So, I've been laid up with a cold all weekend, so I am sorry I wasn't able to get you your weekly dose of Gaki on Sunday, like I usually do. But, I managed to fight through the medication-induced mental fog and subtitle a small portion of an episode. I'm glad it's so short, since you'd probably still be waiting on it if it wasn't. I plan to cover the talk portion of this episode later. Just not now. My head hurts.
Being so sick, I'm not going to talk much. I'm just going to put the video after the jump and let you enjoy it.
So, the first five gags are pretty self-explanatory. They are:
1) Nipple shirt
2) Monkey dance
3) Tranny hair-check
4) Superhero Hustle
5) Shake the pudding
The sixth one is a streak of impressions. The first impression he does is of impressionist Hori. Nakamura does a great impression of a great impressionist. Does that mean that by transitive property Nakamura is a great impressionist? Okay, I realize that I'm sick. I'll stop trying to be funny now. *sigh*
And if you've been following along, you'll notice that despite Shichihenge meaning "SEVEN apparitions", we only get to see 6, just like with Yamazaki. It makes you wonder juat what that last gag was. It looks like it was in the beginning half, because Hamada said he had 4 left after the second one. Maybe that was Hamada's way of saying that he can't stand 5 more, so he limits him to 4?
I'm going to hold off on rating this episode, because the opener was somewhat boring, but the talk segment is very funny. We get to see Hamada joke it up a bit and be the one telling the funny story. I'll put it up later. Wish me well. *sneeze sniffle sniffle*
Read more!
Showing posts with label Shichihenge. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Shichihenge. Show all posts
Monday, May 18, 2009
Sunday, April 19, 2009
Tetsuo's Shichihenge
Original Airdate: 2/8/2009
I've taken a break from reviewing the older episodes to do sometime more recent. I figured that I might as well watch and review videos at the same time to save myself some effort. Makes sense, right? I'm also trying out the YouTube thing, and embedding it here. So, try to check out my channel and all that.
Today’s challenger will be the Tetsuo from the comedy group “Waraimeshi”. If you watch Gaki often, you’ll recognize them as the group that’s always putting on some sort of play whenever Gaki tries to hold a badminton event in a park. Tetsuo is the taller of the two and is probably the most outspoken and stylish of the pair.
As always, the rules of shichihenge apply, I believe. Upon counting though, I’ve found that there are 11 people in the room. There usually are only 10, but when the person belongs to a comedy group, they usually let their partners stay in the room to watch.
1st henge: Tetsuo comes in wearing a old-fashioned baseball-cap. You know, one of the ones with the mesh thing in the forehead area. He’s got it flipped down over his eyes, like I’ve done so many times while bored during Little League baseball practice. He soon flips it back to the correct position and pulls out some red tape. He begins marking off a box around his area on the table, and spells out 入ルナ (hairuna), meaning “DO NOT ENTER”, then flips the mesh back over his eyes.
On second consideration, he adjusts the boundaries of the table to include some of Matsumoto and Hamada’s table space, and sets some money down in front of Hamada. Giving up, he heads out of the room, putting the money in the counting basket, with no one laughing. After he leaves, the cast is left to wonder if that actually counts.
2nd: Tetsuo comes back in with a mirror, and begins practicing his “one-line gags” in front of it. He starts by doing Edo Harumi’s “goo-goo” gag, then someone else’s “Sanpei-desu”, followed by Dandy Sakano’s famous “GETS!” line. For some reason, this part really echos, probably due a recording. This essentially freaks everyone out. He tries a half-hearted “sanpei-desu” again, then tries Ai Haruna’s “Iu yo ne!” line. He then returns with an echoing “GETS!” which gets 8 of the people in the room. After another “sanpei-desu”, he does another “GETS!” which gets his partner. A total of 9/10 laughed. Compared to his first try, a definite improvement.
3rd: Dressed as a doctor, he comes in and sits down and calls for someone to send the next patient in. A woman in a red sweater comes in and says she feels feverish, so he asks her to lift her shirt. He takes a stethoscope, and puts it on her boobs. This immediately gets Hamada and Matsumoto. He asks her to do a half-turn in her swivel-chair and then immediately asks her to turn back around and repeats that several times. He puts a pair of rabbit ears on her and starts groping her with a pair of plastic hands. After a good groping, he sends her on her way. Over the course of the gag, he gets 6 cast members to laugh.
4th: In a magician outfit, with two lovely assistants carrying fish tanks with water and a not-so-lovely male assistant, Tetsuo sidles into the room repeatedly thrusting his hands into the water. His chubby male assistant hands him a towel to dry his hands. He takes a rapier, and one of his assistants throws what’s supposed to be a orange, which he seemingly pierces with the sword. He goes back to thrusting his hands into the water and dancing with the disco music in the background. They repeat the process with the orange and rapier a few more times, and the chubby assistant switches places with Tetsuo and does the hand-thrusting and dancing. The room is left to wonder how the hell someone thought that up. 7 of the crew are driven to laughter.
5th: Dressed in a red robe and equipped with a fart machine, Tetsuo waddles in with funny eyes painted over his eyelids. He scampers frantically around the room, sounding the fart machine near people. This got most of the people in the room. Between the combination of the make-up and the farts, he gets 6 people.
6th: Leading a class of PE students, PE Teacher Tetsuo teaches the students how to count off in the coolest way possible, with a mild lisp. As they start counting, he jumps in and corrects the students who used alternative pronunciations of numbers. For example, the fourth child uses “yon” and is instructed to use “shi” instead. He leaves out of the room to let the students practice, and the students huddle and just decide to leave. The lesson gets all 11 people in the room to laugh.
7th: As characteristic for shichihenge, there’s got to be some absurd amount of nakedness. Tetsuo comes in wearing a bath towel saying “I guess it’s not here” while searching around the room. He takes his towel off, and according to the note which the censors have left, he’s apparently has red bean paste slathered all over his junk. Once again, this gets the whole room to laugh for another 11 bills added to pile.
Added all together, he gets 53,000 yen and ties for second place with Bob Sapp for all-time second place.
I’ve given this episode a rating of 5 stars. Fart jokes just get me every time. Combined with the nostalgia from the baseball cap, this probably would have gotten 5 stars even if all the jokes sucked.
Read more!
I've taken a break from reviewing the older episodes to do sometime more recent. I figured that I might as well watch and review videos at the same time to save myself some effort. Makes sense, right? I'm also trying out the YouTube thing, and embedding it here. So, try to check out my channel and all that.
Today’s challenger will be the Tetsuo from the comedy group “Waraimeshi”. If you watch Gaki often, you’ll recognize them as the group that’s always putting on some sort of play whenever Gaki tries to hold a badminton event in a park. Tetsuo is the taller of the two and is probably the most outspoken and stylish of the pair.
As always, the rules of shichihenge apply, I believe. Upon counting though, I’ve found that there are 11 people in the room. There usually are only 10, but when the person belongs to a comedy group, they usually let their partners stay in the room to watch.
1st henge: Tetsuo comes in wearing a old-fashioned baseball-cap. You know, one of the ones with the mesh thing in the forehead area. He’s got it flipped down over his eyes, like I’ve done so many times while bored during Little League baseball practice. He soon flips it back to the correct position and pulls out some red tape. He begins marking off a box around his area on the table, and spells out 入ルナ (hairuna), meaning “DO NOT ENTER”, then flips the mesh back over his eyes.
On second consideration, he adjusts the boundaries of the table to include some of Matsumoto and Hamada’s table space, and sets some money down in front of Hamada. Giving up, he heads out of the room, putting the money in the counting basket, with no one laughing. After he leaves, the cast is left to wonder if that actually counts.
2nd: Tetsuo comes back in with a mirror, and begins practicing his “one-line gags” in front of it. He starts by doing Edo Harumi’s “goo-goo” gag, then someone else’s “Sanpei-desu”, followed by Dandy Sakano’s famous “GETS!” line. For some reason, this part really echos, probably due a recording. This essentially freaks everyone out. He tries a half-hearted “sanpei-desu” again, then tries Ai Haruna’s “Iu yo ne!” line. He then returns with an echoing “GETS!” which gets 8 of the people in the room. After another “sanpei-desu”, he does another “GETS!” which gets his partner. A total of 9/10 laughed. Compared to his first try, a definite improvement.
3rd: Dressed as a doctor, he comes in and sits down and calls for someone to send the next patient in. A woman in a red sweater comes in and says she feels feverish, so he asks her to lift her shirt. He takes a stethoscope, and puts it on her boobs. This immediately gets Hamada and Matsumoto. He asks her to do a half-turn in her swivel-chair and then immediately asks her to turn back around and repeats that several times. He puts a pair of rabbit ears on her and starts groping her with a pair of plastic hands. After a good groping, he sends her on her way. Over the course of the gag, he gets 6 cast members to laugh.
4th: In a magician outfit, with two lovely assistants carrying fish tanks with water and a not-so-lovely male assistant, Tetsuo sidles into the room repeatedly thrusting his hands into the water. His chubby male assistant hands him a towel to dry his hands. He takes a rapier, and one of his assistants throws what’s supposed to be a orange, which he seemingly pierces with the sword. He goes back to thrusting his hands into the water and dancing with the disco music in the background. They repeat the process with the orange and rapier a few more times, and the chubby assistant switches places with Tetsuo and does the hand-thrusting and dancing. The room is left to wonder how the hell someone thought that up. 7 of the crew are driven to laughter.
5th: Dressed in a red robe and equipped with a fart machine, Tetsuo waddles in with funny eyes painted over his eyelids. He scampers frantically around the room, sounding the fart machine near people. This got most of the people in the room. Between the combination of the make-up and the farts, he gets 6 people.
6th: Leading a class of PE students, PE Teacher Tetsuo teaches the students how to count off in the coolest way possible, with a mild lisp. As they start counting, he jumps in and corrects the students who used alternative pronunciations of numbers. For example, the fourth child uses “yon” and is instructed to use “shi” instead. He leaves out of the room to let the students practice, and the students huddle and just decide to leave. The lesson gets all 11 people in the room to laugh.
7th: As characteristic for shichihenge, there’s got to be some absurd amount of nakedness. Tetsuo comes in wearing a bath towel saying “I guess it’s not here” while searching around the room. He takes his towel off, and according to the note which the censors have left, he’s apparently has red bean paste slathered all over his junk. Once again, this gets the whole room to laugh for another 11 bills added to pile.
Added all together, he gets 53,000 yen and ties for second place with Bob Sapp for all-time second place.
I’ve given this episode a rating of 5 stars. Fart jokes just get me every time. Combined with the nostalgia from the baseball cap, this probably would have gotten 5 stars even if all the jokes sucked.
Read more!
Thursday, March 26, 2009
つっつん 八変化!!
（Tsuttsun Hachihenge）
Original Airdate: 3/3/1996
(NOTE: I did not have the time to add screen grabs and pictures. I will do so soon。)
Since the beginning of the shichihenge, they’ve been letting some of the standouts on the staff try their hands at being comedians. Today, they let director Tsuttsumimoto Yukiou, affectionately known as Tsuttsun try his hand with the shichihenge. Tsuttsun is known for being a fairly shy guy with practically no stomach for breaking bad news to the cast. He’s also known to get it crunk after work with his love of alcohol. But seeing as the last three non-comedians (Heipo, director Sakamoto, and producer Suga) didn’t do so good with the numbers, they’re letting Tsuttsun get 8 chances to make them laugh to even things out. Let’s see what Tsuttsun has up his sleeve for laughs.
Henge 1: Tsuttsun walks into the room with shades and a black tank top on. He sits down in his chair as he puffs his cigarette, and then gets uncomfortable and just kinda squats on the chair. Probably not all that funny in itself, but it might be if you knew the man. Probably one of those “I always wondered what it would look like if he did that” moments. Matsumoto laughed, putting the first bill in the money box. First blood for Tsuttsun.
Henge 2: Tsuttsun runs in wearing a Judo gi (the stereotypical martial arts outfit) yelling “Yah!”, like they do in judo schools. He starts grabbing the staff members and shaking them violently. Judo is a sport all about balance. There’s a lot of grappling, and throw maneuvers and you have to keep your balance while still being on the offensive. As a warm-up, a lot of judo practitioners warm up by finding a partner and then pushing and pulling each other as a way to get those stabilizing muscles working. He ends the gag with a less than enthusiastic “hai” and exits. This last bit gets Heipo to laugh, and forces him to pay.
Henge 3: Tsuttsun’s got a hat that essentially makes his head look like an acorn. On the little piece of branch are a few more acorns. He pulls one of them off to eat it, bites in and throws it away as it tastes awful. He then just gets up and leaves. Not very funny. Hamada right afterwards brings up a reference to Yamazaki’s fail-tastic shichihenge experience.
Henge 4: Tsuttsun comes in dressed as an anime character. I can’t seem to put my name on the anime though. His cell phone rings, and he answers with “This is Bell”. I wanted to say Zatch Bell, but that’s not it. Man, I’ve gotten out of touch with anime. Okay, I never was in touch with it, as I never really liked it much. Anyways, the conversation continues with “What?! Someone’s injured? I’m on the way.” Tsuttsun walks back out of the room, apologizing to everyone while leaving. This gets two staff members, producer Suga, and Yamazaki.
Henge 5: Tsuttsun walks in wearing a cartoonish police hat, a tie, his undies, a backpack and nothing else. He’s carrying a jitte, which is like a police nightstick with the little side protrusion bending the same way as the main shaft. I’ll let you do research on it if you so care, so I won’t bother you with the details. Basically, he takes the jitte and rubs it over Matsumoto’s face and body and all sorts of creepy ways. This gets Matsumoto and Hamada. On his way out, he does some little random moves.
Henge 6: OMG blackface. Okay, not really. Tsuttsun adorns some dark make-up, almost ganguro-ish (something else to look up in your free time), to imitate what the members assume to be producer Suga. He walks around the room, pestering Hamada in Suga’s style of talking closely and asking questions twice.
Henge 7: Wearing only cardboard angel wings and a halo, cherub Tsuttsun strolls into the meeting with his bow in hand. He straddles the helpless Matsumoto and shoots him softly at close range with a few arrows.
Henge 8: Dressed as a school girl, Tsuttsun sits next to Matsumoto and pesters him with cries of “do it~~~!” and “Gimme~~~!”. Really doesn’t get anyone, until long after the joke is over and everyone starts shouting their opinions. That seems to be a good way to avoid laughing during the joke: Knowing that you can laugh like hell when the person leaves the room. Much different from the “No Laughing” penalty games, where laughing anywhere gets you a penalty.
When the dust settles, Tsuttsun racks up 10,000 yen for charity. That means that he got 3000 yen more than Yamazaki did, and didn’t need the extra chance to do it. Anyone else up for filing a “GTFO Yamazaki” petition?
This episode’s opener wasn’t that great, but the talk is the great redeemer. Matsumoto talks about various topics like interracial children and sex. One write-in question asks about the concept of the “Half,” which is what the Japanese call someone of half-Japanese half-some other nationality, usually American. The question wants to know what it’s called when two “halves” make a baby. I was interested in what the hell Matsumoto was going to answer, as I’d imagine that knowledge of the word “quarter” is rare in Japan. Matsumoto’s answer is “that’s a traditional child” and he didn’t understand the question. He never gave an answer, but went on to say that he thought there were three or four words for it already. If this episode were just the opener, I would have given this episode a 2-star rating, but the great talk bumps it up to a 3.
Read more!
Original Airdate: 3/3/1996
(NOTE: I did not have the time to add screen grabs and pictures. I will do so soon。)
Since the beginning of the shichihenge, they’ve been letting some of the standouts on the staff try their hands at being comedians. Today, they let director Tsuttsumimoto Yukiou, affectionately known as Tsuttsun try his hand with the shichihenge. Tsuttsun is known for being a fairly shy guy with practically no stomach for breaking bad news to the cast. He’s also known to get it crunk after work with his love of alcohol. But seeing as the last three non-comedians (Heipo, director Sakamoto, and producer Suga) didn’t do so good with the numbers, they’re letting Tsuttsun get 8 chances to make them laugh to even things out. Let’s see what Tsuttsun has up his sleeve for laughs.
Henge 1: Tsuttsun walks into the room with shades and a black tank top on. He sits down in his chair as he puffs his cigarette, and then gets uncomfortable and just kinda squats on the chair. Probably not all that funny in itself, but it might be if you knew the man. Probably one of those “I always wondered what it would look like if he did that” moments. Matsumoto laughed, putting the first bill in the money box. First blood for Tsuttsun.
Henge 2: Tsuttsun runs in wearing a Judo gi (the stereotypical martial arts outfit) yelling “Yah!”, like they do in judo schools. He starts grabbing the staff members and shaking them violently. Judo is a sport all about balance. There’s a lot of grappling, and throw maneuvers and you have to keep your balance while still being on the offensive. As a warm-up, a lot of judo practitioners warm up by finding a partner and then pushing and pulling each other as a way to get those stabilizing muscles working. He ends the gag with a less than enthusiastic “hai” and exits. This last bit gets Heipo to laugh, and forces him to pay.
Henge 3: Tsuttsun’s got a hat that essentially makes his head look like an acorn. On the little piece of branch are a few more acorns. He pulls one of them off to eat it, bites in and throws it away as it tastes awful. He then just gets up and leaves. Not very funny. Hamada right afterwards brings up a reference to Yamazaki’s fail-tastic shichihenge experience.
Henge 4: Tsuttsun comes in dressed as an anime character. I can’t seem to put my name on the anime though. His cell phone rings, and he answers with “This is Bell”. I wanted to say Zatch Bell, but that’s not it. Man, I’ve gotten out of touch with anime. Okay, I never was in touch with it, as I never really liked it much. Anyways, the conversation continues with “What?! Someone’s injured? I’m on the way.” Tsuttsun walks back out of the room, apologizing to everyone while leaving. This gets two staff members, producer Suga, and Yamazaki.
Henge 5: Tsuttsun walks in wearing a cartoonish police hat, a tie, his undies, a backpack and nothing else. He’s carrying a jitte, which is like a police nightstick with the little side protrusion bending the same way as the main shaft. I’ll let you do research on it if you so care, so I won’t bother you with the details. Basically, he takes the jitte and rubs it over Matsumoto’s face and body and all sorts of creepy ways. This gets Matsumoto and Hamada. On his way out, he does some little random moves.
Henge 6: OMG blackface. Okay, not really. Tsuttsun adorns some dark make-up, almost ganguro-ish (something else to look up in your free time), to imitate what the members assume to be producer Suga. He walks around the room, pestering Hamada in Suga’s style of talking closely and asking questions twice.
Henge 7: Wearing only cardboard angel wings and a halo, cherub Tsuttsun strolls into the meeting with his bow in hand. He straddles the helpless Matsumoto and shoots him softly at close range with a few arrows.
Henge 8: Dressed as a school girl, Tsuttsun sits next to Matsumoto and pesters him with cries of “do it~~~!” and “Gimme~~~!”. Really doesn’t get anyone, until long after the joke is over and everyone starts shouting their opinions. That seems to be a good way to avoid laughing during the joke: Knowing that you can laugh like hell when the person leaves the room. Much different from the “No Laughing” penalty games, where laughing anywhere gets you a penalty.
When the dust settles, Tsuttsun racks up 10,000 yen for charity. That means that he got 3000 yen more than Yamazaki did, and didn’t need the extra chance to do it. Anyone else up for filing a “GTFO Yamazaki” petition?
This episode’s opener wasn’t that great, but the talk is the great redeemer. Matsumoto talks about various topics like interracial children and sex. One write-in question asks about the concept of the “Half,” which is what the Japanese call someone of half-Japanese half-some other nationality, usually American. The question wants to know what it’s called when two “halves” make a baby. I was interested in what the hell Matsumoto was going to answer, as I’d imagine that knowledge of the word “quarter” is rare in Japan. Matsumoto’s answer is “that’s a traditional child” and he didn’t understand the question. He never gave an answer, but went on to say that he thought there were three or four words for it already. If this episode were just the opener, I would have given this episode a 2-star rating, but the great talk bumps it up to a 3.
Read more!
Monday, February 2, 2009
山崎邦正 七変化!!
(Yamazaki Housei Shichihenge)
Whoo… Sorry it’s been so long since my last post. Life has been getting in the way. Anyway, I think I will try to post things on a regular schedule. Right now, it’s looking like it will be Sunday nights. Well, I guess it’s early Monday mornings, as it’s about 1 am now.
The Shichihenge series is another legendary part of Gaki’s legacy. Shichihenge(七変化) translates roughly to “the Seven Shapeshifters” or “The Seven Apparitions”. The point of this game is fairly simple. The Gaki members, producers and general staff higher-ups have a planning meeting. Whoever’s turn it is to do the shichihenge-ing leaves the room and returns seven times, to try to make the people in the room laugh. Each time someone laughs at one of the gags, they have to pay a penalty fee of 1,000 yen (which ranges anywhere between USD $10-12, depending on the exchange rate) which is donated to charity. So, doing the math, since there are ten people in the room, with seven gags at a penalty fee of 1,000 yen, the maximum amount earnable is 70,000.
Today is Yamazaki’s turn to take on the Shichihenge. So far in the history of the show, I think there’s been three other shichihenges: Heipo, director Sakamoto, and producer Suga. If anyone out there can correct me on this, it would be greatly appreciated. I can’t find the dates or episodes for those three, so I don’t know for sure when they happened. None of them really did well, but they decided to let him go anyway.
Matsumoto starts out with by saying he wondered what would happen if he let Yamazaki do this. Yamazaki explains that he’s studied, thought about it carefully and come up with several gags to unleash on the crew. Let's take a look at how Yamazaki, who I generally don’t find funny, did.
Henge 1: Yamazaki walks into the room mostly naked, in what I think is supposed to be a play on the stereotypical mermaid outfit. He’s got shells over his nipples and only-God-knows on his crotch (Thank you, censors). He brings in a mirror to set down on the meeting table, so he can check himself out.
Who laughed?
Me: No.
Staff: No.
Henge 2: Yamazaki walks in carrying buckets of live fish, and wearing a stopwatch. He starts and stops his stopwatch a few times, then grabs a fish from the bucket and puts it in his armpit. The fish flops around and gets away, so he grabs the buckets and leaves. There was no mention of him picking that fish off of the ground (which will probably upset you more if you’re in PETA), but I’m pretty sure that one of the staff picked it up, as it isn’t there for the next henge.
Who laughed?
Me: No.
Staff: Heipo.
Henge 3: Yamazaki comes in wearing a burglar outfit, with a stocking over his head. For those of you who are familiar with Japanese comedy, you know that the stocking over the head is used fairly often as it just warps the wearer’s face into funny shapes. He faces everybody with his little toy knife, and nobody laughs so he leaves. He stops in the doorway on the way out and breaths heavily, which produces a Darth Vader-ish noise. This cracks Matsumoto and one of the directors.
Who laughed?
Me: No.
Staff: Matsumoto and some staff member who I can’t remember right now.
Henge 4: Okay. This one was kinda funny. Yamazaki comes in dressed as an office lady. He unzips his/her briefcase and starts typing away on a laptop. A cell phone call comes, which he answers with “Hello?... Hello?.. Oh… Georgia… Okay… Michael… Okay…” He cracks Matsumoto. This also cracked me, but for different reasons. One, if you watch enough Gaki, you’d know that Yamazaki touts himself as being good at English, but he’s only good at imitating things he hears. If you watch some of the “Yamazaki Produces” episodes of Gaki (which I guess I will do here eventually) you’ll see that he tries to write songs in English, but completely mangles grammar. Thus, when he speaks English as jokes and such, it’s usually small one or two word phrases, or longer phrases that they teach students in school like “Nice to meet you.”
Who laughed?
Me: Okay. Yeah, I did.
Staff: Matsumoto.
Henge 5: Yamazaki comes in dressed as a superhero. He cracks Hamada right off the bat, and then complains about it being cold, which then gets Matsumoto. He punches some staff with his big foam hands, then leaves.
Who laughed?
Me: No.
Staff: Hamada ,Matsumoto and that producer whos name I’ll figure out later.
Henge 6: Yamazake comes in “dressed” as a baby, carrying a baby doll. He puts the doll on the desk, and then stands on the desk two in the position that the doll is in. As you can see, this resulted in people sitting in the room seeing more of Yamazaki than they’d really care to. Nakedness though, really does get the job done when it comes down to making people laugh.
Who laughed?
Me: No.
Staff: No. (Although, I will say, that I would have ruled that Matsumoto laughed.)
Hrm… they stop there. Now I’m glad that I’m actually blogging this, as I’d never noticed this before. It looks as though either Yamazaki didn’t do a seventh or it was generally too stupid or too vulgar to be broadcast. That’s interesting. Maybe I could do some research and see what happened.
Anyway, the money was totaled, and Yamazaki earned a measly 7,000 yen for charity. That is a mere 10% of the maximum total possible. That score was the lowest score for a long time as far as shichihenge goes, and stayed as the low score for several years. It may still be the lowest score ever. That really must be a huge blow to the pride, when you call yourself a comedian or entertainer, and your score for making people laugh is being resoundingly beaten by the producers and directors on the show you work on. That’s why I gave this episode a 2-star rating. It was just lame. Okay, the talk wasn’t bad, but I hardly make it to the comedy talk on this episode because I usually turn it off during the shichihenge.
Read more!
Whoo… Sorry it’s been so long since my last post. Life has been getting in the way. Anyway, I think I will try to post things on a regular schedule. Right now, it’s looking like it will be Sunday nights. Well, I guess it’s early Monday mornings, as it’s about 1 am now.
The Shichihenge series is another legendary part of Gaki’s legacy. Shichihenge(七変化) translates roughly to “the Seven Shapeshifters” or “The Seven Apparitions”. The point of this game is fairly simple. The Gaki members, producers and general staff higher-ups have a planning meeting. Whoever’s turn it is to do the shichihenge-ing leaves the room and returns seven times, to try to make the people in the room laugh. Each time someone laughs at one of the gags, they have to pay a penalty fee of 1,000 yen (which ranges anywhere between USD $10-12, depending on the exchange rate) which is donated to charity. So, doing the math, since there are ten people in the room, with seven gags at a penalty fee of 1,000 yen, the maximum amount earnable is 70,000.
Today is Yamazaki’s turn to take on the Shichihenge. So far in the history of the show, I think there’s been three other shichihenges: Heipo, director Sakamoto, and producer Suga. If anyone out there can correct me on this, it would be greatly appreciated. I can’t find the dates or episodes for those three, so I don’t know for sure when they happened. None of them really did well, but they decided to let him go anyway.
Matsumoto starts out with by saying he wondered what would happen if he let Yamazaki do this. Yamazaki explains that he’s studied, thought about it carefully and come up with several gags to unleash on the crew. Let's take a look at how Yamazaki, who I generally don’t find funny, did.
Henge 1: Yamazaki walks into the room mostly naked, in what I think is supposed to be a play on the stereotypical mermaid outfit. He’s got shells over his nipples and only-God-knows on his crotch (Thank you, censors). He brings in a mirror to set down on the meeting table, so he can check himself out.
Who laughed?
Me: No.
Staff: No.
Henge 2: Yamazaki walks in carrying buckets of live fish, and wearing a stopwatch. He starts and stops his stopwatch a few times, then grabs a fish from the bucket and puts it in his armpit. The fish flops around and gets away, so he grabs the buckets and leaves. There was no mention of him picking that fish off of the ground (which will probably upset you more if you’re in PETA), but I’m pretty sure that one of the staff picked it up, as it isn’t there for the next henge.
Who laughed?
Me: No.
Staff: Heipo.
Henge 3: Yamazaki comes in wearing a burglar outfit, with a stocking over his head. For those of you who are familiar with Japanese comedy, you know that the stocking over the head is used fairly often as it just warps the wearer’s face into funny shapes. He faces everybody with his little toy knife, and nobody laughs so he leaves. He stops in the doorway on the way out and breaths heavily, which produces a Darth Vader-ish noise. This cracks Matsumoto and one of the directors.
Who laughed?
Me: No.
Staff: Matsumoto and some staff member who I can’t remember right now.
Henge 4: Okay. This one was kinda funny. Yamazaki comes in dressed as an office lady. He unzips his/her briefcase and starts typing away on a laptop. A cell phone call comes, which he answers with “Hello?... Hello?.. Oh… Georgia… Okay… Michael… Okay…” He cracks Matsumoto. This also cracked me, but for different reasons. One, if you watch enough Gaki, you’d know that Yamazaki touts himself as being good at English, but he’s only good at imitating things he hears. If you watch some of the “Yamazaki Produces” episodes of Gaki (which I guess I will do here eventually) you’ll see that he tries to write songs in English, but completely mangles grammar. Thus, when he speaks English as jokes and such, it’s usually small one or two word phrases, or longer phrases that they teach students in school like “Nice to meet you.”
Who laughed?
Me: Okay. Yeah, I did.
Staff: Matsumoto.
Henge 5: Yamazaki comes in dressed as a superhero. He cracks Hamada right off the bat, and then complains about it being cold, which then gets Matsumoto. He punches some staff with his big foam hands, then leaves.
Who laughed?
Me: No.
Staff: Hamada ,Matsumoto and that producer whos name I’ll figure out later.
Henge 6: Yamazake comes in “dressed” as a baby, carrying a baby doll. He puts the doll on the desk, and then stands on the desk two in the position that the doll is in. As you can see, this resulted in people sitting in the room seeing more of Yamazaki than they’d really care to. Nakedness though, really does get the job done when it comes down to making people laugh.
Who laughed?
Me: No.
Staff: No. (Although, I will say, that I would have ruled that Matsumoto laughed.)
Hrm… they stop there. Now I’m glad that I’m actually blogging this, as I’d never noticed this before. It looks as though either Yamazaki didn’t do a seventh or it was generally too stupid or too vulgar to be broadcast. That’s interesting. Maybe I could do some research and see what happened.
Anyway, the money was totaled, and Yamazaki earned a measly 7,000 yen for charity. That is a mere 10% of the maximum total possible. That score was the lowest score for a long time as far as shichihenge goes, and stayed as the low score for several years. It may still be the lowest score ever. That really must be a huge blow to the pride, when you call yourself a comedian or entertainer, and your score for making people laugh is being resoundingly beaten by the producers and directors on the show you work on. That’s why I gave this episode a 2-star rating. It was just lame. Okay, the talk wasn’t bad, but I hardly make it to the comedy talk on this episode because I usually turn it off during the shichihenge.
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