【Film and TV critical review】

　　It is the winter vacation, and when parents and children are choosing "spiritual food", they find that there are not many children's TV series to choose from. The high-quality children's TV series that have had a wide impact on the public level and are talked about by people are still broadcast many years ago. classic work. Most of the newly created works are short-lived and have little response when they are broadcast. It is difficult to leave a deep impression after being broadcast. Children's TV series are basically absent from the cultural and entertainment life of young people.

　　Children's TV series refer to TV series that are specially created for children's audiences, are in line with children's receptive abilities, and meet children's psychological characteristics and children's aesthetic needs. This type of TV series can be traced back to the budding period of Chinese TV series in the late 1950s. With the popularization of televisions and the flourishing of the television industry, children's TV series have entered the fast lane of development since the 1980s and 1990s. A number of excellent works have emerged on the market, such as "Good Dad, Bad Dad", which explores the relationship between father and son, "Sanmao's Wanderings", which describes Sanmao's encounters after begging all the way to Shanghai, and tells the story of various interesting things after the union of two divorced families. The story "A Family with Children" and so on. In recent years, the market for children's TV series has cooled significantly, with fewer new creations and more single themes. From 2018 to 2023, the proportion of youth-themed TV series among the domestic TV series approved for distribution nationwide was 4.34%, 5.50%, 3.47%, 1.55%, 3.76% and 5.13%. Among them, only 14 youth-themed TV series in 2019 were in The subject matter classification covers four categories: contemporary, modern, modern and ancient, and there are 11 contemporary themes, which far exceeds the sum of the other three categories. The subject matter classification in the other five years only includes two categories at most.

　　Behind the small number and imbalance of themes is the profound change in the market environment of children's TV series. With the rapid development of the mobile Internet, children's viewing habits of watching children's TV series after school every day have changed. Audio-visual content suitable for children, including children's TV series, can be watched on video websites anytime and anywhere. Faced with a large number of domestic animation works and diverse children's content, parents tend to let their children accept cultural products that are more pragmatic and educational, while children tend to choose animation products that are more attractive in form and more in line with their own aesthetic needs. The combination of multiple factors has led to a decline in the children's TV drama market.

　　Not only is the market experiencing a cold spell, but creations are also experiencing a "cold wave." Specifically, children's TV dramas take children as the main viewers and performers. Therefore, the narrative perspective, plot design, shooting techniques, scene scheduling, etc. must comply with children's nature and psychological characteristics, and grasp the balance between content depth and interest. Balance should neither be lost in preaching by being too elevated, nor fall into the quagmire of low-intellectual content by being too low. These characteristics of children's TV dramas place higher demands on the experience, quality and humanistic accomplishments of the creators. In addition, the production cost of children's TV series is not low because it involves live performances, special effects technology, scenery and other aspects. However, there is less space for the development of derivatives, and it is difficult to maintain the stability of the IP image. From a commercial perspective, compared with other categories of children's video products such as cartoons or other subject types of TV series, the market prospects are unclear, which to a certain extent affects the enthusiasm for investment and creation.

　　Of course, this doesn't mean that children's TV shows in recent years have been nothing to behold. Works such as "Mi Xiaoquan Goes to School" and "Wandering in the Bug World" have made new explorations in plot design, creative techniques, technology application, and theme exploration. For example, "Mi Xiaoquan Goes to School" observes the world from the perspective of Mi Xiaoquan, a naughty elementary school boy. In his daily life, such as running for class president, competing to be a flag raiser, and joining the football team, it shows the child's individualized attitude towards fair competition and chasing dreams. Thinking; "Wandering in the World of Bugs" uses a shooting method that combines reality and reality to create a "bug space" and create an image world for the popularization of knowledge. Both works have received positive feedback from the market and audiences to a certain extent. However, the brilliance of a single article cannot cover up the overall paleness.

　　So, how can children’s TV series become “hot”? First of all, the subject matter must be "hot". The childhood stage is the starting point of life, and stories and materials related to children should relate to the myriad scenery of life. In this sense, children's TV series have never been linked to "unpopularity". Creators should further explore creative resources, extract materials from hot real life, and constantly draw inspiration from traditional culture and literary hot spots. For example, the animated web drama "The Big Monster in the Forbidden City: The Secret of the Cave Light Gem" is not only based on the popular fairy tale IP, but also provides a new audio-visual presentation of the palaces and spine beasts of the Forbidden City, and also uses the "live-action + CG" creative technique. The attempt provides certain reference for the innovative development of children's TV series.

　　Secondly, the creator’s heart must be “warm”. A child's heart is an incredible land. If you sow the seeds of thoughts, you will reap the rewards of behavior; if you sow the seeds of character, you will reap the rewards of growth. An excellent children's TV series often has a profound and lasting impact on children. Therefore, creators should talk to children from a straight perspective and a vicarious mentality, see the world with warm eyes, inject deep philosophical and artistic thinking into seemingly simple and ordinary stories, and plant a seed for children's growth path. A seed waiting to bloom.

　　Finally, the children's audio-visual industry should also become "hot" through continuous exploration. In the long run, practitioners' enthusiasm for the creation of children's TV series and the improvement of commercial benefits should be a mutually beneficial relationship. In the future, we should further consolidate the position of children's TV series in the audio-visual industry chain, such as developing children's version derivatives of popular series, exploring content and industry linkages between series, etc., and promoting the "two-way relationship" between outstanding creators and successful business models. Run to”.

　　Some commentators once expressed the important role of children's literary and artistic works in children's growth with the term "guarding the heart lamp". We call for more classic children's TV series and images full of positive energy to appear, to light up every young heart pursuing a better life.

(Author: Li Xuan, editor of the editorial department of China Television Arts Council)