Chapter 10: The Reaction

When netizens woke up, they were stunned by the rankings of various platforms’ viewership data released by marketing accounts.

It was no surprise that The Watchers ranked first for its premiere data. Recently, there wasn’t a single drama that could compare to the momentum of The Watchers during this time slot. However, what caught everyone off guard was that a drama that had almost no presence before airing had actually made it into the top ten of the day’s rankings.

[The Watcher breaking ten thousand views on its first day is totally expected, but… My Baby Prince? What is that? I’ve never even heard of it!]

[The Watchers is still strong, crushing a whole batch of primetime dramas from major platforms. But this Baby Prince showing up is really odd.]

On the rankings, The Watchers firmly held the number one spot with its premiere viewership breaking 10,000. The second place was taken by Cloud Films’ The Sweetness of a Candy, a typical lighthearted romantic drama. Its two leads were currently trending young stars. Since its target audience didn’t overlap with The Watchers, Cloud Film deliberately scheduled it to compete head-to-head in this slot.

Of course, there was no way it could beat The Watchers. But since the production cost for Candy wasn’t high, losing didn’t matter much.

Cloud Film and Deyi Film both had dramas on the rankings. Chenxi Film’s primetime drama also made it into the top ten. Yet, among all these primetime dramas, My Baby Prince, with 6,000 views, stood out as particularly conspicuous.

The first reaction of most drama enthusiasts upon seeing it was—what even is this?

For primetime dramas across platforms, even if the cast wasn’t particularly notable, avid drama fans would usually have heard something about them.

But My Baby Prince seemed to have appeared out of nowhere, inexplicably climbing into the top ten of the trending charts. It even outperformed Three Peaks Half Fallen, a primetime drama from Green Apple Film. Granted, Three Peaks Half Fallen was indeed a subpar production, with mediocre storytelling and lukewarm audience reception, but it wasn’t the kind of drama that should be surpassed by something completely unheard of.

What made this even more astonishing was that My Baby Prince aired at midnight.

In other words, despite airing a full four hours later than the other dramas, My Baby Prince managed to break past 6,000 in popularity.

[How is that even possible? How did they pull that off?]

Setting aside the fact that Chenxi Film was only a second-tier platform with limited visibility, even top-tier platforms like Grape Film struggled to achieve significant viewership during late-night slots.

However, under normal circumstances, data like this was rarely fabricated.

Even Chenxi Film’s own team was baffled.

Although they weren’t as clueless about their own dramas as the general audience, when the viewership data came in, showing that a low-budget in-house web drama had outranked their meticulously prepared flagship productions, the higher-ups couldn’t help but feel bewildered.

Their only real knowledge about My Baby Prince was that Lu Xu had a role in it.

“Could it be due to Gu Sinian’s aggressive promotion?”

After much deliberation, the executives could only come up with this explanation.

After all, My Baby Prince had virtually no promotional budget. Its only visibility stemmed from Lu Xu, a former member of the idol group Verse. The drama seemed to ride on the coattails of The Watchers, leveraging Gu Sinian’s soaring popularity.

In a way, Chenxi Film’s assumption was partly correct.

The conflict between Lu Xu and Gu Sinian did indeed draw some curious netizens to My Baby Prince. After all, Lu Xu had been frantically liking and unliking dirt on Gu Sinian until nearly midnight, which naturally piqued the interest of some who decided to check out My Baby Prince while they were at it.

In addition to curious onlookers, Gu Sinian’s fans played a role as well. After all, if Lu Xu had the audacity to criticize Gu Sinian’s acting, his fans weren’t going to let My Baby Prince off the hook without dissecting it for every laughable moment.

However, while casual viewers might click on the first episode out of curiosity, they typically wouldn’t stick around for the second episode.

Yet, based on the trend of its popularity—My Baby Prince had a popularity score of 6100+ for its first episode, which inexplicably increased to 6700+ for the second.

For a drama, such a trend was highly unusual.

Take The Watchers as an example: its first episode had a popularity score of 13,000+, breaking Grape Film’s premiere viewership records of recent years. However, its second episode dropped to 11,000+, a typical trajectory for most dramas where audience curiosity peaks during the premiere but tapers off afterward.

Intrigued, netizens began searching for discussions about My Baby Prince, only to be met with an avalanche of ridicule from Gu Sinian’s fans.

In fact, Gu Sinian’s fanbase had been mocking the drama relentlessly since its release on Chenxi Film.

Initially, they mocked the cast. Then, they mocked Pan Lingfeng’s nickname, the so-called “Horse-racing Prince.” After that, they targeted the “elite” Ariel Academy, which came across more as a poverty-stricken private school than a prestigious institution.

At least The Watchers managed to include one or two high-end sponsorship placements. My Baby Prince had none. The supposedly aristocratic academy looked anything but lavish. The school uniforms seemed cheap, and Pan Lingfeng’s “prince” character didn’t even have a luxury car. Ironically, in The Watchers, one of the titular “Watchers,” whose real-life persona was the son of a wealthy tycoon, was chauffeured everywhere in actual high-end cars.

[Did the entire production budget go into paying Lu Xu’s salary?]

[I am speechless! Your ‘Horse-racing Prince’ is literally riding a horse?? And worse, the horse is CGI!]

[I’ve never seen such a broke production crew—how do they even have the nerve to put this on air?]

The cast and crew of My Baby Prince were relentlessly roasted, from costumes to locations. Not a single element escaped the biting criticism from Gu Sinian’s fanbase.

Lin Ge Entertainment maintained a good relationship with several marketing companies. After the broadcast of The Watchers, Gu Sinian’s fans and these marketing accounts collaborated seamlessly. High-profile fan accounts, which already had a considerable following, began aggressively criticizing My Baby Prince.

As these critical posts gained traction, something unexpected happened: the more My Baby Prince was criticized, the more curious some drama enthusiasts became.

In this era, most drama productions were well-funded. Lead actors were often draped in luxury brands, and fashion bloggers regularly cataloged the outfits seen in various shows.

But My Baby Prince was a rare exception—its visible poverty set it apart.

The production’s extreme lack of resources piqued the curiosity of many viewers: what was the point of a drama this underfunded even existing?

The reality was that most of Chenxi Film’s mass-produced web dramas operated on shoestring budgets. Normally, these dramas wouldn’t even catch the attention of serious drama fans. If not for Gu Sinian’s fans digging into it so fervently, My Baby Prince would have stayed under the radar.

When drama enthusiasts finally clicked on My Baby Prince, they braced themselves for a disaster: a visibly broke production team, actors whose performances were likely as weak as the budget, and a script riddled with cringeworthy moments.

But what they saw surprised them.

While the nickname “Horse-racing Prince” was undeniably cringy, Pan Lingfeng’s character didn’t lack the charisma of a true prince. Lead actor Yang Shu’s looks were undeniably up to par, and in the first two episodes, he vividly portrayed Pan Lingfeng’s bold, reckless yet endearing personality.

As a campus drama, My Baby Prince focused on youthful and lively students—a far cry from many current youth dramas where “teenage” leads were clearly played by actors well into their late twenties or thirties. For example, Cloud Film’s The Sweetness of a Candy was guilty of this trope. In contrast, the casting in My Baby Prince was noticeably youthful.

Perhaps because the cast lacked fame, they approached their roles with remarkable freedom and authenticity.

For seasoned drama fans, who had seen it all, the telltale signs of awkward acting were easy to spot. But My Baby Prince? Surprisingly, it wasn’t as cringeworthy as they had expected.

Even though the plot of My Baby Prince was somewhat unrealistic, no one expected a youth drama to mirror real life. As long as the story was engaging and the characters endearing, it was enough.

The heroine, Zhong Baobei, might have had a rather tacky name, but in her scenes, she brought the character to life completely.

Like a resilient weed, she was brave, adorable, spirited, and optimistic. Together with the class’s lovable misfits, she created moments filled with charming sparks.

For viewers, a cliché plot was acceptable; some themes never went out of style.

Just like Tan Qi’s sentiment—despite My Baby Prince having plenty of flaws worth criticizing, drama fans still found themselves unknowingly drawn into the second episode.

And then, they witnessed the introduction of the character Yu Wei.

It was a face that perfectly matched the character, one that drama fans hadn’t seen in a long time.

Melancholy seemed to come naturally to him. His gaze carried an innate fragility, and yet, the moment his eyes fell on Zhong Baobei, that fragile brokenness seemed to piece itself back together.

He had found his sun.

Some fans were aware of everything Lu Xu had experienced during his time as a member of Verse, while others were completely in the dark. But this didn’t affect their impression of Yu Wei in the drama.

[It’s hard not to be captivated by Yu Wei.]

[A good-looking actor who can’t act is nothing more than a pretty vase. But if that ‘vase’ can completely immerse you in the story, drawing you in with just his gaze, imagine how irresistibly charming he becomes.]

[That shot of Yu Wei turning around? I’ve only rewatched it ten times!]

[Yu Wei is ridiculously handsome. I’m just a sucker for good looks, and I was instantly hooked by his GIFs. Who could possibly resist such a fragile puppy-like character?!]

[At first, I thought those stills were heavily edited, but it turned out they were GIFs straight from the drama. Absolutely stunning.]

[I couldn’t sleep in the middle of the night, stumbled across some handsome stills, and decided to check out the drama. Honestly, My Baby Prince may be absurd, but it’s absurd in a way that makes me want to keep watching.]

[I’d rather watch an entertainingly absurd drama than one that’s logically coherent but mind-numbingly boring.]

Under discussions about My Baby Prince, the phrase “Lu Xu is handsome” frequently appeared.

Although Verse had a large fan base, the television audience was significantly broader. Most viewers didn’t care much about what Lu Xu had done during his time with Verse. As long as the plot and characters were engaging, that was all that mattered.

Once this group of viewers was hooked, My Baby Prince’s viewership naturally began to climb.

As the drama made its way into the top ten trending list, many marketing accounts started posting comparisons of the roles played by Lu Xu and Gu Sinian in My Baby Prince and The Watchers, respectively.

Gu Sinian portrayed a passionate youth in The Watchers. However, when placed alongside the performance of the lead actor, Yue Hui, Gu Sinian’s acting seemed overly forced.

To showcase his skills, Gu Sinian came off as stiff during calmer scenes and excessively exaggerated during emotional moments, with his features contorting unnaturally.

While Gu Sinian’s looks were decent by Verse’s standards, they were average within the broader entertainment industry. On stage, heavy makeup could compensate for his flaws, but on television, the more distorted his expressions became, the less flattering he looked. This created a disconnect between him and his character.

In contrast, though Lu Xu was labeled by Gu Sinian’s fans as playing a “dumb character” in a “dumb drama,” he fully brought Yu Wei to life.

Yu Wei was attractive, gentle, and tinged with melancholy.

It might not be entirely fair to compare characters from two different dramas, but at first glance, the more captivating one was undeniably Lu Xu.

The Watcher Production Team

Gu Sinian naturally noticed that My Baby Prince had made it into the day’s top ten viewership rankings, but he didn’t take it seriously.

Even though My Baby Prince’s viewership had exceeded 6,000, that was barely half of The Watchers’ numbers. Gu Sinian never entertained the idea that My Baby Prince could surpass The Watchers in ratings.

How could it possibly surpass?

With its painfully low-budget production, near-nonexistent promotion, and Lu Xu’s face?

If looks were all it took, Lu Xu would have been Verse’s top member long ago!

Gu Sinian was used to beating Lu Xu. While he couldn’t guarantee victory against others, Lu Xu was a former member of Verse, and Gu Sinian had plenty of experience besting him.

Still, Gu Sinian wasn’t pleased about My Baby Prince making it onto the trending list. In his mind, Lu Xu didn’t deserve to be on the same ranking chart as him.

And yet, Lu Xu’s appearance in My Baby Prince had even landed him on the trending search list!

One of the reasons Gu Sinian disliked Lu Xu was because Lu Xu was better-looking than him.

From the start, Gu Sinian hadn’t supported Lu Xu debuting as a member of Verse. Why should someone like Lu Xu, who joined halfway through, get to bask in the glory that he, Xie Qingyang, and Meng Qin had worked so hard to achieve?

It was as if all the effort Gu Sinian put in couldn’t compare to Lu Xu’s effortless charm, thanks to a handsome face.

To make matters worse, during Verse’s early days, Lu Xu’s popularity had consistently outshone the other three.

That day, Gu Sinian kept refreshing discussions related to The Watchers.

But whether it was his imagination or not, Gu Sinian couldn’t help but notice discussions about My Baby Prince popping up here and there among his fans’ comments about The Watchers.

It made him even more irritated.

The Watchers was the best project Gu Sinian had ever been offered and the top-tier opportunity Lin Ge Entertainment could currently provide to any newcomer. While outsiders claimed Gu Sinian was “favored,” only he knew how hard he had fought to secure such resources.

After all, Lin Ge Entertainment managed more than just Verse; they had other signed artists competing for the spotlight.

Gu Sinian refused to let himself fall behind Xie Qingyang and Meng Qin. As for Lu Xu—ever since Lu Xu had been kicked out of Lin Ge Entertainment, Gu Sinian had long stopped considering him a rival.

Lu Xu simply didn’t deserve it.

The promotion for The Watchers was still in full swing. With its primetime slot and a cast that included two film emperors, it was destined to be a winner.

But then…

Why had the viewership for episodes 3 and 4 of The Watchers dropped to 9,800+ the next day, while My Baby Prince had broken 7,000, reaching 7,200+?

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