Chapter 480: Not Crazy, Not Alive

In a large flat in Baodao.

The director of "Casino Bureau within a Bureau", Zheng Jing, is holding a tablet, checking the real-time box office of the Spring Festival movie season.

Many apps nowadays provide very detailed data.

Not only can you check the cumulative total box office of a movie, but you can even see the split box office for the film producers.

This so-called producer split is the money that Luo Mo and the others can receive.

Generally speaking, it falls within the range of thirty to forty percent.

Zheng Jing looked down the list, observing the various data points, feeling quite displeased.

He felt a headache especially when looking at the column for 【Media Premiere Predicted Box Office】.

The data written here is the final box office performance predicted by the media when the film premiered.

For "Casino Bureau within a Bureau", the media initially predicted 2.5 to 2.7 billion.

"But looking at the current situation, it's hard to even break 2 billion," Zheng Jing thought to himself.

Conversely, for "Dragon Detective", the 【Media Premiere Predicted Box Office】 was 1.6 to 1.8 billion, but because its word-of-mouth is much better, and audiences are currently quite interested in suspense films, the box office might just overtake "Casino Bureau within a Bureau" in the later stages!

Zheng Jing was actually no stranger to this kind of comeback.

As a leader among Baodao directors and one of the representative figures of Hong Kong films, he had also had many films successfully make a comeback.

And they were all those low-budget commercial films made in a month or two using a "fast-shooter" model.

From a certain perspective, Zheng Jing's past is a bit like a certain fat man with the surname Wang on Earth.

The output and efficiency are incredibly astonishing.

It's just that in terms of conduct and personality, there are obvious differences.

"But this 'Monkey King: Hero is Back'..." Zheng Jing really couldn't understand it.

The 【Media Premiere Predicted Box Office】 was only 260 to 300 million, yet today it actually relied on a 14% screen share to break 100 million in single-day box office!

Its cumulative box office, including those pre-sales, has already broken the 300 million mark!

The final tally will be at least 700 to 800 million.

This can no longer be considered a small comeback; this is terrifying, okay?

The most absurd part is that a piece of music in the movie is now actually being called god-tier music and has been labeled as a 【Century Classic】.

A century classic, what kind of concept is that?

Was a movie specifically made for this piece of music, or did they just casually produce a world-class piece of music while making a movie?

Zheng Jing felt his brain wasn't quite enough; he had never encountered such a bizarre operation.

This is not playing by the rules at all...

Zheng Jing is a very pure commercial director; his primary goal in making films is for everyone to make money.

He makes money, the investors make money, the cinema chains make money... anyway, just making money is the end of it!

As for whether the word-of-mouth is good or not, that has never been his greatest pursuit, and it's very likely not his pursuit at all.

In his eyes, Luo Mo is a total outlier.

Disregarding costs, ignoring risks, and throwing 150 million in production fees into an animated movie is already insane.

There were even more bizarre operations afterward, leaving people scratching their heads.

Zheng Jing lit a cigarette; given his usual habits, he would very likely make some remarks and then frantically ride the coattails of "Monkey King: Hero is Back".

Over in Baodao, they have always been very good at this.

Whether it's riding the hype or creating gimmicks, they are truly formidable.

Not to mention anything else, just look at the format the Blue Star Hong Kong media uses for news headlines; it's exactly the same as on Earth.

For example:

Of course, Naicha Lun, who is always in the limelight, never escaped it either.

Once, he bought a new large motorcycle and found a remote place to test drive it; after being photographed, the headline was "Zhou Jielun Rides New Lover in Dark Alley".

Honestly, it's not just Zheng Jing who wants to stir up trouble; most of the films in the Spring Festival season really want to stir up trouble for "Monkey King: Hero is Back".

It's just a pity that it was publicly praised by five special media outlets and even appeared on the "News Broadcast".

You can bicker with each other, but... try messing with "Monkey King: Hero is Back"?

It's not that no one had crooked ideas; it's that they really didn't dare.

Instead, the former big brother of domestic animated films—"Legend of the Red Dragon"—posted a congratulatory poster titled 【Two Dragons Playing with a Pearl】 early on the morning of the fifth day of the Lunar New Year.

In the poster, the Red Dragon was drawn, along with the Little White Dragon from "Monkey King: Hero is Back", and the pearl had big characters written on it—Congratulations to "Monkey King: Hero is Back" for breaking 100 million in single-day box office!

Everyone has long been tired of those sordid tactics; in fact, they only increase netizens' resentment.

Some people use these "seven-injury fists" just because they purely want to drag others down with them.

It's great to be like "Legend of the Red Dragon", isn't it?

………

………

Time passed quickly, and in the following few days, "Monkey King: Hero is Back" was unstoppable.

The screen share increased a little every day, and the single-day box office performance remained stable at over 100 million!

The entire animation industry was already a bit shocked into numbness.

—"I'm Numb"!

Finally, the cumulative box office of "Monkey King: Hero is Back" infinitely approached "Dragon Castle".

This day, many animation professionals had been waiting for a full two years.

Two years ago, "Dragon Castle" was released globally, and in the Huaxia region alone, it raked in over 600 million in box office.

This result caused Huaxia animation professionals to fall into silence one after another.

At the same time, a large amount of mockery and sarcasm appeared on the internet.

Many people wondered, is it possible that one day, a domestic animated film could break the record of *Dragon Castle*?

But two years flashed by, and it remained just as high and mighty, unreachable.

This floating castle made all the animation professionals in Huaxia have to look up at it.

Honestly, the massive success of *Dragon Castle* and its explosion in popularity in the Huaxia region ignited the ambitions of many domestic animation professionals and changed their mindsets.

At the same time, many investors locked their sights on domestic animated films, and before the release of several films, they even used slogans like "production comparable to *Dragon Castle*" or "determined to surpass *Dragon Castle*."

But the result was... the box office might only be a fraction of theirs.

Investors lost everything, down to their last penny.

The fire in many people's hearts was extinguished right then and there.

A large number of investors stopped eyeing this market, and many projects were stillborn or had funding withdrawn halfway through.

"We are still craning our necks to look up at it," He Yuanguang once said to Luo Mo.

"Once, our ambitions were ignited, and we tried to catch up to it."

"But the harder we ran, the more desperate we felt."

"Because when you are exhausted, you suddenly realize that what you thought was close to you is actually so unreachable."

"It's like looking at a mountain and running a horse to death!"

This is the current state of the animation industry over the past two years.

The situation is very awkward.

Because of *Dragon Castle*, investors are more willing to increase investment amounts than before.

But at most, they would only add twenty or thirty percent.

Who doesn't want to win big with a small stake?

If one were to double the investment, it would be better to do other types of films, where the risk is even lower.

"Nobody would invest in your project before, and now that I've put money in, you tell me you want more money and want to play for higher stakes? What a joke!"

"What are you doing? They have a global release, we only have a domestic release, Boss!"

"Do you understand risk? Did my money fall from the sky?"

Being stuck in the middle is actually quite meaningless.

Many Huaxia animation professionals began to deliberately forget this film.

Even when He Yuanguang talked to Luo Mo about the current state of animated film box office, he only mentioned *Legend of the Red Dragon* and did not bring up *Dragon Castle*.

He only used *Legend of the Red Dragon* as an example to tell Luo Mo that investing 150 million was a crazy act, and a top-tier crazy act at that.

And then, a top-tier madman was born just like that.

—If you aren't obsessed, you won't succeed!

Come back to life, damn it!

The eighth day of the Lunar New Year, 8:24 PM.

*Monkey King: Hero is Back* cumulative box office surpassed 700 million, topping the history of Huaxia animation films.

(PS: First update, requesting monthly tickets.)

(End of this chapter)