Star Wars struggles in a country far, far away: As people around the world wait in line for days to watch The Rise of Skywalker, sci-fi series struggles to win over Chinese audiences as only a handful of fans turn up
- Chinese fans are shunning the final Star Wars movie in the scif-fi film trilogy
- Disney stepped up efforts to gain fans in the world’s fastest-growing film market
- Cinemagoers are instead flocking to see Marvel superheroes and domestic films
Star Wars fans from around the world waited in line for days to catch ‘The Rise of Skywalker.
But the sci-fi series has struggled to woo film-goers in the increasingly important Chinese market.
Special previews of the long-awaited ‘Star Wars’ film in Beijing this week drew just a handful of fans.
Superfans of the sci-fi series are rare in the increasingly important Chinese market. Fans are pictured queuing up to watch the new film. ‘The Last Jedi’ ranked number 47 at the box office in China in 2018, far behind Marvel’s superhero film ‘Avengers: Infinity War’
Chen Tao is a rare superfan in a country where Friday’s opening day pre-sales were just 12 million yuan ($1.7 million), according to Xinhua news agency.
The 35-year-old Shanghai resident only became curious about the space saga by accident after stumbling across a pre-installed ‘Star Wars’ video game on his first computer.
Chen now runs one of China’s biggest online Star Wars fan groups, debating lightsaber physics on the online message board Zhihu and managing a Twitter-like Weibo account with 30,000 followers.
He loves the Star Wars world for its vast scale and rich detail that fans can piece together through movies, books and games.
One Beijing bar hosted a screening Tuesday of previous ‘Star Wars’ films ahead of Friday’s China release — but the special room was mostly empty
Since buying Star Wars studio Lucasfilm in 2012, Disney has stepped up efforts to gain fans in the world’s fastest-growing movie market
‘Its world is like a jigsaw-puzzle… which feels very magical to me, and inspires a desire to explore this universe,’ he said.
Chen and his fellow fans are rare in China, where cinemagoers flock instead to see Marvel superheroes and domestic films.
‘The Last Jedi’ ranked number 47 at the box office in China in 2018, far behind Marvel’s superhero film ‘Avengers: Infinity War’ at number six, according to Box Office Mojo.
Since buying Star Wars studio Lucasfilm in 2012, Disney has stepped up efforts to gain fans in the world’s fastest-growing movie market.
In October, Disney and Tencent-owned e-book company China Literature announced they would be publishing the first-ever ‘Star Wars’ novel written specifically for Chinese audiences featuring ‘Chinese-style expression.’
‘We will introduce interpersonal relations and other concepts from Chinese custom into Star Wars,’ said a China Literature representative.
Chen Tao is a rare superfan in a country where Friday’s opening day pre-sales were just 12 million yuan ($1.7 million). He is pictured above looking at merchandise from the saga
A Beijing bar hosted a screening Tuesday of previous ‘Star Wars’ films ahead of Friday’s China release — but the special room was mostly empty.
The indifference could be explained by the fact that Chinese audiences were introduced to the series in 1999 with the prequel ‘Episode 1 – The Phantom Menace’ — a disappointment to original fans and panned by critics.
‘When Star Wars was released worldwide in 1977 it was a real film revolution,’ said Steffi Noel, an analyst from Shanghai-based market research firm Daxue Consulting.
‘Each new episode of Star Wars is linked to a craze, a nostalgia,’ Noel told AFP.
But most Chinese viewers never formed this nostalgic bond with the movies.
Since buying Star Wars studio Lucasfilm in 2012, Disney has stepped up efforts to gain fans in the world’s fastest-growing movie market