World

China to mark Year of the Pig with 'Peppa Pig' movie

Agence France-Presse

December 31, 2018 | 8:59am

China to mark Year of the Pig with 'Peppa Pig' movie

Children books of British animated series Peppa Pig are for sale at a supermarket in Zhengzhou city, central China's Henan province, 9 July 2018. British Peppa Pig, who now serves as a subculture icon in China. The cartoon pig, who was introduced in China in 2015, has become a huge hit among the Chinese public thanks to her frequent presence on video sharing and social media platforms. At time of press, Peppa has attracted over 45 billion views on Chinese video platforms, garnering over 320 million hits on China’s Twitter-like microblog. Such great popularity may have also led to the pink piggy’s own downfall. According to media reports, user-produced content based on Peppa Pig has been removed from popular short-video platform Douyin in May due to certain “gangster adaptations” that disrupt “social harmony”. Though Douyin later denounced the rumors, a large number of Peppa videos still cannot be accessed as of press time.

Zuo dongchen / Imaginechina

BEIJING, China — China is set to mark the Year of the Pig with a film starring "Peppa Pig," despite a backlash against the popular British cartoon character earlier this year.

A government document listing upcoming movie projects shows a new film in the works titled "Peppa Pig Celebrates Chinese New Year" to be released in February 2019 during the Lunar New Year holiday.

The film includes Chinese New Year customs such as a dragon parade and fireworks, state-run China Daily reported.

It is co-developed by Alibaba Pictures -- part of the vast Alibaba technology group -- and Canadian media company Entertainment One, which currently produces the series for the BBC.

The film includes the entire "Peppa Pig" cast and two new characters named "Jiaozi" or dumpling and "Tang yuan" or glutinous rice ball -- two popular Chinese New Year items.

The series, introduced in the mid-2000s in China, has become extremely popular through episodes dubbed into Mandarin.

The fervour intensified at the end of 2017 among a young adult audience. Many internet users including stars sported temporary "Peppa Pig" tattoos in selfies, and cups, watches and clothes appeared bearing the image of the heroine.

But several media outlets affiliated to the Communist Party lampooned the series earlier this year, saying the playful pink pig had become a "subversive" icon for slackers and anti-social youth in China.

People who upload videos of Peppa Pig tattoos and merchandise and make Peppa-related jokes "run counter to the mainstream value and are usually poorly educated with no stable job," state-run Global Times said in May.

"They are unruly slackers roaming around and the antithesis of the young generation the (Communist) party tries to cultivate."

Some online memes featuring the beloved children's character also took on dark undertones, occasionally veering into violent or pornographic territory. Pornography is illegal in China and laws banning it are strictly enforced.

The state media backlash led to a Chinese internet platform giving "Peppa Pig" the chop in May although there was no official ban enforced by censors.

At least 30,000 clips of the British cartoon were removed from the popular Douyin video-sharing platform, while the #PeppaPig hashtag was banned from the site.