entertainment

Jude Law stars in Japanese Pepsi commercial as legendary demon from tale of 'Momotaro'

11 Comments
By Oona McGee, RocketNews24

In Japanese folklore, "Momotaro," or "Peach Boy," remains one of the country’s most well-known tales. The ancient story of a hero’s quest to defeat a beast on Demon Island, with a dog, monkey and pheasant by his side, has recently been given an awesome Hollywood-style reboot by Pepsi Japan, who’ve picked up on the core theme of “defeat those stronger than you”, and used it as their tagline for an ad campaign of epic proportions. So far, we’ve seen the tale play out in a series of four commercials, from Episode Zero through to Episode Three, and now it’s time for the latest instalment in the series, which gives us the back story of the villainous demon on the island, played by Jude Law.

Watch the ad below in full screen to immerse yourself in the stylised environment of Jude Law’s character, a tormented demon who was once a man protecting people on his island before they banished him to the caves.

Episode Four brings us close to the climax of the story, as the Peach Boy, Momotaro, arrives on the island and prepares to go head-head with the feared demon. Despite being labelled a villain in the original story, this clip fleshes out the character of the demon, with the British actor bringing a sense of humanity to its back story, which has us empathising with the beast’s sad origins.

As the clip begins, the subtitles explain that the demon once lived among the people, who hailed him as their bravest hero for his strength, until one day, someone who envied his popularity sent a fearful opponent to fight him.

In order to defeat the dangerous beast and protect the people, the man gave up his mortal life, drawing upon a bottomless reserve of power that actually frightened the people. Fearing for themselves, they locked him away in a cave on the island.

The anger and sorrow he felt after being betrayed welled up and released itself in flames from inside his body, transforming him into a frightening demon, giving birth to the name “Demon Island”.

This is the demon Momotaro will now have to fight, summoning up the courage to “defeat those stronger than you” in the closing shot, which paves the way for the next spectacular instalment in the series.

While we’ll have to wait to see whether the British actor will appear again in the next commercial, we can see what he has to say about the series in the on-set interview here, which starts at 3:35, following the trailers and clip for Episode Four. With Law revealing his love of Japanese culture and food, and his desire to work on a Japanese feature film with Takeshi Kitano, we’re looking forward to seeing what the future holds for the Japan-loving star.

Source: Suntory Japan

Read more stories from RocketNews24. -- Pepsi’s awesome Peach Boy reboot continues with new episode, fire-breathing giants -- Vegetables are smarter than fruits: Three high IQ Japanese veggies -- “But we’re speaking Japanese!”: Humorous video confronts lingering stereotypes in Japan

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11 Comments
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Frikken awesome commercial, more like a movie trailer. I wonder what obscene amount they paid him.

2 ( +3 / -1 )

Someone NEEDS to make the movie! WOW!

2 ( +3 / -1 )

Wow, I'm gonna have to stop posting if Yubaru and I agree on something

1 ( +1 / -0 )

Wow, the power of sugar! (Gotta love JLaw!)

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Narrative in the video was not too clear, but the video set looked nice and expensive. Was Momotaro the guy with the katana?

Glad to have the background in Oona's article which I read next, which straightened it all out.

Not sure which has more sugar though, Pepsi Strong or Rocket News

2 ( +2 / -0 )

Was Momotaro the guy with the katana?

No Jude Law was momotaro

-3 ( +0 / -3 )

Jude Law stars in Japanese Pepsi commercial as legendary demon from tale of 'Momotaro'

Jude Law was momotaro

Somebody is wrong, which is it?

1 ( +1 / -0 )

Nice commercial. ThIs may be an asinine question but if he was so powerful, why did he allow himself to be locked away in a cave in the first place? Nice guy syndrome? What I learned from watching this. No good deed goes unpunished. Naivety and good will doth a monster make.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

I have no idea why they would choose a foreign actor when there are a ton of great Japanese actors available. sad story.

-1 ( +0 / -1 )

Here are Episodes 0, 1, 2, and 3 of this series

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6zqHoiA-dA

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Check out this awesome VFX breakdown of the PEPSI Strong spot - https://vimeo.com/179406436

0 ( +0 / -0 )

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