IDIOT BOX SAVANT "Well, whaddya know? My old prom suit still fits."

Thursday, June 19, 2003
Copyright © Las Vegas Mercury

Idiot Box Savant: Those zany Japanese!

By Andrew Kiraly

I'll admit it. Seduced by those commercials featuring hot but sensible-looking womenfolk with haircuts straight out of Redbook, I tried a V8. Wow. Everything I ever expected from chilled ketchup sentenced to life in a soda can. I got halfway through one before the screams of my suddenly health-stricken mitochondria overwhelmed me with pity. Needless to say, the V8 can's tenure on the Savant's Coffee Table of Most High Esteem was a mercifully brief four minutes--half as long as last week's Pepsi One that met a similar fate. I banish you both to the outlands! My ass-bones did not achieve their vast sofa jurisdiction by being selective about calories. Researchers, double your efforts on Gravy Coke!

So anyway, TNN, in its quest to reap the attention of our vast TV-watching mook nation (me), is now styling itself as the first network for men (not me so much). At this point, that seems to entail a nonstop loop of "Real TV" and "The A-Team" reruns, but there are a few blips of promise on the sloth radar of late, namely, "Most Extreme Elimination Challenge" (TNN, cable channel 29, Saturday, 9 p.m.; Sunday, 8 p.m. ), a show that can be enjoyed by men, women and even by members of that cusp-toeing species, female bodybuilders. I know, the show's name sounds like a clusterfuck of every extreme reality game show to ever shoot from the flaming bowels of Mammon. But there's a reason: "MXEC" not-so-daintily trots the line between satire and plain ol' ham-slapping funny.

See, the show is actually a wacky, oddball Japanese prog called "Takeshi's Castle," except instead of translating the show and dubbing the voices, the Stateside producers just make them say the craziest shit--you know, to better firm up our stereotypes of the Japanese as wacky, oddball and being mad at whales for some reason. I know, I know, stereotypes are bad. But, really, how can I lodge my principled distaste for such backward-minded fare when I'm laughing so hard that I'm peeing so hard that I'm crying? The Savant and his disobedient organs give "MXEC" a thumbs up!

Generally, the shows are set up as team competitions, like the Former Child Stars vs. The Inventors, both of whom are then subjected to a grueling obstacle course that results in some serious body crunchage. Really, for all the show's cartoony, rubber-limbed comicality, some of the challenges look downright painful. The centerpiece seems to be a series of rotating cement "logs" suspended over water; one slip and a contestant usually gets bopped or squished between the things, their broken form sploshed into the water below. You'll never see this kinda stuff on American TV, thanks to the life force-draining culture-vortex invention called "lawsuits." Think of "MXEC" as a 99-cent store version of "Fear Factor"--the downside being there are no excuses to put female contestants in bathing suits.

Dramatic pause, Hammond organ flare: "My God," I now say, an expression of horror dawning on my face between bites of my third Klondike bar, "what are the Japanese doing to us?" The Savant has got this theory brewing that with their inundation of Americulture with Playstations, inexpensive, reliable cars, anime and countless "grown-up" tech gadgets, they're scheming to ensnare us in a state of perpetual adolescence, infantilizing us into a posture of drooling, bemused submission, our only reflex to consume, all to make their final conquest that much easier. You think? I would be outraged, but I'm actually in full support of it. The Savant loves sushi and ninjas. With all due haste, Koizumi, dispatch an army of your finest to destroy our nation's rich stores of V8!