After "In the Name of the People" and "Wolf Warrior 2" became popular, will male TV dramas take advantage of the momentum to rise?

after nearly five years of dominating the screen, the big actress TV series has begun to show fatigue. At the same time, "Men's Drama" has shown a momentum of revival.

I don't know since when, the domestic TV screen has become the world of "big heroine". From the Legend of Zhen Huan and the Thousand bones of Flowers to the Legend of Miyue and Jinxiu Weiyang, most of the hit dramas in recent years are "heroines". In comparison, the number of male-themed TV dramas is not only small, but also the ratings and influence are difficult to compete with female-themed TV dramas.

this year, the situation seems to have changed. Male TV dramas such as "in the name of the people" and "Alliance of military Advisers" have won good ratings and word of mouth. The emergence of "Wolf Warriors 2" makes the audience see the huge market potential of works with male themes. With the help of the "Dongfeng" of these popular male-themed works, will male-themed TV dramas rise?

< strong > Big actresses dominate the screen, while male themes are rarely popular. < / strong >

looking back at the TV screens in the past two years, you will find a very interesting phenomenon. Among the popular TV dramas in recent years, the leading actress accounts for almost half of the country. The biographies of Zhen Huan, Thousand bones of Flower, and Legend of Miyue in the past two years, and this summer's Biography of Chu Qiao, drunken Linglong, and the bright moon heart of Qin beauty, all belong to this type.

the so-called big heroine refers to a TV series with women as the first protagonist and narrates the growth experience of the heroine. According to statistics, there were about 16400 episodes of TV dramas filmed in 2016, more than half of which were featured by big actresses, with feminist and female themes accounting for 70 to 80 percent. Nearly 22 leading actresses are scheduled to be broadcast and filmed in 2017, including "Ruyi's Royal Love in the Palace", "the full Moon", "winning the World" and "helping the Queen shake the Queen".

in terms of ratings and influence, the leading actress can be regarded as a "screen bully" in recent years. From the ratings list over the past decade, we can see that major female TV dramas such as the Legend of Wu Mei Niang, Legend of Miyue, and Flower Thousand bones have all received more than 2% of the audience. The Legend of Chu Qiao, which was broadcast this summer, not only has an audience rating of 1.71%, but also has exceeded 40 billion, setting a new record for the broadcast of domestic dramas.

behind the dominating screen of the heroine, it reflects a phenomenon-most of the TV dramas that have been popular on the screen in the past decade are female TV dramas, while male TV dramas are rarely popular. (note: the female theme mentioned in this article refers to the urban emotional theme, family ethics theme and youth idol theme preferred by the female audience, while the male theme refers to the political and historical theme, science fiction suspense theme and hot-blooded action theme. )

it can be seen from the table that among the 17 popular dramas in the past decade, only the anti-Japanese drama "War Flag" and the spy drama "Dancing with Wolves" are male-themed TV dramas. The remaining 15 TV dramas can be roughly divided into three categories-dog-blooded suspense dramas, youth idol dramas and costume idol dramas, all of which are popular with female audiences.

this year, things seem to have changed. The most outstanding audience performance in the first half of the year, "in the name of the people", is a real "man play". According to statistics, the average audience rating of this TV series is as high as 3.661%, and the number of webcasts in the first half of the year has also exceeded 35 billion, which can be said to be a veritable "phenomenal popular style". In addition, the male audience's favorite power drama "Alliance of Advisors" and the epic "White Deer Plains" have also gained a good reputation, and male TV dramas seem to be showing a momentum of revival.

< strong > what is the reason behind the difficulty of finding popular styles in male TV dramas? < / strong >

recall that more than a decade ago, there were many popular male-themed works on TV screens, such as "Kangxi Dynasty", "Bright Sword", "Soldier assault", "lurking" and so on. At that time, the proportion of male TV dramas was relatively high. In recent years, female TV dramas represented by big female dramas are becoming more and more popular, while male TV dramas are not as powerful as before. Why?

1. Female viewers are the main viewers of TV dramas

most of the TV dramas with high ratings are loved by women. Why? The reason is simple: female viewers are the main viewers of TV dramas. A survey shows that the proportion of female audience of TV series has exceeded 60%, and this number continues to grow. It can be said that the female drama itself has a huge audience base, and it is not surprising to get high ratings.

even in male TV dramas, you can see a lot of plots that "please" female audiences. For example, in the Alliance of military Advisers, there is not only a power struggle above the court, but also a lot of warm and interesting emotional scenes. In Bai Lu Yuan, Tian Xiaoe is not portrayed as a "slut" from a male perspective, but she is portrayed as a poor person who wants to fight against fate, but is repeatedly teased by fate. Such plots and characterization are more likely to resonate with female audiences.

2. Lack of successful precedent similar to the Legend of Zhen Huan

in the past two years, online writers have created a large number of "strong women" novels on the Internet, creating a strong, hard-working and enterprising female image. With the popularity of the Legend of Zhen Huan, slightly famous female Qiang novels have been bought with a lot of money and adapted into film and television works. The popularity of movies and TV dramas has further stimulated online writers to create the same kind of stories. In the past two years, popular works such as Legend of Miyue, Jinxiu Weiyang, Lonely Fang without self-admiration, and Biography of Chu Qiao have all been adapted by popular IP.

by contrast, there is no successful precedent with such great influence as Zhen Huan in the film and television works adapted from men to online novels. Looking back on the male TV series broadcast in recent years, only "Nirvana in Fire" and "in the name of the people" can be called "popular style". Compared with the big female TV series "shoot a hit", male TV dramas are still far from reaching the stage of "mass production". In the case of lack of successful precedents, it is difficult for such works to win the attention of the capital market.

3. It is more difficult to shoot male TV dramas

due to the different tastes of watching TV dramas, male audiences have higher requirements for the logic and scenes of TV dramas, and generally like to watch historical dramas, era dramas, war dramas and case-related dramas. These TV dramas are often expensive, difficult to adapt, difficult to shoot, and the annual output is limited.

on the other hand, male TV dramas are more likely to touch the red line of policy. In 2004, the drama involved was expelled from prime time by SARFT because of too many scenes of bloody violence, and it was not until 2014 that it began to "thaw". In recent years, suspense, psychic, and secret-exploring dramas have become "hardest-hit areas" for rectification, and many online dramas such as "remaining crime", "psychological crime" and "exterminator" have been removed from the shelves. For these types of TV dramas, it is a fluke to survive on the Internet, let alone on the TV screen.

in comparison, female audiences are more emotional, less demanding for TV drama stories and logicality, and prefer to watch emotional and family plays. For the dual consideration of audience rating and return on investment, domestic dramas generally have a tendency to "please" female audiences. "the first half of my Life", which was a hit some time ago, is a typical case of "courting" a female audience. The plot of the show is very bloodthirsty, but it has become a popular style because it involves several issues that female audiences are most concerned about-"the other woman interrupts", "how to find a balance between the workplace and the family" and "what if a best friend falls in love with an ex-boyfriend".

4. Female TV dramas have greater advertising value

compared with male TV dramas, female TV dramas have more advantages in advertising development value. To create a female TV series, even if it fails to win the top spot in terms of ratings, it may perform well in terms of profits. In recent years, TV dramas famous for advertising placement, such as "Let's get married", "Love of Golden Marriage" and "Ode to Joy 2", are mostly female-themed TV dramas.

Ode to Joy 2, which was a hit in the first half of the year, is a "walking billboard". Take Taobao as an example, enter "Ode to Joy with the same style" in the search bar and more than 100 pages of products can be found. Among them, a halter top suit that Andy wore in previous episodes has sold more than 450 pieces, and another blue beach dress of the same style has also sold more than 500 pieces. Only the "same style" of the characters in the play can sell well. No wonder more than 50 advertisers favor this TV series.

the movie version of "three Life, three generations and Ten Mile Peach Blossom" released some time ago can also be used as a case study. Although the film has a reputation on the street, derivatives are very popular. According to the media, the derivatives of "three generations and Ten Mile Peach Blossom" have sold more than 300 million yuan. Of this total, female buyers account for 75% of sales.

< strong > the fatigue of the leading actress is emerging, and the male TV series are expected to make a comeback? < / strong >

after nearly five years of dominating the screen, the big actress TV series has begun to show fatigue. Take this summer's leading actress, for example, although the Legend of Chu Qiao has achieved eye-catching ratings, it has also caused a lot of complaints because of the end of the story and the procrastination of the plot. The ratings and word-of-mouth of "drunken Linglong" and "Qinshi Beauty Mingyue Heart" are not as good as expected.

in addition to the leading actress, other female dramas broadcast this year are also "audience and controversy fly together". TV dramas such as "because of meeting you", "Ode to Joy 2", "my first half of my Life", "three generations of Peach Blossom", "Guardian Beauty" and so on have attracted a lot of complaints. In particular, "Ode to Joy 2" and "the first half of my Life" have almost become popular in the face of abuse. So far, there has not been a popular female drama this year.

the cooling of female TV dramas is mainly due to the lack of content. Most of the female TV dramas broadcast in the past two years have fallen into the routine of "Mary Sue". In the words of netizens' summary, "all the men in the play love me and all the women are jealous of me." These stereotyped stories and flattened characters always lead to aesthetic fatigue if they read too much. After the market for women's themes is saturated, the audience is in urgent need of a change.

while female themes are beginning to show fatigue, "Men's Drama" has shown a momentum of revival. On Douban, the score of "White Deer Plains" is as high as 8.9, "in the name of the people" is as high as 8.3, and the score of "military Advisor Alliance" is also as high as 8.1, making it far ahead of many female TV dramas. In terms of audience performance, the real-time audience rating of "in the name of the people" has repeatedly exceeded 7%, the highest in the history of domestic TV dramas in the past decade, and left behind a number of female TV dramas with mediocre reputation.

these high-quality male TV dramas have made many male audiences become "dramatists" again. According to the survey, 67% of the viewers watching "in the name of the people" are male, while the proportion of male viewers of "Bai Luyuan" is 55%. According to the Youku Index, the proportion of male audience of "military Advisor Alliance" is 58.4%. Thus it can be seen that male audiences do not like to chase dramas, and when they encounter high-quality dramas that they are interested in, they may become the main viewers. Relevant data have shown that the viewing rate of male audiences will increase whenever historical dramas or chronological dramas are broadcast.

the unexpected popularity of Wolf Warriors 2 this summer also confirms the huge market potential of works with male themes. As of press time, Wolf Warriors 2 had grossed more than 5.2 billion yuan at the box office. According to the user portraits of the professional version of "Wolf Warriors 2" on Taobaopiao, the audience of the film is mainly male. "want to see" the film has a total audience of more than 1.15 million people, of which 65.48% are men, far more than women.

these data can show that male-themed works are not without market demand, but this demand is obscured by the blowout of female themes. To some extent, the excessive ingratiation of domestic dramas to female audiences has led to the loss of male audiences. When there is no drama to follow, some male audiences escape into the world of games, live broadcasts or overseas dramas. Only when there are high-quality TV dramas such as "in the name of the people" will these viewers return to the TV set.

from the broadcast plan in the past two years, although viewers will still be surrounded by a lot of "big women" in a short period of time, male themes have shown a momentum of rise. The Nirvana in Fire the year before last and the popularity of this year's "people's name" and "Alliance of military Advisers" are good examples. In the past two years, a series of "Men's dramas" such as Jiang Wen's "Cao Cao", Wu Lei's "fighting the Sky", Yang Yang's "Wu Zhi Qiankun", Huang Xuan's "the Story of the Cloud at Sea in Kyushu" and Zhang Ruoyun's "Huo Quan's Disease" will also be released.

having experienced the baptism of a large number of Mary Su TV dramas, it is naturally a pleasure to see the male theme return to the screen. However, at present, male-themed film and television works are only in the early stage of return, and there is still a large market to be developed in the future. For TV dramas with male themes, we should learn the lessons of big female TV dramas, jump out of the routine of "little love", illuminate real life with fictional stories, and show our thinking about history and human nature. After all, the audience has just escaped from the clutches of the heroine of "Open hanging", and I'm afraid they don't want to see the story of the hero of "Goldfinger" any more.

Edit: mary