Heart Signal Season 2 (2019)

China's dating reality tv show - Highly recommended!

The only reason season 2 is a tad bit better is because they brought the 4th housemates in earlier, and they allowed the 4th woman housemate to have dinner with the 4 men, without the 3 other women. The major con for this season is the overflow of advertisement in every episode (it's way too much, and takes away from the show). Oh yeah, I liked the commentators in season 1 better, and it's probably because they were the furst commentators that we saw. I had to get used to the new commentators for season 2.

I like the Chinese version of Heart Signal much better than the Korean version. On the Korean version of Heart Signal, the commentators talk too much and for too long (most of the show, is the commentaries giving their feedback). It is one of the reasons why, although I've watched two seasons of Heart Signal Korea, I never made it to the last 4 episodes. However, with Heart Signal China, the commentary was very good (not too much, not too little). Additionally, the contestants on the show are kinder to one another, specifically the women. The men also seem more sure of what they want (I believe this is a cultural difference). Lastly, the women on the Chinese version don't do aegyo/sājiāo unless it's a joke. The only con to Chinese variety shows is the shallowness of the famous people. Mostly everything is focused on the importance of physical appearance and name brands. I hope globalization from the west (I am a westerner) didn't encourage Chinese people to be like us. SIGH!

Note: There was no acting/cast. To be honest, I probably would never rewatch a reality tv show or dating show.

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Disappointing

I watched this after having watched a couple of seasons of the original Korean version. I started with Season 2 simply because it’s much higher rated than Season 1 here on MDL. As this Chinese version follows the same general format as the original, it was impossible not to compare them.

The main positive is that I found the panel of this Chinese version much more tolerable than the Korean panel. Or at least they got less on my nerves, despite all the squealing. It helps that the panel took up a bit less screentime that could be better dedicated to the participants, though it was still too much for my tastes.

The negatives compared to the Korean version include:

1. The participants go into the house with much more competitive mindset, while not making the same effort to develop close or lasting friendships with those of their same gender the way they tend to do in the Korean version. This was particularly true of the men early on who seemed to be mostly focused one-upping each other. I’m not at all surprised that most of women immediately gravitated towards the dreamy eyed laid-back unthreatening guy who basically couldn’t care less what the other guys were up to.

2. One result of the above is that I didn’t really like many of the contestants. I took an almost immediate dislike for most of the guys (though Junjun did start growing on me). With the women it was more one of those cases where I ended up sympathizing with the underdog, only I would have picked Wen Pi right from the beginning long before it became apparent that none of the men were interested in her (which certainly didn’t improve my low opinion of the guys). Two of the other girls had that infantile overly cutesy act going that I can’t stand but I guess must be popular among at least some Chinese men. I wonder if this is a cultural thing as none of the women in the Korean reality shows I watched even came close to that extreme and the two women from the Japanese Terrace House I can remember trying to put on that act eventually got found out and ridiculed, even though they didn't act nearly as extreme as these two on this show.

3. The method for selecting the final critical dates seems almost purposefully designed to discourage any couples that were beginning to be formed up to that point. I can see the value of pushing participants into dating different people, but that should come earlier in the season. If the producers were really interested in romantic outcomes, then they should allow the participants to select their own final dates. If not, you end up with a bunch of final climatic dates in which most are disappointed either by who they were forced to date or by the lack of romantic interest from their date (but kudos to the participants for at least attempting to fake enthusiasm). The fact that one of the couples might still be together doesn't really change my opinion.

4. The product placement is ridiculously over the top, to the point it was distracting. Featuring the participants in ads throughout the season may have at least earned them some additional income (one hopes), but it wasn’t always even clear what was an ad and what was supposed to be part of the action (assuming there was any difference to begin with). I’ve gotten used to a certain amount of product placement in k-dramas and c-dramas, but this went way beyond anything I’ve seen before.

I’m not sure I’ll watch any more Heart Signal seasons (either Korean or Chinese) as this simply isn’t my favorite format for this genre. I’m finding I much prefer the approach taken by the Korean “EXchange” and “My Sibling’s Romance” series. And my two favorite Asian dating shows continue to be the Netflix one-off “Nineteen to Twenty” and “Offline Love”.

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