Heavy Load (Animated short)

**Heavy Load** (ヘビーロード *Hebīrōdo*) is a 1986 Japanese, adult animated short produced by Tukobon and directed by Shigeru Itō. It won the Academy Award for Best Japanese Animated Short Film in 1987. It premiered on August 12, 1986, in theaters in Japan and was shown alongside the 1986 Japanese, adult animated feature *Mortal Combat*. In this short, a character of an unknown species, named Jiko, travel to a hotel when he encounters some bowels issues and needs to find the bathroom. It is also available on home video versions of the film. In 2013, the short was remade into 3D, and it was theatrically re-released alongside the 3D re-release of *Mortal Combat* in Japanese theaters. The short was also released in 3D on *Mortal Combat* Blu-ray 3D, on October 19, 2014.

## Summary

An anthropomorphic character named Jiko went to the hotel with his wife and family, but Jiko is afraid he will get in trouble if he makes messes like poop in the hotel. His son Koji then decides to talk to him about the poop.

## Plot

The short begins with Jiko and his family leaving his house for a room at the Wonderland hotel. He overhears a human man saying that if any person poops or pees without using the bathroom, they would get in trouble. Jiko, who wore a transparent underwear and pants, wants to ask his wife Yoshi (who didn't hear the argument) what the poop is, but causing his daughter to drop the expensive vase he just bought for her birthday. So instead, Jiko asks his son Koji about the poop; he reacts by gasping, confirming Jiko's belief that the rules has the power to make children and pets obey. He then tells his father about how poop was made. Then Jiko's cheeks turned red, and Koji tells him that he had a fever. Then suddenly, Jiko sees Yoshi turning into a talking UFO before his very eyes. Then the UFO turns back into Yoshi, when Jiko realizes that it was just a hallucination. Jiko later tells Koji about his hallucination. He tells Jiko that he probably has stomach problems. But he IS interrupted by Jiko passing a gas, and the sound of his bowels scares him. Jiko felt pain in his stomach, shooting out a giant flatulence out of his butt. Koji laughed to his father as he felt even more gas in his bowels. Unfortunately, Jiko felt something sticky and gooey in his pants, thus Koji suggesting that it is poop instead. There were more than poop in his bowels and he had a sudden urge. Jiko grabbed his stomach with both hands to try and get rid of the abdominal pain. The creature looked down and heard his belly rumble. Afterwards, he dashed quickly to the bathroom after he is unable to hold his excrement.

He then went near the bathroom door, he yelped with panic when he saw the automated locker on the door turned on. He realizes someone was in the bathroom. Then he waited for someone to leave the bathroom. After the bathroom was empty, the locker was turned off and the random creature left the door open, letting Jiko go in the bathroom. Once he entered the bathroom, he accidentally defecated his pants, and a very large, half-a-foot poop begin to seep out of his anus slowly and landed onto the seat of his underwear. At the same time Jiko passes gas, another load of large poop came out. Jiko walked to the toilet (with his poop still coming out), but his stomach started to spasm and hurts worser. Jiko continued to poop and fart in a process until he realized that it was too late to reach the toilet. When he passes gas again, more poop came out and a bulge forms in his pants, turning it brown. Afterwards, Jiko had an iadea and makes a huge, heavy load of poop is his pants. He felt relieved that pooping outside of the toilet will be more fun that it be.

Meanwhile, back in the hotel, Yoshi suddenly had to go to bed. While she walked near the bathroom, she smells a bad stench coming from the bathroom. Then she ignored it and proceeded to the the bed.

Jiko took a step outside of the bathroom and started walking back to the hotel where lots of people were located. He then suddenly hear a gossip on Koji's conversation with a man next door, and he became more nervous. Koji revealed that only non-human creatures can poop in the clothing or pants rather than pooping on the toilet or in the bathroom. Jiko finally knew from the very second that he was relieve. The short ends with a cat-like creature pooping in his pants in the bathroom.

## Quotes

* Unnamed Daughter: Man your stations! Red alert! Red alert! Take cover!

* Jiko: Enough with those dumb folks already!

* Jiko: Not even Pac-Man would stop us!

* [After Jiko finished pooping in his suit]
* Jiko: [pants] I've never seen myself poop like that. [looks at the brown bulge in his suit] I had that since my incident during the store.

* [Jiko holds his stomach.]
* Jiko: Owww...
* Yoshi: Dear, you don't feel so well!

* [Someone on TV won the championship:]
* Crowd: Kyryu! Kyryu! Kyryu!
* Koji: Horray for Kyryu!
* Crowd: Party! Party! Party!
* Jiko: Party? Son, wait a second!

* [Jiko groans and grunts as his face has turned red.]
* Jiko: I think my heart's gonna burst.
* [Cuts to under his tail where poop is seen seeping out of his butt.]

## Trivia

* When Jiko's cheeks turn red, the unknown character that resembles Polly from the PBS' PTV Park fame walks near him. The character then react to Jiko's cheeks turning red and ran off.
* When this short was shown in TV Tokyo on November 15, 2019, the broadcast was hijacked with a screen that had a background similar to the 1998 Klasky-Csupo logo. It had a picture of Mario and a message above him reads "Me and other Nintendo characters were trapped in an Unown dimension! HELP!" and a repeating message with Bowser Koopa's voice saying "I HATE NINTENDO! TV TOKYO ROCKS!" The text disappeared and the background changed to a Japanese cartoon of a caricature of Shigeru Miyamoto holding a whip and shouting "Get out, Bowser!" While this happened, one audio clip of Mark Elliott saying "Disney..." and Luigi saying "...lay a dozen eggs!" (as heard on the 1936 *Felix the Cat* short "The Goose That Laid the Golden Egg") were repeated. This broadcast signal intrusion ended with a video clip from *Pokémon: The Movie 2000* with Lugia swimming underwater while "Better Off Alone" by Alice Deejay plays in the background and then cut to a Nickelodeon Pinchface bumper with the crowd screaming "AAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!" off-screen. Then, we cut to a commercial break. The person who hijacked the broadcast, the American hacker named Joesph "Mr. Pokémon" Franks, was found and arrested later on that same day when the Nintendo Switch games *Pokémon Sword* and *Pokémon Shield* were released internationally at certain stores.
* Ayumi from *Mortal Combat* makes two appearances in this short when Jiko held his stomach and again behind the door after Jiko finished defecating.
* When this short airs on NHK on June 23, 2020, there was a special footage of Urshifu standing on the cliff before the short's title. This was done to commemorate the release of "The Isle of Armor" expansion pass for *Pokémon Sword and Shield*. On this version, after the end of the short comes a 3-minute footage, with a serial code at the bottom of the screen that allows players of *Pokémon Sword* and *Pokémon Shield* to obtain a Volcarona that knows Fusion Flare.
* In the original version, the song "Go Go Yellow Screen" by Digital Emotion was played on Jiko's tape player. This was cut off in the 3D re-release, replacing the song with the theme from *Mortal Combat*.
* The TV screen on Jiko's rented room that says "Kaos was here" is a direct reference of the *Mortal Combat*.
* Right before Jiko says "I've never seen myself poop like that", there was an image of Son Goku from *Dragon Ball*.
* On November 16, 2018, a crossover segment is added in the beginning of this short with Jiko and the Pokémon Pikachu and Eevee, who talks to the viewer about the digestion. This only happens on the YouTube channel website.
	+ Coincidentally, this short is released on YouTube the same day that *Pokémon: Let's Go, Pikachu! and Let's Go, Eevee!* were released in stores internationally.
	+ Also,this short is released on YouTube followed by selected clips from *Pokémon the Movie: The Power of Us*.
* Pac-Man is mentioned in this short.
* Some of the quotes in this short were later remade in several *Rugrats* episodes, mainly "King Ten Pin".
* Right before Jiko catches the bowel movement, there are only two symptoms that he had: Fever and hallucination.
* Koji saying "Wowsers!" is a direct quote from Inspector Gadget. This line is cut off in the edited version.
* Before it was released in theaters, a VHS tape of this short was given away Seiyu stores in June 30, 1986 for a limited time.
* Jiko's line "Enough with those dumb folks already!" became a popular phrase on many internet sites.
* Jiko's daughter's dialogue ("Man your stations! Red alert! Red alert! Take cover!") was later used in the *Spongebob' **'**Squarepants* episode "The Algae's Always Greener
* When this short aired in syndication in 1997, the ending of the show has a 1994 Super Nippon Productions "Creepy Face" logo instead of the "Tukobon" logo. This was fixed in 1998 by the time the *Pokémon* anime was aired.
	+ When this short aired on the US GNC channel on October 22, 2020 (the same day *The Crown Tundra* Expansion Pass for *Pokémon Sword and Shield* is released), it accidentally uses the 2017 Sacred Fire "Ho-Oh II" logo instead in the same fashion. This was fixed in 2021.
* During Jiko's hallucination scene, the talking UFO from the anime *Rose Marie!* made a surprise appearance although it was actually Yoshi.
* This short is more cartoonish than any of the any Japanese animated short directed by Shigeru Itō.
* Despite being the adult animated short, there is no profanity or genitals.
* Some of the animation used in the scene where Jiko hallucinates were reused on *Pokémon: The First Movie*.
* The music during the some scenes sounds like an instrumental version of "You Spin Me Round (Like a Record)" by Dead or Alive.