News that the manga Oishinbo would get a TV anime adaptation broke on 5ch’s Hello! Project board, and the thread lit up with nostalgia. At the same time, plenty of posters raised concerns about whether the original — which by today’s standards is full of discriminatory and politically charged content — could really be adapted as-is. The fact that the voice actor for Yuzan Kaibara has already passed away, and that protagonist Shiro Yamaoka’s canonical age would now put him around 70, also came up, with many worrying the show would end up like recent revivals: watered down and defanged.
What people said
1AnonymousSep 19, 2026 13:57
@oishinbo_ch
Oishinbo [Official] | Streaming now on YouTube!
@oishinbo_ch
4AnonymousSep 19, 2026 13:59
Isn't there a bunch of stuff in this that'd be a compliance violation nowadays?
5AnonymousSep 19, 2026 13:59
It'd be great if they did early Yuzan, back when he was completely unhinged.
6AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:00
Come on, there's definitely stuff in Oishinbo that wouldn't fly in today's climate.
7AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:00
It'll probably end up as boring as every other recent revival.
Let's just leave the memories as they are.
8AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:01
Didn't the voice actor for Yuzan pass away?
43AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:11
Re: #8
Akio Otsuka could take over the role and it wouldn't feel off at all.
9AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:01
I am Yuzan Kaibara, head of the Gourmet Club!
13AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:02
I'm sick of watching the episodes that already aired — remake the banned/skipped episodes with a modern take instead.
14AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:02
The values are so outdated that today's younger viewers would probably be put off.
15AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:04
So many episodes wouldn't clear compliance now, so it'll probably just get watered down and ruined.
17AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:04
Food is just personal taste, but he flies off the handle and totally shits on other people's preferences —
modern audiences just can't handle that.
19AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:04
Among the Oishinbo regulars, Kazuhiko Inoue, Rei Sakuma, and Ako Mayama are still active today.
20AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:05
Cold ramen, you say?! You want ME, Yuzan Kaibara, to make cold ramen?! (a famously over-the-top manga scene)
21AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:05
There are also plenty of flat-out discriminatory episodes.
23AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:06
Shabu-shabu is the worst possible way to eat meat.
24AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:06
A remake of this is doomed to fail — the original was just too good.
It's actually pretty blatant about talking down America while glorifying China and Korea.
28AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:08
Japanese audiences today just don't have room for Kariya's political messaging and satire anymore.
It'll end up bleached out into something bland and flavorless.
31AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:09
Re: #28
People aren't rejecting it out of open-mindedness — the values themselves are just outdated.
30AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:08
It's the exact opposite direction from Solitary Gourmet — authoritarian, constantly pushing its values on you.
33AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:09
What bugs me is how you can catch glimpses of the author's ideology peeking through.
That kind of thing feels dated these days.
41AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:11
Re: #33
With Oishinbo it's way more than just a glimpse.
34AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:09
Shiro Yamaoka was born in 1957.
Oishinbo is a story about someone who'd be 70 now, back when he was around 30.
47AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:13
Re: #34
Kazuhiko Inoue, who voices Yamaoka, was born in 1954, so that checks out.
37AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:10
You need the literacy to read the awful Showa-era values as a joke, not literally.
Taken at face value it's just a terrible manga, so animating it seems like it'd cause all kinds of trouble.
38AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:10
Honestly I'd rather see a live-action version.
Shiro: Ryohei Suzuki
Yuko: Kasumi Arimura
Yuzan: Shinichi Tsutsumi
Something like that.
42AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:11
Was the political messaging even that heavy back when it originally aired as an anime?
54AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:17
Guess Deputy Chief Tomii's 'Kurita, get the tea' line is getting cut too, huh. (a line seen as demeaning to a female colleague)
60AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:20
Re: #54
Come to think of it, women's social status has really changed since then.
66AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:22
Oh, the manga famous for its smear campaign against Ajinomoto?
76AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:24
Re: #66
Let's get Ryuji to make a cameo. (popular home-cook YouTuber)
81AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:25
This is the anime that aired when 50-year-olds were in elementary school.
Do 40-year-olds even know Oishinbo?
90AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:27
Re: #81
Back in the day the collected volumes were a staple in every neighborhood barbershop's waiting area.
91AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:27
Re: #81
If you're 50 it'd have been more like middle school, wouldn't it.
85AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:26
Remaking Showa-era anime — is that the trend lately?
Kids these days aren't going to watch something like this.
92AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:27
Re: #85
It's just the ego of people who think 'it's a classic, so young people should watch it too.'
110AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:32
I never got why Yamaoka always dressed like he was in mourning.
112AnonymousSep 19, 2026 14:32
Re: #110
Just think of it as the opposite of Zakiyama. (comedian known for loud, flashy outfits)
Background and Key Points of Debate
Oishinbo is a long-running gourmet manga that began serialization in Big Comic Spirits in 1983, and its politically charged episodes — heavily colored by creator Tetsu Kariya’s personal views — have repeatedly sparked controversy. Most notably, a 2014 arc covering the aftermath of the Fukushima disaster depicted characters suffering nosebleeds, triggering a controversy so intense that the episode was ultimately left out of the collected volume. The concerns raised in the thread — about compliance issues and political messaging — appear to stem directly from this history. At the same time, the manga is also highly regarded as a pioneering work exploring Japanese food culture, and that nuance — that its legacy isn’t simply good or bad — went largely unmentioned in the responses.
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