Forum - View topicAnswerman - How Much Control Do Japanese Producers Have Over Dubs and Subtitles?
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chronos02
Posts: 268 |
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Well, I have watched both the English and the Spanish (Spain) versions for the movies, and part of the tv anime, and while in English there's a bit of awkwardness when it comes to the translation, reason being it's far too literal, in Spanish things get... very strange, The translations are not literal -at all-, and are, in fact, too blatantly adapted into very casual speech in certain portions, while on others, they use a strange construction of the language which makes me wonder who translated this and where they are from. There are also quite a few errors here and there which can and will confuse the viewers.
Now, regarding the dub, if in English Shinji sounds too girlish, in Spanish he sounds like a goddamn Alpha, the cast choice was a big blunder here. There are also many mispronunciations, timing problems when speaking (not by the sound timer, but by the dub actor!), and many of the other actors simply don't fit their roles (when compared to the Japanese voice style, which should be taken as a base, or so I believe). Also, many of the screams are outright ridiculous (most dubs never dubbed screams for Japanese shows over here). Let this be clear, this is not a problem caused by the actors, this is a casting AND dubbing direction issue, I don't care if Khara had control here (doesn't seem like it for the Spanish dub, honestly), this is not a job well done, it's watchable, mind you, but it's light years away from the old Spanish dub (which had it's huge track record of problems, yes, HUGE), and that's honestly quite sad. |
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Top Gun
 Posts: 4594 |
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Super-literal translations are almost always a bad idea, unless you want your dialog to sound like it was written by a high school freshman working on a Spanish assignment. Japanese and English are very linguistically disparate languages, with their own different structures and idioms. It's extremely difficult to attempt to go straight from one to the other and still sound like something a living human being would actually say. I don't speak Japanese, so I don't know how much ADV's English script may have deviated from the original, but I do know that the corresponding translation choices I've seen from the Netflix version generally carry far less impact, which seems very undesirable for a show like Eva. (Original creators or not, I also have a fundamental objection to people who aren't remotely fluent in a language issuing directives over a translation into that language. Stick to what you know.) |
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Kougeru
 Posts: 5531 |
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I'm of the opposite opinion. I think it's better to be as "literal" as can be, while also making it sound coherent in ENG or w/e language. So many anime stray way too far from the original meaning. I especially hate when Japanese cultural jokes and puns are changed - in subs. In dubs, that makes sense but not for people watching in Japanese with subs..different audience and they want those cultural references/jokes. The Evangelion thing.... Choosing the cast and actual directing them are two different things. The VOICES are fine, but acting is where the issue lies...and that can largely be attributed to the voice director (the person that made that tweet - trying to blame Japan for the issues). As for the "Straightwashing" - it's 100% in the context of the episode. They were definitely pushing closer to homosexuality than not. I've watch almost every "Netflix Original" anime and there's countless issues with their subtitles, I don't even know where to go begin. Well, I do. Basic grammar mistakes/typos. I've sent in like 50 corrections for 3 shows and not a single one has been fixed as of last week - one of these shows is like 5 years old. Netflix just doesn't care. They had forms to submit corrections but they don't listen or care. Some of the errors are very basic and don't matter much but others change the meaning of the message to the opposite of what it should be (one case they had "can't" instead of "can". Netflix just has proven time and time again that they are putting minimal effort into the anime section. They just throw money at licensing and that's it. The whole "No weekly streams!" thing is a separate bizarre issue on it's own, but it's slightly related since they give themselves and extra 6-12 months and still release with more issue than fansubs that took 1 day. As I said earlier, Netflix just doesn't seem to really care. It's like they have no editors at all. |
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jdnation
Posts: 2007 |
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Well at the very least all this is a testament to Evangelion's ability to continue delivering memes long after it's run, proving once again to be the timeless classic that it is. All according to Keikaku (a worthy graceful plan).
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Gemnist
Posts: 1758 |
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As the article states, it depends on the creator. In terms of casting though, the only other example I can think of is Funimation's One Piece dub. |
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FelipeFR
Posts: 16 |
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EvaGeeks recently came out with an article on their wiki about it. It seems nobody can say for sure (yet?), but Khara apparently was very, very closely involved with the new localization, much more so than before.
https://wiki.evageeks.org/Theory_and_Analysis:Kaworu%27s_lines_in_Episode_24#Background_for_the_translation |
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One-Eye
 Posts: 2261 |
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I'm about 5-6 episodes into the Netflix dub and I'm finding it to be mediocre. I don't think the old ADV dub was superior by any means. I'm not upset about recasting, but the tone and pitch of much of the dialogue has been turned down which contributes to the characters at times sounding a little more robotic or lacking in personality. So far Misato's spontaneity and goofiness when she's off-work doesn't really work well. When Misato and Ritsuko speak to one another its often at the same pitch and it doesn't come off as though they are responding to each others comments as in normal conversation, its more robotic or like just reading lines. Don't get me wrong the dub is not awful, the lady playing shinji works pretty well voice wise for me, and I've heard much much worse but I don't find this to be a good dub just serviceable.
The 3rd children and 4th children comments are jarring and I can only imagine that if you are watching the show for the first time and in subs for that matter you might think that these are misspellings or grammatical errors. So far, and again I'm only about 6 episodes in, the translation is not ruining the show (I am totally sucked into the story) but its not enhancing my comprehension either while making it come off awkwardly. So I'm not sure how its actually supposed to benefit viewers or the studio. |
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FlamingFirewire
 Posts: 463 |
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This is really where I'm coming from too in my critique of the English dub - yes, the ADV dub is of its era and not really "good" all things considered, but at least there's palpable emotion most of the time. The direction on the new dub shows that either the dub director isn't very experienced, or they were simply not given enough time to iron out the script and do multiple takes to bring out the full talent of their actors. It's a shame, because this show really is a prestige property & should have been treated as such by its licensor and current "host" (Netflix). |
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Cardcaptor Takato
 Posts: 4869 |
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Inverti Herikawa
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^ THIS. ALL OF THIS. There needs to be a balance between preserving the original intent and adapting the dialogues so that they make sense to the target audience. The Eva redub backlash should be a very clear indicator that most fans *don't* want verbatim scripts. As scriptwriter and the true Asuka VA Tiffany Grant would say: https://gyazo.com/76a509458f51cda063d3165ff379aeb4 For the record, I completely agree. Matt Greenfield made the right choice and won the argument regarding "Child vs Children" back in the ADV dub days. The redub doesn't even grasp basic English grammar, so it's yet another clear indicator that the JP committee should *not* be micromanaging dub scripts. To spite the redub, I've been watching the original ADV dub. It's just better than the redub in every single way. The redub is an abomination; ESPECIALLY Shinji, Misato and Asuka. Here is my rant: https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/490483579315552256/592343037070540810/Eva_rant.png In a nutshell: When you recast VAs that have been voicing their characters for more than 2 decades, it almost *never* works out well. There had been good redubs, such as Sailor Moon and Escaflowne, but not this. |
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luisedgarf
Posts: 659 Location: Guadalajara, Mexico |
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If this were just an exclusive problem from the English dub, perhaps the controversy would be less severe.
But what I can see so far, most of the foreign dubs has more or less serious problems with either translation, acting or both, and it seems the Latin American Spanish dub (and likely others like the Brazilian and German dubs, correct me if I'm wrong) is likely the only dub with the less problems regarding it so far (outside problems regarding translation consistence), albeit the same cannot be said about the Spanish subs. In any case, this is likely a giant, monumental screw-up of epic proportions for Netflix, and it could really affect them in the long term. |
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mewpudding101
Industry Insider
 Posts: 2206 Location: Tokyo, Japan |
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Here is an example of an English dub that was checked by the Japanese side: Pokemon. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=naUL66MyiBY |
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Sailor Star Dust
 Posts: 166 Location: US and A |
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I just wanted to reiterate that Khara's in-house translator isn't new to Eva (he even translated a gag comic back in the NGE days) or translating, period.
I think a mixture of what happened is Khara being very particular about how they wanted things translated, alongside occasional genuine human error (the translations feel somewhat unpolished in spots, hopefully a potential western-released bluray box would clarify that) but *shrug* Also, like previously stated: Even back in the ADV days, Gainax fought to get "Children" in the subs/dubs, but Matt Greenfield and co (understandably) made sure to use "Child" instead. Weird quirks are weird. |
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Sakagami Tomoyo
 Posts: 940 Location: Melbourne, VIC, Australia |
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The thing I keep in mind first and foremost when watching(/reading/listening to) something translated from another language is that there's no such thing as a perfect translation, and the more different the two languages are, the further from perfect it's possible to get. Of course that said, there's still a lot of translation choices out there that should never have been made. I haven't seen the Netflix subs for Evangelion, so I can't comment much on those specifically, but from what I've heard it seems like they suffer for the translator A) not being a native English speaker, and B) letting his own biases creep in.
I can comment on ADV's sub and dub, which certainly have issues, the dub more so than the sub, though honestly they're pretty decent for their time.
It does appear in text but not in the lyrics, though the Japanese word for "angel" (tenshi / 天使) does. It seems to me more like the use of "shito" (apostle) in the Japanese version is the oddity here, as they've got names more like biblical angels rather than being named after any actual apostles, and are mostly about as strange and otherworldly as biblical descriptions of angels are. As with many other details, it's not entirely clear what Anno was thinking with that choice. |
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BadNewsBlues
Posts: 5976 |
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Affect them in what way? |
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