284: Chapter 284: Filming Completed, Release Date Set!

Red Star Heavy Machinery Factory.

An unprecedented man-made blizzard was raging through this wasteland architectural complex covering over ten thousand square meters.

This was not the cheap fake snow made of foam scraps and blowers commonly used by film crews.

It was a special artificial snow-making vehicle, originally designed for extreme climate testing, that Su Zhe had shamelessly borrowed from the National Meteorological Research Center.

With the roar of the high-pressure spray guns, snowflakes mixed with ice shards came crashing down, covering the sky and earth.

The temperature was forcibly lowered to minus fifteen degrees Celsius.

"Attention, everyone!"

"Last scene, all hands on the vehicle!"

In the wind and snow, Su Zhe was wrapped in a thick military coat, shouting into a megaphone, his voice almost torn apart by the gale.

In front of the camera.

Wu Feng was wearing that black exoskeleton power armor weighing dozens of kilograms, his visor covered in a thick layer of white frost.

In front of him was a dark gray eight-wheeled heavy all-terrain transport vehicle.

In the setting, the ignition core of the transport vehicle was damaged, and the rescue team needed to use pure human strength combined with the power of the exoskeleton to force it onto the launch track.

"One! Two! Three!"

"Push!"

Wu Feng's eyes widened, and he let out a roar like a trapped beast.

The micro-servos on the back of the armor emitted a piercing buzz, and the blue indicator lights flickered wildly in the snowstorm.

Behind him.

Tie Niu, Yin Hua, and the thirty hardcore extras acting as test operators from the Heavy Industry Group all pushed their shoulders against the cold armored vehicle.

Creak...

The heavy explosion-proof tires ground against the snowy ground, making a friction sound.

Everyone was giving their all!

The sweat that had just emerged on their foreheads instantly froze into ice crystals.

There was no pulling of wires, no green screen synthesis.

This was the most primitive struggle between dozens of flesh-and-blood bodies and a multi-ton steel beast.

As the camera moved rapidly along the track, the heavy metal oppression and tragic atmosphere felt like it was about to spill off the screen.

"Firing pin on track!"

"Ignite!"

As the last line of dialogue in the script ended, the tailpipe of the transport vehicle suddenly spewed a thick cloud of black smoke, and the twelve-cylinder diesel engine let out an earth-shattering roar.

Success!

"Cut!"

Su Zhe leaped up from behind the monitor, smashing the megaphone in his hand heavily onto the snow.

He panted heavily, his eyes red-rimmed.

Looking at the actors and staff who had collapsed in the snow, too exhausted to even take off their helmets, Su Zhe's voice was hoarse but resonant like a bell: "I announce! The live-action filming of the movie 'the wandering earth'... is a full wrap!"

The set paused for two seconds.

Then, a roar that could blow away the snowstorm erupted!

Wu Feng lay splayed out in the snow, gulping down the cold air, tears mixing with the melting snow as they flowed down.

It was so bitter!

He had spent half his life filming action movies, jumped off buildings, broken his legs.

But he swore this was the most exhausting, most torturous, yet most damn satisfying movie he had ever filmed.

Tie Niu hugged Yin Hua, rolling in the snow.

Sister Liu and Zhao Xiaoxiao also ran onto the field, distributing the military coats and ginger soup that had been prepared long ago.

After months of hard fighting, this heavy industrial giant ship carrying the hope of Chinese sci-fi finally sailed out of the shipyard, tempered by ice and fire!

However, for a sci-fi movie, finishing live-action filming was only fifty percent of the work.

The remaining part was the key to its life or death—post-production special effects!

Underground cities, exoskeletons, transport vehicles—Su Zhe could build these with real objects.

But what about that massive Navigation Space Station in space?

What about the terrifying red storm that could tear through the atmosphere when Earth was captured by Jupiter's gravity?

These grand cosmic spectacles that couldn't be filmed in real life had to rely on powerful CG computing power to render.

If he went to an outsourcing company, it would burn at least two hundred million and take over half a year.

Su Zhe had money, but he didn't want to burn it like that.

So, the day after the wrap party, this director, who was famous in the Chinese Entertainment Industry as a workaholic, locked himself in the special effects machine room on the second floor of Jinyuan Building again.

Ten top-tier graphics workstations were firing at full capacity.

The fan speed soared to the limit, and the entire machine room was as hot as an oven.

Su Zhe was shirtless, diving into the ocean of data.

The system's [Holographic CG Algorithm Mastery] was fully activated!

The light refraction paths and particle collision calculations that seemed as complex as a tangled mess to ordinary special effects artists were automatically converted into the most concise and perfect underlying code in Su Zhe's mind.

Jupiter's Great Red Spot gradually took shape under his fingertips, carrying a kind of deep, oppressive feeling that caused deep-sea phobia.

The faint blue tail flames of ten thousand planetary engines on Earth were rendered with extreme realism; even the slight distortion at the edges when the plasma burned was clearly visible.

Twenty days. Twenty full days and nights.

When the final audio track was perfectly synced with the footage, Su Zhe pressed the Enter key.

"Rendering complete."

Looking at the prompt box popping up on the screen, Su Zhe slumped into his chair, his eyes bloodshot, but a proud curve appeared on the corner of his mouth.

3:00 PM. In the studio's small screening room, Sister Liu, Wu Feng, Zhang Song, and other core creators were invited to watch the final cut of 'the wandering earth'.

Two hours later, the lights came on. The screening room was dead silent.

Wu Feng's fingers holding the cigarette were trembling slightly, his eyes red.

Sister Liu was even more dumbfounded, looking at the big screen as if she had seen God.

"This..."

Wu Feng swallowed a mouthful of dry saliva, his voice hoarse: "Director Su, that final special effects shot of igniting Jupiter... was it really done by you alone in these twenty days?"

It was too shocking!

That cosmic-level grand narrative, the sense of despair of Earth being like an ant in front of Jupiter's massive body, and the destructive aesthetics when the shockwave swept across the globe—even if compared frame-by-frame with Hollywood's top sci-fi blockbusters, it was absolutely crushing!

"Genuine and authentic."

Su Zhe took a sip of goji berry tea to soothe his smoky throat.

"The movie is done. Sister Liu, contact the major cinema chains. Get ready... for the release date!"

However, upon hearing the words "release date", Sister Liu shuddered violently, waking up from the shock.

Her face changed instantly; instead of joy, it revealed a deep sense of despair.

"Su Zhe..."

Sister Liu took out her tablet, her fingers cold: "You've been in seclusion in the machine room for the past half month, and the sky outside has changed.

Just yesterday morning, the sci-fi giant 'interstellar battleship 3', directed by top Hollywood director James and having grossed two billion dollars globally, officially announced that it had passed the import approval.

And, it has high-profile scheduled its release for Chinese New Year! The Spring Festival slot!"

This news made everyone's hearts sink.

James!

That arrogant foreigner who openly mocked China as a "sci-fi desert" on the red carpet and ridiculed Su Zhe for only knowing how to film "low-level tear-jerking comedies".

He was bringing Hollywood's sharpest battleship to pierce through the biggest and fattest cake in the Chinese film market for the entire year.

He intended to carry out a massacre-style box office harvest during the Spring Festival.

"Not only that."

Sister Liu opened several industry reports, her voice bitter: "Facing James's heavy pressure, the seven major blockbusters originally scheduled for the Spring Festival, including comedies and action films by several veteran directors, have all chickened out!

They released withdrawal statements overnight and fled to the May Day or Summer holiday slots to avoid the limelight.

Moreover, major domestic cinema chains, facing such a guaranteed money-making Hollywood cash cow, have already shamelessly leaned towards James.

Internal news suggests that the major cinema chains are prepared to give 'interstellar battleship 3' a terrifying 80% screen allocation rate in the first three days of the Spring Festival!

This is meant to seal off all paths for the domestic market!"

Sister Liu looked up, her eyes full of worry as she looked at Su Zhe: "Su Zhe, James is engaging in cultural crushing with capital.

Although our 'the wandering earth' has god-tier quality, the genre is, after all, hard sci-fi that our country has never succeeded in before.

Facing such a behemoth with a global fan base, if we also choose to release during the Spring Festival...

That would be no different from an egg hitting a rock.

Should we... also avoid the edge and change the release date?"

Retreat.

This was the consensus of all domestic filmmakers at the moment.

Facing the hegemony of Western sci-fi industry, no one dared to touch this bad luck.

The conference room was dead silent.

Wu Feng clenched his fists, and Zhang Song lowered his head.

Although they felt aggrieved, they knew that the cruelty of the commercial market would not change by human will.

However, Su Zhe did not speak.

He stood up and slowly walked to the huge floor-to-ceiling window of the office.

Outside the window, Beijing's first snow was falling, dyeing the ancient city silver-white.

Su Zhe stood with his hands behind his back, watching the falling snowflakes.

In his mind, James's arrogant face with a condescending smile appeared.

"Sci-fi desert? Can't handle real film industry?"

The corners of Su Zhe's mouth curled up, bit by bit, into an unruly, cold sneer.

A fierce, wolf-like determination—one that would not return until the enemy was defeated—erupted from his back.

"Avoid the limelight?"

Su Zhe turned around abruptly.

In those bloodshot eyes burned a violent wild fire capable of melting ice and snow!

He looked at Sister Liu, his voice not loud, but it struck everyone's mind like a thunderclap: "This is China!

The Spring Festival is a holiday set by our Chinese ancestors!

In my territory, when is it a foreigner's turn to run wild?"

Su Zhe walked to the conference table.

He slammed his hands heavily on the table, issuing the most crazy, most decisive, and destined-to-shock-the-entire-Chinese Entertainment Industry death order since the studio was founded: "No withdrawing!

No changing dates!

Release the release poster immediately!

'the wandering earth' will be released simultaneously worldwide on the first day of the Chinese New Year!"

Su Zhe's eyes were like knives, murderous: "Since James thinks we are a desert, then today, I will insist on growing a towering tree in this desert!

This time, I am going to... go head-to-head with Hollywood!"