Idol Bombaie, whatever that means

05.02.2010 by Patrick W. Galbraith

So Adrian and I were invited to Idol Bombaie (アイドルボンパイエ) in Shinjuku in January by the folks who do the signage for Yodobashi Akiba. The idols who appear on the time announcement on Yodobi (the big TV out the central exit of Akihabara station) come from this event, I guess, so that is the connection. It was a little weird to be sitting with the Yodobashi guys at the VIP table to begin with, but then the new character, Yodobi-chan, was projected on stage and started talking. The seiyuu who does her voice was at our table. They were playing the Yodobashi theme as filler music before the event, and even sometimes when idols were on stage, which was also strange.

It'd been a while since I attended one of these things, and I was looking forward to busting out some otagei. The venue was the Big Pink Pig, providing generous floor space. Unfortunately, everyone sat down and crowded up to the stage, which eliminated all chance of movement. Worse, they had otagei dancers on stage to back up the idols, so everyone just watched them instead of joining in. I was seriously bummed... On the bright side, some of the "otagei dancers" (trying to make this sound official cracks me up) were familiar faces from the now defunct Akihabara street culture. Roberta, one of the men who enjoyed wearing maid and goth-loli costumes, was among them.

Anyway, so we ended up just standing there and watching the show, but the MC was none other than Inagaki Saki, the female comedian who dresses up like Asuka from "Eva." My love for Asuka is known, and this girl is just damn cute to begin with, so I was happy. The other MC was Space Pirate Gorgeous, who was a colorful character to say the least. Inagaki and Gorgeous weren't the only comedians around. R Fujimoto (I think that was his name) did a freaking hilarious interpretation of Yamcha from "Dragon Ball Z."

The basic premise of the show was that idols in groups or solo would perform a song, then would be judged as true or fake idols. The true ones got an otagei dance in their honor. The fake ones got roughed up by a guy who appeared to be Raoh from "Fist of the North Star." The first time he appeared, he ripped a manga magazine - as thick as a phonebook - in half. Every time his theme, "Tough Boy," played, the girls knew they were in trouble. He basically just picked them up, flashed their underwear to the audience and dragged them off stage. Yeah, these events can get a little weird... Of course this was all staged; everyone knew who was going to lose and those girls wore swimsuits or bloomers under their skirts.

The losers actually were some of the best idols, I think. They were also mostly talents pretending to be idols as a joke, and playing the part of ugly, mean-spirited girls. Metropoli-chan V and Yamashita Wakana fit into this category. Number one idol of the night had to be Hikita Saya, who sang "Cruel Angel's Thesis," or tried to! The wrong version came up, she didn't know the intro and ended up doing it over. Holy cuteness. Juri Juri was a close second, and Adrian's first, because she is a "tokusatsu idol" and wore a retro costume that resembled Minmay's. Overall sexiness, though, had to be Hisanaga Ayana. She wore an Ayanami Rei schoolgirl uniform in ways I didn't think possible.

Overall the event is fun and worth checking out. The official blog is here. The girls apparently also appear on this site.