The word "omokuri" in the title of the variety show "Omokuri Kantoku" (Fuji TV, Sun., 9 p.m.) is a combination of the words "omoshiroii" (interesting) and "creator." The program invites several people famous in other fields to "direct" television shows based on their own ideas. Then a panel of judges, headed by comedian and director Beat Takeshi, critiques the finished products.
Among this week's directors making videos on the theme of "Gourmet" is Takashi Niigaki, the musician who actually wrote all the music that best-selling composer Mamoru Samuragochi claimed he had written but didn't. Niigaki is a straightforward storyteller, and the jury finds his artless, earnest video amusing. Also on hand is comedian Tsubasa Tobinaga, whose work dramatizes the "dream of a young comic," and which the jury finds "quite provocative."
Every year since 2011, Fuji TV has aired a special program called "Wasurenai" ("Will Not Forget"; March 7, 3:35 p.m.) to mark the anniversary of the Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami, and each special features new footage from that tragic day never before televised or newly uncovered data related to the events of that day. The theme of this year's two-hour program is "Escaping the Giant Tsunami," which assembles footage depicting the killer wave that wiped out a good portion of the coastline of northeastern Japan and killed so many people. To those who were in the path of the tsunami, life and death was a matter of seconds—not minutes, but seconds, since the speed and power of the wave was unimaginable.