Interview de Oda

One Piece Super Stage Day 2

The battle for the ticket is a long one, and one that won’t soon be forgotten. As you may or may not know, this was the first year JUMP Festa handled the Super Stage events via invite-only.

Which is bullshit.

STAG FECES

The entire point of JUMP Festa is to go see your favorite authors live and hear them talk about their work. At least, that’s what it is for me. Seeing the voice actors? Yeah it’s neat, and sometimes they tell some interesting stories, but that’s something I chronicle mostly for you guys. For the past 3 years going to see Oda has been an annual reward for the work I’ve done that’s taken me to this point in life. I don’t mind working like a dog in a country far from home for kids that mostly don’t care about English so long as:

* I’m with the woman I love.
* I can see Oda once a goddamn year at a place he’s SUPPOSED to be.

This year that changed when they created a lottery. Send in the equivalent of a JUMP proof of purchase and you get a chance to attend the show.

Sounds simple enough right? With the help of my students across 6 weeks I gathered 36 proofs of purchase and sent them all in separately.

The week of December 6th the tickets started arriving at homes. And as each day went by, I was left without anything in our mailbox. I checked the Japanese blogs to see what was up. Evidently, Shueisha gave favoritism to children and simply threw out the entries of applicants over a certain age once the quota was filled.

Can you believe this shit?

“But JUMP is for kids!”

Yeah? So fucking what? Does that mean only kids enjoy it? DIDN’T THEY JUST SPEND A FUCKING FORTUNE ADVERTISING THEMSELVES IN A NEWSPAPER THAT KIDS CAN’T EVEN READ YET?

I’d like to meet the sadist creep who made that decision in a dark alley one night.

Furthermore I began reading responses like this on blogs: “Wow! I only sent in one card and I won!”

Or scumbags who literally used their toddler children to get in: “My kid doesn’t even read JUMP and I put the card in their name and I won!”

And it wasn’t long before some cuntrags even began selling their tickets on Yahoo Auctions. Now, it was stated well in advance in JUMP that there would be identity checks and that ID would be required at entry. That means, even if you bought a ticket on Yahoo (I saw some go for the equivalent of over 500 dollars) you couldn’t get in unless you had that person’s REAL ID AND matched their ID info.

I’m even aware of some parents who literally sold their children’s tickets, then sent their elementary school son or daughter into the show WITH A COMPLETE STRANGER.

FUCKIN’ A!!!!!!!

And as the days went by, still nothing in the mailbox.

I was desperate and depressed. This is something I had literally been looking forward to since the moment One Piece Super Stage ended last year.

And so I turned to the dark side.

2ch.

I found a JUMP Festa thread and began offering the equivalent of 100 bucks for someone to take me with them to the Day 2 stage.

Nothing.

Next day I posted again.

Nothing.

Next day I raised the price. 150.

Later that day I saw a response:

“To reduce the number of people like 409 [that was my post #], I’d like to offer my friend’s seat to someone here. Please respond to me at:XXXXX”

I instantly checked the post time and it was an hour ago from the current time and I scrolled down the page to see if anyone had already replied.

And they had….

FUCK!

BUT WAIT! WHAT’S THIS!? THE E-MAIL ADDRESS WAS BAD!!!!!!

One person attempted a reply but the addy was bad.

Scrolling down further the original poster had already reposted!

“Sorry, my mistake, the address is XXXXXX”

AND IT WAS THE MOST RECENT POST!!!!!!!!!!!

I flew to Hotmail and copy-pasted the address and put:
“I WILL GIVE YOU 15000 YEN FOR THE SPOT!!!!!” in the title and sent it.

After that I sent another e-mail apologizing for the abruptness and that I was simply overexcited because of the opportunity and explained my love of the series.

No reply.

Two hours later.

No reply.

But at 11:30PM

“You’ve got a message.”

INBOXINBOXINBOX

メール、ありがとうございました。

沢山メールをいただきましたが、グレッグさんのメールが１番早かったので、
グレッグさんに同行をお願いしたいと思います。

Or:

Thank you for your e-mail.

I got a lot of replies but the message you sent me Greg was the first so I’d like to invite you to attend with me.

T^T

There were tears folks. Tears and screams not unlike a girl at a Jonas Bros. concert.

The next day we began to negotiation of how to deal with the money and it became a bit scary. I started to get super paranoid. Afraid I was getting taken for a ride. Afraid ‘she’ was going to be a ‘he’ with 5 other powerful friends. It didn’t help that she said the ticket she had, wasn’t actually her OWN ticket. It was her older sister’s! @_@ Furthermore she ultimately decided that I was going to go with ‘a friend’ because she would be busy.

WTF.

The day before we had our first real meeting under the giant Luffy balloon and everything SEEMED okay. She was actually a ‘she’ and seemed like a nice person. She also showed me the ticket. But…you just never know right?

So after the final OP VA talk on Day 2, I made a b-line for her position near the Stage entrance. She was waiting there for me and her ‘friend’ who was late. Now, her ‘friend’ would be using her sister’s health insurance ID to get in and her sister is 22 years-old. Which is why I was shocked and horrified when her ‘friend’ that showed up WAS ABOUT 45-FREAKIN-YEARS-OLD EASY!!!!!!!

WTF!?

This obviously wasn’t someone she’d ever met before and I felt I’d been taken for something of a ride but at this point I didn’t care because she agreed to accept payment after the stage. Which…was dumb on her behalf because I could have split but luckily for her I’m not a duckweed like that.

Anyway, we got through the first checkpoint since all the old lady had to do was flash the ID card. As we stood in line waiting to get in, I slowly came to the horrifying realization that the woman standing next to me was in fact, a REAL otaku.

Like, the people you read articles about that married pillows or some shit.

FUCK!

Now, I think it’s pretty goddamn crazy that I sent in 36 postcards for the lottery. The only excuse I have is that my students gave me their JUMPs to help out. I ended up buying only 5 extra JUMPs myself when all was said and done which is about 12 bucks.

SHE SENT IN 50 ON HER OWN.

@_@

So that freaked me the shit out from the bat but it just got worse.

She started talking about the voice actors and CHRIST! I mean, it’s fun to see them once a year and of course I’d geek out if I passed one on the street, but honestly, aside from the times they provide anecdotes about Oda, they’re no different to me than the people who perform the crew in those lame costumes. They don’t offer anything interesting regarding the series, nor do they directly affect anything in the series other than performing as per Oda’s direction. That’s not to say I would refuse their autographs or some shit, just….I really don’t care about them that much.

THIS LADY COULDN’T SHUT UP ABOUT SANJI’S VA!!!!!!!!!

She went to see him at some show I don’t give a shit about and shook his hand and since it was winter and she was waiting outside, her hand was cold and she said he said to her, “Your hand is cold, you must have been waiting for a while.” She proceeded to orgasm on the spot or some shit, I dunno I was busy trying to avoid the attention her giant pink Chopper cowboy hat was garnering.

Now stop.

Yes.

I was wearing a gigantic pink Chopper hat.

IT’S DIFFERENT.

I’m a gaijin. I’m supposed to look and act like Tom Cruise. At least, that’s what they all expect. So when one of us gaijin do something like that, so long as we aren’t annoying when we do it (ie. “HEY! YOU’RE JAPANESE? DO YOU LIKE ONE PIECE!? WHAT’S YOUR FAVORITE EPISODE!?”) it’s funny.

An old woman short woman wearing a pink Chopper cowboy hat is disturbing on so many levels.

So many.

Then we got to talking about the bullshit of the lottery which is something I agreed with. I joked that in order to get in next year we should have kids with our families. Hahahaha!

But no.

“Yes, that’s what I’m considering now.”, she replied deadpan.

O_o

So after a few minutes of horrific awkwardness, we entered the final checkpoint and when she handed in the insurance card, I’ve really gotta give the chick who was doing the checking a load of credit for not bursting into laughter instantly. She passed it back with the excuse, “It doesn’t seem that you’re on the list, could you please check with Information?”

Now, the place was swarming with rent-a-cops and here we were just exposed for committing identity fraud. I had to laugh as the little otaku said, “Wait here, leave this to me.”, and waddled off to Information.

I paced for about 3 minutes before she came back with passes and an explanation.

She said they found out she was lying and they offered her passes for ‘standing room’.

SURE! FINE! WHATEVER! I don’t give a flying fuck! I just wanna see Oda and hear what he has to say! I was ecstatic but she was pissed. That’s otaku for you. And hat I would give to hear the conversation where she must have strung a yarn of bullshit so thick is destroyed a loom of steel. But whatever, she got it done. Gotta give otaku credit, they get shit done.

They made us stand in the ‘bad kid line’ which was separated from the rest of the visitors. After everyone entered we were let in last into a cage in the back of the hall. It was hysterical. I think it was designed to make everyone there feel bad but I seriously could care less! I DID find it funny that of the 12 of us there, there was one young couple and other than that young boys glued to their PSPs.

And at long last, the stage began.

The stage lit up and two backlit figures shook hands at center stage, then went off to the side and began doing a live reading for us. The scene was the escape from ID. The full voice cast was utilized including Magellan and Jinbei but lesser characters were left out or skipped in interest of time. As it turns out, while the one shadowy figure was obviously Tanaka in the SW suit jacket, the other was Yao-san who was doing the reading for Mr. 2. We were the first to hear his voice as Magellan which was great since it didn’t sound a damn thing like Magellan.

It finished with Bentham’s declaration to thunderous applause.

One by one the VA’s were announced and they all showed from different points around the arena dressed up in their Strong World suit attire.

The interesting part about this was they all came out stating lines…or at least lines similar to what could be imagined, for their recent cover stories. The only notable one was Usopp who performed for the first time ever, his fat voice as the fat Usopp we caught a glimpse of.

The order they came out was: Sanji, Usopp, Nami & Zoro. They ran through the gated groups of the crowd and slapped hands on their way up like rock stars.

Zoro actually pretended to get lost on the way up like a certain swordsman.

The other Vas left messages for the crowd.

Chopper was doing a meandering monologue on whether she was eating an-bread or jam-bread.

Robin who is usually very composed was a bit silly as she said she ‘INADVERTANTLY’ forgot today was JUMP Festa using the same word as Gedatsu. She then said she’d show us something neat and gave a countdown that ended with her falling over.

wtf?

She said she couldn’t fly for us even though she tried. Weird.

Then freaking Cho-san holy CRAP! HE WAS FUCKING GOLD.

The moment he appeared on screen he was doing a perfect 45degrees! Then he lowered himself to attempt a 30 and the instant he let go of the wall he fell flat on his goddamn face, it was hilarious. THEN HE FOLLOWED WITH A HANDSTAND INTO THE WALL.

I thought I was going to die on the spot. What a nut-job.

Then it came time for Oda’s entrance which was by now a good 7 minutes into the presentation.

This year a plastic dumpster came up in his place with a drawing of Elizabeth from Gintama and an arrow pointing down.

The hell?

Just when we were trying to figure it out, he appeared from stage left wearing a gigantic tiger mask. It seemed obvious it was because of the soon approaching Year of the Tiger but he said he wanted to wear something ‘strong’ for SW. He also performed a ROAR pose two or three times but the great part was, he didn’t actually say anything, he just did the pose. Still, this is a huge change from the man who at one point was embarrassed just to stand in front of us.

Every year he introduces himself as someone he obviously isn’t and this year he introduced himself as ‘Movie Supervisor and Original Comic Author, Ai Kaito.”, the weather girl who did the voice for the character Ever in the new film.

Their first stage game of the year was a presentation, “100 Ways To Enjoy The Movies”.
Which could have been cool if it had some super secret stories behind their creation but instead it was just a collection of a lot of stories many of us already know.

The stage was set with the dry ice gas again so that Oda could gas the VA’s if he found their presentations boring.

They were broken into two teams: Luffy, Sanji & Zoro VS Franky Nami & Usopp but no points were kept, it’s just a gimmick.

1st presentation, Movie 1. Famous Line, a scene about treasure under a gateway. They said Nami’s comedic form is completely different back then.

2nd 2002 movie. Who is the VA? They asked who the VA for a certain character in the soccer special was. Of course we all know it was Oda. The funny part was, as Oda’s lines came up, he would set off the gas so no one could hear him but he was simultaneously overwhelming the Vas with dry ice gas.

3rd 2007 movie Emotion. The holy X scene.

4th 2008 movie Emotion. The pink snow falling.

& Famous Line. Dalton’s explanation of the Hiking Bear. WTF? ^o^

At the end the VA’s all bow and at that moment Oda set the gas off directly in their faces.

They bust Oda on his role as Special Advisor which in Japanese sounds close to ‘funeral’ so they asked if he was in charge of the funeral.

They asked about ‘Why the suits?’ and he said that everyone enjoyed the suit spread from JUMP so he wanted to make it move.

He designed Shiki as the godfather or ‘oyabun’ of a yakuza syndicate.

The ship’s wheel in his head has no meaning. It’s just something he’s wanted to use for a long time because he thought it’d be funny if someone had a ship’s wheel stuck in their head.

He said he wanted to depict the animals as normal animals that simply got stronger and not as mythological creatures.

At this point the animal sketches from Strong World were flipping by on the giant monitor and Oda gassed the VA’s because he was ‘bored’.

He said it feel great to see his own pictures moving like that. I guess that’s kinda cool because this is the first time he’s actually seen ideas that are 100% his own moving on the big screen.

Luffy’s VA asked him to draw Shiki’s parents, coming off her comment from the previous VA stage, and at first he agreed but when they pushed him on it he said, “Don’t give me more work than I already have!”, as he gassed them.

Here they brought out a jump rope and they said that every time they jump successfully, they’d show us 10 seconds of the movie.

This ‘game’ is a rip-off of a game that’s currently played on the Hexagon II Quiz Show which the singers of OP12 belong to and Luffy’s VA does the voiceovers for.

They were going to show us the damn movie (again) anyway so the whole thing was pointless as hell. While they went along with the absurdity, Oda sat by himself in the darkness of the stage with his tiger mask. Love him.

They tried three times and on the last try, Tanaka tripped it before they even got to 1 jump and she threw a tempter tantrum on the ground in her ‘Captain Kiddy’ voice and Oda smothered her with his tiger mask.

Is this man amazing or what?

They show us 4 minutes of the movie, which we’ve practically ALL seen -_-

OKAY IT FINISHES.

And now what we’ve been waiting for.

Usopp asks, what can we look forward to next year.

Oda says flat-out he can’t and won’t talk about it. However, he’s going to show us how serious he is with the story and that it’s simply going to be one surprise after another.

I’ll take that.

Sing Binks’ Sake.

Tanaka: Merry Christmas!

Oda- pushes button.

Bang!

Confetti!

Applause!

Finish.

I pass the lady who allowed me 15000 yen.

JUMP Festa 2010 over.