Super Zoo

After the internal meeting, Long Wu left the conference room, took a brief rest in the office, and then immediately made a phone call to Suming.

It was half to express gratitude and half to explain.

"Brother Shi, you don't need to say that." Suming laughed and even offered reassurance in return, "I just provided some suggestions. Whether to accept them and how to act on them are still decisions for the boss to make based on actual circumstances. If all suggestions had to be accepted, how could one manage anything as a boss? Brother Shi, rest assured, this matter won't have any impact on us."

"You're considerate, so I won't say more than necessary," Long Wu nodded over the phone, then spoke with some worry, "My wife is very stubborn, which sometimes is a good thing. Without her firmness, our company wouldn't have made it this far. However, inflexibility can lead to breakage, and I won't lie to you, I indeed don't have much confidence in this movie."

Long Wu's concerns were certainly reasonable.

For the film 'The Legend of Gods', not only were the industry insiders who had seen the internal previews not impressed, but even the general movie fans weren't buying it. Even before the official release, there were already plenty of criticisms and verbal abuse on the internet.

Some of the critics came from a more professional standpoint, including industry insiders who had attended the internal screening, who were not optimistic about the prospects and quality of the film;

Others hadn't even seen the film but criticized 'The Legend of Gods' based on their own conjectures... The Chinese audience had been deceived by so-called 'domestic blockbusters' and 'big-budget productions' too many times, having accumulated enough experience to know that such films, brimming with celebrities and boasting so-called Hollywood effects and massive investments, were almost certain to be poor in quality. Bashing them was hardly ever a mistake.

Since the days of 'The Promise', equating domestic blockbusters with trashy films had become an unstoppable trend. Ironically, these low-quality films still managed to rake in money. The involvement of the capital market introduced a restless atmosphere throughout the film industry, leading both investors and filmmakers to abandon the earnest pursuit of content and quality. Trashy films emerged one after another, continuously lowering the audience's expectations.

The fact that these poor films could make money was not entirely due to the viewers' taste; more importantly, the audience lacked choices. With screens dominated by low-quality films, viewers were forced to pay for them.

The audience's tolerance was nearing its limit, and their expectations for domestic blockbusters were repeatedly lowered. They could guess what the next so-called blockbuster would be like without even watching it.

Suming looked at the comments left by netizens online and found them to be very 'predictive', with many pointing right at the weaknesses and flaws of 'The Legend of Gods' as if they had foreseen them.

If Suming could see the online comments, Long Wu certainly could too, and since the film was Huaxia Star's major project, he was even more concerned about the online public opinion.

With it not yet released and nearly all comments being negative, of course he didn't feel confident.

Huaxia Star took decisive action, secretly paying professional film critics and internet commenters to post positive reviews to counter the negative ones.

But such an attempt to manipulate ratings can only be the icing on the cake.

If it is a good film, artificial praises can take its box office and reputation to a higher level. On the contrary, if it is a trashy film, the more it is hyped, the worse it will fall once it's released, revealing the stark truth when all pretenses are stripped away.

Suming, however, didn't think too much of it. He wasn't the type to say he didn't mind while silently holding a grudge. As he had mentioned, it was their family affair; as a friend, offering his full support was enough.

During the subsequent period, Suming even went the extra mile to stand by them, taking the animals to attend several promotional events and press conferences. While promoting the movie, he also promoted the performing animals.

But regarding Long Wu's 'concerns', Suming found it inappropriate to comment further, nor did he have a better solution.

If Huaxia Star had made a decision, then it was up to them to bear the outcomes of that decision, whether good or bad.

Under the watchful eyes of many, 'The Legend of Gods' was released as scheduled.

On the first day of release, the box office was quite impressive, exceeding 80 million, including the midnight show, and took the championship for the day's box office!

Following closely were the weekend's takings: Saturday and Sunday's box office were 0.64 billion and 0.55 billion respectively, bringing the total for the first three days of release to 2 billion;

Looking at the total box office for these three days, The Legend of Gods and Spirits had delivered a passable report card.

But a closer analysis would reveal that the situation was not so optimistic.

A good movie's box office should gradually increase during the first three days and should show a rising trend within the first ten days of release. For example, Terror Animal City and Great Saint Returns both experienced explosive growth in the later stages.

However, The Legend of Gods and Spirits showed a clear downward trend in revenue on the second and third days, indicating an evident lack of follow-up strength, beginning to weaken.

One must keep in mind that these two days were prime weekend viewing times.

This indicated that the audience was not buying into this film. After contributing to its box office success on the first day with curious anticipation, most viewers were not willing to pay money to see this movie in the theaters.

Indeed, the box office continued to drop in the following days.

At the end of the first week, the total box office was merely 2.79 billion. In other words, after the two billion taken in the first three days, the box office for The Legend of Gods and Spirits over the next four full days was only 0.79 billion, with growth almost coming to a standstill.

The online reviews were overwhelmingly negative, and Huaxia Star's paid influencers were completely suppressed. At this point, no one dared to come forward and post positive reviews.

"'The Legend of Gods and Spirits' finally takes over from 'Dwelling in the Fuchun Mountains' as the epic bad movie!"

"Completely insincere, fooling the audience!"

"I went in expecting a laugh, but not only did I not find it funny, but I also became quite annoyed. I struggled to stay until the 70th minute before leaving the theater..."

"A crowd of stars were there just for show, propping up the second-generation stars..."

"As a newcomer taking the lead on the big screen for the first time, Xiang Zuo's performance in this movie was passable, but the other stars seemed heartless..."

"I give it two stars, all for the animals in it..."

In the theaters, a rare phenomenon occurred: audiences kept leaving during the movie. On Douban, the rating for The Legend of Gods and Spirits, initially boosted by paid influencers to 7 points, quickly dropped to 3.1, and continued to fall, showing a trend toward breaking the record low score of 2.9 for the all-time bad movie Dwelling in the Fuchun Mountains.

Starting the second week, except for a small portion of the audience curious about "how bad the film could really be," tickets for The Legend of Gods and Spirits were almost unsellable.

The era of bad movies making money was gradually coming to an end. In over a decade, the Chinese film industry had brought commercial blockbusters to their zenith and also exhausted the audience's confidence in them.

After half a month in theaters, the score for The Legend of Gods and Spirits on Douban had unsurprisingly dropped to 2.8, and the total box office had plateaued at 3.5 billion.

Both box office and reputation were a failure.