Challenging the 10 billion box office, the rise of national comic books has been planned for a long time

author| Zinc Finance Sun Pengyue

Today, the box office of “Nezha’s Devil Boy Causing the Sea” exceeded 9 billion yuan, just one step away from the 10 billion mark.

No one would have imagined that the tens of billions of movies that have been awaited by countless fans for many years would actually be completed by an animated film.

From 956 million yuan in “Return of the Great Sage” in 2015 to nearly 10 billion yuan in “Nezha 2” in 2025, the national comic book has completed nearly 10 times the leap forward in ten years. Although there is a gap between the two, it is undeniable that “The Return of the Great Sage” is a milestone in the rise of the country.

The transformation of Guoman is not an accident, but a long-planned sublimation. There are good works that are amazing, and there are also some shoddy works that deceive the audience.

But the most important thing is that when “Nezha 2” is about to exceed 10 billion yuan, no one will think that the rise of Guomang is a false proposition or a false narrative caused by luck. It has become a legend in China’s film history.

Who can save the country?

Before the concept of the rise of Guoman, Guoman experienced a long period of shock.

Since the production of “Treasure Lotus Lantern” by Shanghai Meiying Factory in 1999, Guomao has entered a period of darkness and decline. Animation works from the United States and Japan have dominated the market, and Disney-style fast-paced animations have become the mainstream.

Animated films, which were once highly artistic and full of China characteristics, gradually disappeared from the screen. The childhood and youth of the post-90s generation are no longer Sun Wukong wielding a golden cudgel, but all kinds of beautiful Japanese comics.

In 2006, when Japanese and American animations such as “SpongeBob” and “Naruto” poured into the China market in a near-dumping manner, the domestic animation industry was experiencing an unprecedented winter.

At that time, international animation giants represented by Disney of the United States and Toei of Japan launched a comprehensive competitive layout in the China market with their strong production capabilities and mature business models. In particular, the free strategy adopted by these international giants caught the domestic animation industry off guard.

Not only do American animation companies not charge TV stations for broadcasting, but they also take the initiative to invest in advertising time. This market strategy of almost buying money for the pearl makes it difficult for domestic animation, which already lacks financial support, to match. Data shows that between 2006 and 2010, Japanese and American animations accounted for more than 70% of the China TV animation market.

What is even more worrying is that this competition has not brought about industrial upgrading, but a near-extinction industrial regression.

A large number of local animation companies have been forced to transform into overseas animation manufacturers. The technological advantages originally accumulated in the era of “The Troubles in Heaven” and “Nine-Colored Deer” have gradually been lost in day-to-day outsourcing work. Even Shanghai Fine Arts Film Studio, known as Disney in China, had to accept outsourcing orders to provide special effects production for overseas animations.

In such a cold winter of the industry, the attitude of the capital market has further exacerbated the downturn in the industry. Statistics show that from 2008 to 2014, the investment scale of China’s animation industry continued to shrink, with an average annual growth rate of less than 5%, while the average growth rate of the global animation industry remained above 10% during the same period.

Who can save the country?

This is an extremely serious and very real problem.

When the country was in danger and was about to fall apart at any time, a group of swordsmen stood up.

“Bright Moon in Qin Dynasty”

In 2007, Hangzhou Xuanji Technology launched “Qin Shi Mingyue Hundred Steps Flying Sword” not only had high on-demand volume on the entire network, but also the royalties cost rose: from hundreds of thousands for the first “Hundred Steps Flying Sword” to 1 billion yuan for the third “Hundred Schools of Philosophers”. By the time the fourth “Great Wall”, five platforms bid at the same time, finally setting a domestic animation copyright purchase record of 12 million yuan.

The popularity of “Bright Moon in the Qin Dynasty” has injected a shot of boost into the national comic strip, and the national comic strip market, which has been vacant for more than 20 years, has experienced a major explosion.

More importantly, for the first time, domestic animators truly felt that in addition to the national team represented by Shanghai Meiying Factory, animation companies can also produce good works and produce works that are popular in the market.

As a result, a bottom-up transformation of the country began.

Traditional animation studios that focus on China’s aesthetics and core, such as Shanghai Meiying Factory, have quickly stepped down from the historical stage.

New animation companies that focus on the upgrading of animation technology and advanced animation technologies such as dynamic capture, cartoon rendering, and hair details have reached the forefront of national manga.

After a series of shock treatments, although Guomi has regained some vitality, it can only attract the attention of the industry and cannot spread to the entire film and television industry.

Guoman needed a bomb to set off a huge wave on the calm lake.

When tap water becomes the sea

Ten years ago, national manga was just a scrap of the film and television ecological chain. It could only barely survive on the cartoon sub-menu of the long video platform. It could only fight against “Naruto”,”One Piece” and “Detective Conan” on specific tracks. Seize traffic.

The crown of the film and television track will always be movies. At that time, popular movies were popular. Find some popular stars and shoot a random movie, and they could win 500 billion yuan in box office. The production budget was small, and the capital behind them was almost guaranteed.

If you want more viewers to feel the power of national comics, only a block-selling animated movie can break the circle.

But who is willing to invest in an anime movie that is technically difficult, expensive, and difficult to get a high box office?

Faced with the embarrassing situation of the country’s inability to continue, finally, in 2015,”The Return of the Great Sage” came.

“The Great Sage Returns”

“Return of the Great Sage” is a very miserable movie. It is so miserable that the production budget can only barely support it until it is completed, and there is no more publicity budget.

Forced to have no choice, director Tian Xiaopeng could only crowdfund publicity funds, pooled 89 crowdfunding investors, and received an investment of 7.8 million yuan.

The meagre publicity funds were put into the national market, but not even a splash occurred. It all relies on excellent quality and continuous reputation. Even if the issuer did not do much publicity, it still attracted more and more attention from the market.

On the first day of its premiere, the screening rate was only about 10%. On the third day of release, it received nearly 40 million yuan in box office results and slightly surpassed “Tiny Times 4” to become the box office champion of the day. Within four days of release, the box office exceeded 100 million yuan!

In Douban, more than 6000 people had gathered before its release, and more than 200 long film reviews were published; on the Sina Weibo movie hot search list, the film’s rating has remained at around 9 points, and the hot discussions have remained in the top three.

All the fans who have seen “The Return of the Great Sage” have taken the initiative to promote it in their circles of friends, waving the flag and shouting for this conscientious cartoon that in their minds is comparable to Hollywood.

Fans label themselves as tap water, pure water, that is, this drop of tap water gathers into the ocean that overflows the country.

In the end,”Return of the Great Sage” won 956 million yuan in box office, proving to the entire China market that it is not that no one watches Chinese comics, nor that Chinese comics are not good enough. An animated movie can also become a social phenomenon.

It can be said that “Return of the Great Sage” is the starting point for the rise of national anime. Its success has given confidence to countless anime people and shocked the capital and theaters behind it.

Originally, animated films could only appear in some irrelevant spare schedules and became a side dish to the schedule. Now, paper people can also suppress traffic stars.

After “Return of the Great Sage”, works that were both praised and popular were constantly published. For example, the box office of “Big Fish Begonia” reached 565 million yuan in mainland China, and the global box office exceeded 700 million yuan.

What is even more relieved is that national manga has finally gained normal status and is no longer regarded as a snack side dish.”Big Fish Begonia” received 20% of the high-profile films as soon as it appeared.

Status in the Jianghu is not blown up by others, but is achieved little by little by little through results.

After “Big Fish Begonia”,”The Battle of Luo Xiaohei” grossed 315 million yuan at the box office in China; there is also the PG-13 masterpiece “The Great Protector of the Law”, which let fans know that national comics not only have family fun, but also depth of thought, as well as understanding and exploration of human nature.

Just when the outside world thought that this was the peak of the rise of Guomian people,”Nezha” came.

The rise of the country has become a thing of the past

Before the release, even the gods probably didn’t expect that “Nezha: The Devil Child” would get 5 billion yuan at the box office, but this incident actually happened.

The success of “Nezha” has also labeled the country’s comic book of excellence.

Behind it are 66 script revisions and more than 1400 special effects shots, jointly achieved by about 1600 animation producers. In the second one, the number of characters is three times that of the first one, with nearly 2000 special effects shots and a main creative team of more than 4000 people.

When an animator, or filmmaker, as long as you do your job down-to-earth and do everything in place, you can see the dawn of success.

“Nezha”

After “Nezha”, Guomang also produced “Jiang Ziya” with a box office of 1.603 billion yuan,”White Snake 2″ with a box office of 580 million yuan, and “Lion Boy” with a double box office harvest of word-of-mouth, as well as a cumulative total box office of more than 8 billion “Bear Infested” series IP movies.

China animation has officially broken away from the whirlpool of self-certification of the rise of national animation, and has also changed from dessert to finale.

In any schedule, no animated movie appears in any one step will be strange.

I believe that after “Nezha 2”, no one will discuss the topic of the rise of national comics.

What we should think about is: What are the limits of national manga?