"THE NEWSREADER: UNDER THE SPOTLIGHT THERE'S NOWHERE TO HIDE" (2022, Australia) ＃１

Viernes, 13 de marzo de 2026: 

 At night, I watched the following drama in my Japanese-style room.

 Recorded on a USB-HDD (registration number 3) connected to a DIGA (2017 model). Aired on BS12 on October 7, 2022, at 9:00 PM.

 Friday's Killer Street "THE NEWSREADER: UNDER THE SPOTLIGHT THERE'S NOWHERE TO HIDE" (2022, Australia. 6 episodes total. Original language: English. Japanese subtitles). Episode 1.

 Interesting.

 I was amazed that they were using teleprompters in 1986. They trained with incredible attention to detail.

 (This might give away my age, but...) Japanese news anchors at the time were all rigid and expressionless, reading their scripts mindlessly. 

 Even now, Japanese male news anchors haven't changed much. Their everyday lives and behavior are directly reflected on the television screen. They can only read their scripts monotonously, with a cyborg-like, expressionless face, just like in their everyday behavior.

 In recent years, in Japan, too, news anchors standing while speaking has become mainstream, mimicking Western news programs. Japanese television stations, when someone starts doing something, quickly exhibit a totalitarian, conditioned reflex temperament of "follow the crowd," and every news program on every station, including NHK, starts doing the same thing. 

 It's so typically Japanese.

 But, this is merely a case of replacing the Great Buddha with a standing mannequin.

 Due to such special circumstances, in Japan, idol-like girls fresh out of prestigious women's universities are popular as news anchors (Joshi-Ana). These women are not professional journalists; they completely lack the experience, skills, sense of mission, spirit, and rebelliousness of a journalist.

 However, their idol-like talent allows them to attract high viewership ratings.

 In recent years, female idols, actresses, and comedians have even been featured as news commentators. Just the other day, a young woman, around 22 years old who recently graduated from AKB48, was a "guest commentator" on a late-night news program on a commercial TV station (I find myself watching it too...).

 Until recently, Shimada Shinsuke (stand-up comedian) hosted a Sunday morning news program (before his downfall due to his ties to the Yakuza), but more recently, Beat Takeshi (stand-up comedian) has been a regular commentator on a late-night news program on a commercial broadcasting.

 In Japan, the line between daytime "wide-shows" aimed at housewives, the elderly, and middle-aged NEETs and (serious？) news programs has almost completely disappeared.