Turbo Granny Is a Real Japanese Legend (Dandadan Explained)

Turbo Granny is not a joke the Dandadan author made up. She is a real Japanese urban legend that people have been telling since the 1990s: an old woman who runs next to your car at night, at your exact speed, staring at you.

In this episode Rin dresses as Momo and Tadashi as Okarun. Rin is half Japanese and sure of three things: Turbo Granny is invented, "Okarun" is just a short version of his surname, and the aliens are cartoon designs. Tadashi brought a folder of files. She's wrong on all three.

Turbo Granny, the real urban legend

The classic version is set on Mount Rokkō, the mountain right above Kobe. You're driving through a tunnel at night. Someone knocks on your window. You look over, and an old woman is running next to your car, keeping pace and staring at you. Yes, she knocks first. She's polite.

In some tellings she has a piece of paper taped to her back that says "Turbo". She also has a cousin in Hokkaidō, at Lake Mashū, who only lets you go if you drive faster than 100 km/h. In every version, if she passes you, you're cursed. Dandadan didn't invent her. It gave her a job.

The one thing Rin did know is hidden in the name. The polite word for an old lady is おばあさん (obāsan). The word in the monster's name is ババア (babaa): same woman, but rude. Something like "old hag". So ターボババア (tābo babaa) is literally "the Turbo Old Hag". People were scared of her, just not scared enough to be polite.

Okarun is named after Japan's toughest actor

Okarun's real name is Ken Takakura, and that's not a random name. Ken Takakura was the most famous tough guy in Japanese cinema. Born in 1931, died in 2014, more than two hundred films, almost all of them about yakuza and men who never smile. The whole country called him "Ken-san".

In Dandadan that name belongs to a skinny kid with glasses, and Momo is a huge fan of the actor. So she gives him a nickname. Rin's version: it's like a nerd named Clint Eastwood whose friend calls him "Nerdy". Later in the show, Okarun even says the actor's most famous line word for word: "I'm just clumsy, that's all."

The nickname itself is オカルン (Okarun): オカルト (okaruto), "occult", plus くん (kun). "Occult-kun". You add "kun" to a boy's name when you like him. Also when he works for you. Don't ask which one Momo means.

The aliens are real American UFO files

Rin is half right here. The designs are the author's, but both aliens come from real files. The red-faced one is the Flatwoods Monster. In Flatwoods, West Virginia, on September 12, 1952, seven witnesses saw a figure about three meters tall with a round red face and a pointed hood. The story ran in newspapers across America.

The bald ones are the Serpo. "Project Serpo" is a supposed secret exchange program in which twelve American soldiers traveled to another planet in the 1960s and came back in the 1970s. The story surfaced in 2005, on a mailing list.

Tadashi's favorite detail: Momo believes in ghosts, and what grabs her is an American UFO file. Okarun believes in aliens, and what curses him is a Japanese ghost. Each one gets attacked by the thing they didn't believe in. So ghosts versus aliens is really Japan versus America. In Japanese, a ghost is 幽霊 (yūrei). An alien is 宇宙人 (uchūjin), literally "universe person": universe, plus person.

Turbo Granny ends up inside a lucky cat

In episode 5, Momo's grandmother, a medium, does a ritual to pull the curse out of Okarun. The curse comes out, but Turbo Granny doesn't disappear. Her mind gets sealed inside a porcelain lucky cat, and her power stays inside Okarun. For the rest of the series she gives advice from inside a cat.

That cat is a 招き猫 (maneki-neko), "the cat that calls". It lifts a paw to call customers in, and you've seen one by the register in Japanese shops and restaurants all over the world. In the episode, Mikan has been sitting on the table with his paw up since the first second. Nobody has checked if he does 100 km/h.

So Rin goes zero out of three and pays up with a nickname for Tadashi, who spent the night with a folder of alien files: 宇宙人くん (uchūjin-kun), "Alien-kun". Half of Dandadan is real Japan. The other half is West Virginia.

Japanese words from this episode

FAQ

Is Turbo Granny a real Japanese legend?

Yes. Turbo Granny (Tābo Babaa) is a Japanese urban legend told since the 1990s. The classic version has her running beside cars in tunnels on Mount Rokkō, near Kobe.

Who is Okarun named after?

His real name, Ken Takakura, is the name of Japan's most famous tough-guy actor (1931 to 2014). Momo is a fan of the actor, which is part of why she calls him Okarun instead.

What does Okarun mean?

It's オカルト (okaruto), "occult", plus the suffix くん (kun) for boys. Roughly "Occult-kun".