The custom M-16… of LOVE

I completely forgot to update during my period of post-E3 decompression about the best thing to happen at the entire stupid event. See, at the 1UP members-only party, Wes Ehrlichman of The Gamer’s Quarter gave me a box of condoms.

While that action alone would be creepy to the point of terrifying, it was the brand of condoms that made the difference. Yes, Golgomania has now become full circle: I own a box of Golgo 13 prophylactics.



Having stumbled across these things when I went to Japan a few years back, I’ve since kicked my brain repeatedly for being too bashful to buy a box at the time. Thanks to Wes’ grossly inappropriate gift (the box was already open, for that extra touch of ewwww) my love of insane novelty has been fulfilled. These things are great. Er, well, I mean the packaging is great. I won’t actually be using them, for far more reasons than I have space to enumerate.

Highlights: crass multilingual innuendos making the obvious connection between sex and Golgo’s preferred M.O. — note the condom illustration on the back of the box which happens to look remarkably like an M-16 shell casing. And the front of the box says in English: “We’ll never make a bad shot.” But the best part is the somewhat obscure pun about these being for “big safe capers” — “Big Safe Caper” being the title of the very first G13 story from 1968. In that case, the safe was a vault; here, of course, it refers to safe sex. Which really just goes to show that no matter what the property, no matter how “adult” the ancillary merchandise, anime-branded collectibles are inescapably nerdy.

Completely brilliant. So thank you, Wes Ehrlichman, for having sufficiently poor judgment to think an open box of condoms is a suitable gift for a complete stranger. You rule.

For your consideration, geekiness of a more family-oriented nature: a random yet completely great comic I stumbled across yesterday. Sadly, a cursory glance of the archives suggests that the rest of the comic is fairly mundane. But in lieu of other comics about pink-haired girls with a fondness for Katamari Damacy, perhaps you will feel otherwise.

In sadder news, one of the site’s latest referring search strings is “Neil Peart naked.” Come on, Internet. I expect better than that. Even from you.

23 thoughts on “The custom M-16… of LOVE”

  1. so you’re saying we can’t find images of Neal Peart naked here? No more archive hunting for me.

  2. I call plagiarism on my dream Super Smash Brothers Brawl lineup of King of all Cosmos, The King, and Tingle.

    You can ask Nich if you don’t believe I thought of it first. He was there.

  3. I dunno, they were looking for “Neil.” There might be some porn of Neal kickin’ around here. Blog spammers are hard to keep track of… I wouldn’t put it past ’em.

  4. “Thanks to Wes’ grossly inappropriate gift (the box was already open, for that extra touch of ewwww)…”

    My monitor has been the victim of a water-spewing “Pfffffffft!” of hilarity. ‘Cause that was some funny right there.

    Oh, and when it comes to Canadian rock trio porn…sadly, there’s far too much Mike Reno stuff kicking around. It’s a crime against nature.

  5. I don’t know what’s worse: the fact that I have in fact envisioned such a battle among Kings… or that I recognize the exact panel of the Ranma 1/2 comic that it comes from.
    Which leaves me the option of having to bow to your superior, crack-shot Golgo 13 geekery.

  6. Well shit, I remember you proudly showing me some sort of Golgo 13 merchandise at E3, but you were gone in a second and I thought it was another manga. Laff!

  7. I heard your awkward thank you at the party and was briefly confused, but then some girl started handing thongs out to people at random. I just figured I was at a…uniquely deviant mid-afternoon gathering, but I suppose that’s E3 for you.

  8. The phrase “Neil Peart naked” made me think of Neil causing a domestic disturbance doing a drum solo in the nude. Damn you Matthew McConaughey!

  9. Who the hell is Neil/Neal Peart and why, in God’s name, am I about to google him?

  14. The girl who created that comic strip was in one of my creative writing classes a few years back. I was really disappointed when I stumbled across the strip one day and saw how lacking it was… her short stories were considerably better than anything I saw on the site.

  15. Between the manga character condoms of questionable origin and the mere concept of Rush prog porn, I don’t know whether to laugh hysterically or cringe in abject horror.

    Perhaps a little of both.

  16. Best photoshop I’ve seen in a while, even if minimalistically so. Care if I use it when confronted by a Randbot?

  18. Oh, God. My rusty Japanese just kicked in, and I now realize there’s a third level to that terrible “Big Safe Caper” pun:

    Seifu is Japanese for “wallet.”

  19. part of me wonders how well Golgo 13: Big Safe Condoms would sell in america, or at least on the con circuit…

  21. I can’t believe I missed this post! I’m honored to have been part of the best thing to happen at E3.

    And yeah, I know the box of condoms was open and I realize that’s pretty gross, but hey, at least none of them were used. At least – not the ones I gave you.

    Besides, the uncomfortable conversation that took place after the gifting was well worth it.

    Jeremy: “Soooo, condoms.”
    Me: “Yup. Condoms.”
    Jeremy: “I’m gonna go now.”
    Me: “See ya’.”

    -Wes

  22. “I won’t actually be using them, for far more reasons than I have space to enumerate.”
    But is it mostly because if you use one you probably won’t be able to use another one (or any other condom for that matter) for a long, long, long time?

  23. Holy crap. You sir, Mr Ehrlichman, have found the Holy Grail of Duke Togo merchandise, and I can only be glad that I lived long enough to see it with mine own two eyes. I did a bit of reminiscing on the ol’ Perfect Machine of Snipe myself a few months back if you click the URL in my name; this message was originally much longer, but clicking Preview told me that “spam is not appreciated.” In any case, I salute Toastyfrog for its grand Golgo 13 coverage, the only noticeable gap being that there’s no apparent discussion of the theatrical film. Perhaps it’s been archived and stored away along with the classic Xenogears and Evangelion writeups of years past?

Comments are closed.