''Super Boy'' or ''Happy Boy'' (; literally "Happy Boys") was a Chinese singing contest for male contestants. It was organized by

Hunan Satellite Television Hunan Television or Hunan TV () is a provincial satellite TV station officially launched on 29 September 1970 and is currently China's second-most-watched channel, second only to CCTV-1, owned by China Central Television, although Hunan STV occasio ...

in 2007, as a spin-off of its popular '' Super Girl'' series. It's a talent show which aims at uncovering talented tomorrow new male stars.

Outline

Partly inspired by the many spinoffs of the UK show ''

Pop Idol ''Pop Idol'' is a British music competition television series created by Simon Fuller which ran on ITV from 2001 to 2003. The aim of the show was to decide the best new young pop singer (or "pop idol") in the UK based on viewer voting and par ...

'', the competition was open to any male contestant regardless of his origin, appearance, or how he sings. The restricted

audition An audition is a sample performance by an actor, singer, musician, dancer or other performer. It typically involves the performer displaying their talent through a previously memorized and rehearsed solo piece or by performing a work or piece giv ...

sessions drew contestants over the age of 18. Many applicants travelled long distances to take part in the competition hoping to become the next pop star in China and elsewhere. Following the selection of contestants in the six regions, the competition began with the preliminary rounds. Preliminaries were held in each of the six locations where auditions were located. Television viewers were able to watch each of the preliminaries and vote for their favorite singers. Voting was conducted by

telephone A telephone is a telecommunications device that permits two or more users to conduct a conversation when they are too far apart to be easily heard directly. A telephone converts sound, typically and most efficiently the human voice, into e ...

and

text messaging Text messaging, or texting, is the act of composing and sending electronic messages, typically consisting of alphabetic and numeric characters, between two or more users of mobile devices, desktops/laptops, or another type of compatible compute ...

. The regional preliminaries are followed by a weekly broadcast

knockout competition A single-elimination, knockout, or sudden death tournament is a type of elimination tournament where the loser of each match-up is immediately eliminated from the tournament. Each winner will play another in the next round, until the final matc ...

held in

Changsha Changsha (; ; ; Changshanese pronunciation: (), Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is the capital and the largest city of Hunan Province of China. Changsha is the 17th most populous city in China with a population of over 10 million, an ...

Hunan Hunan (, ; ) is a landlocked province of the People's Republic of China, part of the South Central China region. Located in the middle reaches of the Yangtze watershed, it borders the province-level divisions of Hubei to the north, Jiangxi to ...

province. Viewers call in to vote for their favourite singers, and the weakest two—as voted by the judges and the audience's weekly

SMS Short Message/Messaging Service, commonly abbreviated as SMS, is a text messaging service component of most telephone, Internet and mobile device systems. It uses standardized communication protocols that let mobile devices exchange short text ...

— face-off subsequently in a ''PK'', short for ''Player Kill''. The term is derived from kill-or-be-killed multiplayer

online game An online game is a video game that is either partially or primarily played through the Internet or any other computer network available. Online games are ubiquitous on modern gaming platforms, including PC game, PCs, Console game, consoles and ...

s. The singer with the fewest votes is then eliminated. Unlike ''Pop Idol'', the last event is contested between the final three, rather than the final two contestants. Unlike ''

American Idol ''American Idol'' is an American singing competition television series created by Simon Fuller, produced by Fremantle North America and 19 Entertainment, and distributed by Fremantle North America. It aired on Fox from June 11, 2002, to Ap ...

'', judges for the competition were selected from different backgrounds in society. A few dozen "audience judges" were selected in addition to several professional judges.

Democratic expression

One of the main factors contributing to the show's popularity was that viewers are able to participate in the judging process by sending

text messages Text messaging, or texting, is the act of composing and sending electronic messages, typically consisting of alphabetic and numeric characters, between two or more users of mobile devices, desktops/laptops, or another type of compatible compute ...

with their

mobile phone A mobile phone, cellular phone, cell phone, cellphone, handphone, hand phone or pocket phone, sometimes shortened to simply mobile, cell, or just phone, is a portable telephone that can make and receive calls over a radio frequency link whil ...

s to vote for their favorite contestants. This was, according to Jim Yardley of

International Herald Tribune The ''International Herald Tribune'' (''IHT'') was a daily English-language newspaper published in Paris, France for international English-speaking readers. It had the aim of becoming "the world's first global newspaper" and could fairly be said ...

, considered as one of the largest "democratic" voting exercises in mainland China.

Reaction

The contest selected many stars like

Chen Chusheng Chen Chusheng (born July 25, 1981) is a Chinese singer. Early life Chen was born in Sanya, Hainan. His family is originally from Puning, Guangdong. Since childhood, he has developed interests in the guitar and singing. He is also good at "bo ...

Jason Zhang Zhang Jie (born 20 December 1982 in Chengdu, Sichuan), also known as Jason Zhang, is a Chinese pop singer. He made his television series debut in the reality singing competition ''My Show'' in 2004, which he won. By the end of May 2017, Zhang ha ...

, Chen Xiang,

Vision Wei Wei Chen () (born February 22, 1986) is a Chinese pop singer and actor, who rose to fame through televised singing competition '' Super Boy''. He is probably best known through his album ''Disparate'' and his role as Ye Shuo in television serie ...

Hua Chenyu Hua Chenyu (born on February 7, 1990, in Hubei province , China) is a Chinese Pop singer and songwriter. He gained widespread recognition for his music talent, strong vocal ability and stage performance after participating in '' Singer 2018. O ...

and so on. It gives the young boys, who love music, the way to achieve dreams. But it also caused some criticism. Some people think it contributes to the atmosphere of daydream of becoming stars. Many young people change their attention from study to music and singing, without considering whether they have this gift. In sum, it once became a fashion.

Season summary

2007 season

The first season of ''Super Boy'' aired from May 25 to July 20, 2007. Although the winners of the competition were not promised recording contracts, the top three winners signed such deals.

Qualifications

Final contest

: Champion : Challenges succeed to switch rank : Eliminated

Final Contestants

(陈楚生) - Champion *

Su Xing Su Xing (; Allen Su; born March 5, 1984) is a Chinese singer, songwriter and actor. He took the 2nd place in the 2007 Super Boy 快乐男声contest, which was a national singing contest for young male contestants held by Hunan Satellite Televis ...

(苏醒) - 2nd place *

(魏晨) - 3rd place *

(张杰) - 4th place * Ji Jie (吉杰) - 5th place *

Yu Haoming Ham Yu Haoming (born 14 November 1987) is a Chinese singer, actor, dancer, and host. He was born in Guangzhou, the largest city of Guangdong province. In April 2007, he participated in Hunan TV's ''Super Boy'' and won 6th place nationwide, lau ...

(俞灏明) - 6th place * Wang Yuexin (王栎鑫) - 7th place *

Amguulan Amguulan ( 阿穆隆) (born August 30, 1984), commonly known as Amulong or Amu, is a Chinese singer and songwriter of Mongolian descent. He competed in the 2007 edition of the singing competition show '' Super Boy'' on Hunan Television. Filmo ...

(阿穆隆) - 8th place * Zhang Yuan (张远) - 9th place * Wang Zhenglian (王铮亮) - 10th place * Yao Zhen (姚政) - 11th place * Guo Biao (郭彪) - 12 place * Lu Hu (陆虎) - 13th place

2010 season

: Champion : Weekly cover boy : Eliminated : Special contestants

Final contestants

* 06. Well Li Wei (李炜) -

Fuzhou Fuzhou (; , Fuzhounese: Hokchew, ''Hók-ciŭ''), alternately romanized as Foochow, is the capital and one of the largest cities in Fujian province, China. Along with the many counties of Ningde, those of Fuzhou are considered to constitute t ...

Area - 1st place - Champion * 09. Liu Xin (刘心) -

Area - 2nd place * 02. Philip uyi(武艺) -

Area - 3rd place * 11. Jaki Tan Jiexi (谭杰希) -

Guangzhou Guangzhou (, ; ; or ; ), also known as Canton () and alternatively romanized as Kwongchow or Kwangchow, is the capital and largest city of Guangdong province in southern China. Located on the Pearl River about north-northwest of Hong Kon ...

Area - 4th place * 12. Chen Xiang (陈翔) -

Chengdu Chengdu (, ; Simplified Chinese characters, simplified Chinese: 成都; pinyin: ''Chéngdū''; Sichuanese dialects, Sichuanese pronunciation: , Standard Chinese pronunciation: ), Chinese postal romanization, alternatively Romanization of Chi ...

Area - 5th place * 04. Li Hangliang (李行亮) -

Area - 6th place * 03. King Wang Ye (王野) -

Shenyang Shenyang (, ; ; Mandarin pronunciation: ), formerly known as Fengtian () or by its Manchu language, Manchu name Mukden, is a major China, Chinese sub-provincial city and the List of capitals in China#Province capitals, provincial capital of Lia ...

Area - 7th place * 13. 8090 - Kuai Le Tian Tuan - 8th place * 10. Zhang Jianbo (张建波) -

Hefei Hefei (; ) is the capital and largest city of Anhui Province, People's Republic of China. A prefecture-level city, it is the political, economic, and cultural center of Anhui. Its population was 9,369,881 as of the 2020 census and its built-up ( ...

Area - 8th place * 07. Wu Junyu (吴俊余) -

Area - 9th place * 05. Umut 玉米提·帕日哈提 -

Area - 10th place * 01. Delay -

Area - 11th place * 08. Zhao Fan (赵帆) -

Area - 12 place

References

External links

Hunan TV 2007 ''Super Boy'' official site
{{DEFAULTSORT:Super Boy (Contest) Singing talent shows Chinese music television series Mandopop 2007 Chinese television series debuts 2010 Chinese television series endings Chinese television shows Mandarin-language television shows Hunan Television original programming