Macross's contribution to modern culture?

[Akilae]

First of all: w00t! The forums are back!!!

Second: During the Great Blackout/Draught/Nothingness/Downtime of 2006, I roamed around and found an article over at the China wiki on the definition of the term "Otaku", in which the contributor said:

<Univeral Translator>

The term "Otaku" is a Japanese term used to address people in the second-person. Its useage in the anime world most likely arises from the anime "Super Dimentional Fortress Macross", in which the main characters use this phrase when referring to each other. Anime viewers at that time were most likely influenced by this useage and started using the phrase "Otaku" to describe each other.

</Universal Translator>

Can anybody confirm or deny this? Somehow "Otaku" didn't stand out to me when I was watching Macross... then again, my knowledge of Japanese is limited to "hai" and "iieh", lol.

[JB0]

I'd like to think I notice when I hear a word I know...

I'm chalking it up to "those silly wiki people." Even on "reliable" wikis like Wikipedia I can point to a half-dozen major errors without even trying. Including self-contradicting paragraphs.

[Chas]

Well it sounds fishy to me! This is what Wiki.org has to say on the etymology of the term.

Otaku:

Etymology

The word otaku is derived from an honorific Japanese term for another's house or family (ãŠå®…, otaku) that is also used as an honorific second-person pronoun (roughly equivalent to usted in Spanish). The modern slang form, which is distinguished from the older usage by being written only in hiragana (ãŠãŸã) or katakana (オタク), appeared in the 1980s. It appears to have been coined by the humorist and essayist Akio Nakamori in his 1983 series An Investigation of Otaku (ãŠãŸãã®ç ”究, Otaku no KenkyÅ«?), who observed that this form of address was unusually common among geeks and nerds. It entered general use in Japan around 1989, and may have been popularized by Nakamori's publication in that year of The Age of M (Mã®æ™‚代, M no Jidai?). It applied the term to the (then) recently caught serial killer Tsutomu Miyazaki, who turned out to be a recluse apparently obsessed with pornographic anime and manga and who lived out his rape fantasies on living young girls, thus attaching a huge taboo to a formerly innocuous term.

Sounds a-lot more plausible to me.

[1/1 LowViz Lurker]

Maybe the sub they were viewing macross with was a bootlegged version?

I have seen some bootlegged movies from hong kong with some very strange subtitles in them (in english while I was bored) The characters practically are saying things that have absolutely nothing at all to do with what they are supposed to be saying! But it was hilarious! Don't ask me why there even was an english subtitle (given they are already speaking in english) for it in the first place..

Edited September 12, 2006 by 1/1 LowViz Lurker

[sketchley]

Chas's post pretty much sums it up.

As for the effects of Macross in general - I occasionally hear some of the orchestral music of Macross (only Zero and Plus, so far,) on Japanese variety shows. It's only short clips, but it's definitely Macross.

Also, there's another character out there in the Laser Raymond Hard Gay tradition, who raises his right fist and screams, "Bomber!" Though, as his name is Captain Bomber, and he wears clothes of the same design as the US flag, I'm not sure if it's a reference to Macross, a political statement, or something else entirely.

[Pat Payne]

Maybe the sub they were viewing macross with was a bootlegged version?

I have seen some bootlegged movies from hong kong with some very strange subtitles in them (in english while I was bored) The characters practically are saying things that have absolutely nothing at all to do with what they are supposed to be saying! But it was hilarious! Don't ask me why there even was an english subtitle (given they are already speaking in english) for it in the first place..

Although I don't believe Macross had anything to do with the popularity of the term as an epithet, I do seem to remember early on in the series Hikaru adressing Minmay as "Otaku" in the original Japanese (tho' I may have misremembered).

I always heard it was much the same story as the one that Chas posted, that it was an uber polite form that got picked up as a mark of nerdhood some time in the mid-to-late '80s.

[Renato]

I believe there are many factors involved in the evolution of the word "otaku" into what it now means, but while improbable as it may first seem, there are plenty of sources that claim Macross is indeed one of them.

In fact, the latest of these I have spotted has been in this year's May issue of EX Taishuu Magazine, one of those tabloid news/softporn mags which ran a special on Macross including features on Mari and Kawamori. There are several trivia tidbits and one of them indeed states that hardcore fans started calling each other "otaku" after hearing the characters do the same in the show (which they do, as Pat pointed out). It's in Japanese, but I can probably scan that bit of text.

As I say, I do not believe there is ONE sole origin of the word, rather various situations and uses evolved into the now common one. However, do not be quick to dismiss Macross's involvement in this, for this is not the first time I have read of this.

[GutsAndCasca]

What I'm wondering is, what the heck (who the heck) is the "otaku killer", what the heck did he/she do, and how come anime is sort of shunned now because of it all?

[sketchley]

The scary thing is that he has the same name as one of the most famous Japanese animation directors: Miyazaki! You'll have to do your own googling to find further info on him. Old news...

[Pat Payne]

I agree with Sketchley, the details are too raw to repeat here. He's still waiting on death row, about a decade too long IMHO.

[GutsAndCasca]

Okay I checked it out. Pretty awful. And it kind of pissed me off. Anybody who associates anime like Macross with this is just terribly off. Miyazaki or whatever his name was could just as easily been into Looney Toons; it's not fair for anime to catch a bad wrap because of this. Also, I finally read up on the word "otaku" and it seems to be a derogatory term anywhere except in the USA. (I also read some humorous paragraphs about how otakus in Japan don't know how to communicate with the opposite sex; they are just dorks to the bone) Hopefully.. well crap, this is really old news - not to me though - but hopefully this won't/didn't permanently tarnish the image of anime, especially my beloved Macross.

[Akilae]

Okay I checked it out. Pretty awful. And it kind of pissed me off. Anybody who associates anime like Macross with this is just terribly off. Miyazaki or whatever his name was could just as easily been into Looney Toons; it's not fair for anime to catch a bad wrap because of this. Also, I finally read up on the word "otaku" and it seems to be a derogatory term anywhere except in the USA. (I also read some humorous paragraphs about how otakus in Japan don't know how to communicate with the opposite sex; they are just dorks to the bone) Hopefully.. well crap, this is really old news - not to me though - but hopefully this won't/didn't permanently tarnish the image of anime, especially my beloved Macross.

Actually, Otaku is a derogatory term primarily in Japan. Among the anime population I've met in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and China, the term Oktau is just another noun to describe anime lovers.

I think Miyazaki for Japan would be what Columbine is for the US. As Otakus might now be considered as potential socialpaths, "nerds" in the states are likewise considered on the same basis. The medium in and of itself (be it Macross or Doom) should be irrelevant to the discussion. This is unfortunately not the case...

Just keep in mind that in traditional Japanese useage, Otaku still refers to an honorific second person. So for its time, Macross was not in the wrong to use it. It's funny how times have changed, to think, "gay" and "fag" once stood for entirely different things!

[sketchley]

To be frank, if you ask anyone in Japan about Miyazaki and anime, they will talk about the director. Most people won't even remember the murderer.

As for the comparison to Columbine... there was a crazed man who entered a school here in Osaka prefecture, and killed a bunch of kids with a knife. That occured around the same time as the Columbine event, and that is fore and present in people's minds like Columbine. Heck, they added walls, gates, and security cameras at schools, along with other security procedures after it... Miyazaki, just a name with a bit of infamous history.

[GutsAndCasca]

Well. No matter what, I think somebody on the net got pretty bored insinuating that Otaku-ism (even if just in name) began with macross. I think macross' biggest contribution to modern culture is keeping old guys like me young at heart indefinitely! And that takes a certain amount of magic, in my opinion. My heart's been captured since the age of 5! Yes, I can remember a whole range of shows and toys from childhood... but only one franchise still fascinates me even to this day.

[Sumdumgai]

"Otaku" has been bastardized in the west to mean "I'm a crazed fan that worships and adores anime, and proud of it!" without keeping any of the negative connotations held in Japan. It's actually somewhat appropriate that "hardcore fans" self-brand themselves as otaku, because they tend to uphold the negative stereotypes that the word brings up. Fat, smelly, hairy, socially inept, creepy, and unhealthily obsessive to name a few. It's not appropriate just for the cases where it upholds the stereotypes, but also because most western cultures are individualistic.

It's just a label. It has negative connotations in Japan because Japan is a country that's society based and not individualistic. The nail that sticks up gets hammered down, and otakus are not the norm, thus they are to be shunned. They don't act the way "normal" members of Japanese society should act, and those that really don't want to be rejected by society go to greath lengths to hide that they are otaku, or not even otaku but fans of this or that. If you say "I like anime", if you're an adult, people in Japan will look at you funny and wonder if you're an otaku. You bury yourself if you say "oh, but I'm not an otaku!".

The Otaku-killer blew things up and made it really bad. Because when the stereotype is reinforced in a society that is naturally prone to reject what's different and scared of it, good luck in trying to overcome this reinforcement. They already saw otaku as deviants, this case just reinforced the stereotypes and/or created new ones.

My wife is friends with some mangaka in Japan, and at least one of them is downright horrified of otaku. That particular mangaka gets creeped out by them, and see's them as sick and demented. They're not right or proper in the Japanese view. Especially adult guys that are obsessed with shojo series and the girls in them (especially young ones). That mangaka was quite shocked to find out the way the word "otaku" is used in the west, and quite horrified. We had an interesting conversation on that subject (we were able to converse in French, because I don't speak Japanese really).

I've met Japanese otaku in Japan. For the ones that fulfill the negative stereotypes, oh god I am scarred for life. The particular instance was having a giant squeeling hairy pig, hopping from foot-to-foot and clapping, before diving between my wife and I to get at some toy of some sentai series... He stank so bad, he literally squeeled like a pig, and it was just horrifying!

Comic Market was really interesting to see the wide range of simple fans to otaku, to OMGWTF-SCARY OTAKU! There was one really creepy, smelly otaku that was going around with a special jacket that had fans mounted all over it, so it would constantly fill his jacket with circulating air to keep him cool in the summer heat. The air coming out though practically killed everyone around him.

The general fans and people that western fans would call "otaku", were fine by me. The stereotypical ones stuck out like a sore thumb though and were creepy like all hell.

Overall I have to say that I find the western self-proclaimed otaku to be far more annoying than the Japanese hardcore otaku. The western ones have all the bad sides of the Japanese ones, plus a lot of times blind worship for all that is Japanese, fan-boy/girl Japanese (with horrible misusage of Japanese words), and are loud and irritating. At least the Japanese are much more silent. God, Comic Market was truly amazing in many things, but most of all in the organization and rule-abiding attendees, completely different from Anime Expo or any of those puss-bucket-piss-poor-excuse for conventions in France.

I consider myself to be a fan. Besides I'm already lacking in one of the major criterias. I'm married. Otaku guys stereotypically can't talk to girls, much less get into a relationship with one. Plus, I'm thin. Although I have been accused of looking like the serial-killer type...

[sketchley]

By and large, your summary is good, except for one point that I wish to take issue with:

If you say "I like anime", if you're an adult, people in Japan will look at you funny and wonder if you're an otaku.

Maybe it's because I am a gaigokujin here in Japan (and as we all know, gaikokujin can get away with more things than the Japanese, or other Asians,) but whenever I mention that I am interested in anime, or like a particular series, I get more positive, or curious responses. Mind you, I don't dwell on the topic*, am well groomed, have a wife, and son, etc.... In other words, if you come across as a 'I'll watch it if it's (easily accessible) on TV' (and don't go out of my way to hunt it down) type, then you'll come across as a more or less normal person.

To be honest, most people in Japan are abnormal in some way - the trick is, to not flaunt it in front of others. I think the problem with those known as otaku is that they don't have the social skills to not flaunt their likes in public. But isn't this the same in any other country?

*It's like saying, 'I like chocolate covered donuts.' If you move on, and don't obsess about the donut, then all is well.

[GutsAndCasca]

Sumdumgai --- I laughed so hard when you described the fat smelly otakus! The one who squealed like a pig?? *ahahahah!* Thanks for making my evening. I guess I can't be an otaku for the same reasons as you, although I don't look like a serial killer I don't think, as long as I keep the blood washed off me. Plus I only really buy Macross stuff, and the occasional berserk item. Is there a name for someone like me in Japan? BerMacTu?

[treatment]

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?.../07/07/apop.DTL

In its standard usage, otaku (literally, "your house") is an extremely formal way of saying "you"; an English equivalent might be "thou." In the early '80s, the term was adopted as self-referential slang by hard-core anime fans in Japan, possibly because the lead character in the most popular series of the time, the SF epic "Super Dimensional Fortress Macross" tended to idiosyncratically use "otaku" in addressing other characters, rather than the colloquial "anata."

[Sumdumgai]

By and large, your summary is good, except for one point that I wish to take issue with:

Maybe it's because I am a gaigokujin here in Japan (and as we all know, gaikokujin can get away with more things than the Japanese, or other Asians,) but whenever I mention that I am interested in anime, or like a particular series, I get more positive, or curious responses. Mind you, I don't dwell on the topic*, am well groomed, have a wife, and son, etc.... In other words, if you come across as a 'I'll watch it if it's (easily accessible) on TV' (and don't go out of my way to hunt it down) type, then you'll come across as a more or less normal person.

To be honest, most people in Japan are abnormal in some way - the trick is, to not flaunt it in front of others. I think the problem with those known as otaku is that they don't have the social skills to not flaunt their likes in public. But isn't this the same in any other country?

*It's like saying, 'I like chocolate covered donuts.' If you move on, and don't obsess about the donut, then all is well.

Although I am not born in Japan Japanese, and wasn't raised there, I brought up that subject from conversations with some Japanese people that lived in Japan all their life (a mangaka, some university students, etc), and some gaikokujin that have lived and worked in Japan for a little while. This by far isn't a good random sample that would stand up to intense scientific scrutiny, but it's varied and general enough for me.

And I agree with you, sketchley, that the trick is to not publicly flaunt abnormality. You can be as screwed up as can be as long as you keep the facade of normality in front of society. Otaku that fulfill the stereotype are probably the same in any country like you pointed out, give or take some behaviours due to cultural differences.

GutsandCasca, the squeeling pig in mandarake was thankfully the worst example of otaku that I ran into in Japan. Although you can spot otaku in Akihabara really easily, look for the slouching guys that wear plaid shirts and are carrying lots of bags. There was this really creepy otaku that helped guide my wife and I to Akihabara from the nearby metro station, and wound up asking us for a couple hundred yen (which surprised us because up until then all the Japanese that helped us did it for free). So we paid him, since he did help us, and he ended up walking off while spasming and talking to himself about needing more money to buy this and that... When we came back to Akihabara another day for shopping, we saw him spazzing out in front of one of the metro ticket machines, going all psycho and raging at it for some reason or another. And another time (I liked going to Akihabara, nice good selection of stores), we saw him in the metro station creeping people out and latching onto the tourists and creeping them out. And he was always wearing the same plaid shirt, had that unkempt look, was kind of smelly, and was really creepy.

All the Japanese women that saw him would give him a really wide birth and stay as far away from him as possible.

If you watch Otaku no Video, when they're standing in line to see some movie and one of the group comes up showing off stuff they got about DYRL, some drunk guy walks by and harasses them. He gets pissy at them and comments on the way they use "otaku", translated as "thou" I believe. A fun watch for a mockumentory with a lot of truth in it.

[GutsAndCasca]

*laughing once again* Oh man! I have GOTTA' visit Japan one day, if just to get a look at these guys. Do you think it's really anime that makes people into these crazy dorks? I wonder if maybe Japan just doesn't have enough diversity of hobbies to disperse the nerds enough, so they end up in anime-concentrations.

[Sumdumgai]

Nah, it's not anime. Look in the US and you see hardcore Trekkies, which is just another form of Otaku-ism. The fat guys that dress up as Klingons, learn to speak Klingon, smell as bad as real Klingons probably would smell, and are in such good shape that they'd collapse after jogging a quarter-mile (yes these are just generalizations ).

Or the Lord of the Rings hardcore fans that dress as elves, learn to read, write, speak, and comprehend Elvish. Or the Star Wars psycho fans that think they're TRULY Jedi, can feel the force flowing through them, come up with insane ideas of how to build a real lightsaber, try to use force powers, and get hurt trying to teach themselves how to fight with a lightsaber (in this case a wooden or bamboo rod).

While I may be guilty of swinging my FX lightsaber around I'm no Jedi. Besides, that thing lights up and makes lightsaber sounds! But I'm getting off topic.

Then again the US has some things scarier than mere otaku. You have things like M-F. I dare not utter the name, I shall only use the initials.

[kensei]

Macross has contributed something else to modern culture too.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macross_Missile_Massacre

Edited September 16, 2006 by kensei

[sketchley]

Kensei, isn't that really called 'the Itano Circus'?

Anyhow, Sumdumgai, don't forget the sports otaku that are prevalent in North America. I swear, anywhere you turn, you come across them, their bad fashion sense, and geekiness to talk only about sports. Of course, sports otaku are not really recognized as otaku... the last time I checked, that is.

[kensei]

Wouldn't have a clue. Just passed on it thorugh the wiki.

[1/1 LowViz Lurker]

Isn't there a character in metal gear solid who is an otaku? "Otacon" He plays the nerdy guy that has to help snake stop the bad guys and is some kind of mecha nut?

I would say that in anime the stereotype is this:

-has to wear glasses (yang neuman for eg)

-no GF or girls find the person creepy

-usually always doing something technical and speaking in a languange nobody understands because the person doesn't use layman terminolgy. (this can include esoteric knowledge of obscure anime that isn't mainstream enough to be common amongst normal people)

When there are female ones, in hentai for example, they are the computer literate one that reads lots of technical books and is like the sidekick of the main character. The female one wears the stereotypical glasses, is shy, has small tits, (aquarion had a big titted glasses girl though) and is never the courageous one who confronts things head on and is always less athletic and fit than the non-nerdy one. They might also enjoy hobbies that most would find boring and can also be creepy in some evil way. (ie the bookworm/librarian/mad scientist with no morals and an ego that "thinks it is more evolved than other people" character type, and then tries to take out its revenge on everyone using a doomsday weapon because as a kid it was bullied or something )

I only base this from what I see in anime stereotype characters so it might be different idea completely to real ones, as I don't go to conventions and stuff to see them. I think of otaku = generally antisocial people. (you could be fat, skinny, tall whatever. But if you are antisocial in any way the other stuff are just the popular stereotypes that might be common amongst many of them)

The thing that makes you an nerd I think is age. So the 6 year old kid who is a fan of the teenage mutant ninja turtles and jumps off a building because it thinks it can survive the fall is safe. But if you are an adult cosplaying as optimus prime and take your fanboyishness of the series very seriously (ie like an addicted drug addict where it interferes with normal parts of your life - see WoW players ) then you would qualify. The otaku doesn't sound all that different to the nerd really.

While I may be guilty of swinging my FX lightsaber around I'm no Jedi. Besides, that thing lights up and makes lightsaber sounds! But I'm getting off topic.

I was thinking of getting one of these. But damn they are expensive. The otaku would probably be using gundam style beam saber variants of these and stuff. Possibly two beam sabers at a time and mimmicking amuro ray and believing he has newtype psychic abilities But having said that: I think once a science fiction movie, book, series becomes too mainstream and popular, the effect of nerd or hardcore fanboy behaviour is lessened a little. Sort of like how you can have a normal guy who likes bikes and rides a harley and dress a certain way but doesn't want you to associate him with the typical bikie gangster. Or a gun nut who is not violent in any way, but who is just passionate about the guns as thier hobby. Now I think it is the same with adult fans of old series. They are just passionate about the series, are fans of it, but not the otaku stereotype. If the series is not mainstream its even harder for that person to explain as an adult to "outsider" why they collect such and such or waste money and time on this or that because it is not "normal". I think that is why people are so self conscious about bringing valkyrie to work because they want to avoid that stigma. If macross was more mainstream, no explanation is necessary, no need to explain why you have a large toy collection of it (assuming you collect toys, not merchandise of the thing you are fanatical about, implying that you are childish for the 'toy' part etc) and people are much more relaxed because they might be familiar with it and think it is actually cool and want to know more about it.

Edited September 17, 2006 by 1/1 LowViz Lurker

[JB0]

Kensei, isn't that really called 'the Itano Circus'?

Wikipedia has a seperate entry for that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Itano_Circus

If Wikipedia is trustworthy, Itano Circus covers more than 3M does.

Either way, it makes sense that more than one term would evolve for the same thing.

[yellowlightman]

Isn't there a character in metal gear solid who is an otaku? "Otacon" He plays the nerdy guy that has to help snake stop the bad guys and is some kind of mecha nut?

The name Otacon comes from the American anime convention Otakon, oddly enough.

[sketchley]

http://www.google.ca/search?hl=ja&q=itano+circus

[GutsAndCasca]

To be perfectly honest, the biggest nerds I've ever known in my life were "sports-otakus." Since I moved to Utah two years ago, I have come to realize that nearly every single member of the male species in this state is a "jock-ku." I won't get into all the ways that they annoy the piss out of me, but I think it's strange how being jock-ku in the USA (especially UT) is not only accepted but frankly glorified. To me, nothing is more drab and boring than someone who has absolutely nothing else to do in their free time except watch team sports on cable and read sports illustrated. I'd rather smear peanut butter on my eyes and let live gerbils gnaw their way deep into my skull than be a team-sports obsessor.

Edit: Sometimes, I wish I'd been born in Thailand where at least me and the jock-kus would have something to talk about. Thailand's national sport is actually something to be proud of.

Edited September 17, 2006 by GutsAndCasca

[Sumdumgai]

A large number of female otaku in Japan love Yaoi. Not just in Japan though. Man, one of the Mandarake stores in Tokyo got converted to Yaoi only, an entire Mandarake. Then at comic market they have a day that is devoted to yaoi (there's still hentai doujinshi, but a lot less).

Most of the same generalizations of male otaku apply to female otaku, with the addition of yaoi. Although my wife and I have met some doujinshika that defy the generalizations though, and if you're a doujinshika you're damned close to being an otaku if you're not one (whether or not they fit the stereotypical generalizations). An example for a guy doujinshika that defied a bunch of stereotypes was Koh Kawarajima. He was thin, not creepy, dressed like a normal person, didn't smell, and looked like he had good hygiene. Another one was Saigado, which really threw me off because I didn't realize the guy at his booth was him (I thought it was an assistant or a buddy of his). He was tall, dressed very well, no aura of creepiness, no killer BO, and was very thin. It was really strange, because a great deal of the doujinshika there at the convention fulfilled a great deal of the stereotypes (especially fat and creepy).

A female doujinshika that defied stereotype was Yonekura Kengo. She was really thin, wore trendy clothes, had high-lighted hair, wore these crazy blue contact lenses, no BO, and no creepiness aura. Funny thing is that she does hentai doujinshi as well as yaoi, which used to be not so common for female doujinshika, but it's increasing more and more.

Good point on the sport-otaku in the US. The jock ones in general annoy me with their constant need to prove their masculinity while putting everyone else down because they're too insecure about their own sexuality, with the whole: "I'm so manly, I play football and I wrestle, you're gay because you don't like mainstream sports". Which is more or less a quote I pulled from real-life from high school. Of course the look on his face was priceless when I pointed out that he thought it was manly to put on skin-tight clothing and grab other men and roll around on the floor with them.

Don't get me wrong, there were some jocks I knew that were good guys and didn't need to pull that crap, and I respected them for that. But the general jock sports otaku, man... Damned annoying that society promotes people like that.

Yes, the line between fan and otaku is a blurry one. But lots of things in life are like that, including the line between sanity and insanity.

[GutsAndCasca]

Imagine living in a state where the one and only conversation guys have in their spare time deals with somehow knowing exhorbitant amounts of information about a plethora of other men. In my little world, I'd call that being queer. For jock-kus, knowing every name of every player on every team for every sport in every circuit and everything about the lives of all of them makes you cool somehow. (?)

Now I will admit that it would be strange for a person to know everything about every anime ever made blah blah blah, but at least anime is diverse, intellectual, imaginative, and creative. I'd like to see a reality TV show in which they stick otakus and jock-kus together in the same house for a while.

[sketchley]

The jock-kus would probably terrorize the otaku with physical violence until the otaku hide in their rooms, and the jock-kus make a mess of the house with their reinactments of favourite sports moments.

[bandit29]

. But the general jock sports otaku, man... Damned annoying that society promotes people like that.

That's because there's money to be made on those guys. Lot's of it. From local gambling, to Las Vegas, fantasy leagues, sports bars, videogames etc..

The only sports I really love is the NFL and NASCAR(yes it is a sport). I just don't go overboard with it. I don't show up at sports event half naked covered in my teams colors lol.

Macross contribution to modern culture? ya its called credit card debt lol

Actually I did hear Macross Plus music and Escaflowned music in a very old episode of Iron Chef.

[Zinjo]

Actually I did hear Macross Plus music and Escaflowned music in a very old episode of Iron Chef.

Really?!

Which one?

I love that show, it's almost as over the top as Takeshi's Castle in it's particular genre!

Imagine being a chef able to make a $5000.00 a dish meal (and that's only the INGREDIENTS)!?

[bandit29]

Really?!

Which one?

I love that show, it's almost as over the top as Takeshi's Castle in it's particular genre!

Imagine being a chef able to make a $5000.00 a dish meal (and that's only the INGREDIENTS)!?

I'ts been awhile since I seen it but IIRC its an episode where the Iron Chefs visit US culinary schools or universities. It wasn't the typical chef battle episode.