In mid-November 2024, footage resurfaced on social media supposedly showing a Japanese TV game show in which the players try to carry and serve hot tea in a slanted room.
One example of the video appeared on Reddit, where it had amassed more than 34,000 upvotes as of this writing.
A Japanese game show where contestants serve tea in a tilted restaurant
byu/Ultimate_Kurix ininterestingasfuck
Other iterations of the claim appeared on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube throughout 2023, while another shared to X in mid-October 2024 had garnered more than 21.7 million views.
That X user wrote: "The Japanese game show where contestants serve tea in a tilted restaurant."
(@HumansNoContext/X)
However, a community note accompanying the clip said it showed a comedic skit by Japanese YouTube channel Tokai On Air — not a game show. The community note was, indeed, correct.
YouTube's translated subtitles show the episode was included as part of a 26-minute video titled "The Leaning House," which was posted to the platform in late December 2021.
In it, the "girlfriend" character Keiko Suzuki brings her "boyfriend" character Hiroshi Shibata home to meet her parents.
"But the house is [a] little different, so don't be surprised by it," said Suzuki. "You see, there used to be a mountain here … because flattening it costs a lot of money. Build it like this! My dad said."
The duo are shown opening a slanted door into a tilted room to an awaiting father. The skit continues as the young man struggles to find his seat at the table — literally and metaphorically.
Though the footage was indeed Japanese, it depicted a skit, rather than a game show, which is why we have rated the video as miscaptioned.