A couple of weeks late on this one but it’s very much worth watching. Conan O’Brien and Andy Richter visit the Bang Zoom studios and try their hands at doing anime dubbing for Ghost In The Shell. Of course they try their hardest to make a mockery of their acting but truth be told the result is a million times better than your average English dub. In fact I’d be much more willing to pay $50 bucks for a box-set if they included joke-dubs as good as this in the extras.

The Japanese may not be known for jumping, at least for for height or distance but damn, they can jump fast. This girl is the current record holder for fastest rope jumping in the world. Here she tries to match her record of 160 jumps in 30 seconds. She comes in at 143 but it’s still pretty damn amazing!

It’s also appears to be the most fun thing in the world as the girl has a smile like she’s experiencing the joy of a thousand souls. Hmm, maybe that’s what fuels her, souls.

[Japan Probe]

Somebody at Oasis clearly knows what appeals to young otaku men. They ticked every box for this commercial. 2 girls on a bed in netball outfits: check. One girl feeding the other a tasty beverage as she has her mouth suggestively wide open: check. Japanese dialogue: check. Japanese girls screaming “No!” in high pitched voices: check. A city being attacked by sonic rays: check. A J-Pop jingle: check, check, check! All that was missing was some up-skirt panty shots, a school uniform, and a bit of para para.

TV commercials in the UK pretty much suck. It goes in phases. Sometimes you’ll get lots of cool adverts air at a given time, then you’ll get a load of shit ones. So this definitely stuck out to me and my mates when it aired. It threw me through a loop. Because I never though an advert so Japanesey would air on UK TV. Who knows! It could be a new trend thing. Especially as this comes after the Mikado advert.

For those who want to see more of the girls in the ad, you can watch them giggling and mucking about on a laptop here. And if you’ve got a webcam and mic setup on your desktops or laptops, you can play the official Rubberduckzilla games here.

Yo-yo’s are one of those things that come into vogue every decade or so, only to fade back into obscurity again. That doesn’t apply to Yo-yo pros though! These people live and breath yo-yos, with no strings attached… except the yo-yo string. Here’s a video of Japanese yo-yo champion Hiroyuki Suzuki bustin’ some moves for a TV segment.  His moves are impressive, his style has no match, he has the crowd hanging on his every move!

Except for that old man falling asleep to the right… He couldn’t give a shit about this kid and his yo-yo. Back in his day you had to crash a plane into an aircraft carrier or survive a nuclear attack to be cool. This kid? He’s got nothing.

[Japan Probe]

This week Conan O’Brien took over the Tonight Show and it didn’t take people long to notice something peculiar about his new set. It seems it looks awfully familiar… those curves, those lines, we’ve seen them before. Well, this friday Conan decided it was finally time to address the speculation.

Oh boy, no I’m never going to be able to see it again without thinking about this.  Just like I swear the hills south of San Diego look like the hills in the original Super Mario Bros. game. Have you also seen games where there are none? I’m I the only one crazy here?

We all know of those chocolate covered biscuit sticks known as Pocky, right? Well now Glico have saved UK Pocky lovers the hassle of finding Asian supermarkets, Anime conventions and trekking to London’s Chinatown just to buy them. Because they are now available in every supermarket and convenience store under the new name Mikado! I hate the name change, but love the advert that comes with it.

Japanese OL and upskirt photocopying for the win! Aside from making me laugh, it makes me want to go and buy a pack of Mikado. To snack on of course! Not place on high shelves above photocopiers to tempt ladies in the office at work.

Rumors have been flying wild around the second season of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya ever since it was announced back in 2007. Years have passed and fans had been expecting this to be the year of Haruhi’s return. With even a tentative April date being discussed as the launch date for the project.

Now it turns out the much discussed April date is nothing more than a rerun of the series. However, many circles around the Japanese web have been rumoring that the rerun might actually be a decoy and that it is actually a 2nd season. Others say that it will be a rerun with some new content or new episodes in the middle. Whatever it is, it’s already got many hardcore fans dancing Hare Hare Yukai in a very angry manner.

[J-cast / ANN]

Japan is truly the master of giant robot kid shows. While the only American version, the Power Rangers, had some pretty cool moments back in the day (and by this I mean back in the day when watching the Power Rangers was still fun), even having two megazords fighting alongside each other, they never had a 12 man robot, ever. But Japan does! As you can see in the clip above from the new robot series Sentai Go-onger.

That’s right, that’s a huge badass robot made of twelve smaller robots. Do you have any idea how badass that is? It’s so badass you start running out of colors for your ‘rangers’. It’s so badass your evil giant monster can kick it in the crotch… and it feels nothing.

There’s even a freaking whale-plane! A whale-plane. Power Rangers eat your heart out!

[Tokyomango]

The above ad is for Giga Pudding, a giant mold that allows you to make a gargantuan piece of flan, not only is the song catchy and repetitive enough to make you want to try it but the ad also lets you know that if you eat Giga Pudding (which is apparently made of smaller, cannibalistic puddings) you will:

• Make every children’s party a hit.
• Turn that boring brainstorming meeting into a room filled with super genius execs.
• Give you a wave of time-slowing pleasure with every bite.
• Get your girlfriend really shocked.
• Feel true love.
• Make you a handsome bastard with a twinkle in your eye.
• Plus it seems if you dont eat him, Giga Pudding wont have any remorse about crushing your city.

I’m sold! How about you? Now time to watch that again for the 67th time…

[Tokyomango]

Its been a while since we last examined proof of the 1st rule of Japanese marketing: cosplay sells. Its still true though, it even sells backpacks, or bear suits, I’m not sure it matters. Here we have Becky, an anglo-japanese idol, promoting backpacks while cosplaying as a polar bear. Perhaps Coca-Cola could learn a thing or two about marketing with polar bears from Japan.

[Japan Probe]