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Our one-star Halloween mask from Amazon has arrived! …in mid-November

Master Blaster Nov 22, 2021
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At least it sucks too.

At the beginning of October, our staff was just getting into the Halloween spirit. It was then that our reporter Masanuki Sunakoma searched Amazon Japan for this year’s costume, but he also decided to kill two birds with one stone and find one with a one-star review to write an article about it, as he’s known to do.

He wasn’t overly serious about Halloween anyway, and since it would only be used for a single day, it didn’t really need to be all that good. The picture looked pretty cool though, like a ghoulish alien. We can’t show the actual page, so here’s a sketch based on how Masanuki remembers the photo looking.

One review wrote, “Don’t buy it,” which Masanuki took to mean it was so scary that he wouldn’t be able to handle it. That was all he needed to hear, and he placed an order for one “Alien Mask” for 1,980 yen ($17.24). Then, he waited.

It wasn’t until 15 November that a strange package from China arrived on Masanuki’s doorstep. Our office decided not to hit the town like they usually do out of respect for calls not to gather in Shibuya this year, and Masanuki had forgotten that he even ordered a mask over a month earlier.

He checked his Amazon history to make sure the package was something he actually had ordered and then realized what it was. There wasn’t much he could do with it in the middle of November, but at least he could finally see the real thing…

▼ Masanuki: “Oh…”

It didn’t look scary as much as it did frail and sad.

On top of that, aside from a few wrinkles it had an amazingly healthy complexion. In some ways it was an improvement over Masanuki’s actual skin.

▼ Masanuki: “Aren’t alien monsters supposed to be pale and green with pus-filled sores all over?”

The mask just stared at him blankly, as if equally baffled about what to do next.

▼ Masanuki: “Sigh…”

Even though it wasn’t Halloween, not wearing a mask was denying it its right to exist. Masanuki felt bad for this ugly – but not scary – thing, and decided to have an impromptu mid-November freak-out in celebration of his online purchase.

He quickly strung up some Halloween garland, unaware that it was actually Day of the Dead garland, and slowly came out for the grand veiling.

▼ Masanuki: “So? How do I look?”

▼ Masanuki: “Hang on, lemme check a mirror…”

▼ Masanuki: “Oh.”

There really were very few redeeming qualities about this mask. It was too tight in some parts and too loose in others, and someone made the odd design choice of not blending the eye-holes with the mask’s black eyes and instead put them higher up and closer to the center of the mask. Now, it looked like a slightly concerned monster with well groomed eyebrows.

One the other hand, it was so crappy that it kind of looked like those horribly crafted masks deranged killers such as Leatherface and Buffalo Bill made out of their victims’ faces.

Still, it wasn’t Halloween, so what was the point of all this?

“Don’t buy it.” It was such a simple message, but Masanuki was too blinded by his own optimism to see it for what it was.

▼ Masanuki: “Grrrrrragh!”

Perhaps, some heroic worker at the factory that makes this horrible mask was trying to do Masanuki a favor by sending it too late, knowing that even a half-assed costume slapped together at the last minute would have been better than this. If so, thank you crappy mask factory worker, wherever you are.

Related: Amazon Japan: Alien Mask
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[ Read in Japanese ]