Forum - View topicHey, Answerman! [2009-05-15]
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crilix
Posts: 208 |
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I admire the business logic Funimation has in place right now, which is spreading their content on as many delivery platforms as possible, but their direct anti-piracy efforts are starting to backfire, I believe. You can't nurture a "core" otaku market if you're willing to stomp it out of existence. |
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phoenixphire24
 Posts: 260 Location: SoCal |
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The only problem I have with fan-subs is when, for some reason I can't fathom, they choose to use white font when most of the backgrounds are white, thus preventing you from reading most or all of the subs. What's the point of subbing if you can't bloody read it?
I wish CN still showed anime like back in the day. My brother and I spent many happy afternoons after school and during the summer watching anime on TV before we had any access to anime any other way. I have, however, recently discovered the brilliance of Chowder. It's not quite as good as Spongebob, but still really good. |
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TatsuGero23
 Posts: 1277 Location: Sniper Island, USA (It's in your heart!) |
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I find it hard to imagine anyone really liking or loving the first season Negima series. I could never get over the fact that it seemed like the guys behind the anime originally planned for the serie to run longer so they didn't use too much money on the first half of the series in hopes to stay in budget for when a second season or 26 to 50 more episodes were greenlited. "Then they find out, oh... we are only doing one 26 episode season... We need an ending!!"
The pacing was horrible and the art quality really stale. Even if it stayed true to Ken Akamatsu story, it really dragged and did it little justice or showed little signs that the creative team felt inspired or even liked the source material. The reason the plot twist towards the end of the series felt like it came right out of left field is cause it was. The series wasn't green lited to go on so they had to make some kind of ending cause they couldn't go on with what the manga had when they only had less then half a season to go. So what's the easiest way to make a sudden change to the plot? Kill someone off. It funny cause I felt that those episodes were some of the best animated, most interesting episodes of the anime series even though it was a balantant fubar on the anime teams part. Also you could tell they were blowing the rest of their budget on these since the quality jumped way up compared to the rest of the series. I though if they had just taken the same approach as they did with Love Hina, it would have at least been decent and not just some kind of example of a poor attempt to underestimate/trick fans and sponsors to make or watch series fueled solely on name value of the source material and not do a redeeming thing in their own product until it was too late. Granted I don't like the Love Hina anime either but you know, at least it looked good even if the stories and fillers (Can you really have fillers in a 26 episode series?) were kind of weak and the movie OVA seemed a bit of a cash grab. |
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irishninja
 Posts: 344 Location: Seattle-ish |
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I haven't seen many fansubs, and with the exception of Air four years ago I haven't downloaded any myself, but the ones I have been shown make me wonder why they are so popular. I am turned off by all the things Brian mentioned in his post, plus:
1) Gratuitous swearing. According to both Japanese instructors I have had, anime characters already swear more than normal Japanese. We don't need the random f-bomb to make them seem even more edgy or "cool." This also ties into... 2) Incorrect translations. I haven't taken a lot of Japanese courses and I'm certainly not skilled at the language, so if I know the fansubbers got it wrong (and not in a way that makes the English better... just... wrong), I question their skill not only in Japanese but also in English. 3) Unsubbed lines. Seriously, if you're going to go through the trouble of making a fansub, at least be thorough about it. Don't just not sub a few lines. Even if the lines are inconsequential, I want to know what was said. |
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rizuchan
 Posts: 974 Location: Kansas |
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As a person that's done many minor fansubbing projects (mostly PVs and video game promo videos), I can say this about karaoke subs: all they are are a chance for the typesetters to say "I'm a better programmer than you". I've done some very simple karaoke subs before and the scripts they use make little sense to me, and there are no tutorials or teaching materials to be found in a general google search, other than "learn it yourself, we don't have time to teach you" like it's a hidden art.
But can't we all admit, the karaoke subs are pretty cool in the rare case that you don't care what's going on in the opening theme? (I never did them until I actually got requests and thought, "why not try?") And even though I usually just use Aegisub's defaults for karaoke subs, there is some satisfaction to doing them and having them look kinda cool, even though I myself hate karaoke subs.
I kinda get what they mean. It's because spoiler[She agrees to wait for him, rather than him deciding to stay with her.] My dad and I both agreed it would have been more romantic to end with the latter. Mind you, I wasn't screaming "sexist!" the whole time, but I can see how it could be interpreted as such. |
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corinthian
Posts: 264 |
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I think the excessive swearing is some childish subber's notion of "anime is more mature, and mature means swearing!" Even if it would be out of place for the character, or their age. Middle school children probably don't swear too much, and I'm sure there must be equivalencies to "crap" and "darn." Speaking of equivalencies, I'm of the opinion that they exist and they should be used. If you can have a note saying "This word means that in English" then just use that unless there truly is no translation or it sounds really awkward. Fansubbers are translators, not teachers or cultural ambassadors. |
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HJSoulma
Posts: 62 |
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Ugh, same here. I feel like a lot of fansubbers think they're very special human beings because they allow nerds to watch things hours after they come out, and because of that I think lots of the take a lot of liberties with the script to make it sound more like how they want it to sound-- and then hope that because most watchers don't speak Japanese, they'll just take their word as gospel.
I take it you haven't been to a middle school classroom recently. Also, totally off topic from the fansubbing issue, I thought the amount of people who had forced themselves to watch something they didn't think they'd like was pretty impressive. My gut reaction to any given anime is usually correct (opinion wise, I mean-- like, if I assume I won't like it... I really won't like it), and the couple times other people have forced me to sit through a series I didn't think I'd like (Wolf's Rain comes vividly to mind) I wanted to bash my brains out on the table. I mean, if someone else hadn't been making me, I'd never have made it through the first half of the first episode, and my life would be better for it-- so I guess my question is, why force yourself to sit through something you don't expect to like? Does the desire spring from wanting the cultural literacy to be able to discuss said series with other anime fans, or something else? Because as for myself, I couldn't see the discussion aspect be enough to make me watch something like Code Geass-- in fact, I think I'm happy to be able to stay out of those discussions. Last edited by HJSoulma on Fri May 15, 2009 10:43 am; edited 1 time in total |
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Teriyaki Terrier
 Posts: 5689 |
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Oh joy, fansubs. Hopefully this doesn't turn into a anger fest that one of the moderators will have to lock.
Like Brian stated, Toonami is gone. Cartoon Network's era of well thought and interesting shows is gone as well. Cartoon Network has eliminated most of its anime, so I really don't think they'll ever make a comeback. I just hope Cartoon Network doesn't shut down Adult Swim. But I am not entirely sure if Cartoon Network owns Adult Swim. But at this point, I wouldn't be surprized due to t he fact after 11 years Toonami was shut down. |
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irishninja
Posts: 344 Location: Seattle-ish |
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I think you have a mighty good point there, corinthian. 
Agreed here as well. If I want a lesson on Japanese culture I'll read a book or take a class, preferably from a native or, at the very least, a trained anthropologist. 
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HJSoulma
Posts: 62 |
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I'd be sadder if the threat of Adult Swim leaving was say, a year or two ago, before all the decent programming got replaced with stuff like Squidbillies and Assy McGee... ~___~ |
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zawa113
 Posts: 7357 |
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Man I miss Toonami, sometimes I'll just watch some of the old ads on youtube. Outlaw Star is still one of my favorites because of the fond memories of staying up til 1am every Saturday in middle school to watch it. Actually, I never saw most of the show that ran on Toonami due to have having cable for most of it's lifetime, so I'm still sorta "catching up" so to speak. I wish someone would put Reboot and MegasXLR on DVD so I could watch them. I was so mad when they moved it to Saturday night and killed off most of the good shows, Toonami ended right there for me personally.
But now that Toonami's gone, maybe we should pay more attention to Sci-fi, which shows some really good anime, but not really the introductory type in my opinion, but good stuff nontheless and I could be wrong, maybe it is introductory stuff. |
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Teriyaki Terrier
Posts: 5689 |
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I really wish Adult Swim would get rid of those types of shows. Excessive swearing and violence, that is all those shows consist of. Even Super Milk Chan was more intelligent(which is saying a lot considering how bizare the show was.) Adult Swim should get rid of those shows and replace them with somewhat intelligent shows like Lupin III and Case Closed. But it still shocks me that people actually watch shows like Squidbillies and other excessively violent shows. |
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Quark
 Posts: 710 Location: British Columbia, Canada |
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I don't think he's so much praising them for using clunky equipment and buying laser disks and such. I'm in the same camp as Brian, that fansubbing before digital subs was slightly more okay. For one thing, you had to *gasp* be patient back in the day - you would have to send money and your order through the mail, and then wait for the tapes to get made, and then sent to you, whereas nowadays, you can just download a whole show in a few hours. Also, fansubbers back in the day would remind you that those tapes were not meant to be your 'hard' copy of the show in question. During every eye catch, and sometimes in the OP/ED, it would state that it was a free sub, and that you should support the creators by buying the official licensed product if it ever got released. Not only that, but any good fansubbing group would pull the fansubs from their site, so that you had no choice but to buy the official release if you wanted to see a series. This concept is pretty much dead now, because you've got something that rivals the official licensed copy, there's always someone to upload it, so why should you bother to buy it? I don't really know if Brian is so much as praising them, to me it sounds like he felt that the old way of doing things was less harmful to the industry. Generally they were fansubbing things that either were released here totally mangled, or that had little chance of being released. Nowadays, most of the anime gets a proper release, and there is a lot of licensed anime to choose from. The way modern fansubbing works now encourages a lot of moochers with a sense of entitlement to get all the shows they want for free, now, all the while claiming that they totally love anime. That being said, I don't know if this counts as forcing one to watch an anime, as I was initially excited to see it, but - Martian Successor Nadesico. I had wanted to see this series since the mid-90's when I read a review in a gaming magazine that hailed it was the greatest anime ever (hey, another magazine said the same thing about Eva, and I agreed with them completely, so...) In addition, on the back of the box, it claimed it was voted the best series by Japanese fans, plus, a quote from this site claiming that it had truly likeable characters. So I found a copy at the local comic store, took it home, and eagerly watched it (despite the massive pile of other anime I had to watch) I was excited, sang along with the opening as I used to listen to it way back in the day, and then...was confused. My confusion basically lasted through the whole series as I had no clue what was going on, and furthermore, I didn't like any of the characters - especially Yurika, whom I found irritating - so in addition to not knowing what was going on, I didn't care about what was going on. Not only that, but I found that all the emotional scenes were seriously lacking, as there was no buildup to any of them - basically stuff happened, they would show characters reacting, and some sad music would play, and I would sit there feeling...nothing. Long story short, I hated the show, but since I had dished out $60 for it, I forced myself to watch it, and after piddling around, decided to marathon half the series in one go, just so I could get it over with and watch something else...like maybe Evangelion. And now, I'm going to go kick myself, because I told myself that I would never get involved in another fansub debate again, and then broke my promise. |
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vashfanatic
 Posts: 3489 Location: Back stateside |
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First o all, since someone asked:
Hardsub: subtitles cannot be removed. They're a part of the video now. Softsub: subtitles can be removed, so that you can choose to watch the video without them.
Some of the problem is that Japanese doesn't really have swear words (other then the ever-handy "kuso"). Being rude is written into the language thanks to polite/plain/casual forms. A lot of the time the swearing is intended to give an impression of someone speaking in a markedly rude form of Japanese - but it really should be chosen according to the character what form of rude English they might be using. "Kuso" could be translated "damn it," "crap," "s**t" or "f**k" depending on the situation.
That's the price of those super-duper fast fansubs people love so much... and why having professionals helps. Not because professionals may know Japanese any better than amateurs, but because if you're not doing this as a full-time job, you can't do it both fast and well. It will either be slow and well done, or fast and bad. And of course I could do a list of times I've seen official rleases on DVDs that made me (who only uses subtitles like kids use training wheels on bicycles; my Japanese is pretty darn good but not perfect) do a complete facepalm. But this post is getting to be long enough as-is.
So far nobody has. I'm so proud of us.
Oh, and for those of you living overseas: my understanding is that ISP maskers are yet to be illegal. Get yourself a program that doesn't let the webpage know where you're computer is. It doesn't really harm the site that much, and it removes the temptation of keeping your fansubs instead of buying the official releases. And I repeat what I always say: DON'T KEEP YOUR FANSUBS. They have a purpose as previews, but they are not substitutes for actually buying the series. |
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leoval
Posts: 11 |
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I have forced myself to watch several Anime series with mixed results. For instance, even today I have no idea how I endured the total piece of crap that Serial Experiments Lain is. Somehow I felt obligated to Netflix and I kept getting the next DVD's, when the last one finally arrived I was actually relieved that the torture ended.
I made the same mistake with ./HACK Sign, from DVD 1 I could tell something was not quite correct yet I kept ordering more, at the end it was a waste of my time and Netflix's queue space. On the positive side, I forced myself to watch Gurren Lagann even though I utterly dislike the Mecha Genre. What a great series, epic is not enough to describe what the series scale represents, it actually made me reconsider my dislike of Mecha. Sadly it was a short lived experience, I gave Gundam Seed Destiny a try and after a single DVD it managed to destroy all the good things that Gurren did for me. |
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