Let’s talk about its interesting parts first.
Whether it is a novel or a film or television drama, it is interesting to talk about a region or field that is unfamiliar to readers and audiences. This is a necessity of storytelling. "Once Upon a Time on the Edge of Water" tells a gang-like story in an imaginary area full of violence. These contents are far away from the lives of the viewers, so everyone will get a sense of exotic interest. This type of content is the same as science fiction novels and science fiction film and television dramas. Foreign worlds are always full of stories. Because it is unknown, there are stories.
In "Bianshui Past", there is smuggling, drug trafficking, and stone gambling. These contents all have the story of a foreign land. Similar stories have also happened in the field of tomb robbing that everyone is not familiar with. However, with the proliferation of tomb robbing themes, readers and viewers no longer find this type of exotic content surprising. This kind of content can only be a novelty.
Let’s talk about the real level of this kind of content.
makes up an exotic content and then tells all kinds of bizarre stories in it. This is actually not the most expressive place. Works in the science fiction and tomb-robbery genres can produce a lot of story-rich content because they are from foreign and unfamiliar regions or fields. However, these contents are not final presentation level. The ultimate level of this kind of foreign content is the philosophy behind the entire story. To put it simply, with so many bizarre stories, what philosophical thoughts do you want to express.
Using my standards when looking at tomb-robbing novels and film and television dramas, basically all of them are bad novels and films. If you look at science fiction works using this standard, more than half of them can be classified as bad works. Looking at "Once Upon a Time on the Edge of Water" based on this standard, based on only the current 4 episodes, it is just a novel work with nothing profound. It is often difficult for novel-seeking works to contain profound philosophical content. After "Once Upon a Time on the Bianshui" is all aired, I will try to talk about it again to see if it has any valuable philosophical connotations. For now, it doesn't.
Then let’s talk about techniques.
An exotic TV series, even if it has no philosophical connotation, can still make the whole TV series very enjoyable with the excellent skills of the screenwriter. When talking about how screenwriting techniques can be a good addition to TV dramas, I have been using the "Prosecutors of Nine" as an example these past two days. With good techniques, even if the work is not realistic, it can still make the work look good. What is the level of screenwriting skills of this "Once Upon a Time on the Edge of Water"?
makes up stories for the sake of stories, making them up randomly and with poor technique. Even if it is a "fake story", TV drama screenwriters must first solve a core problem, that is, the protagonist's behavioral motivations need to be well planned and rationally planned. "Once Upon a Time on the Edge of Water" just lacks this kind of rational planning in terms of the male protagonist's behavioral motivations.
The male protagonist lacks rationality in shaping his behavioral motivations since he went abroad to find his uncle. At this point, if you add a few more elements to support the motivation of the behavior, the effect will be more realistic. Then, the male protagonist and his friends climbed out of the wall, but there was also a lack of temptation and blessing from outside the wall. Just eating and drinking is not enough to attract the audience. It might be better to add a little feasting here.
Then, the male protagonist goes to borrow a loan shark, but the character's behavioral motivation is not enough. The emotional content between the nephew and uncle is not sufficiently shaped, and the nephew's own sense of "killing and decisiveness" has not been established.Because of the lack of rationality, the whole story became a story for the sake of a story, a fabrication for the sake of fabrication. Even later, when the male protagonist went to find the boss played by Wu Zhenyu , there was a lack of reasonable explanation. Later, he works for a big boss by mistake, and the rationality of the narrative has not been clarified.
Due to the immaturity of the screenwriter's creative skills, this TV series gives the impression that the screenwriter has been creating all kinds of bizarre content in an attempt to present the so-called narrative climax. However, this TV series has never had a climax, and the audience does not want it. Knowing where the plot will go, everyone is not looking forward to the follow-up content of this TV series. If the same story is written by a knowledgeable screenwriter, the effect will definitely be different.
went on to talk about the overall look and feel of this TV series: like watching a monkey show.
In the play, the fighting and killing are quite intense, but it is difficult for the audience to sympathize with it. Why? Because this TV series lacks the narrative ability to bring the audience into it. Because of the "fake" nature of the play, the audience naturally concluded that it was just a joke and there was no need to empathize. Therefore, even if the male protagonist encounters various dangers, everyone knows that he will be fine.
For example, the male protagonist is tied to a car and about to fall off a cliff. Everyone knew that he would definitely jump out of the car. For another example, the male protagonist was submerged underwater. Everyone knows that someone must save him. The actor was even shot by Ng Zhenyu's character and was suspected of being beaten to death. Everyone knows that it must be fake. All the tension that the screenwriter tried to create for the male protagonist's existential crisis in the play was disintegrated because of a fake look.
Under this situation, these intense contents can only bring fatigue to the audience. And because the audience is not involved in the drama, these fighting and killings are more like a monkey show in a zoo. The audience came to see the monkey show. The play does not allow the audience to get involved in the play. No matter how hard it is, it can only act like a monkey on its own.
Finally, let’s talk about Guo Qilin’s performance.
Guo Qilin is a huge failure of this TV series, but it is definitely not the biggest failure. The biggest failure of "Once Upon a Time on the Edge of Water" is that the writing skills of the screenwriter are too low, resulting in insufficient motivation for the character's behavior, the main plot mode, and the story's inability to engage the audience, etc. Under the premise that the script is not good, it is Guo Qilin's performance in the play that makes the audience laugh.
In this TV series, Guo Qilin's performance has been subtly reminding the audience that I am talking about cross talk, I am just joking, you must not take it seriously. This is the anti-TV show. TV dramas are meant to pull the audience into the screen as quickly as possible, rather than push them away.
The more exotic a TV series is, the less it should be overly amusing. Instead, it should have a serious and passive performance of the protagonist. Guo Qilin immediately destroyed the seriousness of this TV series with a playful smile. Everyone immediately thought that this was a joke. If the audience is not engaged, the play will be in vain. Remember, in this type of TV series, the protagonist cannot be a comedy setting. If you want to make people laugh, you need to design the burden on the supporting characters.
Two other examples. In " ghost blowing out the light ", the supporting actor is responsible for making people laugh. In "The Legend of Yue Fei", Niu Gao was also responsible for amusing him. The actor Guo Qilin of "Once Upon a Time on the Edge of Water" came to tease, which destroyed the reality of the entire TV series. This kind of story itself lacks real blessing, and the actors always resort to vulgarity to stage it, which makes it even more failed.
The above should be the reason for the low quality of the TV series "Bianshui Past".(Text/Ma Qingyun)
