Pre-Iron Chef: Emeril blinds everyone with his spice weasel.

In other news, I hereby declare myself to be the #1 contender for JG's Bedroom Championship. Wait, that sounds completely gay.

This is the one with actual Iron Chefs, not Captain Kirk and Bruce Vilanche. It's gonna be totally, totally self-indulgent. I'm not sure why you need a "Making Of" before the battles have even aired, but here I am, doing my civic duty.

Earlier this week, I learned that Alliterative Food Nerd Alton Brown will be serving as "Culinary Commentator", which is fucking fabulous. Here is a picture of Mr. Brown being romanced by a fish, which, oddly enough, will come to be a running theme.

A.B. starts us off by fondling one of those yellow peppers that Chairman Kaga was so fond of. "If memory serves me right, the original Iron Chef was produced in Japan and featured Japanese master chefs all dressed up in bright silk pajamas doing culinary battle with challengers who traveled from all over the planet just to put their careers on the line in a so-called 'Kitchen Stadium'." There's a shot of bald Kandagawa bringin' the steel. Alton has a Kaga wig and foppish robe, which is possibly the best thing ever. He bites the pepper, but some midcarder tells him that the Chairman will kill him if he catches him wearing his stuff. Via Karate.

During the next hour, we'll find out how Mario Batali gets his eyeliner applied. Riveting. Here's a sneak peek at our judges. Heh, J. Peterman from Seinfeld. Midcarders... midcarders... TED ALLEN from Queer Eye! And Big Pussy! Wow. The new Chairman is actually some Jappy guy. I wish it was La Parka.

Factoids. Iron Chef began in October 1993. Here's some of the grosser footage from the O.G. Kaga yellin', ducks with the heads still on, octopi, and what have you. Kaga rides out on a white horse. Pepper-biting montage. Haha, the first Iron Chef episode was "Salmon Confront". It's never been seen in America, and Kaga had a gay little haircut.

The vice president of the Food Network explains the impact Iron Chef made in Japan. Here's Kandagawa bisectin' fish heads. Iron Chef fans giggle about how them Japs is crazy. Ted likes the robes. We see the specs for a gaudy new Kitchen Stadium. The American Iron Chefs ascend on Gangrel's Hellevator. Behind each one is a giant painting of his fat head. Is Batali wearing elf slippers? Food TV dude tells us what an honor it is to be selected as a Iron chef.

Commercials. "I got your Miracle Whip right here."

The new Chairman wears a Yakuza suit. Hey, maybe it's Sakoda. Meet America's Iron Chefs.

Bobby Flay, Professional Dickweed: Yo, you dealin' with the sizzle factor. Bobby went to French culinary school before discovering that he preferred dirty Mexican food. I'm spicy! "I'm gonna try to go to the ingredients I know, like an old friend." Tortillas are his only friends because other humans can't tolerate him.

Mario Batali, Fat Plumber: He'll be working in the "Italian vernacular". Fuhgeddaboudit.

Wolfgang Puck, Un-American: He put Californian cuisine on the map, whatever the hell that is. Either Wolfgang has more than ten restaurants, or Alton Brown lost some fingers. In the war.

We learn about the first time each competitor saw the original Iron Chef. Kandagawa is getting an unheard-of amount of play.

Well, here come the Japs. Hiroyuki Sakai, French Phenom: "Delacroix" is said. His new dubbed voice is awful. I think that's the Food TV commercial announcer. Sakai's never lost a fish battle. Mario describes him as a "Zenmaster". Gay.

Masaharu Morimoto, Bingo Hall Proprietor: They subtitle his English because we're apparently too stupid to understand it. Double M wanted to be a baseball-playing sushi chef. Flay: "He comes to kill." I wish he'd succeeded against you, Bobby. We recap the two battles Flay and Morimoto split. YOU DISHONOR YOUR CUTTING BOARD BY POSING ON IT, SIR!!! Morimoto: "He stood up on the cutting board! That's not right!"

Commercials. Food Network commercials are weird. Many Native Americans died during the construction of your Mohawk carpet. All these depressing American Heart Association commercials are just fabulous.

Alton tours the catering table for some reason. It sucks. 20 feet away is Kitchen Stadium v.2, which is better. Let's learn about the ingredients. Freshness is key. There are some sea urchins in a fucking cardboard box. The "Culinary Producer" lady describes the ridiculous pantry. "Arrowroot Powder". Some "Food Shopper" had to go to Japan to purchase Morimoto's special ingredients. Uh, I think you can get panko bread crumbs in America, dawg. Nori are little seaweed wrappings, I think. Also the name of a Dwarf in The Hobbit. Buckwheat noodles. And lotus root.

Jesus, look at those giant turnips or whatever. "They look like a giant turnip." I just said that, bitch. Clean the potatoes out of your ears. It's actually a type of Japanese radish. Culinary Producer Jill Whoever will apparently be feeding Alton his lines. It's a Tony Schiavone situation. "Alton has a limited view." Because of his thick nerd glasses, no doubt.

Commercials. Paul Heyman bathes in Philadelphia Cream Cheese.

A.B. shows us around Kitchen Stadium. He can pronounce "hallowed", so he'll never be Vince McMahon's priest. Each chef gets identical equipment and ingredients and whatnot, except for Bobby Flay. All his appliances are electrocuting deathtraps. Here's the convection oven. And a "salamander", which is apparently a broiler. Alton claims he's going to steal it. Now we're on to RVD's favorite piece of equipment, the smoker. And the electric deep fryer, which Japan's Kitchen Stadium didn't have. Double ovens, a million burners, and the McGriddle. Flay: "It's really on the chef. It has nothing to do with the equipment, because it's all been given to us." What the fuck, Flay? You cried like a bitch about inferior equipment after you jobbed out the first time. Grr.

Morimoto thinks the brand new Kitchen Stadium is "too convenient". He wants to be forced to fight off irradiated monsters while he cooks. The total combined cost of the original Iron Chef's ingredients was around eight million dollars. Alton says "haute". Sakai has "lost his privacy" due to Iron Chef fame. Here's some insane thing where Gordon Elliott took Iron Chefs into American homes to mock their food. Morimoto: "Cooking!" Michiba: "Cooking!" Fat Food Critic Jeffrey Steingarten: "The rise of the celebrity chef. They have groupies, of course. I can tell you, however, that food critics such as myself have better groupies, and, um, more groupies. They're not as athletic, um, but they're much more literary." Creepy. Wolfgang tells us that some ho dumped him when she learned he was a cook.

Some vapid EXTRA correspondent: "You can't go anywhere anymore without seeing, you know, Wolfgang Puck." Yeah, I saw him at the gas station just the other day. Idiot. Puck hits Flay with a newspaper. He must have piddled on the rug. Wolfgang says that we have more talent in America than anywhere in the world. You're from Austria, Wolfgang.

Commercials. Eh.

Puck: "You know, somebody really cuts their finger really badly, burns themself really badly, or so on. So there's always some concern, you know, just like a racecar driver. You always have a concern about an accident." Chefs are totally hardcore. "Iron Chef Morimoto was once bitten by the razor-sharp teeth of a monkfish." And a squid got Sakai. Alton: "How many people actually knew that, uh, squid have teeth? Well, you know, they're not really teeth, it's more like a beak. They evolved from bivalves, and... never mind." Nerds are totally hardcore.

Here's the story about Bobby Flay nearly cutting off his finger and then being electrocuted due to leaky sinks. That's because it was a makeshift Kitchen Stadium in New York, which means that America sucks. And Morimoto bitches about the cutting board showboating. "All tools, knives, cutting board and tongs, chopsticks. All cooking equipment, very, you know, like a... sacred." Like a sacred. Flay: "RAISE THE ROOF, YO!!!" He didn't know cutting boards were sacred to those wacky Japs. "To me, it was just a very American thing to do." To be an asshole? Indubitably! Sakai: "Who knows? I may do it next time!"

Flay lost, whined about "sabotage", and won his rematch in Japan. That time Bobby flung the cutting board before jumping around and raising the roof. That's clearly less offensive than before! Morimoto had to drink green tea to ease his moral outrage. That American sumo guy gave Bobby some dap.

Commercials. Wonderbread grants you the power of flight, I guess. Igor Singer M.D. is as creepy and wooden as you'd expect a person named "Igor" to be.

So who's the new Chairman? He's Kaga's retarded nephew, Eugene! Here's ridiculous blurred footage of his Kung-Fu training. "Our ultimate competition is with ourselves. That is what my uncle told me when I would visit him as a young boy. Now, I prepare myself for my most savory(?) challenge. My uncle, the man the world knows as Kaga the Chairman, has decided that, although America is a young country, we now possess the proper palette to host our own Iron Chef competition." Kaga Junior BOWS to the pepper, but BITES THE APPLE! OMG HE'S FOLLOWING HIS OWN PATH!!!1! "Kaga honors me by asking that I serve as Chairman of our own Gourmet Academy and preside over this most glorious event. He has sent gifts that will help pass the torch between our two worlds and he has dispatched two of his bravest champions. These heroic figures, these Iron Chefs, will compete on these shores in our new Kitchen Stadium and reveal to us their tantalizing lessons of taste, texture, and technique. The Iron Chefs have traveled far, not only to do honorable battle with American's finest chefs, but also to carry a flame that burns within each and every one of us... that undying thirst and eternal hunger to be our best. To be... the best." He stabs an invisible opponent with his sword. Now he does fucking BACKFLIPS, then STRAIGHTENS HIS SPORTCOAT. Holy crap, that was the most awesome and retarded thing ever. I hope this guy is Hirohito. BANG A GONG WE ARE AWWWNNNN!!!

Final Thoughts: Well, now I'm totally pumped.