Tokyo Toy Show 2010 Report

Tokyo Toy Show: Steampunk Project Pullips.

Tokyo Toy Show is an annual event where toy makers from Japan demonstrate their latest products. The first two days are for business only, but the weekend is open to the public. For some reason, llamas always seem popular.

My first booth was Groove Inc which has apparently taken over marketing Pullips, a brand of Korean doll, in Japan from Jun Planning. If what I saw at their booth is any indication, they’re doing a great job. The booth manager approached me in English, talked positively about their products and gave me his business card. I was extremely impressed by the professionalism on display here… not to mention the products themselves. My favourites were the new limited edition Steampunk Project dolls, each one based on different doll types. The designs were more than just ticking boxes (“Okay, goggles… top hat… gears… we’re done!”) and detail was incredible.

Hot Toys, on the other hand, were doing the same things they always do. Alien figures, Michael Jackson figures, Mars Attac– wait, who is buying these things? Who has been searching all over for plastic models of Inglourious Basterds’ characters?

A small stand devoted to Hexbug Nanos was hidden in the Bandai booth labyrinth. The bug-like robots, about the size of a thumb, ran around on a tabletop. “Put your hands down!” exhorted the salesperson. “COLLECT THEM!!” If you put your hands flat on the table, the Hexbugs vibrated violently towards you and got stuck between your fingers and you’d amass ten or twenty of the things thrusting into the creases between your fingers.

However, I’ve never bought anything at the Toy Show until today. At the Gentosha Education booth, I watched a demonstration of Doubutsu Shougi (“Animal Shogi“), which has been put together by the Ladies’ Professional Shogi Players of Japan to introduce children to the strategy behind shogi. It’s played on a 4 x 4 board and players control four thick wooden blocks which each have a simple animal picture – a lion, an elephant, a giraffe and a chick, which can be promoted into a cockerel. Despite being aimed at kids, this is a fun strategy game for adults and comes highly recommended.

Finally, here’s a list of Japanese Toy Awards 2010 grand prize winners. I find myself a bit uneasy at the separate categories for girls and boys. I’d suggest they change it to “Toys To Celebrate Domesticity” and “Toys To Celebrate Sports And Engineering” but everyone would be able to see what they did there.

Category	Name	Company	Sale Date	Price in Yen
Access For All Children “Kyouyuu” Award	Korokoro Talking Tomica A I U E O	Takara Tomy	June 2010	6,090
Educational Award	Talking With Anpanman: Picture Dictionary	Sega Toys	April 2010	7,140
Boys’ Toy Award	Ishikawa Ryou’s Exciting Golf	Epoch	July 2010	8,379
Girls’ Toy Award	Shushurun	Pilot	April 2010	2,604
Character Toy Award	Kamen Rider W Transformation Belt DX Double Driver	Bandai	September 2009	6,825
Innovative Toy Award	JIGAZO PUZZLE @rt	Tenyo	September 2010 (provisional)	2,310 (provisional)
High Target Award	Otamatone	Cube	November 2009	2,940

More photographs from Tokyo Toy Fair 2010 (including a llama!) after the jump

SpamFromJapan: Meat Meat Meat (Yakiniku in Sendai)

Yakiniku at Kuniwake, Sendai.

Kuniwake is a yakiniku restaurant squeezed into the Kokubuncho entertainment district of Sendai. The manager — a gruff old man — waits for you inside, where the decor is black and the lighting low. I’m usually wary of these kinds of places.

However, a group of us had been wandering around for about an hour looking for a restaurant from my friend’s guidebook. It turned out to close at six pm every day. We eventually agreed on Kuniwake instead.

I thought we were going to have problems when the manager refused to serve us gyuutan (cow tongue), a regional speciality of Sendai. The sign outside advertising it had been one of the things to draw us in. We were hungry and decided to go for the all-you-can-eat yakiniku option, where plates of meat are brought to you within a specific timeframe and you cook them yourself on a mini-barbecue embedded in the table.

Gyuutan (cow tongue).

The rules were simple. They would bring us three types of meat, one after the other. Afterwards, we were free to choose more meat from a restricted menu. The second of these plates was the dreaded horumon (offal), but the first and third plates were the best yakiniku I’ve ever had. I don’t know if it was the meat quality or the preparation, but it was amazing.

Afterward, we finally got our gyuutan. We didn’t realise we had to specify we weren’t trying to get it for free under the all-you-can-eat option. Once it was understood that yes, we’d pay extra, the gyuutan was served. It tasted like steak with the texture of over-cooked squid and an odd aftertaste. I didn’t particularly like it, although it took me several pieces to decide whether it was the taste, texture or concept that bothered me.

I highly recommend this restaurant and you can find a map here (in Japanese). Sendai in general is a great place to visit in Japan — check out Matsushima and Gundam Shot Bar Zion while you’re there too.

Spam From Japan: Beer, Castles and Haunted Dolls in Inuyama, Aichi Prefecture

Inuyama Castle, located in Inuyama City in Aichi Prefecture, is said to be the oldest original castle in Japan. Many other castles are actually reconstructions.

Since it was Golden Week at the time of our visit, there were a clutch of food stalls just before the path up to the entrance gate. One of the booths belonged to Loreley Brewery. We bought two real German sausages (no wieners here!) and two locally-brewed beers. We also picked up a flyer for their all-you-can-eat Golden Week buffet. More on that later.

We got tickets, joined the line and went round the castle. You need to buy your ticket at the booth before you join the line. The line leads directly to the entrance, not a place to buy tickets. The only information I saw about this was in written Japanese, so take care because the line is a long one. All the original castles I’ve visited have had very steep staircases inside, so dress appropriately. Once you’ve made it to the top, you can walk around the turret area for a good view of the local area and the river Kiso.

Our ticket also allowed us entrance to two much smaller museums just a short walk away from the castle. One was mainly about the Inuyama Festival and the other was dedicated to terrifying haunted dolls known as karakuri. From there, we walked to Inuyama Station and caught a bus at the east exit (on the far side of the station) to Meiji Mura (The more detailed Japanese site can be found here).

Meiji Mura is Edo-Tokyo Open Air Architectural Museum’s lesser-known big sister. Established in 1965, the grounds contain a wider range of buildings over a square kilometre of land. In fact, there is a tram network within Meiji Mura to get you around. You can either pay for individual tickets or buy an all-day pass when you buy your entrance ticket.

There are some great opportunities for macro photography, particularly at places like Dr. Shimizu’s office. You can see a few of ones I took below. Just like any picture in this blog post, you can get a larger version by clicking on them.

One thing you shouldn’t miss is the night maze, although there may be a wait. For five minutes, you walk around a maze in pitch blackness. There are a few surprises, mind you, although no ghosts.

Nearby is a (free) brick maze. I enjoyed it, although I almost collided with a Japanese man who was racing his kid (and I racing my partner). We screamed ‘gomen!’ at each other and kept going, because mazes are Serious Business. For the record, I won.

We had mango kakigoori (shaved ice) outside Lafcadio Hearn’s summer house. It was made with one of those old-fashioned ice-shavers that cut up blocks of ice into fine snow. They layered the syrup too, resulting in the best kakigoori ever.

Inside Dr. Shimizu's Office (Nagano, 1897)

We stayed right up until the last minute and caught the only bus available, which took us to back to Inuyama Station. From there, we went to Haguro Station, giving us a ten minute walk to the brewery. If you want to go too, I hope you have a proper map instead of the bizarre geometric one Loreley use for advertising.

Inside we got a craft beer sampler set and access to a large buffet including sushi, shumai, cake and roast beef. It was fantastic (particularly the beef), but the highlight was the beer. Our sampler set consisted of three types of beer from Loreley Brewery next door, each a different shade and texture.

It’s difficult to believe all these photographs were taken in a single day. However, you might want to break it up a little and spend longer at Meiji Mura.

Spam From Japan: Sumida River Fireworks Festival sucks!

Itabashi Hanabi Taikai

Sumida River Fireworks Festival sucks! Yes, the most famous summer fireworks festival in Japan, officially known as Sumidagawa Hanabi Taikai, is crap. There are three key reasons why:

(1) You have to camp out for weeks in the hope of seeing anything. All the best places fill up as the event gets closer. You won’t find anywhere comfortable to stand, let alone sit, no matter how early you show up on the day. My memory of the festival was of standing behind a wire fence on a small patch of grass slightly smaller than the area covered by the soles of my feet.

(2) The ‘boom factor’ is a lie. The fireworks go off in two different places, meaning the number is effectively halved. That makes the number you can actually see around the same as less well-attended displays. There are, however, a few choice spots where you can see both locations. For that, you’ll need to camp out for weeks.

(3) Crowds. Once the display is over, everyone heads to Asakusa Station. That’s 948,000 people all heading in the same direction. Eating is also a big part of festivals, so the usually scenic Asakusa streets are lined with trash.

Thankfully, there are better firework displays, like Itabashi Hanabi Taikai (いたばし花火大会). My friends arrived in the early afternoon and spread out their blue sheet. We drank and ate red velvet cake while dragonflies danced around us until it got dark.

Another great festival is The 43rd Katsushika Nouryou Hanabi Taikai (第43回葛飾納涼花火大会). All day and into the evening, giant red dragonflies float above the grass, making it look like a section of one of those digital art posters you had in college where all the dolphins are flying into space on rainbows.

Itabashi Hanabi Taikai

What you need:

A blue plastic sheet. Hell yeah it has to be blue! Don’t look at me, I don’t make the rules. This is used not so much as a place to sit, but more of a way to mark your territory.
Plastic bags. To put your rubbish in. You’ll need more than one.
Beer. Don’t buy it from the convenience store near the display since they’ll be full of people doing the exact same thing. If it has to be ice-cold, you can buy it from a vendor (limited selection), but you’ll still want more than one over the course of the display. Buy those in advance.
Wet wipes. Eating buttered jacket potatoes with chopsticks is tough. Most festival food is fairly greasy too.
No food. Never bring food. There are plenty of food stalls selling food and even standard fare like corn-on-the-cob and jacket potatoes have a Japanese twist to them. You’ll have to queue for these too, but it’s worth it.

There are a number of summer firework festivals and almost all of these are better than Sumidagawa. For a fairly comprehensive free listing, pick up Lawson’s Ticket magazine from Lawson’s convenience store. However, even if you aren’t in Tokyo (or, perhaps, especially if you’re not in Tokyo), there should be plenty of local firework displays around you. Have fun!

This was a response to a call for submissions to the June 2010 Japan Blog Matsuri on “Hot Fun In the Summertime!” Thank you to Locohama for hosting.

Spam From Japan: Matsushima in Miyagi Prefecture

Godaidou

A samurai sat in a plastic chair and held up a sign outside Marine Gate Shiogama. The helmet shape and eyepatch identified him as Date Masamune (伊達政宗), a local hero.

We were there to catch a boat to Matsushima, an area of Miyagi prefecture known for being one of the three views of Japan (Nihon Sankei). Inside the marina, there were Tanabata decorations hanging down from the ceiling. Tanabata falls on July 7th and the festival in Sendai is particularly well-known. This was Winter Tanabata.

Also inside was a tuna auction and a stage for a talk show about tuna that would take place later that day.

Once on the boat, I saw a box of limited edition zunda Kit Kats, only sold in the Touhoku area (Akita, Aomori, Fukushima, Iwate, Miyagi and Yamagata prefectures). I bought some and, after I handed over my money and received my Kit Kats, I asked what ‘zunda’ was. Apparently it’s chopped edamame (baby soybeans), usually served sweetened and with mochi.

As we were setting off, the woman who was behind the till walked around selling ebi senbei (prawn crackers) for the seagulls, which was actually a popular brand from the convenience store. No wonder the birds had been gathering round the boat. We didn’t buy any, but went outside to watch.

Two kids and their parents also came out soon after and offered us some of their seagull food. It started snowing, but the seagulls kept coming. Every so often, the kids would shove more ebi senbei into our hands. As you can see, I got some amazing shots of the birds in flight.

It got colder and the snow grew more intense. The sky became dark and the rocks around us got whiter as the snow fell. The seagulls shrieked and snatched crackers from the air. All the while, we were surrounded by pine-covered islands officially declared to be one of the three most beautiful sights in Japan.

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Just before we docked in Matsushima Marina, I remembered I had the zunda Kit Kats. I thanked the parents of the two boys and checked if it was okay for them to have chocolate. Great family and I hope their kids like edamame.

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We were drawn to a traditional house near the marina, named Kanrantei (観瀾亭). Kanrantei was originally built in Kyoto and then moved by Date Masamune’s son in the Momoyama era because they liked Matsushima better. Since Date Masamune was feudal lord of Sendai, the prefectural capital of Miyagi, he got one of the best spots on the island for watching moonlight sparkle on the water.

After taking a look around the museum, you can have green tea and a traditional snack while looking out at the bay. I had green tea and zunda. The lady at the counter asked if I’d had it before and tried to talk me out of it. I had to be a little more insistent than anyone should have to be when trying to give someone money. Eventually she relented and I got my zunda. It was sweeter than I expected, but definitely worthwhile. I drank my tea from a lacquer bowl watching the sunlight and snow hit the waves, just as Date Masamune might have done over 360 years ago.

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Godaidou (see main picture) stands nearby and had far more visitors. A small red bridge connects it to the mainland.

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Outside, a woman holding a menu all-but insisted we visit her restaurant. There, we had amazing kaki soba (oysters and noodles). We made the mistake of ordering two ‘jizake’ (local sake). Fooled by Tokyo prices, we could never have expected two medium-sized bottles would arrive at our table.

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Afterwards we crossed the Fukuura Bridge to the island of the same name. Just off from the main paths you’ll find thick ropes tied to posts that will allow you to climb down to the deserted beaches safely. I presume they’re deserted according to the season; Matsushima isn’t crowded, but the weather varied rapidly between snow and sunshine so that might have been why. Nevertheless, no one else made the trip down onto the sand.

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If you’re going on a trip to Japan, you must include Matsushima (and Sendai) on your itinerary. Catch a boat from Hon Shiogama Station and don’t forget to check out Gundam Shot Bar Zion in Sendai while you’re there too.

Spam From Japan: Miso Katsu at Yabaton (Nagoya)

Miso Katsu

Every area in Japan has a regional speciality which is usually made from local ingredients. Nagoya (Aichi prefecture) is famous for miso katsu, which is breaded pork cutlet covered in miso paste. You can eat it with shredded cabbage or on rice.

Of the many restaurants that specialise in miso katsu, Nagoya’s Yabaton is the most famous. Every time we passed by, we could see a long line of people outside waiting to be seated.

The miso-katsu-don in the photograph looks amazing, doesn’t it? Well, it’s deceptive. The quality cuts of meat in Japan are considered to be the ones with thick seams of fat running through them, and that’s precisely what we got. Good if you like “juicy” meat, but I hated it.

Yabaton’s official website (They also have a branch in Tokyo)

Spam From Japan: Dream Live 7th Concert Review

Are these the actions of a man who had ALL THE TENIMYU HE COULD HANDLE?

Dream Live is what you get when you cross Wimbledon with a host club and a certain song from the Lonely Island (video, NSFW). It’s the revue version of Musical Tennis no Oujisama and takes place between plot arcs of the regular musicals in which a junior high tennis team attempt to win the nationals. Dream Live 7th was the climactic run in a seven year-long ‘first season’ and took place in Yokohama Arena in front of around 17,000 fans.

I got to Yokohama on Friday night having dashed across Tokyo from work. I was the only person there in work clothes, with everyone else in either pretty floral dresses or Dream Live T-shirts that they queued for hours to buy. Some had coordinated tennis-themed clothing with their friends.

In the lobby they had smaller booths selling the concert basics that even non-fans want to buy. I say ‘non-fans’, but there aren’t really any here. Tickets are tough to get — you call up a special number and get a lottery number, then ring back a couple of days later to find they don’t have any tickets for you. You go to a convenience store at 10 am on a Sunday morning (there will already be a girl in a pretty floral dress in front of you) and button-mash the ticket machine for 20 minutes until it stops giving you a busy signal and tells you all the regular tickets are sold out. Then your friends take pity on you (they also happen to have won 12 tickets in the lottery) and sell you one of theirs.

Today, there’s just me and my loose tie and jacket, bag full of papers on education and stuff. I only want a penlight (the limited edition sold out) and a program. Unlike theatre programs in Britain which often have a list of scenes plus song titles, these just have lots of photographs and short interviews with the stars. At the booths outside, you can buy sets of photos of every actor appearing for 600 yen each, plus posters and T-shirts. The queue will take several hours to get through, depending on the weather.

The stadium is smoky and the stage is already decked out in blue, yellow and pink rainbows and green disco lights. There’s an announcement about not filming and turning off mobile phones made by the actors who play the ichinen trio. Musicals often get actors to do this standard announcement in character in the hopes people will pay attention. Like airplane safety, you plan to follow as best as you can, but it doesn’t stop it from being part of the scenery.

The lights go out and all the penlights come on and start swaying. They’re mostly blue, because that’s both Team Seigaku and Team Hyoutei’s colour… and also the most commonly available penlight colour. They wave in time to the music and it’s like being on Pandora. Echizen Ryouma, I seeeeee you.

The giant screen above the main stage lights up and shows images of the actors dressed in their tennis gear. The screams are piercing and people are going crazy for certain characters and teams. Speaking as someone who’s never come from the mere sight of a guy in a tennis outfit, I felt more out of place than ever. The girls next to me were jumping up and down and screaming themselves hoarse over Yagyuu.

A full song list can be found here on the Tenipuri_Myu community on Livejournal. They included some of my favourites, including “V.I.C.T.O.R.Y.” and “Aoku Moeru Honoo”.

Next, there was a staged video segment of rehearsals, which let me baffled. Some of people around me were really into some of the actors getting slapped and punished. Compared to previous Dream Lives, there were more songs and fewer skits and fancy costumes. There were more references to the actors-as-actors, rather than their characters.

Then came the First Cast. The actors that portrayed Seigaku in the very first run of the musical. Perhaps… I am a fan after all. I’ve never seen these guys as their characters live, although I will admit to being a fan of Tuti (Tsuchiya Yuuichi) when he acts as Gin in Rock Musical Bleach. Their appearance means different things to different people. It’s been seven years since Tenimyu first started and for many people this is their last chance to see the cast that started it for them. For others it’s a chance to see the cast that came before that they’ve never seen live.

They sang the iconic “Kore ga Seigaku Regularjin na no da” and a character medley from the first musical. When they did the talk segment, they seemed strangely plastic and younger than I remembered. There must have been a hell of a lot of make-up involved and possibly a bit of stage fright. The first time, they spent the entire segment having Kimeru saying other character’s catchphrases. He could’ve sung “You Got Game?” in that time instead. Second time around was much better and involved Inui’s juice.

After more songs is another talk segment with actors who portrayed characters in previous musical. At the first show I attended, this was fairly awkward. Most of them weren’t quite sure what they were doing there or what was expected. Of the first group, I was only really interested in Toyanaga Toshiyuki, but mainly because of his work as a voice actor. The second group I saw included Miyano Mamoru (another voice actor) and everyone had much more to say.

The concert finished off with two ending themes — “F.G.K.S” and “On My Way”. It occurred to me that they hadn’t sang “Season” yet, which was recently voted the most popular song from the Tenimyu franchise on the official site. Ueshima-sensei (the dance mastermind behind choreography) came out and announced it as the last song. Deep down, I have to admit that is the kind of trivia only fans can remember.

If you liked this review, you can check out my review of the second Kuroshitsuji musical or see my list of the top ten anime musicals and stage shows.

Spam From Japan: Design Festa (Spring 2010)

While the Kuroshitsuji musical has the best-dressed audience, Design Festa attendees are the most original. A number of them were wearing their original creations, many of them using kimono fabric.

I arrived at 10:30am at the Big Sight knowing that it opened at around 11:00am. With my experience attending Comiket and the Tokyo International Anime Fair, I figured that that would get me inside the quickest. I needn’t have worried, since there was only a tiny queue. Many of the booth staff were still setting up at that time as well, so it wasn’t like I missed anything. You might as well arrive at a little past opening.

There was a huge variety of Stuff available to buy. At first glance, grandma-style Victoriana seemed to outstrip the goth Victoriana, but the latter was still there. One shop specialised in black gothic dresses with straps featuring crucified bunny rabbits.

I was amazed at the number of satirical T-shirts featuring un-PC depictions of Kim Jong-Il and other political figures, which I really don’t see much in Japan. There were torn shirts made from non-torn shirts, ordinary-looking jeans and patched together animal headpieces. I also saw a cool rabbit gasmark; but wear it once and you’re awesome, wear it twice and you’re that guy with the rabbit gasmask. There were also bars of home-made soap for sale, which intrigued me. I looked into it once and found I’d have to look for a lye (sodium hydroxide) supplier in Japan. That couldn’t be easy.

In the end, I bought two postcards by Akito, who seems to be inspired by H. R. Giger and anime. I would have loved to be able to buy artbooks from any of the booths or, even better, a collection from a selection of booths (yes, I realise that’s impossible). I don’t have anywhere to put the stuff on sale, or it’s not something I would wear or use, but it was so awesome I wanted to keep it to look at anyway. Photographs for that end (which are fine at most booths) seem mean-spirited.

Click on any of the photographs to enlarge.

Live painting area:

Booths:

(My friends declared the giant plant-thing to be ‘kawaii’ and ‘cute’. What do you think?)

Dolls:

More Booths:

(One of the booths specialised in making plastic keyrings with everyday objects subjected to a type of Japanese bondage called ‘kinbaku’. I thought this was awesome, but not everyone agreed!)

There were two stages. One was bigger, indoors and had more mainstream acts. The other was outdoors, tending towards goth/punk/indie and was like a tiny Glastonbury festival. This was what kept me at Design Festa from the very start until closing. The atmosphere was amazing. The bar next to the stage had the worst beer I’ve ever had, while the French-style hotdog stand tasted great and used real sausages.

Bands:

(Jack and Sally, plus two of Kojinshugi Gekijo.)

Psydoll, one of my favourites:

N.S.D.P, who seemed to have lots of female fans:

ENIGMATIC DRIVE did alt. jazz. I wouldn’t have said jazz was really my thing, but it was a great feeling at the end of the day to hear those notes echo into the sky as it got darker.

More than anything, I was left with a strong desire to create something or design something or just… DO something. Well at least I have a blog, I guess.

Spam From Japan: Kuroshitsuji Musical Review (2010)

Musical Kuroshitsuji -The Most Beautiful DEATH in The World- Sen no Tamashii to Ochita Shinigami

Cast:
Sebastian Michaelis: Matsushita Yuuya (松下優也)
Ciel Phantomhive: Nishii Yukito (西井幸人) 　
Eric Slingby: Saeki Taisuke (佐伯太輔)
Alan Humpfries: Matsumoto Shin’ya (松本慎也)
Grell Sutcliff: Uehara Takuya (植原卓也)
William T. Spears: Nagaoka Takuya (永岡卓也)
Ronald Knox: Yousuke Crawford (ヨウスケ・クロフォード)
Baldroy: Iwasaki Dai (岩﨑大)
Finnian: Minami Shouta (南翔太)
Mey-Rin: Igari Atsuko (猪狩敦子)
Undertaker: Izumi Shuuhei (和泉宗兵)
Viscount Druitt: Fujita Ray (藤田玲)
Fred Abberline: Ise Naohiro (伊勢直弘)
Sharpe Hanks: Aoki Shigeto (青木隆敏)

Full Title: ミュージカル黒執事 -The Most Beautiful DEATH in The World- 千の魂と堕ちた死神
Transliterated: Musical Kuroshitsuji -The Most Beautiful DEATH in The World- Sen no Tamashii to Ochita Shinigami
Translated: Musical Kuroshitsuji -The Most Beautiful DEATH in The World- One Thousand Souls and a Fallen Shinigami
For obvious reasons, it will be referred to as ‘Kuromyu’ from now on.

WARNING: Spoilers for Musical Kuroshitsuji 2. Also assumes that you’ll be buying the DVD regardless of reviews, so favours description over the usual things found in reviews.

It was easy to tell who was going to see Kuromyu amongst those milling around Akasaka on a bright spring morning. They wore entirely black, many of them in Victorian-style capes and lacy dresses. Without a doubt, the best-dressed audience I’ve seen.

The musical starts without fanfare. The lights don’t go out or dim. I was sitting at the back reading a manga (“Number” by Tsubaki Kaori-sensei. Varies between awesome and awkward…) and when I looked up there were people on stage. No warning. Nothing. This scene continues as a silent human chess game with each team dressed entirely in either black or white.

I was lucky my manga wasn’t sufficiently engrossing, because soon a cloth-covered cage was wheeled into the centre of the stage and the whole theatre went pitch black. Ciel intones “God? There’s no God here.” So begins the musical; Ciel is in the cage in the centre and Sebastian appears above him, wearing a cape. This was funnier than it had any right to be.

The first song belongs to Sebastian and rightfully so. In the previous musical, they started with ordinary dialogue (rather than the dramatic monologue used here) and the three servants had the first song. It made for a strange start.

I was torn over one of the next scenes. It begins in the world of shinigami, with some of them clocking off work having taken the night shift and some arriving for the morning. All of the shinigami (Eric Slingby, Alan Humpfries, William T. Spears and Ronald Knox, plus extras) are there, except for Grell. William calls her out, referring to her as ‘he’. Grell appears stage left, announcing that’s she’s a ‘she’, not a ‘he’.

This temporarily ruined my image of William (‘temporarily’, because a few seconds later I decided a musical was hardly canon.). I saw him as a guy who plays by the rules and is constantly aware of his hourly rate. Now he’s a “human” resources nightmare and an arsehole. Ah, Kuromyu. You make it canon that a character is definitely transgender (which anyone reading the manga would know) and then you make it clear that she doesn’t deserve any respect within that canon.

This is also anime!Grell. I thought Takuya’s performance was spot-on in the previous musical, but now there’s too much of everything that was good before. Like Captain Jack Sparrow in the Pirates of the Caribbean sequels. It didn’t help that the first performance I saw was being filmed for the DVD, so everyone was even more over-the-top than usual.

The next sequence is a kind of eighties industrial dance about the Shinigami Haken. If it were a person, I’d hit it. It was awesome. They briefly reprised it for the curtain call too. Alan and Eric are properly introduced next and assigned to each other as partners in a case concerning a serial killer. They are long-time friends. Best friends. Really, really close friends, okay?

Skipping ahead a little, Ciel and Sebastian go to see Undertaker. There’s more fanservice than there ever was in the manga, but it’s less out of place when people are already bursting into song. This concept is nicely illustrated in this scene, when Undertaker says he’s not interested in laughing anymore, he wants to love. Since this is the jumping off point for an enka song and dance routine, I can’t complain. I don’t know if anyone reading this is familiar with enka, but today it’s linked with a romantic image of Showa Era Japan and songs about first love and drinking sake. It’s like the Hollywood golden age in terms of iconic figures and old-time sex symbols. So that’s the background to Sebastian’s song. It’s an act of pure fanservice, which is completely appropriate here.

Musical Kuroshitsuji -The Most Beautiful DEATH in The World- Sen no Tamashii to Ochita Shinigami

Ciel doesn’t appear much in this scene or any others really, but it’s nice that his kindergarten let him out early so he could take part.

In the next scene, I can only assume Sebastian and Grell slept together. It’s morning and Grell emerges dramatically from her bedroom panting that she had a hot night of passion while Sebastian seems unconvinced he slept with her. The second time I saw it, the build-up was even more suggestive… there were ropes (but Sebastian still seemed unimpressed in the morning). At breakfast, Sebastian announces Eric is the killer. Eric attacks and Grell hands Sebastian her Deathscythe. Eric escapes.

Viscount Druitt’s big song is next. He’s kidnapped two women and wants them to behave like pretty birds for him. They comply… in a fantasy sequence in which he sings a rock anthem and they chirrup, temporarily freed from their restraints. It was in bad taste, but I laughed. Eric shows up and Druitt realises he’s the real killer.

The first half concludes with Ciel ordering Sebastian to kill Eric.

The second half is a cross-dressing epic featuring Ciel’s much-loved pink and white dress. The reason? Druitt has organised a party to which only women and children are invited. Men are allowed only if accompanied by a woman. Sebastian teases Ciel and says that if he insists he’s not a kid, he’s going to have to go dressed as a woman. That’s… an original excuse. Grell will accompany Alan, which I thought was a nice touch, but then Alan appears in a dress too. Sebastian says it suits him better and Grell gets jealous.

Moving ahead a couple of scenes again, Alan and Eric are reunited. Eric reveals that he is trying to collect one thousand souls because it will cure Alan’s illness. They talk about flower keywords and the word assigned to the flower ‘erica’ is ‘loneliness’. They put down their shinigami glasses and leave together. Alan will not be able to see Eric’s sins anymore and says they are still partners.

It doesn’t end well for the two best friends. Eric has only one soul left to collect, so he attempts to kill Ciel. I’m sure you can guess who he kills instead.

Cue the cinematic record, with Eric and Alan reliving their past as very good friends. Eric is distraught and Sebastian kills him. With that, snow (and glitter) falls down, each flake a soul Eric collected.

The final song is ‘Hallucination’, sung as Ciel sleeps. It’s not so much a Kuroshitsuji song as a Matsushita Yuuya song. The final speech is by Sebastian, which goes something like this:

“I have little interest in collecting one thousand souls. I want only one. That would be yours, bocchan. According to our contract. After all… I’m a devil of a butler.”

Really? Let’s rephrase it: “I have no interest in amassing one thousand sandwiches, I just want one… this delicious cheese and ham one. For the next fifty years, I will wait solely for this sandwich.”

Curtain call one: Sebastian picked up Ciel in his arms and carried him off, so William picked up Ronald too.
Curtain call two: Sebastian lifted Ciel onto his back. William and Ronald copied it, with William adjusting his glasses magnificently as he rode Ronald out. I like William’s actor very much indeed.

Overall, I loved this musical, but I had some serious (albeit brief) problems with it. It seems to be moving further towards the anime version than the last musical and I hope that trend won’t continue. There were some memorable songs, particularly the Shinigami Haken one and the main theme. If you want a more blow-by-blow account from Spacecat, click here (you’ll have to scroll). Or you can read my list of the top ten anime musicals

King of Thorn Movie Review

King of Thorn Anime Movie Review

Cast:
Kasumi Ishiki: Hanazawa Kana
Marco Owen: Morikawa Toshiyuki
Shizuku Ishiki: Sendai Eri
Katherine Turner: Oohara Sayaka
Timothy “Tim” Laisenbach: Yajima Akiko
Ron Portman: Nomura Kenji
Peter Stevens: Miki Shin’ichirou
Ivan Coral Vega: Isobe Tsutomu
Alessandro Peccino: Hirota Kousei
Laura Owen: Kawasumi Ayako
Alice: Kuno Misaki
Walter: Fujita Yoshinori

The following review has mild spoilers for Ibara no Ou: King of Thorn. I enjoyed the movie, but major spoilers will kill it for you. Go see it first.

I came away from Ibara no Ou: King of Thorn feeling elated, like I’d seen something amazing. This was primarily due to the movie’s climactic ‘genre twist’ that previously had many fans giving up on the manga. Essentially, the thing that sold it for me was the reason why other people didn’t like the original work.

The anime begins as creepy science-fiction survival horror. In the first scene (as shown in the trailer), a woman plunges to her death from a New York skyscraper and smashes into the pavement, having been turned to stone. There then follows a massive infodump in the form of TV news footage describing the so-called Medusa Virus’ spread across the world.

The action then moves to Scotland, where busloads of people infected with the Medusa Virus are travelling to a cryonics lab run by a cult called Venus Gate in the hope of finding a cure. What could possibly go wrong?

When these people wake up from their induced sleep, they find monstrous bats nesting in the cryonic pod chamber and thorny vines grown up around the pods. The monsters quickly dispose of the generic characters, leaving behind those with distinctive character designs. The survivors decide to fight their way out.

Up until halfway through it was generic survival horror with the main characters alternately fighting and running away from monsters. In fact, it’s so generic that you can predict who will die and in what order with this handy chart. Consider the African-American man (Ron) and the little boy (Tim). Do you know which will die and how soon? No? Then clearly you don’t watch many horror movies.

What stops this section from being a step-down from standard Hollywood horror (which at least knows its genre well enough to try to subvert it) are the hints that Something Deeper Is Going On. One of the first clues is that the female lead’s name is Ishiki, meaning awareness or consciousness. Furthermore, the male lead has visions of her surrounded by thorns which seem to be connected to her. Oh, and she’s a twin. That’s suspicious in its own right. We also know the lab is run by a cult. Those genre-savvy enough to be bored by the paint-by-numbers handling of the first half will probably realise there’s more to the plot.

I’ll leave the review here. The revelations soon start piling up, throwing everything that went before it in a new light. Just about everything in the first act, even the annoying reporter trying to interview people as they entered cold sleep, was a Chekhovian gun waiting to go off later. That’s why I left the cinema feeling the way I did. I love massive, complicated mindscrews and this did it well. But the ending is key and to describe it would be to ruin it. You’ll have to sit through the generic horror to get the payoff and that’s just the way it is. If you really must know, the Wikipedia page for the manga will point you in the right direction.

The movie is almost certainly heading overseas (America, at least). There’s an English version of the official site and a great deal of the onscreen writing is in English. But if the wait makes you feel bad, just remember we don’t get Iron Man 2 until June 11th.

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King of Thorn Movie Review

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