Guys Don't Play With Dolls, Figurines, Gi-Joe or $1250 Punk Barbies

(A blast from the past...)

Playing with dolls is for little girls. Collecting ridiculously expensive dolls is for collectors (preferably rich women or antique dealers). My ex-wife collected porcelain Barbie dolls and some of those were way over $1000 a piece. I'm sure she still has many of them. 

Being a guy, I'm not really into dolls. Funny that. Even when I was a kid I didn't much care for dolls. I remember in the mid-sixties when the first GI-Joe dolls came out, my parents bought me one. I think I liked it when I first saw it. But when I opened the box, I thought, 

"Gee, mom, dad, what am I supposed to do with it?" I didn't really think dressing and undressing a male doll in uniform was all that fun. 

I think I set the GI-Joe on fire in a realistic reenactment of the Battle of the Bulge... I often set my toys on fire when I was a kid.

In the last 20 years or so, playing with dolls has come back into fashion for some guys. Though they won't call them dolls. They are called "figurines." Call them what you want, they are still dolls.

One time, I went to a friends house and in his room, he had all sorts of these figurines lined up at the head of his bedroom wall. They were things like Star Wars' Darth Vader, R2D2, Luke Skywalker, Star Troopers, etc. You get the picture.

He said to me, "Mike! Do you like my figurines? Aren't they cool?" 

I ribbed him back when I said, "Yeah. Real cool. I think I stopped playing with dolls when I was 6 years old."

"They are not dolls! They are figurines!" He protested.

"Yeah. Whatever..."  

That reminds of my second daughter, Sheena. When Sheena was about 6 or 7, Ren & Stimpy was on TV. I loved that cartoon. On Ren & Stimpy, they had a fake commercial for a toy called, "Log." Log was just as the name said it was; it was a piece of wood. Since I watched Ren & Stimpy religiously, my kids watched it too.

Never underestimate the power of TV on a child's mind. That's why it is so bad and dangerous.

WATCH THIS FAKE COMMERCIAL FOR LOG FROM 

THE CARTOON REN & STIMPY

One time, after the commercial for Log came on, my daughter said, "Daddy! I want one!" I was so surprised. "Are you kidding me?" I thought. I decided then, that I should use that opportunity to teach her a lesson about life and about BS on TV.

Soon after it was her birthday so I went to Tokyu Hands Department store and bought a piece of wood that looked like Log, wrapped it up and gave it to her for her birthday. She was so happy to get it. After opening the package, she said to me with wide eyes full of bewilderment, "Daddy? How do you play with it?" I sang the song:

What rolls down stairs alone or in pairs, and over your neighbor's dog? What's great for a snack, And fits on your back? It's log, log, log It's log, it's log, It's big, it's heavy, it's wood. It's log, it's log, it's better than bad, it's good." Everyone wants a log You're gonna love it, log Come on and get your log Everyone needs a log log log log *whistle* LOG FROM BLAMMO

I think she was so disappointed. Of course, I had also predicted that she would be so I had bought her some other presents that I can't remember.... Funny that... I'm sure that neither can she... But I bet we both remember Log. 

Now there's a new doll in town that's making noise. Well, she's not new. She's old. It's Barbie. But this time, she has tattoos and is, er, well, ostensibly "Punk." Yeah. "Punk" as in "Punk Barbie." How could Barbie be punk, you ask? Well, easy. Just imagine if Paris Hilton decided that she'd go punk for the evening and there you have it... Punk Barbie is about as punk as Lady Gaga or Boy George...

My one word review: "No!"

Punk Barbie is causing a fuss amongst parents who actually think their little snowflake will run out and get a tattoo just because their Barbie doll has them... 

In an article from the New York Daily News some candidates for Parent of the Year were appalled and quoted as saying,

"I'd kill my daughter if she came home with a tattoo," said Tom Gurry, 43, of Rego Park, Queens, who has an 11-year-old.

"Barbie's supposed to be a role model for young girls, right? I don't want my daughter looking up to someone like that."

Another contestant parent said,

"I don't think that's an appropriate toy for a young girl," she said. "You don't want your kids to think tattoos are a good idea at such a young age because they last a lifetime."

Tiffany Newkirk, 51, said her 17-year-old daughter has been pestering her for permission to get tattooed.

Gee... I'd hope that, at 17, Barbie wouldn't be such a great influence on your dumb kids... Hopefully they can get good influences from wholesome things like MTV, American Idol, and their dimwit parents....Can you imagine your five-year-old with an awesome spiderweb on her neck, dragons on her arms, and three nose rings? Kewl!

These same parents who are complaining about Punk Barbie are the types who will complain later on, when their daughter is 16, drops out of school, and really does get tattoos an her neck and face that "...it was all Barbie's fault!" Yeah. Your kids being all f**ked up couldn't possibly be the result of being spoiled to death by idiot parents.   

But why listen to me? Let's hear what a real punk says. What about it Ryan Cooper at About.com Punk Music? Ryan says:

I think it stands to reason that if the Barbie you gave your daughter is the biggest influence on her life, you might need to look more closely at who the parent is. Barbie may be the president, and an astronaut, and a doctor, and a race car driver, but the last time I checked, she's not a mother.

So if she's the primary influence on your daughter's sense of ideals and fashion, you might want to kick her out of her dream house and on to the curb.

Or you could just leave Barbie alone.

And you be the parent instead.

Punk Barbie sold for $50 at retail, but they are all sold out (Go figure!) Now, according to Ryan, they are selling on E-Bay for $100.

So, Ryan, you think that's bad? Hell, in Japan, Punk Barbie is selling for over $1,250.00! (USD!)

¥98,000 Japanese yen is $1252.56 

Hopefully my kids won't have their lifestyles and fashions influenced by Barbie... But then, again, if they can afford more than $1,250 for a Godd*mn doll, then I guess they are adult enough to know what they want to do...

I won't make any comments about whether Ken likes boys more than girls, let's just say that Ken is not the "marrying type" (or, shall, I say that he probably won't be getting married at a Catholic church anytime soon.)

So, I won't say anything, unless, of course, my daughters bring Ken home one day and say they want to get married to him. That's when daddy puts his foot down!

You know why? Guys don't play with dolls.

Fifty-Year Old Cartoon Tried to Warn Us - Never Give Up Your Freedom

I remember seeing this cartoon when I was a kid. They tried to warn us.

It's too late? Probably is, but an understanding of this and what this kid's cartoon says, is an education in politics that 92% of all people fail to understand to this day... (my statistics).


I'm relieved that the OWS people are on the streets in the USA now, but can they continue growing? I fear that the powers that be will not relinquish control of the Status Quo so easily.

Thanks to What Really Happened

Holy Sh*t! World War Two Japanese Propaganda Anime of Attack on Pearl Harbor!

Yesterday's blog was extremely, er, "popular"... Actually, I posted about this sort of stuff on this blog long ago when this blog was just in infancy, but at those times, I guess I only had 5 readers (4 of those being my family). 

This brings me to being able to coin a new word in the blogosphere. And that word is "Blag." "Blag" means a blog post that brags. OK? So I brag that I have made a new term because I am so fricking superior that I can show you stupid white imperialist trash just how superior our Japanese air-forces are to your corrupt Rooseveltian power-hungry scum are. Damn! I'm great!


Also just how cool and suave and debonair I am because I have come up with new terminology.


Anyhow, here's another cool Japanese anti-American anime is that I want to introduce to you uncultured foreign savages....


From Youtube (especially watch from 1:00 in the video...) Ha! Ha! Ha! We bomb Pearl Harbor in Momotaro's Sea Eagles and kick some serious American butt!) Die! Die! Die! Amerikanischer Swine!: 


Momotaro's Sea Eagles

American cartoons weren't afraid of stereotypes during World War II; Popeye and Bugs Bunny battled racist visions of Japanese soldiers, and one can easily guess why the short "Tokio Jokio" wasn't part of regularLooney Tunes TV rotation. Of course, Japan had its own school of WWII cartoon propaganda, and the most famous are Momotaro's Sea Eagles and its sequel, the first feature-length Japanese cartoon, Momotaro's Divine Warriors.

Unlike the slapstick of Popeye shorts, the Momotaro cartoons are relatively serious children's films in which Prince Momotaro and his cuddly animal friends don sailor suits and bomb Pearl Harbor. Well, they don't actually say it's Pearl Harbor, but Momotaro's Sea Eagles glorifies its heroes' attack on the ogres and other vicious foreign devils of Onigashima. Momotaro's Divine Warriors tells much the same story, but with even more scenes of cute little bears and squirrels and monkeys crowding into realistic airplanes and parachuting down to slay their racial inferiors.




Momotaro's Divine Warriors isn't available on DVD in North America, but Momotaro's Sea Eagles is. Zakka Films released it as part of a "Roots of Japanese Anime" collection, along with less offensive animated works. Historical value aside, the film is both insidious and surreal, like a Funny Little Bunnies version of Triumph of the Will.

The Greatest Men's Anime in History! Sakigake!! Otokojuku! Japan's Most Sexist, Racist, Nationalist Anime Ever!

Sakigake!! Otokojuku! Must be the world's most nationalist traditionalist pro-Japanese male anime ever made! And it is hilariously funny! 


Sakigake loosley translates into "first line of attack" (or "Charge!"). Otokojuku is "Men's school". So, these guys are the first line of attack at a men's high school. Get it? No? Oh, you will...

Sakigake!! Otokojuku! Main characters

Wikipedia writes:

Sakigake!! Otokojuku (lit. Charge! Men's Private School) by Akira Miyashita is a comedy martial arts manga that was originally serialized at the Weekly Shōnen Jump from 1985 to 1991. It is staged in a private boy's school that teaches ōendan to troubled teenagers. The students are trained to "revive the Spirit of Japan" and mainly engage in fighting or killing courses. The nature of the manga is usually considered by the readers as a comical, or even parodic view of Japanese nationalism.

I've posted about this hilarious cartoon and other anti-American anime before in Hilarious Collection of 12 Most Anti-American Anime. The makers of this cartoon take a comedic look at hating foreigners and definitely have humorously decided the correct place of women. I'm sure they long for the good old days when men were men and women were women. The days when women walked two steps behind their man (well, actually I know lots of Japanese women who still do this). Sakigake!! Otokojuku! also disrespects foreigners. The makers long for the good old days when foreigners (read: uncultured savages) were foreigners and not living in Japan! 


Hee! Hee! Who doesn't?


Here is a snippet of my favorite Sakigake!! Otokojuku! of all time. It is the most anti-American cartoon I've ever seen. This stuff is hilarious as the sterotypes just crack me up. See if you enjoy it too!

God! Isn't that fantastic? Can you imagine something like that on TV in the USA? The PC crowd would NEVER allow it! Sekigake!! Otokojuku! "How to Deal With Foreigners". In the above episode, the protagonist, Momotaro kicks the butt of an American. After mopping the floor with the guy, the Japanese girl "falls in love" with him. She says, "He's so strong!" and runs up to him and asks if he'll start dating her. He replies,

"Yesterday, dating a foreigner. Today, dating a Japanese. I hate stupid girls who change their minds all the time!" As the boys are walking away they say, "Otokojuku doesn't need women!" 

大爆笑！(LOL!) 


See, I told you that this cartoon was wonderful! 

Sakigake!! Otokojuku! Is a very famous cartoon that ran on Fuji TV for only 34 episodes in 1988. I think it was cancelled because many people failed to see the irony, cynicism and humor and thought that the makers of this cartoon were completely serious.

Trust me, I was here in 1988 and there were a heck of a lot of people with no sense of humor... I mean, just how racist and sexist could a cartoon on national TV be? (As opposed to sexually explicit manga and all sorts of other underground publications that still exist?) 

This next snippet is from an episode where the boys go to a "fashionable" club to kick the butt of the regular American guy who was usually the main antagonist mocking Japanese men and taking advantage of "naive" Japanese women. The boys are getting ready to gang up on him and beat him up, but first, they have to confuse the dumb foreigner by bedazzling him with his command of the English language. The episode itself is funny, but the best part is the English subtitles! Enjoy!

In Sakigake!! Otokojuku! women are definitely looked down upon (as well as the main characters sometimes being made fun of because of being stupid). Women in this anime, as in the minds of the makers of it, most certainly have their place in Japanese society.

The note on this next Youtube video is hilarious:

Fans all know women should never appear in this, the manliest series ever. EVER. This movie takes it one step further and proves that the manliest of men can be fooled by plastic dummies with hooters, eighties hairstyles and swimsuits. Post cockblock, the Otokojuku delinquents must take on WHALES AND AN ARMED HELICOPTER for their mistake. Poor guys. A little Engrish pops up again, and Toramaru kills a whale with his own lethal fart technique. Must be seen to be believed

Sakigake! Otokojuku! Women are Always Traps!

Oh, how the makers of this anime must long for the good old days of Japan! (Or, at least, when they were getting paid to make this great cartoon!)


Oh, how I long for the good old days when Japan had cartoons like this!


You can see many other results on Youtube here.

Betty Boop in Japan (1935)

Everyone knows that Japan loves Winnie the Pooh, Mickey Mouse and Snoopy, but did you know that Betty Boop was popular in Japan before any of them? It's true.


I think it is because Betty Boop could speak Japanese... No. Really. I'm not making it up. Watch this cartoon and see for yourself. In it, she sings in Japanese and dances. Her Japanese is pretty darned good too!

In fact, Betty Boop is still popular in Japan today! I sometimes see her on girl's fashions and in stores on posters and handbags. 


Did you also know that Betty Boop flew to Japan in 1935 and did a stage show? Yep. 


Here is a 1935 Max Fleischer produced Betty Boop cartoon called "A Language All My Own." Max Fleischer was famous for Betty Boop, Koko the Clown, Superman and Popeye. Click here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KHTUHT4kAOY

Wikipedia says about this cartoon:


The studio produced this short after discovering that Betty was very popular in Japan. Animator Myron Waldman, worried that Betty's gestures might offend the conservative Japanese audience, asked a group of Japanese college students to review his work. Having Betty sing in Japanese also allowed her to slip a racy comment past the Hays Office: one of the lyrics in the Japanese song translates to "Come to bed with me and we'll boop-oop-a-doop!"


"Come to bed with me and we'll boop-oop-a-doop" Indeed!


Please enjoy this 5 minute cartoon from a simpler time from yesteryear! This is so charming. You don't get any more eclectic than this!

Betty Boop? You kidding me? I wouldn't kick her out of bed for eating rice crackers!

Distrust of Romantica by Hitoshi Suenaga

It is called Electronic Theater and is a class of post-expressionism. This particular item is a very Avante-Garde black and white cartoon called, "Distrust of Romantica" by Hitoshi Suenaga in 2001. Don't watch it more than twice, you'll have nightmares.



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Keywords:
Distrust of Romantica, Mike in Tokyo Rogers, Hitoshi Suenaga, anime, animation, cartoon, Marketing Japan, Mike Rogers

Very Weird Japanese Anime: One Piece

I love Japan. I love everything about Japan; the people, the history, the architecture, the culture, the girls, the anime... Er, well, no. As an "oldster" (someone over 50) I do have a problem with Japanese anime. In fact, I always have.

Since the very first time I saw Speed Racer and Kimba the White Lion on TV when I was about 13-years-old, I've had a "problem" with Japanese anime; it was too wimpy and too cute for my liking.

Actually, I hated the Speed Racer cartoon

Forgive me, you have to remember that I grew up in 1960's America where is was OK to have violent kids cartoons with lots of killing and guys like Galactus coming to earth to suck its energies and lifeforms completely dry...  (It also is a strange sort of commentary about American society when our comic book heroes are all extremely muscular guys who wear skin-tight leotards!) It was this way until the early 1970's when the PC crowd got a hold of TV and made sure there were no more violent cartoons so kids got stuck with crap like the Archies and, well, Japanese anime.

Of course, today's Japanese anime seems to me to be much better than those old days. I first started thinking, "Wow! This is cool!" when I first saw the Japanese cartoon Dr. Slump. That was very bizarre...

Today, I'd like to share with you another Japanese anime that I've found that strikes me as quite bizarre. It's called One Piece and it is a very strange cartoon.

One Piece is about a pirate kid named Monkey D. Luffy... There's even Wikipedia entries for this guy and One Piece.  I'd go into a big explanation for this but why bother? All you folks need to do is to read on and watch the Youtube video and you'll see real Halloween for yourself. This is one very off-the-wall cartoon....

Wikipedia says about Monkey D. Luffy:

Monkey D. Luffy (モンキー・D・ルフィ Monkī D. Rufi), or "Straw Hat Luffy" as he is often referred to as, is a fictional character and the main protagonist in the anime and manga series One Piece created by Eiichiro Oda. 


Wikipedia also adds:


He is a boy whose body is made of rubber after he ate a devil's fruit and acquired the ability.


Catch that? Read that last sentence again. "He is a boy whose body is made of rubber after he ate a devil's fruit and acquired the ability"!? (emphasis mine)


Hey! I thought that Wikipedia had people checking these things. Is that sentence for real? Or have the Japanese anime lovers actually done that on purpose?


I suspect that this cartoon is so popular in the USA and Japan that this is on purpose. Don't believe me? Watch this 10 minute segment of One Piece for yourself and see. I think you'll agree with me that this is one extremely bizarre cartoon.... Er, I mean "anime".


Anyhow, watch this and check out these characters in this cartoon... I thought drugs were illegal in Japan... I wonder what the creators of this cartoon were smoking!

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Keywords: One Piece, Mike in Tokyo Rogers, Speed Racer, Kimba the White Lion, anime, cartoon, Monkey D. Luffy, Mike Rogers

Superman Sabotages Imperial Japanese Navy Cartoon from 1942 in Color!

By Mike in Tokyo Rogers

Once again, this weekend, digging through the treasure chest that is the Internet Archives, I find an interesting treat from a day long gone by. It's a 1942 Superman cartoon in color - and in great condition - that was made right smack dab in the middle of World War II when Germany and Japan were looking very powerful.

The byline description reads:

Superman is responsible for several acts of sabotage at the Yokohama Navy Yard in Japan. Lois Lane is held hostage but Superman saves the day. Animation by William Bowsky and William Henning. Music by Sammy Timberg. Produced in 1942.


Now, I am not a fan of Superman at all (when I was a kid, I only read Marvel comics!) and this comic is pure US military propaganda; but it is enjoyable to watch and consider how the world has changed.

DOUBLE CLICK TO SEE FULL SIZED IMAGE

DOUBLE CLICK TO SEE FULL SIZED IMAGE

Also, how the heck did Lois Lane get into Yokohama in 1942 is anyone's guess but it is a very enjoyable 4 minute cartoon. Superman: Eleventh Hour! Enjoy!

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Keywords:
Superman, World War II,  Cartoon, Marketing Japan, Mike in Tokyo Rogers, 1942, Mike Rogers, Internet Archives, Yokohama

Marketing Japan: Tokyo Government Spends Over 1/2 Million Dollars on 10-Minute Cartoon!

By Mike in Tokyo Rogers

Those morons!

Well, heck, no wonder Japan is about to go bankrupt! Yesterday, it was announced that Japanese government debt was past 190% of GDP and that every man, woman and child in the country owed about $83,174 each! I blogged about that here.

But now it has been announced that the Tokyo metropolitan government spent ¥48,000,000 yen on a ten-minute cartoon for their website to attract foreigners. That's over 1/2 a million US dollars! For a cartoon!?

What complete idiots!

Now, I am as much of a fan of anime as the next guy (well, no, not really) but spending that sort of money when the government is so heavily in debt is sheer stupidity or, even worse, criminal.

Heads should roll. This sort of thing really irks me as you always hear these clowns saying that we have a financial problem, but their lame ideas are always increasing taxes... You never ever hear them suggesting that we cut out government waste or "services" (like making cartoons for tourists).

I have a good idea on how to cut the budget, immediately cut the salaries of public employees by half and fire 70% of all assistants to politicians... No more free airfare and Shinkansen train rides either.

Anyway, if you want to see the anime for yourself, it is here  (Click "English HQ" at the top left under the anime).

The cartoon is bad, so if you don't want to click around, here's a Japanese language version... It's about on par with Speed Racer from the early 1970's only no action at all!


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Keywords: Anime,  cartoon, Marketing Japan, Mike Rogers