To commemorate the release of the first volume of the manga “Toppen!!!” currently serialized in “Monthly Bushiroad,” the event “Teppen Grand Prix 0th Preliminary Round” was held on Saturday, September 11 at the Science Hall of the Science Museum, where performers Aimi, Sasaki Mikoi, and Ito Ayasa gave talks and manzai (stand-up comedy act) with MC Aiba Aina.
“Toppen!!!” is a coming-of-age girls’ story, based on the original story by the voice actress sisters [Team Y] (Manami, Sasaki, and Ito,) full of laughter and tears, in which three high school girls aim for the top (Toppen) of the comedy world).
“Toppen Grand Prix 0th Preliminary Round” is a talk and comedy event that recreates the world view of “Toppen!!!”
At the event, the three members of Team Y actually performed manzai and monoboke (being funny using an object.).
The first corner was manzai where they act as the characters from “Teppen!!!” Aimi, Sasaki and Ito performed as “Young Wai Wai”, a trio of Osaka high school students, performing stories related to Osaka such as takoyaki (octopus dumplings).
After that, they moved on to a corner where they competed for points by monoboke and ogiri (a game where people answer questions comically.) In each topic, the three of them excited the audience with their high sense of gagging that you would not expect from a voice actress. Especially in the “monoboke”, Sasaki Mikoi came up with one joke after another even though it was improvised, and almost all of her jokes excited the audience and earned high scores.
In the end, Sasaki won by a large margin. As a bonus, she won the right to do whatever she wanted on the color pages of “Bushiroad Monthly.” There was a suggestion that the three of them could do a gravure together, but we were looking forward to seeing what kind of color page project it would actually be.
At the end of the event, the members of Team Y performed a manzai as themselves, not as characters, and the event ended amidst loud cheers.
This project started when the three members of Team Y performed manzai at an event held in January 2019. Aimi, Sasaki, and Ito were involved in setting up the world view and drafting the characters to create a manga series based on the theme of “comedy”.
In addition to the serialization of manga, you can see how manzai linked to the characters has developed, such as linking the work and the physical event, which is very interesting. A voice-over drama was also announced at this event, so we can’t take our eyes off how this is going to be.
©Namamugi/Inujun ©BUSHIROAD MEDIA
