Matsumoto and Eri, II

Ha! Free time! Whoo!

For today, we have "Matsumoto and Eri, II" which is the second chapter in a fake love story between our ever loved Matsumoto and Eri, his girlfriend. In the first episode, we find that Matsumoto has a "girlfriend" that he brings to the set, and the two of them go on a spree of shirking their duties and making the audience laugh in the process. The episode ends with Matsumoto having a small argument with Eri, but eventually "reconciling". Today's episode occurs about six months after that point, while the Gaki members are preparing for a contest against another group of comedians.

But first, housekeeping on this old dusty blog!

• From one "Eri" to another, I've done some updating on one of my non-Gaki related posts regarding Eri Hiramatsu, and the song of hers which I am entranced with.


• If you haven't noticed, there's a new poll up. I'm just curious to see what the viewing habits of this blogs readers are. Being cynical, I kind of stereotyped other Gaki viewers, but I decided to use the polling feature to get to know you all more.


• Fixed subtitle files and provided some insight to clear some confusion regarding the end of Itao's Car Crash, regarding the removal of the wife's facial blurring. Matsumoto asks "You aren't Itao's wife, are you?" to which she replies "Of course." This "of course" meaning along the lines of "of course not". Since she's not really Itao's wife there's not need to protect her identity and they remove her face censoring.


• Cleaned up the General Request Post, and updated the status of my "scheduling" basically to "whatever happens, happens". Also, I know you're probably bubbling to find some subtitles to the new Batsu game, but they won't be coming from me. I have hardly any time, recently.
  

Well, now that all the maintenance is done, on with the show!

The show starts like most others. The whole Gaki team is lounging in their dressing room, making smalltalk and just generally joking with each other before taping. The staff gives a debriefing of the plan to do their third "Breath-Holding" episode, which usually feature the Gaki members taking on a group of their comedian friends.

However, mid-preparation, Matsumoto gets a phone call. The flirtation begins and suddenly Eri reveals that the just happens to be in the neighborhood, and she wanted to come talk to Matsumoto. Given that they still had some time before filming, the staff and crew allow it, and seconds later Eri pops into the dressing room.

Expecting another adventure after taping, Matsumoto's mood brightens up. However, Eri drops the "We have to talk" bomb. It's from there that she drops the "We have to talk because we're breaking up" bomb. In an effort to stop his personal life from being shown to the entire viewing public, he scrambles to get the cameramen to stop filming. They keep filming, of course, or else it wouldn't be much of an episode, now would it?



Seeking explanation, Eri drops the "I've found someone else" bomb, which from scientific reports is about eight times more devastating than the "I'd like to be single" bomb. Eri lists of reasons why she's decided that it's time to move on, which Matsumoto tries to get Endou to strike down as complete crap. Endou, wanting absolutely no part in this lover's quarrel, smartly just keeps his mouth shut.

However, the part that's killing Matsumoto is Eri's refusal to answer if it's someone that he knows. Therefore, he just generally assumes that he knows the person. Suddenly, the ever timid director Akihiro Oonuma interrupts and tries to get Eri to spill the beans. Connecting the dots, Hamada figures out the reason why Eri refused to say if Matsumoto knew the other man and why Oonuma is referring to Eri in an close, affectionate way. (If he had no relation to her besides the show she filmed 6 months ago, I probably would have attached some sort of polite form of verb when commanding her to talk and/or attached a respect-showing suffix to her name.)

Enthralled by the juicy gossip, Hamada proceeds to extract all the details of the affair from the two in the guilty party. Apparently the whole thing started when Eri came to the show. Damn, Oonuma, you're a player. Apparently after the little spat Hitoshi and Eri had, Oonuma managed to work his way into the little crack in the relationship and started to push Eri away from Matsumoto. As Endou points out, they are even wearing matching necklaces.

Producer Suga, wanting a generally happy work environment, feels it is his job to step in and keep the "expendable" staff from pissing off the stars, so he confronts Oonuma, and scolds him for messing with a taken woman. Oonuma responds with a polite version of "I don't give a damn". Matsumoto, still reeling from the blow, wants to see if there's any chance of reconciliation but cannot put any words together. Hamada, probably sensing his partner's distress leaps in, and prods Eri to get her to give a status on how she really feels about Matsumoto, and how deep the relationship with Oonuma really is. Luckily for Matsumoto, she's still got a place in her heart for him, and could possibly be won back.

It's around this point that I started to think that in his younger days, Hamada might have been "the other man" a few times. He seems to know just what to say, like he's used to this situation. When Yamazaki and Tanaka try to force Eri back over to Matsumoto with a guilt trip, Hamada just tells them to shut up because this is Eri's decision to make, not theirs. Suga, sensing that Eri can generally go either way, gives Matsumoto a way to win Eri over by suggesting that they compete in the Breath Holding event for Eri's love. Since Matsumoto has experience in it, he probably figured he'd have the advantage. Both men agree, but just to get a grip on the magnitude of the situation, Matsumoto asks how far the two have gone in their scandal. Refusing to give up that information, everyone assumes that Oonuma's managed to hit a "home run" and score. However, Endou tries to pry the info out with "If you did it, you should just be a man about it and say so."

irony - (n.) When a man who would later get kicked to the curb for his wandering eye and general refusal to admit the details to his wife, tells another man that he should just admit it when he's having sexual encounters with someone he shouldn't be.

Now that both competitors are ready for battle we move on to the competition itself. Eri takes over as host of the segment, and has me laughing at her mannerisms. The arm flailing when she tells "Hiro-kun" to "STAAAAA~TO" just cracks me up. However, something unfortunate happens, and Oonuma is no longer to compete, and has to be pulled out of the water. Eri, finding that she truly loves Oonuma, performs mouth-to-mouth on her true love.



We then cut to a montage of how Eri and Akihiro's love for each other blossomed, accompanied by "Itoshi no ELLIE" by the Southern All-Stars. The song is a pretty special song in Japan because it was later covered by the great Ray Charles. It's praised as one of the few songs from Japan, along with the likes of "Sukiyaki" by Kyu Sakamoto and "Shima Uta" by The Boom, to get worldwide recognition in more than the niche "Otaku" market. This song helped set off a boom of Japanese naming that with names that were both common to Japanese and other languages, usually English or Chinese. Names like Eri (Ellie), Erika, Dan, Jun, and Reina which were also names in languages like English, Chinese and French, gave parents that "Hey, my child's name is now acceptable worldwide!" feeling.

Anyway, by the end of the montage, the audience as well as Matsumoto realize that there's no way for Hitoshi to win back Eri's heart. Endou and Hamada try the usual "You can do better" and "Those two nuts belong together" bits, but Hitoshi's little heart is still broken.

This episode hadn't yet been put in my big chart of Gaki episode summaries and rankings. If I had to choose, I'd give it 4 stars on my wonky rating system. It's not the greatest episode, but some parts are non-intentionally pretty funny, like Oonuma's Rapist Face when he meets Eri during the montage. I'd say it's only slightly less funny than the first episode, which I'd have to find and dig out of the pile of episodes. Unfortunately, there are some videos on my hard drive that aren't named correctly to let my find them quickly, so I'd have to wade through most of them to find it. So, I probably won't be putting that up anytime soon, sadly.

As a general conversation sparker, have any of you out there ever been "the other man/woman"? In middle school, I was, in a way. While the relationship between myself and this girl was strictly platonic in my eyes (partners for a school project. Nothing more.), she viewed it as more, and essentially left her boyfriend for me. After being confronted by her huge, jock boyfriend, the girl and I had a little talk about what the word "platonic" means. She generally lost all feelings for me after that, but I don't think the two of them ever got back together. Oh well.
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Kiki Nattou!

Well, it's time for another BB-- Wait. . . this is a whole episode.

Ah, right. This is the episode I'd planned on putting up on Sunday, but was still getting used all the buttons and stuff on my new video editing and subtitling programs. Okay, I won't call them my "new" ones, since I'm so not impressed that I'm undoubtedly going back to my previous methods due to sheer ease.

Anyways, this episode is Gaki's 23rd entry in the Kiki series. This time's subject of taste-testing is nattou. For those of you who know what the Kiki series is all about, just skip ahead to the videos. For those that don't know, the Kiki series is a long running series on Gaki No Tsukai, where each member is assigned a brand of product, chosen by the other 4 members. They then have to try that brand blindfolded, and then go through the table full of various brands and try to find their mystery brand. You can only choose one at a time, and if you think it's not the one, you throw it in the trash. If you think it's right, you come to the center stage and say that you think you've found it! If you get say the wrong brand is correct, or you throw away the correct brand, you get a penalty. Penalties on Gaki No Tsukai will almost always involve pain. Today it's in the scrotal area.



We open up the episode with the usual introduction of the rules of Kiki, and the introduction of the topic. Today, it's nattou. Nattou is definitely an odd-looking food. It's fermented soybeans, so they start to make a little juice and it gets all sticky and stringy. Tanaka doesn't eat nattou much and doesn't care for it, so he's at a huge disadvantage. Which is exactly why they make him go first. Poor Tanaka.

And let me take this time to say: "DAAA~MN, son! That punisment is messed up!"

Next is Yamazaki, who does the usual "I know what I'm doing" act, and generally overdoes all the lame jokes that aren't getting laughs. If anyone out there doesn't understand why I don't like Yamazaki, please take a look at this episode. He was the reason I had trouble dividing the episode. I couldn't find a good place to cut the video, because he's constantly being lame and/or screaming. So yes, this section ends in a fairly odd place. Blame Yamazaki for that.



Then we pick up right were we left off. Yamazaki is confused. I want to kill him, and speed up translation. You guys have no idea how hard it was for me to get through his section because he's just that lame. The only part I care about is him getting hit in the nuts. Hopefully he will never contribute to the gene pool ever again.

Next up is Hamada. Hamada does a Tanaka and gets out on the first brand. After that is Endou's turn. I really feel sorry for Endou, being in the social position that he is. His role in his comedy duo is the tsukkomi, who pretty much puts down stupid people in his presence. However as far as Gaki No Tsukai goes, he's one of the youngest and least experienced in the industry, so he has to be polite with everyone, except Tanaka. You can see that he REALLY wanted to sling some insults during this episode, but had to hold himself back due to social order. Poor Endou.

Anyway, he finds out that the one that he's been assigned is not one that he normally eats so he goes by process of elimination. Can I take a moment to say that his hair looks good and bad at the same time? Anyone else feel that way? Those little feathered parts in the back make it look like he's got a mini-mullet that hasn't grown into a big-boy mullet yet. Anyways, enough of the follicle-check. After he's done, we're on to Matsumoto's attempt.



Matsumoto does bring the funny this entire episode, getting a good crack in at pretty much everybody and making funny observations ("We don't know what you're imagining", "you slow mudtortoise", "You think a girl likes it when you fondle her? Well you're wrong.", and "This explains the drop in birth rates") so it's nice to see him in the hotseat at times like these. And boy, does Matsumoto put on a show taking it down to the last two brands. Will Matsumoto be the only one to get his badge for the Kiki Nattou?! *cliffhanger and suspenseful music*

As usual for the Kiki episode, there's lots of suspense and lots of good points. However, there were a lot of bad parts (read as "Yamazaki's there"). I'd give this one a 6. It should probably only get a 5 but Matsumoto REALLY saves this episode with his wit. Tanaka was reeling too bad from getting knocked out on the first brand, Yamazaki's just annoying, I couldn't take my eyes off of Endou's magically disappearing and reappearing mullet, and Hamada didn't really seem to be on his A-game. Congrats Matsumoto. We'll credit you with a "save" on this one. Of course points and stats don't really matter.
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Endou's Hollywood Audition!

(Original Airdate: 4/18/2004)

Okay. So I've finally managed to get another Sunday release out. *sweatwipe* I'll probably do my usual "housekeeping" on Wednesday, for the BBB. I've got big things under my sleeve. *shifty eyes*

In today's episode, we get to see what it's like to be on the end of a prank. Endou has long wanted to appear in some sort of worldwide entertainment project, but has only been able to land a few roles in some Japanese dramas and appears on many Japanese TV shows. So when a famous Hollywood producer comes to Tokyo to look for new stars for his latest film, it should come as no surprise that Endou jumps on the invitation he gets.




Endou is lead into a room and is told that a producer saw him on television and was interested in making him a star. This immediately gets Endou's attention. Apparently, he has a soft spot for flattery. He's then led into the fake audition site, where three other people are waiting. If you look carefully, you can see that the man sitting next to Shin-Onii from recent episodes and batsu games. It looks like NTV's had him on their employed list for almost 5 years, I guess.

The fake announcer reveals the fake title of the fake movie, which is "The Last Hohohoi". The Hohohoi is pretty much Endou's signature move, and when he doesn't react, the audience pretty much should have been tipped off that this whole thing was a prank on them. The fake announce then calls in the fake producer, fake translator, fake assistant, and fake cast. All of them are Gaki members wearing the stereotypical "I'm really a foreigner" noses. Notice the hot stems on Tanaka, playing the role of a half-Chinese woman:



The fake audition continues with lots of fanfare and such. They don't really have announcers are such small auditions, do they? I could understand if it was something like an open casting call, but this is a closed session. Maybe this is how they do it in Japan. *shrug*

After formal introductions, the translator tells the Hohohopefuls *dodges rotten tomatoes* about the money to be made on this production: a whopping two million dollars!

In order to prepare and get ready, the producer has an assistant pass out the necessary supplies for completing the Samurai Hohohoi's look: hair gel and white briefs. Endou happens to be wearing his own briefs and will be using those for the audition. The other three go and change.

Then Yamazaki does what he always does on Saturday nights:

• Dresses up as a woman
  
• Bends over
• Shows his panties in hopes that it will catch a man's eye
• Clean up any spilled fluids off of the floor afterwards
  

I can only assume that the role given to him for this prank comes naturally to him.

With Yamazaki's obligatory "I'm an idiot" moment out of the picture, we can start the audition and see if Endou's going to be a star. The first two old geezers try to do the Hohohoi, and get rejected. Gotta love Matsumoto's "GET OUT!" after the first one. Even though he tends to say less than others when he does speak, his English pronunciation is probably the best out of the Gaki members.

The third auditioner, The Artist Later Known as Shin-Onii, tries his hand at the hohohoi. Apparently, he didn't know what he was supposed to be saying, so he kept saying "Hahaha". That's probably why they kept him around. Unfortunately, even he was eliminated.

With only Endou left, he's sure he's got this in the bag. Between being a Hohohoi master and being in on the knowledge that the producer seemed quite taken with him, his confidence was at its peak.



In an abbreviated remix of the Hohohoi, Endou impresses the production team and comes one step closer to the two million dollars that comes with the role of the Samurai Hohohoi. The producer decides to put Endou through a few more acting challenges.

The first challenge is using a toy light gun to act out an action scene. Basically Endou just looks back and forth and pulls the trigger. Good enough for a laugh. Challenge Number Two is the timeless pillow reaction. I heard that one acting coach does something similar to this. You get something incredibly lame done to you, and you have to overcome the lameness and act like it was seriously life-threatening. Of course, you don't want to overact either.

The third challenge is another HUGE clue that this actually a prank on the audience. Everyone who knows Endou knows that his prized impression is that of the somewhat spastic comedian/producer/actor Takeshi Kitano, who is also known as Beat Takeshi. Endou does the movements quite well, but for some reason the voice just sounds off here. Perhaps the acoustics in the room? He usually does a great impression of him.

Challenge Four is getting Endou to tapdance. He has to do so on the feathers that were just spilled everywhere by the pillow reaction challenge. Hopefully those are the feathers that have that little middle hard tube part taken out. Wouldn't want anyone getting hurt for the sake of my laughter (except Yamazaki). While Endou's tapping away, Hamada, playing the part of the American Hohohoi, loses his nose for a few seconds.

Challenge Five brings us to "Brokeback Hohohoi". The American Hohohoi turns out to be gay and makes moves on Endou. It's these types of moments that inspire homely, adolescents/post-adolescents to write horrible fanfiction about how these types of situation work out later on in the dressing room. Perhaps poorly written, generally Too Much Information, slash fanfiction doesn't hit the Japanese internet anywhere as hard as it does in English-speaking countries? If so, I've decided that I'm moving. (On a sidenote, I saw some SkiFree fanfiction the other day. Yes, SkiFree. That game you used to play on the old Macs with the little Yeti that comes out from the side of the screen and chases you down the slope as you try to avoid trees. Yeah. Gay SkiFree fanfiction. The skier falls in love with the Yeti. *passes out barf bags*)

Anyways, this prank comes to a conclusion as Hamada leaves after being rejected by the Samurai Hohohoi, and comes back with a bazooka. We are treated to the campy "ZOMG IT'S A PRANK, ENDOU!" when we really know it should be a "ZOMG IT'S A PRANK, AUDIENCE!". But we get one last picture of Endou and the rest.

I'll upload the talk for this episode soon. It's pretty funny. I'll hold out for that and then rate the episode.

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Itao's Car Crash!

(Original Airdate 7/18/1999)

Hello, hello! It's time, once again, for the Gaki members to let out some pent-up aggression with a dodgeball match. In commemoration of a new summer, the Gaki members head to a nearby park to shoot. [sarcasm] And like always, when Gaki doesn't shoots on location for playing sports, they always go off without a hitch. [/sarcasm] On the way to the location shoot, several things happen.

First, the other Gaki members put Yamazaki's ticket sales out in public, which made me laugh. It makes me smile to know that not everyone's just slobbering all over his tiny, shriveled testicles like the Japanese fan-girls do with the other, more testicularly-ample members.

The second, and in my mind the less gratifying thing, is they get into a car accident. The large Gaki location bus gets into a silent, non-fatal crash, all while staying about 5 feet from the car in front of it.

Stay tuned, BlackGaki readers, you are about to witness a tale of love, spilled stew, and murder on the dodgeball court...



It was a day like any other. Five celebrities, their manager, and TV production crew head out to do a shoot on-location in a local park. And like any other day as a Gaki member, when you do an on-location shoot, there will be several things that go wrong. So, yes, this will be a day like any other.

On the way to the park, Yamazaki tries to make friendly conversation with the other members about their experiences with dodgeball. When Endou tries to be analytical, Yamazaki takes the "sarcastic-ass" route and cuts the conversation short. Matsumoto, hereby demonstrating on why everyone loves him, blasts Yamazaki's ticket sales. For some reason, I can just see these empty audiences who come to see the shows. I'd wager a bet that at least 3 of the 25 people who came to see his performance in Nagoya were in his own family. Seriously, when only 25 people show up for a show, your material must suck. Even struggling comics can pull in 35-40 if they can get a gig. I can just imagine Yamazaki not being able to pull off a gag, and then resorting to whatever the Japanese equivalent is for the "Wow, all you ladies are looking good tonight" bit. Then, by his own mention, he only managed to sell about 1/3 of the seats in his performance in Tokyo. Haha, all these years on Gaki No Tsukai really built up your following, hasn't it?

Suddenly, the location bus stops. The car in front of the bus is waving the bus down to pull over. The driver gets out, and it's none other than our friend, Itsuji Itao.



This episode shows prime examples of several comedic elements that I love about the Itao episodes.

First of all, these episodes are filmed on the streets, so there's usually bystanders just watching. I -LOOOOOVE- seeing the occasional passer-by get completely starstruck and defecate all over themselves. I present to you a prime example, the woman right behind Itao :



You can practically see her bowels loosening at the sight of Hamada! She then seems to emit some sort of dork-summoning signal which calls in dorky goon to pop onto the left side of the screen for a second. It's always fun to see how many people just watch, like I may have commented on in the "Itao Is Watching" episode, where there's a random bystander on the roof of the building that the cameraman tried to zoom in to hide, to preserve the integrity of the storyline.

Itao's signature on the Gaki No Tsukai series, besides his love of money, is his use of his "wife". Over the years, there have been many wives. The one probably most of you are familiar with is the one with the long ponytail who dances, as seen in the High School and Police station penalty games. I plan to discuss the history of "Itao's Wife" in an episode shortly, including some facts you may not know. Over the years, we've seen several "wives" come and go. I believe we're on wife number 9 or 10. Yet, I digress.

The second thing I love is the "I signal, you say" type of interaction that Itao uses. Itao's Wife is usually limited in vocabulary. In most cases, she's a foreigner that doesn't and thus there's she just has to take body-language cues from the situation and give her usual response of "mochiron sou yo!" ("Of course so"). It's hilarious when they fool her into confirming something that only hurts Itao's position in begging for money.

Okay, so back to the action. While trying to settle this little accident, Itao goes through the contents of his car. I don't know how hard I laughed when I saw the spilled stew. I don't know what it is about it, but I just crack up. Maybe it's because I found it funny, and Matsumoto just cracks up laughing when he sees it, thus making it thousands of times funnier. Maybe it's because it's poop-brown with broccoli floating in it. I don't know, I just find it funny. So for my, and hopefully your, viewing pleasure here's pictures of the spilled stew. XD




Itao then reveals the slightly less comical contents of his trunk, and then begins the usual negotiations for some money. They agree to pay for the car repair, but like almost all people are starting to do in today's litigious society, he brings up the "Oh, my neck. It may be whiplash" line. I wonder if we have seen the last of him for this episode? Okay, we haven't. There's another video right below this.



We knew this was coming. They show up again in neckbraces and toting X-ray pictures. They're injured, and seeking compensation. So, after another round of negotiation with the Cowardly Lion -- I mean Producer Suga, Itao decides to make the most of this appearance on the show and try to earn the money by joining the dodgeball game. When he manages to get his foot in the door, he weasels his wife onto the other team, so no matter which team wins, his family gets a share of the prize money. I SEE WUT U DID THERE, ITAO.

And in breaking news, there's been a death on the park. Not from a rapist, not from a serial killer. This time from a rubber dodgeball. Today, a woman known as "Itao's Wife" was killed during a dodgeball match after being struck in the leg and getting too damned excited. (I'll admit the clutching of the heart during the fall was so funny though.)

And in an act of stubbornness and love, Itao fights to get his wife an ambulance as soon as possible. The only obstacle in the way is the prospect of the undivided prize money. It's just not Yamazaki's day, is it? First his underachievement is put out in front streets for all to see, then Itao fake-demeans him.

About three hours ago, somewhere almost halfway around the world, Chuck Norris farted. Those sacred sulfur molecules wafted all the way over to Japan and into the nose of one dead Itao's Wife, and brought her back to life and all lived happily ever after. (Yes, I made a Chuck Norris joke, even 4 years after those things went out of style.)

Clarification note: There seems to be some confusion, in both my translation and the interpretation of the removal of the Wife's face mosaic. Matsumoto asks "You aren't Itao's wife, are you?" to which she replies "Of course." This "of course" meaning along the lines of "of course not". Since she's not really Itao's wife there's not need to protect her identity and they remove her face censoring. This is what errors in your subtitle files gets you, kiddies. They have been fixed to display a more clear and correct translation.

I don't know how to rate this episode. This is another one of those episodes that I didn't attach a rating to. I want to give it around a 6 on my rating scale, but then again I want to give it a 9 just for the stew. You guys have no idea how long I spent laughing at just the 20 second interval where they were showing the stew. I have no clue why I find it funny, but I do. I'll just go ahead and give it a 6. Mochiron sou yo. (Maybe I should create some labels so you can search episodes by rating? I think I might do that.)

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Matsumoto's Challenge: Skateboarding!

"Matsumoto Week" comes to a close here at BlackGaki with this episode, again from the "Matsumoto's Challenge" series. I wanted to do the "Matsumoto and Eri" episodes that someone requested from this series, but I can't get them to work right. Everytime I try to separate it so it will fit, all the programs I've tried using think it's an audio file. I can open the file and it plays as video just fine. Tried updating my codecs and everything. I'll try and figure out why that is, and then throw it up here to watch. They would have been a nice change of pace, and it's somewhat fitting given the news that he's going to be a daddy. So, minor bummer, as I didn't get to put in all the programming I wanted to during the week.

However, any Gaki is better than no Gaki, right? So today's episode really doesn't need that much explanation if you've seen the other Matsumoto's challenge episodes. Matsumoto wants to skateboard. Not just your normal "maintain balance while rolling" type of skateboarding that I still have yet to achieve. He wants to do tricks. Specifically, a "backside-grab, shifty frontside 900 air".

I'm most definitely not an authority on skateboarding, but using what I've picked up from playing "1080 Snowboarding" a long time ago on the Nintendo 64, I think I've been able to pick apart the nomenclature to dissect the elements of the trick. Any of you who happen to be more skate-savvy, feel free to correct/confirm.

"Backside-grab" = Rider grabs the board on their rear side.
"Shifty" = Rider's feet shift on the board in air
"Frontside" = The rider's front side is going into the spin.
"900 Air" = A 900 degree rotation in midair. 2.5 spins.

That sounds like an impressive accomplishment.



As it's a fairly familiar format if you're a regular, I'm just going to put up the movies and let you sit back, relax and watch. See ya afterwards.






So, it looks like they didn't try to research what a back... that trick is supposed to be. Oh well. It was still very funny in the process. Sometimes I wonder just how much Matsumoto is on what the other members are going to be doing to him. For most of these tries, he looks incredibly surprised, afraid or gets hurt (that surfboard thing lands on his wrist when he falls off of it). After this and the other Matsumoto challenge episode, I might have to see if I can't snag a copy of Hitoshi's movie "Dainihonjin". He shows that he might have some abilities to be a serious actor, like when he's in the dressing room with snot dripping down his face or in the other when he's about to cry.

I didn't actually give this episode a rating, in my big list of episodes. I wonder why not. I'll give that one a 5-star rating. It's got all sorts of natural, scared Matsumoto moments, combined with great comedic set-ups like the magazine reporter's "Wakarimasu wa~"s. Over time, these Matsumoto's challenge episodes become a struggle between Matsumoto and the other members to be the most outlandish. You can see the both sides surprising each other with their shenanigans. I love those moments.
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The Matsumoto Martin James Hypnotism Show!

(I wanted to upload this last night, but stupid YouTube was down for maintenance.)

BlackGaki's "Matsumoto Week" continues with another episode! This time, like the last episode I reviewed, Matsumoto has something he REALLY wants to do. However, being so close as comedy partners, he only tells Hamada. However unlike last time, he wants to try his hand at hypnotism.

Hamada being ever so kind to his comedy partner, he enlists the help of the entire staff to play the victims of Matsumoto's latest venture. Also unlike the "Matsumoto's Challenge" series, this is not Hitoshi doing the High Jump, the hypnotism will be performed by his Japanese-fluent, westernized counterpart, Matsumoto Martin James. But seeing as Mr. James' powers of hypnotism are weaker (read as "non-existant"), the staff will have to play along.


Just like the Matsumoto's High Jump challenge, Hamada makes his entrance into the dressing room before the show in an unusually cheesy outfit. Speaking of cheesy outfits, what the hell is Yamazaki wearing? A shirt with cannabis leaves on it? What are we, immature college students?! Well, okay, I am. But are you, Yamazaki? I bet if someone threw a bag of it into your lap, you'd run off crying.

Aaanywho. We don't care about Yamazaki. He didn't win the poll. Matsumoto did. They've even made him his own set to host this new show, with a bench big enough for all of the prominent staff members to sit on. With Hamada acting as the assistant/announcer/commentator, the other staff members are put into a hypnotic state. The first suggestion which Matsumoto Martin applies is to Heipo, which is that of a chicken. Hilarity ensures. I don't know if did an adequate job translating the misunderstanding, but hopefully the note in the subtitles explains it?



So, the ever-pissed James retires to his dressing room to get a bite to eat. As you'd expect, a few follow to try and get Matsumoto to complete his act. I mean, it wouldn't be funny if they just let him leave and that was the end. So we try it again, with everyone coming to the agreement that they need to understand the damned instructions and do a better job of faking. So Matsumoto returns to the stage, and has to re-hypnotize everyone. However, his return act is to turn several people into Bruce Lee. More hilarity ensues due to an epic failure. However, one hypnotic suggestion does pass, thanks to Endou and his inner pervert.



With one successful hypnotism under his belt, James moves one to another suggestion. This time it's a gorilla, and the one tapped to be made primitive is the already slightly ape-ish Producer Suga. They would have ended the episode by now if something funny wasn't going to happen. And it just wouldn't be the same if it wasn't at least a semi-epic failure. Another apology, another excuse, another hypnotism. The last group hypnotism is fantastic, due to Tanaka's presence.



And Hamada, who is the biggest critic, winds up just ruining all the work. Not all stories have a happy ending for Matsumoto, I guess. I have no clue what I rated this video before, but I'm sure it was high, due to the monstrous amount of failure coming from Heipo and Sakamoto combined with Fujiwara's Bruce Lee face, all topped with a gay Tanaka and a nipple-rubbing Endou. I must say that even though it wound up being the entire episode, rather than the usual 10-15 minute opener, I enjoyed subtitling this release. It was easy since there were several things that were repeated over and over. Ha.

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Matsumoto's Challenge: High Jump

In 1993, Javier Sotomayor of Cuba set the current world record for the High Jump event by breaking 2meters and 45 cm, which is over 8 feet for all you non-metric users out there. The validity of this jump is much debated as Sotomayor allegedly tested positive for a performance enhancer. (Note: I'm not saying he did. It's "alleged". I really couldn't care less.) It's somewhat of a hot-button issue as he will openly admit to doing enough cocaine to put an artificial snowcap on Mt. Everest, but denies the use of a steroid.

Whether or not this feat of physical prowess was all skill or brought about by a steroid and crack binge, there will always be someone who strives to be number one. Today, that person is Hitoshi Matsumoto. The only things I assume Matsumoto would ever get high on is life and liquor, so if he succeeds, I wouldn't dispute it. Sometimes, a man has to do things that he feels are right, no matter what anyone else says.


Possibly on the verge of a mid-life crisis, Macchan breaks down crying and asks Hamada to help him get into the record books. Sensing that he can't do all of this alone, he asks for the help of the other members while dressed in "kuroko" uniform. Kurokos are kabuki-style stagehands. As kabuki usually was performed in front of a black background, a kuroko could walk around on the stage and manipulate things while blending into the background. Think of it like an old-fashioned green-screen technique/special FX department. Kuroko is still used today in things like TV shows when they want to move something, but don't want to show the staff's faces, etc.



After being coerced into helping with Matsumoto's predicament, Cocorico and Yamazaki change into kuroko uniform and get the show started. Matsumoto, clad in athletic gear, looks ready to get this thing started. Please note Matsumoto struggling to hold in his laughter as he explains why he has to do this. The other members start by trying to assist Matsumoto with an old-fashioned "Heave-ho!" over the bar, but to no avail. They try it again using a mat for some added leverage, but yet again to no avail. A frustrated Matsumoto returns to his dressing room to cool down with some knitting. When the other members come in to apologize for flubbing up the attempt, Macchan has had enough of being patronized and takes his frustations out on his own knitting. It's going to hard to pick this lost stitches back up.

Being the good sport that he is, Hitoshi gives it another shot for the sake of being a worldwide sports phenomenon. This time, the kuroko members use a firm mat to lift Matsumoto's limp and uncooperative body over the bar, but unfortunately that doesn't work. Hamada tries to say that it's a matter of angles, when it's pretty clear to anyone watching that height is a problem too. He probably could get higher on his own by really running and jumping.



Giving it another shot, they try to be inventive and create a makeshift harness and check him over poles. As usual, this does not work, and as soon as he can get those painful things off, he becomes a beast unchained. Please note Matsumoto pimpslapping Endou at 2:09 as well as Endou receiving said slap. Once again, Macchan pays a visit to his dressing room where he practices drumming, just in case this whole comedy thing doesn't work out.

After yet another reconciliation, an attempt is made to build a ramp up to the bar, and then flip over a stretcher with Matsumoto on it. Let's just say that the ramp wasn't near close. Also, please note Tanaka's frustration grunt/dance at about 3:44. Another trip to the dressing room while Matsumoto fills out an embarkation card. If I had enough money to commission an award, I would give the first ever Gakkster Award to Matsumoto for the hissy-fit he throws at starting around 5:12. I actually thought he was on the verge of tears. Literally.

So, in a last ditch effort to prevent BlackGaki's favorite member from breaking down, they use several stepladders and the strength of a few staff members to pull Matsumoto's body up to the bar. Even Matsumoto has to laugh when he sees what's in store for him. When they get it together and get him lifted, Matsumoto manages to "clear" the 2m 50 cm bar. With that, a new world record was set.

If my record is right, this is the first in the "Matsumoto's Challenge" series, in which Matsumoto tries to do something amazing, usually involving a world record. On the surface these types of episodes are funny for many "Factors of Funny": The "WTF?!" factor, the "That was unexpected" factor, the "Random Violence" factor, and the "Physical Comedy" factor. It also makes you wonder one several levels just how they planned this type of episode to look. Did they really want anyone to thing that Matsumoto was really trying to break a world record? Did they want us to believe that Matsumoto was being serious for once?

I'm not sure if I'm actually able to judge this episode very well just on its own merits. I gave it 5 stars in my big spreadsheet-thing that I logged these episodes in. I think that is a fair verdict, if even a little high. The episode is quite enjoyable due to hilarious, and at times believable, overacting coupled with slaps and the general "comedy-of-errors" format. I think I'll keep it at 5.
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Itao is Watching!

(Original airdate: 2/7/1999)

Sorry about the late post AGAIN this week. Got stuck helping a friend move to a new apartment. Unfortunately, this friend has no sense of space and when to let things go, so there was a ton of unnecessary things that he wanted to take with him, etc. I was trapped all weekend, and it takes about 2 days for me to subtitle a video, especially one this speech-heavy. And then I've got to post a review here, which usually make take another night to really refine and polish, but since I don't want to be any later, I'm just going to throw one together in about an hour. Sorry for giving you less than my best. *bow*

Before we get started, a few reminders. The first poll is going to be ending! It looks like Matsumoto is far out in the lead, so I'll probably just declare him the winner now, as Yamazaki getting enough votes to take over the lead is probably the result of foulplay (I can see where the votes are coming from :P ). It ends at the end of Friday. Well, Saturday morning at exactly 12:00, but anyway. Just vote if you haven't!

Then stay tuned for one or two new polls. These polls will be shorter duration and have fairly little effect on the programming here at BlackGaki, but it's a way to get input out of you. So, on with the program.

It was a day like any other. The Gaki No Tsukai members and staff were going to play some badminton and try to shake off some cabin fever caused by the cold winter. Nothing out of the usual. We just get to sit back and enjoy the antics of 4 comedians as they try to play a game which they really have no idea how to play, with the help of a referee who has EVEN LESS idea of how to play. (If you swing and miss at a shot that lands out, it still landed out, Yamazaki! You'll see what I mean when you watch the video.)

Nothing out of the ordinary should happen here. . .

Just going to play some normal, fun, uninterrupted badminton. . .


We're all good at the beginning. Everyone's going to enjoy a nice refreshing game of badminton in a park in the city. The members are divided into Hamada-Endou and Matsumoto-Tanaka teams for the match. When the action begins the Hamada-Endou team (in blue) takes the first point as Matsumoto seems to lack hand-eye coordination with a racket. Both teams find their rhythm and coordination, and finally get a few rallies going, with Endou and Tanaka having some sort of unintentional "Who can hit the birdie the unnecessarily high?" match. After a point that requires a line judgement, Yamazaki spots a familiar face on the veranda of an overlooking residential building.



That figure is Ittsuji Itao, member of the comedy group 130R. Itao is also a member of Yoshimoto Kougyou talent agency, along with the other Gaki members, and worked with Downtown for about 7 years on the show "Gottsu Ee Kanji". One of his main gags is his "wife", who usually is just a sidekick to Itao's hairbrained get-rich-quick schemes. These "wives" aren't his real wife, as he is happily married. The comedy wives are usually foreigners, but in the earlier episodes, they were native Japanese. I believe so far he's had about 6-7 wife characters with the 4th or 5th one being the most popular (the one that dances, and uses only 3-4 phrases). I'll probably have some sort of post on the history of his wives and what I've been able to dig up on some of them.

Anyway, they don't want Itao watching them, which is understandable, as Itao does look somewhat creepy when he stares. He's got the buggy rabbit-eyes thing going on. Naturally, being a shot on location with skies looking somewhat gray, they want to wrap up the shoot as soon as possible. So, they send the doughy manager, Fujiwara, up to ask Itao to kindly GTFI, with I being "inside." After some arguments, Itao does in fact GTFI and the members are able to play.

The quiet doesn't last very long as Itao emerges again. This time, they send a squad of men, slightly more intimidating than chubby little Fujiwara, to make it clearer that Itao has to let them finish taping. And he does get the message and goes back inside disgruntled.

So we thought...

And ONCE AGAIN, Itao peeks his head out onto the veranda to watch the match. The part I found funny about this whole staged situation (Yes, it's staged. Sorry if I ruined the thinly-veiled surprise) is that there actually is a random spectator watching from the roof at 5:13. Ha! Anyway, Itao returns with a vengeance. He doesn't think he should have to go inside, as the place is his house after all. They chose that spot to work and they should just deal with it if he cares to watch from his own property. Minor hilarity and minor blackmail ensue. . .




So in the end, Itao wins the badminton tournament, and the legacy of Itao's episodes on Gaki No Tsukai begins. On my scale, I gave this episode a 4. It was fairly good, but compared to other Itao episodes this is just the basics. This episode itself isn't that iconic in the GNT universe, but this type of structure provides the foundation of what Itao's involvement in Gaki will be for years to come. I promise more Itao episodes to come, as those are some of my favorites (mainly for his wife though).

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Producer Nakamura's Shichihenge!

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*

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Kiki Canned Coffee!!!

Before I get started, I’d like to take a minute to remind you readers about the poll on the main page. If you haven’t voted already, go ahead and do so. I’m going to be uploading an episode which I think does a good job of showing off the winner’s charm. So far, Matsumoto’s in the lead, while Yamazaki and Tanaka are neck and neck near the middle, and Endou and Hamada are fighting it out in the tail end. So make your voices heard and hopefully your favorite wins!

Also, the general request post has been updated and some things have been added. If you’ve got anything else you’d like to see, put it up there, and I’ll try to work it in if I have it.

Now, on to the episode at hand.

The Kiki series is yet another one of Gaki’s many main series. In each episode, there’s a topic product, usually food, but not always, like in the case where they used cigarettes. On the table before them, several different brands of the topic product are spread out, and one by one, each Gaki member has to try and guess which brand of the product was given to them by process of elimination. If they manage to do so, they get a 100,000 yen in prize money! If they guess wrong, they get a fat slap in the face! The audience can’t lose either way!


The first episode of the Kiki series is canned coffee. First of all, let me take an educational moment to reflect on some of the oddness of the Japanese language. If you don’t care about this kind of thing, skip on to the next paragraph! Okay, so when the opening scene shows up, and Hamada’s reading the banner, you may notice that “can” has a kanji character "kan"(缶) even though “can” is a borrowed word. Normally words like that are spelled out in Katakana, which is usually used for loan words and onomatopoeic sounds. However, through the phenomenon called “ateji” kanji compounds that would have the same sound when read and similar meaning are attached to the word. A common example that you might see when watching Japanese TV is “club.” You’d expect it to be written out in katakana as クラブ(kurabu) but you may see in kanji as 倶楽部 which has the same pronunciation, and pretty much the same meaning. Another example I can think of off the top of my head is tobacco. In katakana, it should be tabako(タバコ), but also has the kanji 煙草. In this case though, the katakana version is used way more frequently than the kanji version. Aaaaanyway, back to the episode.

The Gaki members are dressed up as suave waiters, with cute little vests, bowties, and aprons. Hamada gets the honors of introducing the segment and rules. If you watch closely during this part, you can see Tanaka getting all riled up and anxious, because he loves coffee. Hamada also gets to introduce the prize money of 100,000 yen, and that there’s a penalty if you guess incorrectly. Knowing that his comedy partner doesn’t like coffee normally, Matsumoto questions Hamada’s motives for participating in this kind of event with accusations of wanting some money for to keep for his self.

I know the review is going to be very short, but as not to ruin any of the results, I’m just going to put the movies in here and let you watch them. I‘ll see you guys after the movies. :P







So, no one managed to guess their brand correctly. That is unfortunate, but it really makes you wonder just how hard it is to do something like that. I imagine it would pretty dang hard. However slaps abound in this episode and it really manages to keep you on the edge of your seat: will we get to see someone succeed? Even if we don’t, we get to see them get smacked! I also got the added bonus of watching Tanaka fidget around while hyped up on coffee and watching Yamazaki get pimp slapped.
I gave this episode a 6-star rating on the official Black Gaki rating scale.

This is one of the episodes where I started to realize the pure genius that comes out of Japanese late-night TV. We’d never get something like this on American TV. The host take themselves way too seriously to ever let someone slap them, and they’re just too anorexic to eat things in front of other people. I wish there was some way we could write a letter to TV execs basically saying “Your shows suck. We’re outsourcing your jobs to Japan.” I think we’d have some sort of valid basis to show how popular their shows are if they didn’t go screaming “COPYRIGHT!” every few weeks and taking things off of video sites. Until we get our voices heard, you know that you have me, right?!

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Ice Coffee Limit Check

Another one of Gaki no Tsukai’s long-running series, the Genkai(Limit) series finds the Gaki members interacting with just more than each other. They take the action out into the real world with real people. The first episode in the Genkai series comes about due to Matsumoto flubbing up his order and his observation that if you go into a restaurant and order ice coffee, even if you should slur or mangle the word a little, you’ll still get the iced coffee. Isn’t it funny how Matsumoto gets all sorts of ideas from restaurants, like when he wanted to make waitresses spin in place.

So Downtown and Yamazaki hit the tour bus, and head out into the town. Matsumoto kicks his idea off by introducing 11 things that he thinks that you can say and still get away with. They are:

• “aisu moohii” (Ice Mohi)


• “naisu koohii” (Nice coffee)


• “maisu moohii” (Mice Mohi)


• “naisu koochi” (Nice Coach)


• “aisouwarai” (a faked smile)


• “koohii koohii” (coffee coffee)


• “tansu nouhin” (a cabinet delivery)


• “atsui koohii” (Hot coffee)


• “aitsu mou ii” (I’ve had enough of him)


• “haisosaitii” (High Society)


• “aianhiiroo” (Iron Hero)

They only aired 10 of the them, and cut out the “atsui koohii”, which always got hot coffee. Due to Downtown's notoriety, they send Yamazaki to do the hard work, as at that time he was still fairly unknown. Let’s see how the little runt did. . .



First up, “Ice Mohi”. Yamazaki orders his “ice mohi” and the waiter stands there with a dumb look on his face, trying to confirm that that he really meant iced coffee. When asks for four “ice mohi”s, he knew it wasn’t a mistake and went to fetch the drinks. “Nice coffee” went off without a hitch, and the waiter returns with an iced coffee. Hopefully it actually tasted good, then he would have gotten what he ordered.

For the third attempt, Yamazaki finds himself trying to order a “Mice Mohi”, which he does actually get. But I’d like to take this moment to make a public service announcement: Children, brush your teeth. The waiter helping Yamazaki and friends has a grill that would make Chuck Norris cry. (Yes, I did just make a Chuck Norris joke, even though those are about 3 years old now.) Seriously, his teeth are so bad that his hairline is running away from it.
The fourth phrase, “Nice Coach”, was a close one. The waitress and the man making the orders both heard it, but assumed he was talking about coffee after he refused to give a response. The waitress just decides to screw it and go with an iced coffee. It was just barely close enough to pass.

Aisouwarai is a forced smile, kind of like when you’re forced to play nice with someone you really don’t like. Apparently when you order at a restaurant with that, you get iced café au lait. I guess I can see how that would work: “Aisouwarai” versus “Aisuoore”.

Ordering a “coffeecoffee”, gets you regular hot coffee. That would be a no-brainer, so I can’t figure out why Yamazaki looked surprised and disappointed when she brings hot coffee.

The seventh is where we just ditch the concept of coffee altogether and start ordering all sorts of oddball things. The seventh phrase is “tansu nouhin” which translates to “delivery of a dresser/cabinet”. There was no way that these from here on out were going to pass.

“Aitsu mou ii” is eighth, and this threw the waitress for a loop. She tried to act like she understood the order and walked off, but when Yamazaki called her over to make sure that she got it right, she gave away that she had no clue.

The last two, “High Society” and “Iron Hero” were just not going to pass. I do commend both of the waitresses for not slapping Yamazaki in the face for his idiocy. The last waitress even wanted to learn, like she wanted to stay on top of the current slang and lingo. She figured it was a new trend that she might need to take note off. I’d give her a tip if I was Yamazaki.

After reviewing the results, Matsumoto takes Hamada out to try ordering with high-level words. The hilarious and the miraculous ensue. However, in the comedy talk after the opener, Hamada puts Matsumoto in his place by exposing the truth about what happened in the coffee shop that day.



Overall, I give this episode a 4-star rating. For more on my wonky rating system, check this out.

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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.

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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.
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レベンジマッチ:山崎vs.Moriman Part 3

(Revenge match: Yamazaki vs. Moriman part 3)

　　　　After getting his ass handed to him on a platter in the previous two matches, Downtown revises the format of the match to include more than the pants removing match, in hopes that it would give Yamazaki the chance to get his revenge. Also, the newcomers to the show, Cocorico, serve as Yamazaki’s trainers. Feel free to squeal at the sight of a tracksuited Tanaka. Endo gets the responsibility to break the tension before the fight, and does so with great ease. He’ll get this responsibility for all of the Yamazaki vs. Moriman events after this, and it’s easy to see why. However, after this he’ll be doing this bit in briefs.

　　　　The first match is the “face stocking removal” match, in which both contestants try to remove the pantyhose placed over their opponent’s head. In doing so, their face will warp which means big laughs for the viewers. Unknown to the organizers of this event, Moriman wasn’t in it for the laughs, and winds up wrestling Yamazaki to the ground, climbing on his back and choking him. Yamazaki taps and loses the match.

　　　　After regaining his composure, Yamazaki is faced with the “slipper fight” match. The premise is simple: each person gets two slippers and attempts to beat the living hell out of their opponent. Moriman jumps out of her corner and begins the ass-beating. Yamazaki puts up a fight, but finds himself backed into a corner. He tries to circle to the center of the ring, but turns his back to Moriman and finds himself on the receiving end of a direct slipper hit to the face. Another victory for Moriman.

Behold the face of a man who has been beaten down with a slipper.

　　　　Yamazaki gets to choose the third match, and chooses the “Low kick” match. I don’t think he really thought through the idea that Moriman was going to be able to kick him.
　　　　The fourth match is the “super hot ankake” match, in which each person gets a pan full of hot ankake sauce to fling at their opponent. The first one to give up or is unable to continue loses. Okay, while it’s still funny, the “OH MAN IT’S HOT” myth was debunked a while ago. Japanese comedians seem to love doing thing with “hot” things because they get to do reaction bits. The most common hot thing is hot water. For example in some quiz shows, if you get an answer wrong, you get dropped into “hot” water, and the comedian runs around, says that it’s hot, and flops around, etc. In actuality, it’s a little warmer than room temperature, and poses no health risks at all.
　　　　Fifth match is the “wet towel” match, where several wet towels are placed in the ring. Rule is much like all the other ones. Use the towel, beat the snot out of your opponent, you win.

　　　　Much like times before Yamazaki gets pummeled while showing little to no resistance. I think I’ll give this episode a rating of 5 stars. Although the new battle themes were nice, all of the matches were fairly short. The commentary between and after rounds is what made the episode worth watching.

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山崎邦正ケツリベンジ: KETSU-1グランプリ!! (Yamazaki vs Moriman Part 2)

(Yamazaki Housei Ass revenge: Ass-1 Grand Prix)

Original Airdate: 12/29/1996

As the title suggests, today is Yamazaki’s chance to get revenge on Moriman because he got steamrolled by Moriman. First he starts by making excuses, about his ribs, and that there’s something keeping him from performing at his very best. Matsumoto just wants to clear the air, and make sure that he’s not wimping out. When he asks if Yamazaki wants to quit, Yamazaki answers “…if I can…” for which Matsumoto, like I would, smacks him across the face.


Unlike the previous time, Yamazaki opts out of the sparring matches against groups, and shows off his sparring partner. His sparring partner, Heipo, works on the show, and is generally known for three points: He’s easily scared, he’s got no luck with the ladies, and he’s generally a pervert. Yamazaki squares off against this pervert. Then after the first match, Hamada reminds Yamazaki that Moriman usually manages to get him in a defensive position and that he has to be able to guard, so the second sparring match starts with Heipo on top of the grounded Yamazaki. Pimp slaps ensue. Matsumoto suggests that they should change the line-up to Moriman vs. Heipo.

The show then breaks for a Downtown comedy talk, in which they talk about things ranging from Yamazaki’s work as a singer to the sound of rain in the building to the Tamagocchi (you know, those little virtual pets that all us kids, including myself, had in fourth grade) craze. I was thinking of subtitling some of these talks because they’re a big part of the show, and sometimes they’re things you can’t laugh at by visual cues alone unlike most of the other openers. So, uh… if anyone knows any programs, or generally what you’d use to subtitle videos, dropping me a line in the Comments section would be appreciated.

After the comedy talk, we’re ready for the revenge match. It starts with challenger Yamazaki’s entrance to “Eye of the Tiger”, then champion Moriman’s entrance to “We Will Rock You” and rocks Yamazaki with slaps to the face before the match even starts. Yamazaki’s forced to wimp out yelling “Owowowow!” Once the dust settles, both fighters are presented with flower bouquets from foreign women (showing Gaki’s, or perhaps all of Japan’s, concept that “it’s funny because they’re foreign” which we’ll see many times throughout Gaki’s history) and then they are ready to battle. Note: as you watch this video, please be prepared for Matsumoto’s infectious hyena-laugh at about 15 seconds.

Hamada pretty much summed it all up with the “何ソレ?” (nani sore?) meaning “What was that?” The story of Yamazaki’s life, eh? I’ve cataloged this episode as a 4-star episode, but I’d like to bump it up to a five. It’s building up to a legend. I probably marked a 4 because I think this was the first of the “Yamazaki vs. Moriman” episodes I’d ever seen and didn’t know that it was going to a part of something so huge. It lacks the polish and general hilarity over that most of the other episodes have, being so short, but it’s still able to hold its own.

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山崎ケツ公開スパーリング （Yamazaki Vs Moriman Part 1)

Original Airdate: 11/03/1996
Yamazaki Housei ketsu koukai sparring. Yamazaki vs. Moriman 1

This episode is a classic that will start what will go down in history, at least in my book, as a legendary series on Gaki no Tsukai. Yamazaki, who recently joined as a regular on the show still has to prove himself to Downtown, and therefore has decided to show that the entertainment world is all about kicking ass and getting your ass kicked. On a side note, he does all this while wearing this schoolboy uniform.

Downtown didn't ask why he wore this, so neither will I.

Yamazaki has decided to warm up, and then have a match with the Champion. Myself, nor Matsumoto or Hamada know how a champion exists, but apparently there is one. The rules of the battle are simple: Pull off the opponent’s pants, leaving them to lie there bare-assed in shame. The first two matches are sparring matches in which Yamazaki faces a group of five opponents at once, and cannot remove his opponent’s pants. The point is to see just how long he can hold out against them. I think the main reason is to see Yamazaki get straight owned by 5 people at once.

The first match is against a squad of American Football players. The squad doesn't see to be professional, but hey, they're just there to tear the pants off of Yamazaki. It doesn't take a professional anything to do that.

A pitiful nine and a half seconds. I can't play a song on my violin sad enough to describe how sad that was, but then again, I've only been learning for about 3 months so I can't play much of anything.

Sparring match two is against the fearsome "おばさん軍団” or "Granny Squad". These here ain't your "give you fresh baked cookies" variety of grannies. These are the pants-pulling, ass-slappin' grannies that your friend told you stories about, but you never believed.



After strutting down to the ring, the grannies sized up the opposition. Yamazaki seemed to want to size up the granny in the gray blouse...

... but, uh... Yamazaki... that big grape looking thing behind you looks like she can crush you with her left boob alone... (which I secretly wish she did)


As is somewhat obvious if you know how weak Yamazaki is, he gets dragged to the ground and stripped. Left to lie in shame, with this ass flapping in the breeze.

After the warm-ups, it's time to take on the Champion, which no one knows who appointed as the Champion. The champion is Moriman. I guess technically that's wrong. Moriman is a duo made up of 種馬マン(Taneuma-man) and モリ末(Moriou), but Moriou is the one doing all the fighting. Taneumaman serves as the corner girl. Aaaaaanyway, the champion makes their way into the ring, and starts by sending a message of the hard slap to Yamazaki's face. This is where to the battle begins. Yamazaki can now try to take off his opponent's pants. It's on, show them what you can do, Yamazaki.

Not much, apparently, lol. Okay, well you have to give the man some credit. After taking that beating, he gets back up and is ready immediately for his rematch. You lost the battle, not the war. Get 'er done, Zaki.

Okay, so now you've lost the war. It's okay, Yamazaki. Unfortunately for you (yet fortunately for the rest of us), you'll be fighting Moriman again later.

I'm giving this episode 6 stars. As I said in my first post ever, there's very few things that make me even care about Yamazaki. One of those things is Yamazaki getting pummeled. This episode if chock full of it. This is episode sets up a series that will last for years on Gaki no Tsukai, and is truly a golden gem in th -- ... wait... a golden gem? Is that even possible? It must be late, I'm being nonsensical. Let me be brief then, and generally non-poetic. Yamazaki gets beatdown, and that makes me happy. Four stars!

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