Quick reminder that if you aren't watching Teekyuu every season then you're doing something wrong.
Also, the Working!!! finale was one of the more satisfying endings to a show in recent times.
I've recently watched all of Mushishi; confirming its absolute brilliance. 9/10 easily.
If you enjoyed Mushishi, you have to watch Kino’s Journey. I think they’re very similar, but with Mushishi I got bored at times because of the slow pacing, while Kino’s Journey has slightly faster pacing that doesn’t bore you. I like Kino’s Journey over Mushishi, definitely recommend it.
Ef – A Tale of Memories is in my opinion the best romance anime I’ve ever watched, recommended to anyone who likes that genre.
Now this is weird. I was just going to something to the extent of "didn't I actually gush all over Kino's Journey in the previous anime thread", and then I thought something was wrong and went to the forum search to realize there was no previous anime thread for, like, a decade. Whoa, umm, I'm not even sure which part is more strange.
But yeah, Kino's Journey. One of my favorite series of all time, and one I keep rewatching about once every two years on average. Incredibly clever and subtle throughout, with a ton of emotion and zero fanservice. Absolute must-watch.
Warp wrote:
Edit: I think I understand now: It's my avatar, isn't it? It makes me look angry.
You definitely shouldn't marathon episodic shows, especially Mushishi.
One episode per week is mostly fine.
I’ve never not marathoned an anime. Except for maybe very rare times I don’t even remember. I avoid watching anime as it’s coming out, due to the wait for each episode and the fact that the Blu-rays are of superior quality anyway.
Re:Zero kara Hajimeru Isekai Seikatsu - Best anime this season. Characters are likeable, setting is nice, mystery is intriguing, plot is engaging, cliffhangers are deep. Apparently the author was unsatisfied with the current status of the industry, and set out to lead by example. He's also a sadist who loves to torment his characters.
Boku no Hero Academia - So sappy and emotional, but somehow it works and the episodes are over much too soon.
Kabaneri of the Iron Fortress - Some similarities with Attack on Titan, but thankfully the shounen is dialed back. Highlights are the animation quality, action and worldbuilding.
Ushio to Tora - Continuing from last season, it now seems to prepare for an epic ending because the plot is moving awfully fast.
Kuma Miko - Best comedy slice of life of this season, imo.
Joker Game - Best cerebral show this season. It seems like it's having an episodic plot though by following the different agents around the world, so it'll probably not entertain me as much as it otherwise could.
Oh hey, topic reply email notification to the rescue! :p
This season is pretty decent, all in all. Far better than the two previous ones, anyway.
Much thanks for pointing my attention towards Joker Game, I'll definitely pick it up. On that note, would you consider Boku no Hero Academia to be good for somebody who's grown pretty tired of typical shounen stuff? Its premise seemed pretty banal to me, and I took the high rating as more indicative of a lowest common denominator sensibilities rather than good writing. Is it at all clever about what it does?
As for my own experiences...
Between the two Trigger shows aired simultaneously this season, Space Patrol Luluco is probably the better one. It follows the short form explored earlier with Inferno Cop and Ninja Slayer but plays its comedy straighter most of the time and focuses more on its characters. Also, it has the most stylish ending I've seen in a very long while, as well as surprisingly good bits of dialogue, very appropriate rapid-fire pacing, and, last but not least, Mayumi Shintani among the main cast.
Kabaneri looks like a well-executed mishmash of Attack on Titan and Showpiercer (doesn't help that it's done by the same studio that animated AoT). Hopefully it'll show some fresh ideas down the line, because so far there's been hardly any. Well, at least it's been doing well what it has set out to do... so far. Something AngerFist might enjoy, too. Probably. :p
Re:Zero is very fun indeed—a shounen done right in many respects. I've checked out the manga, and, to my satisfaction, the anime handles the scenes a lot better at literally every point. That's the main sign of a competent director/screenwriter combo at the helm.
Not sure what to make of Bungo Stray Dogs yet, but it looks nice so far, the characters are mildly promising in their quirkiness and being based on real-life prototypes (a dangerous card to play!). It looks like a faster pacing would have benefitted it, but I've only seen two episodes so far, so I should probably hold off on that opinion.
Kuma Miko is... alright, I guess? I've seen two episodes so far; it's quite cozy, and the premise is certainly good, but it takes quite some time to set up the actual, well, comedy. In this respect I probably laughed more at the first episode of Re:Zero. Still, definitely comfortable enough to go through the full cour.
Netoge treads a very thin line between instances of decent subculture humor and near-incorrigible amounts of third-rate anime cliche. I almost dropped it the first episode due to all the trite writing, but, being well-acquainted with the MMO subculture it portrays, had enough hearty laughs by the end to give the show a chance... that it will likely fail, but I like to believe in miracles.
Kiznaiver I don't have high expectations for. Apparently its screenwriter is known for delivering a subpar product. I guess I've done remarkably well unknowingly avoiding her earlier works.
Mayoiga has been tripping a lot of suck flags from the get-go, so I'll most likely drop it unless the next episode works a miracle. Apparently Mari Okada whom I was talking about in the previous paragraph had something to do with this show as well.
Sakamoto I probably won't watch at all, but will read the manga instead. People say it gets the comedic timing a lot better. And it allegedly contains a reference to my favorite One-Punch Man chapter, which is a good thing. :p
The new Jojo... I'll probably marathon it sometime later in continuity with the other related titles I haven't watched yet. Crazy high rating tho!
Also, to those who haven't been following the previous season too closely: do yourself a favor and watch Shouwa Genroku Rakugo Shinjuu, its by far the least disappointing (and actually very well done) show. Warning: it's a slow-paced, highly thematically-focused period drama about adults, for adults—no surprise it didn't manage to grasp even 1/3 of the audience of the more hyped titles of the season. Features outstanding voice acting and decidedly subdued animation that belies great efforts to focus on capturing subtle details with pinpoint accuracy.
And lastly, to the 1.5 people whom it may concern, Heta is finally back at subbing Gag Manga Biyori+, aka the fourth (and the best, so far) season of Gag Manga Biyori—a gag comedy show from 2000s for, erm... a special brand of comedy connoisseurs. Those unfamiliar with it should try locating the first episode of GMB+ to see what its humor all about.
Warp wrote:
Edit: I think I understand now: It's my avatar, isn't it? It makes me look angry.
would you consider Boku no Hero Academia to be good for somebody who's grown pretty tired of typical shounen stuff? Its premise seemed pretty banal to me, and I took the high rating as more indicative of a lowest common denominator sensibilities rather than good writing. Is it at all clever about what it does?
If you look back at the summaries of your favorite anime (e.g. at myanimelist or elsewhere), you'll often see that the premise sounds either insane, misleading or even incredibly boring. So after eliminating titles based on some rough criteria (continuations of shows that I dropped, certain topics that are not for me, like yaoi or idols) I just give each show at least one episode. That allows for enough judgement regarding topic, art style, plot progression etc. (So this season that resulted in watching the first episode of 22 shows, from which I dropped 10 after one or several episodes.)
It doesn't have to be clever. I just watch shows that don't feel like a waste of my time, shows that are uplifting (Boku no Hero Academia), make me forget real life with action (Kabaneri of the Iron Fortress), plot (Joker Game), comedy (Bakuon!!), soundtrack (Ikkitousen), all of the above (Re:Zero) or some other mysterious ingredient (Flying Witch).
Boku no Hero Academia is the story of the kid who meets his ultimate hero, in a world where everybody in his class except him has superpowers. It's the story of the guy least equipped for his dream job getting one chance to do what he wants to do.
It's idealistic and realistic. It's not some shounen where the protagonist gets good at saving the world overnight.
moozooh wrote:
This season is pretty decent, all in all. Far better than the two previous ones, anyway.
But there's been Ajin, Boku dake ga Inai Machi, Gate: Jieitai Kanochi nite, Hai to Gensou no Grimgar, Heavy Object, Kaku Tatakaeri 2nd Season, Kono Subarashii Sekai ni Shukufuku wo!, Koukaku no Pandora, Koyomimonogatari, Little Witch Academia: Mahoujikake no Parade, Noragami Aragoto, One Punch Man, Oshiete! Galko-chan, Owarimonogatari, Shinmai Maou no Testament Burst, Shouwa Genroku Rakugo Shinjuu, Ushio to Tora, Valkyrie Drive: Mermaid
moozooh wrote:
Also, to those who haven't been following the previous season too closely: do yourself a favor and watch Shouwa Genroku Rakugo Shinjuu
I have noticed that with many anime series watching the first episode only is not actually enough to get a good picture of what it is really about, or even if you will like it or not. For some reason, it seems, many anime series do not use the standard American TV show method of trying to hook you with the first episode of the series and maximize retention rates that way. Instead, the "introduction" to the actual idea of the show might take even up to three or four episodes sometimes.
I have noticed more than once that if I had judged an anime based on its first episode alone, I would have concluded that I probably won't like it, but after watching more episodes I ended up liking it after all. (Although, to be fair, sometimes the exact reverse has happened as well.)
I have noticed that with many anime series watching the first episode only is not actually enough to get a good picture of what it is really about, or even if you will like it or not.
Yes, that's why Kiznaiver is still on the list.
Warp wrote:
after watching more episodes I ended up liking it after all. (Although, to be fair, sometimes the exact reverse has happened as well.)
And that's why I dropped Assassination Classroom during season 2.
I have noticed that with many anime series watching the first episode only is not actually enough to get a good picture of what it is really about, or even if you will like it or not. For some reason, it seems, many anime series do not use the standard American TV show method of trying to hook you with the first episode of the series and maximize retention rates that way. Instead, the "introduction" to the actual idea of the show might take even up to three or four episodes sometimes.
This is exactly the case, for better or for worse, which is why I'm usually asking around before having to spend 1–2 hours trying just to see if the thing is worth spending several more hours on. That being said, some of the more popular series of the past few years have actually managed to successfully execute the hooking approach.
creaothceann wrote:
If you look back at the summaries of your favorite anime (e.g. at myanimelist or elsewhere), you'll often see that the premise sounds either insane, misleading or even incredibly boring.
To be fair, that often remains the case regardless of me ending up watching, dropping, or ignoring them. :p
I do agree that a lot of time a show with a lackluster premise can be saved by its execution; eg. One Piece is, for all intents and purposes, the most typical Tom Sawyer-ish shounen adventure story there is, with all of its bog-standard tropes played completely straight, but its huge cast of unique (and mostly fleshed-out) characters, legit good comedy, and pretty incredible attention to the overarching storyline elevates it above most of its competition that has or would have easily run out of steam in half the number of episodes OP has been pushing. But it still remains a shounen, and as such more of a feel-good guilty pleasure of mine that I'm not actively searching replacements for. :p
creaothceann wrote:
But there's been Ajin, Boku dake ga Inai Machi, Gate: Jieitai Kanochi nite, Hai to Gensou no Grimgar, Heavy Object, Kaku Tatakaeri 2nd Season, Kono Subarashii Sekai ni Shukufuku wo!, Koukaku no Pandora, Koyomimonogatari, Little Witch Academia: Mahoujikake no Parade, Noragami Aragoto, One Punch Man, Oshiete! Galko-chan, Owarimonogatari, Shinmai Maou no Testament Burst, Shouwa Genroku Rakugo Shinjuu, Ushio to Tora, Valkyrie Drive: Mermaid
Most of those I haven't watched at all. To be fair a lot of them seem like the typical cliche'd anime fare with no distinguishing traits which is why I haven't bothered. I mean I have watched most of what would be considered the standard-defining pillars of their respective genres, at least those I had any interest in, so any new work in those genres must have something that makes it stand out in terms of either writing, execution, or overall interaction with genre boundaries. If a show attempts nothing of the sort and just checks every major trope expected of it, it's very unlikely that I consider it at all, let alone put a high priority on it. Sometimes I sample things that end up with a high rating, but in my experience that serves as a rather poor indicator most of the time; basically anything between ~7.4 and ~8.8 on MAL is a total crapshoot in terms of actual artistic value—there even exists a strong inverse tendency where works that try to be different end up underappreciated and those appealing to the lowest common denominator end up with a bloated rating. It's only outside those values that things strongly converge in their respective direction.
Boku dake ga Inai Machi (8.79 on MAL): The first three or so episodes were certainly worth as much as a high 9, but around the midpoint it rather quickly devolved into something incredibly disjointed, unrealistic, and all-around profoundly disappointing when it became obvious that the author hadn't actually planned everything in advance (which in a work this short is just amazingly poor form). I've even checked out the manga to see if the source material got it right, but somehow it was much worse in this respect (hats off to the anime director for their attempts to mend the source's wrongs—they have succeeded to a respectable extent in weeding out most of the author's stupidity); it almost seems like the author had a really good idea but was too much of an amateur to make something high quality out of it. I ended up giving it a 8 because of how good the first few episodes were and because of the clear efforts the studio pulled to do well with what they were given and generally be clever, like the changed opening sequence in ep. 10 and the switch to cinematic 2.35:1 aspect ratio for the 1986 scenes. Realistically the show completely failed the supernatural aspect, screwed up the mystery, and came up with a really predictable and lackluster way to tie up the ends to the main story arc. I could elaborate upon what I thought was handled poorly, but I wouldn't be able to avoid major spoilers, so it should probably be done elsewhere if at all.
Hai to Gensou no Grimgar (7.94 on MAL): 100% forgettable. I don't remember anything out of it that was good aside from the truly gorgeous backdrops which cannot possibly substitute the lack of everything else. 12 episodes is more than enough time to flesh out 7 characters, and all we got was a half-assed character arc for maybe three of them that weren't even likable. Get this: about 15% of the show's runtime was devoted to mourning, flashbacks, and discussion of a dead cardboard character who wasn't developed even remotely well enough for a viewer to care about him at all. Similar thing with the plot: 12 episodes is plenty of time to show a compelling story, yet we've got none at all—just expository infodumps by the main character's internal monologue. I don't even know why they bothered with the MMO fantasy game references; it only made the characters and their motivations more insufferable and made watching the show as much of a mindnumbing grind as they were going through "in-game". Made me sad that such drivel is being animated yet there have been no plans announced for adapting real gems such as DungeonMeshi. (I wish Ryoko Kui received more attention in general, she has shown really good taste and wit in all of her works to date.)
Something-monogatari: How many seasons does this series even have, like seven or eight? Considering there have only ever been four series spanning over 70 episodes that I have watched (and only three of those I would recommend without any reservations), this is a super hard sell for me.
One Punch Man (8.92 on MAL): This is a tricky case. If you compare it to the manga and the original webcomic (which is incredible, btw), the TV show has erratic pace all around, it has screwed up a lot of comedic timing of the manga, added some scenes that don't even make sense to begin with, and devoted a LOT of time to the actual fights in a story whose premise intentionally mocked the fighting shounen genre by introducing an absolutely overpowered and indestructible protagonist from the very beginning. And this is considering the animated chapters contain no major plot development to speak of. But with all that the show still managed to execute said fights a lot better than any actual fight-centered anime I've ever seen (the Boros fight is just unbelievably well done; spoiler: protagonist wins) and ended up the best show of its season somehow, at least out of those that I watched at the time. Maybe those fights were the main reason people liked it this much, as there was little to show otherwise—for the record, all of these fights take 1–2 pages or less in the original webcomic. But considering the next major manga/webcomic arc is a LOT better—you can basically say the animated chapters were just a big introduction to the world and the characters of OPM—I have very high hopes for season 2. The overarching plot really picks up and there will be plenty of opportunities for the studio to showcase their fight animation capabilities; too bad we'll have to wait for another year at the least. Good news is that another adaptation of OPM author's work, Mob Psycho 100, is being premiered this year.
Noragami Aragoto (8.53 on MAL): Slightly better than the first season (hardly a feat) but still quite mediocre. Unrelatable cardboard characters, stunningly boring action sequences (except maybe one fight in the whole season that doesn't end in one strike), questionable character motivation, way too many loose ends. I may watch the next season if I have time, but they better wrap everything up with it.
Ajin: I saw the vomit-inducing CGI and never gave it a second thought. Is there a manga or anything else that won't make my eyes bleed? :p
Little Witch Academia is neither a series nor a full-length feature film, so probably doesn't belong in that list. But other than that, yeah, it's really good.
Warp wrote:
Edit: I think I understand now: It's my avatar, isn't it? It makes me look angry.
Sometimes I sample things that end up with a high rating, but in my experience that serves as a rather poor indicator most of the time; basically anything between ~7.4 and ~8.8 on MAL is a total crapshoot in terms of actual artistic value
I've found that if an episode discussion thread in reddit's /r/anime has a high number of comments then it usually isn't bad. (The inverse isn't really true though, i.e. low number of comments doesn't always mean it's bad.) MAL ratings are quite unreliable anyway - not to mention that people often dismiss anime that don't agree with established themes, e.g. any occurrence of ecchi fanservice.
moozooh wrote:
Something-monogatari: How many seasons does this series even have, like seven or eight? Considering there have only ever been four series spanning over 70 episodes that I have watched (and only three of those I would recommend without any reservations), this is a super hard sell for me.
12 parts so far. I only became a fan after my second attempt into it, when I was reading a blog alongside with watching the episodes to help me understand what I was seeing. It's been great ever since.
moozooh wrote:
Ajin: I saw the vomit-inducing CGI and never gave it a second thought.
Just like with Sidonia no Kishi, it takes some getting used to. I found the characters and plot interesting enough to keep watching. You also might have some success with running "enhancement" software like SVP, though I don't have experience with that. (Btw. there's a Sidonia torrent out there that is interpolated to 60fps.)
You're sourcing MAL for scores, and you didn't notice Ajin was an adaption.
Please don't hurt me sempai, I promise I'll do better next time. :p
creaothceann wrote:
people often dismiss anime that don't agree with established themes, e.g. any occurrence of ecchi fanservice.
I think it has more to do with the vast majority of ecchi fanservice being neither tastefully served (done right: the "Gainax bounce", the foogasms in Shokugeki no Soma, etc.) nor meaningful for the story, if there is one in the first place (done right: Shimoneta, Panty & Stocking—too bad it wasn't enough to save either from bad writing and over-reliance on shock value, lol). It's a very cheap and low-effort way to profit off of hormone-raging shut-ins, and blatant creative shortcuts like these deserve being slammed imo.
creaothceann wrote:
12 parts so far. I only became a fan after my second attempt into it, when I was reading a blog alongside with watching the episodes to help me understand what I was seeing. It's been great ever since.
Yikes. Well, thanks for the tip with the blog. I'll put it on the back burner for now.
creaothceann wrote:
You also might have some success with running "enhancement" software like SVP, though I don't have experience with that. (Btw. there's a Sidonia torrent out there that is interpolated to 60fps.)
I'd probably live with it had it only been about the choppy framerate, but there's also the issue of characters ending up in the uncanny valley that makes them look like grotesque Lego figures. Well, now that I've been directed to the manga I won't have to deal with that, so win/win I guess. :p
What I don't understand is why high-budget projects like the Berserk movies and the upcoming TV series still fall victims to many of these issues (choppiness in particular). I mean if you look at Rebuild of Evangelion, or some of the acclaimed Production I.G works (GitS:SAC, Psycho-Pass), or the recent UC Gundam OVAs, that stuff is almost entirely done in CG but doesn't look like shit... and most of the time you can't even tell it's CG. Berserk is the world's most acclaimed manga, and the studios responsible for animating it still can't do anything better than the hand-drawn TV adaptation from 1997. It's almost like I'm playing the movie on some game engine in real time on an Xbox 360-era hardware.
EDIT: Ok, I've read all the released Ajin chapters so far, and it's pretty damn solid. Premise-wise it's kind of what Elfen Lied aimed to be, except with better everything and without all the stupid. I especially like how creative the author is with regards to demi-humans' tactical use of their abilities, especially in some of the later chapters; it's perhaps the best sci-fi action I've read since Gantz (Gantz:G is such a shameless self-plagiarizing cash-grab I won't even count it). Assuming the upcoming feature-length movies have better animation budgets I might watch those as well.
I also read all the Sakamoto manga up through chapter 19 (can't find anything more recent online), and it's mildly fun. Think One-Punch Man in Great Teacher Onizuka-like setting. Some of the joke setups are pretty clever though; the porn DVD chapter, for one, is legit good comedy.
Speaking of OPM, be sure to read the Monster Association/Garou arc in the webcomic. It's bloody fantastic, and the manga is still at least a year away from finishing the improved version.
Warp wrote:
Edit: I think I understand now: It's my avatar, isn't it? It makes me look angry.
So, I have been watching some more anniemays recently.
Ongoing
Re:Zero remains the highlight of the season for me so far. Which isn't saying much; clearly 2011 this is not.
Dropped Mayoiga. Close to dropping Netoge because the stuff that made it somewhat different from the rest ended a few episodes ago—it devloved entirely into generic crap since then.
Kiznaiver actually got interesting in episode 9. At least now that I know they aren't raising super soldiers to fight with a super villain or something else similarly stupid it succeeded at making me somewhat intrigued by the possible conclusion. The story seems like it would have benefitted from tighter screenplay and actual character development rather than the expodumps in some cases and utter negligence in the others. Being cute for the sake of being cute (those Gomorin...) probably wasn't warranted, either.
Kabaneri, on the other hand, is becoming progressively more generic and predictable. I mean, when we all joked about it being a re-skinned Shingeki no Kyojin in April, who would have thought how far the similarities would extend? At the same time KnK has nothing on SnK in terms of story, and characters are all about as shallow as they get. By about episode 5 they also seemed to have run out of budget, with all the static frame pans and whatnot.
Started watching My Hero Academia. Mildly fun, but too bad it isn't really trying to subvert or rise above the genre. It's a typical shouneny shounen with a side-dish of more shounen down to its core. Made me remember why I appreciate the One-Punch Man webcomic so much—there aren't many superhero stories that pack such tightly-written, thought-provoking narrative at all—let alone under the disguise of affectionate parody drawn by a five-year-old.
Also picked up Tanaka-kun wa Itsumo Kedaruge / Tanaka-kun Is Always Listless. A surprisingly fresh (ahem) protagonist that doesn't act like one; most of the other characters are pretty lovable as well and bounce well off of each other. Probably not something I would remember years down the line though.
Older stuff
Katanagatari. Was confused by the art style at first, but it quickly grew on me, especially when I realized how many things about this series were going to be intentionally deceptive. It feels like a comedy at first but is incredibly tragic under that facade (very similar to Kazuaki Kiriya's Goemon in many respects). Amazed by the writing: it's not often I get to see an action series with 50-minute-long episodes where at best 5 minutes is devoted to action, and the rest almost entirely filled by dialogues that... aren't boring! Spoken by characters that... aren't made of cardboard and stereotypes! Holy shit, is this still anime I'm watching?! AngerFist, if you're reading this, give this one a go. It's not all gory action, but it sets up and executes every fight so well you're being 100% invested in each of them and never feel like there's a lack of content.
Mawaru Penguindrum. Another series I could probably write an essay about, had I been able to put concisely into words everything that I thought it aspired to do and excelled at. This and Katanagatari were among the few series that prompted a complete rewatch even before I was even finished with them. Being familiar with the cultural and historical context helped a lot though—diving into this unprepared is bound to make you miss a lot of the between-the-lines stuff. And this series presents more messages between the lines than it spells out directly.
Welcome to the NHK! Nominally a comedy (I think I even laughed a few times), but really it's more a case of "those who served in the military won't laugh at the circus", as the Russian proverb goes. Every single character represents various facets of less fortunate life that I have either personally experienced or at least witnessed close enough firsthand that I don't find it very amusing, and they're also being brutally realistic at it, subverting almost every single expectation. Certainly not a series for everyone.
Shinsekai Yori. Interesting premise, decent execution, but not without its share of problems. For one, I can't say I appreciate the Shyamalanian twist at the end very much, and the overall pacing often feels like it would have benefitted a lot from cutting the total time from 25 to 22 episodes or so at the expense of some padded content around the middle and beginning. In the time it took it could have developed the supporting characters a lot better, too, imo. I get that most of the praise it received was largely banked on that twist at the end, but you've got to give other parts of the story due attention, too. I guess what I want to say is that I wanted to like this more but it appeared significantly lazier than it should have been.
What next
I think I'm finally ready to start on Monogatari... just need to figure out which order to watch it in and which sub groups to use. Aside from that, a friend has been pestering me with Umineko no Naku Koro Ni. Can't say I was a fan of Higurashi (hell, it bored me enough to drop after the first two loops), but I guess there's something that makes this one different enough? Also, Mob Psycho 100 will be aired next season; this gonna be good.
Warp wrote:
Edit: I think I understand now: It's my avatar, isn't it? It makes me look angry.
Thanks. Any advice on particular translations for each item? Dialogue-heavy series tend to vary a lot in quality, which often has a significant impact on wordplay/foreshadowing/humor/etc..
Warp wrote:
Edit: I think I understand now: It's my avatar, isn't it? It makes me look angry.
Joined: 10/12/2011
Posts: 6437
Location: The land down under.
In my opinion for the Monogatari Series.
Liberal translation is better than trying to explain what words mean within the subs.
The official subs sadly don't do liberal subs and try to explain the joke in the subtitles... in a heavy dialogue anime.
So my opinion look into the fansubs, as they use wordplay making the joke understandable, in the quick situations.
Example: Owarimonogatari - Episode 7
Official:
K: "Araragi-senpai, It's been a while (o-hisa)" knees Araragi in the face {It's a knee (o-hiza)}
A: "Well, having eaten a knee from an underclassman right as we meet, I shouldn't be hoping to look stylish or anything."
K: "[...] To make a correlation between a kneecap (hiza-gashira) and ''right as we meet'' (deai-gashira)"
K: "[...] I prefer to call the kneecaps my ''knee-boys'' (hiza-kozou)."
Liberal:
K: "Araragi! Long time no see!" knees Araragi in the face {Long time no knee!}
A: "Well, perhaps it's out of line to hope for a cool way of getting kneed in the face."
K: "[...] Immediately making a pun on getting kneed in the times of need is impressive."
K: "[...] Permit me to say this, but I prefer the word patella over the word kneecap."
WebNations/Sabih wrote:
+fsvgm777 never censoring anything.
Disables Comments and Ratings for the YouTube account.Something better for yourself and also others.
To be fair, both options from your example kinda suck. :( I had this problem with Penguindrum where nearly every line of dialogue carried a second meaning, a reference to past/future event, or something else of the sort. At least there was an option that was clearly superior to others in terms of both flow and precision. Not so lucky with Russian translations, neither of which I can honestly recommend to any of my non-English-speaking friends.
I generally agree that liberal translation can equal to better reading/watching experience. The problem is if it's not handled well—in other words, done without a high-grade editor + TLC duo—the result can ruin the experience completely by losing or irreversibly distorting the meaning behind significant lines, or, at the very least, introducing incoherent stylistic choices that easily break immersion (eg. an old person talking like a teenager or vice versa). So I usually avoid overly liberal translations unless I'm absolutely sure they're done by an experienced team, and prefer to err on the side of script accuracy.
Based on what I see here, the four available options for Bake often end up at pretty much the opposite ends of original meaning—exactly what I was saying above. Of those present I actually like Aniplex's the most (who would have thought, right?), but their typesetting is allegedly nonexisting (well, no surprise there), and it's been brought to my attention that these re-edited subs fix most of what is wrong with the ANE/gg release, including some major semantic inaccuracies, without sacrificing any of their strong suits. So I'm going with that for Bake. For Nise, I think I'm going to go with UTW for as much as they have done, and continue with Coalgirls (they use CMS script, which is a very lightly edited official script, with decent typesetting and uncensored) from there onwards. After that... well, I need to get there first, I guess.
Warp wrote:
Edit: I think I understand now: It's my avatar, isn't it? It makes me look angry.
I will point out, one of the fansub groups, gg, even though, they do indeed look like trollsubs, they v2 their subs (sometimes), and people have modified their subs ontop of it.
(People also used gg subs for Penguindrum on top of that, and modified the subs)
Owarimonogatari on the other hand (the example quotes) were from the Offical subs and the fansub group Commie. There is a group, doing the blurays, modifying Commie's subs.
WebNations/Sabih wrote:
+fsvgm777 never censoring anything.
Disables Comments and Ratings for the YouTube account.Something better for yourself and also others.
Groups like gg require extra attention because they can do really well when they put effort into it, and they suck horribly when they don't—much like Commie and some others. I actually used their v2 for Penguindrum (well, actually Flep+Zurako, which was a BD release with enhanced typesetting based on gg's v2 with a few more fixes). That was the single superior option I was talking about, and it was largely helped by gg's project leader for Penguindrum bringing a super experienced TL on board for this series, 8thsin.
gg didn't v2 Bakemonogatari themselves as far as I'm aware, but that anon stuff I linked above seems to be the working equivalent of a v2, so I take that as the superior option.
8thsin actually did TLC Nisemonogatari for UTW, which is a clear tipping point for me in terms of script accuracy, and their typesetting is historically A-grade, but they had to drop it after episode 3 because of staffing issues which essentially made them disband. UTW's release appears strong in both script accuracy and typesetting, so it's unfortunate to have to choose between a group with inferior typesetting (CMS) and a group with botched lines (Commie) for the remaining episodes. At least Coalgirls' release which is based on CMS looks like the lesser evil to me. Them anniemays and their problems. :v
On a mostly unrelated note, apparently there is a sequel to FLCL coming next year, and it's set after a significant timeskip. Not sure yet what to make of it. I thought FLCL was perfect as it was and didn't need any sequels, to be honest. *shrug*
Warp wrote:
Edit: I think I understand now: It's my avatar, isn't it? It makes me look angry.
Jeez you guys are fansub experts. I just take whatever shit I find first and deal with the errors.
Been finishing up Sword Art Online II recently. First half was garbage but second half is less so. I should get back to watching more anime.
