Only three days after it was broadcast, Tencent Video's costume drama "When the Wild Goose Returns" rushed to the second place on the Yunhe Daily list with a market share of 27000.0%, and it was only one step away from reaching the top. In Tencent Video Station, the popularity value of "When the Goose Returns" is also about to break through the 0 mark, and there is a potential to reproduce the trend of "Nine Purples".
With the popularity of "When the Wild Goose Returns", the entry #Buy Stock Director# also appeared on the hot search on Weibo, and many viewers said that Tencent Video once again succeeded in "buying stock directors", "Yang Long, the director of "When the Wild Goose Returns", packed up and prepared to be promoted. In entertainment groups such as Douban's "Ratings Research Center", the high ratings of "When the Goose Returns" are high, largely thanks to the director's ability to control, whether it is the narrative rhythm, lens aesthetics or character presentation, it has a texture different from that of previous costume dramas.
From last year's "Nine Purples" and "Once Upon a Time by the Water" to this year's "National Beauty" and "When the Wild Goose Returns",The entertainment value officer found that the director is becoming the focus of everyone's discussion of a drama, and it has also become the most critical element of the success or failure of a work。 With the joint help of video platforms and audiences, a group of cutting-edge directors are collectively "on the table", replacing traffic stars as the center of industry resource gathering.
Cutting-edge directors collectively "promote coffee"
Last year was the year when the ancient puppets collectively hit the streets, and it was also the year when the traffic stars' "transfer love" completely failed, and none of the actors were successfully promoted because of the popular dramas, but many cutting-edge directors stood out with their "dark horse dramas" and gained the attention and affirmation of the audience and the industry.Such as Zeng Qingjie, director of "Nine Purples", director of "Once Upon a Time in the Water", and Ding Ziguang, director of "National Beauty", etc。
Among them, Zeng Qingjie is the first time to shoot a long drama, and Ding Ziguang is the first time to get involved in the theme of ancient costumes, but they both handed over a high-score answer sheet. Compared with the mature directors on the ancient puppet assembly line, they do not have the greasy feeling of "ripe and flowing", they can bring the audience a sense of freshness in all aspects of narrative, lens, style, etc., and can also respond to the audience's needs and aesthetic changes with a "rheology" mentality, in short, they are more "persuaded".
Behind the collective "table" of cutting-edge directors, there is a strategic shift in the long video platform from betting on "traffic" to betting on high-quality creators, the directors mentioned above have been deeply bound to the platform. A platform insider told the entertainment value officer: "The platform is now aware that buying stock directors and screenwriters to support actors is more profitable than counting on one or two actors to carry bad scripts, and traffic actors with average acting skills and good scripts complement each other, and good actors and good scripts are the icing on the cake." ”
The market's collective backlash against the formulaic production of costume dramas, and the impact of the narrative rhythm and emotional concentration of short dramas on long dramas, resonate with the audience's strong demand for innovative expression, and promote the industry to enter the critical cycle of creative talent iteration.
This transformation not only reshapes the ancient puppet track, but also spreads to cross-theme fields such as urban and suspense-By systematically expanding the reserve of young creative forces, the platform solidifies actions such as the signing of popular directors on the platform and resource upgrading into routine operations in the industry, marking the deep shift of the content production model from a "resource consumption war" to a "talent war".。
Under this background, a group of young and middle-aged directors who are exquisite, not perfunctory, and have personal characteristics are gradually becoming the mainstay of the drama circle。 At the same time, as the "street hit rate" of the drama series has increased year by year, when the competition for "good cakes" in the fan circle has intensified, these directors who have promoted coffee have also gathered the unprecedented attention of pollen and corn fans. The projects of cutting-edge directors have become the focus of their close tracking and heated discussions, thus achieving their own traffic.
How do video platforms "buy shares" of directors?
The logic of "buying directors for shares" on long video platforms has been repeatedly verified in practice, and each platform has a different strategy.
This year, theWhen the geese returnThe up-and-coming director Yang Long has actually been "dormant" on Tencent Video for three years——From the 2024-year-old small-cost drama "Our Little Luck" to the 0-year ancient puppet test work "See You Again", Douban's scores are hovering at the passing line, but the platform has always given it room for trial and error, until the S-level IP "Noble Girl" is handed over to him, and finally activates the dual potential of its lens language and narrative control.
This "step-by-step training" strategy is even more extreme in Zeng Qingjie. He has directed many high-reputation short dramas such as "Nian Nian Ignorance" and "False Face" for Mango TV, and is known as the "short drama ceiling" in the industry because of the emotional atmosphere created by the Chinese aesthetic conception and the light and shadow of the camera.After he was recruited by Tencent Video, he first completed the team run-in with the short drama "Provocation", and then went from short to long, trying to use the technique of short drama to activate the ancient puppet track where the audience was already aesthetically fatigued。
腾讯视频的试验并没有一上来就大步流星，《九重紫》只是一部A级制作的古偶剧，资源配置也是“万年配角+新人导演”，却凭借酣畅淋漓的叙事节奏，每集都有高光名场面的“短剧套路”，以及曾庆杰最擅长的唯美画风与强氛围感，让不少长剧观众眼前一亮，realized the S+-level broadcast effect, a mediocre hand, but I didn't expect to play the "king bomb"。
Because of the success of "Nine Purples", Zeng Qingjie has also become a director chased by fans, "Chasing Jade" before the start of filming because of the topic, several times by fans of both the male and female protagonists into the cold palace, as a result, when I met Zeng Qingjie, the attention was greatly improved, and after the start of filming, Reuters marketing must be reuters every once in a while, Reuters has even been "upgraded" to "high-definition plot cut advance preview", and finally promoted from "paste" to "must explode".
Last year, Tencent Video not only had "Nine Purple Purple", an ancient puppet dark horse, but also "When the Mountains Are Blooming", a drama that won the word-of-mouth championship of domestic dramas that year, it may be difficult for you to think that director Fei Zhenxiang once filmed "Ghost Blowing Lantern: Yellow Skin Grave" with a score of 2.0 on Douban.2022-0 years, Fei Zhenxiang was just a series of online drama directors of "travel work" on Tencent Video. Until the success of "Xinghan Splendid Moon Rising in the Sea" in 0 years, Fei Zhenxiang gained greater autonomy from Tencent Video, "When the Mountains Are Blooming", a drama that is destined to have limited revenue, is what he tried his best to promote with the full support of Tencent.
After years of running-in, Fei Zhenxiang has transformed from the director of the "Ghost Blowing the Lantern" series to an all-round creator, which also reflects the platform's re-evaluation of the director's value:Instead of pursuing a single drama hit, it is better to cultivate content assets that can be developed sustainably。
In recent years, Mango TV has continued to break through in the drama market, and the ratings ceiling has been continuously improved, and it is gradually reversing the problem of "bias" that only relies on variety shows to walk on one leg, and the deep binding with high-quality directors is one of the important reasons.今年年初芒果TV的开年大剧《国色芳华》热播期集均播放量破4000万，助力芒果TV首度跻身云合年度前十。
Although Ding Ziguang, the director of "National Colors", was born in 1985 years, he has already filmed many hit masterpieces such as "The Next Stop is Happiness", "In the Name of Family", "Going to a Windy Place", "National Beauty" and so on.
In addition to cutting-edge directors like Ding Ziguang who continue to raise the audience chassis of dramas, Mango TV also reserves directors like Li Mo who create word-of-mouth dramas for the platform and explore their way to occupy a place in the scarce track, Li Mo is one of the most representative. Although he directed "8 Day Restart Plan", "Brilliant Wind and Sea", "Apocalypse" and "I'm Good in Another Country", although they do not have the blessing of traffic stars, and the market attention is not as good as "To a Windy Place" and "National Beauty", but the Douban score remains around 0 points.
As a scarce director who is very good at filming urban workplaces in the eyes of the public, and a rare male director who can properly reflect the group portrait of women, Li Mo has attracted a group of high-quality audiences for Mango TV。 He once told the media that "Mango gave me the greatest creative freedom, so I chose Mango". Although the outside world and the media have said that Li Mo is worthy of an S+ project, it is obvious that Mango is willing to give him more time and more freedom, instead of rushing to the shelves, driving him out of his "comfort zone", and smashing this signboard that has been cultivated for many years.
Youku has adopted the method of constantly recruiting outstanding external talents and establishing self-made studios with producers and directors as the core, integrating the cutting-edge creative forces in the industry into the content ecology of Ali Entertainmentto support them to produce more works with a strong personal style.
2月13日，曾参与《唐探1900》《误杀2》《我和我的家乡》等多部影视作品的编剧刘吾驷正式入职阿里大文娱，成立驷马难追工作室。去年11月26日，90后新锐导演别克入职阿里大文娱成为正式员工，成立别剧异格工作室。去年暑期爆款《边水往事》收官后不久，导演算就入职阿里大文娱，成立三边坡工作室，专注悬疑原创，新作《悬案》也列入了优酷2025片单。
If it can boldly innovate and continue to bring fresh image vocabulary to the screen, Sanbianpo Studio is expected to become the top label in the domestic suspense drama track and achieve more stable and continuous content output.
In the cold winter of film and television
Industry resources are concentrating on high-quality creators
Recently, the cold winter of film and television has become a hot topic in the drama circle and the fan circle.有网友盘点了今年前两个月开机的长剧项目——1月份开机总计6部，较去年同期22部下降了近73%；2月份仅开机了5部，较去年同期下降了近31%。
Compared with the grand occasion of previous years, this year's long video platforms are invariably extremely cautious, and the good times when traffic stars seamlessly joined the group are gone.Improving the "certainty" of popular models and reducing ineffective waste as much as possible has become a common problem for all platforms to solve。 It is precisely at this time that those "shengcai" directors who are close to their masterpieces are the "straw for life" that the platform is eager to grasp, and the resources in the industry will also be tilted towards them to a greater extent, which also gives them more choices.
The speed at which the director of the short drama soared is beyond our imagination.After filming the popular short drama "Writing" in 2024 years, director Zhang Zhiwei was soon invited by Mango TV to take charge of the costume drama "Jade Tea Bone" starring Hou Minghao and Nazha, and became Yu Zheng's "new favorite". At the same time, he also has to take into account the online drama "Qingchuan Dream" at station B, and take on the important task of station B to launch an impact on the drama market again.
In addition to the director,Reliable drama screenwriters are also becoming the target of long video platforms and audiences to "buy shares".。 Cao Xiaotian, the screenwriter of "When the Wild Goose Returns", has always been good at the theme of female mutual assistance, from "Jiang Zhao Dawn", "Nine Righteous People" to "When the Wild Goose Returns", his talent has been seen by the public step by step. The next drama "Golden Branch", which he is responsible for writing the screenplay, has also become a "good cake" that fans pay close attention to.
As for the upcoming blockbuster drama of the year, "Chess Warrior" starring Wang Baoqiang, many viewers are most concerned about who the screenwriter is and what resume works he has, and unknown screenwriters have also become the biggest uncertain factor in this series. If "Chess Warrior" wastes such a top-level configuration because of the screenwriter's ability to perform as expected, it should make the industry further realize that the screenwriter may be the most important board that determines the quality of the series.
Now, a more profound change is quietly taking place:The valuation system of the film and television industry is shifting from "traffic discount" to "creativity discount"。 Those platforms that can continue to incubate director assets and build style moats will eventually grasp the pricing power in the new round of industry reshuffle.