The domestic dramas in 2023 seem to be a little high and low until mid-November.At the beginning of the new year, "Hurricane" set off a nationwide discussion boom, and "The Long Season" received wide acclaim for the wonderful performances of the three male protagonists. But in the second half of the year, the top platforms collectively fell into a state of lackluster.
The birth of "News Queen" on Youku can be said to inject a dose of stimulant into the dull domestic drama market at the end of the year.
As of the week of the broadcast on November 25, the topic of the show has been read more than 700 million times on Weibo, with a total of 373 lists on Weibo and 60 on the main list.
The Douban score of "News Queen" has increased from 7 at the beginning of the broadcast9 points climbed to 82, this achievement is already outstanding in Chinese TV dramas.
In addition to the applause and popularity, the hot finale of "News Queen" in 2023 has unusual significance for Youku, TVB, mainland audiences, and even the domestic TV drama market.
For mainland audiences, "News Queen" is the most respectful work of Hong Kong dramas in the past ten years (counting from the 2014 TVB Best Drama "Apostle Walker"), which reawakened the respect of the post-70s to post-90s to TVB, and successfully attracted the attention of the post-00s in the short ** era.
For TVB, it indicates that TVB has regained the courage and ability to produce high-quality Hong Kong dramas - TVB has taken "the first time in history" in many directions in the production and dissemination of "News Queen", which also creates the possibility for the revival of Hong Kong dramas in the new era.
For Youku, it indicates that the Hong Kong Theater column launched in 2018 and the Xingang Drama plan launched in 2022 have achieved phased success, and the relevant person in charge of Youku has said that "News Queen" is the first sample after the concept of "Xingang Drama" was proposed, laying a solid foundation for the follow-up with TVB and other related film and television production companies to create special columns.
For the industry, it indicates that the cooperation between the mainland market and Hong Kong film and television production companies such as TVB has evolved from a simple "buy-sell" model to complementary resources, and a three-dimensional cooperation model that embraces the needs and professional requirements of the new market has been established.
It can be said that the industrial topics brought by "News Queen" are no less energetic than the social topics it causes.
Workplace dramas are one of the three parts of the world in TVB's glorious history. Whether it is "Sister Tuogun", "Criminal Investigation Files", "Forensic Pioneer", "No. 1 Imperial Court" with the theme of police and criminal investigation, or "Wonderful Hands and Benevolence", "Rushing to the Clouds", "Delicious King" and "Negotiator" with other themes, they have all become classics that can be reminiscent of the three generations from the 70s to the 90s. There are many mainland TVB fans and netizens laughing and talking: "Golden Branches and Jade Sins" and "Palace Scheming" are also TVB's boutique workplace dramas, but this workplace is in the Forbidden City.
TVB's workplace dramas have deeply influenced the creation of mainland TV dramas. However, in all fairness, the level of workplace dramas in the mainland is still difficult to say that it surpasses TVB classics.
In fact, before the broadcast of "News Queen", a "Love as a Camp" with a similar theme was broadcast in the mainland, but the ratings were average, and the Douban score was only a little more than 4 points. The audience pointed out that this is actually a sweet pet drama of "the domineering president fell in love with me", but the heroine's profession is just a financial **person.
On the other hand, in "The Queen of News", the heroine "Sister Man" played by Charmaine Sheh does not lie flat, does not deceive herself, is in awe of her profession and the times, and has won the favor of a large number of female audiences, and not only "Sister Man", all the protagonists in the play "refuse to fall in love and do not rely on unspoken rules", and this sentence itself has become a hotly discussed social topic out of the circle.
In addition, the drama is remarkable for its professional representation of journalism – pragmatists who will do whatever it takes to achieve their goals, elites who struggle between professional goals and moral constraints, two-faced people in the workplace, and "centrists" who cherish the ideals of righteous journalism but never achieve their ambitions...The audience sees the most typical "appearance" of the news industry in "News Queen". His acting skills are exquisite, the plot is compact, the reversals are wonderful, and the golden sentences are frequent, so it is not surprising that he can be praised by CCTV Weibo for 2,500 words.
As pointed out on CCTV Weibo, the focus of "News Queen" is "themes closely related to modern real life", which has current reference significance. In fact, a large part of the appeal of "Hurricane" and "The Long Season", which caused heated discussions in the first half of this year, comes from the audience's nostalgic resonance with the scenes of the 90s and 00s in the play, and it is not closely related to current life. In contrast, "The Queen of News" is even more valuable.
In fact, over the years, TVB has also tried to continue the classic Hong Kong drama IPs such as "Golden Branch Desire 2" and "Sister Tuogun 2021" to play the nostalgic card, but the overall effect is not ideal.
Mainland audiences complained about "Sister Tuogun 2021".
In 1985, TVB, which was robbed of the limelight by ATV, made a big splash, and its stars went out (including Zhou Haimei, who acted for the first time) to shoot "Yang Jiajiang", which also became the only all-star lineup in TVB's history and became a good memory for mainland audiences. In the past few decades, TVB and ATV have competed with each other and contributed a large number of high-quality Hong Kong dramas to the Chinese community.
There was once a voice that the closure of ATV in 2016 and the lack of progress of a dominant TVB were the main reasons for the decline of Hong Kong dramas. This is not the case. The real reason is that the basic conditions for the production of high-quality Hong Kong dramas have disappeared.
Since the beginning of the new century, the mainland's economy has taken off, the GDP of major cities has surpassed Hong Kong's in turn, the mainland's film and television industry and entertainment industry have developed rapidly, and Internet technology has changed with each passing day, while Hong Kong's cultural and entertainment industry has faced problems such as shortage of funds, technological stagnation, and brain drain, which have exacerbated the decline of Hong Kong dramas.
The well-known TVB actor Zhou Haimei went to the mainland in 2001 to shoot "Actually, You Don't Understand My Heart" directed by Zhong Shujia, and then decided to move to Beijing, and there are more and more Hong Kong artists like Zhou Haimei who moved to the mainland to develop. Chung Shu-kai, the producer of "News Queen", won the "Hong Kong's Most Popular TV Show" award in 1997 for his first drama "Difficult Brothers", but he has been working in the mainland since 2004. The year Zhong Shujia went north was also a turning point for Hong Kong dramas. In 2005, the most popular drama in Hong Kong was no longer created by TVB, but the introduction of "Da Chang Jin", which once hit a rating of 50 points.
Zhong Shujia directed at the filming site of "News Queen".
In the 20 years of entrepreneurship in the mainland, Zhong Shujia has cooperated with Youku many times. And "News Queen" can become a Hong Kong drama boutique in the new era because with the strong support of Youku, the creative team led by Zhong Shujia is given space to display their strengths, and they can strive for excellence in all aspects from scripts, actors to "chemical uniforms".
It's no accident that Queen of News became an instant hit. Behind it is the fruit of years of cooperation between Youku and TVB.
Youku is the earliest ** platform in the mainland to cooperate with TVB. As early as 10 years ago, that is, in 2013, Youku reached a strategic cooperation with TVB and exclusively obtained all TVB genuine copyrights. Since then, the cooperation between Youku and TVB has reached a new level every year.
In 2018, Youku, TVB and TVBC jointly launched the "Global Synchronous Drama Series" and began to create the "Hong Kong Theater" intestine brand, realizing the simultaneous broadcast of TVB dramas in the mainland and Hong Kong for the first time. This move broke the communication barrier between Hong Kong dramas and the mainland market.
In 2020, Youku will go one step further and join hands with TVB, Media Asia and other filmmakers to produce customized dramas such as "Criminal Investigation Diary" and "White Strongman 2", which is an important symbol of TVB's cooperation with the mainland, marking the official farewell to the simple "buy-sell" model for Hong Kong dramas on the road to the north.
In 2022, Youku will hold high the banner of "new stories, new horizons, and new users" and start a new exploration of "new Hong Kong dramas", trying to make Hong Kong dramas more potential for the whole people on the basis of classic Hong Kong-style dramas. From 2022's "Forensic Pioneer 5", "Family Glory", this year's "Hidden Door", and the just-launched "News Queen", it can be seen that TVB is actively seeking changes in terms of drama content, production methods, marketing planning and other aspects.
2022 is also the 25th anniversary of Hong Kong's return to the motherland, and on the basis of years of in-depth cooperation with Youku, TVB has also begun its own process of diversifying and deeply cultivating the mainland market. From the development of dramas, variety shows, e-commerce and other multi-lines, it once set off a "Hong Kong fever".
This year, TVB officially came out in person, and its official Douyin account has reached 12.51 million fans, with the highest number of fans in the account with goods reaching 1.13 million, and the number of multi-account joint fans has reached 2 million. The first live broadcast sales were 23.5 million, and the follow-up set a record of 73.2 million in 12 hours.
In addition to the Douyin platform, TVB announced in March this year that TVBC and ** reached a cooperation intention, and the two sides will jointly develop more than 48 e-commerce live broadcasts within the year. Judging from the results of the Double 11 live broadcast, considerable benefits have been obtained.
From the marketing link of "News Queen", we can focus on TVB's keeping pace with the times, as well as the tacit understanding and sincerity of the cooperation between the two sides.
If the marketing of dramas in the past mainly relied on premieres, billboards, and press conferences, then now, the main publicity and distribution positions of dramas are on the Internet and social networking, which requires all practitioners to change their mentality and change their methods.
According to Xie Ying, vice president of Youku, during the operation of "News Queen", Youku provided unprecedented marketing investment in the Hong Kong drama category under the condition of predicting the market potential of the show.
During the hit broadcast of "News Queen", the audience can be seen everywhere on social platforms, and its starring role promotes the fermentation of topics through various forms such as memes, drama linkage, and netizen interaction, prompting the audience to discuss spontaneously.
During the gathering**, the Weibo of the starring Charmaine Sheh has been non-stop and hot. And she Gao Haining and Chen Minzhi collaborated on "Apostle Walker" ten years ago, and the diametrically opposite mental states of the three in the two dramas have also become an important branch of the topic of "News Queen": "Ten years ago, I went crazy collectively, and ten years later, my mood is stable", effectively forming a dream linkage of the series. not only aroused the audience's memories of chasing dramas, but also caused widespread ridicule among netizens.
These are the most intuitive advancements of TVB.
According to Capricorn Business Review, in recent years, under the continuous sincere cooperation and promotion of Youku, there are two main changes that have occurred in TVB itself:
First, as mentioned in the previous section, it is Youku that has supplemented TVB with the necessary funds and talents to produce high-quality dramas, so that TVB can regain its confidence and traditional skills and try to shoot high-cost high-quality dramas
Second, Youku provides TVB with a three-dimensional solution from topic selection to publicity in the Internet era, and links the vast mainland market, and the two complement each other's advantages and can get more attention from Chinese users.
It is too early to say that Hong Kong dramas are being revived, but "News Queen" is obviously just the beginning of TVB's regaining self-confidence.
In March 2023, TVB announced that it had signed a cooperation framework agreement with Youku, under which its subsidiary, 77 Studios, would provide Youku with a number of purchased dramas within two years, while TVBC would provide TVB simultaneous dramas and stock dramas. TVB expects that this cooperation will bring in about RMB 700 million in revenue.
According to TVB's interim announcement released in August, in the first half of 2023, TVB's revenue will be 15HK$600 million, narrower than the loss in the second half of 2022. At the same time, the announcement said that through the in-depth cooperation with the mainland ** platform, the revenue is strong**, and the e-commerce live broadcast business provides a stronger revenue contribution, which is expected to turn losses into profits in the second half of this year and the whole year.
In fact, the cooperation model between Youku and TVB is also at the forefront of international trends. Since the second half of the 2010s, Netflix has started the "two-legged walking" model of joint production by domestic production in the United States and foreign investment teams, and has given birth to high-profile high-quality dramas such as "Money House", "Lee Corpse Joseon", and "Alice, the Dying Country".
The hit screening of "News Queen" has written a glorious footnote to the cooperation between Youku and TVB in the decade from 2013 to 2023. It is believed that with the deepening of cooperation, especially with the advancement of TVB, the two parties will join hands to dedicate more high-quality dramas for the audience to enjoy.
And this will be a double harvest of economic and social benefits.
