We're taking a break from our not-so-regularly-scheduled programing of kaiju schlock to bring you this periodical created by Asian man-children. Plucked from the cavernous Mandarake Shibuya comes a little magazine from 1985 called Mark 1. As soon as I saw the cover I fell in love with it. What's not to love? Just at the cover you got a costumed sentai hero, a forgettable bubbly pop idol, and a sidebar with videogames, Urusei Yatsura, a robot monkey, and rubber sushi. Unfortunately I couldn't find any info in English about Mark 1, so I have no idea how long it lasted, all I know is that this is Vol.2 and was published October, 1985.The content is a dream for old school anime fans and japanophiles. Mark 1 jumps between covering model kits, TV shows, movies, anime, toys, video games, and sentai/tokusatsu shows. There's even an interview with the legendary Shotaro Ishinomori, but I speak about as much Japanese as a house cat, so yeah... no translation for you. Please to enjoy part one of my scans from Mark 1.
The table of contents! Woo!
Ad for popular porn anime series, Cream Lemon. Sure it's cheap and tawdry, but a lot of great animators actually got their start peddling this smut.
Lets see, the Joyball looks like a rejected Nerf toy, and what the hell kinda name is "Family King" for a controller? Of course the ASCII controller looks top of the line, but do you really need top of the line controllers when it's just two buttons?
Generic manga mech pilot squad, GO!
WOOSH! Pyew pyew!
JESUS CHRIST! What the hell is with your feet? Do flipper babies make good mech pilots or is this some kinda moe thing?
I have no idea what these things are called, but for the hell of it, Imma call them Transforming Robo-Animal Fuckbuddies. Because they all look kinda phalic to me.
Get out of there, Japanese man in a circle. You're not supposed to be there. You're not even a Rumiko Takahashi character.
One of these doesn't belong. That's right, you wheel your ass out of there, Super Gaijin WHORE!
You with the microphone! If your outfit clashes anymore, you'll probably explode in a fountain of gore and shoulder pads.
Best episode of Fist of the North Star EVER.
If you don't know who the fella with the antennae is, then you cretins are reading the wrong Akira Toriyama manga.
DUDE! When you said you wanted one of my Zoids for a photo shoot, you never said anything about LIGHTING IT ON FIRE!
Do you have any idea how many garbage bags it took for me to make this Hakaider costume?That's it for part one. Part two coming when I damn well feel like it.
This is a great find. It's interesting seeing how legitimately innocent "moe" was in the 80s, and also how amateur a lot of the stuff was. Those figures all look pretty crude compared to modern ones, and some of the art is pretty awful, like the "flipper girl."
ReplyDeleteIt seems that the otaku scene was much more homegrown and less commercialized back then.
Hard to believe it wasn't so awash in pornography or pedophilia either. ...Oh wait. But I'm glad you like it. I'm trying to find more old magazines like this in the states, but it's a lot easier when you just go straight to the source in Japan.
ReplyDelete