Tokyo Scum Brigade

Loli-con Complex: Azuma Hideo and Aoyama Yuki

noreply@blogger.com (DrSenbei) — Thu, 16 May 2013 06:52:00 +0000

Available on Amazon.

If an artisan's touch can venerate obscene materials to the level of art, then perhaps Azuma Hideo and Aoyama Yuki will integrate loli-con aesthetics into the public sphere—or at least keep the censors off their backs for a little while longer. Azuma Hideo, recovering alcoholic and pioneer of the erotic-cute style of manga popularized in the late 70's, recently met with photographer Aoyama Yuki, best known for his tantalizing collections featuring schoolgirls in surreal poses, to discuss their collaboration on a new omnibus of Azuma's works.

On Aoyama Yuki
Azuma:
His photos manage to be erotic without showing the girl's face—that impressed me most. He leads your eye to the minutia, the wrinkles in a shirt, the ratio of fabric to flesh. He focuses on the parts you want to stare at on the train, but can't in fear of being arrested. There's something wholesome about that.

Aoyama:
A photo book is a collection of one panel manga. Each photograph is self-contained. There's no grand narrative, no connectivity, so a single frame needs to tell an entire story.

Disconnectivity is the core of my work. Typically at fashion shoots, the photographer tries to build up a rapport with the girl—“Yes yes, give me more!” But I want to remain removed without creating a relationship. I don't personally know the subject, so I can't ask them to act a certain way. I get more natural poses when I resign myself to their nature.

Likewise, I maintain a disconnect between the subject and viewer with barriers. A chair leg, a window frame, a wall of foreground defocus. Anything to put a visual element between you and the girl.

On Azuma Hideo
Azuma: Everything is ad-libbed while following the classic 4-act structure of beginning-rising action-twist- conclusion. I start with a main theme, then connect each panel with gags to serve as a part of the larger whole. The narrative needs to loop back on itself. It can't be nonsense. The punchline should be logical, even if the logic is self-contained—we're talking science fiction, after all.

Some of my characters have developed a life of their own. Like Nanako and Mia from Scrap Gakuen. They're still tumbling around inside my head, waiting for their roll call.

Learning how to draw girls is an ongoing study. Aoyama's books are a great reference for how skirts fold and shirts crease. My style has changed more times than I like to admit since the 70's, but the fundamentals are the same—a young face with a big chest and fat ankles.

Aoyama:
Puberty introduces boys to girls as an object of sexual desire without providing a way to connect with them. That's why us men are always stealing looks, peaking over our shoulders. Azuma's work contains that same cocktail of sexual frustration and daydream innocence. His drawings manage to be cute and pure despite the grotesque motifs—bugs, poop, violence. His simple lines are purposeful and kinetic, ready to jump off the page.

On their Trademark Design Element:
Azuma:
The juxtaposition of slender limbs poking out of baggy clothing. Like cardigans or puffy blouses that scrunch up at the sleeve.

Aoyama:
Most of my models are backlit to create a crisp silouette and posed to create depth—for example, partially showing the other leg obstructed by the foreground leg prevents the image from looking flat.

On Following Trends:
Azuma:
There used to be more classically trained artists drawing comics. These days, everyone is simply a manga artist. Manga artists aren't draughtsmen—they can't draw anatomically accurate human forms.   We copy from other manga artists. Me, from Tezuka and Ishinomori Shotaro. People copied Otomo when he was big, then Takahashi Rumiko when she was big. Our drawing style shifts with trends because we have no core integrity.

Aoyama:
The same thing happens in the photography world. When Ninagawa Miki made her break, suddenly everyone rediscovered primary colors.

On Keeping It Real
Azuma:
A certain level of abstraction shields my manga from the censors. Setting nude characters against surreal backgrounds or omitting the man during sex scenes helps diffuse the smut potential.

It would be short-sighted to say that my work didn't have any effect on society. But that doesn't mean that I should limit my imagination and creativity because of that.

Aoyama:
You can photograph a young girl eating candy, so long as it doesn't have a stick. Lollipops and suckers are off the table. But what if you wanted to shoot her simply enjoying the treat? I think it all boils down to intent. Is the artist trying to create something lewd, or does the viewer pervert it in thier mind?

We live in the real world ruled by lawsuits so we must think pragmatically. Intent is open to interpretation, so it's the editor's call to decide what is fit to print. Take the recent AKB48 “hand bra” debacle. The photographer and models were just doing their jobs. It was the editor who was asleep at the wheel.

On What's Erotic
Azuma:
I'm taking a community college life drawing class. They sit you down to draw a naked woman, but it doesn't do anything for me. The girl needs to be clothed to get my juices going.

Another thing—girls that ooze sex from their pores aren't interesting either. They leave nothing to the imagination. But take a modest girl. You know she's as dirty as the rest of them behind closed doors. That's where it's at.

Aoyama:
Acting as my own editor, I don't allow panty shots to creep into my work. Spandex shorts only. Think of it like a doughnut. The middle is hollow—no obviously erotic elements at the center—but the outside ring is delicious.

Azuma and Aoyama have overlapping themes and visuals despite differences in their personal perversions and the generation gap. The phrase "loli-con" elicits a gag reflex in many, but strip away the sexual politics and you're left with a pleasingly soft aesthetic scented with the sweet smell of nostalgia. Even Freud had to admit that sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. How long before the public accepts that sometimes, a lollipop is just a lollipop?

Araki and Umezu's Bizzare Correlation

noreply@blogger.com (DrSenbei) — Thu, 14 Mar 2013 01:45:00 +0000

Author Profiles

Araki Hirohiko

Born: June 7th, 1960 in Sendai, Miyagi prefecture

Debut: 1980. Buso Poker (Armed Poker) receives Tezuka Award

Representative works: JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Part 1-8

Umezu Kazuo

Born: August 3rd, 1936 in Koya, Wakayama prefecture

Debut: 1955. Mori no Kyodai (Siblings in the Woods)

Representative works: The Drifting Classroom, Makoto-Chan, Fourteen

If you told me that Araki Hirohiko and Umezu Kazuo were starseeds born from the same alien intelligence, or even dimension-shifted doppelgangers of each other, I wouldn’t bat an eye. If anything, this would explain away their eerie similarities—claustrophobic layouts, juxtaposition of gore with guffaws, uncanny youthfulness—while passing as a plot from either author’s archives.

Araki, born by the ocean; Umezu, raised in the mountains. These two opposite forces are drawn together by their overlapping traits, like the eyes of the ying-yang, fated to never meet—until now. TSB has connected the dots to raise awareness of two seminal manga-ka criminally underrepresented in the West. Prepare for thrills, chills, and a degree of plagiarism rarely seen outside of Comiket.

Balance of Horror and Comedy

Makoto-Chan and his pre-school gang.

Head thrown back, mouth stretched open, eyes wild—tell me, are these kids laughing, or screaming? In Umezu's world, it can be either, or both, simultaneously. Horror is the buildup for humor's release. They are indistinguishable, two sides of a coin that blur together as he spins between grody gag manga and gothic girl's horror with no stylistic difference between.

Dio seasons his quarry with the taste of fear before making the kill.

Araki follows the same buildup-to-release paradigm to a greatly different effect. He corrals his characters into seemingly inescapable, life-threatening situations of such cruelty and perplexity that they make Jigsaw's death traps look like mere mouse traps. After several chapters of being pushed to their physical and mental breaking point, the heroes eventually persevere and recover with a red-hot zinger fired right between the enemy's eyes. Now it the villain's turn to feel fear.

With Trembling Hands

Opening a potentially lethal letter from the aptly-named Engima.

Araki insists that he writes suspense, not horror, but the end result is the same. He breaks the Shonen manga law governing the economic use of panel space. Above, he exhausts an entire page in a slow reveal, the camera pushing in tighter and tighter like a hand crushing your chest.

Chicken George from Fourteen pontificates on the fall of man.

This suspense-building technique is hardly limited to Araki—Umezu was doing it years before. And while Araki may have bitten Umezu’s style too hard in the beginning with the Gothic horror and spewing entrails, he later struck out on his own with sunburst panel layouts and unsettling asymmetrical framing. Umezu went in the exact opposite direction, de-evolving into brutal simplicity that bashes the reader’s skull with a rock, again, and again. Violent. And effective.

Stylish to a Fault

JoJo roll call.

From costume designs to panel composition, Araki’s current style is unrecognizable compared to his sophomore efforts. JoJo’s cast becomes increasingly androgynous, starting with Fist of the North Star and Rambo inspired roid-heads that deflated into buff hooligans by Part 3. In Part 5 they started sneaking around their sister's closet, and the newest batch from JoJolion dress like they wandered off a Pierre & Gilles photo shoot and onto the soundstage of a Hitchcock film. Araki’s sets have become less cluttered following his jump from a weekly to a monthly format, with negative space filling in the empty pools of black ink that once soaked the page.

Orochi and Jotaro have your number.

Late-term Umezu used enough ink to stain the margins black, but he didn’t start that way. His early work also rode the bandwagon, following the then-popular Tezuka-cartoony style with Mori No Kyodai until shifting with his contemporaries over to Gekiga in search of something more raw. He hit his peak in 1969 with Orochi, vignettes of a supernatural agent whose carefully cropped bangs and silky chestnut locks flowed through pages of immaculate line work, restrained though detailed backgrounds, and macabre beauty.

Painful to draw, painful to read.

As his stories grew darker in tone, so did the pages, choked in black ink and sharp crosshatching that cut into the readers eyes like garotte wire. By the end of Fourteen, his magnum opus, the nerves in his wrist cinched by the cramped and intense process, his hand struggled to draw even a straight line, his characters, squiggles.

The Greatest Form of Flattery

Probably just a coincidence.

Between Stands named after bands and flagrant plagiarism of fashion illustrators from Antonio Lopez to Tony Viramontes, Araki wears his influences on his sleeve the same way his character Kishibe Rohan proudly sports a Gucchi wristwatch. But Araki's been uncharacteristically reticent when the topic of his inspiration shifts to the grandfather of gore, Umezu Kazuo.

Probably just the trauma of reading Umezu manifesting itself unconsciously.

Anyone familiar with the material can attest that Stardust Crusaders borrows its greatest kills from the 1986 splatter title God’s Left Hand, Devil’s Right Hand. The Tower, a stag beetle Stand that nests in the tongue of its user, is one class removed from the the Queen Spider that hides in its master’s mouth, biding its time. Or the megaphone that bursts from a dog to taunt Jotaro’s crew might as well have burrowed out of the Umezu heroine laid out above, right after the tricycle, rusty scissors, and human eyeball.

Probably what Star Platinum has nightmares about.

The Stands themselves are eerily similar to Umezu's Kage Mouja, a ravenous shade invisible to the naked eye that mutilates all threats facing its host. For further damning evidence, Stands were originally referred to as “ripple ghosts.” Araki claims that he was inspired by the titular guardian spirit from Tsunoda Jiro’s occult classic, Ushiro no Hyakutaro, which was released in the early 70’s, right before another major influence, the desert archaeology adventure tale Babel II. These may have been his formative years, but surely not his definitive ones.

Probably from a Fulci flick.

I’m not trying to belittle Araki here—God’s Left Hand, Devil’s Right Hand is a sticky-fingered sneak in its own right, a pastiche of Umezu’s favorite Italian giallo flicks—not that he’d ever own up to creative borrowing, much less even having seen the films in question!

Iron-Clad Internal Logic

A super power that loops time, or a Klein bottle that pours into pocket dimensions—both authors lead you into new disorienting realities that depressurize your sense of disbelief on the way in. But these environments are self-contained in their flawless internal logic. Though you may stumble at first, you’ll be up and running again once your inner ear gets used to the change in atmosphere.

Regardless of how powerful a Stand is, it has limits—range, specific abilities, its physical host. Like a good mystery novel, Araki establishes clear-cut rules and never betrays the reader by breaking them—though the heroes may bend them in a flash of inspiration that saves the day. JoJo doesn’t suffer from enemy inflation, but from rule inflation. By the final showdown, you need a Stanford lawyer to referee the match.

JoJo is grounded in a single world with laws as reliable as gravity, consistent even when stretched across alternate dimensions. On the other hand, Umezu transverses different worlds set in the same universe. Like Ray Bradbury, his works, disguised as Sci-Fi, read as disconnected parables while feeding into a larger truth apparent in his long-form stories. The Drifting Classroom is a toddler’s first step in a journey that terminates in the loss of humanity’s innocence.

On Deaf Ears

Sadly this truth may never be revealed to English-speakers, except maybe via sketchy scanlations. For whatever reason, be it the retro art-style, poor marketing, or the public’s insatiable appetite for sub-par manga, only a fraction of Umezu’s rich catalog has been released outside of Asia.

In Baptism, an aging actress' beauty is consumed from the inside out.

I Am Shingo is too inaccessible, Fourteen, too long (and crazy). But if Ozaki Kyoko’s Helter Skelter can get licensed, then Baptism—the template for Ozaki’s tale of maternal terror, mental breakdowns made flesh, and cosmetic surgery gone wrong—could easily follow suit. And what gore hound isn’t licking their chops at the thought of God’s Left Hand, Devil’s Right Hand?

Araki hasn’t fared much better. Viz risked Jihad in publishing Stardust Crusaders, and the OVA based on the series has since gone out of print, ostensibly to appease the outcry from Islamic fundamentalists over the scene of Dio reading from the Quran. Perhaps this same fear of controversy is one of the factors keeping the excellent new JoJo anime off official streaming channels. Thankfully, NBM Publishing doesn’t negotiate with terrorists and has released the one-shot Rohan at the Louvre to fabulous reviews.

Rich Soundscapes

"MEMETAH!" The noise your fist makes when striking a wet frog against a solid rock, obviously.

Perhaps the problem is that much of the charm is lost in translation. In their Native Japanese, Araki’s turns of phrase are theatrical though succinct, as memorable as a good tag line. Umezu’s lexicon is smaller than the Esperanto dictionary, resulting in a cadence as recognizable and ripe for parody as Dr. Suess. A good wordsmith will be able to hammer the language into readable English, but some elements are unmalleable—namely, the sound effects.

Snake woman are one of the many things that go "ZA-ZA-ZA" in the night.

This stylized graffiti is part of the art, an independent character that lives off the page. It’s the dramatic sting in a world without sound. GO-GO-GO-GO coils around JoJo like a viper ready to strike. Creepy-crawlies scuttle after helpless schoolchildren with a raspy ZA-ZA-ZA. These symbols are part of the author’s made-up language with tones more shrill than the exclamation mark, more booming than the period. Without them, the reader only hears half the story.

You Can't Spell "Fanatic" Without...

Hardly an isolated case. (Source)

The sound effects are so iconic that JoJo fangirls have taken to painting them onto their tights with magic markers in lieu of the conventional leopard spots and star storms. Last July pro-otaku Shokotan appeared on the late-night celebrity variety show Ame Talk sporting Araki-spangled spats, which inspired a string of imitations on Twitter and manufactured knockoffs. You can't blame them for wanting to look their best for the then-trending JoJo Exhibition art show.

The Shibuya scramble brought to a standstill. THE WORLD!

Fad fashion notwithstanding, JoJo devotees have always innovated ways to show their appreciation for the work in ways other than mindless consumption. Seichi junrei, the practice of touring real-world locals that appear in anime and manga, normally ends as an indulgent day trip. As with all things JoJo, the fans take this over the top. Members of the JoJo's Posing School, an online collective of contortionists with a flair for the dramatic, gathered to invade Sendai, the model for the fictional town of Moriocho from Part 4 to recreate famous scenes, hit up landmarks, and prostate themselves in worship at the station. And that's when they're not busy forming flash mobs a hundred strong in the middle of Tokyo's busiest intersection.

Demerin has Umezu in her sights.

What Umezu's fans lack in organization they more than make up for clinically intense dedication. One took up entomophagy to recreate the cockroach force-feeding scene from Baptism. The gross-out factor is trumped by the creep-out factor of Kaneko Demerin, Umezu’s self-appointed “official stalker” and the only entity that keeps the master of the macabre up at night. A cult has gathered around the charismatic manga-ka, though it’s not clear if he has any control over it.

Doomsday Prophets

Umezu’s long-form serials read like time-shifted parables from humanity’s dystopian future. Drifting Classroom warned against climate change, I Am Shingo predicted aberrant AI in a pre-Internet age, and Fourteen explored the inevitable exodus of Earth aboard interstellar space arks, causing whispers that he was the next Nostradamus.

Araki also made an unwitting prediction—just one, though chilling in its precision. Part 3 of JoJo features the brothers, Oingo and Boingo (Zenyatta and Mondatta in the Viz translation), the latter of which commands a comic book-shaped Stand that predicts the future—anything printed on its pages comes true.

The writing was on the wall.

In this case, a traveler is fated to stab his neck on an electric pole and die at 10:30—an ominous time given the numbers 9-11 displayed on his T-shirt. If the the shark-toothed jumbo jet and Islamic crescent moon seem like just a coincidence, remember that the North Tower of the World Trade Center collapsed mere minutes before 10:30.

Even if Araki can auger future tragedies, especially those involving extremists, he is powerless in his predictions. Otherwise he wouldn’t have drawn mosques being blown up in the final showdown between Dio and Jotaro, or allowed Dio to read from the Quran in the OVA, both incidents that drew howls of outrage from fundamental Islamists and likely shut JoJo out of the western market. But the situation isn’t hopeless. Fate is not to be fought, but to be overcome, as Araki might say.

Phantom Blood

Anecdotal evidence shows that manga artists die young. Tezuka and Ishinomori both dropped out of the race at 60. Kamimura Kazuo passed away at 45, the prime of his life, and took Gekiga with him. The unrelenting deadlines and years spent hunchbacked over the drawing board take their toll.

Umezu has no right to still be kicking all things considered. He simultaneously juggled 3 weekly and 3 monthly serials at his peak. His abused wrists fell to carpal tunnel syndrome in the early ‘90’s during the publication of Fourteen, forcing him into an early retirement. But at 76 he’s more spry than entertainers half his age, leaping across the concert stage in leather chaps and showing his love for slapstick on year-end TV specials.

Still, time flows in one direction and erodes your body with age. Unless you happen to be a Hamon master like Araki. He looks more dapper at 50 than at 40, leading the public to speculate—perhaps the Stone Mask is more fact than fiction.

Cool Uncle, Hip Granddad

More likely, it’s the music that keeps them young. Rocking everything from Prince to Def Leppard to Lady Gaga, Araki is a professed album addict and DJs in his studio to match the mood of the current scene. Heavy metal for fights, folk ballads for lonesome treks through the wilderness. And always, always prog rock.

While not as vocal about his musical preferences, Umezu is closer to the artist themselves, penning lyrics for ani-song starlet Horie Mitsuko and Chikada Haruo, the J-pop taste-maker of his day. Umezu says that if he failed as a manga-ka he would have become a rockstar instead, a dream fulfilled by his studio cuts, Yami no Album I and Yami no Album II.

Araki is known for crafting fabulous outfits and flamboyant poses, something that came to the foreground in Part 3 to help personalize Jotaro's international traveling crew. A full wardrobe is mandatory for any series that wants to be taken seriously. But this wasn't always the case. Early characters dressed as drab as Charlie Brown until Umezu started importing designs from fashion magazines. Makoto-Chan, often laughed off as a dysfunctional family gag manga, is a lookbook stuffed with playful and pop designs. Except they're sandwiched between steaming turds, bodily fluids, and grandma's hanging tits.

Arivaderchi

If you set these two up on a blind date, they’d have no shortage of things to talk about. Favorite bands, cinematic inspirations, Umezu’s love of Dali’s surrealism versus Araki’s respect for Michelangelo and the Mannerists. The former can’t draw anymore, the latter can only draw JoJo—how awesome would it be to see them collaborate on something fresh that plays up their strengths?

Super awesome, though impossible. Araki is absorbed with his art, Umezu is absorbed with his ego. This article may be the last time you see them both in the same place at the same time. Perhaps its for the better. Space-time would likely warp around the combined gravity of their careers, not to mention the potential risk of causing a grandfather paradox should they turn out to actually be dimensional-shifted versions of each other.

Inter-dimensional travelers or otherwise, Umezu and Araki hold a strange sway over the multi-verse of manga. An electromagnetic force invisible in the West, but tangible enough at their epicenter of the East Pole to make your hair stand on end. Unseen in their omnipresence, like a Stand or wandering spirit. And unknowable but hinted at by history, same as the fate of our civilization.

Comiket 83: Photodump

noreply@blogger.com (DrSenbei) — Wed, 09 Jan 2013 14:16:00 +0000

What a haul! Comiket 83 will be remembered for posting record attendance numbers on Day 3 despite giving into terrorist treats against Kuroko's Basketball. Controversy aside, it was business as usual with cosplayers, otaku, and pornographers in their natural element with us there to capture the proceedings on film.

Jojo
Last season's anime adaptation brought the gangs of Araki fans out of the woodwork for a display of the gaudy, distorted, and just plain bizarre. A word of warning to would-be stardust crusaders—the contorted poses required for Jojo-dachi are intended for trained professionals only. Don't try this at home.

Genuine Article
A vast majority of event-goers get suited up as a type of performing art or simply to show their love for the source material. Unfortunately, they are less interesting to photograph than the goods further down.

Gag
Personally, I prefer costumes that provide low-brow gags executed with the grace of an artisan.

Creepy and Candid
Though the seasons change and KyoAni heroines fall out of favor, you can always count on the incorrigible Camera Kozoh to be the most interesting part of the event. Outrageous outfits, Jojo-dachi, and unintentional hilarity—these dudes embody everything that's right (and wrong) about Comiket!

Be sure to check out the Flickr Photoset for everything else that wasn't fit for print, as well as our Comiket albums assembled over the past few years.

Comiket 83: The Hunter Becomes the Hunted

noreply@blogger.com (DrSenbei) — Mon, 07 Jan 2013 11:23:00 +0000

If you've ever been to an event with cosplay, then you're familiar with the fearsome tribe of otaku cameramen, the Camera Kozoh. Barking orders, demanding lewd poses, and pressing for contact information at the end of a grueling shoot, by all appearances they are unrelenting sadists that get off on dominating innocent models. But step into the personal space between the shooter and subject and you'll find that it's the exact opposite. The model has the cameraman wrapped around her little finger, and he would beg for the opportunity to grovel at her manicured feet.

Cosplay is an expensive hobby. The costume itself can easily run hundreds of dollars depending on how complicated the design and accessories are, not to mention hidden fees—upkeep and storage, makeup, trips to the salon, transport and entrance to events—the bills quickly add up for the model, who is likely either still in college or pinching pennies at an entry level position. For girls that plan to get serious about their hobby, first they need to find a way to monetize it—or at least avoid going too far into debt.

Enter the Camera Kozoh.

A good Camera Kozoh will round up a stable of girls that strike his fancy, then organize private photo shoots that serve as the model's main source of income. The photos serve as free advertising and materials for a future photo book. A pretty face might land a girl a few groupies, but to gain name recognition she'll need to tap into the gated community that the cameraman is member of.

Once he gets chummy with a cosplayer, maybe he'll act as her caddy, chauffeur, editor, web master, or even self-appointed manager—all pro bono, of course. To the Camera Kozoh who has already dropped thousands of dollars on monstrous camera rigs, footing the bill is a small price to pay for some facetime. His commitment holds the community together.

To the casual observer, this is where the arrangement falls apart. Aren't these cameramen just creepy middle-aged losers doling out cash for attention from young girls? To a certain degree, yes, probably. But economic constrictions keep any ulterior motives in check. Studio rental fees are prohibitively expensive and easily run half a grand for a session, so they need to buddy up to split the burden. Plus you need a crop of models to rotate between takes, with each asking for a hundred bucks or more to cover costs—a girl's 'gotta eat, after all.

This well-oiled system makes it easy to organize shoots, promote yourself, and make friends along the way for both the cosplayer and the Camera Kozoh.

It also places both parties in a prisoner's dilemma, except without reward for taking a risk. The cameraman wants to make a move on a model, but knows it would ostracize him from his peers and ruin his reputation for private shoots. The model wants attention and money, but if she gets too entangled with a single cameraman she risks alienating fans and the income they represent. “Bros before hoes” has never been a more fitting maxim.

The Camera Kozoh that seems oppressive at events is rendered mostly harmless from internal pressure and external economics. His weakness is obvious to everyone within the community—and most profitable to the ero-cosplayer.

Her revealing costume seduce scores of willing men to purchase CDs filled with photos or videos of the model splayed out in compromising poses, legs open to men with open wallets. These salacious disks, or ROMs, are normally sectioned off from cosplay photo collections at Comiket, or even given adult-only events.

This doesn't stop these succubi from snaking into the photo pit to pass out business cards and promote their wares. If you see a semi-circle of telephoto lenses with flash bulbs strobing, chances are that behind the press of bodies a ROMer is working hard at a sales pitch.

Cosholic, the premiere ROM-exclusive event, is conveniently held in the evening following the second day of Comiket. This allows the model to busk during the first two days, see her new fans at night, then follow-up with a meet-and-greet at her official booth on day three of Comiket.

Ever since the ROMers moved in during the early 90's, the Comiket Planning Committee has been wracking its collective brain-trust trying to find a way to host nudie cosplay without incurring the wrath of the law. Adult dojinshi are comics and as such exist in a legal gray-zone—erotic cosplay, on the other hand, falls squarely under Japan's pornography laws, particularly those outlawing the display of genitals.

Manga can get away with striking out a tiny strip of the offending region with a black bar or a heavy layer of mosaic chaff. If a ROM pulled the same stunt, it could be confiscated as indecent material under article 175 of the Penal Code, with Comiket held accountable as an accomplice.

A scrutinized event like Comiket wants to avoid giving more ammo to the media and more jurisdiction to the authorities at all costs. Hence they have introduced tighter standards of decency—tighter even than those for the off-the-shelf porno mags you find at the conbini. The planning committee may ban a ROM if it doesn't meet their criteria, but this plays right into the hands of the ero-cosplayer. The label “Too Hot For Comiket” is a masturbatory seal of approval and all the more incentive for a fan to visit Cosholic to pluck a bushel of forbidden fruit.

Another major draw are photography tickets. Though the exact stipulations vary from girl to girl, buying a ROM gives the cameraman the right to interact one-on-one with the model and snap to his heart's content, or at least until her handler calls "time." While not as intimate as a studio shoot, it's also nowhere near the hassle—especially for pariahs that have burned all other bridges.

Though it's hard to argue against the predatory nature of models, blaming them for exploiting the cameramen is a knee-jerk reaction. Lonely guys seeking emotional fulfillment have any number of alternate money sinks.

The argument boils down to value—they must feel like they're getting their money's worth, or else would invest into soap lands instead. Likewise, the model needs to maintain a careful balance of professional distance and platonic romance to buffer the dream against reality. Cosplay is defined by role-playing where both parties are expected to perform their parts at all times. If you find this school of method acting too extreme, I suggest watching the drama unfold from the sidelines. Or through a the lens of a camera.

The Best of the Worst 2012

noreply@blogger.com (DrSenbei) — Fri, 28 Dec 2012 09:29:00 +0000

2012 was a year full of life-altering changes and satisfying victories—for the TSB team, in any case. These personal triumphs will look great on our gravestones but reflect poorly on the blog. Still, we believe in quality over quantity, especially when it comes to justifying our frequent month-long hiatuses.

What say you dear reader, assuming there's any of you left? What content do you want to see from us in the new year? Throw us a comment and if it sticks we might humor you. Assuming our day jobs don't get in the way of what's truly important, that is.

Comiket 81: The High Cost of Fandom

Does joining the otaku club require you to sever ties with society and shun your parents? Comiket's ridiculous scheduling around national holidays leaves visitors with no other choice.

Making Sense of Dollers

Hovering between abject horror and bewildered respect, our look into the misfit world of the Dollers may be the most even-handed piece ever written on the subject, if only because no one else can be bothered.

History of Akihabara Part 3.5: 2.5D

Authenticity has evacuated Akihabara and taken its mojo with it. The creative elements of the crumbled otaku Mecca have melded with the youth culture of Harajuku and Shibuya, resulting in a new lifestyle that melts together 3D reality with 2D idealism.

Robot Restaurant

Robot. Restaurant. Kabuki-Cho. There's not much else to say, except that these are the finest photos of bikini girls riding mecha ever posted by us.

Screaming Mad George's Paranoiascape

Our game of the year wasn't some greasy broshooter or minimalist art school ploy, but an unpolished PS1 gem rescued from the recycle bin. Crafted by "Screaming" Mad George, punk rock monster and master of drippy VFX prosthetics, Paranoiascape blindsides the "games as art" debate with the possibility of "games as recreational drugs."

Creepy Kids Songs Part 2: Kagome Kagome

Traditional Japanese nursery rhymes are riddle boxes of cryptic lyrics where each stanza solved chips away another layer of the lies calcified over our eyes. Peer within, if you can handle the truth.

Wave Jack Series: Fighting Piracy With Pin-Up Girls

The Wave Jack series of games for the Famicom disk system is a case study in how not to run the media-mix sales model. Their deluxe packaging included soundtrack cassettes, comics, and strategy guides as pack-ins. A great way to deter bootlegs, but not enough to justify the deluxe price tag, even with smiling idols on the cover.

Just Say NO To Nukes with SKI

The doe-eyed darlings of SKI do their darnedest to swing right-leaning idol culture back towards a more moderate left with the help of Panta, role-model for the violent 70's student protest movement. They've already lambasted ex-prime minister Noda, nuclear power, and the TPP—I can't wait to see how they spin Abe's fiscal policy into a human rights violation.

Scummy Manga Reviews #7: Ressentiment

Written nearly 10 years ago, Ressentiment does for dating sims what Neuromancer did for the IT revolution—postulate a tomorrow that's familiar enough to be believable, yet so advanced as to be purely speculative. Unlike the retro-futurism of Golden Age sci-fi, much of its proposed technology has come into being, and not necessarily for the better.

Raid on the Blood Bank

noreply@blogger.com (DrSenbei) — Mon, 24 Dec 2012 23:28:00 +0000

Even Godless heathens can get into the giving spirit this holiday season. We at TSB mustered up the last lingering traces of compassion from our coal-stoked hearts to visit akiba:F, a Red Cross blood donation center located in the otherwise morally bankrupt center of cloying consumerism, Akihabara.

We rolled up our sleeves, ready to make our first positive contribution to the country even as our minds raced with uncertainty. Assuming that our precious bodily fluids met Japan's regimented standards, could the nurse navigate her needle through the thick underbrush of our barbarian forearm hair? What if the recipient turned out to be a hard-line right-winger that chose death over race contamination? And would our fat gaijin hemoglobin fit through IVs intended for skinny Japanese blood cells?

Such concerns are, in fact, behind the times. The facilities and philosophy driving them are ultra-modern, if not Apple-futuristic, wrapped in warmly curving white plastic backlit by soft neons. It took until 2012, but we finally have a functional model of the spaceport from 2001.

After signing in at the reception desk, we were led to ergonomically-designed Martini glass seats and asked to read comics until it was our turn. With baskets of snacks and an open drink dispenser, the room felt like a manga cafe on the U.S.S. Enterprise. Tea. Earl Gray. Hot. An issue of AKIRA open on my lap to kill time. Factor in vacuum-tube display cases housing figures and merch—currently a tie-in with the new Evangelion film—and it's easy to see why the center would be packed, even on a Saturday night. Otaku space has expanded into outer space, or a reasonable facsimile thereof.

The actual interview and needling process are strictly by the book and hardly worth mentioning—unless you were alive in Europe during the 80's, in which case you'll be turned away as a potential carrier of mad cow disease. Apparently infection is undetectable. Japanese ability is also a plus, if only so you don't accidentally sign-in as a needle-sharing junkie carrying Hepatitis B.

While you wait for the initial feeling of gee-whiz excitement and dizzy anemia to wear off, be sure to thumb through community sketch books filled with doodles and messages from past doners. Like trash blowing down the shoulder of the information superhighway, these journals last are the last scraps of organic communication in a digital age. Soon enough these spiral-bound pages will be replaced by drawing tablets prepped to instantly proliferate the illustrations across your choice of social media at the tap of a pen. Until then, you'll have to make do with our photographs.

The fear of needles manifested as a Hakaijyu-looking monstrosity.

A safer and more hygienic forum to advertise to like-minded individuals than scribbling graffiti on bathroom walls.

Some also use it as a way to pimp their dojinshi circles. The blood banks overflow in the weeks leading up to Comiket.

Of course, certain artists would be better off selling their creations to private collectors.

All this piece of modern art is missing is the glass-paneled frame.

The only thing railway otaku love more than trains is the use of forced perspective.

You have free access to my veins under the stipulation that you be an amnesiac junior high school girl with an otherwise incurable disease. And call me "Onii-San."

"Give me your blood!" The Ministry of Welfare mascot Kenketsu-Kun reveals his true intentions.

Pizza of Death fan art is always welcome.

Probably also from the artist above, known only as "Unko."

The magical sunset city beyond Kadath in the cold wastes. Check out those arabesques!

Throw in the kanji characters "献血" for "donate blood" and BAM, instant parody!

Kyun-Kyun Rock here is a fine example of collaborative works.

Proof that INITIAL D still has fans, somewhere, somehow.

Each Red Cross branch in Tokyo is customized to fit the color of its neighborhood. Kichijoji is an earth-tone hippie paradise. Shibuya offers hand massages for your sore metacarpals after a long day of carrying shopping bags. The new center in Shinjuku is lined with mannequins sporting concept fashion. Once you run out of gimmick restaurants and wacky Japan tourist traps, the only thrill left comes from sticking a needle in your arm. At least you know where these ones come from.

Scummy Manga Reviews #8: Revolutionary Fighter Inudo Sadao

noreply@blogger.com (DrSenbei) — Thu, 13 Dec 2012 14:45:00 +0000

Title: Revolutionary Fighter Inudo Sadao (革命戦士犬童貞男)

Serialized in: Young Magazine, Volume 46 2011-Volume 52 2012
Art and Story by: Sasaki Shohei (佐々木昇平)
Genre: Gag Gekiga Unleashed

What It’s About
The source of superpowers are just as inventive as their application. Superman draws his strength from Earth’s yellow sun; Green Lantern, a ring limited only by his imagination. Or in the case of Sadao the Dog Boy, from a lifetime of pent-up sexual frustration.

His intense nerd rage triggered something primal deep within, unlocking his inner altered beast to transform him into a full-blown man-canine hybrid, fleshy muzzle and all. Vengeance will be his.

Following the bloody break-in of a television station, he hijacks the airwaves to declare war between the animal kingdom and their human oppressors. The crime—betrayal and ignorance. The punishment—extinction. With the exception of his junior high school crush, Yuri. No, she has a responsibility to watch the world burn. And let Sadao lap up the scent of a woman with his hyper-sensitive bloodhound nose, if you know what I mean.

Not if their former classmate Yuji has anything to say about it. He and Sadao were once kindred souls, bonded by an adolescence of shared bullying and abuse. But while Sadao let his anger consume him, Yuji channeled it into an abrupt career as a professional wrestler. It’s time for the great Chiwawa Mask to step back into the ring and pry the innocent Yuri from Sadao’s claws. There’s no time to re-train his body—a fistful of steroids will have to do!

Why It’s Awesome
Pomeranians go feral! Wild geese kamikaze into men’s eye sockets! Dingos eat babies! It’s a Tokyo Jungle out there, with a revolving-door cast of squishy humans as the prey.

The opening pages tease the reader with the would-be protagonist of a typical school comedy. Sixteen-year old Miku just moved to a new town and she’s running late on the first day of class. Chikuwa fish sausage flopping out of her mouth as a surrogate piece of toast, this walking cliche bursts out of the house and slams headlong into trouble—not the hunky upperclassmen she’s destined to fall in love with, but the waiting maw of a horse-sized Rottweiler!

Revolutionary Fighter Inudo Sadao, a pun that can be read as "virgin dog-boy," sets itself apart from the pack right out of the starting gates. While its name draws on classic surrealist titles such as Sexy Commando, this isn't a gag manga for the faint of heart. The excessive gore, bone-crunching violence, and throbbing red rockets mixed with smarmy satire and cherry boy humor brings it closer in line with the so-bad-it's-good heta-uma fare by Koizumi Tomohiro or Hanakuma Yusaku. Except while these authors hide behind a sketchy veneer of insincerity, author Sasaki throws it all out there in graphic detail.

Which isn't to say that it’s all grindhouse-style exploitation. There’s cliche, though complex dynamics between the three main characters. Yuji has always felt sorry for the insecure Sadao and wants to believe that there’s good in his twisted heart, even after the dog-boy makes mincemeat of a live studio audience. Sadao pines for Yuri, though his super-human strength doesn't include the courage to be honest with his feelings. And Yuri blames herself for the unfolding tragedy for seeing Yuji behind Sadao’s back.

It’s as heartrending as Macross. Or, with its former-schoolmate-turned-megalomaniac angle, a superior version of 20th Century Boys that delivers all the emotional suspense and payoff in its two volumes that Urasawa couldn’t force out in twenty.

Why It Won’t Come Out in English

What, you mean aside from the scenes of borderline bestiality? If anything I’d consider those a bonus for the book’s target audience—readers who appreciate realistic art blackened by dense hatchwork and blood spray ala Fist of the North Star, madcap contemporary humor like heta-uma but better, and terse Eisner-quality storytelling.

Unfortunately, filter this number down to the number of people actually willing to throw down cash on the underdog and you can squeeze potential buyers into a medium-sized convention center. Who has time to waste translating, marketing, and distributing a one-shot from an artist without any other exploitable titles? If that person is you, by all means do the humane thing and knock on Kodansha’s doors asking to adopt this mutt before it gets put to sleep.

Tokyo Compression

noreply@blogger.com (DrSenbei) — Sat, 01 Dec 2012 04:16:00 +0000

From the packed commuter prison cars of Push Man to the blood-soaked opening of Suicide Circle, Japan’s rush hour traffic has long been depicted as hazardous to your mind and body. Now artist Michael Wolf continues the proud, sadistic tradition with his Tokyo Compression series of photos. The German born photographer began his career with a focus on mega cities, gradually zooming in from landscapes to capture the lives crawling within. His lens shrinks train-goers down into tiny microbes rushing through an inorganic system of concrete arteries at 60 kilometers per hour.

Though the doors open to let in fresh air at each station, real decompression doesn’t occur until battered employees leave their offices and file into bars, cabarets, and karaoke boxes for intensive depressurization. Be sure to check our Michael Wolf's homepage for more candid portraits of life in cities, including some great snaps of the homeless box men.

Just Say NO to Nukes With SKI

noreply@blogger.com (DrSenbei) — Mon, 29 Oct 2012 14:29:00 +0000

In 1972, Shonen Magazine fired a shot heard 'round the world and changed the rules of engagement by putting teen cutie pie Minami Saori’s smiling face on the cover. The aftermath turned the idol industry into a sexual arms race barreling towards the Apocalypse, with junior high bikini models and AKB 48's spit-swapping commercial riding shotgun.

There’s one group that has agreed to an armistice under the terms that they don’t strip, don’t do doe-eyes, and reserve the right to say NO—the Seifuku Koujo Iinkai (SKI), or Uniform Improvement Committee. Originally formed in 1992 with the pledge “to be pure, proper, and pretty,” they recently rewrote their charter with a left-leaning political bent to make sweeping reforms for the country.

Their first order of business: Abolish nuclear power.

No! No! No more nukes!

I don’t care if it’s national policy

I can’t let this one slide

You spouted lies about the danger

“No immediate health impact?” Hah!

I don’t care if it’s a wonderful invention

I never learned these words in school

Becquerels of cevert, meltdown, turbine building

High level of microsieverts detected!

I can’t forget, you nuclear proponents

If it’s so safe why don’t you live there?

Look at the mess you made

You’re an embarrassment to grown-ups

The generic sound of Da! Da! Datsugenpatsu, or Say NO! To Nukes may not pose a challeng to the pop music status quo, but pick away the cotton-candy auditory fluff and you'll find a string of zingers begging to be retweeted. And with gaffe-happy politicians like ex-Chief Cabinet Secretary Edano “No immediate health impact” Yukio feeding them material, they'll never be short of targets to attack.

The rabble-rousing may be somewhat of a publicity stunt, but it’s for a good cause. Last August the girls sponsored their Nuclear Accident Summer Lecture at the Hibiya Open-Air Concert Hall located a short march from the National Diet Building. Proceeds from the single were donated to the Fukushima dairy farmers forced to slaughter their cows after radiation was discovered in their contaminated milk. Too late in life for a career change and having lost everything in the blink of an eye, some of the elderly chose suicide rather than beg for handouts from the government that betrayed them.

Group leader Hashimoto Mika. (Via her Facebook.)

Although the girls have managed to sell around 3100 copies of the album to date, their good intentions are only worth just under a million yen—a pittance compared to major acts. This is precisely SKI president and former member Hashimoto Mika’s criticism of the industry. She disses AKB48 as empty-headed “dolls” who have sold out their personal values for the sake of record sales—celebrities and performers in their position should be making efforts to influence popular opinion, not simply riding it out for the cash. To her, musical genres are not categories, but a type of segregation. Who says that idols don’t have meaningful things to say about the issues?

Indeed, this call for social revolution through song harkens back to the musician activists of the Zenkyoto student protests from the 60’s to the mid-70's, with Panta from the anarchist folk band Zuno Keisatsu (Brain Police) launching incendiary speeches at Red Army rallies. While students armed themselves with wooden 2-by-4s and construction helmets, his group bandied acoustic guitars, bongos, and provocative poetry. Their first LP was immediately banned for its cover art featuring the still at-large criminal who pulled off a bank heist disguised as a police officer , not to mention the politically-charged anthems, Declaration of World War and Grab Your Guns.

Grab your guns and shout/ Who has the right to judge us?

Grab your guns and shout/ Who spoiled this great land?

The ignorant laughs of the ignorant fools

Echo through this country shackled in lies

Grab your guns and shout/ We won't be fooled

By their fairytales anymore

Those bastards just don't get it

Can't even stand to look at them

Panta and Hashimoto. (From her Facebook.)

Zuno Keisatsu went through a series of breakups and revivals over the years. Like an old war hero who knows he’s past his prime, Panta put the project on the back burner to focus on his true calling—educating the next generation of revolutionaries. The beaming, snaggle-toothed smiles of SKI have given him the saccharine coating lacking from his bitter pill of change.

There's a lot (of power brokers)/ In the world who hate (to see people happy)/ Fat cats and their money

At some point (the dojo loach Noda)/ Got out of hand (and big in the head)/ Bribes and collusion their life's work

Your promises no good / Your policies are no good/ Your cabinet is no good/ It's all no good

Laugh it up (just a lapdog) for Mr. Obama (profits first)/ Too elite for common sense

Your bipartisanship (split up power)/ You don't do a thing (for the quake victims) / Eating free lunches from the relief money

Hippie peaceniks forming angry drum circles is one thing. When you have a gaggle of schoolgirls wagging their fingers at you for being a bad, bad man, you know your political days are numbered. Akuma/Noda/TPP is the hot single from SKI’s aptly-titled new album, The Protester, which tackles both domestic and international issues. The track Save the Children aims to raise awareness of the Vietnamese villages America bombed by Agent Orange, while Hate the Crime (Not the Criminal) spreads a message of peace through justice, not vengeance—and having the heads of top TEPCO executives on a plate is the only acceptable form of justice.

If there’s a good cause, chances are SKI is championing it, no matter how trivial. Assuming their uniforms had sleeves, they’d roll them up in support of the pedestrian smoking ban, cell phone usage restriction law, and citizen activism for the improvement of bicycle safety and manners. More controversial was their involvement in the signature campaign for the 1997 Anti-Stalking Law that sought to fight organized harassment and cyber bullying from Sokka Gakkai, the Buddhist cult-turned-political-party with more clout than the other third parties, namely the Social Democratic Party.

The SDP could only be viewed as radical in a country as conservative as Japan. Their current platform calls for the abolishment of nuclear power in favor of wind energy, the dismantling of U.S. army bases, and absolute adherence to the non-military clause of Article 9 of the constitution—all goals shared with SKI. The two have been holding hands ever since the Anti-Stalking Law brought them together, with the SDP and Japanese Communist Party newsletters promoting SKI events.

Having friends in high places is nice when you have big dreams. And boy, can SKI ever dream. Their recent press release reminds us that, if the politicians aren’t listening, we need to cut them out of the equation by redirecting the flow of money from capital hill to the citizen lowlands as follows:

1) Create a self-sufficient network.

2) Manage your own money and stop depositing it into financial institutions.

3) Create a new bank free of sovereign debt.

4) Create an organization (or political party) with personnel free of to run the country, no strings attached. Leverage this group to smash the opposition in elections and assume majority control to return sovereignty to the citizens. If we don’t go this far, it will be business-as-usual with an administration that can’t even rebuild the earthquake and tsunami disaster areas.

Lofty as these goals may be, the government seems to be cracking under the combined weight of protest, one dissenting body at a time. Last September, Noda revealed his intentions to wean Japan off nuclear power and onto renewable energy over a 30-year period.

It’s still much too early to even feel optimistic about this statement assuming there’s any truth to it, and it hints at an even more immediate problem in the nation’s future—a Godzilla-sized carbon footprint. But two can play the lobbyist game. It’s only a matter of time before Big Energy hires AKB48 producer Akimoto to preen their multi-million dollar multi-member PR camp. The next wave of social-issue idols will be doing the can-can to Kick the Kyoto Protocol and winking that Natural Gas is the Natural Choice. Better start preparing for the imminent sexual meltdown before it's too late.

Zenkyoto Student Riots Through the Lens of Michiko Sasaki

noreply@blogger.com (voidmare) — Mon, 22 Oct 2012 02:25:00 +0000

Lullaby for the Outcasts (はみだし野郎の子守唄) by Barefoot Gen director Masaki Mori.

Post-war Japan experienced growing pains during its industrialization, with the late-60's Zenkyoto student riots serving as a woefully short-lived period of rebellious adolescence. The peaceful picketing of Nichidai University students against the corrupt administration's gross embezzlement of tuition fees met with indifference from the government and violence from Yakuza-backed strike breakers. As the batons of the riot police fell, public dissidence rose, with over two-thirds of the universities in the country joining their brothers in organized protests and campus-jacking barricades before the flames of revolution died out as quickly as they had spread.

Looking back generations later, the highly fragmented nature of the movement makes it difficult to piece together an accurate image of the people involved, their struggle, and the end result. The best source of information is from eye-on accounts from participants like Michiko Sasaki (佐々木美智子), who had her boots on the ground and camera in hand behind the barricades.

Based on her photographs below, you have to wonder if the gates of the prime minister's residence would stand as firm if the anti-nuke protesters were armed with this sort of tenacity.

Instascum

noreply@blogger.com (voidmare) — Tue, 16 Oct 2012 12:38:00 +0000

The motto of toy camera photography is "don't think, just shoot" and we've definitely got the first part nailed down. Lengthy observations about life in Japan sit heavy on the psyche but only tell a fraction of the story. We need to capture the moment on film, bring out the flavor, and break it down into bite-sized squares—the perfect visual snack with all the requisite empty calories. After all, they say that those who eat what they want but are a little pudgy live longer than those who starve themselves thin for the sake of what's considered to be in fashion.

Follow voidmare_ds on Instagram for your recommended daily intake of grime, haikyo, hobos, and cat pictures.

Residing Evil: Sweet Home

noreply@blogger.com (DrSenbei) — Tue, 09 Oct 2012 14:53:00 +0000

The relationship between movies and video games have always been tenuous at best and destructive at worst, with horror serving as the stabilizing element in this volatile Venn diagram. To wit—horror movies are great and horror video games are great, while movies based on video games are awful and movies based on horror video games are somewhat palatable if not enjoyable. Paul Anderson’s first Resident Evil flick had nothing to do with the source material but was a passable creature feature. Hell, even Uwe Boll’s shlock-fests give you something to riff at with friends. In sharp contrast, “competently” produced features like the Super Mario Brothers movie exist solely to traumatize your inner child.  

Turnabout is fair play—video game licenses of horror titles have also failed to transfer that sense of terror from the screen to pixels, although no one has made an honest effort since the dreadful Friday the 13th and Nightmare on Elm Street adaptations for Nintendo.

This makes the re-discovery of Sweet Home all the more shocking. Released for the Famicom in December 1989, it broke the mold of traditional Dragon Quest-style RPGs in serving as Capcom’s first stab at survival horror and established a template for the first generation of Resident Evil titles.  

The story follows a group of five reporters who visit the abandoned Mamiya mansion secluded deep in the wooded mountains to film a piece on the fresco paintings of the previous owner who died under mysterious causes thirty years prior. Our cast doesn’t even make it past the foyer before things go awry. Suddenly the rotted ceiling collapses seemingly of it’s own will, blocking the way out, and the vengeful spirit of Lady Mamiya appears to deliver a wicked portent—you will all die here!  

The validity of her prophecy all depends on how the player manages their limited resources. Healing tonics are scattered few and far between about the manor grounds. Each character can only carry two items at a time in addition to their default tool, making inventory management a psychologically stressful task. Do you risk leaving recovery potions where they lay to keep your pockets empty for the key puzzle items supposedly coming up around the next turn? What’s your backup plan if the group carrying the candle is ambushed and needs support, but the other team has to fumble through the darkness to reach them?  

Therein lies the defining feature of Sweet Home. The five characters can team up in groups of up to three, meaning that one team will always be a pair of hands short in exploration and combat, leading to tense moments where one party calls for the other mid-battle and the other races against the clock to save their friends from being butchered by the mansion’s supernatural inhabitants. Once a character dies, they (and their puzzle-solving tools) are gone for good. As the number of survivors dwindle you inch closer to a literal dead-end draws closer, making each enemy encounter a countdown to certain doom as your HP falls away into the void.  

The immediacy of rushing in to help your teammates is only heightened by the frantic battle theme breathing down your neck as threatening as any ghoul or ghost. Like a good film, the soundtrack is another character in itself, covering the abstract pixellated mansion in a miasma of dread.

The cinematic qualities don’t end there. The birds-eye-view opening shot establishes the Mamiya manor as a desolate locale far removed from outside help—you are in this on your own. Unlock a door and we switch to a cut-scene of it creaking open, daring you to challenge the darkness within. There’s even pseudo-quick time actions where falling chandeliers and spike traps come flying at your POV, prompting you to make a quick dodge to safety or suffer the fatal consequences.

So far we have a creepy mansion, resource scarcity, pus-oozing monsters, door sequences—we're only missing one more of Resident Evil's hallmark features; Progressing the plot through diaries and letters left by their deceased authors. Sweet Home does this too with pages torn out of notebooks, dying messages writ in blood, and still cognizant corpses. As the party progresses through the house's puzzles, the gruesome truth behind the death of Lady Mamiya's baby and the local child kidnappings comes to light. The team will need to assemble the evidence of her terrible crimes in life to exorcise her spiteful spirit in death.

  If the haunted aesthetic of the game was crafted by Fujiwara Tokuro, the Ghosts ‘n Goblins director and future general producer of Resident Evil, than we can assume that the cinematic flair was imbued by filmmaker Itami Juzo. Renowned for his satirical works like Tampopo and The Funeral, Itami had teamed up with Capcom and Fujiwara in the past to produce a Famicom adventure game adaptation of A Taxing Woman, his black comedy about a female IRS agent hounding the yakuza to come clean with their cooked books.

In fact, this wasn’t the first version of Sweet Home that Itami had produced either. He mentored a young Kurosawa Kiyoshi, director/screenwriter of the Sweet Home film that the game was faithfully based on. The tone of the movie is far removed from Kurosawa’s later slow-burning cerebral thrillers and feels more like a Hollywood haunted house flick, ironic considering that the gruesome special effects were handled by Poltergeist alumni Dick Smith.  

Before his breakout hit with Cure, Kurosawa was stuck doing pink films like Kandagawa Pervert Wars for Nikkatsu. Through a lucky twist of fate, he met Itami on the set of The Excitement of the Do-Re-Mi-Fa Girl, a bawdy college sex romp where the seventy-year old actor played a lecherous professor who was very hands-on with his students. Itami took the promising director under his wing and showed him how to manufacture a hit in the industry—a bit too forcefully as it turned out.  

The senior producer immediately wrested over creative control, bringing on Nokko, singer from the rock band Rebecca, for extra mainstream appeal, and, in typical Itami fashion, cast his wife Miyamoto Nobuko in the lead. He then proceeded to re-edit the movie without the director’s knowledge for the coup de grace. We’ll never know what Kurosawa’s vision of the film was—the final print shown in theaters and released on VHS is the Itami cut. As to be expected, the incident led to irreconcilable differences between the filmmakers, leaving the intellectual rights and possible remakes of the movie or game in legal limbo.

While the film drags a bit in the third act and the cast is worthless, its impressionistic use of shadows and eerie soundtrack make things bearable during the lengthy intermissions between special effect shots to keep the viewer from zoning out too much. If you're looking for more of a non-stop thrill ride, skip the movie and track down a translated version of the Famicom game. It delivers all the melting old man Itami-goodness you're itching for without the wait.

TRANSFUNKET: Fujoshi in Diguise

noreply@blogger.com (voidmare) — Mon, 01 Oct 2012 12:21:00 +0000

Let's do a quick word association test: Japanese giant robot shows.

The usual subjects come to mind—Evangelion, Gundam, Mazinger Z and all his god-like brethren. Transformers would only register as an afterthought, it at all.

It's easy to forget that Transformers, though produced by Hasbro, was animated chiefly by Japan's legendary Toei Studio (as a follow up to Voltron, ironically). Japan continued the saga even after the toy line died down in the states with The Headmasters and successive series throughout the mid-90's, many of which still have American fans clamoring for a release. Even the 100% western-produced CG Beast Wars would receive a mad-cap localization and anime sequels overseas that brought a new generation into the fold.

Transfunket is another such effort to take Tranformers back to its country of origin in a way that only the Japanese can—through dojinshi and cosplay.

Held last Sunday at a rusted-out civic center in Asakusabashi, the event crammed over 100 dealers into an area the size of a church basement for an afternoon of human-on-bot excitement. Proceed with caution—the content is not what you'd expect of your typical BotCon. The rare toys and comics were sorely outnumbered by the Etsy-level crafts and slash fiction. If you've ever wanted a Decepticon daruma, or fantasized about Megatron and Starscream grinding gears, then you've come to the right place.

I didn't get an advance ticket so by the time I was let inside all the "good" dojinshi was sold-out. Knockout pairings were apparently in high demand.

The only way to improve Shockwave's design would be to add breasts and thigh-high boots. Bravo!

Crafting anthropomorphic fashion is the most important skill a Transformers fujoshi can possess, next to visualizing slash fiction for heavy machinery. Dig the giant collar for Megatron's shoulder pads.

Michael Bay and Be@rbrick, double branding of two of my least favorite things.

The Transformer equivalent of a doller.

Taking the expression "Bayformers" literally.

Proof that the fandom hasn't been completely taken over by cross-dressing robots.

Nakashima Naoki is the one artist I would actually buy something from, so naturally he didn't have a booth.

My apologizes to red-blooded western Transfans—you won't share a common bond with a majority of your Japanese compatriots. According to the organizer, the event used to be driven by man-children in awe of giant robots, but recently fujoshi have started calling the shots.

The changeover was inevitable. Transformers is a sausage fest (assuming that the 'bots have interlocking moving parts) and any show with a mostly all-male cast is ripe for fujoshi-sploitation. If anything, the franchise was behind the pop-culture curve before picking up its female fans. All it needs now are MikuMikuDance videos to fully divorce it from the source material and make it another burnt-out meme.

Sorry, looks like I spoke too soon. Autobots inferior, Vocaloids superior.

Wave Jack Series: Fighting Piracy With Pin-Up Girls

noreply@blogger.com (DrSenbei) — Mon, 24 Sep 2012 13:30:00 +0000

Video game companies have always been designing schemes to encourage consumers to purchase their software mint in the shrink wrap and discourage piracy. Before first day pre-order bonuses, before Working Design pack-ins, before Star Tropic had you dip the manual in water, there was the Wave Jack series.

Published by Imagineer for the Famicom Disk System, these open-ended titles pushed passive players to be more proactive in searching out clues, not only in the 8-bit world itself, but also in the materials included with the disk. These ranged from simple maps to detailed guidebooks by living gaming legends to music cassettes featuring trending idols. A promising project on paper, in execution the trilogy was a buggy, unfriendly, unbeatable mess not unlike Atari’s Swordquest experiment.

The adventure kicked off on November 6th, 1986 with Ginga Densho, aka Galaxy Odyssey. Set in a distant future of space colonies and interstellar travel, an ominous meteor shower rains down an unknown skin-calcifying virus, and you must scour the galaxy in search of the cure. Each of the five planets begins with a vertical-scroll shooting stage where you gather oxygen for the top-down exploration segment set deep within the alien star.

The Guardian Legend this ain’t. Spaceship sequences feel tacked-on and half-baked compared to competent contemporaries like Super Star Force which was released just a week afterward. The exploration bits are hamstrung by finite oxygen resources, copy-pasted screens, and game-freezing bugs, making this a kusoge by our modern rubric. Despite its fatal flaws, the opulent packaging drummed up enough interest to move a few units.

Relatively unknown sci-fi manga artist Okazaki Tsuguo provided the character designs while teen superstar Oginome Yoko lent her voice to the theme song Romantic Odyssey. The lyrics, in conjunction with the instruction manual written as a prose novella, supposedly contain clues for deciphering the in-game space runes left behind by extinct civilizations—a DIY Al Bhed primer. There’s even a 10-page pamphlet from the Japanese Psychoeducational Institute extolling the benefits of these mental gymnastics on a growing mind to scam parents into buying more edutainment for their family computer.

Imagineer’s sophomore effort, Kieta Princess (Missing Princess) is considered the strongest entry in the trilogy, albeit a confusing mess. The princess of the imaginary country Rabia (or Labia, depending on how you romanize it) is kidnapped during a goodwill visit to Japan, putting the kibosh on trade—specifically, the vaccine for an incurable virus running rampant across the archipelago. As a private eye employed by the government, you have thirty days to find the missing princess and restore international relations.

Thirty in-game days, mind you. The clock ticks forward relentlessly as you scramble for clues and resources in a completely free-roaming world. You can interact with nearly every building on the congested map, go to the martial arts dojo to boost your life total, or even take on a part-time job to supplement your daily stipend. But don’t dawdle. Come nightfall, shops close and the streets are overrun by pistol-toting gangs. Get too trigger-happy in self-defense and you’ll be arrested and slapped with a fine.

Missing Princess tried to do more than the infant technology could handle. Years later, once hardware grew up to fit the design, sandbox games become a cornerstone of the medium. Until then, players were left to sift through the litterbox.

At least they didn’t have to dig in with their bare hands. The package came with a police badge notebook, map of the city (whose backside served as a poster of the game’s token idol), travel log by Mori Meijin (mousy rival to Takahashi Meijin), and vocal tracks by actress Tomita Yasuko who had recently been launched to stardom by her role in Lonely Heart (Sabishinboh) by Hausu director Obayashi Nobuhiko.

Finally we have Holy Sword Psycho Calibur, the most competent of the trifecta for what it's worth. Released on May 15th, 1987, this quest puts you in control of a young orphan on a journey to find his father and unravel the secret of his mother’s memento, an ancestral sword. Aided by the fairies Pipi and Popo, you must make the sacred blade shine once more to free the land from the Demon Lord Hrungnir and his hundred-year rule of terror.

Don’t let the flip-screen overhead view and sword-slinging fool you—this isn’t Zelda’s long-lost cousin, it’s the mutant twin confined to rot in the attic. Right from the offset the player is asked to purchase equipment that will make or break their adventure without any explanation or context, making it a blind crap shoot amongst an already aimless sprawl. Good thing there’s pack-in guides, right?

Well, not so much. There’s a storybook illustrating the history of the realm, a Bikkuri-Man style monster manual, and cassette tape soundtrack needed to solve the musical Lost Woods riddle hiding the true last boss. Very fancy, but not useful in divining what items do. Do cherries restore health? (No, they’re actually bombs.) Is it worth dropping all your rubles on a teardrop? (Yes, it’s an over-powered boomerang). The game is still playable if you factor in the vintage. Do you enjoy the perilous learning curve of Rougelikes and poor hit detection of lazy programming? Then you’re in for an import gaming treat.

The rest of us can enjoy the totally sweet cassette illustration by Kamen Rider Black RX monster designer Amemiya Keita and the screamin’ saxophone accompanying smalltime idol unit Poppins on Springtime in the City Means Adventure.

Citing low sales given the high production costs, Imagineer pulled the plug on the Wave Jack series after just three titles. Their 5000 yen price tag—normally reserved for cartridge games—was highway robbery compared to other Disk System offerings. Thanks to the proliferation of disk writers, you could download new games for 500 yen a pop at the corner store after an initial 2000 yen investment for the blank disk. With A+ titles like Castlevania, Kid Icarus, and Metroid at their fingertips, kids would be insane to spend their lunch money anywhere else. Even idols, normally the sexy deciding factor in the war for young boys’ pocket money, lost their luster in light of bootleg porn games, including Bishojo SF Alien Fight and other NSFW titles.

Ironically, Wavejack’s pack-ins were originally devised to fight such unlicensed disks through added value. Rogue agents quickly figured out how to bypass Nintendo’s lax copy protection systems, with the Disk Worker from Hacker International being the workhorse of choice for counterfeiters. The Famicom homebrew scene hit a growth spurt with mooks dedicated to Disk System mods, blurring the line between hobbyist and hacker pirate.

Despite the ease of piracy and format obsolescence from advances in ROM carts, the Disk System enjoyed a robust life cycle, cranking out titles and providing disk writing services through 1993, three full years after the release of the Super Famicom. The Wavejack series is a fondly remembered footnote in Japan for what it could have been, while hardly known in the west due to the language barrier. Still, there’s enough clues scattered across the internet to start hearty enthusiasts down the right path. After all, a journey isn’t an adventure unless it’s into the unknown.

Special thanks to Mind Rot for introducing me to Poppins and putting this post into motion.
Images of packaging and pack-ins taken from StrategyWiki.

Von Jour Caux: The Philosopher's Stone

noreply@blogger.com (DrSenbei) — Mon, 17 Sep 2012 11:40:00 +0000

If use of space is one of the pillars that architectural design is built upon, than Von Jour Caux warps that very foundation.

The Philosopher's Stone contemplates the streets of Ikebukuro.

Born January 27th 1934 in Asakusa, Tokyo as Toshiro Tanaka, he studied architecture at Waseda University and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Following a tour of New York and Mexico, he returned home to draft apartment, offices, and resorts—very conventional, very boring.

Seeking spiritual fulfillment, in 1971 he turned his back on the business world to reinvent himself as Von Jour Caux, leader of a troupe of artists and craftsmen known as Art Complex. They took the nouveau riche country by storm, completing over ten major projects until society’s appetite for extravagance vanished with the mid-90's housing bubble . Private residences, condominiums, nursing homes—while the decorations by gaudy, the structures themselves never be wasteful, with the Philosopher's Stone being one of their most eye-catching offerings.

Come along with us on a guided tour of the crown jewel of bizarre Tokyo architecture.

Organic insect shapes molded into the edifice.

Detail of the front.

The building is owned by the sake manufacturer Hirakiya.

The first floor is open for business and pedestrian traffic.

Sinuous snake details on the wrought iron entrance gate.

Ouroboros before he got played out.

The waiting room for your trip to a Gaudi-inspired dreamscape.

Another serpentine motif in the tiled fresco above the elevator.

The secrets of creation are well guarded—this locked door is as deep as you go.

Open-mouth ceramic tubes sprout from the walls like mushrooms.

The hand lamps saturate the room with warm shadows.

At a distance, the slick walls shine like snakeskin.

The backrest is surprisingly ergodynamic.

Sit and ponder exactly how and why this place was built.

The project's codename was Raga Chakras, as illustrated by this ceiling pattern informed by Hindu mandalas.

More ruminations on the origins of life.

Inscription on the outside is French for "the forest."

Though technically a private residence, the unlocked front gate is irresistibly inviting. You're more likely to run into another shutter bug than building security. Still, we ask that you use common sense and respect the property.

Directions:
From Ikebukuro Station, head straight out of the Center East exit and proceed down the right side of the main road. On the fifth block you will pass a Detour coffee shop. Turn right at this corner and the building is down the street on your right.

Address:
Toshima-ku, Minami Ikebukuro 2-29
(豊島区南池袋2-29)
Google Map

Special thanks to Tokyo Damage Report's awesome Tokyo Tour Guide for the tip!

Creepy Kids Songs Part 3: Satchan

noreply@blogger.com (DrSenbei) — Mon, 10 Sep 2012 11:50:00 +0000

Our songs up until now have been fairly innocuous ditties dragged into dark places by BBS denizens with the free time to match their sadistic imaginations. The final installment is something more raw—this true tale of sadness is a knife to the heart twisted by internet muck raking.

That Satchan / Is really named Sachiko

But she calls herself Satchan / 'cuz she's so small

I feel silly with / Satchan

That Satchan / She really loves bananas

But she can only eat half / 'cuz she's so small

I feel sorry for / Satchan

That Satchan / Is she really going far away?

But she'll forget about me / 'cuz she's so small

I feel sad without / Satchan

Memorial to Satchan at Minami Osaka Kindergarten.

Satchan was penned in 1959 by Osaka-born Sakata Hiroo(阪田寛夫), author of children's books known for his Japanese translations of The Adventures of Tintin. Years later in an interview with literary magazine Shunkan Bunshun, he admitted that TV personality and estranged boyhood friend Agawa Sawako (阿川佐和子) was the inspiration for the lyrics. He soon backpedaled, stating that Satchan was actually a transfer student from his preschool that had health problems.

This is where Satchan gains a life, or rather an un-life, of her own.

The lyrics reveal that Satchan was a sickly child. Everything starts fine with the first stanza. By the second, she's too feeble to handle an entire banana. And at the end of the song, she goes far away—recall from Toryanse that “to go” is a homonym for “to pass away.” I feel sorry for Satchan. I feel sad without Satchan. These genuine feelings of emptiness are the foundation of Japanese ghost stories and transmit clearly to their recipient beyond the grave.

Satchan is no longer an inhabitant of this world, if she even was to begin with. Kid's names are normally written using the round, friendly hiragana system, but the “Sa” in Satchan is inexplicably rendered with sharp, aggressive hiragana characters, suggesting the cramped scribblings or claw marks of some foreign entity imitating human script.

From Teke-Teke, starring AKB48's Oshima Yuko. The horror!

All signs point to Satchan being an incarnation of the yokai Teke-Teke. Satchan is so small and can only eat half a banana because she herself is only half a body. As the Teke-Teke story goes, a young girl has her legs run over by a train, either from slipping off the platform or in a botched suicide attempt. She survives the dismemberment only to suffer a slow, agonizing death. The lower body is never recovered.

Hence the vengeful spirit of the Teke-Teke haunts suburbia at night in search of her lost legs, a torso scuttling on its arms at speeds of up to 150kph. Those unfortunate enough to be caught meet the same fate as her—she slices the victim in half at the waist with a wicked scythe.

Satchan's transformation from benevolent childhood playmate to relentless wraith seems to be a recent one. Her backstory shares too much in common with other urban yokai to be an organic creation—bullet train speeds of the human-faced dog Jinmenken, leg-stealing ala the Red Shoes ghost story, bladed weaponry borrowed from the purse of a split mouth Kuchisake Onna.

There's even a rumored fourth verse inviting Satchan to come out and play, a chain letter element obviously cribbed from the blockbuster hit The Ring. It goes something like this:

That Satchan/ A train took her legs

But she's coming back / 'cuz she wants yours

I'll see you tonight / Satchan

I should have mentioned this earlier. Satchan will pay a midnight visit to whoever lays eyes on these cursed lyrics—unless they can find the hidden fifth and final verse within three days to put her spirit to rest. The clock is ticking, dear reader.

From Hell Teacher Nube, a favorite of our buddy Velocitron.

Creepy Kids Songs Part 2: Kagome Kagome

noreply@blogger.com (DrSenbei) — Mon, 03 Sep 2012 22:21:00 +0000

Our second dreadful dirge warns of murderous in-laws, global conspiracies, and treasure best left buried. You're never too young to learn that someone is always watching you, so fit in or pay the price.

Basket basket / Bird in a cage

When will it go free / At the eve of the dawn

The crane and turtle slipped

Who's that behind me?

Beware: Children at play! (Source)

Kagome Kagome is a cryptic nursery rhyme in the vein of Ring Around the Roses. Children join hands and slowly circle around the blindfolded “it” while chanting. When the singing stops, the “it” tries to guess who is standing behind them. If they’re correct, the two swap places and the game continues.

The song’s mysterious origin and vague lyrics have made it a topic of tireless speculation, with each analysis more macabre than the last. It all hinges on how you interpret the eponymous kagome.

Public execution like ikido dissuades others from falling out of line.

Typically kagome means "basket," though it can also be a perversion of kakome, “to surround.” This makes the bird in a cage a prisoner in jail. Written with different kanji characters, “at the eve of dawn” reads “the dawn patrol” (夜明けの番人) who have come to escort the accused to their execution—if the crane and turtle, symbols of longevity, take a fall, then death is certainly not far behind.

Or kagome may derived from kagomi (籠女) for "pregnant woman"—literally ”basket lady” for the extra abdominal baggage. In this gruesome interpretation, the unborn child (bird in a cage) becomes a ticking time bomb in an inheritance squabble. Rather than risk sharing the windfall with their family member to-be, the in-laws plot to push the wife down the stairs in a forced abortion. Be sure you can trust those at your back.

The Four Symbols from Chinese constellations. (Source)

The rabbit hole only gets deeper from here. Viewed through the lens of New Age spirituality, the bird becomes the soul confined to the trappings of flesh, yearning for escape. The eve of the dawn will usher in the next stage of human existence incited by a world-changing event prophesied by Chinese astrology—namely, Genbu, the Black Tortoise of the North and Suzaku, the Vermillion Bird of the South slipping, a metaphor for the inevitable shift of the earth's magnetic poles and ensuing chaos.

The kagome-mon pattern.

Don't be so fast to write this off as mere tinfoil-hat speculation—the Zionist threat is real! Though what it represents is up for debate. The hexagon cross-work pattern of kagome wicker basket coincides with the Star of David, conjuring up images of Illuminati plots or the Committee of Three Hundred's hidden hand corralling us into cages of the mind like the cattle we are.

A more likely conspiracy theory posits that the kagome acts as a treasure map to the buried gold of the Tokugawa clan. In 1868, the shogunate abdicated rule to the emperor, thus bringing a close to the bloodless Meiji Restoration. Though ousted from his castle and stripped of power, Tokugawa had the last laugh—the penniless new government was banking on funds from the war chest to rebuild the country, only to find that the riches of the vaults had been moved elsewhere!

Connecting the dots between Sado Kinzan Gold Mine, Edo Castle, and Toki Shrine, then Akechi Shrine, Senpu Castle, and Nikko Tosho-gu Shrine.

The search to uncover this lost fortune continues through the present, fruitless even with the help of modern science. Kagome Kagome may be the secret tech in cracking the mystery. Draw a line between the six areas closely connected to Tokugawa Ieyasu, the first Tokugawa shogun, and the points form a hexagram—this narrows down the search.

Next, assume that the bird in a cage hints at the location of the treasure. Logically it would be in the center of the hexagram, though once again wordplay offers a different interpretation. Tori meaning "bird" is nearly a homonym for torii shrine gate. This makes the most likely location Nikko Tosho-gu Shrine where Ieyasu is entombed. The final puzzle pieces are the tortoise and crane statues in the shrine's southern park. At the eve of the dawn, their sunrise shadows will converge, revealing the precise location of the treasure.

Follow your nose to history-altering revelations. (Source)

With the answer so obvious, what's keeping work crews from excavating the site? If you are willing to believe in the truth in the rhyme, you must also accept its warning. On an etymological level, kagome is derived from kago no me—"the eyes of the cage." Someone is watching to make sure that the secrets of the shogunate remain deep in the ground. Someone standing right behind you.

Whose eyes are those eyes? (Source)

Creepy Kids Songs Part 1: Toryanse

noreply@blogger.com (DrSenbei) — Wed, 29 Aug 2012 22:20:00 +0000

Summertime in Japan belongs to the ghouls. Dead ancestors return to visit the living during the O-Bon festival, and spine chilling ghost stories are the best way to beat the heat. Cut the air conditioning and turn off your fan, because TSB has a trifecta of eerie nursery rhymes guaranteed to keep your teeth chattering through the humid nights.

Pass through, pass through

Where does this narrow path lead?

It leads to Tenjin shrine

Won't you please let me pass?

Those without business may not pass

I have come with my child

To present an offering celebrating their seven years

Though going be easy, the return be frightful

Frightful it may be
Pass through, pass through

Illustration by Morohoshi Daijiro.

Toryanse, or Pass Through, is played much like to London's Bridge. Two children sing as they join hands to form an arch that the others duck under. When the song stops, the arch comes down and anyone trapped inbetween switches places with one of the arches.

The narrow path still stands. (Source)

At face value, the song is about a family convincing the gate keeper to let them inside Kawagoe castle north of Tokyo. The shrine refers to the Miyoshino shrine north of Tokyo, one of the fourteen thousand holy sites dedicated to the poet Sugawara no Michizane who was deified as Tenjin at the end of 10th century AD. During the Edo period, peasants were only allowed into the castle for auspicious occasions, in this case the Shichi-Go-San festival celebrating a child’s third, fifth, and seventh birthdays, all joyous benchmarks in a time fraught with high infant mortality rates.

This commotion also made it easy for spies and thieves to sneak in with the revelers. Sneaking out was another story. Visitors were waved through, only to face strict interrogation as they tried to leave. Though going be easy, the return be frightful, in more ways than one.

Send your daughters to the slaughter at the Shici-Go-San festival. (Source)

Some macabre wordplay turns this simple caution into a warning from beyond the grave. In Japanese, "to go" (行く) is homonym for “to pass away” (逝く). Similarly, kaeru for “to return home” (帰る) can be perverted into “return from the dead” (甦る). Dying’s the easy part, getting back is the problem. Take care when passing through.

This urban legend has taken up residence at cross walks in major cities. Busy intersections play folk tunes during green lights to let pedestrians know that they have the right of way, the most infamous being Toryanse. Here's the creepy bit—after Though going be easy, the return be frightful, the high notes in the last stanza segue perfectly into wailing ambulance sirens. The subliminal message urges you to look both ways when passing through, least you fail to make it across.

Another interpretation brings the danger much closer to home. A forgotten tradition of Shichi-Go-San involves hanging a paper charm in the shrine to pray for the child's safety. As the old saying goes, “children are property of the Gods until they turn seven” (七つまでは神のうち), making the talisman a proxy sacrifice that hopes to sate the Gods in keeping them from abducting the village youth.

Even today, missing children are said to be the victims of kamikakushi (神隠し), literally to be “spirited away” by the Gods. Kamikakushi was also a euphemism for mabiki (間引き), the practice of weeding out weak sprouts to give strong ones room to grow—which is to say, planned infanticide to reduce the number of mouths to feed. Toryanse may describe parents agonizing over a life-or-death decision. Do they make their offering at the shrine one of paper, or one of their own flesh and blood?

In other cases, being spirited away is more literal than metaphor. And when those abducted make the difficult trip back from the other side, they don’t return alone.

Folklore horror author Morohoshi Daijiro writes about a variation of Toryanse, Kaeryanse, or Return Home. In his manga "Tenjin-Sama", the song acts as a key between our world and a shadow zone populated by forgotten deities. When this gate at the Tenjin shrine is accidentally unlocked, a young girl dressed in traditional shichi-go-san ornamentation passes through it, together with the demon who first kidnapped her. With the portal left open, the Old Gods have free reign to claim their right—unattended children under seven.

Yokai hunter Hieda Reijiro is there to save the day in typical anthropologist fashion. If Kaeryanse is a song of summoning, than Tooryanse must be a song of banishment. Hieda sends the monster into the void, though not for the first time. Recall that Tenjin shrines were originally dedicated to other Gods before Sugawara no Michizane usurped them a century ago. Our demon is one of the many beings pushed out of reality by the current Japanese pantheon. Who can speculate the intentions of these Great Old Ones, or the vengeance they will unleash when freed from their prisons to pass though, pass through?

Robot Restaurant

noreply@blogger.com (DrSenbei) — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 11:13:00 +0000

Name: Robot Restaurant
Hours: 5:30PM-11:00PM, closed Sundays. (3 to 4 shows depending on the day. Reservation required.)
Price: ~~¥3000~~. ¥4000 as of 8/20/2012 (Includes boxed lunch.)
¥350 for canned beer.
Age: 25+ (No drunk college kids busting the equipment, thank you.)
Address: 1-7-1 Kabukicho, Shinjuku. (Map.)
Japanese level: So long as you can make the reservations, you're golden.

Robot Restaurant is anything but. There’s no mechanized waitstaff, much less anything to serve assuming there was a menu. Rather, customers are treated to an iridescent stage show put on by bikini girls celebrating the cultural quirks that make Japan the great nation that it is. Ready for right-wing propaganda, World War II fetishism, and innocent idols all under one roof? BANZAI!

The evening begins with a suspiciously militaristic salvo of battle cries reinforced by Taiko war drums. All those red-and-white national flag inspired scanties will pump that hot-blood straight into your throbbing Samurai spirit. Seeing them twirl traditional naganita polearms and flags emblazoned with "Woman Warrior" is enough to make you become a constitutional revisionist just to see how these ladies would fare in combat.

While chatting up a girl with a full back tattoo, beach-grown tan and rockin' 'bod may be proper bro etiquette in your home country, in Japan it's the fast track to the bottom of Tokyo Bay sporting a new pair of cement shoes, capiche?

The follow-up brass band fell right into step with Japan's panache for doing Americana better than America. Don't expect Hooters Girls to break out such regimented rhythm. Even the waitresses at the Biohazard Cafe perform like zombies by comparison. Say what you will about the cheesecake—these are professional performers with the chops to rumble.

And rumble they do, riding double on a fat hog. Who needs a fog machine when you have a diesel engine? These fun-loving biker gals are a callback to ultra-tough speed tribes like The Ladies that terrorized the countryside through the mid 90's.

The restaurant's namesake finally takes to the runway. It takes two girls to pilot the robot—one to control the pneumatic breasts, and another to wave to the crowd. Surprisingly, the Guntank in a wig is not the most interesting piece of hardware in the robot carnival.

No, that honor goes to this morale-boosting troop transport. The tank's electricolor dreamcoating renders it useless in combat, but man, imagine the sense of power you'd get straddling the canon.

As the big machines taxi lazily across the main strip, an LED-embossed merry-go-round ferries, well, pole-dancing fairies around the peripheral of the room.

If the fluorescent Panzer wasn't enough, the girls bring out a World War II bomber for one last run, thus bookending the militant undertones of the evening. Dig the pink leopard print aviator caps!
Once all the gear was returned safely to the holding cages, the dancers worked the crowd as only an cabaret unit could, skipping down the line in an impromptu high-five session. Giant robots, glow sticks, and a bit of harmless skinship—an otaku dream fulfilled.

From the hyper eurobeat soundtrack to the opulent 10 billion yen startup cost, Robot Restaurant feels like it slipped through a wormhole straight from the bubble economy, a period where Japan had the cash and libido to fuel such spectacular decadence. In a way the bubble never popped in Kabukicho—the unique needs of its nightlife prop up an independent micro-economy. The champagne fountains may have dried up, but step into this time machine and you can pretend to party like it's 1989.

FINAL JUDGMENT
Food: N/A (The box lunch is an afterthought.)
Service: 5/5 (Dude, did you see that? She was totally smiling right at me!)
Ambiance: 5/5 (A cool date destination despite appearances.)
Maximum Overdrive: 2/5 (Minimal contribution to robot uprising.)

Complete photo set on flickr.

Screaming Mad George's Paranoiascape

noreply@blogger.com (DrSenbei) — Tue, 14 Aug 2012 09:43:00 +0000

Illustration for Punk magazine.

Even if you're not consciously aware of Screaming Mad George (AKA SMG), he has fingers curled tightly around the throat of your repressed inner child. The Osaka-born visual effects artist is responsible for some of the best in traumatizing B-movie body horror, such as the cockroach transformation sequence from A Nightmare on Elm Street 4 and monsters in The Guvyer live-action, as well as connoisseur-level camp in Jack Frost and The Dentist 2.

He first journeyed to America in the 70's to study at the New York City School of Visual Arts before forming seminal horror punk-performance band, The Mad, whose gore-strewn sets loaded with prosthetic appendages—including self-disemboweling and cannibal babies—helped pave the way for a Hollywood gig on Predator.

Irrational, SMG's post-Mad group from 1983.

George describes his style as “anti-realism,” an outlet to free associate nightmarish dreamscapes onto the screen with a thin veneer of fantasy that insulates against the shock of real world violence. His mantra drowns out the critics who peg gore hounds as psychopaths. To quote, “you can enjoy fake violence even if it's a really, really horrible thing. But I don't like violence when it's real. I don't like anything that is real.”

World 1-1 as you've never seen it before.

And nothing is as unreal as Paranoiascape. A Japan-only Playstation release from 1998, George handled the creature design, concept, and music in reanimating the long-deceased pinball genre as a first-person shooter. Imagine equal parts Devil Crash and Doom stitched together with a screeching metal soundtrack and you're only halfway there—Paranoiascape needs to experienced firsthand to fully plumb the depths of its madness.

The gameplay and environmental hazards are straight out of a Dali painting—if Dali had been a gutter punk from the 80's. Dirty syringes spring up from the floor to jab the skeletal flippers. Flocks of vitreous-sucking Vampfish swoop in to steal your flaming brain pinball. The stage select screen is a pizza of death topped with melted ears and giggling cancer cells. George never fails to put on an entertaining show.

His final act plucks you out of the familiar POV hallways and drops you into an overhead maze infested with cardboard zombies. You command a mannequin grafted onto a wheelchair, a failed alchemy experiment straight out of a Brothers Quay feature, in navigating the crypt to unite the spirits of the king and queen so they can create a new form of life. Behold, the first ever pinball concept album.

The title plays more like an extended music video for his at-the-time band, Psychosis, than an actual video game. Regardless of how precisely you time the flippers, they only launch the ball in one direction—the one you don't want. It's best to simply set it to infinite credits, sit back, and enjoy the twisted ride.

With the gameplay removed, you're left with a guided tour of George's impressive career that terminates with a FMV of his creature workshop. The breathing walls come from his time with H.R. Giger on the set of Poltergeist II. The ass-faced walkers in high heels are a send-up of the infamous “butthead” scene from Brian Yuzna's Society. After a certain point you start to see the method behind George's madness. Don't take my word for it—I implore you to spend an evening mucking through SMG's mind. You too will realize that what goes down on the inside is far more sane than what is perpetrated on the outside.

BONUS STAGE:

The Mad 7"s available for download:
Eyeball
Fried Egg

Monster Maker's Contest 1986
A grotesque parade of the best in creature effects, curated by Screaming Mad George.

Longplay of Paranoiascape on Niko Niko Douga.

Umezz Updates

noreply@blogger.com (voidmare) — Thu, 02 Aug 2012 14:11:00 +0000

You never know with Kazuo.

Following the death of the Kazuo Umezu Official Homepage, he stepped out of the spotlight and embarked on a quest to leave the manga world behind in reinventing himself as a rock star. Now Kazz is staging a comeback, kicking things off with scattered television appearances and a session on Niko Nama last month. There's also the forthcoming Umezz Perfection release of has magnum opus, Fourteen, featuring a brand new ending spread out over 18 full color pages--his first manga work in well over a decade.

Source

Even more, the Lumine department stores in Shinjuku and Ikebukuro are plastered with advertisements featuring his heroines and trademark red and white stripes. As bizarre as that may sound, Kazz is the original fashionista mangaka and one the first to give his characters revolving wardrobes. Kazz has always had an eye for costume design--including his own.

Everything is leading up to Umezz Carnival 2012, a day filled with live performances of material from Yami no Album 2, along with a talk event unraveling the mysteries of Fourteen, dancers, and a high-five session topped off with autographs. Kazz has never disappointed before, so be sure to grab your tickets when they go on sale August 20th!

Scummy Manga Reviews #7: Ressentiment

noreply@blogger.com (DrSenbei) — Tue, 31 Jul 2012 12:08:00 +0000

Title: Ressentiment (ルサンチマン) 
Serialized in: Big Spirit Comics, Volume 3 2004-Volume 12 2005
Art and Story by: Hanazawa Kengo (花沢健吾)
Genre: Self-loathing rom.com

What It's About

Nothing on earth consumes a man more quickly than the passion of resentment. 
-Friedrich Nietzsche 

People drop out of society for a number of reasons—bad luck, missed opportunities, poor timing—often the same reasons that prevent them from dropping back in. But in most cases, especially for protagonist Sakamoto Takuro, it's resentment towards the world that keeps them under its thumb.  

Our hero has every reason to hate the skin he lives in. Thirty with a hairline going on fifty, he sponges off his parents and works a dead-end job at a printing factory for beer money. Whatever self-respect he once had has been sanded away over years of grinding against prostitutes. Did I mention that he's grossly obese, just plain gross, and suffers from extreme foreskin coverage? Blaming society for his lot in life is more comforting than making the effort to overcome his laundry list of shortcomings. 

For those without the will to power, escape is the only release from their self-determined slavery. Takuro hitches a ride out of his squalor on Noah's Ark, a world wide massively multiplayer online role-playing game. This is no mere World of Warcraft substitute—it surpasses virtual worlds and augmented reality to present a fully-interactive virtual reality that's better than the real thing. The only reason to log out is to change your diaper.

Takuro fashions his avatar after a romanticized version of his high school self, back before he grew fat and self-loathing. His sweetheart-to-be, Tsukiko, initially appears to be docile, subservient, and just out of elementary school—the perfect foil for Takuro's insecurities. But there's some bugs in her programming. She has her own agenda, fighting off Takuro's violent sexual advances. Unlike the other girls, she's aware of the world outside the game, and over time finds ways to interact with it. 

Tsukiko's erratic behavior recalls urban legends of a proto-program named Moon, the kernel of data that all current A.I. popped from. Rumor has it that Moon can make a digital clone of the user's memories and personality, thus liberating their consciousness from the shackles of reality to seek salvation on Noah's Ark. The procedure, however, comes with risks. With society removed from the equation, can Takuro's coddled ego stand up to the shock of being brought face-to-face with its true nature?  

Why it's Awesome

Author Hanazawa Kengo lies somewhere between George Carlin and William Gibson in making biting social commentary through the filter of science fiction. The technology behind Noah's Ark may be exaggerated, but the sociological factors that allow for wayward youth like Takuro are very real. Any of us could just as easily fall off the tracks after a series of slip-ups. 

Ressentiment takes place in the not-so-distant 2015. While most futuristic works overshoot mankind's evolution, Hanazawa follows our current trajectory towards a tomorrow that falls short of our expectations. We're still living in Tokyo’s lower-middle class suburbs, not a high-rise in Tokyo III. Approaching the story as speculative fiction, rather than science fiction, offers insight into where Japan was in 2004 and where it's heading. 

Noah's Ark is split into two main regions: Fantasia, a Dark Ages Europe for role players, and Nostalgia, a Showa-era suburb for dating sims. FPS clans patrol the borderlands, while Nostalgia is a strictly monitored demilitarized zone safe for the user to parade his girlfriend across town back to the Good Old Days. Here, memories come from a time before adolescent depression and economic deflation. The real money trading rate is set at one-tenth the value of real-world currency. Players can treat their girl to a steak dinner or dress her up in designer clothes, all on a McDonald's paycheck. 

Flash back to our inescapable present, where the media never tires of new buzzwords to berate the youth for bucking accepted patterns of consumption and employment. First it was the NEETs, 15-34 year-olds not in education, employment, or training—a convenient acronym to pin the economic slowdown on. Headlines proclaim; NEETs are bringing down the GDP; they're rotting out the pension system!

The moniker carries so much baggage that NPOs tried to phase it out for the politically correct “Late Bloomer,” as if being jobless was only a phase to grow out of once you “get with the program.” Rather than focus on creating employment in the growing tech sector that this generation of net natives are equipped to contribute to, the government is wasting time offering unstable and unsatisfying temp positions through Young Hello Work.

If an image change and temporary jobs are the best the administration can do, it's no surprise that the number of NEETs has stayed strong at around 600,000 over the past two decades. The cutoff point for NEET-dom is 35, at which point you graduate into an uncounted demographic dead zone. Better to sweep them under the rug then chalk up another loss.


The herbivore male in his natural (sex-free and sanitized) environment.	(Source.)

Those fortunate enough to have regular employment still aren't free of society's judgmental gaze. Lowered incomes make the current crop more frugal than their fathers. These economic deadbeats would rather spend a quiet weekend at home rather than blowing their wad at singles parties and are derided as “Herbivore Males” for acting so domesticated; interest in luxury goods and cars is falling nearly as quickly as the nation's libido. Everything is mendokusai—more trouble than it's worth—and the passive resistance of non-consumption is the best quiet riot the youth can muster.

For a generation of young men making ends meet on a part-time salary, something as high-maintenance as an automobile—or a girlfriend—is certainly attainable, though not economically sustainable. Unless, of course, it's in a virtual world with third-world prices.  

Konami has been pushing the limits of pre-packaged girlfriends. Their romance simulation game Love Plus (over 600,000 copies moved, one for every NEET,) brings a high level of physicality to the relationship with dates timed to the real world clock, region-specific presents, and most recently, augmented reality marker tags that open a digital rift between our world and that of your fairy-sized soul mate. There's also Dream Club Zero, where you woo cabaret girls with gifts—gifts purchased with real world currency (at a fraction of the actual price, naturally,) charged directly to your smartphone.

The iron-clad argument against virtual girlfriends (apart from being sad and creepy) is that there's no physical compensation for the time sink. Ressentiment delivers return on investment, with dividends. The Noah's Ark software comes packaged with a VR helmet and pressure-sensitive gloves for force feedback and increased immersion. Hardcore users will be interested in the body suit (sold separately), as well as the numerous adult attachments.  

Behold, the penis case, a divine synthesis of Rumble Pack and motion wand technologies. Once you succeed in buying your way into her heart, prove to your girl that your wallet isn't the only thing that's fat with the ultimate post-game content. Proper sizing is required for maximum stimulation, so be honest about your measurements—all sales are final. I also recommend preparing a last will and testament before jacking in, because you may never see the light of day again. The body suit will become your new skin. 

The spinning, clicking, and relentless penis case would later find its real world counterpart. In 2007, Tenga launched a series of male masturbatory aids poised to bring sex toys to the casual consumer through minimalist packaging and sleek designs. The original “easy beat” Tenga Egg was ready out-of-the-box and came in six styles reminiscent of the Fruit Colors Power Macintosh G3. Sony still laments that Japan wasn’t the one to deliver the iPod to the world, but the country can take pride in the iWank. All it takes is one pump to see how Tenga successfully moved one million units (two for every NEET!) in its first year of production.

If Dream Club and its derivatives are any indication, people are becoming more comfortable with trading tangible money for intangible goods and services—though the ethereal nature of these transactions where no physical cash is exchanged—could have something to do with it. Take the recent comp gacha scandal as an example.  

Comp gacha in a nutshell. (Source)

Comp gacha is short for “complete gacha-gacha,” a type of cellphone game where players crank gumball machines (known as “gacha-gacha” for their patent clanking sound) for randomly generated loot. Complete a series and get an exclusive item in that category. Here's the rub—the odds are rigged to make the last piece in a collection ultra-rare and keep your hot hands turning that handle at 100 to 500 yen a pop—not that this matters to elementary students whose parent’s foot the bill. 

Once the PTA rose a ruckus, the government’s Consumers Affair Industry quickly moved to ban their sale for violating the Act Against Unjustifiable Premiums and Misleading Representations. Bad news for social game giants like Gree and DeNA who operate out of the nouveau rich Roppongi Hills and Shibuya's Hikarie on the backs of profits from would-be compulsive gamblers. And possibly worse news for the public, whose rallying cry against comp gacha consisted of throwing their hands up in the air and lamenting, “GOJ, please raise our kids for us because we have no idea how!”  

Given Japan's notorious history as a nanny state, it’s amazing how they’ve avoided becoming a police state. Near the end of the aughts, security cameras replicated throughout Shinjuku and Shibuya, pushing crime into non-monitored areas such as Ikebukuro, though their number is still one-third that of London, and their perversity nowhere on the level of the Orwellian Intellistreets infiltrating American cities. The daily announcements telling kids to go home at dusk and gentle warnings on trains are coddling, though not nearly as intrusive as militant street lights barking orders, or cameras that can pick your face out of a crowd. 

Ressentiment's vision of Japan in 2015 is of one utter complacency to the CCTV sentries standing watch at every intersection. This seems contradictory to the premium placed on privacy, as seen in the uproar over pedestrians snapped on Google Street View, or the majority of Mixi and Facebook accounts using pets and Disney characters for profile pictures. But imagine a scenario where the government made a low-key push for more surveillance cameras—perhaps at the urging of a US-backed security firm. Would the conservative nation rule against greater security? So long as the units are out of sight, the public would put them out of mind, if not feel reassured by their omnipresence.

Takahashi Katsuya then and now.

The nearly two-decade manhunt for the three remaining fugitives of the 1995 Tokyo subway sarin gas attacks came to a close last month partially thanks to Big Brother. Hirata Makoto first turned himself in to police over New Year's, which lead to the arrest of Kikuchi Naoko, who then provided the alias of Takahashi Katsuya. Security camera footage from a grocery store by Takahashi's dorm put an updated face to the name, and it was only a matter of time before he was spotted and apprehended. The velvet glove tightens its grip. Can you be so selfish as to complain about being put under non-obtrusive surveillance when the nation's safety is at risk? 

Besides, Japan has a more clear and present danger to contend with. The revised Copyright Law goes into effect October 1st and outlaws ripping copy-protected materials such as CDs and DVDs, as well as makes downloading copy-written music and video files a criminal offense punishable by a maximum of two years in prison and/or a fine of up to two million yen.

The revision was hastily pushed through the Lower and Upper Houses before bothersome experts had a chance to weigh in. Japan has lobbyists as well—in this case, the monopolistic copyright collection society JASRAC, an immovable piece of the Iron Triangle bonded with bureaucrats from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology. Their vested interest in music sales is painfully transparent. More sinister is their stake in monitoring data flow.

The uproar over the new Copyright Law has silenced pleas of mercy from the private sector. JASRAC is strong-arming internet service providers to implement software that detects copy-written music uploaded by users. The file sniffer only runs on the server, not the individual's computer, keeping it within current privacy laws. For a mere fifty-thousand yen (roughly $650 USD) monthly usage fee, ISPs can absolve themselves from potential lawsuits brought upon them by JASRAC for assisting in IP theft perpetrated by their users. Blackmail has never been so legit.

The revised Copyright Law seems to have one saving grace—copyright holders need to make a claim before Joe Public gets served a subpoena. Unfortunately, “copyright holders” is synonymous with the draconian JASRAC who will only continue to sneak in spookware through your mail slot. With the government in their pocket and the ISPs under their thumb, who is left to stop this internet wire-tapping?

NEET army black ops. (Source.)

Enter the NEET. Wait, maybe that's being unfair—I'm sure that many of the members of Anonymous responsible for launching DDoS cyber-attacks against JASRAC and government home pages at the end of June hold down respectable jobs. They came, blasted JASRAC's servers back to the vinyl age with their Low Orbit Ion Cannon, and quickly departed, but not before delivering an ultimatum to the people of Japan. 

To paraphrase their single Japanese tweet:

Anonymous can't fight your battles for you. You must organize and take to the streets. Stand up, or sit in, but no matter what you do, make your voice heard!

Imagine, 600,000 young people mobilized and working towards the greater good, their lives given value through their actions, credentials be damned! Eden of the East spun a similar scenario, where unemployed internet junkies banded together to cause an IT revolution that freed the nation from government corruption. Ressentiment is not so positive.

Its NEET army of malignant hackers disguise themselves as Che Guevara, complete with facial hair that would put Guy Fawkes to shame. Player killing is their business, and business is good. Their ultimate grift is smashing through United States Department of Defense firewalls—get enough grubby hands at the keyboard and one pair is bound to grab the nuclear football. All for the LOLs, of course.

Back in reality, the Japanese won't go near anything nuclear—unless it's in protest of it. The near-meltdown of and subsequent political handwringing over the disaster in Fukushima galvanized the nation against nuclear power. Protesters have taken to the streets in numbers not seen since the student riots back in the 70's, from the 500 person stand-off with riot police at the reactivated Oi power plant to the 10,000 member strong weekly demonstrations in front of Prime Minister Noda's abode.

Judging from the backlash on online web forum 2-chan and personal blogs, the Left is admonishing the Right for being too timid to step out of its comfort zone to make a difference, while the Right criticizes the Left for their misguided attempts to rock the boat. What role do the NEETs play in this revolution? Are they protesting in public to give their lives meaning, or are they flaming the protesters online to protect the status quo that keeps them in their insulated cocoon?

The reality is likely a split a both, with more falling on the side of disinterested rather than polarized—much like the general population. Some utilize their unlimited down time to spread the message of change across social media. Many more go about their lives as if nothing has changed since 3/11.

Action and inaction are both choices, with the decision driven by one's resentment towards society. Let's hope that Hanazawa's vision of young people is his one prediction that misses the mark.

Why It Won't Come Out in English

The four-volume Ressentiment proved that Hanazawa had the chops to tackle a long-term serialization. Since then, he's polished off Boys on the Run, an eleven-volume journey of getting over yourself, getting the girl, and getting your ass kicked along the way. His zombie apocalypse I Am A Hero is still going strong after nine volumes. Boys has a pretty decent film adaptation going for it, while Hero oozes the undeniable “Z” factor. This leaves Ressentiment, the tale of an irredeemable poop-socker, a bit of a hard sell.

Which is a shame seeing how raw it is compared to his later works, both thematically and artistically. The cast's disproportionately large heads work to ratchet up the awkward humor. Backgrounds retain that dirty draftsman style common before the move to sterilized stills traced in Photoshop. Hanazawa used to be on a potty-mouthed Jihad against the world, bent on taking down as many of his peers along the way as possible. Now that he's respected enough to have a stake in society, he's cooled down somewhat as not to loose it—though his Twitter feed still reads like public toilet graffiti.

Much like the current anti-nuclear movement, Hanazawa offers problems, but no solutions. His rantings alone certainly aren't going to save the archipelago. But perhaps his voice will serve as a wake-up call to those who can. Before blaming society for what ails us, we must first look inwards at what we have contributed—or failed to contribute—to the situation. We are the author of our life's narrative. Ressentiment begs us to come up with a better ending then its own.

Biohazard Cafe & Grill S.T.A.R.S.

noreply@blogger.com (DrSenbei) — Sun, 22 Jul 2012 02:43:00 +0000

Name: Biohazard Cafe & Grill S.T.A.R.S.
Hours: 11:00AM-3:00PM, 5:00PM-12:00PM. (Seats rotate every two hours. Reservation required.)
Price: ¥3300 for girls, ¥3700 for guys. (Two hour course meal.)
¥300-¥650 for beers and cocktails.
Address: Shibuya Parco 1, 7th floor.
Japanese level: So long as you can make the reservations, you're golden.

2012 is a good year to be a Resident Evil fan. We've got Revelations to hold us over until 6 drops in October, as well as a new CG film and the latest from Paul Anderson on the horizon, both of which promise to be flaming train wrecks of entertainment. What better time to return to Raccoon City to get reacquainted with the franchise's roots over a plate of home-cooked vittles?

Recently opened Biohazard Cafe & Grill S.T.A.R.S. offers the ambiance of a sleepy Midwestern neighborhood bar, complete with a looping soundtrack of Top 40 hits from the 90's and reformed strippers on the waitstaff. You wouldn't even know you were in a Resident Evil-themed establishment if not for the memorabilia lining the walls. That, and the life-size T-002 Tyrant replica encased in the center of the room.

The trusty typewriter and self-defense flash grenade.

Yet things aren't as homely as they seem. The second loop of Mmm Bop is suddenly drowned out by warning klaxons. Panicked caution lights strobe on and off. The creature has awakened... and is about the break out of its holding tank!

Luckily, the combat boots on the waitresses aren't just for show. The girls of Dance Team S.T.A.R.S. Angelique have been trained from the ground up by their Chief Commander-cum-former K-1 heavyweight Nicholas Pettas and Madonna back-up dancer turned choreographer Ueno Takahiro. They coolly arm themselves with the replica firearms on display and saunter into attack formation, all while keeping their rocking hips on beat to Spice Up Your Life. Critics of the first Resident Evil movie, take notice—this is what it would have looked like if the director wasn't preoccupied with Mortal Kombat.

On the other hand, an elite anti bio-terror strike force equipped with nothing more than hot pants and exposed midriffs is in line with Leon trash-talking a midget Napoleon and Chris uppercutting a two-ton boulder into submission. The real make-or-break point for a restaurant is its food.

Thankfully the first-aid spray dressing only looks like hairspray.

The course comes with all-you-can-eat “B.B.Q. Grill Raccoon-style” churrasco grilled skewers, “S.T.A.R.S. time-out” sweet Japanese curry, “Arkley-style” seafood bisque, and a mixed herb salad topped off with Vietnamese noodles (mild Jill-style for girls, spicy Barry-style for guys) and “Rebbecca's coquettish” mango pudding dessert. The menu names are stretching an already thin concept. At ¥4000+ per head I was expecting more in terms of presentation and value. Is it really too much to ask for a brain souffle? At least take Fiona Apple off repeat.

Last year's Shooting Bar EA offered up a more authentic Resident Evil dining experience coupled with commemorative take-home glasses and an airsoft range where you blast B.O.W.s. In contrast Biohazard Cafe & Grill S.T.A.R.S. offers heartburn and a lot of awkward laughs. Not that I regret going. From the original tank controls to goofy retcons and cringe-inducing adaptations, the series has always demanded a certain degree of immunity through suspension of belief. Just be sure that your wallet is prepared to survive the horror.

FINAL JUDGMENT
Food: 2/5 (Too pricey for the quality.)
Service: 2/5 (Part-time dancers should be faster on their feet.)
Ambiance: 1/5 (I'd rather go to Lockup.)
What IS this?: 5/5 (Some doors are better left unlocked.)

History of Akihabara Part 3.5: 2.5D

noreply@blogger.com (DrSenbei) — Mon, 02 Jul 2012 11:34:00 +0000

Somewhere along the way, otaku culture has gotten mixed in with mainstream culture. This interlude in our History of Akihabara series steps out of Electric Town to explore otaku elements pervading Japanese youth culture as well as the lifestyle alternatives they provide.

From Nemu's personal homepage.

Meet Yumemi Nemu, star of Denpa Gumi, the alternative idol unit for those who think that Momoiro Clover Z has gotten too mainstream. A Renaissance woman of sorts, when not behind the mic she moonlights as a DJ at the anisong club Mogra and models for gravure. I should also add that she doesn’t have a steady income, likely isn’t planning for the long term, and may or may not be defaulting on her pension payments. But this isn’t intended as an attack on her free-wheeling ways. If anything, Nemu represents the growing number of young people searching for new lifestyles and values amidst the scrap of a broken employment system.

She’s a member of the so-called “Lost Generation,” a clumsy branding for those raised during the two decades of economic deflation following the collapse of the housing bubble. These are the convenience clerk NEETs, the hikikkomori shut-ins, the drop-outs that felt their channels to mainstream society strangled by unforgiving educational elitism. Rather than put themselves back on the accepted path to success worn bare by their parents footsteps, they have continued on their outside vector towards unexplored venues of self-fulfillment.

Mainstream media is only now starting to acknowledge what youth of Japan have always known, deep down—that the old paradigm doesn’t work, that company life means no life at all, and that net culture can produce objects of real value.

Raised on low-fi fare like the Famicom without being spoiled by the high-rolling decadence of the bubble era, this generation isn’t afraid to spend the rest of their days working part time jobs, so long as it means scraping up enough cash to pursue their hobbies and social activities. Some describe this worldview as 2.5D, which is exactly what it sounds like—the halfway point between 2D and 3D. It marks the intersection of fantasy space (anime, video games, the net) with real world space (art, gatherings, events).Pink Sugar Heart Attack

For a visual example, look no further than the Neo Cosplay Collection.

Held at La Foret, Harajuku’s flagship clothing mall, the collection featured brands such as GALAXXXY who flip anime heroines into Punkey Brewster street wear. (Source)

If the crux of cosplay is to faithfully recreate the clothing of a character, than neo cosplay is concerned with layering upon that look to make it your own. Imagine if an Akihabara maid went through the looking glass and emerged out of the closet of a Harajuku Fruits fashionista: The resulting spectacle would be enough to get any one's pulse pounding.

Consider it the next step for pastel fairy kei fashion, augmented with otaku elements from Studio Pierrot’s magical girl shows like Creamy Mami. A natural fit, considering that the “sensational lovely” style pioneered by 6% Doki Doki drinks from the same carton of strawberry milk that fuels loli idol culture.

Shamelessly ripped from their homepage.

To paraphrase their homepage, the appeal of 6% Doki Doki comes from being blindsided by a flash of the extraordinary through the fog of the dreadfully ordinary. Entering the store, you are transported to another world where Care Bears never stopped caring, and purple becomes the natural compliment for pink. The shop girls are dressed like princesses from a parallel dimension. Brand maestro Masada Sebastian hand picks the heirs to his kawaii kingdom from a pool of over 200 applicants to preen into fashion models and performers for his avant garde stage shows.

Providing a reprieve from the everyday, producing young girls to serve as the brand image—6% Doki Doki shares its core concepts with amateur idol factories, the most productive being Akihabara’s Dear Stage.

Free Agents in the Game of Happiness

The interior of Dear Stage is intentionally lo-fi to create a home-made, school festival vibe. (Source)

Dear Stage is the mothership for the Moe Japan label captained by Tokyo University of the Arts graduate Fukushima Maiko. Her business model is 100% self-sufficient. Girls perform as idols on the first floor stage, play maid on the second floor cafe, and flirt like hostesses in the low-lit upstairs bar—every male fantasy under one roof. And when a girl’s popularity hits critical mass, Fukushima is ready to produce and release their CD through her own record company, Meme Tokyo, a sub-label of Toy’s Factory.

While Fukushima’s girls aren’t going to steal the spotlight from AKB48 anytime soon, there are a handful of success stories amongst the hopefuls. And how does one even measure success? Each performer has their own personal dream to fulfill. Some want to top the charts, while others simply want a top-rated Nico Nico Douga account. They seem happy enough with whatever fame comes their way, so long as they can set the terms of said happiness.

The simple act of being active in a community you can call your own has become more important than the results of these actions. In her book, The Youth of Japan Are Not Unhappy (日本人の若者は不幸じゃない), Fukushima explains this phenomenon through the concept of “clusters.” Groups no longer need a centralized structure with designated leaders; rather, they can exist independently through a loose network of like-minded persons so long as there is a shared meeting place. These commons can be as expansive as Twitter, or as pinpoint a venue as Dear Stage.

Clusters form around a concept or hobby. Take Hatsune Miku, for example. Though technically owned by the developer, Crypton Future Media, all of the actual content, from artwork to music to choreography, is user generated. There’s no keystone holding the Miku architecture together. Famous artists may arise from the ranks, but they’re more of trend setters than leaders with a vision.

Concentrated on the world wide web and spread across the globe, her legions of fans are simply waiting for their Field of Dreams moment: If you build it (or setup a concert), they will come. In droves, apparently. All ten thousand tickets to this year’s Miku Appreciation Festival sold out in a matter of hours. Most musicians would kill to have that devoted of a crowd, sans glowsticks.

The largest cluster of DIY youth culture is the self-published manga convention Comic Market, or Comiket. Held bi-annually during the national summer and winter vacations, each incarnation draws in over 500,000 visitors and 35,000 artist circles.

The convention hall has consistently been at full capacity for the past few years. (Source)

Comiket has a planning committee which screens applicants and ensures that everything runs smoothly behind the scenes, giving it the illusion of centralized management. In practice, their duties are more akin to crowd control than actually crafting the event. No, the true producers are the circles themselves. Their personal taste dictates what gets brought to the trade floor, each individual booth another link in the network. No single group can wholly represent Comiket, for this diversity is its defining characteristic.

Application fees are nominal and the event is free to the public. Ideally a circle would break even on the booth fee and printing costs. To some, a financial loss isn’t even an issue—having your work on display for others to see is worth the price of admission. Still others plan on turning a profit, with more popular artists able to pull in a living wage. The line between pro and amateur blurs. It’s hard to say which is more impressive: That mainstream manga artists supplement their income here, or that unsigned independents could possibly outsell them.

Like Dear Stage, Comiket provides alternatives—alternatives to white-collar work or blue-collar labor, and alternatives for socializing and personal expression. Sure, not every indie creator is going to make it big, but the possibility is there. This possibility is just the pressure release needed by the youth who have fallen off the fast track or feel suffocated by society. Perhaps the Lost Generation isn’t drifting as aimlessly as everyone thinks. Perhaps they’ve been heading towards their appropriate clusters this whole time.

Once enough of these clusters amass, they form autonomous bodies with clear goals. In 2008, high school student Fujishiro Uso gathered disparate art communities from cyberspace and transported them into physical gallery space. Creators from Pixiv, Nico Nico Douga, 2channel and beyond leveraged social networks like Mixi and Twitter to magnify the manifesto of a new creative movement christened Chaos Lounge: Otaku culture is fed up with being marginalized by the mainstream, and the time has come to hijack the architecture of the Internet to spread this message.

Art by Chaos Lounge's Umezawa Kazuki. (Source)

Their canvas would be the very room housing their installation pieces. Their palette was not limited to colors, but absorbed existing art and found objects in creating barely coherent pastiches, collages of characters familiar enough to be from any given anime, while generic enough to elude recognition. Much like the moe-ification of Akihabara, this terraforming process gave the nomadic Chaos Lounge tribe temporary bases—a place to belong.

Looking back, what changes did their post-modernist cultural revolution spark, if any? They transformed a hotel room into a free-form art commune, participated in an art battle royale, and created clothing for an Ura-Harajuku select shop, not to mention hosted nearly a dozen of gallery events. But aside from the praise provided by fellow otaku artist Murakami Takashi, Chaos Lounge has faced sharp disapproval, and from their supposed in-group at that.

Otaku, acting as the self-appointed governing body of the Internet, are hyper-judgmental of everything, especially their fellow brothers-in-arms. More vocal critics trash Chaos Lounge for being derivative, while fundamentalists expound that the institutions of art and otakuism should be kept separate. Murakami was flamed by his peers for these same reasons. Despite the glut of incriminating Dinner with Waifu photo dumps on 2channel and yatte mita “Check me out” videos on Nico Nico Douga, otaku expect each other to follow the same code of ethics as the rest of the country. Namely, you’re free to be a huge weirdo if you want. Just do it at home.

These demotivational posters in the station send mixed messages posted when next to the "No groping" adverts.

The Generation Gap and the Culture Gap

How can Chaos Lounge be fighting for otaku art but be hated by otaku? Why is Hatsune Miku considered to be fringe music despite scoring Oricon rankings and corporate sponsorship? If pornographic dojinshi moves more units than certain weekly serials, what’s keeping it off the Cool Japan menu?

There is a glaring breakdown of communication between the youth, otaku, and government. 2.5D helps put this into perspective by redefining the rules of engagement. Essentially, all parties are concerned with anime, manga, and the resulting media mix. They’re just operating within different spheres of interest.

Video games, light novels, online culture. For the current crop of digital natives raised on their parent’s comic collections, there is much less social resistance to these things than in the past. What many consider otaku culture is actually youth culture—and youth culture is mainstream culture.

Which isn’t to say that otaku culture, however you chose to define it, is dead. It still lives on, though there is a widening generation gap that starts somewhere between the mid 80’s and early 90’s. If you’re reading this blog, chances are you’re standing on the old man side of this divide with personal biases that don’t necessarily apply to those across the growing schism.

Ironically, as the classic image of the moe otaku gets pushed further into the background, more and more people are beginning to identify themselves as having a bit of an otaku streak. This doesn’t mean that they’ve broken down and bought Queen's Blade body pillows, however. Online shopping and the media mystique of Akihabara have lowered the barriers of entry to fandom, making it easier than ever for anyone to pick up a high-grade sculpt of their favorite One Piece character or visit maid cafes unironically. Attitudes towards the label “otaku” have changed dramatically following Densha Otoko, elevating the hanging albatross into a self-depreciating badge of pride with a glint of sub-culture hipness.

One time Olympic athlete Narita Domu is proudly married to his snowboard and enjoys a more robust sex life than his average countryman.

This new breed of “light otaku” has been warmly accepted by business analysts and the tourist industry. A shrinking population means shrinking markets, unless you can find a way to convert new consumers to your product. Anime and manga manages precisely this with its comprehensive marketing blitz. Media mix casts a wide net of ancillary products guaranteed to snag a few fresh faces from the pool. Once you let yourself go with the flow, it’s only a matter of time before you find yourself purchasing some non-obtrusive character goods. After all, there’s not much difference between a moe blob and loosely-designed (though endearing) yuru-chara when they’re dangling from your cellphone.

With their mindless grins, local mascots make collecting useless baubles charming as opposed to a social faux pas. (Source)

Of course there’s more to being an otaku than mere consumerism. Following the success of Haruhi and Lucky Star, location hunting is back in a big way. Fans embark on seichi junrei, or pilgrimages to holy sites, to soak in the ambiance of the places that inspired a series close to their heart. In the same way that Hatsune Miku concerts convert digital MP3s into a live listening experience, location hunting connects fictional settings with real world space. It’s the perfect motivator to get out from behind the computer screen and travel the country.

Between this, Tesujin-28, and marbled beef, Kobe has everything. (Source)

Accidentally showing up in an anime is the smartest PR move a city can make. Washinomiya shrine is the classic example—its visitors more than quadrupled after appearing in the opening for Lucky Star. Capcom has organized a series of tie-ins featuring the locales and feudal battlegrounds from it's Basara series to make a pretty penny off reki-jyo, or female history buffs. The former Toyosato Elementary has since opened its doors (and vendor stalls) for Keion! groupies. Over the past few years, Ueda City has organized summer festivals that coincide with the events of the Summer Wars movie. The otaku factor is free money for municipalities that are ready to capitalize on it.

The question, then, is what qualifies an otaku? The label means something different depending who you ask. The dictionary defines it as a person who is passionate and deeply knowledgeable in a specialized field. Culture critic Azuma Hiroki adds a post-modern twist by making them “database animals” in search of instant gratification. Gainax founder Okada Toshio holds them as a persecuted sub-sect who are the modern inheritors of Edo’s artisan culture. And psychologist Saito Tamaki deftly describes them as anyone able to get their jollies from nekkid cartoons.

On the one hand, this analysis comes off as an exercise in navel-gazing. And in a way it is, especially for those who consider being an otaku as part of their self-identity. But let’s not forget that anime and manga are serious business. A 2008 white paper produced by the focus group Media Create found that the combined sales of the otaku industry to be 186.8 billion yen (about 1.65 billion USD at the time), with nearly half of the sales from dojinshi.

The Economy Minister has his eyes set on Akihabara as a key to economic growth. Dentsu is primed to form an otaku think-tank to better market anime abroad. Cool Japan has evolved into Vibrant Japan, and if their sponsorship of AKB48 as the official face of the campaign is any indication, they’ve moved even further away from the pulse of what makes their country hip. They have otaku culture centered in their sights—except this makes them blind to youth culture, the lifeblood moving things forward.

If you’re interested in getting in on the ground floor to see Nemu-Chan and the other members of her unit in action, you don’t need to risk taking the plunge deep into Akihabara. Denpa Gumi is taking their act straight to Shibuya, the center of Japanese youth culture. And they’re not alone. Walpurgis Night, a Madoka Magica-themed DJ party, visited the city last June for an evening of anime song exuberance. Clusters like J-Geek are fighting to bring moe pop to the masses. To paraphrase an old otaku adage, "When there’s no room left in Akiba, the maids will walk Shibuya." With the appearance of the digital wonderland Maidreaming, it only seems like a matter of time before the prophecy is fulfilled.

Honestly, the whole scene, from denpa to dojinshi to experimental art, is not my thing (with neo-cos fashion being the obvious exception). But without anything constructive to add to the ongoing movement, my opinion is practically irrelevant. Whatever these crazy kids are up to seems to be going well enough without curmudgeons like me mucking it up.

Given the alternatives—either staying holed up in your own personal bubble or doing the responsible thing by grinding your life away for just above minimum wage—what they're doing is straight up commendable, a faint beacon of hope for potential entrepreneurs that reaches beyond the otakusphere. The harsh realities of facing Japan may not be so simple as to be flattened down to 2.5D, though this new perspective affords overlooked possibilities.

Notes and tidbits
2.5D

The entire concept of 2.5D discussed here was kick-started by its namesake company. 2.5D is a “social television network,” meaning they regularly broadcast content over Ustream, a live feed service. Programming includes talk shows covering art, fashion, and music, as well as DJ events with a bent towards young creators and otaku culture. Shows are free over the internet, and for a modest fee, viewers can sit in on the recording at their studio located west of Shibuya.

Denpa-Kei music

“Denpa” literally means electronic signal or radio waves, like the one from your TV set. While the genre’s heavy use of synth and voice modulation seems to make “Electronic” a fair translation, Denpa refers to a more sinister type of signal--the invasive kind that makes the receiver go insane.

In 1981, a truck driver hopped on on amphetamines went on a stabbing spree in Tokyo’s Koto ward, killing four (including two children) and wounding two others. He claimed that signals sent directly to his brain commanded him to perform the murders. Although his plea fell through and he received life in prison without parole, his claim, along with recent scientific discoveries suggesting that electro-magnetism could effect the human body, popularized such schizophrenic and delusional stories as denpa experiences.

Denpa conveniently replaced the taboo term “kichigai” for describing the mentally unstable and quickly became the lingua franca for the subculture scene. Rock group Kinniku Shojyotai released hits like Denpa BOOGIE and Mr. Delusion about people being manipulated by outside forces.

In terms of modern music, it refers to songs made purposefully unlistenable, off-kilter, or even just plain weird that draws in fans simply for the sheer out-there factor. Better put on your tin-foil hat before clicking on the links above.Legality of Comiket

Despite the record-breaking success of Comiket, it and other dojin events have been skating on thin ice since their conception. Creating derivative works without explicit permission from the rights holder is clearly illegal, and as the handful of cases made by the publishers has established, indefensible in court. Dojin is only able to exist out of the benevolence of the original creator. So far, most authors have turned a blind eye to the issue for various reasons, thus allowing circles to thrive. This house of cards could soon collapse, however, depending on the direction things take in the current push by publishers for neighboring rights.

In brief, neighboring rights would allow publishers (and any entity involved in shaping or promoting the work) to effectively bypass the original author when making decisions regarding how the work should be represented. This includes launching an e-book version and, yes, pursuing legal action after pirates, including dojin artists. This has authors like Akamatsu Ken up in arms about what could be the first step towards wholesale seizure of creator’s rights by the publishers. More details here. And this is in addition to the looming specter of the TPP.
Lost Generation and The Zero Generation

As mentioned earlier, the Lost Generation are described as the youth left in the economic lull caused by the housing market collapse in the early 90’s. They’ve since adopted the mysterious moniker, Zero Generation (ゼロ年代). Led by cultural critics such as Hayamizu Kenro and Hiroki Azuma (see Genron), they are attempting to make sense of country affluent enough to be comfortable, yet with an income gap wide enough to cause disparity. How much is soul-searching worth in a wealth-driven consumer paradise? The Zero generation are aware that their gilded cage is beginning to peel and they are busy looking for a way out.

The 2008 White Paper on the Otaku Industry This report broke down the market into 5 categories: DVD/CD, published content, games (consumer products +PC), character goods, and dojinshi. I have been unable to find a similarly detailed document published any more recently, though Oricon rankings and others show that sales continue to grow, especially for light novels, mobile games, and dojinshi.
Denpa Otoko and the fall of Shibuya

In Denpa Otoko, a series of counterpoint essays, author Honda Toru trashes Densha Otoko for selling out and relinquishing his otaku habits for a set of Hermes tea cups and a warm bed. Honda refers to this exchange of physical goods for affection as “romance capitalism” and presents it as a conspiracy orchestrated by Dentsu and the mass media. The popular "pay to play" model is rotten to the core: Love for one’s 2-D waifu is the purest form of devotion, whether the sheeple realize it or not.

The cover is illustrated by Hanazawa Kengo of Boys on the Run and I am a Hero fame. All of his manga feature thirty-year underdogs, none so more prominently than his 2004 debut about unrequited virtual reality love, Ressentiment. In the not-too-distant-future, the young couples of Shibuya are replaced by otaku bachelors as Akihabara spreads its influence across the archipelago.

Shibuya's fate is then sealed with the 2008 visual novel CHAOS;HEAD. The clinically delusional cast flatten the city with a dementia-fueled earthquake brought about by the locales unique "gravitation error rate," which is pseudo-science for denpa.

Alternative Shift Control

noreply@blogger.com (DrSenbei) — Sat, 09 Jun 2012 03:26:00 +0000

Art by Nikibi.

Alternative Shift Control is an Osaka-based collaboration between musician Shogo Yoshikawa and designer Shinsuke Yamaji, aka Catchpulse. Their [36-56] project presents 56 shirts with prints from 36 artists. Each shirt comes packaged with a hardbound art book profiling the contributors.

We caught up with Yoshikawa to get the lowdown on the raddest T-shirt collab we’ve seen in a long while.

Tokyo Scum Brigade (TSB):

Pulling together 36 artists is no small task. What was your motivation for the project?

Alternative Shift Control (ASC):

We'd managed to amass a large stable of awesome artists and wanted a way to get their names out there. T-shirts seemed like the most accessible option. I mean, everyone wears T-shirts, right? Customers think they're getting clothing when they're actually buying art.

TSB:

Almost like a Trojan Horse for good taste.

ASC:

There's a relationship, but at the same time a disconnect, between art, fashion, and music. A crappy band will have cool T-shirts. Or a band with an awesome sound dresses like dweebs. A high-concept design will lack a message.

All artists put their heart into different areas, so it's rare to find that perfect mix. This project aims to be the complete package.

Art by Shogo Yoshikawa.

TSB:

Your designs range from pop street to B-grade trash. Did you have a specific audience in mind?

ASC:

As long as you like alternative art, I'm sure we have something that caters to your taste. There's plain T-shirts for the street kids and more fashionable cuts for the dressy types.

TSB:

Most participants are Japanese, with the rest from Europe and South America. The lack of artists from the U.S. is almost conspicuous.

ASC:

It's not a conspiracy or anything (laughs). We just don't have any contacts in the States.
Touring Europe with bands and producing zines brought me into contact with artists from all around the world. They make up a majority of the book. The rest are friends of friends, along with anyone who showed up on my internet radar.

TSB:

You guys are based in Osaka. I always hear about the Kanto versus Kansai thing, but I don't know how much I buy into it.

ASC:

For the sake of conversation, let's say that the biggest difference is spontaneity. People in Osaka do their own thing without worrying about the static around them. You have all these free radicals bouncing off each other and there's bound to be a reaction. This uncontrollable energy is our blessing, and our curse (laughs).

TSB:

I think it’s great that you incorporate international artists as well.

ASC:

We want to do more work with foreign talent. Outside of Japan, it feels like people have a different take on art, like it’s more ingrained into the average person’s life. It’s hard to make a name for yourself in Japan, and even harder to make a living as an artist.

Don’t get me wrong, I really love Japan, but the scene needs some help.

TSB:

I think you guys are doing it a service.

ASC:

This project is just the beginning. We plan to keep delivering art for the masses at a reasonable price, in a medium they can understand. Once we build up the momentum, who can say how far we’ll go?

Check out the collection here.