1. "Haier Brothers"
Speaking of China's most popular science animation, this title should go to another large-scale domestic animation that preceded Blue Cat - "Haier Brothers" 》. Some time ago, Haier Group announced the news of the animation reset of "Haier Brothers". Different from the Haier brothers in memory, this time the Haier brothers "put on" clothes.
The picture has turned into a flat, simple pattern, and the character design has developed in a cartoon-like direction with big eyes. There are even a few screenshots that do not look like the Haier Brothers, but like Astro Boy. (In fact, the two are really related), but the audience doesn't seem to buy it.
The child brothers in our impression are still the two naked boys. Many netizens also started joking: I didn't expect that besides Teacher Cang, there are people who I don't recognize even if they put on clothes. Some people also say: "Haier Brothers" is the most expensive cartoon that sells peripherals. But no matter what, Haier Brothers has been given multiple meanings in China. It is not only one of the most successful popular science animations in China, but also our childhood memories. Similarly, Haier Group is the world's largest home appliance manufacturer and a multinational company with 73,000 employees worldwide. In 2018, Haier Group ranked 499th among the Global 500.
Almost thirty years ago, the Haier Group was still on the verge of collapse. It was the "Haier Brothers" who brought it all back to life.
If the story of the blue cat is a failure that rises from the ground but makes people sigh with regret, then the story of the Haier brothers is much more brilliant: behind these two little boys without clothes is a story. A legendary experience in business and culture.
1. Using cartoons to promote products is nothing new.
Also in the 1980s, Casio sponsored "Astro Boy" and made patch advertisements in "Astro Boy". In "Astro Boy", all electronic products were Printed with Casio's trademark, this became Casio's first advertisement in China.
Perhaps inspired by "Astro Boy", Zhang Ruimin vaguely had the idea of ??filming an animation for publicity. A good cartoon brand can also be used for the decoration of Haier refrigerators. A long time ago, Haier Brothers was indeed a trademark. But after trying it several times, the effect was not good enough. Firstly, the domestic animation production level at that time was too backward, and secondly, the Haier Group had strict requirements for cartoon characters.
Animated characters must be positive images and must be consistent with the corporate image. It was not until 1995 that Haier Group finally found a suitable target. At that time, it signed a 60 million production agreement with Hongye Animation Production Company to produce large-scale animation at a production cost of approximately 150,000 per episode.
Because it is a Sino-German joint venture, one of the Haier brothers is Asian and the other is German. The entire animation production process is also very long. According to data review, the entire animation took nearly eight years from production to broadcast.
But it was all worth it. "Haier Brothers" has become the most successful popular science animation in China. The animation uses the form of adventure and uses humanities and scientific knowledge to popularize science, changing the style of the original animation, which was based on fighting and mythological stories. At the same time, each episode is supplemented by historical facts and information.
At the same time, "Haier Brothers" also signed an agreement to be broadcast on American TV stations, becoming the first Chinese animation to be signed to be broadcast abroad to achieve "cultural export".
"Haier Brothers" can be said to be a forerunner before "Three Thousand Questions of Naughty Blue Cat". It closely introduced the image of Haier Brothers into thousands of ordinary people's families. By the way, Haier Sales of the refrigerator also skyrocketed, and it is still considered one of the most successful animation cases in marketing history. But if we break it down carefully, Haier Group is at most the biological father of "Haier Brothers", and the adoptive father is someone else.
Liu Zuofeng, the director of "Haier Brothers", is an overseas student. After graduating from Beijing Film Academy in 1982, he came to the UK and the United States. Similarly, animations such as "The Blue Mouse and the Big-Faced Cat" and the CCTV version of "Journey to the West" have participated in the cooperation.
But what really plays a key role in "Haier Brothers" is the animation's producer-Meng Jinzhi, who is also the legal representative of Hongye Animation Production Company. At that time, Hongye Animation Production Company, which signed a cooperation agreement with Haier Group, was just a family workshop with only 7 or 8 people.
In addition, Zhang Ruimin had two previous failures. If Meng Jinzhi had not repeatedly intervened, "Haier Brothers" would have been difficult to come out.
But like "Three Thousand Questions of Naughty Blue Cat", even though it has achieved great success, it also has hidden dangers. Although this animation production company that successfully produced "Haier Brothers" is still in operation, it is also unknown and cannot be said to be successful.
2. Search the Internet for relevant information about Hongye Animation, and you can see the following lawsuit cases:
In June 2001, the chief director of the first and second parts of "Haier Brothers" led the animation Employees collectively sued the management of Hongye Computer Production Technology Co., Ltd. for violating labor laws. (Hongye lost the lawsuit)
On December 10, 2001, the Beijing No. 1 Intermediate People's Court accepted the case of Jing Lili, the chief director of the third part of "Haier Brothers", suing Beijing Hongye Computer Production Technology Co., Ltd. Wang Heping for stocks, bonds, Bill contract dispute case. (Hongye lost the lawsuit)
In June 2002, Zhongshi Media Co., Ltd. applied to the Beijing No. 1 Intermediate People's Court for enforcement, requiring Beijing Oriental Hongye Advertising Co., Ltd. to repay Zhongshi Media's equity transfer fee and late payment fees* **22,266,875 yuan, requiring Meng Jinzhi and Wang Heping to assume joint and several liability for the debt with their personal assets. During the execution, the court has executed the case amount of 388,500 yuan; Meng Jinzhi and Wang Heping currently have no other property available for execution. CTV Media still reserves the right to recover the claims of Beijing Oriental Hongye Advertising Co., Ltd. and its shareholders Meng Jinzhi and Wang Heping in accordance with the law. (Hongye lost the lawsuit and was required to recover indefinitely)
On September 28, 2003, the Beijing No. 1 Intermediate People’s Court accepted China Youth Audio-Video Publishing House’s lawsuit against Haier Center and Beijing Contemporary Mall Industrial Co., Ltd. for infringement of exclusive publishing rights. In the dispute case, it was determined that Hongye Computer Company had completely obtained the operating rights and broadcast rights for the first to fourth parts of the "Haier Brothers" series of cartoons.
On December 12, 2004, the Qingdao Intermediate People’s Court made a first-instance judgment in the case of Haier Center v. Oriental Hongye Advertising Co., Ltd. and Hongye Computer Company over the entrusted creation contract dispute, and determined that Hongye Computer Company no longer enjoyed the rights to "Haier Brothers" The management rights, distribution rights and broadcast rights of cartoons 1-4. (Hongye lost the lawsuit)
On October 20, 2005, the People's Court of Haidian District, Beijing issued a first-instance judgment on the broadcast rights contract dispute case between Beijing Mitiexia Culture and Art Co., Ltd. and Beijing Hongye Computer Animation Production Technology Co., Ltd. , terminated the contract between the two parties and required Beijing Hongye Computer Animation Production Technology Co., Ltd. to return the broadcast rights transfer fee of RMB 100,000. (Hongye lost the lawsuit)
A series of failed cases seems to illustrate the current situation of this company. Some people on the Internet have analyzed the reason. It is probably that after the success of "Haier Brothers", the company Hongye expanded rapidly and transformed from a small company to seven or eight group companies. It began to play the capital game from left to right and no longer had the intention to make animations.
Haier Group is also a loser.
Judging from the cooperation between Haier Group and Dongfang Hongye, Haier has not gained any actual benefits except promoting corporate culture. The contract stipulates that the total investment of Haier Group is about 60 million, and its agreed benefits The share ratio is 70% for Oriental Red Leaves. From this point of view, Haier's investment is not commensurate with its income. Although Haier Group is undoubtedly successful in its strategy, it has some regrets in terms of animation income.
The connection between "Haier Brothers" and Haier Group is not obvious. In addition to deeply promoting this image, more people are actually not clear about the connection between "Haier Brothers" and Haier Group. .
Even today, we can see various questions about the relationship between the two Haiers on the Internet. Many people are confused about the exact relationship between Haier Group and "Haier Brothers". Now, Haier Group wants to restart the IP of "Haier Brothers". But this is not the first time: in March 2014, the "Big Painting Haier Brothers" creative collection activity sponsored by Haier Group was launched. This activity collected about 7,000 works, covering a total of about 1.259 billion people.
The entire animated series is now being rebooted. But what we see is that everyone’s attention to the new version of the animation is difficult to return to the old attitude. The current Haier Group no longer needs the image of "Haier Brothers" to provide timely marketing for the group. The current animation production is more like the icing on the cake to regain old memories. Some things, once missed, are lost.
As the adoptive father of "Haier Brothers", "Hongye Animation Production Company" has also been completely deleted from the list of the new version of Haier. Haier is currently a multinational company with a scale of hundreds of billions, and in the new version of Haier's production list, the main responsibility is the cultural company under the Haier Group.
If the fall of Blue Cat is due to lax control of the product, then the short-lived appearance of "Haier Brothers" has to be said to be a "precise loss of control" when the animation production company cooperated with the group. The two were not clear about the division of copyright and income. At the same time, after achieving success, they failed to go further. Instead, they turned around and became businessmen. In the end, it was difficult to achieve a win-win situation.
2. "Three Thousand Questions about Naughty Blue Cat"
This cartoon first premiered on Beijing TV Children's Channel on October 8, 1999, and later also appeared on CCTV and CETV Prime By 2012, 4847 episodes had been produced and broadcast (verifiable), and the producer was Hunan Blue Cat Cartoon Media Co., Ltd. (renamed Tianjin Blue Cat Cartoon Media Co., Ltd. after 2010). Blue Cat Animation has been exported to 17 countries and regions in Asia, Europe, and the Americas. In 2006, it also received an investment of US$7.5 million from Sequoia Capital. It was at its peak at that time.
1.IP matrix.
Blue Cat Naughty 3000 Q&A *** has 7 main characters. Each has a different personality and role division in the film. The story mainly uses Blue Cat and Naughty as the protagonists. Think about the current Avengers. Blockbuster films like Alliance are also models in which characters team up to form an IP matrix. It has to be said that Blue Cat is not lagging behind at all in this regard. There was an episode. When Blue Cat was broadcast on Taiwan's Dongsen Children's Channel, the station gave it a very low rating and concluded that it was not recommended to be broadcast. However, due to "the needs of the relationship between officials and public officials," Taiwan found a new dubbing team, asked Wu Sikai to produce a new theme song, and re-edited the film. In the end, Blue Cat received high ratings when it was broadcast.
2. Series.
Blue Cat Naughty 3000 Questions *** has 15 series, each series covers a different theme. It uses the adventures of the protagonist "Blue Cat" and his friends to use the characters they encounter. Questions, providing the audience with knowledge about the universe, starry sky, ecological environment, humanities and history, biological views, etc., similar to an animated version of an encyclopedia for teenagers. ?
3. Popular science professionalism.
It is a rare cartoon that does serious science popularization. Although Haier Brothers and Qianqianwen also have science popularization, most of the content is either pseudo-scientific or contains knowledge errors. In the early days of Chinese animation, most of the focus was on imagination, and few people took the content seriously.
Blue Cat has some serious plots because of popular science. Compared to the Haier Brothers or Xi Yangyang and Big Big Wolf, Naughty Blue Cat 3000 is a more serious and professional cartoon. The most famous thing is that the concept of gravitational waves appeared in its cartoons at that time, and it also carried out popular discussions. The explanation, at least conceptually, is correct and can withstand scrutiny. ?
4. IP development and peripheral products:
China was the first cartoon to try to develop IP and make money from it. According to the China Informatization Review, in 2006 it was International copyright revenue was US$1.63 million, and the cumulative total revenue over the years reached approximately US$5.5 million. In China, derivatives development and production are mainly carried out through authorized IP. The SKUs that can still be verified so far include: clothes, shoes and bags, stationery, school bags, and repeaters. The business model is relatively traditional, mainly relying on offline store expansion and franchise chain operations.
However, the heavy franchise store and audio-visual chain business model also brought down Blue Cat, resulting in problems with the final return of funds. On the other hand, the intellectual property protection environment at that time was poor and piracy was rampant. If it could persist for a few more years, the copyright might be sold to video websites, and Blue Cat would survive.
5. Interaction:
In addition to the general direction of the content, in terms of some small details, it has to be said that Blue Cat was at the forefront of innovation at the time. There were two aspects of Blue Cat that were very popular at the time. One was the prize-winning telephone interaction at the end of each cartoon. This feature became the target of imitation by many domestic animations. The other was that before each cartoon was broadcast, there were about For 10 minutes, the naughty blue cat chatted and solved the life problems raised by the children's letters, and also drank some chicken soup.
In an era when televisions were still the absolute gateway to video traffic, these two small settings gave Chinese children a sense of participation and interaction for the first time, greatly improving their stickiness. .
6. Negative comments:
The overall industrial level of Blue Cat cartoons is not very high, the picture production quality is poor, and the number of frames and painters are very different from foreign cartoons. The characters in the 2D images are very out of shape, but the further they go into production, the better. In addition, another big problem with Blue Cat is that the interaction between the characters is very stiff, and the characters are abnormally facial makeup. Feifei and Fatty have almost no sense of presence, and even the naughty presence of the second male lead is relatively weak. rare. However, the producers have done better and better from the early mechanical science popularization to the balance between story and science popularization.
Finally, music production lacks copyright awareness and pirates existing foreign music. The pirated music that can now be verified includes Saber Dance, background music of Inuyasha the Movie (Gurren: Horaishima), Batman 1989 background music, Metal Gear Solid 2 background music, etc.
In the final analysis, Blue Cat is still a serious popular science cartoon with cross-era significance. It is the first of its kind in China in many aspects and has left many things for subsequent successors to learn from. . With the rise of family consumption consciousness of the post-90s and post-00s generations, as long as the successors of Blue Cat make good products with truly educational significance, the east wind of Chinese animation is about to come.
Essentially, the two animations - "Blue Cat's Three Thousand Questions" and "Haier Brothers" had their own glorious and heyday era. In that era, they were high-spirited, they were popular, and they seemed to have a sure grasp of the future. But looking at the two animations, it seems that only the Haier Group can be regarded as the winner - and the victory is not so happy. It is difficult to find a reason to summarize, but I looked around and saw the rise and fall of just twenty years, and the glory and greatness of just a few decades.
All I saw were four words - never forget your original intention.
Think about the way you came, so that you don’t go in the wrong direction. But this is too easy to say and too difficult to do.
There is no shortage of talent in Chinese comics, nor is there a lack of effort. However, truly good works always lack strong support. In the context of a commercialized economy, carefully crafted animations are often no match for low-cost, fast-food animations. We also hope that our children can watch Chinese comics that are as good and educational as many Japanese comics!