A Nigh Unfathomable Conjunction of Forces (Update about updates, again)

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Dear Friends,

Though I had heard of the union before - my snackfood's advertisement bearing evidence - I dared not hope for more: his name on the box alone was awesomeness enough. Nevertheless, in a collaboration that I can only say makes me shudder with happiness, two of the primal forces of my life, CalorieMate (you may remember me referring to it as "people kibble") and Jack Bauer, have been joined to create Japanese commercials. Every now and then, a U.S. celebrity drifts over the Pacific and ends up in an invariably hilarious situation in Japan, but Jack Bauer (Kiefer Sutherland, "24"), was too much to hope for. A couple of weeks ago I came across Johnny Depp on TV being interviewed by an 8-year-old Japanese boy, which I would have to describe as amusing. Nevertheless, Depp handled himself pretty well and cracked a few jokes which the audience laughed at, despite the strangeness of the interview format ("Now, I will show you some pictures I drew of you for 'Pirates 2!'").

I've started recording TV commercials because of their ridiculousness here, but this is one I will link straight in from that there inter-web-tron. After wading through the Japanese websites, here's the three "24"-CalorieMate commercials I've discovered so far - any "24" fan should see this, and the fact that it is half-Japanese makes it even funnier:

First - http://www.cmt24.net/tvcm/tvcm1data/cm_ct0601004_300k.asx

Here's the dialogue:
Bauer: "Yeah, it's me. We're on the last set of stairs. We're almost at the scene. Right now, we're running out of time."
Ma-chan: " I've just come from training - I am Matsuo! Please call me Ma-chan!"
Bauer: "..."
Ma-chan: "Souvenir! For you!"
Bauer: "Ma-chan! I can't eat that now!"
Ma-chan: "For you! I'm giving it to you!"
Bauer: "Follow me!"
And so forth, in English, ending with Ma-chan's confused "Twenty-four?!?"


Second - http://www.cmt24.net/tvcm/tvcm1data/cm_ct0602002_300k.asx
I don't like this one as much, because Jack Bauer never insults incompetent people when they're being useless. Everyone in the world is utterly incompetent compared to Jack Bauer - he just yells to get people to do things. All the time: "Do it. DO IT NOW!" Nonetheless, this commercial is the only one I know of that uses "dammit" and "hell" in a 4-second period. Lol.

Lastly: http://www.cmt24.net/cm/movie/cm_ct0503002_300k.asx
Jack Bauer assumes control of a CalorieMate truck, and apparently needs to go to Shinjuku . The girl responds "Is there an incident?", then, the second time, (with wonder) "Is there a big incident?", then lastly suggests that Jack try things like the soup-type CalorieMate, which is very good let-me-tell-you. Endquote. Lol, I love that she's blithely advertising to him in Japanese while he's just hollering at her for information.

I'll have another post coming up soon - Daimonji (the huge burning kanji festival) happened, I had a short vacation during which I went back to Tokyo (via overnight bus!), and so forth. Unfortunately, I don't know if the pictures are good, and I have to wait until I get them developed. Freakin' analogue cameras.

Later.
-Danny

P.S. A quick search of the murmurings on the internet show this to be old news, but I hadn't seen the commercials before. So if you haven't, either, enjoy.

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Comments

[z mirjehan]

cool 'mercials
thanks for sharing, liked the idea of kids interviewing celebs; i am working on library 'mercials for community television right now, so it was real timely. am gettin the hang o imovie and watch out final cut pro, here i come!

[Lasrman]

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