Live! From your Local Shopping Centre

One of the things I really love about Japan is the live shows they have every weekend at the mall. Even though I live in a very small town, we're still treated to acts of music, magic and other interesting specials and exhibits. While the shows we've watched at the mall have been pretty interesting and entertaining, the show that inspired me to write this blog is the Kamen Rider mall appearance.

Kamen Rider is a Power Rangers-type show, which features people transforming into power suits to fight evil muppets. Also, much like Power Rangers, each season has a new type of Kamen Rider. I don't know anything about this particular Kamen Rider, but the kids seemed to love him.

The show in general was cute and interesting. The host, a pretty girl who referred to herself as Nee-chan (Japanese for older sister or young lady) came on to the stage and talked to the kids for a bit. From their reactions, I would say she was doing typical pre-show hypes. Like "how are you?, "I can't hear you," and "Oh, I think I hear Kamen Rider coming!" Then, as his theme music played and all the children cheered, Kamen Rider came onto the stage.


From what I've seen on anime, live shows of a Power Ranger nature usually include a simple fight against a stuntman in a costume of an evil monster. I was a little disappointed to discover that this was not one of those shows, but it was still interesting to watch.

The show was a short trivia show. Nee-chan asked 3 random trivia questions and 3 music questions. After the question was asked the audience had a few seconds to think about the answer and then they asked if anyone knew the answer. Little hands shot up into the air, complete with hopping and squeals of "oh, oh, me, me, please me!" Nee-chan picked someone, and, after they found their shoes (the audience was sitting on a mat covered floor in the center court, and since this is Japan, they had to remove their shoes), Kamen Rider helped them onto the stage. They introduced themselves, bowed to the crowd, and answered the question. Kamen Rider took a few suspenseful moments to decide if the answer was correct and then would turn to the child with one of his thumbs up. Nee-chan would happily cheer, "Bing-bong," the Japanese sound effect for a correct answer. Then the child was rewarded with a small toy. After all the questions were asked, the children had a chance to have their picture taken with the Kamen Rider. Of course, the Japanese parents were ready with cameras in tow.

While it wasn't the evil doer butt-kick show I was expecting, it was still fun to experience. After all, it's not everyday you get to see a superhero in person.

Here's a short video of Kamen Rider's entrance. There's no subtitles, cause, well, I don't know Japanese well enough yet to add them. Enjoy!