discussion of Monster anime rundown

Fan Boy Joined: 18 Apr 2004 Posts: 31 Location: here

just for the sake of adding in my opinion to the mix........

from the list of screenshots in the url posted earlier, i compared soldats' and a-kraze's versions, and i actually think the dialogue in soldats' is better. granted, both groups do a good job, but it seems obvious to me that soldats put far more effort into script editing (or maybe the translator simply worded it more to my liking), making the dialogue look as if it originated in english (-kun's aside)

i preferred "so my friend and i fought over that dress" to "and i ended up fighting over that dress with my friend"; it's less wordy. however both work well, considering the casual way she is speaking.

i preferred "the turkish man's operation was performed first" to "the turk's operation was initiated first", not because of the usage of the word turk, but rather because soldats used "performed" rather than "initiated" (which seems to me the far more natural word choice). of course, i don't know japanese so i dont know if it should have been translated as "initiated" (to place emphasis on the starting time of the operation; "performed" doesnt have this same emphasis, but still gets the meaning across), so forgive me if i'm wrong.

and in the last set of images, i preferred "the bullet grazed the left side of the middle cerebral artery" to "the bullet is touching the middle cerebral artery". the former seems as if it's something a doctor would actually say, and is far more descriptive. but again, i don't know how it should have been translated. Seeing as how the tense in each sentence is different, i figure one might be wrong...

in the end, both groups seem to convey the correct meaning of the dialogue; it's just they way they word it that's different. of course, i would have to see more dialogue than just those lines to make an accurate comparison. also, since i was happy with soldats' version, i saw no reason to download the same episode a second time (yay laziness) so i probably shouldnt even bother comparing in the first place. but i typed this much already, it'd be a shame to waste it............

Street Musician Joined: 16 Feb 2003 Posts: 530

One thing about the word "initiated" is that it usually implies "taking the first step/action", so "initiating first" is sort of redundant, which may have been why you found "performed first" to be the better choice.

[edit] for the record, I've not seen any of the fansubber's Monster releases, hell, I haven't seen the Monster anime period (and probably won't) so my statements are not to be taken very seriously.

Fan Boy Joined: 18 Apr 2004 Posts: 31 Location: here

i guess it does seem redundant, but it really isnt (i wouldn't say that leaving out "first" would make it better). if you replace initiated with something equivilent, like "the turk's operation was started first", it doesn't seem so redundant, does it? my preference to "performed" is strictly based on what would sound better to me, not on whether it's correct or not.

Fan Boy Joined: 18 Apr 2004 Posts: 1

About Tenma-kun... Note: this is based only upon experience with the American medical system, so obviously I can't speak to the Japanese or German medical culture. Generally, the hospital (medical) director is not only an administrator but also a medical colleague. This is in contrast to, say, the hospital CEO, who doesn't necessarily hold a medical degree. So depending on the situation (e.g. private vs public) and the individual Director's personality, I could see a Medical Director addressing a staff physician as either "Dr. Tenma" or "Kenzou". "Mr. Tenma" would definitely sound out of place and possibly a little insulting. I think using "Tenma" alone is reasonable, though it still feels a little awkward to me -- not that leaving "Tenma-kun" as-is isn't awkward in other ways, as has already been pointed out. There's just not an ideal solution to this, since we're talking a story in the Japanese language set in Germany but being translated into English. Razz

As for the "initiated" vs. "performed", I think either choice works. It should be obvious to the viewer that the real issue is not which surgical case actually started first but the fact that Tenma got pulled out of the first case (the Turk) to work on the second case (the opera singer). "Initiated" just draws a little more attention to the point.

Anyway, I've looked at the A-Kraze and Soldats versions, and overall both looked pretty good to me. If I wanted to nitpick, I'd say A-Kraze tended to get more of the medical terminology correct ("noudoumyakuryuu" as "cerebral aneurysm" rather than "cranial arterial mass", "kekkankeisei" as "angioplasty" rather than "repair the artery"). Both groups mistook the middle cerebral artery as singular, though...the left MCA and right MCA are two different and separate arteries. And "on call" physician is typically used a lot more commonly than "on duty", at least in the US. But again, these are nitpicks, and I doubt many other people really care that much about them, haha. This is why I can't watch medical dramas, though. Razz

Posted: Sun Apr 18, 2004 2:47 pm

Emperor Ketchup wrote:

One thing about the word "initiated" is that it usually implies "taking the first step/action", so "initiating first" is sort of redundant, which may have been why you found "performed first" to be the better choice.

I don't think it's redundant -- the point is that one surgery was started before the other. "Performed first" makes it sound like one surgery was completed before the other, which definitely did not happen.

The interesting thing about this line is that it's not in the manga.

Stephen: I have a suggestion. You should lock this thread and move all posts except for your two episode posts to a separate thread called "Discussion of Stephen's Monster rundown" or something like that.

-Chris

Fan Boy Joined: 18 Apr 2004 Posts: 31 Location: here

there's no getting around the fact that any translation from one language to another is awkward. the -kun thing is a perfect example of this; there is no literal meaning for it in english. so you just do the best you can.

medical terms are indeed a bitch in any language Razz

it's like a whole other language by itself.

Fan Boy Joined: 13 Apr 2004 Posts: 3

I helped our editor with the medical terms for the soldats release, but I didn't do the final edit. I am not a doctor, and by no means a medical expert. I'm just a lowly researcher in neuroradiology, so I get to hear the terms they tossed around a lot.

I will conceed the left MCA line. It probably would have been more accurate if it read "the bullet grazed the side of the left middle cerebral artery." Overall though, the meaning is not lost with the way we had it worded ("the bullet grazed the left side of the middle cerebral artery").

I'm going to go out on a limb about angioplasty versus "repair the artery". I don't remember exactly when the line that said "repair the artery" was, but keep in mind this episode takes place in 1986 and that Dr. Tenma is a neurosurgeon. I would think given the time frame and Tenma's speciality, "angioplasty" would be inappropriate. I'd like to think the more generic way we worded it is more accurate of the terminology Tenma would use in the OR.

Regarding the cranial aterial mass, its just a matter of translation. I trust our translator 100%, and his translations are highly regarded in the fansubbing community. However such isoterric terms as used in Monster are often difficult to nail 100%, especially when being spoken; I'd only expect a doctor from Japan to be able to do it. I will ask him if aneurysm makes more sense. I had suggested it using hematoma instead, but I wasn't sure, so the editor left it is as. We will be using the raw manga scans as a reference point from now on in hopes the actual kanji will help make our translation of these terms closer to 100% accuracy.

Sorry if this post was too defensive, but I just wanted to eleborate our perspective. Thanks for your input, I really appreciate when people point out our errors. I'd like it if you pointed out any other inconsistencies you might have found, as we'd like to change them for future releases Smile

Posted: Mon Apr 19, 2004 12:52 am

I took Chris's suggestion and split this off. Do not be alarmed, please continue your discussion.

Roadie Joined: 10 Mar 2004 Posts: 45 Location: Located

I don't really care too much about slight miswordings etc, I just want to make sure the content is there... cake before the frosting. Totan's episode two was much better than the first, one bad line was "a tearjerker headlines" but the meaning was clear enough. I like the subtitle font and am probably just gonna stick with them to be consistent since they're fast and doing a better job than they did with the first episode. For the true perfectionists the battle still rages on though!

One element not mentioned much is the visual quality, a-kraze's quality seemed a bit blurry and had bad contrast compared to a-keep's and totan. Forgot what Soldat's was like.

As for the ending lyrics, I like totan's way of doing it as well, simply because it is the most seamless, though they still have two lines off in episode 2! Though to be honest I don't see the point in the first place (it makes sense for Japanese songs, but...). The lyrics up on davidsylvian.net are unofficial (ie not on davidsylvian.com) but are almost certainly correct... they were transcribed from a audio rip from the divx video so were given a good amount of attention / playback. Here's some info on the upcoming Monster soundtrack http://www.vap.co.jp/monster/music/

Fan Boy Joined: 20 Apr 2004 Posts: 2

Overall akraze has a blurred image? I am not sure what you mean, having an encoding background myself, if you compare the picture quality Akeeps/Totan is actually a bit oversmoothed. Look at the lines on his face, it has some smoothing, if you compare it to the akraze one, you can tell it has a more defined look. Soldats was way too high contrast. The edges are a lot more definte, the other two versions have some obvious smoothing along the edges. Not sure what filterchain they used but thats my analysis. Some will argue but its really preference, some people prefer an image that is a bit smoothed on the edges to give it a more sharper image. The Kraze encoder did a fairly nice job to keep the lines the same and not do too much smoothing to take away from the overall quality.

Fan Boy Joined: 25 Sep 2003 Posts: 15

Im the type to wait for the best available episode possible. I still see ToTans being the best because of their pre existing background knowledge to the manga. Everything seems to flow right with them and their encoding/picture quality is not of any problem either. I do see ToTans version as a better search for perfection than the other. Just because their faster doesnt mean they put less work into it, they just have less of a life outside of fansubbing. No bullshit, this is the first time Ive sided with one of the faster releasing groups.

Tien

Fan Boy Joined: 20 Apr 2004 Posts: 2

Not sure I see what you mean, If you look at all the reviews by the translator himself he was saying that anime-kraze had the best overall translation and strongest one.

Fan Boy Joined: 24 Apr 2004 Posts: 1

what do you think of using just the fist name instead tenma-kun... i mean it isn't common in japanese language for your boss to call you with your fist name but in english/german. (especially if it's nearly your son in law)

edit.ps: in the - official - german translation of the manga they used "kill me"... of all translations this is prolly the worst...

Posted: Sat Apr 24, 2004 5:09 pm

Ostra wrote:

edit.ps: in the - official - german translation of the manga they used "kill me"... of all translations this is prolly the worst...

I wouldn't say it's the worst. The Japanese line has at least two interpretations -- first, that she's repeating what Johan told her to do (which would be "kill me"), or that she's telling people to kill Johan or herself ("kill hiim" or "kill me").

Given her catatonic-like state, I always assumed she was just parroting what Johan had said, and in that case I like "kill me" better than "kill him", although the best translation is one that leaves the line ambiguous

-Chris

Fan Boy Joined: 25 Apr 2004 Posts: 2

Ah~ just one comment about the translation for manga chapter 6, page 149 (or in anime episode 3):

When Dr. Tenma is operating on the lockpicker, he's talking about how he's going to remove a parasellar meningioma using a right "terionar" approach. I understood what a parasellar meningioma was, but I couldn't quite figure out what a "terionar approach" was (which worries me because I'm a med student, and made me think I should be studying instead of reading manga, you know?)

After thinking about the katakana for a bit, I figured it out: he means a "right pterional approach."

I just thought I'd mention this, since Tenma's medical jibba-jabba really jumps out at me and I thought that the translators might like to know. (Really, it's a reasonable mistake to make.)