I'm just trying to ride the wave of popularity!

Chapter 274 Naval Forces Defection
From the mid-80s to the 90s, Chinese cinema experienced a golden age...

That year, kung fu films, led by Hong Kong productions, such as "Iron Fist" and "Dragon Shadow," swept through European and American theaters, igniting a craze for Eastern martial arts aesthetics...

That year, long lines formed outside North American cinemas, European moviegoers eagerly imitated the "Shadowless Kick" of Foshan, and even children in South American slums were learning "Drunken Fist" moves in street fights.

That year, kung fu films became the first sharp blade of Chinese cultural export, carving out a niche for themselves in Hollywood...

That year, Chinese superstars like Jet Zhang and Hendrik Willem Van Loon went to Hollywood and, with their kung fu movies and amazing action stunts, managed to establish themselves there. They even made classic films that grossed over $100 million overseas...

however……

With the comprehensive upgrade of Hollywood's industrial system in the late 90s, and the overwhelming global success of Hollywood special effects blockbusters, Hong Kong kung fu films gradually declined.

During this period, facing the impact of Hollywood special effects blockbusters, Hong Kong directors attempted to diversify their productions, shooting films of different genres such as crime films and romance films in an effort to revitalize the overseas market.

However, these works performed poorly at the domestic box office, and they struggled to gain traction in overseas markets due to cultural barriers and weak distribution capabilities.

After the turn of the millennium, directors had to return to the old ways of kung fu films, but audiences had become accustomed to the Hollywood industrial system and had little interest in kung fu films that lacked innovation.

Even though the two big-budget special effects kung fu films, "Qin" and "The Legend of the Condor Heroes," achieved breakthroughs in the domestic market, their overseas box office performance still failed to replicate the glory of the 90s...

It was even ridiculed by many overseas audiences, who believed that Chinese films had no other notable works besides kung fu movies!

Just when everyone thought that Chinese films would be forever trapped in the shackles of kung fu movies and would never be able to conquer overseas markets again!

The Black Robe Alliance appeared out of nowhere like a thunderclap...

When the news that "The Black Robe Alliance" had surpassed $2.1 million in global box office revenue was reprinted back to China by foreign media, the Chinese internet was instantly thrown into a silent tremor.

It all started with a screenshot of a post on the [Movie House] forum that went viral. The poster, [Film Hunter], simply typed: "2.1 million, US dollars! 'The Black Robe Alliance'!" Three minutes later, the comment section was flooded with thousands of comments marked with "???", and then quickly overwhelmed by exclamations of "Holy crap!" and "Really?"...

Someone posted a screenshot of Rotten Tomatoes' real-time box office figures, and the bright red "$210M" number was so eye-catching it made people's eyes burn!

The moment I saw the $2.1 million global box office!
Countless people were shocked!

Immediately afterwards...

"Damn it! What happened to all those people who were hyping up Catwoman?"

"Yeah, where did all those people who were hyping up 'Catwoman' go?"

"Get the hell out here, you son of a bitch! I've been putting up with you for ages!"

"Yes, everyone, please help us find where those people are!"

"Damn it, keep blowing! Why did you stop?"

"..."

Countless angry netizens began frantically searching for those film critics and media accounts that had once dominated the internet!
Amidst the outrage of netizens, the homepage of the film and television influencer [Superhero Observer], who had previously flooded the screen with comments like "Hollywood's industrial dominance" when "Catwoman" was released, was suddenly flooded with criticism.

Immediately, the top comment on the latest article praising the action scenes in "Catwoman" was a comparison image photoshopped by netizens: on the left, Anne Dessereau's gymnastic slow-motion in "Catwoman" was labeled "luxury goods advertisement," while on the right, Paddy Peek's scene in "The Black Robe" tearing apart the control device was captioned "This is true rebellion."

On the topic of #BlackRobeAllianceExceeds2Million#, the most popular post is a long article: "We have been criticizing Chinese films for ten years for only being kung fu movies. Now someone is using an anti-superhero narrative to tear open the iron curtain of Hollywood, but some people are kneeling and saying it's 'unrealistic'?" The accompanying picture is a page from Entertainment Weekly that mocked Zhou Yang for "riding the coattails" of the film. Now, netizens have posted the North American daily box office data of "Black Robe" to refute this.

As countless angry netizens began to "settle accounts," the marketing accounts sponsored by the five major film studios collectively pretended to be dead!
However, resourceful netizens had already unearthed their email records of accepting money to suppress "Black Robe," and all sorts of evidence flew around, quickly going viral across the internet!
Even more so, countless accounts were posting parody images of people photoshopped into black and white funeral portraits under the hashtag #WaterArmyConfessions#.

The most ironic thing is the official website of [Film Review].

This authoritative media outlet, which once touted "Catwoman" as the "savior of the Chinese market" on its front page, quietly removed all related reports and then published an article late at night titled "Looking at the New Path of Globalization of Chinese Cinema from 'Black Robe'." However, netizens were not convinced, and some even posted the final box office data of "Catwoman" in China, which was only 1.4 million yuan, to mock it, adding a cold remark: "Savior? He's probably in his coffin."

..........................................

3:00 AM on October 28th.

The lights in the [Spectacular Effects] feature are still as bright as day.

Xu Yunyi sat in his office, staring at the astonishing figure of $2.1 million on his computer screen, and took a deep breath.

He reminded himself to stay calm, stay calm, he had to stay calm...

But, for some reason, it trembled slightly!

A surge of anger welled up inside me, but it was trapped in my chest, and I couldn't let out a roar.

He picked up his phone and dialed Zhou Yang's number, but hesitated to say anything.

Zhou Yang on the other end of the phone seemed to have guessed something, and simply said one sentence.

"We succeeded."

Upon hearing these words, he was slightly startled. After a moment, holding the phone, he subconsciously looked up and stared at the words "Spectacular Special Effects," feeling as if he had been transported to another world!
The past year has felt like a dream—a dream of a cinematographer, kicked out of a film crew, gradually leading his team to establish [XuanShi Special Effects] under Zhou Yang's guidance…

In its early days, 【Special Effects】was a gamble starting from scratch. The team consisted entirely of recent graduates, none of whom had ever touched Hollywood-level special effects software. They could only study pirated tutorials day and night, writing and trying to create effects again and again...

Of course, they were not poor. Mr. Zhou paid everyone a salary far above the average, and he did not interfere much with their creative work.

From "The Distant Man: Reboot" to "The Haunted Village," and then to "The Martial Soul Zhao Zilong"...

These films, limited by technology and equipment, actually have rather mediocre special effects; they mainly rely on their plots to succeed.

During this period, he witnessed the gradual growth of a team, heard a lot of criticism from the media and users, and also a lot of ridicule from his peers...

However, having risen from humble beginnings, they did not lose heart when their peers mocked them, saying that "Chinese special effects are only fit to shine Hollywood's shoes." Instead, they spent countless days and nights disassembling Blu-ray discs of special effects from Hollywood blockbusters, repeatedly extracting and rewriting the motion capture code, and studying it in depth...

They didn't give up...

President Zhou did not give up on them either.

Seeing no future prospects, Zhou Yang spared no expense in hiring several veteran special effects artists who had worked in Hollywood, using all his spare time to invite them to [XuanShi Special Effects] to guide the team's work.

During those days, Xu Yunyi once saw countless banknotes burning in the flames... He subconsciously looked at the main rendering server not far away, which was always crashing and covered with sticky notes. The scribbled words "Crush Hollywood" were still stuck to the control panel.

This server was actually obsolete a long time ago, but as a testament to its growth alongside [Special Effects], he kept it...

"Yes, we succeeded!"

Xu Yunyi nodded, repeating the sentence in a trembling voice.
Then...

He stared at the computer screen.

He saw that the marketing account that was vehemently criticizing "Black Robe Alliance" just three hours ago suddenly had its homepage filled with long articles titled "In-depth Analysis of TD Company's Metaphors";

He saw that the influential blogger who photoshopped Shen Long into a funeral portrait yesterday was working overnight to change the title to "Ten Foreshadowing Clues in the Black Robe, Terrifying Upon Closer Look!"
What he found most ironic was a movie review blogger whose latest video on their homepage was "Black Robe vs. Spider-Man: The Ultimate Showdown Between Eastern and Western Heroism," while just two days earlier, the same account had posted "When Will This 'Pick-Up' Marketing End?"...

Reality is cruel, but it is also extremely ironic.

The insults and ridicule directed at "Black Robe Alliance" by China's five major film companies have now vanished, replaced by countless accolades...

At that moment, Zhou Yang, who hadn't hung up, said something else.

"Interested in visiting Hollywood? I recommended our [Spectacular Effects] to Universal, the production company behind 'Fast & Furious'..."

"..."

..............................

"In the past six months, it seems that all the accounts that our company had just started cultivating have been exposed..."

"It's not just us, there are also many media accounts with over 10,000 active followers maintained by the five major companies..."

"Everyone who was involved in smearing Zhou Yang has been exposed today..."

"..."

【Tianyu】

Xu Haibo received a phone call.

After finishing the phone call.

He stared silently at his computer, refreshing the trending topics list.

then……

I saw several trending topics related to #ZhouYangRevengeList#!

At this moment, the densely packed screenshots are as glaring as blood-red blades: from the money transfer records of "Film Critic Lao K," the head of the Tianyu Media's online army, over the past year, to the price list of "5000 for a single smear article" in a private group chat by "Superhero Observer," the official account of Huasheng Brothers...

Everything was brazenly and blatantly exposed on the internet...

Almost simultaneously, a push notification from [Movie Vanguard] suddenly popped up in the lower right corner of the screen: "Exposing the Dark Side of the Internet: Who Controls Chinese Film Reviews?" The accompanying image was ambiguous, and even the source of the online image was unclear, but...

There are negative reports everywhere about Tianyu Media paying for online trolls...

And at the same time...

The office door was hurriedly pushed open!

Xu Haibo saw his secretary walk in trembling!

"Mr. Xu! All three hundred of our company's accounts in the film and television section have been banned! It's Weibo accounts, not Kuaishou accounts! I asked around, and they said too many people reported them. They said they run a platform and need to be fair and impartial..."

on the laptop.

The Weibo account's ban notice was bright red and eye-catching, with the reason for the violation stating: "Suspected of paid defamation!"
Seeing this, he was suddenly both angry and amused!
Fairness and justice?

Isn't this blatant double standards?

When "Catwoman" was released, the capital behind it and the theaters joined forces to create hype, with overwhelming marketing, squeeze screenings, and public opinion guidance. Those accounts that were "paid to defame" were not only not banned, but were also promoted to the top of the trending searches, becoming the vanguard in suppressing "Black Robe Alliance".

But when "The Black Robe Alliance" made a comeback and topped the charts, grossing over $2.1 million worldwide and slapping everyone in the face, the ban announcement for "suspected paid defamation" only came belatedly after the public outcry became uncontrollable.

Now let's talk about fairness and justice...

Ah!
When they take money from them and then promote and slander Zhou Yang, why don't they talk about fairness and justice?

Ha, this is hardly a ban.
This is clearly opportunistic. Seeing that "Black Robe Alliance" has swept through the market, they quickly shifted the blame to the "scapegoat" account and pretended that they had never participated in this crackdown!
Ironically, none of the large fan accounts under Zhou Yang's own companies, [Kuaibo] and [Movie Home], which were cultivated by [Tianyu Media], were banned; instead, they received a surge of traffic...

Although!

The comments below were all unanimous curses!
"Mr. Xu, what should we do next?"

Just as Xu Haibo was about to say something...

The phone suddenly rang.

Telephone……

From the copyright department of Columbia Pictures in Hollywood...

After receiving the call, Xu Haibo was incredulous, then stunned!
"What! They're going to license Vampire Hunter to us?"

"The requirement is a November release?"

"This……"

"..."

(End of this chapter)