Over the years the mascot industry in Japan has swelled considerably. An uncountable number of people in big-headed costumes currently represent the nation’s prefectures, cities, government offices and private companies. Then on top of all that we have independent mascots running around too like Funasshi and Teruhiko.

However, the editors at RocketNews24 feel they have come up with something that will bring the entire mascot world down to its knees. His name is Hard Ku**mon and he is prepared to do something that no other mascot has done before: actual labor.

■ Loose Characters

Mascots in Japan go by the name of yuru-kyara which translates to “loose character.” This is probably more a reference to the typically puffy costumes they wear but might also be connected to the work itself.

Being a mascot basically entails wearing a furry costume and stumbling around while waving to strangers. That’s pretty much what I do on a Saturday night anyway except for the licensing deal.

Even our own Mr. Sato has entered the fray as Satosshi, in an effort to make some easy money. During his time in the murky depths of low-ranking yuru-kyara culture he came across another up-and-coming mascot by the name of Hard Ku**mon.

■ Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger

Hard Ku**mon represents an important evolution in yuru-kyara. Shedding the over-sized fluffy suits and enormous heads he is a streamlined, aerodynamic mascot designed with performance in mind.

Of course he still maintains the yuru-kyara’s signature cuteness atop his head. But that is kept safely out of the way to ensure work gets done.

Unlike any other mascot, he cooks and cleans.

He can also assist people with desk work by providing back rubs while pointing out typos and poor sentence structures.

Indeed Hard Ku**mon has all the functionality of a regular person, making him head and shoulders above a regular yuru-kyara in terms of productivity.

■ Whipping RocketNews24 into shape

One day as Mr. Sato was coming off a shift as Satosshi and into his regular reporter gig, he noticed that his fellow reporter Wasai was dogging it a bit. He felt this was a time to bring in Hard Ku**mon to show him how to work more efficiently.

As we just saw in the video, Hard Ku**mon is first and foremost a mascot, so before showing Wasai how to work his butt off, he was sure to give him gentle caresses with his latex fingers so that Wasai could feel relaxed.

■ Hard Ku**mon’s mission

By now you might be thinking that Hard Ku**mon is a blatant rip-off of Kumamoto Prefecture’s famous mascot Kumamon. It’s hard to argue with that even though Hard Ku**mon can ride a bike way better than Kumamon.

So, Hard Ku**mon will travel to Kumamoto to request his authorization as an official yuru-kyara. If successful, his status in the yuru-kyara world will rise considerably and we will finally be able to remove those annoying asterisks from his name.

Will he succeed? Or will he get run out of town and placed on a sex-offenders’ registry? We will just have to wait and see. In the meantime, you can show your support for Hard Ku**mon on his Facebook page where currently, he has three likes.

Wait a minute… make that four!

 

Original report by Nakano
Photos and Video: RocketNews24 unless otherwise stated
Dancing Video: YouTube – Kyodo News
Kumamon video: YouTube – Yamaguchi Kazutoshi