''Hey! Spring of Trivia'' is the name given by

Spike TV Paramount Network is an American basic cable television channel owned by the MTV Entertainment Group unit of Paramount Media Networks. The network's headquarters are located at the Paramount Pictures studio lot in Los Angeles. The channel was o ...

to the show , a

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

ese

comedy Comedy is a genre of fiction that consists of discourses or works intended to be humorous or amusing by inducing laughter, especially in theatre, film, stand-up comedy, television, radio, books, or any other entertainment medium. The term o ...

game show A game show is a genre of broadcast viewing entertainment (radio, television, internet, stage or other) where contestants compete for a reward. These programs can either be participatory or Let's Play, demonstrative and are typically directed b ...

Fuji TV JOCX-DTV (channel 8), branded as and colloquially known as CX, is a Japanese television station based in Odaiba, Minato, Tokyo, Japan. Owned and operated by the it is the key station of the Fuji News Network (FNN) and the Fuji Network Sys ...

Concept

''Trivia'' consists of a series of video segments that introduce and confirm the validity of unusual trivia. Past trivia has included exploding

eraser An eraser (also known as a rubber in some Commonwealth countries, including South Africa from the material first used) is an article of stationery that is used for removing marks from paper or skin (e.g. parchment or vellum). Erasers have a ...

spider Spiders ( order Araneae) are air-breathing arthropods that have eight legs, chelicerae with fangs generally able to inject venom, and spinnerets that extrude silk. They are the largest order of arachnids and rank seventh in total species ...

s affected by

caffeine Caffeine is a central nervous system (CNS) stimulant of the methylxanthine class. It is mainly used recreationally as a cognitive enhancer, increasing alertness and attentional performance. Caffeine acts by blocking binding of adenosine t ...

, and

insect Insects (from Latin ') are pancrustacean hexapod invertebrates of the class Insecta. They are the largest group within the arthropod phylum. Insects have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body ( head, thorax and abdomen), three pairs ...

s that cannot be killed. Most of the

trivia Trivia is information and data that are considered to be of little value. It can be contrasted with general knowledge and common sense. Latin Etymology The ancient Romans used the word ''triviae'' to describe where one road split or forked ...

on the show is sent in by viewers. A

celebrity Celebrity is a condition of fame and broad public recognition of a person or group as a result of the attention given to them by mass media. An individual may attain a celebrity status from having great wealth, their participation in sports ...

panel of five judges (ten in special episodes) evaluate each video segment and votes on how interesting it is by pushing a every time they are astonished. ( is the Japanese

interjection An interjection is a word or expression that occurs as an utterance on its own and expresses a spontaneous feeling or reaction. It is a diverse category, encompassing many different parts of speech, such as exclamations ''(ouch!'', ''wow!''), curse ...

for expressing genuine surprise, equivalent to a mix of the English

s "Really?" and "Wow!".) The total of all "Hey"s collected during the presentation of the trivia (maximum of 20 per judge) is then used as the indicator for the degree of surprise of this trivia. For every "Hey" a piece of trivia gets, the trivia submitter receives 100

yen The is the official currency of Japan. It is the third-most traded currency in the foreign exchange market, after the United States dollar (US$) and the euro. It is also widely used as a third reserve currency after the US dollar and the e ...

. Should it receive a perfect score of 100 Heys (200 in special episodes), the trivia submitter receives 100,000 yen (200,000 in special episodes). To date no piece of trivia has received 100 Heys. At some point in the show, there is a segment called . Viewers submit hypothetical questions intended to produce answers in the form of new trivia; "Trivia" then "go sto great lengths to answer them."

Tamori , known by his stage name (an anagram of his surname), is a Japanese television celebrity. Known for his trademark dark sunglasses, Tamori is one of the "big three" television comedians in Japan along with Takeshi Kitano (a.k.a. Beat Takeshi ...

(referred to as "Chairman Tamori" in the English dubbed version) evaluates the Seed of Trivia by pulling a lever. The Seed of Trivia's grade is shown as a flower. is the highest of grades. Past examples of "Seed of Trivia" segments have included the fastest Japanese

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding tea ...

mascot A mascot is any human, animal, or object thought to bring luck, or anything used to represent a group with a common public identity, such as a school, professional sports team, society, military unit, or brand name. Mascots are also used as fi ...

s, the brand of

ramen is a Japanese dish, Japanese noodle dish. It consists of served in a broth; common flavors are soy sauce and miso, with typical toppings including , nori (dried seaweed), menma (bamboo shoots), and scallions. Ramen has its roots in Chinese ...

containing the greatest net

noodle Noodles are a type of food made from unleavened dough which is either rolled flat and cut, stretched, or extruded, into long strips or strings. Noodles are a staple food in many cultures (for example, Chinese noodles, Filipino noodles, Indo ...

length per package, and which form of

barbecue Barbecue or barbeque (informally BBQ in the UK, US, and Canada, barbie in Australia and braai in South Africa) is a term used with significant regional and national variations to describe various cooking methods that use live fire and smoke t ...

lions prefer most. As of 2005, there is a new segment called . This is where they take a trivia sent in by a viewer that turned out to be false and sink it in a sort of bog. Additionally, they say, "If you use this trivia, you might be called," and then they always show a cute girl (

Tamaki Ogawa Tamaki may refer to: New Zealand *Tāmaki, a suburb of Auckland to the west of the Tamaki River *Tāmaki (New Zealand electorate), in Auckland *East Tāmaki, a suburb of Auckland to the east of the Tamaki River * Tamaki River, in Auckland *Tamaki S ...

) doing some date-like activity and saying, at the end of the segment. At the end of the show, host

Norito Yashima is a Japanese actor, TV personality, narrator, voice actor and presenter. He is currently employed by ComeCome Miniki-Na Theater Company and SIS company. He landed his first hosting job on the Fuji TV series '' Hey! Spring of Trivia'', a show he co ...

gives out , a brain shaped trophy that has a

melon bread A (also known as melon pan, melon bun or melon bread) is a type of sweet bun originating from and popular in Japan, as well as in Taiwan and China. They are made from an enriched dough covered in a thin layer of crisp cookie dough. Their appear ...

inside that is in the shape of a brain, to the sender of the highest rated trivia. Co-host

Katsumi Takahashi is a common Japanese given name used by either sex. Possible writings Katsumi can be written using different kanji characters and can mean: ;as a given name *克己, "overcome, self/oneself" *克巳, "overcome, sixth earthly branch" *克美, "ov ...

gives out – a smaller version of The Golden Brain with the same shape but with no melon bread inside – to the sender of his favorite trivia (announced as "MFT - My Favorite Trivia"). In 2005, small color-appropriate banners were added to the awards, and in 2006, the awards began featuring a small analog clock.

History

''Trivia'' has been running in Japan since October 7, 2002, first as a low-budget program after midnight (with initially much more obscene and sexual trivia than afterwards). Its increasing cult status (the show obtained viewership ratings just above 5%) made Fuji TV shift the broadcast time to

prime time Prime time or the peak time is the block of broadcast programming taking place during the middle of the evening for a television show. It is mostly targeted towards adults (and sometimes families). It is used by the major television networks to ...

July 2, 2003. On November 4, 2004 Fuji TV announced that twenty six episodes of ''Trivia'' would be adapted for broadcast in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

on the

cable Cable may refer to: Mechanical * Nautical cable, an assembly of three or more ropes woven against the weave of the ropes, rendering it virtually waterproof * Wire rope, a type of rope that consists of several strands of metal wire laid into a hel ...

network Spike TV (now

Paramount Network Paramount Network is an American basic cable television channel owned by the MTV Entertainment Group unit of Paramount Media Networks. The network's headquarters are located at the Paramount Pictures studio lot in Los Angeles. The channel was or ...

). The network began airing the slightly edited English dubbed version of the show on November 11, with the broadcast ending in May 2005. The editing included the removal of certain culturally specific trivia pieces such as those referring to Japanese history and actors. The shorter run time was made up for by adding trivia pieces from other episodes. Unlike Spike TV's other Japanese show '' MXC'', the English dialogue was mostly based on the original Japanese utterances and texts, although it was often exaggerated in a comical manner. Spike had planned to produce an American version of the show premiering in Spring 2005, but that version never materialized and the network decided against ordering more episodes of the English dub.

References

External links

* {{Spike (TV network) programming Spike (TV network) original programming Trivia 2002 Japanese television series debuts 2006 Japanese television series endings Japanese comedy television series Japanese game shows Fuji TV original programming

Concept

History

See also

References

External links