Shulou(Shulou.com)11/24 Report--

Author | Zu Yang

Three and a half years later, Marvel movies have finally returned to the big screen in mainland China. Unfortunately, two blockbuster films have encountered Waterloo one after another in China.

As of February 21, Black Panther 2 had been released in China for 15 days and grossed $102 million, making it the lowest-grossing Marvel film in the mainland since 2011. Five days after its release, Ant-Man and Hornet Girl: quantum Craze (hereinafter referred to as "Ant-Man 3") grossed 145 million at the mainland box office, and Douban's score dropped to 6.1. overseas, the film's rotten tomato freshness is only 47%, on a par with Marvel's worst film, the Yong Heng.

One is the end of the fourth stage of the Marvel film, and the other is the beginning of the fifth stage of the Marvel film. It is of great significance to choose these two works to be the first to meet the Chinese audience. However, the market performance of the two films, ranging from box office to word-of-mouth, not only makes Chinese audiences feel "extremely disappointed", but also shows that Marvel's appeal and influence in the Chinese market is not as strong as it used to be.

Since 2008, Marvel has opened a new era of global superhero films with typed production, with a unified narrative theme, a unified emotional style and a unified industrial standard. it has created a batch of classic superhero images such as Iron Man, Captain America and Raytheon, sitting on a huge global film market and a broad audience. The benefits of typed creation are obvious, both improving productivity and ensuring stability of input and revenue-Marvel has produced 30 films and grossed nearly $30 billion at the box office over the past 15 years.

But the frequent bombardment of superhero blockbusters also makes the audience feel aesthetically tired. The successive failures of the two Marvel films Black Panther 2 and Ant Man 3 in China are revealing the failure of stereotyped creative routines. How to give the audience more "freshness" on the basis of ensuring production efficiency and quality is a new question that needs to be answered in the development of Marvel films.

Although "Black Panther 2" was released in China first, "Ant Man 3" means that Marvel and the Chinese market officially broke the ice-- China and the United States released at the same time, and the release window, which was scheduled a month in advance, also returned to its pre-epidemic state.

However, compared with the 671 million box office of Ant-Man in 2015 and 831 million in 2018, the box-office gap of Ant-Man 3 in China after its return in 2023 still feels like a change of time. If you look at it from a longer perspective, the release time of the three Ant-Man films is connecting three key points of Marvel's development in China-consolidation, peak and restart.

The period from 2008 to 2012 is the beginning of Marvel movies. Iron Man officially kicked off the first phase of Marvel when it was released in mainland China in 2008, and then the Avengers exploded the mainland market, grossing 114 million yuan in two days, setting a new domestic premiere record for a superhero film. At this stage, the Chinese film market is in the early stage of development, and the public awareness of Marvel IP is also in the preliminary stage of educational cognition.

In 2008, Iron Man entered the second phase of the Marvel film in 2013. At that time, Chinese audiences had a better understanding of the superhero image created by Marvel, and after the popularity of "couplet 1" in the mainland market, the second stage of Marvel films had an overall upgrade from content to box office. Superheroes continue to expand, with the introduction of Galactic Guardians and Ant-Man as new roles in addition to classic roles such as Iron Man, Raytheon and Captain America. In terms of box office performance, Ant-Man, released in 2015, also received a dividend. Even if released three months later than in North America, it also grossed 671 million yuan in the Chinese market.

From 2015 Ant-Man to 2018 when Ant-Man 2 was released, the total box office of Chinese films exceeded 60 billion, and Marvel films also ushered in a high-profile moment in the Chinese market. At this time, in the third stage of Marvel movies, Marvel Universe began to complete, box office and word-of-mouth also entered a stable mode.

The total box office of 11 films, singles and collections in the third stage reached 14.781 billion yuan in the domestic market, and the Douban rating of 11 films also reached 7.54. In addition, "Reunion 4" set off a national frenzy during its release, grossing more than 188 million yuan at zero points, breaking the box office record at zero points in Chinese film history. Director Russell also said that without Chinese fans, there would be no Marvel today.

In 2019, the Avengers 4: the final Battle, from 2008 to 2019, the first three stages of Marvel's development were closely related to the Chinese market, but the situation took a sharp turn for the worse from the fourth stage of the Marvel film. The launch of the epidemic Black Swan and streaming media platform has also had an impact on Marvel, accelerating the pace of streaming series production, hoping to win between cinemas and streaming media in quantity, but also directly leading to a sharp decline in quality and word-of-mouth.

Not only that, since 2020, the first film of the fourth stage, "the Black Widow," has not been released in the mainland, and the next few films such as "Shangqi and the Legend of the Ten rings" and "Yong Heng nationality" have also been unable to enter the mainland market due to force majeure. The three-and-a-half-year cut-off period has directly left Chinese audiences without the fourth stage of Marvel films, and Marvel films have also temporarily lost this big position in the Chinese market.

At the beginning of this month, the long-lost Marvel re-entered the Chinese market. The closing work of the fourth stage, Black Panther 2, was released on February 7, and the opening part of the fifth stage, Ant Man, was released simultaneously between China and the United States on February 17. The long-absent "consequences" are also obvious. The audience's viewing continuity and emotional stickiness were broken, and the box office and word-of-mouth of the two films failed. Marvel may still be Marvel once, and the Chinese film market has changed a lot.

Starting from scratch, of course, Marvel has been absent from the mainland market for a long time, and the loss of domestic Marvel fans is only one of the reasons for the poor box office, and the most fundamental reason lies in Marvel itself. New and old heroes do not follow each other, creation falls into routine templates, and audience aesthetic fatigue.

From its birth to the present, the uniqueness of Marvel's film universe lies in the combination of super-British movies and genre elements, presenting a world view of the universe with the advantage of composite genre films, and using single superhero films to show small aspects of the universe. play the role of laying the groundwork for characters, and then use major events to gather characters of different styles, showing a multiverse of different races and civilizations. On the surface, they are stories, and they are all connected under the same big worldview.

As the story structure of the Marvel film universe becomes larger and larger, the character relationship becomes more and more complex, the visual special effects become less and less innovative, and the advantage has become an obstacle to progress.

The content narrative is in a state of fatigue. In the fourth stage, Marvel films emphasize world issues and show different types of civilizations, but only superficial diversity is achieved in the landing process. the core values are still the American personal heroism of the stronger and the stronger, and in the Douban hot review area of Black Panther 2, "in the fantasy world, Wakanda's diplomacy is still the same as that of the United States" was topped to the front row.

And the continuity of the superhero character that supports the stickiness of the audience is also weakening. Because of illness, litigation with the original company, etc., the old hero left, but the new hero did not grow up, which also caused dating, which in turn affected the logic of the entire world outlook story line. After the protagonist of Black Panther 2 suffered from cancer, the script was readjusted, and the adjusted characters and storyline weakened the fullness of the end of the fourth stage.

The huge world outlook and complex narrative line of Black Panther 2, the highly consistent and frequently bombed visual special effects, and the "tandem assembly" of various heroes have gradually reduced the audience of Marvel films and become fan-oriented films. it's hard to attract young incremental audiences.

The average viewing age of the top 10 imported split films from 2022 to 2019 is 28 years old, while the average viewing age of the top 10 imported split films in 2022 has reached 30.3 years, according to the report "Insight of Chinese Film Market data 2017" released by the Cat Eye Research Institute. In other words, the main audience of the sharing film has not changed during the three years, and the main incremental young audience is obviously missing. At the same time, it is also mentioned in the report that the feelings of imported films are difficult to attract a new generation, with fewer types of preferences and accelerated aging.

Under such circumstances, Marvel's sense of crisis is gradually deepening, and Marvel, which is now aware of the problem, is also trying to solve the problem from scratch.

Such as shrinking the front from high-yield streaming dramas, cutting costs and focusing on improving the quality of films. Some time ago, Kevin Fitch, president of Marvel Pictures, mentioned in an interview with Entertainment Weekly that the fifth and sixth stages of Marvel films will adjust the pace, reduce the number of releases each year, and extend the broadcast interval, making some adjustments in post-production. In addition, Mr. Iger, who returned to Disney's CEO, said Disney needs to better manage the output of IP content and want to focus on the quality on the screen as well as to control their costs.

Marvel has grown up with countless fans over the past few years, and the commercial value of its IP has become higher and higher, so for audiences, Marvel films are a carrier of emotion and emotion, so they want to see the content quality and continuous freshness that matches its commercial value. Focusing on the Chinese market, Marvel's lack of mainland China over the past three years, the creative level and box office influence of local films have also continued to rise. To win back the hearts of Chinese audiences, Marvel needs the courage and determination to break and reshape and start all over again.

This article comes from the official account of Wechat: true probe AlphaSeeker (ID:deep_insights), author: true probe

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