Have you watched " Wednesday " (Wednesday)? 20 days after the release of the Netflix platform, "Wednesday" has been watched for more than 1 billion hours, becoming the runner-up in the all-time viewing list of Netflix English dramas (in the first 28 days), second only to the fourth season of " Stranger Things ". On December 12, "Wednesday" also received two nominations for the 2023 Golden Globe Awards : Best Musical/Comedy Series and Best Actress in a Musical/Comedy Series (Jenna Ortega). "Wednesday"'s impressive results and popularity on social media beg the question: How did it become a pop culture phenomenon?
The fusion of "Addams Family" IP and CW-style narrative
After a dismal year in which Netflix's stock price plummeted and users were lost, the popularity of the drama "Wednesday" has undoubtedly injected a shot in the arm into the streaming platform. There are numerous social media posts analyzing Wednesday Addams’ outfits, dance moves and lip color, and there are a dizzying number of cosplays. Entertainment executives everywhere are pondering this question: What is the magic formula that drives this viral hit?
▲Wednesday Adams.
The Netflix series "Wednesday" takes beloved Addams family character Wednesday Addams away from her family environment and into the dark, eerie Nevermore Academy, the alma mater of her father Gomez and mother Morticia. At Nevermore College, Wednesday discovered the secret of his parents from 25 years ago. At the same time, he was attracted by a serial murder case and launched an investigation.
It can be said that "Wednesday" combines the classic IP of The Addams Family, supernatural suspense elements and teen comedy. The Addams Family has retained its enduring appeal 80 years since its debut in The New Yorker magazine in 1938. The Addams Family began as a horror satire created by cartoonist Charles Addams. A TV sitcom adaptation in the mid-1960s brought the family into the pop culture consciousness. In the early 1990s, two hit Addams Family movies became cult classics, and the 2019 animated version of The Addams Family continues to break into the teen market. In film and television adaptations over the years, Wednesday Addams has been a beloved gothic icon, and few characters can be as precise in her put-downs and comebacks as her perfect sense of humor.
IP aside, "Inverse" writer Dais Johnston believes that "Wednesday" adopts a typical CW-style narrative mode. The CW is an American television network that has produced many DC superhero dramas (such as "Arrow" and "The Flash"), and is keen on developing episodic youth dramas with fantasy elements (such as "The Vampire Diaries" and "The Secret Society"). Adopting the common techniques and narrative strategies of CW dramas, Wednesday gradually unfolds herself in murders, romantic relationships, friendships and mother-daughter conflicts, and gives her many skills of the current heroine. This neutralizes the overly black temperament of Wednesday Adams' character itself, allowing this Gothic character born 80 years ago to rejuvenate in the contemporary era.
Iconic Wednesday Dance
Even if you have not watched this show, you must have frequently watched Wednesday’s dance videos on social media. What kind of dance is this?
She twisted her shoulders, her bangs passing over her eyebrows, then tossed her arms nonchalantly back and forth over her head, then took a commanding stance and danced in a straight line. This is Wednesday's lilting dance, this is Wednesday's cold gaze.
Wednesday Adams has mesmerized thousands with her dance at Nevermore College’s annual Rave ‘N dance party. Built on dramatic audacity and quirky humour, this dance is a defiant dance that refuses to conform and is a celebration of the eccentric.The dance, choreographed by Jenna Ortega herself, brings a rich dark glamor to her character and pays homage to the 1964 TV series when Lisa Loring's version of Wednesday Addams teaches Lurch how to dance.
Ortega’s dance has caused a wave of imitation, and TikTok’s recommendation page has been occupied by dance videos from many creators. People danced their own version of the bizarre dance, which involved throwing their heads back, staring wide-eyed at the sky, and waving their arms side to side and up and down like a malfunctioning robot. In the original Netflix series, the soundtrack for Wednesday’s dance was The Cramps’ 1981 song “Goo Goo Muck,” but in TikTok’s dance adaptation, many people chose Lady Gaga’s “Bloody Mary” (I’ll dance, dance, dance with my hands, hands, hands above my head, head, head), the lyrics of this song are more in line with the representative hand movements in dance. Even Lady Gaga herself has gotten in on the trend. Due to the popularity of "Wednesday", "Bloody Mary", which was not a single song, experienced its highest daily increase and broke into the top 50 of Spotify's global daily chart. "Goo Goo Muck" also saw a significant increase in the number of plays on streaming media.
'Thing': An Adorable Hand
While most of the praise for Netflix's 2022 version of "Wednesday" was due to Jenna Ortega's stellar performance, there was also a lot of love for her adorable little sidekick, Thing. The Thing is a hand without other body parts. It is also an important member of the Addams family and becomes a powerful "assistant" to Detective Wednesday in the plot. As for how the Thing came to be, Wednesday said, "It's one of the great Addams Family mysteries."
▲thing.
This version of Thing is played by Victor Dorobantu, a 25-year-old Romanian magician. He has never acted before, but his flexible hand movements and in-depth understanding of the character make the image of Thing more vivid. Although he only plays a hand, Dorobantu puts his emotions into the performance, giving the Thing's actions the joy, anger, sorrow and joy of humans. Fans were intrigued by the demanding performance after behind-the-scenes photos from Dorobantu's shoot went viral on Twitter.
During filming, Dorobantu was required to don a full-body blue screen suit so editors could erase the rest of his body in post-production. “Not only did the blue suit help the visual effects guys in post, it also helped me a lot because when I looked at my hand, I could ignore all the blue stuff, which was the rest of my body, and I was able to put all my energy and thoughts into this hand,” explains Dorobantu. Despite wearing a blue suit, Dorobanthu also needs to hide in small spaces during performances, including under beds, tables, etc. He told Netflix's Tudum platform that the filming process for the role was tricky and "no one knew what to do and we had to figure it out together." They even used pulleys to make the Thing move quickly.
As for the expression of Thing, Dorobantu said: "We borrowed American Sign Language and some gestures that divers would use to mix images that can achieve communication, but this only accounts for 50%. The remaining 5 0% was improvisation, and I had to react to Wednesday’s lines and expressions.”
Netflix once again turned to the bizarre hand in promoting “Wednesday,” using an electric Thing to trick passers-by on the streets of New York City and record their reactions.
News and picture sources: The Guardian, The New York Times, Euronews, Vanity Fair, NBC, CNET, NPR, Slate, Inverse, Hypebeast, some pictures are from the Internet
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