AS SEEN ON TV: ODDJOB

We're sticking with commercial appearances today......

ODDJOB

AS SEEN IN:

VICKS 44 commercial

CREATED BY:

Ian Fleming

PORTRAYED BY:

Harold Sakata

TV DIMENSION:

Earth Prime-Time

From Wikipedia:

Oddjob (often written as "Odd Job") is a henchman to the villain Auric Goldfinger in the James Bond film and novel, "Goldfinger". In the film he was played by the Japanese American actor Harold Sakata.

Oddjob, who also appears in the James Bond animated series and in several video games, is one of the most popular characters in the Bond series. The character, from his unusual appearance, manners, strength and method of killing, forms the archetype for which many henchmen of the Bond film series were based on, which includes Jaws, Nick Nack, Chang and Gobinda.

Oddjob's real name is unknown. He is named by Goldfinger as that describes his duties to his employer. Korean-born (all Goldfinger's staff are Korean), he is extremely strong, proven in one sequence where he breaks the railing of a staircase with his hand and a mantel with his foot. Oddjob is described as being a squat man with arms like thighs and [with] black teeth. A black belt at karate, Oddjob is also an expert with a bow and arrow, and with his metal, razor-edged throwable bowler hat. He has a cleft palate that renders his speech unintelligible to everyone except Goldfinger.

In addition to killing people who might cause trouble for Goldfinger, Oddjob functions as his personal guard, chauffeur, and manservant (though not his golf caddy, as depicted in the film). He has a taste for cats as food, apparently acquired in Korea when food was in short supply (Bond frames Goldfinger's yellow cat for destruction of surveillance film, and as punishment, sees the cat given to Oddjob for dinner).

He is killed when Bond uses a knife to shatter the window next to his seat on an aircraft, which depressurises the plane and blows Oddjob out of the window, a fate transferred to Auric Goldfinger in the film version. (According to my friend Neil Shovlin, Oddjob was electrocuted by James Bond in the Cineverse.)

In 2009, Manolith ranked Odd Job as the fourth best James Bond henchman.

Oddjob's Toobworld presence can be found either before the events of the movie, or even during it - if Oddjob commuted to work with Mr. Goldfinger and actually lived in the suburbs with Mrs. Oddjob (or Mrs. Ramoo, as we'll see......)

[Harold Sakata] appeared as Oddjob in a series of TV commercials for Vicks Formula 44 cough syrup in the 1970s. The advertisement showed Oddjob with a nasty cough, which results in him demolishing the neighborhood and frightening a woman inside her house as his cough spasms grow worse and worse. The woman grabs a bottle of Vicks Formula 44 and races for the door, only to see Oddjob karate chop through it. She quickly opens the door and gives him a spoonful of the cough syrup, which cures his cough. The two bow to each other, and the woman looks past Oddjob to see the destruction he has caused.

The events of the movie "Goldfinger" could be only based on reality and not a reflection of the actual reality. (Except in the Cineverse.) "Goldfinger" could be what "UNreel" wants the world to think happened, when in fact, Oddjob may have escaped death from electrocution - at least as far as his televersion was concerned.

If so, it could be that he showed up in Toobworld three years after the movie came out, this time known by his real name of Ramoo. With Auric Goldfinger dead, and times being what they were, he took a job as the henchman to a crazed big-game hunter named Jonathan Kincaid. They traveled to a nearly deserted island where they found seven stranded castaways... and Kincaid decided that one of them would be his quarry.

Unfortunately for him and Ramoo, Kincaid chose Willie Gilligan, who had divine protection from the Universe......

BCnU!