the final episode of the 2005 season was one of the most popular shows in chinese broadcast history, drawing more than 400,000,000 viewers, more than cctv's new year's gala earlier that year. the final peaked at 280,000,000 viewers at a given time, higher than the 12,000,000-viewer figure for the finals of "pop idol". despite the show being condemned by cctv as being "vulgar and manipulative", season 3 of the show was launched and finished in early october 2006.