The world of modding cars is truly a magical, endlessly amusing, and vast one. It doesn't matter where you're from, or how different you mod is than that other guy's, the fact is that you understand each other, because you're both into modding cars. You both really enjoy taking stock cars and changing them to reflect your likes and dislikes, whether to increase performance, to look cool, to be stylish, or to be unique, and outlandish. It's self-expression at its finest. Plus, it's wildly popular all over the world, from Britain to the EU, from the United States of America to Asian countries. That doesn't mean they're all the same, though, because the styles can vastly differ, and I mean vastly.

One of the weirder, stranger and spectacular car mod cultures you can find is found in the modded car culture of Japan. It's quite the bustling community of car mod lovers, and the owners of these cars get extraordinarily inventive with their builds, outrageous, even. There's cars that will blow your mind with how wild they are. They defy all laws of practicality and sense, and some seem to even defy all laws of physics as well. But that doesn't mean they aren't cool, even if they're insane. This article is going to look at 20 insane Japanese car mods that will blow you away.

20 Leopard Print Is A Nice Touch

Would it be wrong to call this over the top?

We've got not just one Lamborghini decked out to the nines with leopard print, bamboo spear tailpipes, Lamborghini doors, and a giant spoiler, but at least one other similarly fashioned, if not more than just one.

It's so over the top that it's hard to know how to react when you see it. It's obviously hopelessly impractical, but it's kind of supposed to be. Is that the point? To be so over the top, the most over the top? That's probably the case, and this is only one of the many to come.

19 Picnic Table Or Bumper?

That front bumper might just be for cutting the feet off pedestrians at the ankles... Because otherwise, it will slide under anything it's supposed to be protecting the car from, right up until the radiator gets smashed. Of course, that's obviously not the intent of the bumper, which really has no intent except to look cool.

Same with those exhaust pipes, coming straight from the engine and going up and over the whole car. Interesting design, but I have to admit, it gives it a kind of cool look, in a praying mantis kind of way.

18 Well, It's Got A Nice Color Palette

This car is beyond ridiculous. It looks like a crazy car that came straight from a cartoon. But in all seriousness this car is extreme. From the huge front scoop and an elongated front end to the giant exhaust pipes arching over the top of the car all the way back to the giant, ladder-like spoiler, this car is impractical in every way. It's actually styled in the manner of a huge subculture for modding cars in Japan, and it's called Bosozoku.

17 Okay Now We're Warming Up

Now we're talking. This is Japanese car culture at its finest, and most extreme. I love it. Just look at the swooping panels on that bus! Look at the back tail fins!

If you see other pictures of this thing, it's just as crazy looking from the back, which is impressive to accomplish just looking at the two front arms that extend six feet out from the engine.

I'm sure it's decked out on the inside with so much more than just that insane speaker system pictured. This is a fine example of Japanese car mods, and it's only getting better.

16 Amping It Up (Or Down)

This picture is worth a thousand words, but it kind of just leaves you at a loss for words. There's not really anything you can say about this car. It has the most negative camber I think I've ever seen on a car, let alone a Volkswagen Polo, with that small and strange of a rim tire combo set, painted matte grey. This is truly a next level build from Japan.

15 Holy Neon Lights

Okay, so this style of Japanese car mods is actually insane. Insanely cool, that is. The neon lights decking out this Lamborghini are only amplified by the crazy chrome, shapeshifting rainbow-ey paint job.

This car looks straight out of a sci-fi movie, but it's not, it's just from Japan.

Sometimes that's just the same thing. You could almost call them synonyms, especially when this kind of thing is created. Spectacular and so over the top. But undeniably cool.

14 Taking It To A Whole New Level

We've got a bit of a fusion with this Japanese car mod.

The extraordinarily aggressively negatively cambered wheels are paying homage to the subculture in Japan called "Onikyan" which means "Demon Camber".

Some of the cars found in this subculture put the "stance" subculture of America to shame. Of course, we've got the giant bamboo-ish spearlike exhaust pipe shooting out of the side of the car and extending to ungodly heights, which replicates the Takeyari subculture of car mods in Japan.

13 A Pink Stunner

This particular modded out Japanese car is quite extreme, although not as extreme as some. This to me looks like it takes on certain elements and styles from a lot of different Japanese car subcultures, with the extreme level of camber on the wheels, the huge exhaust pipes, and the long, although not overly done bumper and hood.

Seems like quite the setup, and done with a certain amount of restraint that gives this build a certain amount of class. Although I really do wonder how anyone is supposed to be able to get in and out of the back seat.

12 Missing A Paint Job

All this build is missing is a loud, clashy paint job to complement the outrageous additions to the front and side of this Nissan Z. It looks strangely at home, though, stalking the dingy city streets of whichever neighborhood this is.

That exhaust system is quite spectacular with neon yellow spider arms that splay backward right next to the passenger door. Don't burn your hair off getting out!

Also, that front end is positively futuristic, I think I'll take a nap on it.

11 Interpretive Exhaust Art

That is truly positively a blocky body kit. The true epitome of the word blocky. It's like a wedge, somewhere hiding inside that body kit is a car and an engine.

It gets blockier as you go backward too, with a ninety-degree ledge jutting out the back end of the car.

Plus that spoiler is basically my living room shelf painted red and glued onto the car. The red and blue exhaust pipes are quite unbalanced in proportion, which is funny to say considering they are sticking straight out of the car at eight feet tall.

10 Are Those Supposed To Be Antennae?

We've got another case of a doorstop here, this time in more of the manner of a skateboard ramp. I probably wouldn't park this car anywhere near a skatepark, just in case a couple of youth up to no good wouldn't try to attempt any kind of "sick grind" on my pride and joy.

The best part about these kinds of cars and modded cars, in general, is that it's clear to see that the owners of the cars really truly do love cars. They've got a serious passion for them, and they're not afraid for the world to see their creation, no matter how outrageous it is.

9 The Longest Miata In The History Of Time

It's kind of hard to see, but that white fin on the front is exactly that, a fin that sticks out perpendicular to the hood, just like a shark fin.

The back of the car is truly the sight to see, though, right angles, and paper-thin construction.

Careful driving that on the highway, you might rip the bodywork. Just for the record, this is not actually the longest Miata, but it's close. The longest one is a quality, homegrown Miata limo. Pretty high-class stuff.

8 Oh My Quadruple Decker

Optimus Prime? Is that you? This truck looks like it came right out of a Japanese version of Transformers. The amount of bling on this thing is so downright preposterous. I don't think I've ever seen more chrome in one place as I have with this truck.

The art of decking out trucks to the greatest extreme originated from a Japanese movie that featured decked out trucks like these.

Of course, these have since then been taken to the extreme, and have taken on other influences since their genesis in the mid 70's.

7 Strawberry Shortcake, Anyone?

The pink polka dots I think are a great addition to this outrageous build. It's not too over the top with its vibrancy, and the red accents beyond the red polka dots really bring it together.

Plus it's a convertible which is pretty cool. At least the exhaust pipes are at the back of this one, unlike the car next to it over there, with macaroni noodles stabbing out of the front hood. This is another classic example of Bosozoku car modification and a classic example of that. I'd love to drive one someday!

6 Is There A Truck In There?

It's a bit of a struggle to find the windshield in that mass of beautiful blue-green aquamarine goodness.

If you can spot the Canucks logo at about the middle of the mass of lights, you've found the windshield. As for the locations of everything else, your guess is as good as mine.

But man is that a sight to see. It towers above you, a solid wall of lights and decoration from the height of your ankles up to what to me looks like around fifteen feet. That's incredible, and I'm sure takes an incredible amount of power to be able to run. I'm sure it has several generators for showing off, and for pumping music through the amazing speaker system I'm sure it has.

5 A Bit Toned Down From The Rest

This is a more retro, grungy kind of Bosozoku build, but it comes equipped with your standard additions, that shovel on the front end, just in case you want to pick up a few snow plowing gigs in the winter, and the big doorsteps I'm sure you can't actually use.

Although this one is a bit unique because it has some pretty mean looking low-profile fins edging the hood of the car, and it doesn't have, at least that I can see, giant, ten foot long and tall exhaust antennae. It looks pretty slick, in all honesty.

4 An Infinite Tailpipe

I love the framing of this photo. It's genuinely good, because we have what looks like a fairly understated back end of a souped up modded car, but there's something in the way. It may take you a few moments to realize what that something is, but you know it's bright red.

Is that scaffolding? A car jack maybe? Is it a strange antenna of some sort? No, it can't be that. Then you realize it's actually the exhaust pipe. When you realize that fact, it's even better because while you know it's huge, it leaves the frame before you can get the actual scope of it. Could be the end of it just outside frame, or it could continue for ten more feet. Who knows.

3 Now That's Interesting

A cross between a genuine Latin low-rider and an over the top Japanese build, this modded out car is outrageous to the ultimate degree. We've got all kinds of additions and modifications to this car.

First off, we've got a lowered suspension and aftermarket rims, thick, flashy, chrome. Then we've got an aftermarket pink paint job complete with pin-striping.

But that's saying nothing about the pristine white leather interior, or the most obvious addition, Lamborghini doors. Not only Lamborghini doors but also drop cable doors of some design. Pretty over the top.

2 Monsters Inc. Meets Scooby Doo Meets Tokyo

This van is next level Japanese car mod culture. It's got a little bit of everything, and to be perfectly objective, it has incredibly well-done bodywork. We're talking full body, length of car bodywork, and it's sculpted artfully and it's balanced.

The bumper on the back is huge, the fender jutting out of the top rear point of the van is over the top but in a perfectly modest kind of way, and the front end is sculpted to the perfect tone so as not to make you hate it the instant you see it. Plus I love Monsters, Inc. Who doesn't?

1 Onikyan At Its Lowest

I can't really even begin with all the tacky things about this build. First off, at its very base, it's a lame, super compact car. Which makes anything you do to it instantly over the top and way tacky.

So the things like the spoiler, which is surprisingly small and not surprisingly completely useless, the giant exhaust pipes which look like they're about to fall off anyway just look silly, like a toy car.

Not to mention the aggressive lowering and ridiculously cambered wheels. Of course, that's the style, and that's fine, but at least have the grace to do it right. Is that tow cable just dragging on the ground? Who knows.

Sources: speedhunters.com, driven.co.nz, autoevolution.com, bosozokustyle.com