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The story
The ten finalist acts for TBS’s “King of Cont 2026” (airing October 17) were announced at a press conference on September 4. Nanamagari made the final for the first time in 10 years, while Dow 90000 will compete with a lineup of eight — the largest in the competition’s history. On 5ch’s Geinou Sports Express+ board, posters traded takes on Dow 90000, with some arguing they’re “more of a theater troupe than a sketch act” and others chalking their inclusion up to buzz value, alongside assessments of finals regulars like Nippon no Shacho and Kaeru-tei and comparisons with the Double Impact champions, as predictions and personal favorites flew back and forth over the finalist lineup.
The finalist press conference for “Kyujin Box presents King of Cont 2026” (TBS, airing October 17) was held in Tokyo on September 4.
It was announced that ten acts in total will advance to the finals: Yahhoi (Nagai / Izumi), Aishou wa Iiyone (Evi Land / Yadayamukun), Jeradon (Attack Nishimoto / Kamichii), Dow 90000 (Sho Hasumi / Shota Sonoda / Ryoya Iihara / Yuta Uehara / Tamaki Michigami / Momoyoko Nakajima / Ayaka Kutsuna / Reina Yoshihara), Yadan (Long Size Ito / Honma Kid / Toru Nakajima), The Mummy (Yohei Hayashida / Takashi Sakai), Nanamagari (Naoto Morishita / Yuta Hase), Ganso Ichigo-chan (Yuji Uemura / Hyper Perochan), Kaeru-tei (Shuhei Nakano / Iwakura), and Nippon no Shacho (Classic Tsuji / Ketsu).
◆ Kaeru-tei’s Iwakura, on making the final for the first time in three years: “I just exploded [with emotion]”
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Read the original article here
What people said
Nanamagari's material just isn't TV-friendly lol
It's specifically King of Cont that's been 10 years for them
How are they different?
Hurry up and explain how they're different then
People who eat this stuff up on shows like "Enta no Kamisama" (a mainstream comedy variety show) definitely won't get it at all
I don't even like Enta no Kamisama, but I still hate Nanamagari.
anyone who calls this bunch funny has bottom-tier comedy taste
"Comedy taste score" lol
I could kind of get it if it was just Dow 90000 and Jovijoba,
but throwing Choshinjuku in there too makes it feel like "oh, it's just the big-group category" lol
They're way too different in style
and still wants results in a heavier-weight award race
Double Impact's got no leg to stand on then, huh
Magical Love Liars are in King of Cont too though
Still, Double Impact is the comedy contest that makes the most sense to me —
not because the same acts do both,
but because the genuinely funny ones actually win it
Takion were undeniably funny too
and Kaeru-tei lost because they were undeniably not funny
just have Nakajima-san and Hasumi do manzai
They're in the ABC finals too though (the ABC Grand Prix, another comedy contest)
Nanamagari can't win unless they break out of the parallel-world bit, and I'm getting tired of Mummy's panicking-Sakai routine too.
Though I do want to keep rooting for Yadan, who never seem to break through.
Who knew that among the big-group acts, Dow-90-thousand would get ahead of Plan 9
Can you even call that a sketch act?
There are plenty of acts out there who just haven't gotten results, same as Dow 90000
Loveletters' Tamariguchi is a former theater actor too
What makes Dow 90000 good at this is probably the whole "this feels different from anything before" image-building that comes with how they're marketed
There's no clear line there
Tons of comedians came up through theater troupes
Don't worry
They're still just as unfunny as ever
This is clearly the buzz-value slot
It's been a while since Magical Love Liars won M-1,
so I feel like the real reason is just "kinda want to feel that award-race atmosphere again," you know?
They've kept popping up here and there even after winning though
Double Impact does feel like the kind of thing where the not-that-funny guy wins though
Safe, I guess…
It ends up looking like a "jack of all trades" competition
It's like a restaurant that serves both Japanese soba and Chinese food — neither one's any good. That, lol
Background and key points of this discussion
King of Cont is a long-running TBS sketch comedy competition dating back to 2008, ranked alongside the M-1 Grand Prix as one of the major comedy award races in Japan. The thread’s disagreement centered mainly on how to categorize Dow 90000: some argued that their eight-person lineup and heavily narrative-driven style makes them “more of a theater troupe than a sketch act,” while others held that their inclusion reflects buzz value and marketing savvy rather than competition results. Meanwhile, opinions on Nanamagari split between “not TV-friendly” critiques and fans defending them precisely because they don’t want the act to break out. One point worth flagging: the “funny/not funny” verdicts in the thread are just individual 5ch posters’ opinions — they don’t represent judging results or broader public opinion. The final airs October 17, and the actual rankings will be decided by the performances on the day.
*This article is compiled and summarized from the 5ch (Geinou Sports Express+) thread “[Entertainment] “King of Cont” Ten Finalists Announced: Nanamagari Back After 10 Years, Dow 90000 Field Largest-Ever Lineup.”
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