The First SASUKE? Plus, Kane Kosugi at the Shaolin Temple: Kinniku Banzuke!

Well, it looks like G4 is going to re-air the Kinniku Banzuke (Muscle Ranking) series as a show called Unbeatable Banzuke. For those who don't know, Kinniku Banzuke is the TV series that spawned SASUKE, KUNOICHI, Sportsman No. 1 and the Muscle Musical. It aired from 1995 to 2002 and was then replaced by two other shows that didn't do as well and eventually got canceled. You can read all about it here.
Kane Kosugi was a big part of Kinniku Banzuke as a competitor in SASUKE and the Sportsman No. 1 shows (he dominated the early Geinojin Sportsman shows until Naoki Iketani showed up). Kane moved to Japan to try to make it on his own, away from the shadow of his father Sho Kosugi (well-known by teen-aged boys of the 80s for being a ninja). Part of Kinniku Banzuke was about Kane going around and trying different things like being a stunt man or going through SWAT training. In the following clip, we see him learning martial arts at the Shaolin Temple:



And here's an interview from 2003 with Hawaii's Eye-Ai magazine.

Omori Akira AKA Monkkiki (he changed his name to jump-start his career based on advice by that fortune teller lady who's always telling people that they should have died some time or that they will die because of..something) was also a regular in the early days of Kinniku Banzuke. He even went to learn Muay Thai kickboxing for the show. As far as I know, G4 has never aired any part of the first SASUKE competition so we don't know much about it. In the following clip, I assume that the first 40 seconds of this is part of his run in the 1st show as his contestant number matches that found in the SASUKE wikipedia entry and he makes it to the final stage:



Couple of other SASUKE related notes:
The cast of the Muscle Musical will once again perform during NHK's Kohaku Uta Gassen.

Some other competitors for the Sportsman No. 1 show on New Years Day aside from Ronaldinho, Paul ANTHONY Terek and Wakky are Nakayama Kinnikun, handball player Miyazaki Daisuke (who won Sportsman No. 1 in 2006), football player Kinoshita Noriaki (NFL Europe) and San Francisco Giants outfielder Rajai Davis.

Merry Christmas!

For many people back in the states, it's still Christmas Eve...



But since Japan is in the future, it is officially Christmas so Merry Christmas everyone!



Pictures are from the corner near the ANA Hotel in Ube. Isn't amazing how nobody has tried to vandalize the display? Truly the spirit of Christmas is alive and well in Ube!

Simple It's a Wonderful Life Drinking Game: Take a drink any time someone says "George Bailey" in the movie. It should be something like over twenty times. If that's not enough, down the whole drink if a character says "Hee-Haw" or "Hot Dog".

Don Quijote in Ube! ドン・キホーテ 宇部店!

So the other day I rode down to the latest place to open in good ol' Ube, Don Quijote. The first I Don Quijote I ever went to was the one in Sapporo. It seemed very random in it's selection of goods and it was quite bewildering. Of course that one seemed normal compared to the Don Quijote in Akihabara which is the home to idol group AKB48 and has an entire floor of costumes and a maid cafe. But a combination of the reasonably priced and the strange is what Don Quijote is all about. Some of the random things I found during my shopping:

Candy G-string:


Your penis? A faucet:


Kojima Yoshio mask:


And of course, the Billy Blanks costume:


Don Quijote has been trying to extend it's reach as they converted the old Kaheka Daiei/Holiday Mart in Honolulu late last year to create it's first overseas Don Quijote store. At the time, people in Hawaii seemed a bit confused, especially with the name. Then again, I never knew which it was (Daiei? Holiday Mart?) when I was living there anyway.

This is the second new big chain to open in Ube this year as a Kojima Denki opened near Fuji Grand back in October. *Sniff* My city is growing up *sniff*