I don't know what it is that makes these shows more entertaining than the similar crap on TV here. Maybe it's just that I can't understand them. But somehow I think that "Fear Factor" with the sound down would still just be fratboys eating bugs.
Don't hit stop on this homoriffic dance routine before the boys show up. Also here's a fire-breathing fat man doing some candyraver happy-hardcore bullshit, and for some American horror, please enjoy some Hoff and a furry stripper.
Comment below with links to more videos of absurd Japanese game shows. My scarred inner child thanks you in advance.
Furrylympics
Not a game show, but unmissable: Arnold Schwarzenegger exploding out of a girl's head
Holy crap... that second link is nightmare inducing!
I suddenly feel the need to consume several bottles of unknown energy drink to stave off the nightmares.
RATS I'M DEFEATED BY THEIR GENIUS MARKETING!
That stuff has nicotine in it. It's a heck of an energy drink.
Yeah, um, whiskey tango foxtrot?
I dubbed them 'meat visors' since the meat didn't cover the top of the head.
I wonder what cut you'd need to have a full-coverage meat hat.
These folks can probably tell you.
I see occasional bits of google video'd Japanese weirdness floating out of my cutup generator but trying to watch it live on television here is just too depressing with my mediocre Japanese! Did anyone tape, what I think was the "God of Entertainment" guys on New Years Day taking turns eating the dumplings full of wasabi, cockroaches, dry flour, etc etc until one of them found the one full of Anko? I could do with seeing that again.
Y'know, for as crap as Japanese tv can be, the one thing I can never find torrents or video of is the actually entertaining stuff! I love God of Entertainment, but no one seems to put it up on the web, same with the Kasou Grand Prix (the costume/skit contest known for the "Matrix ping pong" video) and some of the other random weird crap you can find on any given weeknight. Apparently if it's not Morning Musume or SMAP, no one wants to be bothered. Tragic.
May already be passe'. Unfortunately, I can't find the one where Hard Gay is humping the back of the salariman's head.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2109163819240567189&q=hard+gay
Truly Little Britain has jumped its shark.
I do believe the one you're looking for is "Yahoo! Goes Hard Gay":
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2644445570646904549&q=hard+gay
There is of course watching The Ring, two clips with drinking alcohol and screaming, a trip through a horror house (that's not as cool as you'd hope), fun in amusement parks (the second one followed by "electrocution"), fun with roosters and a magic trick
Wow, those were about as entertaining as watching a teenager's home movies (aka "the rest of video.google.com"). Bring back the lizard.
So very 80's.
Don't hassel the hoff ;-)
... wtf is wrong with japan?
I think they're doing it on purpose. Their TV exec just sit around thinking about ways to freak out the rest of the world.
Japan's television is five years ahead of the U.S. They were doing "reality TV" five years ago.
Remember, you heard it from me first.
Just to let you know... the girls in the first two clips (Morning Musume) are a sing&dance crew. Sort of... Japanese Menudo, but instead of kicking members out and ending their lives/careers, members "graduate" onto solo careers...
It's a genius enterprise they have going.
Among the other COPIOUS amounts of TV coverage these girls get they has this segment where another girl in a different group (Ayaka Kimura of Coconuts Musume is Hawaiian which goes some distance to explain why her English is so clear) on the same label teaches them phrases in English. Some of them are really hilarious. There's something like 170 different lessons if you want to look for them, but here's two.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3770371647836016102
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=378000844538085641
I would have a lot more to say... but really nobody cares but me.
... a pop idol incubator. Genius.
This still doesn't explain the apparent national obsession with torturing members of Morning Musume.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-8663630273311292125
That explains their obsession. After watching that fragment of torture, I certainly want to torture them... or rather, watch them being tortured on national TV.
If reducing Teenagers to tears on TV isn't a worthwhile national obsession... nothing is. At least it's a damn sight better than the Japanese relationship with Baseball.
Why do it? Because they're there... they're good sports... and their contract probably requires it. It's another work of genius to torture these girls. Their fans love it (because it's them). Their haters love it because its torture (except the segment that hates them because they're omnipresent). I think Tsunku (Their producer/writer/etc) may be one of the savviest men in modern media.
OK, you got me there.
Makes "Punk'd" look crappy by comparison.
What's the best approach? Torturing idoru bands on TV for the amusement of the audience -- Or the UK, where we took the Spice Girls seriously (at least we never fed them to enough polar bears). Now one thinks they're Madeleine Albright in Union Jack knickers and the other is a stick who thinks they're Audrey Hepburn.
tough call...
On one hand... with the British system, you get to laugh and guffaw at "where are they now" shows, when after the people inevitably collapse and suddenly become aware of their own irrelevance, they turn into miserable husks of humanity. And really, TV would be worthless without shadenfreude.
On the other hand... with the Japanese system, the constant torment and torture means that the very young stars can look forward to futures as productive, irrelevant, normal people. They surely are made aware that they're just kind of... media toys. In interviews a lot of the MoMusu girls have said that in 20 years they'll be normal again, with a family and kids. Do you think Tom Cruise could imagine using the word "normal" for himself after making Cocktail? What about now?
Somehow, the Japanese system does seem more humane. Which is ironic, because it's humane-ness is caused by overt, highly public torture and embarassment. Which group of young stars is living in a dream? The ones getting chased around by Bob Sapp and dancing in toilet stalls (the PMV that the homorific man-dance above is spoofing)... or the ones being told that they're the best thing that ever happened to modern media?
I found Nono's surprise dance lesson very funny. I thought I would be the only one.
Have you seen Surprise Dancing Lesson part 1 (the video you linked was the second one)? Really just more of the same, but I'm not hating that. Part 1 also clips the previous English Lesson where Nozomi promises to surprise Ayaka with a dance-lesson...
http://www.yourfilehost.com/media.php?cat=video&file=06010103_ffactorjp.wmv
Japanese girls vs eels, then one poor (lucky?) naked Japanese girl vs pigs. Looks like it's on Morning Misume, too.
I'm pretty sure this is an ad for porn, sadly. Google "soft on demand", which was in the background at one point.
That it may be, but the little piggie shoes were all kinds of awesome. PIGGIE SHOES!
I must admit, the piggie shoes rocked.
Hell of a link nonetheless.
I was under the impression Para Para was dead....apparently not.. Japanese line dancing...oigh...I thought this was dumb when I first saw it a Anime Expo a few years back... I still think it is dumb now.
TIll anon, DP
Dear JWZ people,
please stop exploring the internet's sexuality, It really freaks us out.
signed,
the people who noticed the sex-toy gladiator match involving a 7-pound dildo and didn't mention it.
Wow, it's kinda like Blood of Heroes, but in a high school yard.
"Okay, it's by the same screenwriter as did Blade Runner, right?"
"Right."
"and it's got Rutgur Howard too!"
"Really? That sounds cool."
"Now get this, it's like Mad Max, but instead of cars, it's about football, and instead of football, it's about dog skulls."
"What? You expect me to watch this?"
"It's awesome."
not clicking
it's really just 2 teenage boys dressed up like gladiators hitting each other. well, except that one of them has fashioned a sword from a big rubber dildo.
not a game show.. but.. still disturbing japan-engrish translations of "porn book speak"
http://www.harmful.org/homedespot/newtdr/NEWtdrARCHIVE/6diary/sexbook2/1.html
who can forget yatta
and Japanese Spiderman
You are by far the coolest person on LJ.
The "Giant Black Man" is Pro Wrestler and K-1 fighter Bob Sapp.
He's pretty popular in Japan for his goofy ways and such. Not much of a fighter though...
this is old news, and not a game show, but tokyo breakfast never stops being an uncomfortably hilarious freakshow.
"Morning Musume all have meat strapped to their heads! It really feels like Christmas now!"
One of my favorites is this one where various Japanese girls slap each other.
chichiren
(or, mplayer -dumpstream -dumpfile chichiren.wmv -playlist http://61.193.185.133/tma/yokoku/chichiren.wmv)
Haw haw, their culture is different.
Dude, this goes so far beyond "A different culture."
A different culture is "Wow, they wear red at a wedding"
Putting a meat hat on a pop singer, then siccing a komodo dragon on her ass is a kind of screwed up that we can't approach as just a basic cultural difference.
I've begun compiling a list of Japanese WTF.
Natch, it's not entirely work-safe.
Clicky
Japanese Up-skirt footage taken by a guy who strapped a camera to a cyooty-wooty widdle doggie's collar. kawaii!
How come nobody mentioned Shingo Mama no oHa?
Someone on my friends page linked to this a long time ago. Everyone is happy to link to the weird and prurient Japanese videos but what about the up-tempo, happy, cross-dressing, uniformed fun fests?
Now, I know the cynics on JWZ's list won't buy my assertion that our culture would be well served by an injection of Japanese cuteness and levity, but I ask you all to ponder one simple question: could American television ever come up with something this frivolous?
The answer is "no" and the reason is that despite our insistance that we have liberated ourselves, the Puritans and Calvanists still have us by the balls.
you don't need to go as far as Japan for scarring cultural material.
There is a lot more American Game Show entertainment that goes with that Furry Stripper mentioned above. Its from This or That! Americas Favorite Burlesque Game Show:
http://thisorthat-video.blogspot.com
Have you seen japanese girls breastfeeding a cat?