Zheng Yaqi, who is the son of Zheng Yuanjie and the operator of the full copyright of Zheng Yuanjie's works. "I'm not just the first reader of Lao Zheng's work. In an exclusive interview with a reporter from Yangcheng Evening News, Zheng Yaqi revealed that one of the main protagonists of this movie, "Pentagon Flying Saucer", came from an inspirational collision with his father when he was young.
After becoming a collaborator, Zheng Yaqi saw the value of Zheng Yuanjie's fairy tales more and more clearly. He found that the scenes written by Zheng Yuanjie decades ago are still being filmed in Hollywood, and that readers who were children can still draw courage and strength from Zheng Yuanjie's stories after becoming parents.
"Yangcheng Evening News" reported on December 16
I want two generations to feel the same emotion
Yangcheng Evening News: "The Adventures of Shuke and Beta" has been serialized since 1982, and the first version of the animated series was made a few years later, and the Douban score of this series is as high as 8.8 points. Will this become a stress for you?
Zheng Yaqi: It is really difficult to make a new version of the popular old version of the animation. There are some similar new versions of dramas that only get three or five points on Douban after they are broadcast.
Yangcheng Evening News: The new version of the "Shuke Beta" animated series, the Douban score of the first season is 8.4 points, which is indeed not low. I remember that when the drama was broadcast on CCTV Children's Channel and various David TV Children's Channels, it won the first place in the ratings in the country many times.
Zheng Yaqi: The series has now been updated to the fifth season, and we have the confidence to make a good animated movie. Of course, we have been preparing for this for a long time, in fact, it has taken more than three years from the preliminary planning to the upcoming release.
The earliest Shuk & Beta animated series
Yangcheng Evening News: Compared with animated series, where is the improvement of this big movie?
Zheng Yaqi: In terms of production, it definitely has a big improvement. After all, this is a movie, and there is still a difference between it and the series in terms of picture. But I think the more important significance of the movie version is that it allows parents and children to walk into the cinema together and feel the same IP to move them. That's probably my biggest motivation for making this movie.
Yangcheng Evening News: Do you think going to the cinema is still different from the feeling of two generations watching TV together at home, right?
Zheng Yaqi: That's right, the sense of immersion, the atmosphere of everyone discussing together after watching it, are all different. I was in the big movie "Pipiru and Lusisi: The Canned Villain", and I felt it very clearly at the time. In the cinema, I would see children crying because they were moved and asked for paper from their parents, only to find that their parents had run out of paper. I think it's a good parent-child time for two generations to sit together in a movie theater and watch the stories that their parents read when they were children.
《舒克贝塔·五角飞碟》海报
In the movie version, Shukbeta grew up
Yangcheng Evening News: After watching the trailer of the movie version, some fans of "Shuke Beta" pointed out that the image of the protagonists in the movie version is a little different from the drama version, is that so?
Zheng Yaqi: This is quite normal, many classic images in the history of animation that have gone through the years may have undergone dozens of versions of evolution between the first version and the last version. Comparing our episodic version and the animated version, in fact, the biggest difference is that Shuck and Beta have grown up. Attentive viewers can see that they are three or four years older than the TV version in terms of height, proportions, and even lines.
Yangcheng Evening News: How old should Shuke and Beta be in the movie?
Zheng Yaqi: Our setting is about 13 years old. Although I didn't specifically talk about it in the movie, they looked like they were 13 years old in my mind, and they were about 10 years old in the series.
Yangcheng Evening News: Why is it set up like this, is it to broaden the age group of the audience?
Zheng Yaqi: The main reason is that Lao Zheng's "The Adventures of Shuke and Beta" has a total of 366 episodes, and Shuke and Beta are growing up in the entire original story. They were supposed to be seven or eight years old when they were young, and later Lao Zheng wrote until they were almost 50 years old. Of course, we also hope that children and parents can see a more emotionally rich story in the cinema. Because as the characters get older, their emotions will definitely become richer and richer.
Yangcheng Evening News: What kind of emotion does this big movie want to convey to the audience?
Zheng Yaqi: This emotional growth mainly happened to Shuke. He will realize in the story that it is much more important for everyone to be together than anything like a flying saucer.
《舒克贝塔·五角飞碟》海报
When I was a child, I discussed inspiration with Lao Zheng
Yangcheng Evening News: There were many whimsical ideas in Zheng Yuanjie's novels, which fascinated the "post-70s" and "post-80s" readers at that time. Some say that these episodes are very imaginative to this day.
Zheng Yaqi: Every year, there are more than a dozen or twenty works in Hollywood – whether they are movies or American dramas – that "collide" with the stories written by Lao Zheng back then. Lao Zheng wrote a total of more than 700 stories back then, and it did cover a variety of plots, which still looks quite powerful today.
Yangcheng Evening News: For example, like the pentagonal flying saucer in this movie, how did this idea come about?
Zheng Yaqi: At that time, he had written more than 100 episodes of "The Adventures of Shuke and Beta", and before that, Shuke Beta drove helicopters and tanks. Lao Zheng said that he wanted to change the means of transportation for them. He came to me and asked me what he thought would be a good change. I said, let's change the flying saucer. Lao Zheng said, flying saucers are too ordinary, others write flying saucers, I definitely don't write them. I told Lao Zheng, your flying saucer is not round, it is different from others. So Lao Zheng wrote a pentagonal flying saucer, which became the most important means of transportation in Shukbeta after airplanes and tanks. This time, we also filmed the process of making a pentagonal flying saucer, as well as some disasters caused by the pentagonal flying saucer.
Yangcheng Evening News: How old were you when you came up with the idea?
Zheng Yaqi: It should be my first and second grade of primary school.
Yangcheng Evening News: Because of this origin, you chose a pentagonal flying saucer for the first "Shuke Beta" movie?
Zheng Yaqi: This is definitely one reason, and the other reason is that our drama happened to be filmed here. In fact, we set the plan for the series and the movie long in advance.
Yangcheng Evening News: You should be the first reader of Zheng Yuanjie's fairy tales, right?
Zheng Yaqi: I may not only be a reader, but many of the plots in his works are inspired by his observation of me. Lao Zheng is very good at this, he doesn't get paid, he doesn't experience life, you see he wrote 20 million words, he hasn't smoked a cigarette, he writes at home with his imagination, so some inspiration is taken from me.
Zheng Yaqi and his father Zheng Yuanjie in childhood
Never liked the concept of "superheroes".
Yangcheng Evening News: Some people say that Shuke and Beta are actually the images of early Chinese superheroes, what do you think?
Zheng Yaqi: I've never been a fan of the concept of superheroes. Lao Zheng's works have been sold in China for more than 40 years, and I think one of the characteristics of his stories is that the main character is nothing special. For example, Pipiru, he is a mischievous child, and the difficulties he experiences are actually experienced by ordinary children. Shuk doesn't have any superpowers, he's no better than other mice. I don't like the "chosen one" story, Shuk, Beta, and Pipiru are not superheroes, he's just someone close to you, or even yourself.
Yangcheng Evening News: Since many years ago, Zheng Yuanjie's fairy tales have given many ordinary children courage.
Zheng Yaqi: Yes. For example, Pipiru's story lets children know that children who Xi do not learn well are not necessarily bad children, and that children who do not learn well Xi also have advantages. For example, in "Shuke Beta Pentagonal Flying Saucer", Shuke is a mouse, but he doesn't want to be misunderstood as a thief, he wants to prove himself by supporting himself.
Yangcheng Evening News: For the release of this movie, you chose the New Year's Day file, for what reasons?
Zheng Yaqi: Personally, I attach great importance to the New Year's Day holiday, and I think New Year's Day is a particularly suitable time for parents and children. My daughter is 10 years old, in fact, every time she has a holiday, she will check what movies are going to be on, but not every schedule has movies that are really suitable for children. This New Year's Day, there doesn't seem to be a second children's cartoon of the same genre. Therefore, I hope that when we welcome the new year, parents can take their children to the cinema to watch a happy movie.
Yangcheng Evening News: Your daughter has already watched the movie, right?
Zheng Yaqi: My daughter watched an unfinished version at the time, and she said she liked it after reading it. Funnily enough, she thought that the movie was finished and that I could go home with her instead of working overtime.
Zheng Yaqi
The audience of good works is not divided into adults or children
Yangcheng Evening News: Have you studied the age of the "Shuke Beta" audience?
Zheng Yaqi: We found that many college students and parents of children are also posting barrages in the barrage. Many parents love our episodes when they watch Shuk Beta with their children.
Yangcheng Evening News: "Shuke Beta" is a classic IP for more than 40 years, what do you think is the reason why it can be evergreen?
Zheng Yaqi: Lao Zheng's works are indeed different from other works. In fact, my father used to tell me when I was very young that really good art should not be judged by adults or children. His works, maybe you can see different things when you look at them at different ages.
Yangcheng Evening News: Starting from this movie, will the big movie "Shuke Beta" continue to meet the audience?
Zheng Yaqi: For the second big movie, we have already started to make preliminary preparations. We're going to do it one by one.
Yangcheng Evening News: You are now responsible for operating all of Zheng Yuanjie's classic IPs, what are your original intentions and expectations for this career?
Zheng Yaqi: I grew up watching movies and television works from all over the world. When I was a child, I often thought that the stories written by Lao Zheng were not worse than theirs at all, or even better than them. So I always felt that his story should be filmed so that more children could watch it. Of course, I also spent a lot of time to understand how to adapt it to film and television, and I dared to do it after I had a certain understanding of the industry.
Yangcheng Evening News: In addition to "Shuke Beta", will Pipiru's story continue to be filmed?
Zheng Yaqi: These two IPs are continuing to be done, in addition to China, animations have been distributed well in many overseas countries and regions. After Pipiru & Lusisi: The Canned Man, we are also planning Pipiru's next live-action film. There are too many stories of Lao Zheng, let's take our time.
Poster for the first season of the Shuk Beta series
Lao Zheng never asked me to succeed or make money
Yangcheng Evening News: Many readers of Zheng Yuanjie who are "born in the 70s" and "born in the 80s" have known your story since childhood. For example, after you graduated from primary school, Zheng Yuanjie personally attended a "private school" for you at home. Looking back now, what do you think of his decision back then?
Zheng Yaqi: I remember what Lao Zheng said at that time. He said that life is an experience, and you will have a childhood that is different from everyone else. I didn't understand it at the time, but I understand it now. I feel like I've had a different life experience than others, and that's really rare.
Yangcheng Evening News: How is this experience different from others?
Zheng Yaqi: Now that I'm in my forties, my life is no different from my peers. But I think Lao Zheng has done a particularly good job, and he has paid attention to cultivating my interest since he was a child. At that time, he managed to find all kinds of movies for me to watch, and before watching them, he watched them himself, and he thought I could watch them, so he showed them to me. So when it comes to being a director, although I haven't learned it for a day, I've done it well.
Yangcheng Evening News: Did he expect anything from your life?
Zheng Yaqi: He never asked me, like you want to start a business, you want to succeed, how much money you want to make. His education to me was to teach me by word and deed. I've always felt that his biggest influence on me was not from the lessons he gave me at home, but from the memories I had of him as a child. When I was a child, whenever I opened my eyes, whether I got up in the morning or took a nap, all I saw was the scene of him lying next to the desk and writing. When I see a father who has worked hard to make the family better and better, the impact may be more effective than any MBA.
Yangcheng Evening News: Zheng Yuanjie has suddenly become an Internet celebrity in the past two years, what do you think about this?
Zheng Yaqi: Some people say that Lao Zheng is the earliest joker in China, including his usual replies to fan messages, which make everyone feel quite novel. But it seems to me that this is very common, because he is such a person, but people have never been in direct contact with him, and they don't know much about his character and the state in which he cherishes his readers. But I know, so I'm not surprised at all.
Yangcheng Evening News: Will your current education of your daughter be influenced by Zheng Yuanjie's educational philosophy back then?
Zheng Yaqi: I will take her with me as much as possible in the process of my work, and I will ask her opinion when I encounter problems. I don't treat her like a child. I hope that I can have a positive influence on my daughter and on me when Lao Zheng did me.
文 | 记者 李丽图 | 受访者提供