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Funimation Addresses Prison School Dub Comments Over Gamergate Line

I'm not completely against rewriting lines if it makes the dub funnier or sound more natural, but that was bad a line, for one thing it really dates it, no one's gonna remember what the hell Gamergate is in ten years.

Dubs are kind of a luxury item now and not a necessity like it was for young anime fans growing up watching them on the TV. And while they'll always have an audience, the immediacy of subs and streaming (as well as the death of anime on television for a long time now) kind of makes dubs irrelevant except for the niche that wants them.

Wow, you actually believe that dubs are a luxury and are only desired by a niche crowd.

Not everyone does get the senpai thing so changing that only makes sense.

"Respect your elders" is a universal in all cultures and for all of human history.

Changing a line that "wasn't important" into a new joke makes no sense. If it was a japanese cultural reference joke already, and they changed it to an (evidently obscure) western one, then it would make sense.

Why not just turn every random line into a joke, then? "Hi guys" "Time to do homework" "Oh I'm late for class", turn them all into pop culture puns. I mean you don't lose anything right?

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And what's your point? Most folks here still watch dubs (and patiently wait for them to be made) while the sub watchers are the ones in the minority. You make it sound like dubs should just die off or something. I could care less what sub purists say as they can't be taken seriously. Subs shmubs. I only go with subs if, and only if, there is no dub that exists for a show (Uta Kata and Turn A Gundam, to name a couple).

That is something that only makes sense in Japan.

That is something that only makes sense in Japan. Keep it up people, you don't look like scaredy-cats at ALL.

Long post being said dubs are still extremely popular with many fans and it'll be a long while before they truly become niche as you say, though a large factor going forward will be how companies adapt with simuldubs and getting things out faster because if theres one absolutely truth is that many fans want it now and not later.

johan.eriksson.9003 wrote:

That is something that only makes sense in Japan.

I guess we should change riceballs to donuts too.

Even if you were going to change the senpai line to something localized, changing it to something that's a joke or some edgy nonsense is out of line. Jokes should be changed to jokes, and non-jokes should be changed to non-jokes. This is not a youtube abridged series. If the rest of the dub was fine, then that seems to show that this line was even more of an anomaly, an oversight, a mistake, something he threw in there while getting enraged on twitter with some egg account. It clearly was, but they don't seem to want to own up to it, which is just a further embarrassment on their part.

To use your terms, sacrificing fidelity for transparency when you can't have both is not wrong either way. It is just the translator's preference. However, if you are going to sacrifice fidelity, but not increase transparency, then that isn't really translation. That is then simply inserting your own opinion into the work and essentially rewriting it.

Here there is originally no joke nor insult. Fidelity is lost because material is being added, but adding that line doesn't increase transparency. That is just poor work.

In the sub, the lines went something like this:

Your face looks something like Mori, the previous prime minister.

And the dub went:

You look like that American guy... you know, like Bill Clinton.

Granted, the entire scene was sort of lost in translation (especially the I wish I were a bird line), but the context was changed in order for American audiences to relate.

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