(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).
Read more!
Sunday, May 24, 2009
Monday, May 18, 2009
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*
Read more!
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!
Sunday, May 10, 2009
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?!
Read more!
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?!
Read more!
Monday, May 4, 2009
Goodbye, Yamazaki! 1
If I remember correctly, I had come home from a bad day at school. Or maybe it was summer, and I had a hard day at work. Anyway, I had a crappy day, and I came home hoping that Gaki would be there to cheer me up. I opened the video file to find Downtown and Cocorico, wearing suits with a very somber tone to the scene. I looked just above their heads to see a banner reading “Goodbye, Yamazaki!!” My mood escalated tremendously. After years of having to put up with Yamazaki trying to push his way to the TV screen, he’s being sent packing?! Oh Gaki, I knew you’d make the right choice someday. Let’s just hurry up and get this episode over with, so we can have the show feature the four people I can stand!
Hamada breaks the news that Yamazaki will be leaving the program, and today will be his last episode, due to his “graduation.” Yamazaki is brought out, wearing a tuxedo that looks too big in the shoulders, to explain his feelings. Hamada tries to put the mood into perspective with an “although it’s a sad time, it’s also a happy time” type of speech, when all I really care about is whether the door’s going to hit Yamazaki on the way out. Matsumoto brings up that neither he nor Endo had heard anything about his reasoning behind leaving the show. Yamazaki tries to spit out this crap about how he’s found a girlfriend and implies that he won’t have time. Then he tells the real story about how he wants to appear on more than one show, and they tell him that ain’t going to work, so he decided to leave. Apparently, Matsumoto realizes that Yamazaki is worthless, because he’s turning away from the camera to laugh. Wait. . . That’s why he’s laughing, right? It has to be.
Anyway, Yamazaki has chosen his best 5 clips from his time on Gaki No Tsukai. C’mon. Let’s get this over with. . .
First is Yamazaki’s attempt at becoming a “Super Yogore” comedian. (I actually thought about covering this episode. I’ll get to it eventually, I promise.) In an attempt to be a shock comedian, Yamazaki goes to a “Love hotel” with a dresser. Love hotels are hotels that you rent out on basically hourly rates, and are for, well, making love in. He proceeds to wash and give an “erotic massage” to the dresser, while Downtown watch from a separate room via camera.
In fourth place is Yamazaki versus Jimmy Oonishi. Not just one episode, but over several episodes, Yamazaki and Jimmy Oonishi, which many of you know from the High School Penalty game as the “Ten. . . Ten. . . Ten. Ten. Ten. Ten. Ten” guy, had a feud going on. The clip shows Jimmy doing a move to Yamazaki’s car a la Rick James on Charlie Murphy’s couch. (That first note that shows up during that scene says that is really Yamazaki’s car.)
Coming in third place is a prank that the show played on Yamazaki in which an actor plays the role of the older broth of the girl that Yamazaki is dating. Basically, Yamazaki tries to bitch out and act like he’s not there AFTER he asks “Who’s there?” when the actor knocks. Dumbass. Then when the accomplice writer “accidentally” opens the door for the actor, Yamazaki acts like he’s not Yamazaki. The prank is revealed and he gets all teary-eyed, etc.
Second place is the “Haunted School Piano Concert”. In a penalty game, Yamazaki’s forced to walk around a “haunted school” getting instructions and sheet music on songs to play on the piano. It’s dark and eerie enough, but with added scares from the set-up traps placed by the production crew, there was lots of screaming and whining going on.
Number one is “Yamazaki vs. Moriman: Battle of the Blaze”. As for the reasoning behind this, I’m pretty sure that if you’ve seen the series, you’d know why it’s easy for anyone to enjoy. If you’re a Yamazaki fan, you’ll love that he’s not afraid to make fun of himself. If you’re not a Yamazaki fan (you probably can tell which side of the fence I’m on), you get to see him get his ass handed to him repeatedly. Featured in the clip is a brief history of the “Hot, hot ankake” battle, in which competitors pour hot soup over each other in order to make the other give up.
After the clip, it’s time for the members and prominent members of the staff to say their goodbyes. First up is Producer Suga, starts his message with the traditional “Thanks for these 12 years”, etc. message, and then descends into speaking complete gibberish because he doesn't have much else to say. Then Cocorico gives a speech, and Downtown drops a bomb basically saying “It’s a good thing you quit, because otherwise we were going to.” Ha! ROFL! OWNED!
Next up is Yamazaki’s turn to speak to the audiences. He basically gives the typical “Thank you for cheering me on” speech but adds “I just want to appear on a few other shows”. Ha! Yet again! Ha!
As soon as Yamazaki leaves the stage, Matsumoto explains that his leaving makes it easier on the show. A group of five is a hard thing, and having only four people makes it easy to work together and easier to split up into teams. Way to look at all the positives, Matsumoto! It looks like we’ll be seeing a lot more 2 vs 2 competitions on Gaki No Tsukai, with four people that are going to make this interesting. This calls for cute, little, celebratory emotes! (^__^)b \o/ 8-)
Hrm. . . “Yama-chan wa. . . Gaki No Tsukai Yamahende!”... Doesn’t that mean, “Yama-chan isn’t leaving Gaki No Tsukai”? Wait. . . WHAT?! No! Why is Yamazaki standing behind that curtain? And what in the world is he doing in that shirt?! This is all a joke? No! NO! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! Why is the music starting? Oh, not Ricky Martin... And what's with the Engrish?
. . .
Oh great, now he's doing Para-Para dancing?! Leave. Now.
Okay, Gaki. You got me. I thought you'd kicked him to the curb. Jokes on me. Har har har. Overall, I gave this episode a 4-star rating. If they'd actually booted him off of the show, it would be along the lines of a 25-star rating. I've found out that I really didn't like this episode because I had to subtitle it, and this episode is almost all talk. Secondly, the announcer's voice during the montage is so damn slow, I'd have to leave some subtitles up for 10 seconds just waiting for him to finish a sentence. *shakes fist vehemently at person who requested this episode* Anyway, I guess it's better that I just go ahead and get reviewing it out of the way. I probably won't do most of the others. They're the same format, with different clips and slightly funnier parting messages. The ending parts where he proclaims he's not leaving are the only parts worth the time, in my opinion.
Read more!
Hamada breaks the news that Yamazaki will be leaving the program, and today will be his last episode, due to his “graduation.” Yamazaki is brought out, wearing a tuxedo that looks too big in the shoulders, to explain his feelings. Hamada tries to put the mood into perspective with an “although it’s a sad time, it’s also a happy time” type of speech, when all I really care about is whether the door’s going to hit Yamazaki on the way out. Matsumoto brings up that neither he nor Endo had heard anything about his reasoning behind leaving the show. Yamazaki tries to spit out this crap about how he’s found a girlfriend and implies that he won’t have time. Then he tells the real story about how he wants to appear on more than one show, and they tell him that ain’t going to work, so he decided to leave. Apparently, Matsumoto realizes that Yamazaki is worthless, because he’s turning away from the camera to laugh. Wait. . . That’s why he’s laughing, right? It has to be.
Anyway, Yamazaki has chosen his best 5 clips from his time on Gaki No Tsukai. C’mon. Let’s get this over with. . .
First is Yamazaki’s attempt at becoming a “Super Yogore” comedian. (I actually thought about covering this episode. I’ll get to it eventually, I promise.) In an attempt to be a shock comedian, Yamazaki goes to a “Love hotel” with a dresser. Love hotels are hotels that you rent out on basically hourly rates, and are for, well, making love in. He proceeds to wash and give an “erotic massage” to the dresser, while Downtown watch from a separate room via camera.
In fourth place is Yamazaki versus Jimmy Oonishi. Not just one episode, but over several episodes, Yamazaki and Jimmy Oonishi, which many of you know from the High School Penalty game as the “Ten. . . Ten. . . Ten. Ten. Ten. Ten. Ten” guy, had a feud going on. The clip shows Jimmy doing a move to Yamazaki’s car a la Rick James on Charlie Murphy’s couch. (That first note that shows up during that scene says that is really Yamazaki’s car.)
Coming in third place is a prank that the show played on Yamazaki in which an actor plays the role of the older broth of the girl that Yamazaki is dating. Basically, Yamazaki tries to bitch out and act like he’s not there AFTER he asks “Who’s there?” when the actor knocks. Dumbass. Then when the accomplice writer “accidentally” opens the door for the actor, Yamazaki acts like he’s not Yamazaki. The prank is revealed and he gets all teary-eyed, etc.
Second place is the “Haunted School Piano Concert”. In a penalty game, Yamazaki’s forced to walk around a “haunted school” getting instructions and sheet music on songs to play on the piano. It’s dark and eerie enough, but with added scares from the set-up traps placed by the production crew, there was lots of screaming and whining going on.
Number one is “Yamazaki vs. Moriman: Battle of the Blaze”. As for the reasoning behind this, I’m pretty sure that if you’ve seen the series, you’d know why it’s easy for anyone to enjoy. If you’re a Yamazaki fan, you’ll love that he’s not afraid to make fun of himself. If you’re not a Yamazaki fan (you probably can tell which side of the fence I’m on), you get to see him get his ass handed to him repeatedly. Featured in the clip is a brief history of the “Hot, hot ankake” battle, in which competitors pour hot soup over each other in order to make the other give up.
After the clip, it’s time for the members and prominent members of the staff to say their goodbyes. First up is Producer Suga, starts his message with the traditional “Thanks for these 12 years”, etc. message, and then descends into speaking complete gibberish because he doesn't have much else to say. Then Cocorico gives a speech, and Downtown drops a bomb basically saying “It’s a good thing you quit, because otherwise we were going to.” Ha! ROFL! OWNED!
Next up is Yamazaki’s turn to speak to the audiences. He basically gives the typical “Thank you for cheering me on” speech but adds “I just want to appear on a few other shows”. Ha! Yet again! Ha!
As soon as Yamazaki leaves the stage, Matsumoto explains that his leaving makes it easier on the show. A group of five is a hard thing, and having only four people makes it easy to work together and easier to split up into teams. Way to look at all the positives, Matsumoto! It looks like we’ll be seeing a lot more 2 vs 2 competitions on Gaki No Tsukai, with four people that are going to make this interesting. This calls for cute, little, celebratory emotes! (^__^)b \o/ 8-)
Hrm. . . “Yama-chan wa. . . Gaki No Tsukai Yamahende!”... Doesn’t that mean, “Yama-chan isn’t leaving Gaki No Tsukai”? Wait. . . WHAT?! No! Why is Yamazaki standing behind that curtain? And what in the world is he doing in that shirt?! This is all a joke? No! NO! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! Why is the music starting? Oh, not Ricky Martin... And what's with the Engrish?
. . .
Oh great, now he's doing Para-Para dancing?! Leave. Now.
Okay, Gaki. You got me. I thought you'd kicked him to the curb. Jokes on me. Har har har. Overall, I gave this episode a 4-star rating. If they'd actually booted him off of the show, it would be along the lines of a 25-star rating. I've found out that I really didn't like this episode because I had to subtitle it, and this episode is almost all talk. Secondly, the announcer's voice during the montage is so damn slow, I'd have to leave some subtitles up for 10 seconds just waiting for him to finish a sentence. *shakes fist vehemently at person who requested this episode* Anyway, I guess it's better that I just go ahead and get reviewing it out of the way. I probably won't do most of the others. They're the same format, with different clips and slightly funnier parting messages. The ending parts where he proclaims he's not leaving are the only parts worth the time, in my opinion.
Read more!
Sunday, April 26, 2009
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:
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.
Read more!
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.
Read more!
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Your input appreciated!
Hello, ever increasing Black Gaki readers.
In an attempt to make the reader experience more enjoyable, I'm looking for some feedback on a few things．Feedback on anything, from the layout of the blog itself to my *cough cough* less-than-regular posting schedule, would be appreciated.
If you click on the "READ MORE!" below, I've posted a few things I'd really like your opinions on. . .
THINGS I'D APPRECIATE YOUR OPINION ON:
In an attempt to make the reader experience more enjoyable, I'm looking for some feedback on a few things．Feedback on anything, from the layout of the blog itself to my *cough cough* less-than-regular posting schedule, would be appreciated.
If you click on the "READ MORE!" below, I've posted a few things I'd really like your opinions on. . .
THINGS I'D APPRECIATE YOUR OPINION ON:
- Subtitles - I recently started putting subtitles on the videos that I'm putting up on YouTube. How do you like them? Are they too fast? Too slow? Should I continue to use the YouTube subtitle service thus letting people have the option of removing the subtitles, or should I encode the subtitles onto the video itself?
- Content - What parts of the show would you like to see? Just the openers? Mostly openers, but some talk portions if they're good? Would you like just episode clips or would you like to see some compilations of pieces grouped in some interesting way?
- Layout - Perhaps a different color than this boring old black and light green? (Keep in mind that I'm horrible with HTML, CSS, and pretty much all things Webpage related, so if I do change it, it's going to be rough sailing.) Would you like to see more things like polls around? Should post titles be in English or Japanese with English below it?)
- Non-Gaki items - Anyone care about my personal goings-ons that I put in here, or should I just generally STFU and let you enjoy Gaki in all its glory? How would you feel about the occasional posting of other Japanese comedy acts, and not just those of Gaki or its members? Should I just keep them marked with a "[Non-Gaki Related]" tag, so you can just avoid them if you choose?
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!
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