Before he became a firebrand politician, Toru Hashimoto was a lawyer and TV personality, and one of the variety shows he often appeared on was Nippon TV's "Gyoretsu no Dekiru Horitsu Sodanjo" ("Legal Advice Office With a Line Outside the Door"; Sun., 9 p.m.). This week, another retired political firebrand holds court on the show: former Tokyo Gov. Shintaro Ishihara.

Since leaving office, Ishihara has hardly been idle. He recently published a "personal biography" of the late Prime Minister Kakuei Tanaka called "Tensai" ("Genius"), whose title would seem to indicate that Ishihara, who used to despise Tanaka, has changed his mind. In any case, it's a best-seller. But he won't just discuss the book; he'll talk about his time as Tokyo governor and contribute his two yen's worth about the current man in that position, Yoichi Masuzoe.

Hong Kong fans of Nintendo's "Pokemon" are reportedly up in arms about the company's decision to change the official Chinese names of the "pocket monster" game from Cantonese to Mandarin. Actually, if you check the worldwide franchises, you'll find that every language has its own roster of names for the characters, which number in the hundreds.