A Japanese TV news report takes a look at how Shanghai is preparing for the big 2010 expo:

The report isn’t exactly positive. Here are some of the main points covered:

Work is progressing on the giant red copy of the Tokyo Big Sight China Pavilion. (The Japan Pavilion will look like an ugly pink dome.)
As [...]

NTV’s “Surprise Surprise” variety show featured some photos last week that have ghostly figures in the background:

The first image shown, which I have included at the top of this post, reportedly shows a “headless” man. It seemed pretty obvious that it was a man in a white cap looking downwards at something, but just [...]

Comedian Daisuke Miyagawa recently traveled to Arkansas to compete in crystal digging contest for an episode of NTV’s “Itte Q.” Mark and Mike, twin brothers who are longtime veterans of the event, are hired to guide and assist Miyagawa in his 3-day search for big crystals.
Part 1

Daisuke learns the basics of crystal digging, and [...]

Evening news broadcasts on Japanese TV networks tend to use 10 or 20 minutes of each daily program to in-depth feature reports about interesting topics that aren’t necessarily big news stories. On the day Fuji TV was originally supposed to air its report about Billy Blanks’ new life in Japan, their normal schedule was [...]

The hidden camera show that carried out a sniper attack prank on comedians also tricked model/idol Yukina Kinoshita into believing that she was going on a hunt for kappa. When they encounter the mythical creatures, everyone will pretend that they cannot see or hear the kappa, driving Kinoshita into a state of [...]

Microsoft’s Windows 7 went on sale in Japan yesterday. When Fuji TV filed a report about the product launch, they felt the need to inform everyone of the shocking fact that pirated copies of Windows 7 have been on sale for some time in China.

Even as this post was being written, their morning news [...]

When something ridiculous happens in the States, Japanese TV calls in Dave Spector to give some comentary on the state of America (because he used to live in America before 1982):

Spector describes how there are an increasing number of reality TV shows in America that reward people with money for doing stupid things.
This [...]

A short clip from a TBS News report about crack dealers in the United States shows that Japanese subtitles sometimes fail to capture the beauty of certain English phrases:

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The TBS hidden camera show “Panic Face King” tricks three comedians into thinking that they are filming a documentary about telephone scammers. Shortly after the interview begins, a gunman attacks, delivering what appear to be horrendous bullet wounds to other people in the room!
Let’s see the hilarious looks on their faces as [...]

In the process of traveling around the world, NTV’s “Itte Q” forced assistant directors and other staff members to place themselves at the mercy of local barbers:

Each man was given what the barber thought would look best. The results varied greatly, especially since they went to high class hair stylists in some [...]

Mitsui Sumitomo adds its credit card mascot into Natsume Soseki’s “I am a Cat“:

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Fuji TV’s typhoon-related news coverage included this experiment demonstrating how strong winds can knock stuff over:

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