Christmas and the chicken have now been secured for the KFC empire in Japan. Surely you must be thinking that that is happily ever after for the American corporation. And the Colonel wept for there were no more lands to conquer. Well, luckily in a capitalist world, there are always new markets! Join KFC Japan as they maintain their iron grip on food, enter entertainment, and shock sport!
A New Hope
1985 started as a joyful year for Osaka. The second city was ascendant, riding the high of Japan’s economic dominance. Yet for many in the metropolis, their one desire was still unanswered. To see the Hanshin Tigers, the eternal underdogs of Nippon Baseball, win just one Japan Series.
They were a team that never seemed to have much direction, having not even qualified for the finals since 1947. This is especially difficult to do when you consider that every other team in the sport had won multiple Series by then. It was an embarrassment for such a wealthy team with a diehard fanbase never to have won a single title. So when 1985 came around, no one expected much. Yet once again, an American with a beard stepped forward.
An ex-MLB baseball phenom called Randy Bass had joined Hanshin a few years back and was actually quite good. In 1985 he had a very good season: So good that he was able to lead the team through his running and batting to a much-awaited first qualification into the finals!
This feat caused the already less-than-subdued fans of Hanshin to flock to the streets of Osaka. The ensuing chaos meant people from all around Kansai prefecture were magnetically drawn to the very popular downtown entertainment district of Osaka. Known as Dotonbori, this area is both very populated, and above a series of very dirty river canals. With such high density in Dotonbori, clever fans decided to make space by jumping into the river.
In these frenetic scenes, fans devised a new game. Each time a player had their song ring out (explainer: every baseball player has a “cheer song”), a doppelganger fan needed to jump in the river. This was easy enough; a Japanese player’s song played, so a Japanese-looking fan jumped in. But then we got to Randy. Looking around for Randy Bass, it was clear he hadn’t participated in the party. So a substitute bearded American was needed. Yet in the thronging Japanese crowd, not a single one was seen. Except one life-sized shiny statue of a famous war hero (explainer no. 2: these statues commonly frequent the storefronts of Japanese KFCs). With one swift hoist, the Hanshin Tigers supporters had baptised Colonel Sanders. Only this baptism was more a lost and drowned situation. The statue promptly sank to the bottom of the muddy, sludgy and deep river, presumably never to be found again.
The success kept rolling with the Tigers, as they toiled and finally lifted the vaunted NPB trophy. Nothing could stop this superstar team which had shaken off their demons. This was the best team in Japanese baseball, finally stepping up to the plate. Nothing except one missing, dirty, and unhappy Colonel Sanders.
The Colonel Strikes Back
Riding off the immense high of winning their first title, Hanshin was ready to repeat in 1986. It was a difficult campaign and the team played well, but were unable to repeat the success of the previous year. No matter, there was always 1987.
This is one of those seasons that fans call “a season from hell”. They had unlucky injuries to their star players, internal locker room fights, and even managed to fire Randy Bass who had committed the crime of spending too long in the US with his family. The season couldn’t end quickly enough, with the team crashing to their worst record in history. They finished last.
It was the long-running show Knight Scoop that took up the investigation of how a team that was perfectly set up to dominate over seasons immediately fell apart. (For those wondering how this chicken post drifted into the Hanshin Tiger’s 1987 season, I promise we’re getting back on track.) A fan wrote in to plead with the television station to find the missing Colonel. He was sure that the Colonel was furious underwater and cursed the team until he was restored to his rightful place. The show knew they needed to heed the call for help (and receive the ratings boosting from the 2nd largest city in Japan).
Divers were sent. Sonar boats. A sweeping search up and down the whole of Dotonbori, but no smiling Colonel. It’s the thought that counts, right? Unfortunately for the Hanshin faithful, the gaze of Harlan Sanders was angry.
Now seasons would go past with bad luck for the Tigers. 24 long years of bad injuries, poor draft picks, and cheap ownership. Every other year, a new variety show would decide that they would be the ones to lift this threat looming over Osaka. Yet no Colonel was found.
Maybe it was the cheap owners and poor management that caused the team to be bad? We’ll never know. The curse was fated to rage on, until the Colonel could rest in his natural position. With his thumbs up in front of the Dotonbori KFC.
In fact, another KFC statue was defiled during a Japan World Cup win in 2002 over Tunisia, cutting off his hands in an apparent homage to Sharia law. And as we know, Japan still hasn’t won a Men’s World Cup trophy since then…
Return of the Tigers
A routine cleaning crew in 2009 of Dotonbori River found what they thought was a body. Yet they soon realised it was a much more important torso. Yes! National coverage of this search and rescue mission was needed.
First his upper body recovered. Lower body. A missing right hand. Finally, his glasses. The Colonel was finally allowed his time to rest. Standing guard in front of his beloved fried chicken.
The 2009 Hanshin Tigers became almost instant favourites to win the title. Expectations were enormous. Of course, they were free of this damn curse. KFC was thriving and so too were the Tigers, crashing out at 4th and missing the playoffs.
The fans tried everything to appease the angry spirit of Colonel Sanders. Ceremonial cleansing in a Kansai shrine. Nothing. Placed in front of the stadium’s KFC. Nothing. Moved to KFC headquarters in Tokyo. Nothing.
To this day, no one knows what stopped the curse. Finally 2023 was cemented as the year that Hanshin Tigers would, with the help of the spirit of KFC’s founder, lift their second trophy. To celebrate, fans were all too eager to jump into the Dotonbori again. This time, all statues of Colonel Sanders were bolted down. Naturally the enterprising fans dressed up as the iconic leader, and hopped in anyway.
Kentucky Culture
Having tormented a city through sports for so long, you’d think KFC didn’t have time to engage with much else of Japanese life. Yet as I’ve already outlined, Kentucky is all-seeing in Japan. No matter what your hobby is, KFC is there.
Cosplay?
It’s become an ongoing trend to find stores with the most decked-out statues. It can’t be easy when the Colonel has better outfits than you.
If you think video games are a reprieve from this KFC-fueled culture, of course he shows up too. Square Enix, the Japanese makers of Final Fantasy have recently announced Colonel Sanders as a black mage in the newest Final Fantasy 14.
The Colonel has even conquered the once sacred ground of anime dating games. If you had somehow missed it in 2019, I share for your pleasure, I Love You, Colonel Sanders! A Finger Lickin' Good Dating Simulator. This was a real game released on Steam. Your goal is to date Colonel Sanders while attending culinary school. Nowhere is safe from him.
KFC must look back at their early three stores and laugh with their thousand-plus stores in Japan. They’ve come a long way from their humble beginnings as a multinational fast food giant. And thus the tale of the Chicken Chronicles concludes.
An all-seeing dominant American monster, touching every facet of Japanese life from Christmas to dating. It still might be possible in the far flung outreaches of your hobbies and life to escape their empire building. But they are coming for you. Maybe the only reprieve is to pre-saturate yourself with other Japanese culture, perhaps via Hidden Japan.
A few inaccuracies but interesting read.
(The team played in the Japan Series in 1962 and 1964, so to say they never played in the finals from 1947-85 is untrue.)
(Also, Japanese fans have put nearly NO emphasis on the Curse of the Colonel in the past decade or more... I can't speak for the years before 2014, but since I have become a fan, I have heard (and read) way more about it in English than I ever have in Japanese.)
That's a very interesting story, Leon; and, while some might choose to make light of the late colonel, there is a lot more to him and his family than most expect:
"Secret Search For Atlantis"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=veN-ULuHKxQ