Chuang Asia Season 2 (2025)

One of the Better Survival Shows

When I think back to some of the controversies of past survival shows like Youth With You’s milkgate and recently Kachine’s STOP moment during Starlight Boys, I can’t help but wait to expect something to happen. Surprisingly I’m seeing a lot of talented contestants show their talents, play lots of games and have some live public shows and interviews. It does have the usual online banter and favouratism but which show doesn’t.

What I enjoy the most though is the inclusivity and safety shown towards the contestants. That’s one thing I noticed especially with the Chinese shows and how they handled inclusivity so I’m not surprised seeing them pull away from this type of show and now the number one show filled with boys in China is about farming. I have nothing against farming by the way.

One thing I am finding odd has been the dance and vocal categories. I’m a big believer in live performances that aren’t lip-synched, dance contestants here aren’t forcefully lip syncing, they are only dancing if they’re in the dance category and rightly so, but as a performer, if there are words being sung, I feel they should be sung not lip synched by the contestants if that makes sense.

Actually another oddity is the language barrier, it is shown in all it’s glory here which I think is great as it is a really noticeable disadvantage or advantage for some.

The Judges - I think I need to update this once the show has finished lol. However THE8 is phenomenal. If there was ever a judge with a poker face, it’s him. I’ve never actually heard him say anything negative that I can recall. However, when you watch him, you just expect some very harsh comment but in reality he’s extremely constructive if you listen carefully lol. What am I saying, it is harsh but not in a bad way. Oh dear I think I will need to update this later lol. Update - due to scheduling he wasn’t available for the remainder of the season but shared a recorded message in the finale.

The Finale - opening was truly amazing having past contestants be part of the history of Chuang was A+.

🌊NEXT1DE 🌊NEXT1DE 🌊NEXT1DE 🌊NEXT1DE 🌊NEXT1DE 🌊NEXT1DE

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Comparison between Tencent's Idol Survival Seasons

After viewing all seasons, I would say that this season is the most disappointing.

EP6 - How can Chuang Asia Thailand make trainees wait for their ranking under the unbearable hot sun? If you guys have travelled to Bangkok, you would know that Bangkok is 1 of the hottest city. The trainees can be seen taking off their jacket and the worst thing is the production team would still FILM them having a hard time. I feel so sad for them.

EP7 - They announced that there will be 7 groups performing but there are only 4 groups performing in Part 1. We have to wait 1 more week for Part 2 where the other 3 groups would perform. What is the production team looking for in the trainees? Talent? If so, it is unfair to the other 3 groups performing in Part 2. How do we vote based on this? By purely talents or fans favorite trainee?

Overall, I am disappointed in this season. First of all, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, each episode is 2+ hours while 2024 and 2025 is 1+ hours. I am also disappointed that this season had only 2 stage performances while the other seasons had 3 stage performances before the finals.

Anyway, this season had only 60 trainees compared to the previous season.
2018 - 101 Trainees
2019 - 100 Trainees
2020 - 101 Trainees
2021 - 90 Trainees
2024 - 70 Trainees
2025 - 60 Trainees
This means that after Tencent shifted their Idol survival show to Thailand, the trainees drop almost 30-40%. I understand that China restricted the Idol survival show and hence they move to Thailand. I hope that the next few seasons will have more trainees because I feel that with more trainees, more talents will motivate other trainees to work harder.

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