The Lock-up

Yesterday my girlfriend and I went out to Sanjo to a themed restaurant called The Lock-up. As you may (or may not) know, Japan has a wide variety of themed type restaurants and cafes, the most commonly themed one being maid cafes where the maids play games with customers and almost pamper to their every needs. However, The Lock-up is far from that - it is a prison themed restaurant, with the waiters/waitresses dressing up as police officers or convicts, and each of the booths set up as prison, which does it make it cosy for couples... when you're not being spooked by the random activities of monsters and convicts wreaking havoc on the poor customers.

Anyway, I should probably start from the very beginning. After being greeted by the waitress, she guided us to a waiting area, which we had no idea what we were supposed to do at the time... until the lights went out and someone seemingly dressed up like Sadako from The Ring comes out, crawling along the floor to scare us. They disappear, and the red lights go on, before switching off again, and the strobe lights kick in and Sadako pops again, standing right behind us. They really go all out in creating a terrifying atmosphere. I was more amazed at the effort put in to it, rather than being scared. Unfortunately, my girlfriend was too terrified to share in my appreciation （笑）
After the initial scaring, we're guided to the next room where another waitress dressed in police uniform greets us and explains some of the details, and asks us which of us is to be handcuffed and what crime we committed. My girlfriend told the officer that I eat too much (でも、それはうそじゃない（笑））, and hence, I was arrested on those charges. Leading us along, with me cuffed to the waitress, she guides us to our table, which resembles a prison cell. Because each of the tables are partitioned off, it means that my girlfriend and I could enjoy each other's company without having to look at other tables... or so we thought. After receiving our first order of drinks, the lights go off, sirens start blaring, and criminals and monsters start wreaking havoc on all the unfortunate customers - from the sound of the all screaming throughout the restaurant, there were clearly a lot of girls dining that night. My girlfriend was totally freaking out, but again, I was more impressed than scared with the effort they go to in order to create a really scary atmosphere. After a good few minutes of scaring the customers (with some of the monsters/convicts prodding me with a glow stick because I could not stop laughing when they came in to our booth and tried to scare us), eventually the police show up to save the day and start "shooting" all the criminals and monsters, with one of them "dropping dead" just outside our booth. As an extra, it was someone's birthday, so they were playing "happy birthday" while scaring the birthday guy/girl (I couldn't tell, since we're all in booths). After that, the black curtains lift up and we are greeted to a nice view of the area and Kamogawa (the restaurant is up on the 6th floor). While my girlfriend did not enjoy being scared, she found it to be an interesting experience, and admitted that she was glad that I was having fun.

 

For the meals and drinks, it's pretty much izakaya style of meals, with the main focus being on the prison themed drinks and cocktails. The only condition for dining in is that you have to order at least one drink, but since there are non-alcoholic cocktails also, it accommodates for everybody's preferences. The menu has a wide selection of cocktails, and it tells you the strength of the cocktails with a little graph. I had two cocktails, but they weren't all that strong which is nice. Presentation-wise, they were all horror/prison themed, so they look really nice, albeit a little pricey, but part of the cost is covering the work in producing these cocktails. We also had some takoyaki (octopus balls), though we were warned that one of them was a really spicy one, and my girlfriend really wanted that one. Guess who ended up eating the spicy one? (hint: It wasn't her). We also had nachos, though the middle was a little bit cold. However, the corn chips were really nice. We also had some karaage, but it was made black so it ended up looking like coal - it tasted nice though. Finally, we finished up with a chocolate parfait that is made to look like it's partially exorcised. All of this with the view, it was a good experience.
One thing though: while the cost of the individual drinks and meals is not too bad, it does accumulate in the end. Ultimately, between the two of us, it was about 6000円 - a little over $60. However, considering that Australia does not have these kind of themed restaurants, and I've never been to a themed restaurant/izakaya such as this, it was worth giving it a try. Well, I did go to Sweets of Ninja previously, but the experience was nowhere near as extreme as The Lock-up.

If you haven't experienced this kind of thing before, I would strongly recommend giving The Lock-up, or any themed restaurant a try (though probably stay away from maid cafes if you want to keep your dignity...), especially if you're one who's in to scary things.