【Review of film and television】

　　This summer, the momentum of "Detective Burning Brainstorm" in the variety show market is unabated. Mango TV's "Big Detective" has just ended, and iQIYI's "Cute Detective" (Season 2) has been seamlessly connected and launched almost at the same time. There is also Tencent Video's "knock on the door" work "Let's Reason", and behind them a number of detective variety shows that have been established or are in production are gaining momentum.

　　As my country's variety show market becomes more and more mature, the vigorous creative vitality has spawned increasingly diverse types of programs and tracks.

Among the emerging variety shows, there is nothing more in the limelight than the detective variety show.

This type of variety show is centered on the detection of cases. The guests search for evidence and analyze the case through deduction, restoration, reasoning and other methods, and finally lock the perpetrator and review the truth of the incident.

Under the framework of suspense and reasoning, games, competitions, love, traditional culture and other elements are superimposed on demand and complement each other.

With progressive stories and a tense and brain-burning atmosphere, investigative variety shows have gradually gained a group of active and loyal audiences, quickly occupying a place on the big and small screens.

　　In recent years, the competition around detective variety shows has been escalating, and major platforms have entered the game one after another and continued to increase their weight.

But on the one hand, the shows are coming one after another, and on the other hand, the word of mouth is uneven.

Most of the scripts of detective variety shows revolve around "murder cases", and the homogenization of the programs is obvious, almost to the point of "no murder without murder".

What's more deadly is that the forms, stories, characters, and even service of some detective variety shows are seriously homogenized, and the core tricks (methods and processes of crime) that support the suspense narrative have also begun to show a tendency to be routine, and it is difficult for the audience to let the audience. was pleasantly surprised.

In addition, some detective variety shows over-exaggerated violence, blood, feudal superstition and other content, touching the "red line"; some weakened the reasoning link and tried to find a new way with a lot of gags and special effects in the later stage, but instead resulted in a hasty plot and a lack of tension in the story. These have hindered the further iterative upgrade of this variety show type.

　　Reasoning variety shows lack innovation, how to break through the shackles and gain a broader space for development?

To answer this question, it is necessary to first clarify the question of "what is a detective variety show that the market and audiences love to see".

Throughout the word-of-mouth popularity, detective variety shows have the following characteristics: First of all, they are exciting. The story, guests and audiences jointly complete the narrative of detective variety shows. Therefore, in order to be outstanding, excellent scripts with strong plots must be used as the basis. The guests with the temperament of the show guide the audience to highly participate in the search for evidence and reasoning, and use the ability of analysis, reasoning and judgment to strip the cocoon and find loopholes, and gradually cultivate a tacit understanding with the audience by creating "stalks" and "smiles" in the process.

The second is immersion, which is not only to fully create a tense atmosphere full of substitution, but also to touch the audience's heart through the full and moving character setting and observe the realistic topic setting, arouse empathy, and trigger thinking.

For example, the first episode of "Rooftop Apartment", which aroused heated discussions in "The Great Detective", focused on real issues such as empty-nesters and domestic violence, which resonated with young audiences; Focusing on family emotional relationships and emphasizing the importance of parental companionship during children's growth, these in-depth and realistic contents have become the "plus points" of the program.

　　In short, what the market needs and what the audience wants to watch is nothing more than a detective variety show that can "tell good" stories and even more "good stories" - in a highly restored scene, the audience and guests enter the game from the same perspective "Together" experiences ups and downs stories, participates in layers of progressive reasoning, seeks the truth for justice and touches inner feelings, and draws ideological nutrients, human warmth and forward-moving power from the truth.

　　Therefore, in order to further develop case-based variety shows, we need to take two steps: first, work hard on the "case".

At present, there are a variety of content types and gameplay settings in the regular script killing game system. The content types include joy, emotion, camp, mechanism, and idea, etc. The focus is on immersive entertainment as a trigger for social interaction. relationship catalyst.

Reasoning variety shows also have abundant space to be developed.

On the one hand, focusing on the present, looking to the future, based on social concerns, combined with current affairs hotspots, make good use of the natural sense of seriousness and entertainment of this theme, and use a more realistic plot to make entertainment and cultural attributes resonate at the same frequency; on the other hand It is also possible to look back on the past and extract inspiration from the magnificent historical scrolls, so that guests and audiences can broaden their minds through immersive "participation" in history, and feel the feelings of home and country.

　　Second, make a fuss about "exploration".

Introduce the old and bring forth the new in the gameplay, so that a variety of elements collide with new sparks.

For example, "Detective Detective" is a "detection + film and television IP" model, which brings joy and evokes nostalgia by reshaping classic scenes; the newly launched "Let's Start Reasoning" is presented in the form of "detection + serial drama". It subverts the unit narrative structure of traditional detective variety shows.

Some programs have boldly upgraded the program functions. For example, "The Great Detective" has been upgraded to a law popularization education and reasoning program after cooperation with the Supreme People's Court. A special link "The Great Detective Collegiate Tribunal" has been added, and the relevant legal knowledge involved in the popular science case stories is launched online. The "Big Detective National Law Popularization Classroom" activity realizes the accurate coverage of law popularization content for young people, and the real-time participation and interaction of law popularization activities.

　　The confrontation of wisdom and courage is full of sparks, and the blend of humor and tacit understanding is full of fun. This is the unique "coolness" and happiness of investigation variety shows.

Looking forward to the next stop, detective variety shows can carry more social concerns and ideological depth while innovating and exploring.

　　(Author: Zhou Kui, an expert from a radio and television think tank and an associate professor at Communication University of China)