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Author | Gu Han

Editor | Li Chunhui

The movie "Mo Yu Yun Jian" proves that Yu Zheng is still one of the creators who understands female audiences the most. What's more rare is that he didn't even bother to "go away for half a lifetime". Mr. Yu always holds on to the female market and never hesitates. Even when adapting Jin Yong's drama, everyone falls in love together, and the taste of ancient idol drama is clear.

The inevitable result of this content layout is that the ones who become popular because of Yu Zheng's dramas or become bloody because of Yu Zheng's remarks outside the dramas are always the female protagonists, such as Yang Mi and Zhao Liying in the former and Yuan Shanshan and Bai Lu in Huanyu's own dramas in the latter.

In comparison, the male artists under Yu Zheng are in an awkward situation. They are not afraid to compare their looks and talents with their peers, and they generally have hit dramas, but they are always far from being real traffic stars - they cannot attract fans or retain fans, at least this is still the case with Xu Kai's generation.

But things are changing. In the recent "Mo Yu Yun Jian" male lead Wang Xingyue's CP breakup incident, Yu Zheng confirmed in a reply to netizens: Wang Xingyue's side released the single-player footage of his death in battle with the intention of "purifying".

As we all know, "purification" is the key step to divert traffic from hot dramas and popular CPs to the actors themselves, and it is a classic operation in fan operations.

Since signing the contract in 2020, Yu Zheng's preference for Wang Xingyue has been beyond words. Looking back at Wang Xingyue's development in recent years, it is easy to find some differences from his predecessors such as Chen Xiao and Xu Kai - the straight-to-the-sky straight-man style, the reckless personal life, and the free state as if he were a worker in the crew are gone, replaced by more active business, more comprehensive content coverage, and more deliberate off-screen image building.

However, this desperate "purification" does not seem to have the expected effect. "Ink Rain and Clouds" has been turned over, and with the next big drama rising, no one seems to care about Wang Xingyue's follow-up.

“Yu Nanlang” has changed his career path, so why can’t he escape from being a top star?

"Yu Zheng's Strict Selection" is a blessing and a curse

"Mo Yu Yun Jian" saved Yu Zheng's reputation, and its content aesthetics were re-evaluated. The male lead of "Mo Yu Yun Jian" Wang Xingyue also jumped up, and was called "Yu Zheng's Strict Selection" together with Chen Xiao and Xu Kai, the most popular male actors in previous generations of Yu Zheng. Of course, there is a suspicion of bundling and hype, but some consistent characteristics can be seen in the three of them.

Yu Zheng started out with costume dramas and period dramas, targeting the female market. Accordingly, most of Yu's male actors are handsome Chinese men who are good at costumes and those of the Republic of China, with sharp eyebrows and eyes full of affection, and they are easy to be charming when acting in BG dramas. In the past, they might have been classified as "idols" as opposed to "real talents". However, given that there are many idols transforming and competing with each other in the domestic entertainment industry, Yu's male actors are given some acting qualities, and their value continues to rise.

The benefits of being "Yu Zheng's Strict Selection" are obvious. First of all, Huanyu's production capacity is not low, and its artists are not short of dramas to shoot. The lucky ones can also get tailor-made roles early in their careers. At the same time, Yu Zheng's hit dramas usually win in the plot, and there are a large number of familiar faces and powerful actors joining, so newcomers with immature acting skills can easily be brought to the fore.

Secondly, Yu Zheng is a master of hype. In the television era, he often boasted and made shocking statements. In the Internet era, he has been persistent and courageous in speaking on the mic, turning his personal account into a publicity window for the company, constantly creating topics for new dramas and newcomers and making his presence felt - even if he sometimes doesn't care much about the life and death of the artists, it is indeed effective.

However, nowadays, hit dramas and sporadic topics alone cannot create popular artists. Continuous exposure, crisis public relations, fan management, business cooperation... If you want an artist to rise smoothly and not be "exploded" halfway, each step requires a professional team and a lot of funds.

The essence of Huanyu is a huge theatre company. Its brokerage business is an auxiliary to its production business. It is impossible to invest so much manpower and material resources in artists. After artists become popular, their pay and voice will increase, which is also not in line with Mr. Yu's original intention of making dramas with high quality and low price.

Therefore, for a long time, Huanyu's service and operation of artists were elementary and traditional: focusing on filming and letting them do whatever they wanted outside of the show. Men and women here have the freedom to fall in love, and they have kicked themselves out of the traffic candidates. Chen Xiao, the early No. 1, fell in love with the show and got married early. Xu Kai and Song Weilong's generation are also "dangerous buildings" according to the standards of the fan circle. As for Wang Xingyue, who claimed to go to college at the age of 15, he is not any safer.

More importantly, under the troupe model, artists often have to compromise with the company's arrangements, becoming Hengdian workers who copy and paste the same roles and acting styles. The aura of the actors and the enthusiasm of the fans will be consumed in this process.

Chen Xiao, who was born in an academic school and wanted to transform, eventually left. Xu Kai was obedient but caught up with Yu Zheng's low period. His challenge to the male channel in "Once Upon a Time There Was a Spirit Sword Mountain" was obviously quite brilliant, but it failed to continue. Xu Kai went back to filming a lot of ineffective inner scenes and supporting roles. Now he has too much class flavor and gives the audience too little freshness. So much so that the topic of his successful weight loss in modern idol dramas is not as high as when he was in poor condition in ancient idol dramas. How can it not be a pity.

New era, new style

Wang Xingyue's real name is Wang Tao. He graduated from the Central Academy of Drama. He entered the industry in 2019 by participating in the public welfare film "Deep Water Zone" and signed with Yu Zheng in 2020. So far, he has starred in more than 10 dramas that have been broadcast or are to be broadcast, and more than half of them are male lead dramas. It can be said that he is very productive.

Unlike his predecessors, Wang Xingyue started working in both film and television and variety shows very early. In the second half of 2023, "For the Fragrance" and "Ning'an Rumeng" were broadcast one after another, which really made him famous among the audience of the drama. From then until now, Wang Xingyue has participated in about 7 variety shows, in addition to the drama promotion-type "Hello Saturday" and "Ning'an Rumeng", there are also Mango TV variety shows "Who is Coming" and "All Accelerate", as well as "Fifty Kilometers Taohuawu 4".

His image outside the screen is also much clearer than that of Chen Xiao, Xu Kai and others of the same period, and he has more unique memorable points: he earned the title of "Bread Madman" because he took on a large number of mid-insert advertisements in "Ning An Ru Meng"; he became a "domestic entertainment thief" through his experience in many dramas and his explosion during "Mo Yu Yun Jian"; his label of "Little Kid Brother" was constantly deepened because of his age, contrast, marketing, and playing with memes, etc.

The reason may be that Yu Zheng finally decided to enter the traffic era. Because in 2022, which can be regarded as the same stage, Bai Lu went from being a guest on "Running Man" to a regular, opening the road to traffic. Xu Kai also escaped from Hengdian, participated in the recording of "Escape the Room" and finally equipped with relevant marketing, so that his "stupid handsome guy" side was known to more non-fans.

It may also be a reflection of generational differences in artists. Chen Xiao has the idealism of the post-80s generation, daring to think and act. Xu Kai has the consciousness of the post-90s generation, diligent and Buddhist. Wang Xingyue has the pragmatism and precocity of the post-00s generation, and he seizes any opportunity outside the play to express himself boldly: he ran into Zhou Ye's room and locked the other male guests out during the live broadcast of "The Secret Fragrance"; and left a message to Wu Jinyan in "Mo Yu Yun Jian" that "my husband is here", which made netizens unable to stop themselves.

Of course, changes in the media and industry environment cannot be ignored. Chen Xiao debuted in the traditional media era, with limited variety shows, and being mysterious was the normal state for actors. When Xu Kai debuted in 2018, it was already the Internet era, but short videos had not yet taken off. The amount of behind-the-scenes footage of "Story of Yanxi Palace" may be similar to that of "Mo Yu Yun Jian", but the degree of dissemination is very different. People's perception of the actor's off-screen state is often based on pictures and texts.

In the past few years since Wang Xingyue entered the industry and became a minor star, domestic entertainment has gradually become a huge reality show. It is hard to prevent leaks of filming, long videos actively create variety shows for film and television IPs, the form and degree of film and television business are all involution, several major communities are linked, and netizens are unprecedented in their efforts to dig up new celebrities...

In short, it has become an impossible task for an actor to hide behind a role without being recognized or judged.

The end of traffic, where to go

Whether he is pushed by the changes or actively adjusts his playing style, can Yu Zheng push Wang Xingyue to become a top male star this time? I think: It is difficult.

Looking at the career paths of Yu Zheng's male singers, the real problem is that they usually become famous earlier than their peers with Yu Zheng's support, but they miss the real battlefield because of this.

The 2014 “Gu Jian Qi Tan” marked the beginning of the popularity of domestic entertainment actors. Chen Xiao fell in love and got married at this time and failed to reap the first dividends like other 85-born stars.

The 95-year-old pattern began with the Dangai 101, and took shape with the forum hype of "waiting to explode". However, Xu Kai became popular in 2018. Both he and his fans were too early to be actors, and they could not provide the core users of the domestic entertainment industry with the excitement and sense of participation of talent shows and stock buying.

As a 2000 student who joined the ranks of "explosive" students along with the 1995 students, Wang Xingyue is also very skilled in CP promotion and purification, and seems to be a chosen traffic saint. But in the future, in his longer career, he may face a different domestic entertainment.

I have discussed before that Yu Zheng has never mastered the wealth code of RPS, because he hypes up the CPs of his artists too directly, lacking imagination. Moreover, whether he hypes up CPs or encourages CPs to pair up again or again, the ultimate goal is to make money for the drama, which is fundamentally different from the hype of CPs in gay dramas.

The latter is aimed at creating stars. Through the role CP, the audience is converted into drama fans, and then through real-life business, the emotions and traffic are transferred from the characters to the real people, and finally the cake is divided through unbinding and purification. Ideally, not only can double traffic be created, but platforms, magazines, brands... many other links can also share a share in the whole process.

Judging from this year, Yu Zheng, or his Yu Nanlang, has finally learned how to hype up CP and purify, but "the times have changed for adults", and there is not much cake to share. Or in the words of netizens, it is called purification if there are fans to promote, and it is extraction at best if there are no fans to promote. Whether it is Wang Xingyue or the new version of Yang Kang Wang Hongyi, their unique and beautiful little thoughts have attracted a lot of ridicule, and there are not enough fans to fight against them.

In the final analysis, the traffic era is really over, and the various gameplays that rely on it will collapse one after another. Regarding this, there are already enough signs to show that enough factors are contributing to it.

After the "Clear and Bright" campaign, the two star-making machines of talent shows and gay dramas were reluctantly abandoned, and a large number of star lists were abolished. There are no longer so many blatant ways to stimulate and verify traffic. The process of creating traffic has been greatly weakened, and the money, emotions, time and energy invested by fans in it are no longer as much as before, so new traffic is being thrown away more and more quickly and is becoming more and more of a fake.

At the same time, after experiencing the baptism of the hot money era and the slowdown of economic growth, people have completely disenchanted themselves with the "208w". Not only do passers-by avoid traffic stars, but star chasers and star-drinkers have also changed their mindsets, advocating standing up to chase stars and prioritizing their own feelings. In many cases, they stop at being fans of March dramas and are no longer easily attracted and purified to suffer the pain of the fan circle.

The rise of short videos has greatly rewritten the way of consuming TV dramas. Whether a drama is popular or not, and which actors are on the stage and who fails, are all in the hands of passers-by, and the idea of ​​whether traffic can carry a drama has become a false proposition. Even short videos are affecting the creative thinking of long dramas, endangering the long-tail effect of hit drama IPs. The cast of "The Legend of Zhen Huan" can eat up their respective roles for a lifetime. Which drama dares to say this now or in the future?

In this case, the CP hype has actually come full circle and returned to serving the drama, or in other words, its energy has stopped at serving the drama. Then, the artists who want to stop while they are ahead and the CP fans who are unwilling to let go need to work out a new tacit understanding, and the production companies and brokerage companies also need to explore new ways to survive.

Therefore, Wang Xingyue's attempt to replicate Wang Yibo's path to the top by hyping up CPs is probably not feasible. The same king has a different fate. The timing (media channels), location (film and television industry), and people (star-chasing mentality) are all wrong. However, the case of Yu Nanlang is quite suitable for anti-anxiety - it is better to arrive early than to arrive at the right time, and winning at the starting line can also be a mixed blessing.