VBS.tv is running an 8 part interview/tour with former Super Girl contestant, Yang Lei. VBS went to Shanghai, China to meet Yang in order to learn about the phenomenon that was the Super Girl, and ends up learning lot about current day China.

Super Girl is the Chinese equivalent to American Idol or the UK’s Pop Idol, only it’s limited to female contestants. The final episode of the last edition had an audience of over 420 million people, making it the biggest TV show in the history of TV. Over 1.2 billion votes were cast during the last edition of the Super Girl competition, making it also the biggest exercise in democracy in China’s history.

During the show contestants compete and campaign to move forward in the competition and the audience gets to “choose” or “select” (they’re not allowed to use the term “vote”) their favorite contestants. After the large response to the ability to vote, the Chinese government banned the show from continuing to a fourth season.

The above is Part 1 of the series. You can view the other parts here.