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  • Some women danced on their feet, some women sat in chairs tied to the ceiling

  • There were women on bikes

  • Buggies

  • Tank

  • Oh, and a neon giant plane

  • Whilst some were paraded through the air like some sort of futuristic dystopian female cult

  • Which...I quite want to join

  • Robot Restaurant opened in mid-2012 in Shinjuku, Tokyo

  • after someone spent 125 million dollars

  • building the venue, constructing the robots

  • and hiring the female population of a small city

  • to come perform everyday, 3 times!

  • After reading about how unusual this place was, and being something of a robotic fanatic myself

  • a friend and I decided to check it out on our recent trip to Tokyo

  • and....well...it was pretty interesting

  • The thing kicked off fairly normally, well to some degree, with the female cult as I said, parading around their tattooed leader

  • Shouting loudly and advocating...Soy Milk?

  • Or...just Soya in general..something to do with Soya

  • And after a change of clothes we had a fairly normal performance which my friend particularly enjoyed

  • Alright, so did I

  • And then it all started to turn rather weird

  • A giant robot called King Robota

  • was wheeled out to the Dance Floor

  • Brought to life by the son of Father Christmas

  • Before it started stumbling around and shouting inaudible words

  • we were disappointed or in my case relieved to know

  • to that there is actually someone in the robot

  • There is someone in the 8 foot costume

  • Although half the costume is technically a robot, with the hands and face that do their own thing

  • I'm genuinely scared, what is that??

  • It was a rather terrifying insight into a future of giant dancing robots singing

  • to remixes of We Will Rock You and of course dancing to Gangnam Style

  • I wasn't the only one uncomfortable being in the presence of this giant robot

  • There were quite a lot of other "robots" dancing in Power Rangers-style costumes

  • As well as members of the Albert Einstein fan club

  • and they all seemed hesitant to share the dance floor

  • with the eight-foot tall

  • half man, half robot, half fucking nightmare

  • robot swinging arms thing

  • Or perhaps they were afraid of the crazy man sitting on our left

  • who was on a high dosage of fizzy soft drinks and women

  • and he must have been the only person in that room to have succeeded in touching every women

  • In massive contrast to the overly excited guy on our left

  • on our right we had Tokyo's most thoroughly unenthusiastic man

  • I couldn't for the life of me establish whether he was genuinely unimpressed

  • or just overwhelmingly sexually frustrated

  • Things then died down

  • Except they didn't

  • Because then a fleet of women on giant animatronic robots

  • made their way into the room

  • and started to surround us

  • before poking the giant robot thing

  • in the face which she didn't seem to like very much because she starting doing this

  • My friend even got to sit on one

  • pull a stupid pose on it

  • before driving it backwards and forwards across the room with a cheeky smile

  • And it was at that moment that things started to die down

  • Except they didn't

  • Because just then, a motorbike burst into the room

  • The room turned into a giant merry-go-round

  • with women hanging from the ceiling

  • Then what happened...? Oh yeah!

  • There was a woman riding around on an ostrich

  • A woman being assaulted, cuddled, fondled

  • by a giant rabbit

  • And then... some sort of buggy with half a dozen women just burst into the room

  • And my friend got overwhelmed by it all

  • But then things got really mental

  • because right then in a scene reminiscent from the world's greatest weapon demonstration

  • A giant plane flew into the room

  • and...and a neon Tank drenched with women drove through the room

  • crashing into the plane twice

  • I almost spilled my sanity all over the floor

  • What the fucking hell is going on??

  • It's during this part of the performance

  • that you'll start to wonder why tanks aren't build in neon and covered in bikini wearing women

  • No self-respected enemy soldier would open fire on them

  • They'd be too busy filming it let's face it

  • It was then that the plane and the tank turned around, disappearing off stage

  • with a wave and the cries of goodbyes

  • the performance ended

  • and we emerged from the place wondering what the hell had just happened

  • Even though...whatever I saw...was bloody brilliant

  • They say the best things in life are free

  • They're not, they cost 4000 yens and they come with a bento box dinner

  • Not that you'll be thinking about the food

  • And after all you'll probably have to only do it once

  • although let it be said there are definitely some who make it a weekly pilgrimage

  • The show may not have had all the robots I'd hope for

  • But one things for sure

  • you'll certainly have a hard time finding

  • a cabaret performance as interesting, dramatic, ridiculous as the one at Robot Restaurant

Some women danced on their feet, some women sat in chairs tied to the ceiling

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