Translator: Ink Hub

Editor: Yoog

The goal of building a reputation had not been achieved. Instead, a moronic plot had spread everywhere. Watching their already meager view counts go down the drain, Qike Video could be described as depressed to the extreme.

According to Qike Video’s estimates, based on this trend, the platform’s yearly champion for this year would likely be Secretly in Love with You.

The second half of the year was the off-season. They had counted on the summer slot to produce two hit dramas.

“Chaoxing TV sends a congratulatory telegram.”

“Chaoxing TV states that although they never owned anything, they have also never lost anything.”

“In the matter of viewership, Little Lin comes with a debuff: whoever he stares at, their viewership drops.”

“Could all you screenwriters please write the scripts well? Do not treat the audience like idiots, thinking about perfunctorily dismissing them all day.”

“Every day you criticize Lin Ji’s short dramas for having no value and taking shortcuts. Why not reflect for a moment: why would the audience rather watch ‘valueless’ moronic dramas than love your high-and-mighty classic works?”

Every time Lin Ji won a war of words, it was not only because the dramas accurately met the audience’s taste, but it was also because the audience was tired of the so-called industry insiders’ repeated preaching and pointing of fingers.

For a drama, if the audience thinks it was good, they could naturally name three, four, five, or six points of excellence. If they think it was bad, there was also a reason for it being bad. They did not need to have their heads held down to be told they had no taste.

Lin Ji always accurately struck his peers, never looking for trouble with the audience.

God of War Returns Home and The Heiress both featured one “cool point” per episode. With dense cool points accumulated, the audience was willing to keep following and watching.

Lin Ji never said he was creating a classic or art. Even if his peers mocked him for only being fit to capture the “sinking market,” he didn’t mind.

Was the sinking market not a market? Where did so many noble high-class people come from?

The drama Siege Operation started low-key and ended messily. The viewership didn’t even reach half of Qike Video’s expectations.

When the drama first aired, Gu Lenian simply shared Qike Video’s promotional poster. Once the moronic plot of the sixth episode was cursed into oblivion by netizens, he very decisively deleted this share.

Now his Weibo homepage didn’t have a single piece of news related to Siege Operation.

Qike Video: “?”

Is he sick?

The “f*ck” cursing inside Qike Video had not ended because Gu Lenian actually publicly responded to the matter of Siege Operation‘s low viewership.

“I only wrote this script because I couldn’t turn down a personal favor. We all mix in the TV circle; we see each other often. When someone sincerely invites you, of course, I won’t refuse. Wouldn’t that make them sad?

“I also didn’t expect this plot in the sixth episode would cause such a big reaction. At the time, I mainly considered that Qike Video’s viewing group would prefer such a plot.

“For my next creation, I will, of course, still focus on satellite stations. Web drama platforms are just a deviant attempt…”

Qike Video: “…”

Coming to Qike Video to air a drama was something Gu Lenian had actively suggested. The condition was that Qike Video would be willing to cold-store Secretly in Love with You.

Betrayal shouldn’t be done this way, right?

The platform deeply felt that if there were a single bullet and they had to choose between Lin Ji and Gu Lenian, they would prioritize choosing Gu Lenian. At least the viewership of Secretly in Love with You was real.

“Hahahaha, the world where only Qike Video gets hurt has been achieved.”

“Facts prove that everyone Little Lin curses is a bad person.”

Over here, Gu Lenian stepped on Qike Video again and again, so Qike Video also played its hand. After Gu Lenian finished his interview, Qike Video remade the poster, changing the three words for “Screenwriter Gu Lenian” to the largest size, larger than the heads of the male and female leads. In the cast and crew list, the screenwriter column was adjusted to the first row, pressing down on the heads of the leads.

During the official account’s promotion, they even omitted the director’s name, repeatedly emphasizing that this was “A Gu Lenian Work.”

The audience of Qike Video was also fuming.

The ones who cursed Siege Operation into filth were them, so how did it become that they “liked” this kind of sh*t plot in Gu Lenian’s mouth?

Who would like this thing?

The audience was a brick, moved wherever needed; in the end, they still had to take the blame for nothing.

Gu Lenian’s comment section completely collapsed.

The reason he sought out Qike Video was due to the suspicion of exploiting rookie screenwriters. However, the public focus was on Xiao Cheng, and Gu Lenian’s foundation was much thicker than Xiao Cheng’s, which allowed him to escape from the rumors.

The audience didn’t care whether the rumors were true or false. A round of angry spraying made Gu Lenian close his comment section.

Although he declared that his next work would focus on satellite stations, in reality, A-list stations like Qinglan TV, Dajiang TV, and Xingzhou TV would temporarily not consider him.

Qinglan TV had always wanted to transform from an idol drama platform to a serious drama platform. Snow in Early May made the station suffer a great loss, so when picking screenwriters again, they were naturally cautious. Screenwriters with rumors similar to Xiao Cheng’s were all pushed out the door.

And Dajiang TV had always excelled in serious dramas; the industry’s best serious drama screenwriters were all there, so they didn’t necessarily have to snatch Gu Lenian.

Xingzhou TV’s reason was even simpler: as fellow A-list satellite stations, if Qinglan TV and Dajiang TV didn’t want Gu Lenian, how could they want him?

Moreover, the viewership of Siege Operation was poor, and he dumped the blame on the heads of Qike Video’s audience. If his next drama was changed to air on a satellite station and the ratings were no good, would it again be the fault of the satellite audience?

Lin Ji’s showing of espionage books that day was not entirely to mock Gu Lenian, but rather because, after The Heiress, he planned to conceptualize a script for a spy drama.

There were two types of models for screenwriters to submit scripts in this era. One was for the screenwriter to play freely, finishing the script before submitting it to the platform. The second was for the platform to commission a script from a screenwriter. Every platform had different focuses; in the absence of a favorite script, the platform would actively find a screenwriter to commission a specific theme suitable for the platform.

Lin Ji accepted the invitation from Sunrise TV this time.

Sunrise TV was a B-tier satellite station. Its fame couldn’t compare to A-list stations like Qinglan TV and Dajiang TV. Currently, the competition among major domestic satellite stations had always been fierce. Sunrise TV was a typical station that couldn’t produce representative dramas and didn’t have many highlights in the production of variety shows and news programs.

For the invitations from A-list satellite stations, Lin Ji temporarily didn’t consider them.

After Secretly in Love with You became a hit, those inviting him were all for dramas like “youth sweet treats.” Lin Ji didn’t want to write another script of the same theme in such a short interval, so he looked through all the invitations and finally contacted Sunrise TV.

Lin Ji also didn’t understand. In the situation where other satellite platforms sent invitations for youth dramas, why did Sunrise TV specifically ask him to write a spy drama?

He had a detailed talk with Sunrise TV once, and only then did Lin Ji learn that this script from Sunrise TV was not for him to play freely, but for him to write a spy script with an intelligence officer as the prototype.

The intelligence officer was named Lou Zhi. Next year would be the 100th anniversary of his birth. Lou Zhi’s birthplace was the province where Sunrise TV was located. Sunrise TV hoped to use this opportunity to let more viewers understand this figure.

As a B-tier satellite station, Sunrise TV’s own resources were not as rich as those of other stations. Lou Zhi belonged to the intelligence system and was not a very famous big shot, but for their region, Lou Zhi had many stories worth excavating.

Sunrise TV had indeed looked for several famous screenwriters before, but the other party either couldn’t spare the time or wanted to create in the name of a studio. This completely failed to meet Sunrise TV’s requirements.

Just as Lin Ji hadn’t thought Sunrise TV would send him an invitation, Sunrise TV also didn’t expect that Lin Ji would actually take this script. By some stroke of luck, the two sides actually came together.

Although Lin Ji had not created an espionage theme, let alone proved himself in this theme, in dramas like Secretly in Love with You and God of War Returns Home, regardless of length, Lin Ji could always catch the rhythm points exactly right.

This at least showed that Lin Ji’s basic skills as a screenwriter were no problem, which was what Sunrise TV valued.

After Sunrise TV explained the requirements, Lin Ji went to collect information on Lou Zhi. The more he searched, the more Lin Ji realized that Lou Zhi’s life experience could completely serve as the best creative material.

This man’s life was not a grand magnificence amid a hail of bullets but a grand magnificence hidden in the shadows.

There was no need for a screenwriter to make things up or use others’ life experiences to embellish the character. As long as the story of this figure, Lou Zhi, could be explained clearly and understandably, it would make the audience fall in love with this drama.

However, to write the drama well, the materials he had collected now were still not enough; he still needed to search more comprehensively.

In this life, Lin Ji had not yet been equipped with an assistant. If it were his previous life, if he wanted to check any information, he only needed to list a checklist, and the assistant could deliver it at the fastest speed.

Lin Ji’s screenwriter assistant didn’t need to write the script for him. Lin Ji always felt that unless it was a series or a detective drama, in which different writers’ performances would give different independent stories a unique flavor, a continuous plot was best led and completed by one screenwriter.

If a script was completed by several screenwriters together, that meant the screenwriter responsible for the final draft must be powerful, able to smooth out the peaks and valleys, and perfectly integrate different creations into one.

Of course, for the current Lin Ji, doing it himself was just a bit slower, but he could find more detailed and exhaustive information. The process of checking information was also a process of enriching the creation, so inspiration was naturally more abundant.

Lin Ji spent a few days at the library, borrowed some materials from the local archives, and also ordered many books.

Just as Sunrise TV said, Lou Zhi was not a very famous big shot. Additionally, the person was in the intelligence system; being low-profile was the number one principle. The written materials left in the world were not particularly numerous.

Besides reading books and checking materials, Lin Ji spent almost half a month going through the audio and video materials related to Lou Zhi. Some domestic films and TV dramas mentioned the person’s experience, which Lin Ji also watched.

Now he had an understanding of the person’s life, experience, thoughts, and the source of those thoughts. Coupled with referencing other spy novels and spy films, Lin Ji had already built the framework in his heart for how to pick up the pen.

Sunrise TV hoped Lin Ji could write a drama of around thirty episodes. For the same duration, if given to Secretly in Love with You, Lin Ji would have to add some plots to fill the time. But in the case of writing this spy drama, thirty episodes were a bit tight because the materials he found were comprehensive enough, plus the drama included some professional methods involving intelligence personnel, so he had to ensure the audience could understand.

Lin Ji also asked Sunrise TV to step in and find several historical research units to try to make the script as authentic and reliable as possible.

He was busy checking materials and writing the script. Unknowingly, more than a month passed.

It was at this time that Lin Ji received a phone call from the National Film Academy.

NOTES

Sinking market (下沉市场 – xiachen shichang): A term referring to the massive consumer base in third-tier cities and below, as well as rural areas. Often looked down upon by “elite” urbanites.

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