These lifeless wooden puppets are in fact no less popular than any superstar. Even singing idols like Andy Lau and Jacky Chang can't compete with them!
It's a High Energy come-as-your-favorite-character party. More than 20 fans, recruited by fan club presidents, have spent from NT$6000 to NT$10,000 each for specially made wigs and costumes, turning them into their fave puppets. One, dressed like a character from the spin-off comic strip, looks exactly right, with frizzy long white hair and carrying a "sacred sword" of full-body length. It is said: "Actors are crazy, the audience is foolish." In the face of such enthusiasm among fans, Wei Pei-hsien, helmsperson of the fan clubs and also editor-in-chief of High Energy Monthly, avers: "This is because the puppet characters have struck a chord in society; they satisfy people's aspirations and compensate for something that is missing in the lives of the fans."
Fanning the flames
When you look closely, you realize that the people dressed up like their manly heroes are all young girls. Indeed, for routine club activities, more than 90% of the people who attend in person are female. Huang Chung-hua, chairman of High Energy Puppet Productions (HEPP), explains: "Although there are more boys than girls as fan club members, the girls obviously feel more strongly, and they are more effusive in their admiration of the characters." In fact, girls tend to be more devoted fans for real-life idols like pop singers as well. Chien Miao-ling, former president of the fan club for the Yi Yeshu character, suggests that girls are more willing to put their feelings into action. And with a puppet as an idol, there is no chance of being disillusioned by human failings.
"The impetus for creating the High Energy Club came entirely from the fans," notes Wei Pei-hsien. Long before the HEC was formed, HEPP received scads of letters from devoted viewers. One Su Huanzhen fan wrote every day, reminding him of various dangers, and warning him about which characters were plotting against him. When they used a different puppet for the character, she wrote in to ask Su why he had gotten so thin. One primary school teacher even wrote a missive in blood asking for a promise that the Ye Xiaochai character would never die.
Some diehard HEPP fans simply joined the firm, anticipating whole days spent in the company of their idols. Hsu Shan-chi, a puppeteer on the filming team, and staffers Wong Ching-hsia, Wu Tsai-ling, and Chen Su-leng all started out as fans or even fan club staff members. Scriptwriter Chuang Ya-ting, born in 1972, was immediately captivated when she chanced to see an episode of High Energy puppet theater during her last year at National Taiwan Normal University, a teacher's training institute. She went into teaching after graduation, as required by NTNU, which charges no tuition as long as graduates fulfill their teaching obligation. But after only two years, she decided to pay back NT$200,000-plus to compensate the university for her tuition and headed-on her own, without experience or references-to join the HEPP script team.
Sensing the enthusiasm of their fans, two years ago HEPP sent out an exploratory questionnaire through video rental shops. (This was before the High Energy cable channel was founded, when HEPP productions went straight to video.) They expected to get back about 10,000 responses, but ended up with more than 30,000. Based on this, they established the High Energy Club. The HEC now has more than 22,000 members, mostly in their 20s. Club members may also join fan clubs in southern, central, and northern Taiwan for their favorite characters.
The fan clubs, through club presidents and their staffs, organize a variety of activities-tea parties, character painting exhibitions, HEPP plot quiz games, voice imitation contests, karaoke parties using songs from HEPP soundtracks, live re-enactments of scenes from the series, and so on. During summer and winter vacations, some clubs even arrange tour busses to take the faithful to their Mecca-HEPP studios in Huwei Township in Yunlin County-to see how TV budaixi (puppet theater) is made.
Internet puppets
"Part deity, part saint, part spirit; fully Confucianist, fully versed in the Way, fully virtuous; with 10,000 great books embedded in memory; with mastery of the martial and the literary." This wildly self-laudatory "signature poem" (a poem which accompanies the arrival on the scene of a character) belongs to the incorruptible Su Huanzhen. If you can't remember the next line of Ye Xiaochai's entrance poem after "Embracing a sword, leaving love behind for a lifetime," then just check the Internet.
While a lot of young girl fans express their passion directly, plugged-in fans are more intellectual in their approach. There are in-depth reports available about plots, characters, soundtrack music, and "signature poems." Besides the site established by High Energy, there are more than 40 other websites devoted to its show, all established by fans.
Upon accessing the "Bitter Bamboo Fence" site, the heroic-looking Kuang Dao accompanies his lover Murong Chan saying: "A clear river winds past one thousand willows, it is 20 years ago on the old wooden bridge. On the bridge my lover says goodbye, my resentment lingers even to this day." The Bitter Bamboo Fence website is really a little lovenest for the star-crossed lovers Kuang Dao and Murong Chan. It includes their "signature songs," classic photos, and a segment called New High Energy History that has all the plots from the earliest to the most recent.
Moreover, through a site established by "Red Cloud" of National Chengchih University, fans can listen to their favorite soundtrack songs by request. "At first I just put 11 songs on the site for people to enjoy. I never expected that there would be 500 hits a day on the site; it's really amazing!" says Red Cloud. At present there is enough music stored so that one could listen for three days and nights without hearing a song repeated. Red Cloud also spends about two hours a day transferring the most exciting scenes from TV into the computer, then editing them to produce a new and totally unique picture each and every day. Other websites cover the evolution of the belief systems or groups (especially martial arts schools) in the series, secret weapons and their hiding places, and more. Nothing is lacking.
Highenergyology
Scholar Chiang Wu-chang, who has been researching puppet theater for many years, offers this analysis: Young people today feel a great need to express themselves. And they have the tool-the Internet-to do so. They make an issue out of everything, good and bad. Given the rich collection of complex characters in HEPP, and the plots, full of mystery and uncertainty, that encourage speculation and brainstorming, it has become a fad among university students. What's more, for jaded young "new new youth" who have tried everything, ancient things can become cutting-edge. HEPP's combination of classical type language in Taiwanese dialect with lots of jokes using vulgar slang has made it very fashionable. In many college dormitories, when budaixi comes on around noon, you can see students crowded around the TV, watching the show and analyzing the plot.
Naturally most of the discussion focuses on the characters and the plot developments. For example, Yi Yeshu, who has his fan clubs in southern, central, and northern Taiwan, was originally a bad guy. But after having magic pearls poured into his body, he became a defender of the weak. Recently the story line has been that, due to various hardships and shocks, the pearls are disintegrating, and he is returning to his evil nature. Fans have been intensively debating the plausibility and desirability of this shift in character.
After one character called Shang Jun, who was increasingly popular, died four months ago, devoted fans have not only been protesting, some have hinted darkly that infighting among the scriptwriters caused the character to be killed off, while others have constructed arguments that his death was feigned and have speculated about how he might return to the field. Wei Pei-hsien says that the fans treat the characters like flesh-and-blood people, ascribing individual personalities to the puppets, and arguing over their fates, habits, or love lives. They are meticulous about finding flaws or inconsistencies in characters' behavior or plot developments. On one occasion, fans discovered that when Ye Xiaochai was sick in bed, he still had shoes on!
To satiate the virtually archeological interest of the fans, last September HEPP produced the "Hero Battlefield" program, a quiz show about High Energy. Categories include plot, characters, martial arts techniques, geo-graphy, and history. For example: Who was the original owner of the Great Universe Sacred Temple? Where did Ageless Uncle, Jade Heaven, and Demon Ringleader meet to duel? From the number of people who have signed up and the alacrity with which contestants buzz to answer questions, it is obvious that HEPP budaixi is becoming as much an object of research and discussion as the historical martial-arts novels of Jin Yong.
No Mickey Mouse operation
At meetings of fan clubs, fans come dressed from head to toe in clothing emblazoned with the images of their favorites. They have High Energy caps (featuring 3-D puppet heads on them), Su Huanzhen sweatshirts, Ye Xiaochai backpacks, and wristwatches bearing the slogan of Heibai Langjun: "Others' failures are my happiness." At any time they may break out a pack of High Energy playing cards.
In each of the 22 High Energy specialty shops around Taiwan, there is a budaixi puppet worth well over NT$10,000. The dazzling variety of knick-knacks include pictures, stickers, piggy banks, cups, photo albums, keychains, notebooks, jigsaw puzzles, soundtrack cassettes, videotapes of plot highlights, and even reproductions of the magic sword used by Kuang Dao. HEPP character products, like those of Disney's Mickey Mouse or the Japanese cartoon figure Maruko, are marketed everywhere, and are by no means of any lesser quality or status than those of Japanese or American competitors.
Product division manager Chan Ju-ling says, "The product division was founded to make little commemorative gifts for fans. We never expected the response to be so great. Like photo albums-the first print run was for 2000 copies, and they sold out in a week. And we have to make more than 30,000 copies of each highlight video, which are available through more than 1000 video shops around Taiwan." Company head Huang Chiang-hua sees a bright future for the shops: "We can advertise for free on our channel. And by making some products that fans can actually hold and touch, we can go that much further satisfying their hero worship of the characters."
The Man Behind the Mirror?
Lin Mei-huei, who runs the High Energy Specialty Shop in Tounan Township in Yun-lin County, says that most fans are collectors, so they will buy every new product that comes into the shop. Students from Tsaotun Middle School even make collective purchases for the whole class. Lin, who also runs a video rental operation, opened her boutique (located inside the rental shop) when she discovered that not a small number of fans lined up to wait when new videos came onto the market, despite their being twice as expensive as Western or Hong Kong films.
Over HEPP's history-from a small video production operation to having its own TV station, from the High Energy Club to individual character fan clubs, from websites to specialty shops-its greatest asset, says Huang Wen-chi, has always been "the viewing audience." It is because of these enthusiastic fans that last year's promotional activities were such lively affairs.
It turns out that for all the characters-whether it be Su Huanzhen, he of great learning and martial arts skill; Ye Xiaochai, always ready to jump into a fray to help a friend; or whoever-the real "Man Behind the Mirror" enabling them to have such an impact is this group of devoted fans.
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High Energy's specialty shops sell photo albums, jigsaw puzzles, sweat shirts, cups, mini-puppets, and even magic swords, allowing devoted fans to take their favorites home with them. (photo by Pu Hua-chih)
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Enthusiastic young female fans even go so far as to lay out large sums to buy costumes to dress up as their favorite puppet characters. (photo courtesy of High Energy)
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