Last December 27th I was at the Hello Kitty Around the world pop up tour in Bellevue Washington. The pop-up more like Hell Kitty events held in Singapore and Taiwan but with little interactive pieces and not like museum type exhibit as was the Hello Kitty Super cute museum exhibit four years earlier to the date. still it was something to do.
Well it had been a while before I had some Hello Kitty news.
First, up, it is not just Tiger Woods that had a comeback in 2019; Hello Kitty takes the top spot in Sanrio 34th Annual Sanrio Character Rankings. She beats out Cinnamonroll, who was last year’s winner.
Every year Sanrio polls it fans using the top 100 Sanrio characters. For the last few year s, Hello Kitty languished in the top 10, never making in the top three. I wonder Hello Kitty’s win has to do with becoming a popular virtual Youtuber. I dare say the Annual Sanrio Character Ranking is a barometer of Sanrio’s character Campaign, noting Yoshikitty taking third place last year coinciding with the band X Japan revival.
The second piece of news is Mattel obtaining license to manufacture toys games and others items base on Sanrio’s portfolio of characters. This will start in 2020, just in time for the Hello Kitty Movie and possible TV show. This good thing; I hope this will bring a higher quality to Sanrio’s toy and game offerings.
Birthday 2010
Normally I wound wish them Happy B Day form Hello Kitty online or even Sanrio Town but the game ended in 2017 and the forum is on its way out.
I received a Sanrio gift card form my sister and bought and Aggretsuko plush.
Aggretsuko or Aggressive Retsuko is an adorable anthropomorphic Red Panda created by Sanrio, the same company that brought us cute characters like Hello Kitty, My Melody and Chococat. Sanrio created Aggretsuko in 2015 and was part series of shorts steamed on Sanrio’s Japanese YouTube channel and now released as an Anime on Netflix.
Aggretsuko is a 25-year-old single female office worker, Scorpio, Blood type A. She tries to survive her oppressive job in the accounting apartment, with an incompetent and chauvinist boss hog named Ton. Ton often ridicules and harasses her. In addition, Aggretsuko has to deal with other bothersome situations and coworkers, a gossipmonger, and brownnoser. She has a twisted secret side to her; she blows off steam cause by her job and coworkers with Death Metal Karaoke. The show deals with less cute and more about such the plight of Japanese Office ladies, sexism and being a corporate drone. In a way, it the cartoon is Japanese cross between Office Space and Dilbert. While the show deals with Japanese work culture, one does not need to be Japanese or a female to identify with Aggretsuko’s plight. Many commentators, media reviewers, and fans have given the show glowing revues.
Aggretsuko and Gudetama, a lazy and lethargic egg, adult like behavior branches from the child like kawaiiness of Hello Kitty and other Sanrio charters. Sanrio is sending a strong message they want to appeal to adult male and female market and not just with Hello Kitty.