Sasuke and Kunoichi
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Sasuke and Kunoichi
Sasuke (Ninja Warrior) is a Japanese sports entertainment television special that airs on the Tokyo Broadcasting System (TBS) between Japanese television drama seasons, and consists of a competition in which 100 competitors attempt to complete four obstacle course stages of increasing difficulty.
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ninja_Warrior
Finished Sasuke last week and I have to say it was one of the most addicting things on earth. It may not grab you in right away, but in the long run it's worse than drugs. The point is that many of the requlars will return in future tournaments so it's easy to find favourite competitors.
The first stage is more entertainment oriented, with some crazy competitors (the japanese Bruce Lee, The octopus granny, the world's toughest transvestite etc.) but only about 10 competitors advance to level 2. I usually find myself following stage 3 standing in from of TV, too excited to sit down. But the first stage can be very exciting, too. You know this guy has trained for five years or even longer, and the tournament is only held twice a year, is he gonna fail on first stage or will he reach the final stage (it's not rare that everyone fails during the first 3 stages)?
I know this has been aired at least in the US and UK (and Finland) so maybe some of you have seen this? The UK version is a disgrace, though. The british commentator should be shot in the head and left for rats. The bastard even dubs over everyone who’s been interviewed. The US version (which thanfully aired in FI) is okay. The commentator only speaks between the performances, rest of the time it's the original japanese commentator and everybody gets to keep their own voices.
Favourite competitors? Bunpei Shiratori is pretty impossible not to like. I also liked the fireman from Gifu (not the 3% man, the other one)... And of course I immediately fell in love with Yuko Mizuno, who looks much better live/in action than in any pics I've found of her.
Youtube clips. Good clips are hard to find because most of the videos are UK filth, but these are from the US version. Spoiler warning applies to each (especially the last, which in the beginning shows what happened to earlier competitors. You can avoid those additional spoilers by skipping the first 60 seconds)
Katsumi Yamada on 1st stage (prob 17th competetion): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xb7TS5-Gxtg
Octopus on 1st stage (can’t remember which competetion, but not a huge spoiler): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nttua5w3h3A
Koji Yamada tries the 3rd stage (prob 16th competition): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJmCem8qbTE
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Since Sasuke is too tough for women (only one woman has ever advanced to stage two in Sasuke) ladies needed their own version, Kunoichi. I’ve only seen one tournament so far, and I found it a bit disappointing compared to Kunoichi. At least in this tournament (no 4, I believe) half of the obstacles were ridiculously easy. But I still like the show and of course the girls are lovely. I also think the obstacles will become a bit harder in the later tournaments. I need to see more tournaments to find and decide my favourite, but so far I’m all over Ayako Miyake. God, I never knew a blond could be so hot.
Ayako hotness in youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kwxsFpme ... re=related
Pics
More Ayako links
http://www.ranahouse.com/miyake/#
http://aya-miyake.cocolog-nifty.com/
Kunoichi wiki info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kunoichi_%28TV_series%29
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The UK commentator on Takeshi's is excellent. Matches the silly content. Sasuke on the other hand is much more serious.
I don't know if Sasuke can work really that well if you only watch it randomly. To me the excitement came from seeing the same competitors return again and again. You really couldn't care much for some random competitors (unless something special, like very young, very old etc.), but when you know the person from previous competetions it becomes exciting. If someone who has advanced to 3rd/4th stage 7 times in a row fails on stage 2 it's a pretty big shock. Then there's guys like the poor Katsumi Yamada who once nearly won the whole competition, but later found the 1st stage next to impossible finish. Is he gonna do it this time?
I don't know if Sasuke can work really that well if you only watch it randomly. To me the excitement came from seeing the same competitors return again and again. You really couldn't care much for some random competitors (unless something special, like very young, very old etc.), but when you know the person from previous competetions it becomes exciting. If someone who has advanced to 3rd/4th stage 7 times in a row fails on stage 2 it's a pretty big shock. Then there's guys like the poor Katsumi Yamada who once nearly won the whole competition, but later found the 1st stage next to impossible finish. Is he gonna do it this time?
Last edited by HungFist on 04 Jun 2008, 21:28, edited 1 time in total.
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On Virgin1 now on Sat & Sun morning's!! Good to see the Kosugi brothers give it a go and make howling cunts of the final course!Shingster wrote:I couldn't tell you brad, I tend to put it on when I'm round a m8's (he has Sky digital, I have the bog standard Virgin Media cable tv package - ie fuck all channels). I can't for the life of me recall the channel it was on.
NO WEASEL, NO CRY