The “Got Talent” franchise has exploded since it was first launched in Britain in 2007, and has since spawned dozens of authorized spinoffs in other countries, including China’s Got Talent in China. The show, which aired its first episode in June, is on Dragon TV, and through a partnership with Youku, its episodes are all available in their entirety online as well.
Already, the show has produced some of the spectacular moments that have made it a sensation in other countries. In China, as elsewhere, the producers have discovered performers who are not only remarkably talented but also who have incredible backgrounds. The first episode, for example, featured a troupe of breakdancers who are also migrant workers. In real life, they told the judges, they build roads and wash cars, but on stage they were a tight-knit group of very professional looking dancers — and the crowd went nuts.
The first episode also featured a singer with dwarfism and a fat man who blew the judges away with his performance of the song “Hero”. A clip of his performance has been watched tens of thousands of times on Youku, and netizens were impressed.
“Shocking!” wrote one in the comments. “Very moving,” wrote another.
A more recent episode closed with an even more moving performance: a young man named Liu Wei had no arms, but had learned to play the piano with his feet. His performance alone would have been impressive; what really shocked the judges and the viewers alike was the man’s upbeat attitude about his disability. “There are only two roads in life,” he said. “[Give up and] die quickly, or [persevere and] live an exciting life.”
People have viewed clips from his episode a whopping 30+ million times so far on Youku, and there’s no sign of slowing. The video has attracted thousands of comments, many of them expressing support and admiration for Liu Wei. The judges loved him too, so we’ll be seeing Liu Wei again later this season, and it’s clear many of Youku’s users are hoping that he might even win the whole contest!
Until then, though, rest assured we’ll see plenty of Liu Wei outside the contest, too. He’s already been interviewed and profiled my many major media organizations, and he even gave an exclusive interview to Youku.
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