Japanese Comedy, Comedy Shows

[KujiInRetsu]

All I've really heard on the subject is that there is a deluge of Japanese comedians that speak Kansai-ben, hence the unbreakable association betwixt the two. I'm sure there are at least one or two Japanese comedians whose routines could possibly appeal to Western audiences, once translated of course.

Has anyone heard any Japanese comedians that fit this profile? If not, does anyone know any Japanese comedians that are considered good at all?

[hapacheese]

One of the classic comic groups is The Drifters. Their style is pretty universal, as it is reminiscient of The Three Stooges, but with 5 people (it's almost all slapstick). It's targeted primarily towards kids, but still gets a chuckle out of adults.

Downtown (the hosts of Heyx3) are actually really funny if you can understand the jokes... but their jokes are highly culturally contextualized, so most of them wouldn't translate well. Same applies for London Boots, 99, etc.

The problem with humor is that it hardly ever translates well, unless some sort of physicality is introduced. A lot of humor is based around playing on audience expectations, twisting things they know around, or clever word play... Without some sort of cultural context, it becomes difficult.

[Pierrot le Fou]

I wish I remember what the name of the show was, but it was something like 閥ゲーム【ばつゲーム】 which was basically a show in which if you laughed, you got nailed with something on your arse (a dart for instance, or S&M clad folk whip you), and there would be all sorts of jokes along the way to make people laugh. It ain't standup comedy, but was physical enough to be funny, and wasn't THAT culturally specific.

They'd have things like fake movie posters with the producer's face on it, or naked foreigners climbing into an onsen with the competitors and continually screaming how hot it was. They'd have people dress up like star wars folk, cross-dressers, and just generally funny things.

I'm sure you can download it on winMX if you could find the right title.

I understand Japanese, so I guess it gives me an advantage, but the first time I saw it (I was about 6 sheets to the wind) I was laughing so hard I was crying, because these poor people would be sitting around and getting shot in the ass with a blowgun dart every time they laughed. Quite amusing.

[Henjin]

I've understood maybe 3 jokes told by Downtown. They weren't that funny, but just the fact that I understood them had me cracking up.

[hanacker]

I wish I remember what the name of the show was, but it was something like 閥ゲーム【ばつゲーム】 which was basically a show in which if you laughed, you got nailed with something on your arse (a dart for instance, or S&M clad folk whip you), and there would be all sorts of jokes along the way to make people laugh. It ain't standup comedy, but was physical enough to be funny, and wasn't THAT culturally specific.

Was that the name of the show or just a bit from it? Another show I used to watch had a batsu game where you had to name an item that started with a certain letter and your partner had to make the associated noise ("Inu" would be "wanwan" for example). It would go around in a circle and the first team to mess up three times would be the losers. Then they'd have a penalty, usually involving something mildly painful. Different show but I think the "batsu game" isn't unique to whatever show you saw.

[Pierrot le Fou]

ガキの使いやあらへんで (gaki no tsukai ya ara hen de) was the name of the show. Apparently. Girlfriend just informed me of the correct spelling and whatnot. And batsu game is just a type of game that kids play. The actual title of the show is as above.

[truce]

テツandトモ sing the song 「何でだろう」、they don't use kansai-ben (as far as i know)...and it's not too terribly hard to understand, i guess.
めちゃめちゃイケてる (mecha-ike) has members that use kansai-ben (esp. Ninety-Nine) but a lot of the stuff in the show is slapstick stuff, so it's still pretty fun to watch.

[Henjin]

Who were the guys that did that 'Shinbashi(?)' skit about the train conductors?

うどん！
うどん！
おでん！
おでん！
うどん！
うどん！
おでん！
おでん！

うでん！
うでん？！？
おどん！
おどん？！？
Heh.

[hapacheese]

Dude... Henjin.

I know I liked you for a reason.

ベッド！
ダブルベッド！
二段ベッド！
ニサンカマンガ！
大東文化大学！
ベーコンエッグダブルバーガー！
がー！

:D

(That's 「ザ・ラーメンズ」 btw. They also have another on the net called "Chiba, Shiga, Saga" I think.)

[Henjin]

I first heard it set to a flash animation w/ a bunch of bunnies. Cracked me up. I saved it to my HD.

[hapacheese]

Alright, if you can understand that, you're set :)

これは、小麦粉かなにかだ。

（コレハ、コムギコカナニカダ。）

[Henjin]

Alright, if you can understand that, you're set :)

これは、小麦粉かなにかだ。

（コレハ、コムギコカナニカダ。）


ふむ…わからない。すみません。

[hapacheese]

It's something they say during the beginning mock-Japanese lesson. It means, "This is... um... flour, or something."

(Implying that it's really cocaine, and they're trying to smuggle it.)


And here's the other animation I mentioned:

Chiba, Shiga, Saga! (http://www2ch.at.infoseek.co.jp/chiba_shiga_saga.swf)

[Henjin]

The 「かなかにか」threw me off... But I get it now.

That one you posted was a little over my head. I didn't know most of the kanji/words they used. :(

[hapacheese]

Ah... I actually figured it would be easier, since it's almost all prefecture names.

The hard part might have been the "貴重な産卵シーン" joke that they use a couple times. It's parodying nature shows, as it means (essentially), "...a tender egg-laying scene."

[Henjin]

Well yeah, I got the names, but I got stuck on what you just said.

I just rewatched the Shinbashi one. That still cracks me up.

[hanacker]

While we're on the subject of Japanese comedy, this is pretty hilarious. You probably need to have a pretty good grasp on Japanese to appreciate it for anything more than the pictures made out of different letters (what do you call those? ASCII drawings?), though. A basic understanding of nagoya-ben would help too.

http://fukukou0426.hp.infoseek.co.jp/net/nagoya.swf

[hapacheese]

While not entirely Japanese-created, this is golden.

You guys all remember Dragostea Din Tei? (http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/flash/maiyahi.php)

[truce]

While we're on the subject of Japanese comedy, this is pretty hilarious. You probably need to have a pretty good grasp on Japanese to appreciate it for anything more than the pictures made out of different letters (what do you call those? ASCII drawings?), though. A basic understanding of nagoya-ben would help too.

http://fukukou0426.hp.infoseek.co.jp/net/nagoya.swfhaha, that was pretty funny.. as for the ASCII art, it looks like the style used on 2channel. they make flash movies all the time apparently.

as for Dragostea Din Tei, this is a diff one (i guess 2channelers love it or something):
http://pya.cc/pyaimg/pimg.php?imgid=7653
i started laughing as soon as the dancing onigiri-head guys came up, hah

[Henjin]

Quick question, whey they use 「ええ」 in that Nagoya flash, what's the meaning? I only know it as 'yes' or 'yeah,' but it almost seems like they're using it like 「いい」(良い).

[hanacker]

Quick question, whey they use 「ええ」 in that Nagoya flash, what's the meaning? I only know it as 'yes' or 'yeah,' but it almost seems like they're using it like 「いい」(良い).

What's that say? I can't read Japanese characters at work...

[Henjin]

Sorry. I was saying that [ee] seemed like it was being used in place of [ii].

[hanacker]

Ya, that's part of Nagoya-ben. I might be wrong, but I think some people in Kansai do that too. I do know that sugoi often gets replaced with sugee, which is sort of the same idea.

[hapacheese]

Two examples of the same line in Kansai-ben:
どうでもええやないか！
どうでもええやんか！

Two examples of the same line in Tokyo/Yokohama-ben:
どうでもいいじゃないか！
どうでもういいじゃん！

ええ＝いい

[Henjin]

Oy vey.

It just keeps getting better.

[KujiInRetsu]

I just found a clip of Shimura Ken's "Daijoubu da". Seems a bit like Saturday Night Live in that they do comedic skits as opposed to stand-up or boke duos. One of the only skits I really managed to get the humor in though was the Ultraman skit.

During a meeting, two workers leave, one after the other, as their pagers ring. As they continue the meeting, another pager goes off, but with a distinctly different noise. Everyone searches their pockets for a ringing pager, but eventually they find the sound is coming from a locker in the conference room. The boss opens it, and it turns out it's Ultraman, stumbling out, and that ringing noise is his "low energy" indicator. He then promptly collapses on the table and dies.

Kinda weird, but I got it nonetheless.

[hapacheese]

Shimura Ken is one of the Drifters I mention in my first post. He wasn't part of the original crew, but he was a part of the group during their heyday, and became the most well-known member.

He was my hero as a kid :D

[Sangokyu]

When I was in Japan, I watched about 5 hours of Japanese TV one right...
One show was like "Extreme Classmate Makeover" presented by a guy who wore a Chef's uniform (I think) and had big red circles painted on his cheecks. After the guy turned the shy girl into a slightly hotter shy girl, the principle came out in his underwear... yeah... Then there was a special on bloopers from around Japan.

[KujiInRetsu]

Interestingly enough, Shimura Ken's name comes up in connection with Himura Kenshin of Rurouni Kenshin fame. It seems Shimura was Watsuki Nobuhiro's favorite comedian, and that both his name and trademark phrase "oro" were ported over to Kenshin as a tribute.

Also, never get grievously injured on any major holiday in Japan, lest you have the nurses pour beer down your IV tube. :D