Orbi: a New Multi-Media Theme Park

OK, I wouldn't call it a theme "park." It's really more of a theme theater, but that sounds odd; and Orbi in Yokohama is hard to describe.

It's equal parts movie theater, museum exhibition, and theme park.

BBC and SEGA have teamed up to create a space full of innovative, high definition video displays that showcase the magnificence of the natural world, the animals in particular.

What you have is a large, indoor area with a main cinema and nine surrounding exhibits. The main cinema is a semi-circular, curved panoramic screen where you watch a 30 minute montage of environments. It's visually stunning. Anyone should enjoy the outstanding nature shots, and small kids will be captivated by the animals. This time it was the four seasons of the arctic. The show was supposed to include aromas and while the entire theater had an odd, musky smell to it I couldn't make out any distinctive odors in the course of it. As far as I could make tell, it was just a high-def panoramic documentary which isn't to say it wasn't excellent. But they're promising perhaps more than they can deliver.

Why go?
This exhibition draws on the BBC's vast wealth of wildlife media and with SEGA's multi-media excellence, they present it so well that it transcends conventional natural history museums to stand as fine art. Honestly, the way the animals and environments were presented was nothing short of art. While the photos themselves were gorgeous, the presentations were themselves beautiful.

This is well-balanced for all ages. Toddlers and infants will be just as engaged as teens and adults, which is quite an achievement. It's a great place to take visitors. It was clear to see that this is also a first-rate date spot; I saw a good deal of hand-holding and shoulder-rubbing in the crowds.

It should be as interesting to environmental enthusiasts as to people who don't know a newt from a skink.

The ambiance is outstanding. We all agreed, when we get super-rich we want this to be our living room.

My favorite "room" was a presentation of jellyfish at various depths. I may despise jellies more than anything else in the sea, but some of these were dazzling! And anything less than HD just wouldn't work for these. I went through it several times. They tried to give the illusion of featured jellies suspended in mid-air by projecting them onto vapor cascades (you know, like in the Pirates of the Caribbean ride), but it didn't really work. But it didn't detract from the overall exhibition. Ultimately, it tries to impress on you how far down the lowest point in the ocean is, but it was the jellyfish that we all remembered.

We all loved the "cold room" where you can experience -20C degree blasts of arctic-cold winds. You don't hesitate to pack into a tight huddle with complete strangers as your survival instinct kicks in.

The weakest exhibit may have been the Animalpedia where you stand before a towering video wall and use hand gestures to select among silhouettes of animals and get pop-up displays of basic information about them. But the information was fairly bland; nothing we don't see on the internet all the time. And the controls were frustratingly difficult. So what it's essentially the novelty of a giant screen and an iterative system that while cool-looking will simply frustrate anyone who has grown up using mouses and touch screens.

There's a room that features the colors of nature and surrounds you with brilliant wildlife photos that match the color of whatever you place under a camera in the center of the room. If you love wildlife photography, you'll probably spend a good deal of time in this one.

Next to that there's a dark and winding corridor that features insects. I skipped through pretty hastily, expecting more of a haunted-house with simulated bee and spider attacks. In fact, it's just sights, sounds, and an occasional air jet. Mostly harmless.I may have been a little jumpy because we'd just come from the Komodo Dragon room where, after watching a short documentary on why Komodo Dragons should scare the hell outta us, they put us in total darkness and simulate a throng of Dragons stalking all about us, with synchronized audio, air jets in our seats, and a rumbling base.. Fun and interesting, great for a tepid date, but not for easily frightened children.

Another exhibition sought to put us in the midst of a wildebeest heard and give us a real understanding of what 1,300,000 of them really looked like. I'm grateful they didn't try and simulate smells on this one.

Finally a flying video takes you on a breathtaking 40,000 km landscape tour. If you're in the center of the theater, it's very realistic. If not, you'll have to try and ignore alot of concave distortion.

Why not go to Orbi? The reasons are few and slim:

I felt 2,600 yen / person (half price for minors) was a bit steep. But my wife contends that we spent over three hours in there and as theme parks go, the price was reasonable.

While the staff are eager to speak English and the most critical words are co-presented in English, the entire presentation is limited to Japanese. But it's largely visual and you need not understand a word of Japanese to understand most of it. English language brochures are also available. But this is Japan and English just isn't as globally important as it used to be.

And although they do regulate the crowds inside keep the numbers within limits, we still had to wait 20-45 minutes for most of the attractions. But the lines were close enough to the "base camp" that the little ones could run and play until their group's turn had come. The Base Camp isn't quite a playground, but it is a good space for little ones to run around and burn off steam.

Know this:
Small kids should absolutely avoid room C, the Komodo dragon room. It's not just scary, but the documetary is shocking and gory. It should be rated PG.
Wear good walking shoes because you're going to be doing alot of standing.
Drinks aren't allowed, and not provided, so be sure to smuggle in a bottle of water and maybe some snacks.
Also be aware that once you exit, there's no re-entry.
There's also a large gift shop at the end that carries quite a large array of natural history merch, mostof it direct from England. Alot of this stuff I've never seen in Japan, so this can be a great opportunity to buy novel gifts.

Verdict
A fun, informative afternoon for any kind of group or person. You won't be sorry. And after you're done, you'll be in Minatomirai which is one of the most awesome urban destinations in Japan, and a short walk from Chinatown, Yokohama station, and Kanae.

On a rainy Sunday afternoon, we had to wait about 45 min to get tickets, and another hour after that to get in.

"Base Camp" is a lounge area with animals and environments protected onto shapes. It makes for a striking rest area.

Various animals are projected onto this giant cushion, including this lizard, a polar bear, an killer whale and a caterpillar.

This logo is everywhere

A good idea of the space and the crowds within.

And a brochure is worth another thousand words:

Review: Saturday Night Live: Third Season DVD

Running Time: approximately 1 hour, ten minutes per weekly episode
Perceived Running Time: 40 minutes (depending on the episode)

Replay-ability: high
Estimated Durability: 4 generations+
Audience: Wide. Fifth grade and up (some mildly dirty jokes).

Why:
This is one of the best and most entertaining time-windows into the late 70's you'll ever find. It features some of the funniest, most talented performers, at their height, hungry, raw and energetic. This is about the time when they'd polished off the rougher edges, but before the show became tiresome formulaic. Watching each episode in it's entirety is important as each one had an overall rhythm and flow like a good music album or symphony. My 6th grader has found a cornucopia of inspiration from this trove of forgotten excellence in performance and modern vaudeville. I predict that the material herein will remain fresh and highly entertaining long-after my generation is dead and gone. The Charles Grodin episode alone was hysterical from beginning to end, in a weirdly post-modern way. My son's watched that single week several times over.

Without the commercials, the episodes fly by. They can also be enjoyed in chapters if you need a some quick entertainment.

This is also a great time capsule of Americana, reflecting the mind and matters of the late 70's. If you want to get a cultural feel for that time, or share it with someone else, this is better than any history book. While it does mock timely events and make timely references, it does not rely on them to the point of alienating subsequent generations; about as much as classic Loony Tunes or Monty Python.

In addition to the comedy, it also features some very candid performances by famous musicians, also in their early prime.

Why not:
The jokes do get a little dirty here and there; it is a late-night product of the swinger culture of NYC. It would be considered racy even by today's broadcast standards. It periodically makes references to people and events that are long-forgotten, even by those of us who were active in those days. The most intolerant youth might call it dated, and the pacing is of course slower than modern comedy. The skits that do rely too heavily on the forgotten are easily skipped.

Further, the quality is not strictly consistent. Some "weeks" are funnier/better than others. Some skits soar while some bomb. But even the weakest weeks are quite entertaining. But this is the result of it's organic nature. As it grew in consistency in the 80's, it lost genius.

If you like That 70's Show, you're going to LOVE this. It's the real deal.

Kudos:
Raw, hungry, fresh, energetic talent.

Demerits:
Occasional out-dated references.
A blu-ray edition would be appreciated with more special features, bookmarks and the ability to play only the musical segments.

Notes:
You might be given to buy one of the "Best Of" volumes, but you'd be cheating yourself. Again, each week had a flow. At the risk of comparing SNL with immortal classics, it would be like attending a Best Of Shakespeare. It would be like only watching the highlights of a sporting event. Too much of the overall experience is lost. Several youth I know never "got" the classic SNL until they sat down and watched complete episodes.

Verdict: Don't bore younger people with your old-people stories of how great the 70's used to be. Show them some of this and then just answer their questions.

Lock Up: Horror-Themed Restaurant

Of all the "theme" restaurants we've been to, Lock Up in Shibuya is by far the most memorable.

While most Japanese theme-bars/ clubs/ restaurants run high on concept but lack follow-through in either the food or the theme, I'm happy to report that this place is the exception. I'll get to the food, later. First, the atmosphere, which is the whole reason for going.

 I'd heard that some of the Lock Ups like the one in Ikebukuro were rather weak, but that the Shibuya one was better. I'll verify the others in the future. It took some time and effort to find it, wandering around Shibuya, following a map devoid of any useful landmarks or orientation points; it basically indicated that the place was in the basement of a building somewhere among a bunch of buildings. Not helpful. But once we'd located it (beneath the best Village Vanguard we've seen so far), we made our way carefully down a stairwell lined with cheesy cave-type texturing and adorned with mildly scary thins. But by the time we reached the bottom, we were all genuinely reluctant to even open the door (the duty fell on me, of course).

From here I'll have to be a bit vague to avoid spoilers, something I've never had to worry about before with restaurant reviews.

Beyond the entrance we were treated to a fairly good little haunted house that had a few things that effectively put us on edge. Then we waited briefly to be seated in a very weird hall.

The staff shackled me and led us to our "cell." It was all very Count of Monte Cristo down in the dungeons. The layout was surreal and disorienting, and the decor was as good as any professional haunted house I've been through Stateside. Cut-stone-esque walls; wrought-iron bars and cages; paranoid little nooks and crannies; and a good mix of funk and old-school heavy metal echoing through the background. The best part is a periodic event - but that's all I dare say (spoilers). Furthermore, I wasn't asked to leave for repeatedly messing with the other patrons, poking my head through holes, yelling for help, frightening fellow diners.

They did a good job on the interior, but the food? Not bad. Quality-wise, on a par with the average chain-izakaya. The portions are small, but they get bonus points for presentation. About a quarter of the drinks and dishes are given the horror-treatment. Cyclopean spaghetti, eyeballs in beakers, mad scientist test-tube cocktails, rising-from-the-grave-zombie fingers, and such. With set-menus and cocktails we averaged about 3,500 yen per person. A la carte runs higher and takes longer, of course.

This is a great place to take a date, a family, visitors, or a party. You go here to have a scare, a few laughs, some photo ops, and food and libations. Kids are welcome, but any kids younger than about eight would probably be too scared to have a good time; they really make an effort to scare the hell outta you. My eleven year old loved it. There's nothing particularly grotesque or perverse, but the atmos-fear-factor is pretty high.

Best way to find it is to follow the map, head out past the 109 bldg. toward Tokyu Hands, and home-in on Village Vanguard. From there, descend. If you go, please leave a post here and let me know what you thought.

The Lock Up