Growing up on Japanese TV
By pkaaihue
Aloha folks, 元気ですか？ ..hope you're having a wonderful week. Mahalo to everyone that emailed, called and posted about the passing of a dear friend and Hero of Hawai`i.
Today's JapanMania topic, Japan TV. Growing up in the 70's (I'm 38 now), my family and I were all fans of the programming on KIKU Channel 13 and other shows only available on 'expensive' cable. I learned that the KIKU staff and the efforts of Joanne Ninomiya (currently of JN Productions) are to thank for hours of cool 日本のTV shows. Here's a list of what we'd watched.. what are some of your favorites? Mahalo to JN Productions, HenshinFan and Plasia for the pics!
Dad's favorite .. anything samurai, jidaigeki (period drama), ninja, shogun, swords/fighting/action/overly used fake blood kinda movies. His favorite and mine too:
Sonny Chiba & I
For my mom and aunties.. that's easy. Abarenbo Shogun ("OMG he's SOO HANDSOME!!!"), cry your eyes out TV dramas. They were also *huge* fans of all things Soko Ga Shiritai (the inspiration behind Doko Ga TV! mahalo to creators of Soko Ga, TBS, for their kokua and support)
For us kids... that's even easier. All things superhero: tokusatsu, sentai and anime. Although, I must say that Ikkyusan (一休さん) was loved by everyone in the family (not to mention the really cool theme song) 
what are some of your favorites?
JapanMania – Sugoi!
June 14th, 2010 at 4:51 am
Shadow Warriors
Jubei
June 14th, 2010 at 6:37 am
Howzit Pali!
Growing up I watched all those superhero and cartoon shows on Kiku. I watch Soko Ga Shiritai every night even though I seen the same episode over and over, Doko Ga TV and anything else about Japan.
June 14th, 2010 at 7:02 am
I still get my fix of Japanese cartoons (anime) but online these days.
My all time favorites were Rainbow Man and Go Rangers
June 14th, 2010 at 7:39 am
Mahalo M!!
Yeah, LOVED those shows.. and Soko Ga fills my DVR
June 14th, 2010 at 9:19 am
Wow Akumaiza-! How about Raideen, Getta Robo and Robokon?
June 14th, 2010 at 10:26 am
I grew up on Kikaida too.
Rainbow Man
Diamond Eye
These are two that I do not see mentioned often but was just as popular growing up here in Hawaii.
I like to watch Soko Ga Shiritai now. I try to catch your show too, but seem to always see the same episodes.
June 14th, 2010 at 10:35 am
What was that red robot that was afraid of cockroches? It wasn't a superhero but was around that time of kikaida etc.
June 14th, 2010 at 12:00 pm
@SDE- I think it was Robocon or something like that.
June 14th, 2010 at 12:24 pm
I remember on KIKU, there was a Japanese man who would draw all kinds of cartoon characters....including our God at the time -- Kikaida.
I loved Hakaida because of his shoulder pads and long pistol.
Rydin and Zaboga were some bad asses too!
BIK
June 14th, 2010 at 12:51 pm
In the 70's there was all these J-Pop singers like Agnes Chan, Go Hiromi and Saori Minami. I remember this particular show was on Wednesday nights on KIKU-tv and seemed to be pretty popular.
June 14th, 2010 at 12:54 pm
Hey Pali,
A lot of people my age (20s) are into J-Drama. Hana yori dango is probably most popular.
June 14th, 2010 at 2:09 pm
love the zaboga pic. i just read that they are going to be doing a live action zaboga movie soon. my fave old skool drama was "Mama wa Idoru". I think they showed that on NGN in the 80's. i also looked forward to watching the quiz show "Naruhodo the World". ahh, natsukashii!
June 14th, 2010 at 3:46 pm
Don't forget NHK Theater!
June 14th, 2010 at 3:48 pm
Don't forget NHK Theater! It wouldn't be a Sunday morning with Takeda Shingen or one of the other excellent dramas.
June 14th, 2010 at 6:00 pm
Aloha all, wow! all great suggestions!!! Kage, yeah, we're in repeat season right now, DokoGa's new season starts July 28th 2010 (13/14 new episodes, then repeat season again).
Rainbow Man!!! anyone remember Hakubundo or Bunbundo book stores?
...and yeah, I think that was Robocon (afraid of roaches)
If they can do a live action Zaboga now, that'd be cool! Did you see the Gaiking live action teaser trailer?
http://www.geeknative.com/6214/gaiking-trailer-and-classic-clip/ ...also there's *still* talks about
a live action Evangelion trailer.
For those that came to this year's Kawaii Kon, Shinji Aramaki showed the trailer of his new project, the new
version of Captain Harlock.. it's incredible..
NHK theater!!! Ah, yes, Hana Yori Dango, *lots* of fans for that show...
June 14th, 2010 at 6:43 pm
Thanks for refreshing my memory on Robocon. That wasn't my favorite but for some reason sticks in my mind.
Hakubundo or Bunbundo- not sure which one, still exists on Kapiolani Blvd in the Pan Am building. But they don't sell those cool martial arts stuff anymore.
Pali- any shows about Hokkaido in the future? I think a visit there will be my next trip.
June 14th, 2010 at 6:54 pm
I used to like that samurai who used to fly in the clouds. And Speed Racer.
I still enjoy Godzilla movies.
June 14th, 2010 at 7:06 pm
One of my favorite actors used to be Nakamura Kennosuke.
June 14th, 2010 at 8:53 pm
Howzit Pali,
KSHO (channel 16 on cable) had a pretty good lineup of Japanese programming too: Kozure Okami (Lone Wolf & Cub), Matsudaira Ukon Jiken Cho & Saiyuki (alas, without subtitles).
One of my favorites on KIKU was Tokusou Saizensen, which was an hour-long police drama. I believe it was the only "deka" (detective) show to make it to Hawai'i. They even shot a special 2-hour movie where the characters track down a Japanese fugitive in Hawai'i. Typical Hawai'i Five-O action: in once scene, the cops get to Aloha Stadium by driving towards Diamond Head!
June 14th, 2010 at 11:48 pm
SDE, yup, LOVE Hokkaido!!! we'll be back up there in the fall to shoot more segments up there... and yeah, there was one at the Chinese Cultural Plaza (can't remember which one), and the other was near Like Like Drive Inn. I think that's the one on Kapiolani...
June 15th, 2010 at 6:53 am
Howzit Pali!
Kage mention repeat episodes of your shows but for me I just watch it again and again. Can't get enough of Japan. Also I might see something that I might have missed watching it the first time around.
June 15th, 2010 at 8:08 am
Mahalo M..
I do wish we could go an entire season of new episodes, all 25, but I don't think any of the OC16 directors do that (to the best of my knowledge) and I've learned the repeats do help for those that didn't catch um the first time around. And OC16 is awesome in that they show DGTV and all OC16 shows numerous times a week... so that helps promote the shows.
Not to mention the fact we'd pretty much keel over trying to do 25, then the next 25 etc etc.
We have a 3 person team, Raf (Director/Camerman), Sachi (producer/hosts/translates/books) and myself (produce/host/editor/music) to do each episode. (sugoi taihen!)
Mahalo for watching!!!!
June 15th, 2010 at 8:15 am
Godzilla will *always* rock!
Ah! Dan Moroboshi, Ultra 7 himself.. I'm truly honored
Tokusou Saizensen!!! I remember that:
http://www.toei-video.co.jp/tokusou/index.html
June 18th, 2010 at 9:45 pm
Great info...the other sites didn't really provide anything new like this..Thanks a lot
June 21st, 2010 at 9:39 pm
Sup Pali,
You mentioned a "what if" scenario regarding a Zaborger movie. They just put out a press release announcing a Zaborger movie in 2011:
http://hk.myblog.yahoo.com/timeless_dimension0/article?mid=7179
June 22nd, 2010 at 10:10 pm
Great info throughout this post, anime occupies too much of my personal free time.
June 28th, 2010 at 2:38 am
Your blog is so informative ¡ keep up the good work!!!!
July 9th, 2010 at 6:41 am
The name Godzilla is made by a couple of Japanese terms – gorira (Gorilla) and kujira (Whale).
July 10th, 2010 at 1:42 pm
Great text and nice blog.
July 12th, 2010 at 9:11 am
I don’t usually reply to posts but I will in this case. WoW