I'm Really a Superstar

Adding in the accompanying music.

Working on the post-production.

The production phase was complete.

The show was sent in for review.

The show was approved.

Arrangements for the programming lineup were cleared.

...

About two weeks later.

December 10th, Friday.

It was a hubbub this morning at Central TV Department 14. The program team staff of A Bite of China arrived early today at just past 7 AM. Yan Tianfei was angered, Director Zhang was angered. On the issue of the heads of Central TV Department 1 and Central TV, the group of staff members were also angered. If there was no funding to carry out a mass promotional campaign? Then they would double as the shill army themselves. With the aid of Weibo, they promoted A Bite of China everywhere. Even though it was to little effect, even though they did not have much success, nobody could give up doing whatever they could. Because it was already the last day before the program was broadcast, there were only 12 hours until the official premiere of their documentary!

"Let's make another round on Weibo!"

"Coming, coming!"

"Director Zhang's fans are amazingly supportive! They've helped forward so many for our posts!"

"Which is the highest rated documentary by viewership that our department is broadcasting currently? Quickly seek Director Yan's help to add a few more advertisements at those time slots. There isn't much time left!"

"None of them have a good viewership rating at all!"

"Of the documentaries that are broadcasting now, the highest viewership rating is only 0.062%. We've already been airing more than a dozen rounds of advertisements for A Bite of China in the past few days at that time slot, so it has seriously oversaturated that show. There's no meaning to show the ads anymore. That documentary basically does not have many viewers to begin with anyway, so the ads have already reached maximum effect."

"What about the newspaper firms?"

"My old classmate works at a newspaper firm and I managed to get her to add in an article yesterday after much persuasion. The other newspaper and media outlets are all mainly focusing on Rise to the Dance, since we did not pay any money and ours is only a documentary. They weren't willing to give us any coverage at all. Even in the minority of the news drafts that were just submitted, they only mentioned our documentary because of Director Zhang or because of the Rotten Fruit poem from that day."

"We have done everything that we can!"

"Hai, we'll just have to leave it to fate now!"

Ha Qiqi, Zhang Zuo, and the others had already tried their best. This absolute disadvantage was impossible to reverse with just them alone. Without money, no topicality, and no selling point, how could they possibly do any promotions?

"Where's Director Zhang?" Little Zhang suddenly asked.

Wu Yi turned and looked around. "I don't know."

Ha Qiqi also found it rather strange. "Yeah, why didn't I see Director Zhang today?"

It wasn't until 9 AM, which was also Central TV's normal working hours, that Zhang Ye leisurely strolled into the office. The first thing he saw when he came in was the bustling scene of all the program team staff gathered together. Zhang Ye was stunned by this and simply raised his hand to greet everyone. "Whoa, all of you are here already? This early in the morning?"

Tong Fu nearly fainted at that. "It's A Bite of China's premiere today!"

Huang Dandan also said in a speechless manner, "It's the day of our documentary's broadcast!"

"I know that." Zhang Ye said, "But aren't we already done with the production? The footage was also checked before we submitted it, so aren't we just waiting for it to get broadcast?"

Zhang Zuo was taken aback by his attitude. "Aren't you nervous about it?"

Zhang Ye laughed. "What's there to be nervous about? We have already done all that we could, so let's just wait for the broadcast."

Everyone didn't know how to react as they thought of the saying, "The eunuchs are more anxious than the emperor himself!"

Actually, what they did not understand was that whenever Zhang was needed, he had never dropped the ball before. He was always the first to get to work and would not bat an eyelid even if he had to pull an all-nighter to complete his work. However, once he finished everything, Zhang Ye would not worry about unnecessary things, just like the situation now. They had no money to compete with Rise to the Dance by placing advertisements on high cost platforms like the various online video hosting sites and Central TV Department 1, so posting on Weibo and various forums wouldn't make much of a difference for the show and would have an almost negligible effect. At a time like this, the best option was to just rest. After all, they should be striking a proper balance between work and rest.

Moreover, Zhang Ye had confidence in A Bite of China. Compared to the promotions for first season of A Bite of China back in his previous world, the promotions and topicality of their version was already many times more than the original version!

Did the original A Bite of China do any promotions?

Actually they did, but there was almost no one who paid any attention to them!

Zhang Ye could still remember when he first started watching A Bite of China. It was already near the end of the first season. It was only then that he learned of this show, after he went online to look it up when a classmate told him about it. He spent the entire day watching it in astonishment, but did not contribute to the viewership ratings of the show as he did not know about this documentary at all before that. It was the same for many of the other viewers who also found out about it at a later time. That was what contributed to the great difference in viewership ratings between the first and second seasons of A Bite of China.

Therefore, he wasn't dissatisfied with the current situation that they were in. In this current world, regardless of whether anyone would watch the documentary or not, at least a lot of people already knew about this show called A Bite of China. They knew that A Bite of China would go up against the certainly popular large-scale talent show called Rise to the Dance during the same time slot, so wasn't that enough? Actually, it was already good enough!

"Everyone has worked hard during this period of time." Zhang Ye looked gratefully at everyone. "I saw everyone's efforts. Also, thank all of you for putting your trust in me. Why don't we knock off earlier today? You can leave in a while, or if you prefer, in the afternoon. Just look for Little Wang to let her know when you're leaving. I will approve this. It won't be considered as skipping work, hur hur."

Zhang Zuo wiped his sweat away and said, "Director Zhang, why would we want to knock off earlier!?"

Wu Yi said, "Yeah, the broadcast is scheduled for today! A lot of people are waiting for us to make a fool of ourselves!"

"At such a time, who would still be thinking about resting?" Ha Qiqi also forced a wry smile. "You may be gracious, but we're not. Did you not see? The fans of Rise to the Dance and Chen Ye have been bombarding us in many waves for the past few days! They basically do not have us in their sights at all. Even the staff of Central TV are discussing us in whispers. When Old Wu and I went upstairs yesterday, everyone else in the elevator were giving us strange looks!"

An old employee who was very well-informed said, "I heard that during a station meeting yesterday, one of the deputy station heads who was in charge of Central TV Department 1 even made a joke about our A Bite of China's program team!"

Tong Fu said exasperated, "I think I will stay here and clock some overtime today. I'll just go home later."

"Count me in." His girlfriend, Huang Dandan said, "If I don't see our documentary safely get broadcast, I won't be able to stop worrying. Anyway, the broadcast will end at around 9 PM, so I don't mind waiting!"

"We should definitely stay for overtime!"

"We're already at the last critical juncture!"

Seeing how everyone had expressed their stance, Zhang Ye was helpless to do anything about it. He knew that the attitude of Central TV Department 1 and some of the station heads had angered everyone here badly!

Alright then.

Overtime it is.

Ring ring ring. His cell phone rang.

When he saw that it was from Fan Wenli, Zhang Ye went back into his own office before answering: "Sister Fan?"

"I saw you just now when you were outside. Did you just reach the office?" Fan Wenli said.

Zhang Ye replied: "Yeah, I've just reached the office. You're at Central TV?"

Fan Wenli stated: "I came here for some business today, but because Director Xu and Chen Ye were with me earlier, I did not say hi to you." After a pause, she continued: "Rise to the Dance finished recording its fourth episode. The show's content is quite rich and I find it to be rather good as well. But compared to The Voice, it might not be that exciting since dance is not as mainstream as singing and not everyone knows how to appreciate it as well. When those internal people at Central TV Department 1 kept talking about how they would surpass The Voice, I was really questioning in my mind if they knew anything at all. However, I cannot deny that this is still a rather good talent show. What's more, with such strong promotions for the show, it might not be impossible that they could really match The Voice."

Zhang Ye understood that Old Fan was giving him some inside news. "Oh, I see."

Fan Wenli asked: "How about your side? How is it going at your side?"

Zhang Ye laughed lightly. "We finished the production long ago, so we're only waiting for the broadcast now. I can't say for sure how it'll do, but we'll know after it has been broadcast."

"Do you think you can win an award for it?" Fan Wenli asked.

"Why are all my friends asking me if I have the confidence to win the most prestigious award in the documentary genre these days when they call?" Zhang Ye returned.

Fan Wenli responded: "That's because we're confident in you. Although this is your first time directing a documentary, but with your capabilities, it's not impossible for you to win an award."

Zhang Ye laughed and said: "Why isn't anyone asking me about my opinion on the viewership rating?"

"Viewership rating?" Fan Wenli said with a start. "Because to us, the furthest a documentary can go is win a domestic documentary award. What do viewership ratings have to do with documentaries?"

Zhang Ye only chuckled at that and did not say anything more.

...

Central TV Department 1.

The entire Rise to the Dance program team was busy preparing for the final phase!

Xu Yipeng shouted, "Counting down to the last 10 hours!"

Chen Ye said, "Everyone, chin up and let's finish the last of the promotional activities! Today is the most important day, so everyone has to put in some overtime. Director Xu and I will buy everyone supper tonight!"

Xu Yipeng added, "Pick a place that you all like!"

Everyone cheered at that!

"Great!"

"Thank you, bosses!"

"I'll be finishing up my work here very soon!"

"Can we have western food? Heehee!"

Although they were busy, it was also a joyful and relaxing atmosphere that everyone was working in. All the people of the program team had an unprecedented look of anticipation on their faces, and at the same time, an unparalleled confidence!

Viewership ratings champion of the same time period?

Nationwide viewership ratings champion for variety shows?

It had never crossed their minds that they would not get these honors, because to them, these were already in the bag. With such a huge investment, with such an astronomical title sponsorship fee, with those big shot guest coaches, with such a popular platform, and with such heavy promotions, there was no reason why they would not get the viewership ratings top spot! The only thing on their minds right now was whether they could surpass The Voice, whether they could rewrite history!

Only two people in the program team were feeling rather unsure of all that!

The two were the rookies who had been snatched to Central TV Department 1 from Department 14, who also happened to be the immediate juniors of Zhang Ye at Media College!

The rookie with the broader face whispered, "Aren't they all being too optimistic?"

The other person gave a wry smile and said, "Yeah, I don't think that it's going to be this simple either."

The broad-faced person asked, "Why do you feel that way?"

"There's no reason." That person said, "It's just because he's Zhang Ye!"

Yes, from the point of a given name, Zhang Ye was actually a very ordinary name. There were at least 80-100,000 others named Zhang Ye in the entire country. But in the entertainment circle, this name was not ordinary at all. It could be said that this name represented a legend, a legend who no one dared to ignore!