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Daryl reviews the MANLY MANGA Satsuma Gishiden, Gerald reviews the MANLY CARTOON Spirit of Wonder (what?), and Clarissa is the MANLIEST of us all since she reviews MAZINKAISER~! which law dictates must be spelled in all-caps tilde exclamation point.
Show notes are possibly delayed due to us all undertaking an impossible mission, and by that we mean that Daryl got a Nintendo Wii.
Introduction (0:00 – 20:33)
Is there such a thing as “anime literacy”, and can we recommend any nonsensical anime comedies? We talked about that for 20 minutes?
Let’s News! (20:33 – 40:43)
Kadokawa, undoubtedly best known around the USA for bringing us ABSOLUTE ZERO, NOW!, is going to start distributing their movies via BitTorrent, Yamato Toys is expanding their US operations, the live-action Speed Racer has a set release date, a doujinshi circle somehow sold 15,000 copies of their comic and got nailed for it, the cost to license one episode of anime for release in the US officially averages to $20,000 per episode but can go as high as $80,000, and the Go Nagai Chibi World OAV is getting remastered. In the rumors department, Discotek might actually release something new and Tokyopop might have licensed one of the Gutsoon!/Raijin Comics titles (presumably Slam Dunk), but in the flat-out FACTS department, Hajime no Ippo is THE BUSINESS and Initial D is for people in the Home For Infinite Losers. Also, there are now Rilakkuma condoms.
Promo: Anime Pacific (40:43 – 42:17)
Never mind that this promo is entirely too long; see that website background? ONE OF US! ONE OF US! Clearly Daryl’s advocacy is proving effective. Even though that fansub script for Raoh Gaiden they made totally used “hegemony” as every other word.
Review: Satsuma Gishiden (manga), Volume 1 (42:17 – 1:04:22)
Daryl reviews this fine gekiga title about angry samurai who run around in loincloths and scream like lunatics, as drawn by a master calligrapher. It goes without saying that this is a title from Dark Horse Comics, makers of all sorts of totally rad manga that nobody fucking sells anywhere. Otherwise, this review would also cover Volume 2. Wait, Mail Volume 2 is out? They’re on Volume FOUR of Oldboy? God damn you, bookstores and comicbook shops. Oh well, at least you can order them online. Here’s some Amazon links for the first two volumes: if you buy them through clicking these, we get some money for it or something.
And if you want to buy the comics anthology containing Fairy Princess Yukio Mishima, it can be yours for $10 shipped by heading over to Cheap Disposable Entertainment!
Promo: Popcorn Samurai (1:04:22 – 1:05:26)
Yeah yeah, so his show isn’t actually “weekly,” but it’s not like we’re ones to talk. Because of Daryl’s review, he picked up Le Chevalier D’Eon Volume 1. AND his next episode is about Kazuo Koike. Clearly Daryl’s advocacy is proving effective.
Review: Spirit of Wonder (1:05:26 – 1:20:35)
Gerald has not one, but two different titles to review here, though we get the feeling that neither of them really have any business being classified as “hard sci-fi.” No, this is more of a whimsical light romance affair, though Inignokt and Err better step back if they know what’s good for them. WHICH THEY DON’T.
Review: MAZINKAISER~! (1:20:35 – 1:52:18)
Due to strict awesomeness quotient laws enforced by the federal government, Clarissa is obliged to tell people on the air that MAZINKAISER~! will not change their life and is not as good as GaoGaiGar. These laws do not apply in print. The truth is that it WILL change your life–entirely for the better–and that if there is anything it is not as good as, it would be Getter Robo. After all, how can one TRULY believe in GaoGaiGar’s superiority without acknowledging that GaoGaiGar Final is better than the series itself?
The reason there has not yet been any sort of MAZINKAISER~! vs SHIN GETTER ROBO~! is because that would violate even Japan’s awesomeness quotient laws, which are generally more lenient than ours. Make the right choice, Shinzo Abe.
Promo: Dave and Joel’s Fast Karate for the Gentleman (1:52:18 – 1:53:08)
This is actually a fan-made promo and so there’s nothing in it mentioning the website. Wait, they get fan-made promos?! Actually, we got a fan-made promo too from The Comics Interpreter, but it’s like three minutes long and no podcast would ever actually run that. However, it was professionally done and was awesome. We received this promo and have done nothing with it since…August 2006. Hmm. Maybe THAT’S why we don’t get fan-made promos…
Closing (1:53:08 – 1:55:54)
Next time, Daryl will review another Dark Horse manga title that he can’t find Volume 2 of anywhere, The Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service. In celebration of it’s 20th anniversary, Gerald’s reviewing Dirty Pair: Project E.D.E.N. aka “the real Dirty Pair,” and Clarissa acknowledges that MAZINKAISER~! does indeed change your life by reviewing Loveless in order to bring her testosterone levels back down.
Really good episode, i’m going to buy MAZINKAISER~! now!!
I’m only about halfway through the episode at this point, but like Clarissa asked, is there any chance of getting that Yukio Mishima comic? I’d love to see it and I know some of my professors would want to see it too.
Also, as far as Blazing Transfer Student, mrvacbob (A. Strange) as well as a few other raspberry heaven people are working on something… but we’re kind of waiting for raws at the moment. maybe in the next 3 months?
oh, apparently I am either incapable of simple reading comprehension or you edited in the link for where to buy that comic. Thanks!
Just so you know, the AnimEigo Spirit of Wonder has been out of print for years and was hard as hell for me to get my hands on.
I’m not quite finished listening to the episode, but I just wanted to mention a few things:
To the best of my knowledge, the only Dr. Slump that has been fan subbed were two OAV’s (or maybe they were films–can’t verify with my VCR out of comission). There was also a sequence with Arale-chan (and a brief cameo of the Doctor himself) in the third (non-Z) Dragon Ball movie. I showed this at the last Otakon, and when I mentioned that it has a Dr. Slump cameo, guess what a lot of people replied? (HINT: three letter word, often preceded by “Doctor”)
The othe comment I wanted to make (for now-fu fu fu fuuu!) was that you guys made a very common mistake regarding the names of the female robots in the Mazinger series (so did ADV, but then they can’t tell their maru from their tenten). Their names are corruptions of Greco-Roman goddesses, not the actual names. In other words:
Aphrodi A (Afurodai Eisu)
Dianan A (Daianan Eisu)
Vunus A (Byuunas Eisu)
…as you may have guessed, the suffix is spelled “A” but pronounced “Ace” (the spelling of the rest of the name is up for debate, though it definitely should not be “Aphrodite,” “Diana,” or “Venus”).
Well, off to listen to the rest of the episode (and maybe re-watch the Mazinger Z ep where Boss Borot is built…)
E. Bernhard Warg
Otakon Classic Track
Anime’s Frank
> but we’re kind of waiting for raws at the moment. maybe in the next 3 months?
By that he means we bought a genuine LD off Yahoo Auctions, but the guy who owns the player is incredibly busy and hasn’t copied it yet.
PS: my favorite part of Otokojuku is the main character’s name, “Tsurugi Momotarou.”
I have episodes 2 and 5 but no others; maybe I should put it up somewhere anyway, it’s not like anyone can tell the difference.
All due respect to Mr. Warg, but sir, you are incorrect on the Mazinger partner robots.
I hope you don’t call it ‘Getter’ Robo as well, as we all know it’s Getta.
Nobody ever gets the multi-level pun of the Boss Borot. (Boss being a play on ‘Bozu'[this goes for the character as well], Borot being both a corruption of Robot, and Boroboro or broken down)
Otokojuku totally rocks and should be released in the U.S.
All due respect to Mr. Warg, but sir, you are incorrect on the Mazinger partner robots.
How am I incorrect? “A” is definitely pronounced “Ace” (or “Eisu,” if ya wanna get technical) and the names are definitely corruptions of “Aphrodite,” “Diana,” and “Venus,” but not the actual names, otherwise they’d be “Afurodaiti” or “Afurodaichi”–possibly with lengthened “i” at the end–“Daiana,” and “Biinasu” in katakana, which they’re not. The katakana is just as I romanized it (well, actually I accidentally typed “Byuunas” instead of “Byuunasu,” but otherwise…).
Speaking of katakana, Daryl, the “Akira” caligraphy was katakana, not kanji.
I hope you don’t call it ‘Getter’ Robo as well, as we all know it’s Getta.
Well, technically it’s “Gettaa” … ^_^
Seriously, I sometime say “Getter,” and sometimes “Gettaa,” but I *do* try to do the “Japanese double consonant sound” thing.
Nobody ever gets the multi-level pun of the Boss Borot. (Boss being a play on ‘Bozu'[this goes for the character as well], Borot being both a corruption of Robot, and Boroboro or broken down)
I knew the Robot/Borot thing, but not the rest. Thanks!
E. Bernhard Warg
Otakon Classic Track
Anime’s Frank
I will verify that there is zero skill involved in pachinko; the lever is a trick to make the player feel like they’re in control and technically make the game “skill” as opposed to gambling. Pachinko is REALLY about flashing lights and noise.
And Golgo 13 condoms? How ironic! Selling the thing the man needs least! Fun fact: I am owed a box of Gundam condoms. This is one of those awkward debts you don’t reeeeally wanna collect on.
Bernhard: Are you also one of those types who says that the characters in “Ah! My Goddess” aren’t really the Norse Goddesses of Fate, because the actual name is “Verthandi” but the character’s name is romanized as “Belldandy”?
See, the thing is, you’re running into the limits of Japanese pronunciation, and then insisting that the mispronunciation is the actual intended pronunciation. As in, Go Nagai didn’t want to call the character “Afurodai”–they meant “Aphrodite”. But he couldn’t work out how to write that in crazy moon letters, and “Afurodai” is the best he could do.
So for the name to be translated as “Afurodai” wouldn’t be correct, because what the hell would be the point of almost but not quite naming the robots after Greek goddesses? It would be as though someone in America wrote a story about the “General Nobanger” who conquered Japan, and then someone translated this story into Japanese but still called the character ‘Nobanger’.
Oh, here’s another one, and it also involves AMG. In the “Mini-Goddess” shorts, there’s a scene where the rat is flying the Bell X-1. (don’t ask.) Anyway, they discuss aviation pioneer “Rangra”. Now, they’re referring to Samuel Langley. But are you saying that they actually meant someone else because the romanization worked out differently?
Bernhard: Are you also one of those types who says that the characters in “Ah! My Goddess” aren’t really the Norse Goddesses of Fate, because the actual name is “Verthandi” but the character’s name is romanized as “Belldandy”?
Not at all. The name is transliterated as “Berudandii,” based on “Verthandi,” and officially romanized as “Belldandy.” If, however, it were “Berudan,” or “Byurudandii,” or “Berudandin,” but were romanized as “Verthandi,” then I’d be one of those types.
I’m also not going to argue that Babel II’s giant robot’s name (directly romanized as “poseidon”) should be pronounced “Po SAY don” rather than “Po SIGH don,” but if the katakana read “Posei” or “Pyuuseidon” or “Poseido” or something like that, *then* I’d argue against it being spelled “Poseidon” and pronounced “Po SIGH don.”
See, the thing is, you’re running into the limits of Japanese pronunciation, and then insisting that the mispronunciation is the actual intended pronunciation. As in, Go Nagai didn’t want to call the character “Afurodai”–they meant “Aphrodite”. But he couldn’t work out how to write that in crazy moon letters, and “Afurodai” is the best he could do.
Add a big “TE,” a small “i,” and maybe a vowel lengthening line. Problem solved.
So for the name to be translated as “Afurodai”
Actually, I said “Aphrodi.” I just included the direct romanizations as pronunciation guides (and because in the dub, ADV, on the only occasion AFAIK where they didn’t pronounce it “Aphrodite,” pronounced it “Aphrodi” with the last syllable rhyming with “wii” rather than “why”).
wouldn’t be correct, because what the hell would be the point of almost but not quite naming the robots after Greek goddesses?
I dunno, the same point as calling a robot a “Majin” and then adding a little to the name? The same point as having Frankenstein monsters merely named “Franken?” The same as having an evil Santa Claus mecha named “Satan Glaus” insted of “Satan Claus?”
Besides, it’s not just the one robot, all three deviate from the Goddesses’ names *and* two came after Minerva X, whose name was *not* an alteration (I’m certainly not going to argue that it should be spelled “Mineruba”–that’s as close as one can get to “Minerva” with Japanese phonetics).
Oh, here’s another one, and it also involves AMG. In the “Mini-Goddess” shorts, there’s a scene where the rat is flying the Bell X-1. (don’t ask.) Anyway, they discuss aviation pioneer “Rangra”. Now, they’re referring to Samuel Langley. But are you saying that they actually meant someone else because the romanization worked out differently?
Okay, I just watched the episode, and Mini Belldandy clearly said “Rangurei,” which is pretty much as close as one can get to “Langley” in Japanese phonetics.
At the very least, I’m right about the “A” being pronounced “Ace”…
E. Bernhard Warg
Otakon Classic Track
Anime’s Frank
…or maybe add a “ji,” like with “Heidi”…
To the best of my knowledge, the only Dr. Slump that has been fan subbed were two OAV’s (or maybe they were films–can’t verify with my VCR out of comission).
I have those on tape myself, they were probably theatrical movies since I remember they were letterboxed on my copy (they were produced around the early 90’s).
There’s also episodes of the series that was aired in Hawaii on Nippon Golden Network with their brand of subbing that was rather simplistic. I have some episodes of that too I once had up on YouTube.
I often got confused over whether to use Getta or Getter myself (originally read it as “Getta Robo” years before I saw “Getter” get used).
I don’t think there’s such as thing as a “perfectly” transliterated Romanization. You have to fudge a little to make up for the fact that there are certain vowel and consonant combinations that the Japanese language lacks.
For example: The literal katakana of Majinkaizaa is romanized “Mazinkaiser”. Is this Romanization incorrect? Hardly. It also helps to remember that the official Romanizations in the supplementary materials a.) aren’t always consistent themselves and b.) are not necessarily compiled by people without the strongest mastery of the English language.
I don’t agree with the “Eisu”-pronounced-“A” thing. If it was supposed to be pronounced as the long A sound, they could have simply used the “Ei” phoneme. Why the “-su”, unless they were trying to say “Ace”?
Regardless, it seems a pretty fair bet that ADV screwed up when they translated “hover piloter” as “hober bilder”. There are also missing articles and grammatical mistakes that indicate a pretty poor quality control check on the subtitles.
Regardless, it seems a pretty fair bet that ADV screwed up when they translated “hover piloter” as “hober bilder”. There are also missing articles and grammatical mistakes that indicate a pretty poor quality control check on the subtitles.
“Bird Run!”
“Sidekick Wave!”
E. Bernhard Warg
Otakon Classic Track
Anime’s Frank
Well, I totally admit to being a tool for the A/Ace thing, as when I was doing the review I *looked* at the romanization ‘A’ without thinking about or remembering the fact that they actually *say* Ace.
As for the issue with whether the names are the actual names or alterations, it was partially me having pretty much always seen them romanized as the regular goddess’ names and partially me not being sure. Having been exposed to some pretty ridiculous manglings of western language by Japan, I’m never entirely sure whether, for example, ????? is intentionally meant to be Vunus rather than Venus or if it’s just an author not having great command of English. Or who knows what else. I’m reminded of the fact that Japanese writes/pronounces the word ‘virus’ as ???? rather than ???? or some such, but when translating or romanizing, we still use the proper English virus. (Why is that BTW? Is it a European influence to the pronunciation?)
Ah, Engrish and romanizations. Hooray.
I’m also not going to argue that Babel II’s giant robot’s name (directly romanized as “poseidon”) should be pronounced “Po SAY don” rather than “Po SIGH don,” but if the katakana read “Posei” or “Pyuuseidon” or “Poseido” or something like that, *then* I’d argue against it being spelled “Poseidon” and pronounced “Po SIGH don.”
Oh god. That reminds me of some particularly ignorant fangirls running around insisting that the title of FAKE should be pronounce “fah-kay” instead of the regular English pronunciation of the word. When even the tiniest bit of effort given to looking up/learning the katakana for the title would have revealed that it’s written there as ????, and thus is exactly the normal English word “fake” with correct pronunciation.
Also, I was thinking that the Akira title was done in katakana rather than kanji, but decided that I wasn’t sure if I remembered the original title art too clearly. Should have spoken up after all, I guess.
Don’t mind listening to the 2-week old news personally, as I often don’t pay attention to what goes on in the news until I hear it from you guys!
I do think it pays to be litereate to different types of anime genres and series such as what you describe, or to be aware of them. I was amused after I stuck up those ZIV Captain Harlock dubs on YouTube, someone had to point out it’s Herlock, not Harlock. Is hould’ve told him to f__k off, but I was a gentleman and told him both names were acceptable, only to find out he had to figure it out himself after surfing around.
This is why I would recommend people just go to Wiki for these things. Don’t question me, I’m too TIRED explaining this crap! Especially the noobs whom’ll always pop up seeing these for the first time and go “Harlock looks like Wildstar!” 🙂
Heh, one of those days you need to review Gundou Musashi (I only wish someone kept seeding that one).
Being reminded of having watched the first live-action Gyver flick while in high school 14 years ago. Would be interesting to see how this Speed Racer flick’ll play out.
Would be nice to find out what Gutsoon! Entertainment title TokyoPop did bother picking up, lord knows I hope it’s not Guardian Angel Getten or perhaps Bow Wow Wata. Of course Slam Dunk would probably be a better choice in the end, but it would be nice if City Hunter and Fist of the Blue Sky was looked into as well.
Heh, nice to see one doujinshi group’s gonna get it’s ass slammed out of this stunt! Of course I wish I could pull that off myself. 🙂
If or when you guys get to talk about Raijin Comics, I know I can go on and on about the manga boom of 2003-04 and how big I was into biking my ass down to the nearest comic/RPG shop to pick up an issue of Raijin every week. Of course once they went into being a monthly, I felt it was an insult to my patience (let alone having to wait a month at a time for each chapter of a series since the damn book didn’t get any thicker, really stupid move on Gutsoon’s part to only allow one series to have two chapters a month at random). I wish I could turn back the hands of time to when it was still around, as I was so BIG into buying manga then.
After hearing about the whimsical nature of “Spirit of Wonder”, I couldn’t help but think of another whimsical anime of sorts that posed the question in my head, why in the world was this ever made. That of course was the two-part TMNT OAV from the mid 90’s!
In particular, I’m thinking of the first episode where New York gets flooded up to the gills, killing millions except for our heroes, the baddies and April O’Neil in a newschopper. God that left many viewers in traumatic fits. If this had been shown on CBS way back then one Saturday mornings, the children probably would’ve contemplated suicide quickly!
Now all I need is the Masami Hata-directed “Super Mario Bros.” anime from ’86 (“Great Mission to Rescue Princess Peach”). I wish someone bothered sticking this up besides a few clips on YouTube.
Why is it whenever I learn of something I haven’t seen/heard before, someone’s NOT seeding it on bit torrent? That’s what I’m getting right now with Spirit of Wonder, in particular, getting the “Miss China’s Ring” vid. Someone at BoxTorrent bothered sticking it up a few years back, but is now dead as we speak (trying my best with a dead link to cypher much of it). And of course I had to go check eBay as well but usually get the Bandai release (or some pirated set). Hate finding out about something too late and to bitch about it for days before a lead happens. Right now, I found a private tracker I joined up that stuck the full DVD of the Korean R3 release of “Robot Carnival” from ’04, can’t miss out on that (let alone a DVD of Sanrio’s “Sea Prince & the Fire Child” in both Japanese and & English someone bothered to re-author)!
Aside from the English Mazinger Z themed heard in this episode (what got seen in the Philippines anyway, I have a full episode I could stick up on YouTube if or whenever I feel like it), here’s the Tranzor Z opening from Bunker Jenkins’ 3B Productions crew (in STEREO SOUND)…
And while we’re at it, the Shogun Warriors ad with Godzilla demonstrating his rocket punch!
And because I have nothing better to do than to rot people’s minds, here’s the Arabic opening to Mazinger Z!
That’s all for now (though I know I’m late on continuing the Daimos episodes, so I’ll have to get to that ASAP, though cabin fever has settled too deep into me now)!
What! You don’t have the Animetal cover of the Mazinger Z theme? I love hearing the guy bellow “BULESTU FA-EE-YAAAAAAAAA!“
I’m never entirely sure whether, for example, ????? is intentionally meant to be Vunus rather than Venus or if it’s just an author not having great command of English.
Wait, you can post in katakana on this thing? ????~!
I wonder if I could also…????
That reminds me of some particularly ignorant fangirls running around insisting that the title of FAKE should be pronounce “fah-kay” instead of the regular English pronunciation of the word.
Reminds me of an episode of Otaku Generation where one guy pronounced Elfen Lied correctly as ????? ??? (well, actually he said?????, but I’m not gonna be that nitpicky) , but another “corrected” him, saying it was ????? ???. Don’t even get me started on ???????…
Fun With Phonetics aside, and on the subject of Mazinger Z, I noticed a minor inadvertant error: the Engrish theme you played was not from Tranzor Z, but rather the Philippines dub. Too bad, actually, as the Tranzor theme was just someone banging away on a Casio while an announcer said insipid things about “Tranzoooooorrrrrr Zeeeeeeeeee!! zeeeeeeee zeeeeee zeeee”
E. Bernhard Warg
Otakon Classic Track
Anime’s Frank
??????????
Just to be my usual self: Isao Sasaki, singing the English Mazinger Z theme, is not the original singer of the song, that privilege went to the hardest working man in Anime, Ichiro Mizuki.
Mizuki has ALSO sung an English version of the Mazinger Z theme, which is TOTALLY DIFFERENT than the one Sasaki sung.
Neither of which was used in Tranzor Z, as Chris pointed out.
I still haven’t found any real explaining of that whole batch of English versions of anime themes that Sasaki did. The only thing that comes to mind is that maybe Toei had them done as part of that ‘We’re going to America REAL SOON NOW!’ push they did at the end of the ’70s, the one that went nowhere. Ah well. Someday I’ll stumble across the answer.
As to Mazinkaizer, it’s really very simple. It’s a ‘reboot’ of Great Mazinger.
See, one of the things you don’t know if you haven’t actually watched Mazinger Z and Great Mazinger is, Great Mazinger (hereafter G Maz to save my fingers, and Maz Z for the other, Ok?) really, really sucked. It was super lame. It SHOULD have been awesome as Tetsuya was somewhat inspired by Sonny Chiba and thus a safari suited Karate Man, and G Maz was the Karate Robot (yes, it WAS a somewhat pass on the Streetfighter movies. Honest.) and there was intent to be manly all around, and it failed. It just utterly failed. I don’t know if Toei had their ‘C’ team doing animation, or if everyone was just tired of doing it or what, but man, it was crap-tastic.
Part of the problem was Tetsuya was just a big whiny baby. He got SUCH a bug up his ass about “Koji this and Koji that and STFU about Koji!” that he would go out and beat up trees to work off his angst. Then towards the end of the series Koji comes back and kicks ass and then it’s time for Grendizer.
Great Mazinger was really Mazinger Z series 2. If it had at all be decent Tetsuya would have died and with much manly tears Koji would have taken up G Maz and avenged him.
Well, Mazinkaizer pretty much says Great Mazinger didn’t happen. G Maz and Tetsuya were instead the ‘mid season upgrade’ and ‘rival partner’ concept, pushing just about everyone and every thing else into the background.
What’s interesting is how the entire project somewhat stems from the CB Go Nagai World OAVs. During the funny chibi stuff going on, we get a glimpse of the ‘real world’ happenings of various Nagai chara, and the Mazinger Z footage is just *stunning* in its coolness. It was those scenes that bubbled in the back of the minds of people when the greenlight to ‘legitimize’ Mazinkaizer from ‘video game thing’ to a show.
You just don’t see that sort of thing nowadays.
Steve Harrison quoted:
Neither of which was used in Tranzor Z, as Chris pointed out.
I felt I had to do so!
I still haven’t found any real explaining of that whole batch of English versions of anime themes that Sasaki did. The only thing that comes to mind is that maybe Toei had them done as part of that ‘We’re going to America REAL SOON NOW!’ push they did at the end of the ’70s, the one that went nowhere. Ah well. Someday I’ll stumble across the answer.
Such a shame it never happened. I would’ve loved to been there when Mazinger Z was on the tube as it was elsewhere (or Voltes V for that matter). I have a Toei Doga promotional booklet from ’81 that showed a few pages about their international marketing stragedies though it felt more like America just never caught it far enough.
Oh, and thanks for your Maz Z/G Maz analysis Steve!
Neither of which was used in Tranzor Z, as Chris pointed out
and as Bernhard needlessly restated, since he didn’t check if any new posts were added between writing his last post and actually posting it… (?? ?????)
Great Mazinger was really Mazinger Z series 2. If it had at all be decent Tetsuya would have died and with much manly tears Koji would have taken up G Maz and avenged him.
Actually, he *did* die in the manga, but the rest of your scenario didn’t happen. I belive both Tetsuya and Great were destroyed in a final kamikaze attack on the Genral of the Darkness. Wait, let me make sure…
…Yep! Just as I said. Well, the important thing is that he died. The manga also didn’t have such insipid things as the Rocket Punch motorcycle or Robot Junior.
Oh well, back to watching Mini Goddesses (thanks, HaloJonesFan, for giving me a reason to make it the next thing from my backlog to watch!)
E. Bernhard Warg
Otakon Classic Track
Anime’s Frank
Dash! Dash!
Dan dan da dan
Dash! Dash!
Dan dan da dan
Dash! Dash!
Dan dan da dan
Skuranburu Dasshu!
Oh no! These lyrics are so hard to translate!
Actually, to be evil, there were people who believed that the ‘dans’ in the Great Mazinger theme WERE words that were to be translated…
It made for a really, really stupid translation.
But then again, there are people STILL who think that the name of something is meant to be translated, as it ‘Dairanger’ should be really called Great Ranger..no, it’s Dairanger. The ‘Dai’ is indeed taken from ‘Great’ or ‘Big’ but you aren’t supposed to *translate* it in the name, Dairanger means Dairanger.
Kakuranger means Kakuranger, not ‘Hidden Ranger’
boy that sort of foolishness really tightens my jaw.
But then again, there are people STILL who think that the name of something is meant to be translated, as it ‘Dairanger’ should be really called Great Ranger..no, it’s Dairanger. The ‘Dai’ is indeed taken from ‘Great’ or ‘Big’ but you aren’t supposed to *translate* it in the name, Dairanger means Dairanger.
Actually, “Dai” means “Dai”–it’s the name of their ancient clan (the rival, evil ancient clan, and the villains of the series, being the Goma).
Kakuranger means Kakuranger, not ‘Hidden Ranger’
Or to be more precise, it means Kakuranger, not “Scroll Ranger,” though I think, at least, we both can agree that “kaku,” as used here, doesn’t mean “nuclear” (or “nucular,” if you’re a politician).
Seriously, though I agree that names like that shouldn’t be directly translated, e.g. “Kamen Rider” not “Masked Rider,” “Goranger” not “Five Rangers,” etc. Nothing wrong with translating the name in a footnote or the like, but not when speaking.
Y’know, this reminds me, a while back I did some translations for a Kamen Rider site, and somebody emailed me with a “correction,” saying it should be “Masked Rider.” I hate using that name, because it conjures up images of a generic rip-off of Britt Reid’s great uncle rather than a bug man on a Kawasaki. Maybe I should have used that in my reply to him rather than saying the “Kamen Rider” sounds more Japanese (way to make myself sound elitist and/or clueless…)
E. Bernhard Warg
Otakon Classic Track
Anime’s Frank
This podcast is pretty good…but please stop pausing so much between words. Sometimes it’s really annoying. What…I…like…is…a…show…that…is..fun…to..watch…because…it’s…meaning…means…alot….to ….me…I think….so…..Yea
Daryl, the “Akira” caligraphy was katakana, not kanji.
Ah. I can’t read Japanese and have zero intention of ever learning, so I call anything that’s Japanese text “kanji.” Next week, I will refer to all the sound effects in Corpse Delivery Service as “kanji” as well, even though sound effects in manga are in katakana.
Also, it’s Aphrodite, Venus, and Diana, and I’m fighting that one to the grave just like I’m going to vehemently insist that it’s “Harlock” and not “Herlock” no matter how many times it appears in English in official Japanese sources. It’s like how Yuda in Fist of the North Star is ACTUALLY supposed to be named “Judas” even though his symbol is “UD.”
Why is it whenever I learn of something I haven’t seen/heard before, someone’s NOT seeding it on bit torrent?
I often ask myself the same thing! PS: please reseed your digital capture of Diatron 5.
Isao Sasaki, singing the English Mazinger Z theme, is not the original singer of the song, that privilege went to the hardest working man in Anime, Ichiro Mizuki.
While I’ll own up to the Tranzor Z bit, I don’t remember even saying Isao Sasaki’s name anywhere in this episode to warrant pointing this out to me.
Great Mazinger was really Mazinger Z series 2.
I would bet money that there is not a single person on this planet that is aware of what Great Mazinger is who is not immediately aware of this. Hell, I STILL can barely tell the difference between Mazinger Z and Great Mazinger.
(and no, that is not the opening for anyone to point out to me what the distinguishing feature is, as if I don’t know, I’m just saying it’s incredibly minor a la the difference between Combattler V and Voltes V)
This podcast is pretty good…but please stop pausing so much between words.
You are officially the first person to ever issue this complaint. Most people lament that our show sounds like two hours of constant talking with NO pauses, as if we were all characters written by Aaron Sorkin.
Hey, thanks for playing my Promo guys, I totally appreciate it!
Re: Raoh Gaiden, that was actually secretly done to promote the word hegemony, as it’s not used enough these days. (Actually I just used babelfish to translate from Chinese to English and *tried* to make it into something resembling coherency, just to tide over the fans who were waiting for HOM’s release)
As for MAZINKAISER~! , I’ve already vowed to my wife that if we have kids, it’s Go Nagai anime every day for the little rugrat. I want to give my kid, what my childhood missed out on.
E. Bernhard Warg wrote:
Y’know, this reminds me, a while back I did some translations for a Kamen Rider site, and somebody emailed me with a “correction,” saying it should be “Masked Rider.” I hate using that name, because it conjures up images of a generic rip-off of Britt Reid’s great uncle rather than a bug man on a Kawasaki. Maybe I should have used that in my reply to him rather than saying the “Kamen Rider” sounds more Japanese (way to make myself sound elitist and/or clueless…)
I’m only glad I never did see that Saban series from back in the 90’s that took a whiz on the franchise!
Daryl Surat then went:
I often ask myself the same thing! PS: please reseed your digital capture of Diatron 5.
Yeah, I need to. I just need to free up some 10-20 gigs of extra space in my hard drive before I can be able to upload/download in massive quantities (or try replacing my 80 gig HD with one past 120, whichever comes first, really, I might have to do blow my income tax return giving my PC a little sprucing up). Of course I do have Megaupload as an option if I don’t mind sticking it up there and hope it’ll stay there for a while.
Oh yeah, and if you are interested in getting a copy of the Lupin III “Gold of Babylon” flick, I do have the AnimEigo LD I don’t mind giving away (might have to check it to make sure it’s OK with minimal laserrot, I bought it from when they were finally ditching thehir LD’s for good years ago).
w00t, ZIV Harlock. I love that dub for all its silliness.
Can someone confirm if that’s what’s on the East West Harlock DVD before I shell out the cash for it?
Also, apologies for the delays on Urashiman…damn insert songs…
I’ve been looking through my Nagai Go books (and wishing my Japanese was better…) to try and find any evidence as to whether the female robots’ names are accidentally or deliberately corrupted. So far I haven’t found anything, but I *did* find this partial translation of one of the reference books, so I thought I’d share it with the rest of the class.
E. Bernhard Warg
Otakon Classic Track
Anime’s Frank
exedore said…
w00t, ZIV Harlock. I love that dub for all its silliness.
I know you would!
http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=1D51DA402AC579D8
I might just stick up a few more ZIV dubs like Captain Future, Angel, Little Lulu and others very soon (still need to look for the Candy Candy dub). Great toons that any UHF indie station should’ve said “yes” to, but the whole “original aniamtion” thing didn’t really kick off with syndication television until the toy companies got behind it after ’83 with their junk.
Can someone confirm if that’s what’s on the East West Harlock DVD before I shell out the cash for it?
Not sure since I haven’t seen/bought those discs, though I assume it’s the “My Youth in Arcadia” movie in an edited form from the old “Just for Kids” tape. Surprised if they haven’t gotten to the ZIV stuff yet.
still need to look for the Candy Candy dub
Saw the trailer for that. For some reason I found it very amusing that, despite the original title being “Candy Candy,” and despite their (completely new, no resemblance to the original in any way) theme song repeating the words “Candy Candy” several times, they nevertheless renamed it “Candy.”
E. Bernhard Warg
Otakon Classic Track
Anime’s Frank
I remember the ZIV Harlock dub showing up in the video-rental store (and this was back when mom-and-pop video rental stores still existed, and Blockbuster stocked porn.) I rented it, and watched it with my Dad. I never asked him what he thought about it, and never have. There’s just some episodes in life that it’s better if we pretend that they didn’t happen.
E. Bernhard Warg proclaimed…
Saw the trailer for that. For some reason I found it very amusing that, despite the original title being “Candy Candy,” and despite their (completely new, no resemblance to the original in any way) theme song repeating the words “Candy Candy” several times, they nevertheless renamed it “Candy.”
it was a pretty dumb change indeed. You would think it wouldn’t matter to ZIV since the show’s titlt was appropriate on it’s own without any real change whatsoever (or would having two Candy’s prove to be jarring to the average viewer as to believe that the star’s name is that).
Again, I really don’t know what went through Irv Holender’s or whomever else’s mind at ZIV when these were made, but it sure didn’t bring ’em in the bucks like Gumby did (having watched a syndie run of that around ’83 on a Detroit station with ZIV’s logo popping up at the end).
By the way, here’s that ZIV Candy Candy opening, though taken from a European release of sorts (hense why it’s sped up a bit, also loses the “Candy” title too)…
There’s another version up though that was taken from RetroJunk.com anyway based on the same promo sequence already mentioned.
Being reminded, there was also these LP’s ZIV put up for some of these shows that were like full episodes or such you were just listening to the audio of or whatever soundtrack. Haven’t been able to buy up one fo these though I’m rather interested to see what was on them.
HaloJonesFan said…
I remember the ZIV Harlock dub showing up in the video-rental store (and this was back when mom-and-pop video rental stores still existed, and Blockbuster stocked porn.) I rented it, and watched it with my Dad. I never asked him what he thought about it, and never have. There’s just some episodes in life that it’s better if we pretend that they didn’t happen.
I often wonder how many kids otherwse went a different way, and got too into the show, only to find out that was all they could ever watch of it 25 years ago, and they’ll just have to go on another decade or two before they rediscover it again through the fandom? I would’ve thought it was a stupid tease myself that I only had those four episodes or whatever to watch. The best ZIV could’ve done otherwise was go the same route Jim Terry did with his Force Five series by combining the Harlock series into a compilation video of sorts (given how often we’ve seen those released on tape in the 80’s).
Oh, man. I can’t believe I have to take people to school on the Ziv thing.
OK, here we go. Ziv was a syndicator, a company that sold (actually leased) programming not only to stations in the U.S., they also took American programming and movies overseas. They’re just like Harmony Gold in that way, OK?
At some point Toei was pushing for international distro on their animated catalog, and Ziv picked up the rights to try and sell those shows. ALL the Toei programming we saw back in the day were pilots created to sell the shows to stations, and overseas. There was never any intent to release the shows themselves.
The Jim Terry productions were subleased from Ziv. Ziv brokered the deal that lead to the creation of Albator and all those French and Spanish releases. It was all Ziv, and it was all from those English episodes that were released on the Family Home Entertainment label.
And I will defend to my dying day that FIRST Harlock dub,the one that used episodes 1 and 9, with Tommy Dexter (for Tadashi Daiba) instead of ‘Tommy Hairball’ and all that foolishness. I am to this day convinced that if they had somehow been able to get that voice crew, that scripting crew to do the entire series Harlock would be up with Star Blazers and Battle of the Planets as a cultural memory.
Thing is, FHE released the Harlock ‘pilot’ right at the time that the whole growing awareness of anime was blooming, and it was a pretty big hit in the rental market. Rental stores were asking FHE if there was any more of that Harlock stuff, and FHE went to Ziv to try and find more. Ziv, knowing a good thing when it slaps them in the face with a sheaf of cash, quickly whipped out another tapes worth of stuff, but nobody bothered to actually try and match the original ‘pilot’ production. Needless to say, there was a fair amount of complaining about it and they never did that again.
There’s a much bigger story in there, of course. I wish I had the money to dig into the Ziv Archives. They have a research service (mostly because of the historical value of their live action productions they distro’d. Lots of classic TV stuff if you’re into that sort of thing) but you have to pony up the bucks to get access. Phoo.
“Bird Run!”
“Sidekick Wave!”
I’m not talking about an Engrish catch-phrase used in combat, here. I’m talking about basic English grammar. You drop an article or a determiner, and suddenly a sentence doesn’t make sense. Improperly spelled English words within the subtitled translations are also a problem. I can’t tell you how much it took me out of the moment every time I saw “soldier” spelled as “solider” in the Aura Battle Dunbine subtitles.
Ideally, a commercial product should be more polished than a digisub, no?
Again, if it’s supposed to be “A” and not “Ace”, why the voiced “-su” sound?
Because I’ve awaken the beast, Steve Harrison said…
Oh, man. I can’t believe I have to take people to school on the Ziv thing.
Yes, please teach! (and since I feel I need to be punished for this)
OK, here we go. Ziv was a syndicator, a company that sold (actually leased) programming not only to stations in the U.S., they also took American programming and movies overseas. They’re just like Harmony Gold in that way, OK?
Hmmm….
At some point Toei was pushing for international distro on their animated catalog, and Ziv picked up the rights to try and sell those shows. ALL the Toei programming we saw back in the day were pilots created to sell the shows to stations, and overseas. There was never any intent to release the shows themselves.
Quite intereseting. You only wish some TV channel in the US (even cable) would’ve saw interest in these shows (especially cable in those days when channels like Nick were desperate to pick up whatever was available outside the Hollywood mainstream, I blame Nick for having exposed me to a lot of weird European classics I can’t find outside Bit Torrent these days).
The Jim Terry productions were subleased from Ziv. Ziv brokered the deal that lead to the creation of Albator and all those French and Spanish releases.
Damn!
It was all Ziv, and it was all from those English episodes that were released on the Family Home Entertainment label.
Aside from a couple I found on the Media Home Entertainment label, but that’s a different thing I assume.
And I will defend to my dying day that FIRST Harlock dub,the one that used episodes 1 and 9, with Tommy Dexter (for Tadashi Daiba) instead of ‘Tommy Hairball’ and all that foolishness. I am to this day convinced that if they had somehow been able to get that voice crew, that scripting crew to do the entire series Harlock would be up with Star Blazers and Battle of the Planets as a cultural memory.
I thought the dub of the first episode was GREAT, and would love to have seen the entire show given that treatment. Only a shame Harlock couldn’t share in that pedestal with those other shows you’ve mentinoed. We could’ve had R1 DVD box sets of it by this point.
Thing is, FHE released the Harlock ‘pilot’ right at the time that the whole growing awareness of anime was blooming, and it was a pretty big hit in the rental market. Rental stores were asking FHE if there was any more of that Harlock stuff, and FHE went to Ziv to try and find more. Ziv, knowing a good thing when it slaps them in the face with a sheaf of cash, quickly whipped out another tapes worth of stuff, but nobody bothered to actually try and match the original ‘pilot’ production. Needless to say, there was a fair amount of complaining about it and they never did that again.
Damn, mystery solved I guess. 🙂
There’s a much bigger story in there, of course. I wish I had the money to dig into the Ziv Archives. They have a research service (mostly because of the historical value of their live action productions they distro’d. Lots of classic TV stuff if you’re into that sort of thing) but you have to pony up the bucks to get access. Phoo.
I know I’m pretty interested to see what else they had besides “Spunky & Tadpole”. Weren’t they eventually sold to Lorimar (and then on to Time Warner)?
I’m reminded of the fact that Japanese writes/pronounces the word ‘virus’ as ???? rather than ???? or some such, but when translating or romanizing, we still use the proper English virus. (Why is that BTW? Is it a European influence to the pronunciation?)
Like most of our medical terms, ???? is borrowed from German. Technically it should be ???? but we don’t have, or at least we didn’t at the time of importing, ?? sound in our language so it was changed to ????. How some of Gairaigo or loan word came to be are quite interesting. One of the more well known example of Gairaigo are ??? from carta (Portuguese), ??? from karte (German), ??? from carte (French), all meaning ‘card’ in English which of course we also borrowed as ???. Word that look pure Japanese are sometime Gairaigo as well. ??? or Kompeito is a traditional Japanese sweets but the name is actually borrowed from Portuguese ‘confeito’ meaning confection in English.
But my favorite example has to be ?????? and ??????. What’s interesting about this is that both words are borrowed from same English word ‘profile’. Yes, some guy way back when must have mispronounced it as ?????? and it somehow stuck and became separate word from correct ??????. I always find it hilarious whenever people tries to say ?????? with an English accent.
Sequitur, thanks! I wondered if it might be German, since I knew that there’s been loan words from German like ????? (from arbeit).
Those other examples you gave are really cool, especially the ‘profile’ one. It’s always been pretty interesting to me how Japan goes about adopting new terms and things from other languages.
I know you would!
http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=1D51DA402AC579D8
So that was YOU! I’m the same guy who was bummed about no longer having the Ziv Harlock OP over on Youtube. Thanks for putting these up, they’re educational!
Sub said…
So that was YOU!
Getting that shocked look like what is often seen in anime cliches! 🙂
I’m the same guy who was bummed about no longer having the Ziv Harlock OP over on Youtube. Thanks for putting these up, they’re educational!
Yes they are! Enjoy them while you can, I may take them down soon pending personal concerns and to remain in hiding!
Harlock. Fuck Herlock, fuck Herlock, fuck Herlock– metaphorically, not in a 1984 C/FO Magazine fangirl way. He can call himself Leiji if he wants, but by the way, fuck Herlock.
–Carl
Now that I’m done swearing, and have actually started to listen to the podcast, I had to press pause at 27:41 and say the reason that circle caught static probably had more to do with their making mock of Doraemon than their print run per se. Nobody cares what otaku and their filthy disgusting minds do with Fate/stay night, or, in my case, Gunbuster. Remember that the days when doujin were sold only in small batches at cons are past–these days there are brick-and-mortar chains that retail them. The fact that Toranoana has bought the back-page ad on SHONEN ACE for years speaks volumes about the relationship between doujinshi and the formal manga market (not to mention the presence of commercial publishers’ booths at Comike). 15,000 is by no means an unheard-of sales figure for a doujin. That’s speaking of those done by famous circles or of a work with special notoriety. It is also true, of course, that many do have print runs in the low hundreds (and sales that are less than that). GENSHIKEN’s adventure at “Comic Fest” is typical in that respect. You also do see doujinshi that are simply xeroxed and stapled, more like–well, more like zines.
–Carl
Is the Doraemon doujin mentioned in the podcast, “Doraemon – The Final Episode” mentioned here:
http://tinyurl.com/yuwljy
That article links to a blog that has scans of the doujin in question:
http://tinyurl.com/37azek
Proofing MAIL Vol. 3 and THE KUROSAGI CORPSE DELIVERY SERVICE Vol. 3 simultaneously while listening to A.W.O. but I suddenly was compelled to press “pause” at 50:30. Around the year 800 A.D. “or something like that”? Hey (annoying, whiny, high-pitched otaku voice) , SATSUMA GISHIDEN takes place about a thousand years after that.
–C.
oSorry about all these stuttering posts, but buying JUKU is worth it for “Fairy Princess Yukio Mishima” alone. Ed Hill and Bruce Lewis hit into orbit on this one, complete with transformation sequence and theme song (“Love Love Yukio Mishima”). Ironically, readers are somewhat more likely to get the final panel now than when when the story first came out, although to say why would spoil it. We actually gave strong consideration to seeing if we could run “Fairy Princess Yukio Mishima” in PULP, but we couldn’t work out pages for it before it folded.
–C.
Wait until you get to read Satsuma Gishiden volume 2. It may be worthy of another review.
BTW do you remember the Yokohama mayor in Takashi Miike’s Dead or Alive Final? That stuff he was spouting off on the purity of manly male male love was pure Satsuma. There is more than a hint of that view in the expression on one samurai’s face on page 129 of volume 2 of Satsuma Gishiden.
And the story takes place in the 1750s.
As for Spirit of Wonder the translated manga is about 20% of the original Japanese volume.
Something I’d say about doujinshi is that it probably is the kind of “free advertising” that downloaders tell us that downloading is supposed to be. As in “oh, well, by spreading this around I’m just making sure that more people can see it.” Well, in the doujin case, it is making sure that interest in a particular property stays alive long enough for someone to bankroll more of it–as opposed to the American market, where once something is off the immediate radar it’s dropped like a heavy box. (Everyone was so astounded at how well the “Firefly” DVD set did…but, really, that’s the natural response for that type of show. It’s just that American distributors assume that everything on TV will eventually reappear in syndication, so why bother putting it on video?)
About Japan’s lack of doujinshi featuring black girls, there have been several cubic scads of Nadia books over the years. Of course, Nadia isn’t so much black* as something like a dark-skinned East Indian mistaken for black**, which makes me wonder in turn why there aren’t more doujinshi about Daryl. Probably anime’s greatest black female character is Claudia LaSalle, aka Claudia Grant, from MACROSS/ROBOTECH.
–C.
*In early character design drafts, Nadia was in fact black, which perhaps only goes to reinforce A.W.O.’s point.
**By Jean’s Jacques Le Pen-voting aunt.
I can only hope that we see more doujinshi about Daryl. Perhaps some enterprising yaoi fangirls will even start publishing doujins of Daryl and his anti girl rays, just like Ogiue did about Madarame. He would make a great tsundere uke after all, maybe even sasoi uke? Hmm.
I wonder in turn if I’ll get to be the mysterious and liberated Woman from America in yuri doujins.
Though I think, given doujins I’ve looked at, the far more likely outcome is that Daryl will get to be the possibly faceless (not really) black dude who gang rapes me with a bunch of his friends. Gerald will of course be the leering pornographer capturing it all on video.
Ah, Japan.
Anyway, I would agree that Claudia is the best black woman I’ve seen in anime. I liked her character a lot.