Chapter 9

As for the Chinese market, it was still far from reaching its future heights.

The annual box office champion "Curse of the Golden Flower" only had 250 million RMB,

and only "The Banquet," "Fearless," "The Da Vinci Code," and "King Kong" had box office earnings over 100 million...

Ning Hao's "Crazy Stone" was released and earned 23 million in box office, but the word-of-mouth had not yet exploded.

Just under these complex circumstances,

the teaser trailer for "Spider-Man" quietly appeared on the Columbia Broadcasting System,

as well as on numerous cinema advertisements, the internet, and offline advertising screens.

At Sony Entertainment's North American headquarters, Chairman Howard Stringer was listening to a report.

"Mr. Stringer, the online and offline trailers have been deployed, and the posters have been produced, but we have to wait until the next phase to roll them out."

"How is the trailer performing?" Howard leaned back in his chair nonchalantly.

"Spider-Man" was indeed strategically important, but he also had to be prepared for failure.

If the trailer's performance was excellent, his subordinates would have already reported the good news to him; it wouldn't be his turn to ask.

"There is no effect yet; media attention and public attention are relatively low, and Google search indices have not grown significantly."

"Isn't Spider-Man a hot IP? The situation should be better."

"The main thing is that the live-action movie is a big pit, and Spider-Man is an Asian... this is hard for people to accept."

The old "Batman" series ended dismally,

the "X-Men" series was stillborn,

and even Oscar-winning director Ang Lee's "Hulk" could not escape the fate of loss.

Whether it was investors or audiences, they were already deeply disappointed, so it was normal for everyone not to be optimistic about "Spider-Man."

"Fine then," Howard Stringer sighed.

"Go contact Martin Campbell and Daniel Craig, and try to film the 007 sequel as soon as possible."

Just as Sony executives were disappointed with the initial response to the "Spider-Man" trailer,

this trailer was quietly spreading on the emerging video website YouTube!

Leonard was a PhD student at Caltech, and besides doing research, his favorite thing to do was reading comics.

As a typical nerd, he and his friends were both Marvel and DC fans.

In fact, he had always been looking forward to the wonderful stories in the comics, with superheroes of different abilities being brought to the big screen.

When he was a child, he became a fan after watching "Superman" and "Batman" movies,

but unfortunately, the 21st-century live-action movies completely disappointed the fans.

Comic fans had reached a consensus:

Hollywood today could not film qualified comic book adaptations; it was a huge trap.

After a tiring day, Leonard dragged his exhausted body back to his rented apartment.

His roommate Howard was nervously playing "World of Warcraft."

This game had been in open beta in North America for over a year and had swept the world, becoming unstoppable.

"Playing WoW again? Aren't you tired of playing all night every day?"

"You don't understand, Blizzard games are the best in the world; I can play until I'm 50."

Leonard curled his lips, sat down at the computer, opened a webpage, and browsed YouTube videos in boredom.

He felt that video websites were the mainstream way of entertainment in the future.

"Cat, dog, dog, cat again..."

Before YouTube was acquired by Google in its early days, most of the videos were cute pets.

"Cat, Spider-Man, cat... hmm? Spider-Man?"

Seeing Spider-Man's classic red and blue uniform, Leonard's first reaction was that it was a fan cosplay.

Looking closely, the video publisher was actually the official Columbia Pictures account!

As everyone knew, the copyright of Spider-Man was in Sony's hands, and Columbia was a subsidiary of Sony Entertainment!

Some time ago, the media went crazy with rumors that Sony was rebooting the live-action "Spider-Man," and he thought it was a scam.

He didn't expect it to be true! They even made a teaser trailer!

The current view count was already approaching 1 million, and more and more people were paying attention to this trailer!

With excitement, Leonard clicked the play button.

Full-screen playback!

[Sony Entertainment] [Marvel]

[Produced by Columbia Pictures]

"Not everyone can become a hero."

"My life is destined to be no longer peaceful."

Accompanied by a magnetic voice-over,

a blonde white man in a suit walked into a bank.

Leonard didn't understand; was this the protagonist?

What did it have to do with Spider-Man?

Immediately after, the white man actually pulled out a shotgun and robbed the bank by firing into the air!

Several masked robbers quickly entered the vault and then fled the bank with several large bags.

Several police cars surrounded the bank,

but they didn't expect them to have a helicopter!

Until now, Leonard was still confused; was this a trailer for another action movie?

The next scene made Leonard gasp!

Seeing the helicopter about to carry the robbers to safety,

the next second,

a huge spider web was spun between two skyscrapers!

It stuck the helicopter firmly in the high sky!

The camera pulled back, and in the sunset, a familiar figure swung past between the buildings!

That familiar red and blue color scheme!

Leonard instantly got goosebumps!

[This winter]

Bang!

Spider-Man's classic face appeared in front of the camera!

He stood on the edge of a skyscraper, and then, fell downward!

[Bringing you a brand new shocking experience!]

Swoosh—

Spider-Man fired a spider web and swung to the limit before hitting the ground!

Even through the small computer screen, one could feel the thrill of the strong wind scraping past the ears!

The scene of Spider-Man shuttling between buildings, which could only appear in imagination,

was actually brought to the big screen!

[Spider-Man!]

Leonard had already clenched his fists unconsciously.

In the scene, Spider-Man stood on the top of the Empire State Building, climbing the Stars and Stripes in a familiar superhero pose.

Then, he fired a spider web at the camera and swung toward the screen!

Black screen.