Conan/Leno/NBC debacle animated by same Hong Kong news org that tackled Tiger Woods

Video above: The Leno/Conan/NBC cosmic clusterfrak, retold through the magic of animation by NMA News. That's the same Taiwanese Hong Kong-based news organization responsible for the Tiger Woods bad husband sexy mistress car crash masterpiece, and this fine followup. The magic happens around a minute in, when CoCo transforms into the Incredible Hulk, and Leno into Superman. If only this news org would offer an entire 24-hour channel of this stuff! I don't care that I can't understand the dialogue—all I need to know is in that sweet, sweet CGI.

YouTube video link: NMA 2010.01.19 Showdown at NBC 動新聞 美國深夜脫口秀大風吹. There's an English-language version, too, but somehow it's not nearly as funny as the Mandarin VO. (via David OReilly)

• [Anonymous]

  with these guys and Autotune the News the need for John Stewart and Stephen Colbert for “news” has sharply decreased – D Selector

• [Anonymous]

  that CGI is pretty flattering.

• [Trnck]

  It’s definitely Taiwan, trust me. The company is Hong Kong based, but the video was produced by their Taiwan department.

• [abe lugo]

  why isn’t Conan’s hair taller?

• [EH]

  it’s…beautiful!

• [Dave Faris]

  If you could somehow combine this video with the video in this post and I don’t think Conan or Jay would be having any ratings troubles at all.

• [avraamov]

  bathing ape hoodies!Haawwww.

• [sidereal]

  This is, by far, the greatest act of journalism in human history.

• [Anonymous]

  FYI tag error. China is not Taiwan.

  • [Xeni Jardin]

    The tag is “Chinese,” not China. The language spoken in this clip is indeed Chinese (Mandarin).

• [Anonymous]

  Trust David OReilly to discover something like this.

• [Anonymous]

  Anyone else bothered that “Super Leno” belongs in the DC Universe, while “The Incredible Conan” and “Captain NBC” belong in the Marvel Universe?

  I didn’t think so.

• [thunderhammer]

  I thought it was incredibly stupid until Conan turned into the Incredible Hulk. All the sudden it became awesome.

• [LeFunk]

  I wish they made one for the Hindenburg disaster.

• [whisper dog]

  I wonder if they’ll do one of these about the Google – China battle.

• [adamnvillani]

  I’m kind of amazed that they even care about this in Hong Kong or Taiwan. Are Conan or Jay on TV there?

• [haileris]

  Actually, NMA is Next Media Limited, which publishes Apple Daily newspaper in Hong Kong and Taiwan. It’s a Hong Kong company. This was in Mandarin, which means it’s likely intended for the Taiwan audience — although they probably had a Cantonese dubbed version for the Hong Kong audience, this is normal on Hong Kong TV; they do this all the time. They often use this to show what happened if there wasn’t any video footage, e.g. of vehicle accidents, or police brutality in China.

  • [Anonymous]

    “this is normal on Hong Kong TV; they do this all the time. They often use this to show what happened if there wasn’t any video footage, e.g. of vehicle accidents, or police brutality in China.”

    For some reason, HK newscasts really *love* using these digital re-enactments. Newspapers also often have cartoons/graphics showing, step by step, how an accident or murder or scandal occurred. Kind of morbid, IMO.

• [Anonymous]

  I guess Conan The Barbarian isn’t as recognizable as The Hulk.

• [adamnvillani]

  The best part is Jeff Zucker’s blinding shiny-head powers.

• [Phart]

  I think we definitely need more beer & popcorn street vendors.

• [Anonymous]

  I’m from Next Media Animation and it’s my fault that Jimmy Kimmel isn’t fatter. I gave our animation team a face shot that was pretty flattering. However, I did tell the team to make Conan’s hair really tall and orange and they kind of just refused to do it. I guess they felt more comfortable working from the file photos which didn’t really bring out his glorious ginger-ness.

  Thanks Boing Boing! And hey, need an animated recap for anything else? Let us know, we’re always looking for ideas.

• [Anonymous]

  not only did Conan see it, he aired it on his show last night. the closed-captioning kept typing “Speaking in Cantonese” even though it was in Mandarin. guess the caption-er thought “HK company” and automatically thought Cantonese. “Speaking in Chinese” might have been a smarter move.

• [sobreiro]

  Why can’t all news be like this?

• [Anonymous]

  They made an English language version too: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-y04H5mFUFM

  But it’s much funnier if you can’t understand what they’re saying.

• [Mosh]

  I’ve always been of the opinion that you should only be allowed to use the phrase “frak” if you’re fighting Cylons. Now, I don’t know if you are fighting Cylons, Xeni, but I can assume that you are not.

• [Ocker3]

  I found it hilarious how they’d ‘easternised’ (as opposed to westernised) the features of the various characters, to make them more relateable to their intended audience. Reminds me of the scene in Out of the Silent Planet (C S Lewis) where the protagonist is kidnapped and flown to Mars, and at the end of the story his full-body image is carved into stone to commemorate his journey, but his features are subtly adjusted to make him slightly resemble each of the three disparate races that live there, so that those who live there can more easily identify with him and believe that he existed. If something is Too different, too alien, are we not more likely to reject it as a myth?

• [amida]

  Xeni, do you speak Mandarin? Why is the Mandarin voice-over funnier?

• [Aristan]

  @Anon #7:

  “FYI tag error. China is not Taiwan.”

  I believe the people of Taiwan (Or at least the government) would likely disagree with you. The official name of the country is the Republic of China. The country we usually call China is the People’s Republic of China.

• [Anonymous]

  Props for “clustefrak.”

• [Anonymous]

  This is exactly the kind of thing Conan would get a huge kick out of. Will he see it?