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Halloween in Japan

The best cosplayers from Day Two of the Ikebukuro Halloween Cosplay Festival

From costumes to makeup, hair, props, and poses, these cosplayers know how to bring characters to life. 

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Krispy Kreme Japan’s new “scary cute” Halloween donuts get us in the spooky spirit

Halloween has come to Krispy Kreme!

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Trick or treat! These Tsum Tsum Trick Box Truffles are sure to tickle your Halloween spirit

These delicious-looking, chocolate-covered truffles come in some seriously cute Halloween-themed Tsum Tsum wrappers.

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Japan’s biggest yakuza organization tweets to announce that Halloween is cancelled this year

Ah Halloween. After Christmas, it’s easily the best time of the year to be a kid. You get to dress up, scare people with your friends, and then best of all… go to your local organized crime branch to get a giant bag of candy.

Such has been the annual tradition on Halloween for children who visit the headquarters of the Japanese yakuza group Yamaguchi-gumi in Kobe. But this year, Halloween has had an “unfortunate accident” and been cancelled, meaning the mob will be handing out no candy.

Wait… what? Japanese mafia? Halloween candy? What do these things have in common? Read on to find out!

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Dragon Ball Z’s Piccolo and Frieza show their Halloween spirit, help bring the holiday to Japan

For most of the western world, October is a month of ghastly ghouls and Halloween hijinx. But in Japan, Halloween wasn’t really celebrated up until fairly recently, and even now trick-or-treating at random houses is still a pretty uncommon occurrence.

This year however, Halloween has exploded in popularity. Retailers have been getting ready for the big night several months in advance, and even Pepsi Japan has released a spooky new flavor to celebrate. The pagan festival has become so popular that even some of the characters from Dragon Ball Z are joining in on the fun.

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Wanted: 2,300 people to dance like the walking dead at Halloween zombie party village in Tokyo

Halloween just keeps getting bigger in Japan. While stores are full of all sorts of cute paraphernalia to mark the celebration and a number of Halloween activities are marked on the calendar, there’s one very special event that’s bigger and more unusual than any other in Tokyo. In fact, it’s so popular the organisers sold all 2,000 tickets in one evening and are now offering an extra three hundred tickets to those who get in quick by applying online.

It’s the Zombie Party Village, which comes alive once a year with thousands of walking dead—all of whom are free to dance to their unbeating heart’s content without being bothered by angry mobs and cross-bearing priests. If you’d like to be a part of the 2,300-strong zombie dance collective, read on to find out all the details after the break.

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Universal Studios Japan unlocks its haunted hotel rooms, has a special menu for Halloween

Japan has been gearing up for Halloween since the end of August, but now that we’re actually into the correct month, we feel it’s acceptable to start posting Halloween-related articles. Today we’re introducing the Halloween festivities going on at Universal Studies in Osaka, Japan.

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Japanese salarymen and OLs make company-wide music video of AKB48’s “Halloween Night” 【Video】

For the past two years AKB48 has asked fans and company staff to submit their own music videos to their newly released singles, and their latest track, “Halloween Night”, is no exception. While the song and official video are fairly typical AKB fare, the fan videos of it are really something to see.

And perhaps the best submitted music video so far belongs to the lovely employees at the Japanese internet advertising firm Cyber Agent. Men and women from every department shake and strut to the AKB Halloween beat, and watching it may cause you to suddenly want to work somewhere else.

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Since when was Halloween so popular in Japan?

Just like in many Western countries right now, in Japan ’tis the season to be spooky. Halls in Tokyo are decked with orange; cute pumpkins, witches and ghosts wink from shop windows; and you might even find a special seasonal pastry in your local bakery or supermarket.

Now firmly established in the annual Japanese calendar, not so long ago hardly anyone even knew that such a thing as Halloween existed. How could this day, which has become more like a month-long festival in Japan, go from zero to hero so quickly? What brought this on, and why is it so big in Japan? Japan’s Madame Riri looks at four different reasons.

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Confessions of Snow White in Tokyo on a Weekday

Earlier this week, we heard the confessions of a crossdressing man in Tokyo (the beauty in the middle of the above photo).  As it turns out, this one-night crossdresser works with our next costume-wearing confessor (and they all work at our Japanese sister site, Pouch).

Snow White, pictured above, was hesitant to walk the streets of Japan in costume on a weekday.  However, she swallowed her fear and spent the entire day as a Disney princess.  The following is her account of a day as Snow White in Tokyo on a weekday.

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