Warning: that crunchyroll translator is gonna bury you in bad subs

I used to just trust default English subs on everything until I watched Jujutsu Kaisen season 2 and realized three characters had the wrong name tags for like 4 episodes. Now I always cross-check with fan translation groups before starting a new show - has anyone else caught a bad translation that totally changed a scene?

2 comments

2 Comments

kaiharris19d ago

The Crunchyroll sub for "Oshi no Ko" episode 1 where they translated "idol" as "pop star" completely killed the whole meaning of the scene where Ai talks about being a liar. Fan groups caught that immediately. It made her sound like a generic celebrity instead of someone with this dark performative thing going on. I get that translation is hard but when a single word swap changes the entire character's vibe, thats a problem. Now I check at least two fan sub sources before I trust Crunchyroll with anything emotional or dialogue heavy.

harperb4619d ago

Yeah the "pop star" thing bugged me too. But honestly this kind of word choice problem is everywhere now, not just in anime subs. I notice it at work all the time. Like my boss keeps saying "we're pivoting to optimize our deliverables" instead of just saying "we're changing how we do things." It's like people think fancy words make things sound more important but they just lose the actual meaning. Same with "idol" vs "pop star" - one has that whole idol culture baggage of fake smiles and manufactured perfection, the other is just someone who sings. You end up with this sanitized version of everything.