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Culture & Politics » soc.culture.china » Desperate Housewives flop in China
| Desperate Housewives flop in China [message #225419] |
Sa, 15 Juli 2006 18:42 |
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Interesting commentary. I can certainly identify with
>For one thing, American serials like "Desperate Housewives",
>with their witty innuendoes and multiple twists, are too fast-paced for Chinese taste.
>Some viewers complained they would get lost with the plot after a bathroom break.
>But with South Korean soaps, even if you skip three episodes, you can still follow the story lines.
I caught one Housewives episode I enjoyed very much but the subsequent
three just sucked to me. That was it. I can also identify with
>South Korean soaps, even if you skip three episodes, you can still follow the story lines.
Same with Taiwan costume dramas. They just went on and on with the
same point (101 ways by our corrupt landlord to abuse our hero peasant
- episode 3 to episode 12) and in the final episode the Imperial Judge
appears on the scene and everything is miraculously resolved. I saw
only 3, 12 and final (16) because I happened to flip to that channel
while abroad visiting. I bet if you mixed up the episodes between
the first rwo and the final you wouldn't notice if they were out of
sequence.
Why 'Desperate Housewives' flopped in China
By Raymond Zhou (China Daily)
Updated: 2005-12-31 07:09
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/opinion/2005-12/31/content_5369 93.htm
'Desperate Housewives' has bombed in China.
The American soap opera debuted on CCTV8 on December 19 and ran for a
week, covering the whole first season. The practice of airing three
back-to-back episodes each night was meant to satisfy the Chinese
appetite of gobbling up serial drama, but may have left little time
for digestion as a consequence, as some argued.
The slot of 10 pm through 1 am is designated for foreign fare since
primetime is reserved for domestic shows. That basically winnows out
casual viewers and early risers, leaving only rabid fans and night
owls.
The protectionist measure can be justified to an extent, but may go
against commercial interests: Why should I put a hit show into the
late-night line-up when it could have attracted a much larger
audience?
Preliminary results show that this award-winning series garnered a
ratings point of 0.5, compared with the usual 3-4 points for this time
slot. In the United States, it was the most watched new series when it
was first launched in October 2004 and, despite some erosion, has been
comfortably in the top-10 league. Around the world in 202 territories,
it has been setting ratings record here and there, hitting the number
one spot in countries as diverse as Germany, South Africa and
Singapore.
So, how come a runaway hit ended up running aground in the largest
potential market in terms of viewership?
Besides the inconvenient time slot, some criticize the dubbing for
purging the original flavour from the dialogue. (Chinese dubbing
actists tend to have perfect but homogeneous voices and exaggerated
reading, they say.)
The trimming of a few scenes has also been singled out as a culprit,
but the authorities in charge explained there was very little
censorship except for the toning down of some racy lines.
While all these factors might matter, they do not shed light on the
most fundamental cultural discrepancy. Just look at South Korean soaps
similarly scheduled. They have been delivering ratings many times that
of 'Desperate Housewives', turning legions of nine-to-fivers into
nighthawks and creating Monday morning blues every morning.
Ultimately, it's the show that matters. To put it bluntly,
"Housewives" does not have a demographic fit in the Chinese market.
True, it is high in quality and has suspense, thrill and murder as
plot hooks to entice a wider audience. But a typical television viewer
in China is not someone well-versed in Western arts and literature,
mesmerized by parallel narratives and ingenious tracking shots. It is
usually someone with no advanced education but simply wants to kick
off her shoes and relax after a hard day's work.
The show's fanfare was whipped up by media types exposed to Western
reports and who have probably already seen it on DVD pirated more or
less. As a matter of fact, many people who tuned in to CCTV but found
the dubbing or scheduling annoying eventually saw the airing as a
teaser, turning to the DVD market for the whole nine yards.
These young urbanites may make up a decent market segment for many
product categories. But television being a mass entertainment
platform, it cannot depend solely on the opinion leaders. Rather, it
needs a bigger turnout willing to get on the ride.
For one thing, American serials like "Desperate Housewives", with
their witty innuendoes and multiple twists, are too fast-paced for
Chinese taste. Some viewers complained they would get lost with the
plot after a bathroom break. But with South Korean soaps, even if you
skip three episodes, you can still follow the story lines.
On a deeper level, life on Wisteria Lane, the fictional California
community in Housewives, is too far removed from ordinary Chinese,
even the burgeoning middle class. A Chinese teenager would never, in
her right mind, advise her single mother on the etiquette of dating.
When Chinese housewives get into an adulterous mood, they would not
turn to teenaged gardeners, who are usually migrant workers in rags,
but to people with deeper pockets and higher ranks. A Chinese woman
may act as fastidious as Bree Van De Kamp, but she would not take on
the arch-conservative stance of an American Republican. A Chinese
super-mom, in a country with family planning policy encouraging for
one child, faces challenges very different from tending four unruly
kids.
Simply put, the show fails to connect with the vast number of
television viewers here because it implicitly requires prior knowledge
of the US middle-class lifestyle, exaggerated for dramatic effect of
course. That shouldn't dampen the enthusiasm of those who crave for
quality programming, but its target audience shrinks from the
culturally curious to the culturally adventurous.
E-mail: raymondzhou [at] chinadaily.com.cn
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