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

Chapter 377 Reverse Export of Abstract Culture!

September...

The entire Chinese film industry...

It seems they were all led astray by Zhou Yang!
It's filled with all sorts of twists and magic!
in a sense……

Perhaps, this is a mutation!
……

Before the emergence of "Deformed Steel Bar," the Chinese film market had long been dominated by serious dramas or subtle comedies.

Whether it's a grand historical narrative or a heartwarming and humorous urban romance, both follow the traditional aesthetic of "literature conveying the Way." Even the humor often carries an intellectual's metaphor and restraint. Zhou Yang's early films also had an abstract and absurd feel, but never before has the absurdity been rendered to such an extreme as this...

until!

That spiral steel bar that could cultivate immortality smashed the screen...

This absurd aesthetic, which perfectly blends Hollywood superhero tropes with down-to-earth, everyday life, is like a wake-up call for audiences who have been disciplined by serious films for many years.

People suddenly realized that movies don't need profound meanings or adherence to logic; they can simply use nonsensical joy to wash away the pressures of reality.

Those deliberately imitated plastic special effects, blatantly knock-off advertisements, and undisguised parody spirit constitute a delightful rebellion against elite aesthetics!

Just as steel bars on a construction site suddenly came to life, the cinematic aesthetics of Chinese audiences also underwent a "mutation" at this moment.

Even the Chinese internet, at this moment, ushered in a brand new "abstract era"...

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

"Damn it! Zhou Yang, you're here again?"

"Have you no shame?!"

"Hemorrhoid Hero? Holy crap, what the hell is your imagination?"

"..."

when!
[XuanShi Entertainment] officially announced the names and posters of three movies on its website.

Everyone was stunned!

The first two movies were perfectly normal; they were both just copying the poster designs from "Transformers." This has been their usual practice, so there's no suspense left!
But the third movie...

People were completely dumbfounded when they saw Hemorrhoid Hero!
Everyone felt a wave of lewdness wash over them, followed by a violent tremor that caused their entire bodies to convulse!

As they cursed, they couldn't help but stare wide-eyed at the poster for "Hemorrhoid Hero"...

The poster, featuring a "superhero" wearing thermal underwear and with a plaster on his buttocks, depicting him fighting with his backside sticking out, shocked everyone!
Suddenly, a series of tentacles resembling tumors sprouted from deep within his anus, and then, like an octopus, they carried him across the entire city...

Underfoot...

It appears that someone dressed like a "bat-man" was being trampled under his feet...

The scene is so ridiculous it's unbearable!

Some people slapped their thighs and shouted, "Zhou Yang, are you out of your mind? Why are you filming these?" Others were trying so hard not to laugh that their faces turned red, and still others took out their phones and frantically recorded the screen.

It's clearly abstract, but this outrageous image inexplicably hits the funny bone, and the more absurd it is, the more irresistible it becomes.

……

This mid-to-late September...

As the viral sensation of "Deformed Steel Bar" swept across the internet, a crack was forcibly torn open in the box office myth of "Transformers".

19th!
Although this "abstract masterpiece" with a ticket price of 8 yuan only grossed 600 million yuan on its opening day, it frantically squeezed out market screenings with a terrifying 75 viewers.

Accompanied by the rise of various abstract hot spots...

The daily box office for "Transformers" immediately fell below 4000 million yuan, eventually settling at 3800 million yuan, with the number of viewers being halved to around 80...

Meanwhile, "Transformers" maintained its core audience of 1700 million thanks to its emotional appeal, and its 110 million viewers even surpassed top-tier IPs...

From the 19th to the 23rd, the box office of "Transformers" continued to decline. It earned 3800 million on the 19th, 3500 million on the 20th, 3200 million on the 21st, 2900 million on the 22nd, and only 2600 million on the 23rd. The number of moviegoers dropped sharply from 80 to 60, and the downward trend was hard to hide.

Meanwhile, "Transformers" maintained its core audience by relying on emotional resonance, with daily box office revenue remaining at around 1500 million yuan and the number of viewers consistently exceeding one million. "Transformers" faced constant controversy due to its abstract style, but the 8 yuan ticket price and the spread of catchy memes helped it maintain daily viewership at around 70 and box office revenue at around 500 million yuan.

……

The film achieves a bizarre balance!
Top-tier IPs couldn't compete with ticket price wars, and lowbrow, abstract films relied on massive audience numbers to stay afloat. Only "Transformers" carved out a niche for itself with its "mechanical romance."

The market is in complete chaos, with audiences constantly switching between special effects, tear-jerking moments, and laughs...

An expert who witnessed this scene analyzed it and came to a conclusion!

Behind this three-way box office battle lies a fierce clash between two industrial systems: on one hand, there are sophisticated special effects that took six months to render a 20-second morphing shot; on the other hand, there's the cheesy, slapstick comedy of someone swinging steel bars while wearing slippers...

24th and 27th!
This was the most frustrating day for Transformers!
The release of "Transformers: The Saviors" and "Transformers: The Cosmic Electric" has pushed "Transformers" to the bare minimum of 15% of screenings in the theater chain...

These two films aren't particularly high quality; they're more like troublemakers, movies meant for children...

The film "Transformers: Saviors," which premiered on the 24th, takes the tokusatsu (special effects) genre to its extreme.

A Phoenix brand bicycle, irradiated by a meteorite, awakens in the hands of night market vendor Awei. The bicycle bell transforms into an energy core, and the rusty chain strangles the monster like a giant python.

When the garbage monster of "Bosaitan Star" (made of discarded household appliances) devours the city, a rocket booster pops out from the back of the bicycle, carrying Awei in a "bicycle riding on his face" kill.

Then, the protagonist, Awei, merges with his bicycle, undergoing a cool transformation into the Transforming Bicycle Savior, who then defeats the monster and saves the world...

The "Transformers: Cosmic Electricians" episode on the 27th completely let loose—

Transformers: Cosmic Electricians continues Zhou Yang's quirky "rustic sci-fi" style, grafting the core "transformation" of the Hollywood movie Transformers with local imaginations in a crazy way!
The movie is set on the energy-depleted planet "Bosaitan," where two factions of electricians wage war for control of the energy source!

On one side is Tiger Skybreaker Airplane... On the other side is Electric Man...

Both sides fought fiercely, risking their lives!
In this great battle, all sorts of cool home appliances suddenly transform!

Rice cookers transform into fire-breathing warriors, washing machine drums become black hole weapon warriors, and refrigerator doors are reassembled into energy shield warriors!

The sheer variety of bizarre and wonderful transformations is simply dazzling...

and!

The product placement methods in this film are even more outrageous and aggressive...

……

Professionals meticulously counted them!

The movie "Transformers: The Space Electricians" is arguably the most insane product placement extravaganza in history!
The film features various household appliances transforming into battle forms!

The product features hardcore integration with at least 12 brands: from [Meimei Rice Cooker] to [Bingku Refrigerator], from [Cyclone Washing Machine] to [Light Speed ​​Microwave Oven]...

All sorts of brands were on display, practically everything imaginable, even shoved right in the faces of countless viewers…

Meanwhile, over 100 other smaller brands appeared briefly on camera!
Yes, it's almost 100 more!
It’s simply heartbreaking!

……

But by the way!
These quirky product placements are seamlessly integrated into the storyline!
Surprisingly, it felt completely natural to watch, and made people laugh out loud...

In fact, viewers even joked that "Zhou Yang turned home appliance instruction manuals into a science fiction film!"
……

In late September, the Chinese film industry descended into utter madness!

Zhou Yang's "Transformers Universe" has driven Transformers to the brink of collapse with overwhelming force.

The box office of top-tier IP films plummeted from 4100 million on the opening day, then dropped below 4000 million on the 19th and continued to decline, reaching only 2600 million on the 23rd. Ultimately, it was overwhelmed by the "low-brow" army of films such as "Deformed Steel Bar" and "Deformed Bicycle," and was forced to be suppressed to 1800 million and 1300 million respectively...

Hollywood blockbusters that once swept the globe have been crushed in the Chinese market by bizarre plot devices such as "rebar cultivation" and "elderly bicycle saving the world"!
Despite the drop in box office revenue for "Transformers" to below ten million due to the diversion of viewers to new releases, Zhou Yang continued to dominate screenings with sequels such as "Cosmic Electric Man" and "Transformers" using a rogue tactic of "quantitative change crushing qualitative change".

While cursing Zhou Yang for being shameless, audiences rushed into theaters for the 6-yuan discounted tickets, ultimately reducing the screening rate of "Transformers" to 15%, relegating it to the background of a late-night, unpopular slot.

This is a match!
A ruthless box office battle!
The entire crew of Transformers was completely stunned...

………………

End of September!
It's been showing for half a month!
The box office figures for each movie are out!

Transformers grossed 3.67 million RMB in China!

Far below expectations, and due to severe diversion of audiences, even reaching the 4 million yuan box office mark has become difficult.

"Transformers: My Girlfriend is a Robot" grossed around 2 million RMB, making it a top-performing domestic film...

"Deformed Steel Bar" grossed 5000 million RMB...

The other two films grossed 2000 million and 1250 million RMB respectively...

Despite the mediocre box office performance, the number of moviegoers was quite high!
……

Looking at the overwhelming and bizarre trends on the internet!
Looking at the movie box office and the number of viewers...

although!

This time!
Hollywood movies have dominated the Chinese film market in September, looking down on all other contenders.

but!
Some filmmakers, and even some other people, have realized something!

It seems to be the wind of the times!

Things are starting to change!
In the years before Zhou Yang's emergence, Hollywood films long exported American values ​​to the world through visual storytelling, the core of which was often wrapped in ideological symbols such as "freedom," "democracy," and "individual heroism"...

From the individualistic myth of Superman saving the world to the romanticized interpretation of the American Dream in Fox Gan, and the righteous portrayal of the US military's global operations in the Transformers series, these works encode Western political ideologies as universal truths and deliver them to the hearts of every Chinese moviegoer...

More subtly, through science fiction settings, such as the rebellion against the system in "Digital Empire" or the racial allegory in animated films like "Zootopia," specific political narratives are subtly implanted into the audience's cognition, forming a lower-dimensional attack of cultural soft power...

but……

This time!
This method doesn't seem to be working anymore...

even!

Hollywood's loss wasn't in technology or ideology, but in the aesthetic trends that were completely distorted by the internet age...

Even more shockingly, [XuanShi Entertainment] suddenly announced that Zhou Yang's quirky and abstract films will be a collaboration with [WeiMan Pictures], with plans to officially launch overseas on October 4th, exporting this unique "abstract art" to the international market...

Special!

These heartless bastards!
They've already wreaked havoc on Chinese audiences, and they still won't stop!

Damn it!

Now they're ambitiously preparing to wreak havoc on overseas audiences.

and many more!

10 Month 4 Day!
Isn't this the day that Transformers premiered in 28 countries around the world?
Hemp egg!

he!
This is necessary!
They've ruined Transformers!

(End of this chapter)