Chapter 1843: The Reckoning Has Come!

Zhao Fusheng would not interfere with Marvel's series of operations.

The reason was simple: both Kevin Feige and Sean Fahey were highly skilled in management.

The fact that they had turned Marvel into a company with an output value of over ten billion dollars demonstrated their abilities.

Under such circumstances, his own meddling would only tie their hands.

Zhao Fusheng certainly did not want to become a stumbling block hindering Marvel's development; for this reason, even though he knew Disney was approaching Marvel, he pretended not to see it.

The reason was simple: he felt this was a good thing for Marvel's development.

Anything that helped him make money was a good thing.

This was a basic understanding.

"By the way, after the New Year, are you going to Xichuan?" Ye Jing suddenly remembered something and asked Zhao Fusheng casually.

Zhao Fusheng nodded: "Old Jiang did tell me that. What's up?"

He was not surprised that Ye Jing knew about this; after all, Old Jiang was going on a location scouting trip and would certainly not hide it from him.

Although the crew for "Wulin" had already been set up, filming would not officially start until after the New Year in spring. With nothing much to do during this period, Old Jiang planned to go out and have a look.

"Nothing much. I was thinking, if you also approve of the location Old Jiang picks, maybe we could set up a Republican-era film and television base there."

Ye Jing smiled and mentioned an idea that took Zhao Fusheng quite by surprise.

A film and television base?

Zhao Fusheng frowned, but upon second thought, it actually seemed somewhat interesting.

The future direction of film and television would surely move toward a diversified production structure. To put it bluntly, relying solely on film and television investment to make money and grow big was not that easy.

In that case, they had to choose a profit growth point.

Increasing revenue and reducing expenditure—increasing revenue was undoubtedly the best approach.

And in Zhao Fusheng's view, the plan for a film and television base was undoubtedly a very insightful idea.

"I think it's doable."

Zhao Fusheng thought for a moment and said to Ye Jing, "But the location needs to be closer to the city."

"Not necessarily."

Ye Jing retorted, "I think it's better near a scenic area. If we operate properly, we can turn it into a tourist attraction, just like Hengdian."

"Hengdian's model can't be replicated." Zhao Fusheng shook his head. "How can West Sichuan compare to Jiangsu, Zhejiang, and Shanghai?"

This was the truth. Whether in terms of transportation or development, West Sichuan couldn't compare to developed regions. According to Ye Jing's logic, it would be very difficult to turn the future film base into a shooting base like Hengdian.

Hengdian World Studios was established in 1996, with twelve film and television shooting bases, covering nearly five thousand mu of land, with a building area of five hundred thousand square meters. It is currently the largest film studio in the country and even in Asia, and has become the shooting base with the most scenes, the most complete supporting facilities, and the longest historical span in China.

Since its completion, over five hundred films and TV series have been produced here, including "The Opium War," "The Emperor and the Assassin," "The Emperor Wu of Han," "The Legend of the Banner Heroes," "Chinese Paladin," "Hero," and many others.

Hengdian World Studios has seven major scenic areas: the Palace of Qin Scenic Area, the Along the River During the Qingming Festival Scenic Area, the Jiangnan Water Town Scenic Area, the Dazhi Chan Temple Scenic Area, the Hong Kong Street Scenic Area, the Ming and Qing Palace Garden, and the Pingshan Cave Mansion Scenic Area.

Before 1996, Hengdian was just a small town, covering ten square kilometers with a population of less than seventy thousand. But after the film studio was built and "The Opium War" was produced, the town began to thrive. After twelve years of construction, although Hengdian is still a town, its administrative villages have expanded to over a hundred, its population has increased to nearly one hundred thousand, and its town area covers more than one hundred square kilometers. The per capita annual income of the town is over ten thousand yuan, exceeding the provincial average by sixty percent.

Today, Hengdian World Studios has become the largest outdoor shooting base in Asia, called "China's Hollywood" by American "Hollywood" magazine.

In Zhao Fusheng's view, there were several reasons for Hengdian's success.

On one hand, Hengdian has an advantageous geographical location with convenient transportation, within two hours' drive from nearby big cities.

This is especially important for film crews. When shooting, they don't have to travel far over mountains and rivers.

Moreover, compared to competitors who spend tens of millions on land acquisition fees, Hengdian's land acquisition costs are relatively low, thus significantly reducing construction costs.

Finally, Hengdian took a different approach by positioning the studio as a tourist area. Besides accommodating film crews, it also attracted tourists to visit by leveraging the fame of films and TV shows. Additionally, the studio decided to provide free shooting venues to film crews, making profits by renting equipment and costumes and operating hotels and restaurants.

With this series of operations alone, it would be hard for Hengdian World Studios not to thrive.

This is something Future Film cannot compare to.

Ye Jing's thinking was not wrong; it was just that the specific details were not thoroughly considered.

"That may be true, but I think you're considering it a bit off. Think about it, places like West Sichuan, though remote, have beautiful scenery. The local government will surely value our investment and offer various policy incentives..."

Obviously, Ye Jing had done some research beforehand and was not speaking without purpose.

Zhao Fusheng smiled: "Policy can only be a supplement. When have you ever seen a project succeed solely on policy support?"

This was the truth. For any project, factors like timing, location, and human relations only played a supporting role. The key to a project's success was whether it was needed by the market.

"Then, in your opinion, how should we proceed?" Ye Jing asked, puzzled.

Since Zhao Fusheng was refuting him like this, it was clear he had a plan in mind.

With a slight smile, Zhao Fusheng said: "Bloom in multiple places. Don't limit ourselves to film and television production alone. Include tourism, TV program production—everything. We don't need to build something as big as Hengdian. We can set up several film and television bases across the country."

"Ah?"

Ye Jing was dumbfounded. He never expected Zhao Fusheng to say this. Could it be that the guy had other ideas up his sleeve?

Zhao Fusheng smiled but said nothing more. He believed that with Ye Jing's intelligence, even just this hint would be enough for him to quickly understand what to do next.

Moreover, their current moves were only preparations. The real implementation would take at least two or three years, which was when China's film and television industry would truly take off.

…

…

Time passed quickly. When Zhao Fusheng and Ye Jing spoke on the phone, neither expected Zheng Yao to act so swiftly.

The next day, Zheng Yao launched a full-scale counterattack. Various channels under the Future Group quickly issued warnings to those who had smeared them in newspapers and on television.

Civil lawsuits, lawyer's letters—a series of actions stunned everyone.

Especially the newspapers; after receiving the lawyer's letters, they were completely dumbfounded.

What exactly was the Future Group up to?

Not only them, but even the family clamoring for compensation from the Future Group was utterly shocked.

Because the Future Group officially released a video.

As the video was exposed online and to the media, the public finally learned what had happened that day.

An eight- or nine-year-old child deliberately scratched a car. Then, when the Future Group staff demanded compensation, the elderly woman began throwing a tantrum, shouting, "He's just a child…"

After such a scene was exposed, public opinion erupted!

"This, this is a scoundrel, right?"

"The bad guys have grown old!"

"How do such people have the nerve to post online, claiming they were bullied?"

"Oh my god! If I met someone like that, I'd probably die of anger."

"The bad guys have grown old! If I ran into this old lady, I'd beat her to death!"

"Stop joking! If you beat her to death, she'd extort a million from you!"

Suddenly, the tide of online opinion turned. People began to denounce that family.

That's how people are. When they don't know the truth, they like to follow the crowd and judge others from a moral high ground, as if criticizing others makes them seem more noble.

But in reality?

Once the truth was revealed, these people were the first to turn around and trample on those they had previously supported.

They seemed to think that by doing so, they could prove they were just innocent dupes who bore no responsibility, as if their previous remarks had never happened.

Online, the most shameless were probably these so-called righteous people.

Zhao Fusheng had no intention of letting them off either.

He simply had Zheng Yao pick out a few posts that had loudly proclaimed the Future Group chairman as heartless and oppressive toward ordinary people, find the posters' information, and send them subpoenas.

Simple: everyone must take responsibility for their actions. Since they chose to take sides without knowing the truth, they naturally had to bear the consequences of that choice.

As for what price they would pay, that was not Zhao Fusheng's concern.

He was not a goody-two-shoes who would still smile when someone called him trash to his face.

Moreover, even if he had goodwill, Zhao Fusheng would not give it to these keyboard warriors.

These people, even ten years later, would still be utter garbage, doing nothing beneficial for the country or society except spewing venom online all day.

The greatest tragedy of China's internet age was the lack of any punitive measures against online trolls.

As a result, the internet had become a place where all kinds of monsters ran rampant without restraint.