So there are geeks, then there are Geeks.Risking the possible damage to my persona as a fashion designer, I am totally okay to admit that I am a geek. I stood in line for three solid hours, in torrential downpour for the Episode 1 (then came out of the theater on the other side of the blackhole of disappointment a few hours later). I have a friend who "wouldn't say fluent in it, but can carry a conversation in Klingon."
Randy and Co. of Studio Kaiju are, Hyper Geeks. Randy grew up in this fine country of Superman and Batman, yet he did so while watching all the goofy Ultraman and Godzilla and Kamen-Rider and stuff - all the Japanese kid TV shows I grew up with. I didn't even know people watched that stuff outside of Japan. It's a bit embarrassing, really. These shows did help built my moral fiber, teaching me to protect the weak and fight the bad guys who hijack school buses in Japan in the process of taking over the entire world. But that was, you know, for, goofy Japanese kids. I watched them, just because they were there when I come home from school. But Randy LOVED them. Enough, so that when he reached the cusp of the adulthood, he decided that was what he was going to do for a living. He produces the "live action theater" of Kaiju Big Battel. His hands are in everything - from costumes to script. On the other hand, I eventually moved on to something more grownup. Like, um, drawing unnaturally super skinny women with, um, made-up clothing on them.
Anyway, so this Geeky-ness isn't just with Randy and Co., it seems to be all over the world. A cute young girl of about 16 walked into the store this afternoon, with her aunt. The girl was cute, in her little plaid skirt and some sort of brown fuzzy monster hat (I should have seen it coming right then and there). The girl and the aunt watched the Kaiju Big Battel dvd on our TV for a bit, then spoke to one another excitedly in Spanish at length. Thinking now was the time I show some professionalism, I started explaining to them what Studio Kaiju was about, when the aunt said, "She knows what this is. She's seen it." "Oh really? In Brooklyn?" "No, in Chile."
Apparently, YouTube clips of Kaiju Big Battel is HUUUUUUGE amongst youngsters in Chile. The cute young girl gave me a small, embarrassed smile, and said they came into the store because she spotted the DVD's from outside. Thank goodness for the enormous windows.
So, it pays to be Geeks. You get to make your passion into a way of making a living, and have a huuuge following on the other side of the globe.
