This article is from WeChat official account:Tenth Screening Room (ID: dsfysweixin)< span class = "text-remarks">, author: seventeen, from the head of FIG.: “the clown Wulong legend” theme

In the early 1970s, my country’s treasure island Taiwan was once Japan’s largest animation factory.

Due to the restrictions imposed by the authorities on the local “censorship system”, a large number of cartoonists who were at home were recruited by the Japanese. At that time, a young man in his early 20s, Ao Youxiang, was one of them.

After working continuously to output a pile of drawings for “Little Bee” and “Little Science” and other daily comics, Ao Youxiang, a laborer, pondered in his spare time, a little trance——

Every day, after working to waste my eyes, I don’t seem to be able to gain anything other than high myopia.

▲ Stills of “The Little Bee Seeking Family”

He originally wanted to learn animation production, but in the end he didn’t even know a basic storyboard.

At the time, the Japanese were cautious about the foundry in Taiwan, China, “they always jumped in the mirror, and don’t let people steal the teacher.”

So it is not just Ao Youxiang, most animators can only draw gourds according to the drawings and produce products that others imagine.

The situation of pure labor sales continued until the end of the 1970s, when Hong Kong, a smash hit, drifted to Taiwan.

There will be a four-frame comic “Old Master Zi”, which is the first to extend the ladder for cooperation between Hong Kong and Taiwan.

Taking this opportunity, Taiwan’s animation talents in my country can open the door of independent creation for the first time. Among these pathfinders, Ao Youxiang is naturally indispensable.

The fate of the times has laid a ground here——

In the future, the talented “big brother” who influenced the original comics of the Mainland, Taiwan and Hong Kong was transformed through the enlightenment of “Old Master”.

Before this, Ao Youxiang had neither heard of Dafanshu and Mr. Qin, nor had he understood the so-called four-frame comics. Out of the duty of the original painter, he began to read a lot of original works.

This turn, in addition to making him lament “so funny within a page”, but also interested in this creative form.

In 1980, the animation results of “Old Master Q” were successfully handed over to the Hong Kong filmmakers.

Subsequent Taiwan Pathfinders, due to issues such as the funding system, mostly returned to the path of OEM labor.

At the moment, Ao Youxiang feels that since he is limited in the animation, he might as well go out and do his own creation. With seven years of drawing experience, he found a corner in the “Minsheng Daily” and published a four-frame comic “Pippi.

This puppy story, temporarily conceived for the rescue of “Snoopy”, was affirmed by readers and newspapers as soon as it was published because of its cute style and interesting content.

Ao Youxiang was also found by another newspaper based on his debut.

People who were in the early 1980s are generally obsessed with the powerful martial arts style brought by movies and novels. As an equally important form of entertainment, comics certainly cannot lag behind. Therefore, at the request of the newspaper, Ao Youxiang created new works with martial arts as the core and funny painting style.

A series of comics with minimalist lines, even if looking back after decades of time–

Still a “monster-like existence”.

For the 80s and 90s, I was surprised at how long it was doing, and at the same time, I was even more amazed at how hot it could be.

In 1980, the “China Times” in Taiwan began serializing.

In 1985, he bucked the trend and appeared in the monthly magazine “Morning” of Kodansha in Japan.

During several decades, a total of 24 volumes of Sige comic series, 18 volumes of hilarious comic series, 32 volumes of long comic series, 28 volumes of long story prequel…

Nowadays, it is built by a company called “Guoman with 120 million sales”Book” is a huge tower. And this number does not include pirated editions that were initially popular on the market.

Have you seen “Oolong Yard”?

Have you watched “Oolong Yard” in class?

Have you taken a peek at “Oolong Yard” in class and was confiscated by your teacher?

A humorous book that has made countless young people remember the years is here.

Looking at the country, if Chinese original comics have such an audience, it will be inevitable to move from paper to screen.

This year’s 40-year-old “Oolong Yard”, even though there are few traces of images, has never left a classic.

In the eyes of readers and audiences, this IP adaptation is tantamount to a blue ocean of feelings. In the eyes of the author Ao Youxiang, it is destined to become an indelible dream.

80% try

Full of hardcore happiness is the main style of “Oolongyuan” from the earliest four-frame comic series.

It uses the Song Dynasty more than 700 years ago as the stage, telling a refreshing story about martial arts——

There used to be a mountain and a temple on the mountain. There were four masters and apprentices in the temple, and he was born to be funny.

Master’s long eyebrows can catch flying knives, and the second master’s big ears can slap mosquitoes.

The big brother uses his feet to wash the dishes, and the younger brother likes to play tricks.

Four people with supernatural powers and a peculiar style of painting, while behind closed doors to worship Buddha and martial arts, while challenging the world.

Although I am a Buddhist disciple, I should have a clear heart.

But they adhere to the creed of “the meat and wine pass through the intestines, and the Buddha will keep it in the heart”.

A monk? Or vulgar? No one can tell, and no one cares. The daily life of the four masters and apprentices is essentially like a pack of mental snacks, full of funny plots of shit and piss.

Furthermore, the connotative jokes that can be seen everywhere are a kind of stimulating experience when placed in front of the ignorant pupils.

It can be said that the popularity of “Oolong Yard” in the early years was to allow innocent teenagers to find a touch of satisfaction with the hedging of funny and fun outside the boring study.

Actually, it is the 22nd year since the birth of the “Oolong Yard” that really started to blow on the campus in the Mainland.

In 2002, nearly 50 years old Ao Youxiang came to Zhuhai, Guangdong for the first time as a rookie. For a long time before this, he hadn’t used a pen, but spent a leisurely life in the countryside of Taiwan. Because I want to participate in the production of “OldLike “Master”, “Oolongyuan” was adapted into a classic animation-Ao Youxiang tried repeatedly for more than ten years.

Many people may not know that in 1984, “Oolongyuan” had an animated film. And that was another collaboration between Ao Youxiang and the Hong Kong team after “Old Master Q”.

In this movie, he even went into battle himself as a director.

Using his early four-frame comics as a blueprint, he tells the adventure of fighting against the villain demon king as the guardian secret treasure “The Wordless Book of Heaven”.

Although from the aesthetic point of view of the time, this film has already achieved a combination of jokes and rivers and lakes. However, due to the immature time, people are not enthusiastic about our Taiwanese comics, and the commercial results are not satisfactory.

He was defeated in the first battle, and Ao Youxiang, who refused to admit defeat, later handed over all his copyright–

With various forms of puppet show and puppet show, let “Oolong Yard” appear on the screen.

▲The painting style is a bit strange, black and white photos are more exciting

But no matter whether it is a remake or a derivative, none of them are really made.

There is still no gain in casting a net widely, which also caused him to “look back at the old works and feel that his technique is very poor”.

Strong dissatisfaction lies inAo Youxiang’s works at that time were diffuse, and in the end he simply stopped painting.

About 2000, the mainland economy took off, and Zhuhai gradually began to become a new comics base.

After that, investors continued to go to Taiwan, China, to knock on Ao Youxiang’s door.

After several communications, the other party thought he had finally touched Ao Youxiang and would bring a senior creator of comics in the mainland.

But only Ao Youxiang knew in his heart that he took a close look at the market and started to do animation.

Manga is an original creation, and animation is an advanced dream. He has to distinguish these two points at any time.

In the first two years in Zhuhai, Ao Youxiang did all preparations. He changed the manuscript of the four-frame comic “Oolongyuan”, and then he got the red pocket book that we are familiar with.

As soon as this one-line book came out, it quickly became popular with the lighthearted “green leisure reading” extremely spiritually.

After that, he cooperated with a mainland company to launch an essential reading material for elementary school students, “Comic World”.

This weekly magazine also set up a platform for Ao Youxiang to serialize the new hilarious stories of “Oolong Courtyard”.

In order to open up the market, “Comic World” once kept bargaining prices in many comic magazines. Until the children spend five yuan a week,You can buy a magazine that publishes “Oolong Yard” in a small shop near the school——

Ao Youxiang felt that the time should be ripe this time.

In 2006, he commissioned Huang Weiming, a mainland director and “Father of the Pleasant Goat”, to produce a flash animation sample using the chapter of the “Oolongyuan” four-frame comic “Earth and Change”.

In the ten-minute segment, the story revolved around cracking down on piracy, and was covered with jokes of the four masters and apprentices gagging.

Holding this sample, Ao Youxiang went around in the mainland, but unexpectedly—

The market still didn’t give him any reaction.

At that time, he ignored a very important thing: The boom of “Oolong Yard” was limited to the campus desks.

In other words, no matter how elementary school students like this comic, they don’t have the right to speak whether it is adapted or not. The adults who had the right to speak in the adaptation, at that time preferred Q Meng’s “Pleasant Goat”, “Pig Man” and “Han Bagui”…

Even the former Hong Kong and Taiwan celebrities old masters have become little masters in response to the demands of the times.

▲These brothers, who are you?

I have to admit that although there is a good position in the comics industry, Ao Youxiang has been failing because of his old career in animation.

Whether he produced it himself or was adapted by others, he himself is most concerned about it–

“80% are tried but not finished.”

90% complete

The original four-frame comic “Wolongyuan” doesn’t look like a story with a beginning and an end.

The four grids on a piece of paper are arranged longitudinally, and you can read a paragraph in a few ten seconds.

This is why some people think about it later and think that it has no plot, and it just exists for telling jokes.

In 2006, the appearance of the long-length series made “Oolongyuan Universe” usher in a real highlight.

Its story originated from a cat that suddenly appeared and a koi with a riddle printed on it.

In the next seven years or so, everyone in Wulongyuan started a treasure hunt around the ten-thousand-year-old Ginseng Jing left by Qin Shihuang and named “Huobao”.

First, I found the body of the living treasure in Broken Cloud Mountain, and then stepped through the Five Elements.

Experienced the Iron Bucket Slope where the Iron Fort is located(Gold), Wu Lao Forest behind Shenmu Village(Wood), Youth Pool (water) at the bottom of the Snow Mountain, Hell Valley in the depths of the Bone Bone Desert(Fire).

In these places, they found the limbs of the living treasure. Finally boarded the island of Bliss to challenge more difficult adventure adventures.

From four grids to multiple grids, on the one hand, no one cares about animation, on the other hand, it is an iterative upgrade of comics.

Actually, if Ao Youxiang did not continue to focus on his animation dreams at that time-I believe “Oolongyuan” would not be just a memory for our generation.

In the long series, you can see that the characterization is bolder, and there are many beautiful styles that are rare in the country.

The plot is also more ups and downs, especially in Tietongpo and Wulao Lin, where all forces are launched like a chess game. When it came time to play the real game, Ao Youxiang did not hesitate to paint violence and kill people.

The first dozen or so volumes of the long story, I would like to call it “Guoman”.Whenever you turn it out, you can enjoy the silky experience, to the point of forgetting sleep and food.

But this sense of coolness only lasted until 2010, when the anime dream catcher Ao Youxiang went online again.

He first sent the long story “Oolongyuan” to Jilin, where it was adapted into “Oolongyuan·Changbai Legend”.

As a 104-episode TV animation, the producer once claimed to use it as a landmark work in China. However, although CCTV, various satellite TVs and local TVs provided screens, the response was still mediocre.

Because the finished product has no blood at a younger age, and the dubbing is really bad, you can’t see the explosive power of the original.

▲The character is also changed very stiff

After that, the unwilling Ao Youxiang went south to Hangzhou and signed a contract with another company.

In a high-profile press conference, the producer proposed to “developing the industry chain in an all-round way around this classic IP.”

It’s a pity that no matter how loud the slogan is, there is still a fact that cannot be avoided——

Neither the audience nor the readers have new expectations for this story itself.

The 53-year-old author, as early as the middle of the original manga, fiveThe Lao Lin chapter began to decline in creative power.

Several bosses in the pen have died violently one after another. All the foreshadowings are not taken into consideration, and many important characters have disappeared directly.

In the new era of Japanese comics sweeping the Internet, the ending is so rushed, it is obvious that children who are increasingly picky about their tastes cannot be retained.

But since the production company has signed the contract, it must hand over the work.

The first season of “Legend of the Living Treasures of the Oolong Courtyard” can also use feelings as a stone to arouse a splash of water. But by the second season, the weakness of the original plot has not awakened the audience’s desire to pursue it.

▲Probably the number of Douban scores is not enough, and even the scores are not available

Last year, the mainland summer vacation file “Nezha” ignited the box office and also shocked the animation industry in Taiwan.

On Twitter, Ao Youxiang published an article, and his words were full of exclamation and envy.

He later confessed that if he made a choice now, he would prefer to make an animated film of “Oolongyuan”.

So many years of practice have proved that “TV animation is too difficult to do, the journey is too long, and the details are beyond control.” But for an animated movie, it seems that only a chapter needs to be described from beginning to end. So “I think it is feasible to try to shoot one episode a year.”

As a reader and audience, what I actually want to say is:

As long as Teacher Ao can bother and change your long story ending, I am willing to try again for the memory of your book being confiscated in elementary school.

This article is from WeChat official account:Tenth Screening Room (ID: dsfysweixin)< span class = "text-remarks">, author: seventeen