Chinese animated films unexpectedly become popular because. they're so bad

Hanoi [Vietnam], August 19: 'Niu Lai' is being hailed as a 'disaster' at the Chinese box office. The film has been criticized so harshly that it's unbelievable, prompting many curious viewers to go to theaters to check it out, thereby boosting its revenue by thousands of times.
The animated film " Niu Lai " has become a hot topic on Chinese social media for days, sparking discussions about its bizarre and terrible quality. According to SCMP , the film, released on August 5th, only grossed around 7,700 yuan (over 29 million VND) at the Chinese box office in its first 10 days. Statistics from the box office tracking platform Maoyan show that on some days the film only earned around 200 yuan, an extremely low figure during the busy summer movie season.
However, in the following days, the number of viewers going to see "Niu Lai" suddenly surged, forcing many theaters to increase screenings. AP reported that by the beginning of this week, "Niu Lai" had skyrocketed to 8.2 million yuan with nearly 300,000 viewers. This brings the film's total revenue to 17.1 million yuan (over 66 billion VND).
Reportedly, the film's "miraculous" box office success is due to audience curiosity. " Niu Lai" tells the story of a calf's coming-of-age journey, with a plot twist at the end revealing that "it was all just a dream." The film's content has been criticized as clumsy, with bizarre and crude 3D graphics and illogical voice acting. Many viewers have called it "horrific and unbelievably shocking," labeling it a box office disaster and even the worst Chinese animated film ever. Clips from the film have also gone viral on social media, with some laughing at its naivety, clumsiness, and craziness, while others express helplessness and frustration, questioning why such a low-quality film was allowed to be released.
Another humorous aspect is that some cinemas even designed their own promotional posters with simple, hand-drawn illustrations to advertise the film. In one shared "homemade poster," a calf is drawn with colorless ink, accompanied by the words: "Come see it if you like weird things" and "No refunds." This naive, bizarrely silly approach only fueled more discussion about the film, making " Niu Lai " a trending keyword on Chinese online platforms.
Many believe that the harsh, mocking comments on social media are what drew attention to "Niu Lai" and piqued people's curiosity, prompting them to buy tickets to see just how bad the film was. Some viewers even intentionally left positive comments to trick others into going to the theater and experiencing the "unbelievable" feeling of watching this film.
AP quoted Du Mingxi, a student in Shanghai, as saying: "My original intention was always to play pranks on my friends. If my friends asked me what I thought of the movie, I would say it was good and recommend they watch it." He said he successfully "persuaded" two friends to watch The Ox with him; both found it interesting, but one fell asleep during the show. Du believes that some people are simply curious, attracted by the bizarre and funny things, while many others watch the movie because they are following a trend, regardless of whether they understand the meaning behind it or not.
Source: Thanh Nein Newspaper