In order to determine the essential features of Japanese variety television, I watched a total of 22 episodes of three popular Japanese variety shows: Gaki no tsukai ya arahende (ダウンタウンのガキの使いやあらへんで! Usually abbreviated as ガキの使い), London Hearts (ロンドンハーツ), and Utaban (うたばん). I chose these three shows because of their differing styles, popular comedic hosts, and impressive longevity, with a combined 58 years of runtime. Through my research, I was able to assemble the analyses of basic and technical features found in the next section of this document in addition to several pages of my own notes used to design my original program.
My own program, American Joke (アメリカンジョーク), is meant to be filmed in America featuring an entirely Japanese cast. The main idea of the show is to capitalize on the comedic potential of cultural differences by having Japanese comedians interact with American people and traditions.
In order to showcase the show, I filmed a short “sizzle reel” video featuring Japanese exchange students as the cast. Segments filmed included our “comedians” learning the high jump from ASU track athletes, bringing Japanese fermented soybeans to campus for American students to taste, and participating in an American-themed quiz show.
In this project, I get at the finer details of what altruism really is, and when an act really counts as altruistic. I draw upon many articles and books that discuss the topic, but some left many questions unanswered. I conducted several close readings of the manga, One Piece, to answer these questions. Through the thematic relevance of the series, I discovered more reliable forms of emotional motivation, identified and analyzed highly similar altruistic imposters, and presented a more comprehensive image of the topic by analyzing egotism.
There is a noticeable trend within audiences, made exceptionally more prominent by the rise of social media, in how fan artists and fandoms depict their favorite characters from particular media. In the case of anime like My Hero Academia and JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, hypermasculine characters often emulate intense energy and toxic traits that viewers should normally recognize as problematic. However, there has been a growing movement within fandom culture to depict these hyper violent male characters in increasingly peaceful ways, often softening the character or surrounding them with flowers in a “flower child” vibe. This begs the question of why fandom has been attracted to this archetype in such a different way than before, and what attributes of traditional hypermasculinity lead to this level of admiration. Trends of romanticizing masculine energy is not new to fandom but while many focused on the admirable friendship and bonds between characters, this new trend seems to either idolize toxic and damaging behavior, or ignore it entirely. This research paper studies on notable case of this transformation process in the character of Katsuki Bakugo from My Hero Academia, demonstrating how an aggressive and violent character can be depicted in soft and gentle settings through fan created artworks.