The Shounen Club 18 December 2005 review

And we are finally at the final episode of 2005.

The episode begins differently than usual with each group singing a bit of a song then all of them singing together at the end. This of course is much more common for a start for the program later on, but for now I believe this is one of the first times they are doing it this way.

Because it is the episode airing closest to Christmas we have the holiday as the theme for the episode. All of NEWS is credited as being the producers for the episode, though I am sure that is more because the theme was mandated so it would not be fair to have someone have it be their episode to produce.

The Johnny's Christmas medley is the usual good mix of Juniors and NEWS, even though for the Juniors it does favor Ya-Ya-Yah mainly. I think it is safe to say that Yax3 were being promoted to be the Junior group to take over from KAT-TUN when they make their debut.

It always makes me pause a bit when I notice that a certain grouping is of Juniors that will debut like this. Of course looking at things J.J.Express is probably the group that had the best percentage of its member debut without having the group itself debut. Even though eventually the group is going to go through some roster changes that will probably change that.

The first MC has Yamashita Tomohisa reading a fan letter from a Inoo Kei and Ayukawa Taiyo fan who asks them about Christmas presents. It ends with a bit of an awkward hug between the two.

There is then a random Tegoshi Yuya solo. Like the other new songs for NEWS around this time it is a new song that of course never made it onto a CD. This song is titled YOU - world is yours- and I would have much rather have had it be on the bonus disc of the NEWS best album instead of his solo version of Ai Nante. Also it is nice to hear Tegoshi sing a slow tempo song without deciding that he needs to power vocal through it all and get all shouty.

We get the return of the Mister X wa Dare da!! but there are only NEWS members as the contestants for this one.

Again they go with showing the audience at NHK Hall who the person is without letting the audience watching the show see. While I do not personally care for this way of doing it I do have to commend them for at least being a bit creative about it. It also makes some sense to why they chose this way because the guest did need to change to get out of the Santa outfit.

I guess it was no surprise that Yamapi was the one to get it right, I honestly would have been disappointed if he got it wrong as his friendship with Ikuta Toma is rather well known. I was surprised to see Toma back on the program but I guess it shows that even though he did not debut he still maintained a good amount of popularity.

Toma then is a part of the follow up MC segment were Koyama Keiichiro reads a fan letter that requests for Toma to be a guest on the program.

Toma then gets to perform on the show by kicking off and being a big part of the second Christmas medley on the show for this episode.

For Junior ni Q we have Kato Shigeaki and Tegoshi Yuya hosting the segment. For Juniors featured that are still in the agency we have a couple. I was surprised to see Morita Myuto as I did not realize that he has been with the agency for so long. He makes Tegoshi really happy by saying that he is the senpai he looks up to.

We also get Nakajima Yuto, who is still all kinds of cute at this stage, especially of his "attack" on Shige and Tegoshi after something Shige says about Yuto being the choice of a Christmas present for one of his group mates.

NEWS gets an MC segment where they are each handed a phrase that they need to say to the camera. Of course you can expect them to be pretty embarrassing to the guys, which gives us some fun reactions. Not to mention Kusano Hironori messing up and saying the action he is supposed to do with the phrase.

I do not think anything beats Masuda Takahisa's reaction to having saying his by just walking off onto the stage.

We then get the one song from the recent group of new NEWS songs to make it onto a CD, Rainbow. I rather love how this performance has the guys waving their rainbow flags here. But joking aside coming to be a NEWS fan in 2007 I do not think I really got why it was so exciting for Rainbow to have been one of the B-sides to their single weeeek. After watching these SC episodes I feel I get it now because if it was up to me all the songs they have been singing on the program would have been on a CD already.

The next MC segment is focused on Question? as a fan from the U.S. (L.A.) wrote in and the guys are asked to talk about how they feel about having fans in a place like America and also about having their own lives (concerts).

Next performance is Toshin Yoshikazu & A.B.C. doing a Christmas medley of Shounentai songs. I did not realize that Shounentai had Christmas songs, let along enough to make a medley of. I wish the song libraries of the older groups were raided more as in these times that they are there are always at least a couple of gems that come from them.

The next MC segment has a postcard that gives a tongue twister using Yamapi's name that Yabu Kota and he have to try.

We then get a cover of the J-Friends' song CAN YOU FEEL THIS CHRISTMAS? by NEWS. For me you cannot go wrong with J-Friends so I have no complaints.

The final song is Silent Night, the Japanese version which is titled Kiyoshiko no Yoru, with NEWS and the Juniors, including Toma.


I will confess as much as I am enjoying seeing more NEWS I feel like I am ready for KAT-TUN to come back. If just because it would be a focus on another group. I think with this era of episodes it just shows that this format for hosting just does not work well in the long run unless you plan on switching out the hosting group on a regular basis.

Having Toma comeback though was great. He was always a lot of fun on the show and I was sad to see him slowly get removed from the program.

The Shounen Club 13 February 2005 review

On the final month of this season of Shounen Club, or at least the final month of new content as March only has one lone recap episode. I am hoping for some changes with the new season as things are feeling a bit stale on the program right now.

We get the standard introductions for groups at the start. Toshin Yoshikazu is alone this month as it looks like all of A.B.C. is missing. I can only assume they are busy with some other kind of work as it would be odd to have an entire group missing otherwise.

The theme for the episode is Try. KAT-TUN talk about it, with mainly Kamenashi Kazuya and Akanishi Jin doing the talking. Kame brings up that it is test time in schools while Jin brings up Valentine's day.

For the Try medley only KAT-TUN sings the songs with the rest of the Juniors only back dancing for them. There is really no excuse for this and even though they do cover some songs I love I cannot find myself enjoying the medley much as this seems to be a clear early sign that this is going to be a KAT-TUN heavy episode.

We get introduced to the guests of this episode, NEWS, and this time they have the full eight member roster present for a change.

Koyama Keiichiro and Yamashita Tomohisa are taken to the side of the stage by Kame for a chat. Koyama of course naturally dominates the conversation but Yamapi is able to get in and talk a bit before the stage is ready for them to do their performance of the episode.

NEWS performs one of their album tracks, Say Hello, which is a fun jazzy number. Watching these older performances it is rather interesting to see that the members that have left the group have tended to be the ones that got the most spotlight during these early years.

There is a letter reading segment between Taguchi Junnosuke and Inoo Kei. It is another fun one with Junno being mainly sweet and Inoo's letter having a couple of moments that trolls Junno, who has some great reactions to those.

Ya-Ya-Yah get to sing their song Singin' For You. And if I have noticed anything they tend to switch off with J.J.Express with performances for episodes, so I expect not to see much of them for the second episode of the month because of this.

The VTR segment gives us the return of Ikuta Toma as he supports Inoo as he interviews Imai Tsubasa. Tsubasa definitely has a lot to talk about with being in Endless Shock, having his first solo concert as well as being in the drama Haru to Natsu.

We get to see some clips from Haru to Natsu which looks to be a drama I would love to see as it also has Nakama Yukie as well as the recently departed Mori Mitsuko.

KAT-TUN perform a very un-KAT-TUN-ish song, Oh-E-Oh! Taiyou no Salsa! I honestly think of Tackey & Tsubasa or early NEWS for this type of song, so it seems off that it has been given to KAT-TUN. Worst of all it ends up bring rather boring aside of the Junno-Koki dance battle in the middle of the song.

We are introduced to another set of guests for this episode, Sankyodai, which is made up of Kanjani8 members, Yokoyama Yu, Shibutani Subaru and Yasuda Shota. They get to do an ~ o abake segment, but they are set up for a prank from the start with Uchi Hiroki and Nishikido Ryo being brought on stage after they put the eye masks on. Of course there are plenty of fun moments to this, one being Yasu falling off of his chair for no apparent reason. This is definitely a big highlight to the entire episode.

As they ready the stage for the next performance Jimmy Mackey talks to the members of Question? I am rather surprised to see Question? put up and center like this as FiVe was always stuck in the back and barely recognized in comparison. It is a pity that Q? really could not capitalize on this as much as the other Junior groups and push their way to a debut.

Sankyodai perform the song Mikan, which is Subaru on main vocals, Yasu playing the guitar and backing vocals and Yoko gets to speak some lines in the middle of the song. Or they are playing to each of their own strengths.

Inoo Kei gets to read a letter all about doing your best. I rather like these as they give the younger Juniors a way to stand out a bit.

KAT-TUN then perform the song FEEL YOUR BREEZE which is a cover of a V6 song that was the theme song for Gokusen. It is actually rather fitting as this is the time period where Kame and Jin are in Gokusen 2 the sequel to the popular drama.

For the ending the guys get to play around a bit but still overall it is a snorefest. If anything I am glad that soon I will not have to listen to this song anymore.


With NEWS showing up more and more I hope we are moving closer to when Koyama and Nakamaru Yuichi become hosts of the program. Partly because it was that era of SC that I began watching the program and I am eager to revisit it. That and I know by then KAT-TUN will have debuted and I will no longer have to see one group dominate the show so much until the current SC era begins.

Thinking about changes to the show with the start of new seasons I am gathering hope that we see some of that with the current program. I may love Hey! Say! JUMP but I do not care to see them all over SC and since we have a group like Bakaleya6 that is proving to be a hit perhaps we can see HSJ with a reduced role to make room for them and other Juniors that are rising in popularity. I guess we shall see in April 2013 if this will come to be or not.

The Shounen Club 21 November 2004 review

Cannot believe I am already hitting the end of the 2004 episodes. 2005 should be rather interesting as there are more changes to come for certain Junior groups and KAT-TUN should be gearing up for debut as they only have a little over a year before then.

The theme of the episode is Omoi, which is a tricky word to translate into English as there is no true equivalent unless you are using it in a sentence. But the best would be thoughts & feelings for an idea of what it should be. Like the last episode it is just KAT-TUN talking about the theme with the other Juniors just standing around on stage.

Surprisingly enough KAT-TUN is not all over the medley for the theme. Instead the other Juniors make up the main parts of the medley. And I have to admit that I felt happy seeing that the members of J.J.Express and Kis-My-Ft. that go on to debut ended up being paired up together for the song they sung together.

After that medley we have Yabu Kota leading a group of Fresh Juniors in covering V6's Can Do!, Can Go! And while Takaki Yuya is in this group (stuck behind Yabu for a good portion of the song) there is another familiar Junior that I was happy to see. Sanada Yuma makes his Shounen Club debut this episode, or at his debut as a Junior with a mic and getting his name on the screen.

Another thing to not is that part way through the song Nikaido Takashi and Senga Kento come out to join Yabu being the main singers of the song. I guess this confirms those two as the leads for A.B.C. Jr. In any case it is nice to see at least a couple members of that group do more than just back dance.

The game segment for this episode is the return of Attate Pon! and it is thankfully KAT-TUN lite at least.

This time it is Ueda Tatsuya to have something about him to guess, which was what he made to learn since he was a child.

Jimmy Mackey gets to do the Shounen Club Box VTR segment and he visits old familiar faces, Ikuta Toma and Kazama Shunsuke. The two are a part of the cast for the WEST SIDE STORY production that starred Arashi's Satoshi Ohno, Sakurai Sho and Matsumoto Jun. Yamashita Shoon was also part of the cast, which probably goes to explain his absences from the program.

When we go back to the live filmed part of the show it is for KAT-TUN to perform a song. The song is called MESSENGER and I can only assume it is yet another one of their original songs that have been abandoned post-debut. Something I can understand why because there is nothing all that outstanding about it except for the guys showing off their ero-dance moves.

We get a letter reading corner between Totsuka Shota and Tanaka Koki. It always amuses me how embarrassed Koki gets when others praise him for his kindness. He truly is the biggest softie in KAT-TUN no matter how he tries to present himself.

I was happy to see Toshin Yoshikazu & A.B.C. get some good screen time with having more than one performance on the show. They got to perform the Japanese versions of Dancing Queen and I Can't My Eyes Off of You, both songs that from time to time come back for Juniors to perform.

Imai Tsubasa performed another one of his solo songs, Serenade. When I saw his mic I could not help but wonder if Sexy Zone will get ones just like it sometime in the future.

Kamenashi Kazuya gets to sit and talk about the theme of the show. Of course this segment has frequent screams from the audience in it.

KAT-TUN then sing Hoshikuzu no Spangle, and I always enjoy seeing this song performed. Though whoever was in charge of the dry ice, or whatever they use for the smoke, seemed to have gotten a bit carried away.

The ending song is the same of the usual. The back dancers (A.B.C. and Kis-My-Ft.) get some camera time at least. And while I have no idea what Totsu was trying to do here I have the feeling this was not the planned outcome.


It really frustrates me that some of the non-KAT-TUN portions of this episode could not have been mixed in with the previous one. This is a much more balanced show when it comes to showing all of the Juniors and while I am very glad to have it after such a KAT-TUN centric one I cannot help but think that they should have had more of this balance in the first episode of the month.

Of course with KAT-TUN's debut coming nearer I cannot hope that perhaps they may be too busy to do so much on SC in 2005 to keep being such a large part of the show.