OHHHH.

a loooot of things just fell into place. I don't know how anybody is gonna look at -this- chapter and say things aren't moving. Look, if you're in it to see them fuck, just go the hell away, this isn't for you. If you're here for the story, there were a lot of bombshells dropped in this episode. We just pretty much found out what's up with EVERYBODY's issues.

Kaoru's mom died, and Uta's mom, her doctor, who knew her personally, (old friends? Lovers? Next door neighbors? Who knows at this point,) apparently got blamed for it professionally, lost her license to practice medicine, and skipped the country for five years to start over abroad. Uta's parents split up over it, and Uta went to live with her dad, but couldn't deal with him (probably because he was reeling from the whole thing himself) and so she came to live with her brother and his wife. Reiichi married Kaoru because he feels like it's his duty to look after her after his mom was apparently responsible for Kaoru's mom passing, so he put aside his actual feelings for Risako, who now resents the whole situation.

Also it's now confirmed that yes, there was a confession. Honestly, coming back to this topic after so long, I was surprised to see there was so much contention on this. I guess it's because I had already made the assumption that if we came back to a jump forward instead of the cliffhanger scene itself, that meant Uta had confessed, but I thought the manga was pretty clear on that front. But now we know for sure. Uta confessed, Kaoru smiled and blew it off, and probably lapsed straight into denial the same way she did with Reiichi's cheating.

"Oh, she must mean that she loves me as a sister. I'm going to ignore that she was just telling me about her romantic love for a married person. I must be misunderstanding something. I wonder if she likes her teacher, or somebody from work? Or...Oh, fuck, who am I kidding. My husband is banging my best friend and my sister-in-law is in love with me. Oh, hi, mom-in-law that apparently killed my mother via medical malpractice. Good timing."

Wow, Miya is über gay. And was the senpai's name not mentioned or did I just not catch it?

It seems to be Inou Sa-something. Miya keeps trying to call her by name but chickens out every time. We got her family name from the scene with the delivery-girl.

ergzay posted:

I'm not into trap thing since I prefer Yuri but this kinda cute ahaha , but my question is since Mogu gender is M.F does that mean mogu can choose what he/she wants down there if bird or cat(if you know what I mean) ahahaha ,like the guy in UQ holder.

Not sure if someone else answered it, but that's the space where you circle Male or Female on the employment application. Mogu circled neither.

Right. That make more sense. I thought they wrote M/F to avoid picking one, but instead it was already written there and sister thought Mogu forgot to fill it.

Did they -write- M/F, or was it one of those applications that expects you to circle one?

I ask because it seems a bit weird that they'd put both when identifying as neither. When I read it, I thought it was one where it shows M/F and expects you to circle one, hence the "oversight" was the decision to not circle one.

last edited at Aug 24, 2018 11:12PM

Using the word "homo" is considered offensive? English isn't my first language and I just see everybody using "gay" moust of the time, so if someone can confirm to me if what Mei said is true or if is just a localization thing I would be thankful.

I'll give you the breakdown from my perspective: Where I live, (center of the American midwest) "Homo" is pretty exclusively used as a derogatory slur. "Gay" is pretty much correct/neutral, but it's all in the tone of voice and the context. "Homosexual" is clinical and is rarely ill-intended. Most bigots don't resonate well with multisyllabic words. "Queer" largely depends on who is saying it and in what context. It used to be a slur, but it's been more or less reclaimed by the LGBT community. I sometimes joke that "Hey, that's our word.", but really as long as it isn't being used in an offensive context, I don't think it's particularly bad. It should be pretty obvious from context that the various "F"-words are always NOT COOL.

@Heavensrun
Believe me, I've spent a lot of time thinking about what the best course of action would be. After the initial backlash, I was devastated, because I personally felt that I'd given a good and faithful rendition of how Nanami appears in Japanese, to English speakers; she has a very heavy accent that contrasts greatly against the proper and perfect businesswoman image she has. Scots was the obvious and most fitting choice, in my opinion, specifically because it brings with it a similar stereotype, and is hard to understand for many who are unfamiliar with it, just like a Hakata accent, along with being easy to convey in text, unlike most other accents (compare written American vs British English).

The grave miscalculation of mine, however, was that I'd never realised just how much people hate non-American standard English. To me, it seemed natural that if a character has a heavy accent in the original, I'll translate her with a heavy accent as well. I have also seen Scottish used in other translations, even official licensed releases, for example an old favourite of mine, Excel Saga (big surprise, I'm sure), where one character's Okayama accent is rendered as Scottish, and written in an extremely non-standard, mainly phonetic way. This is to say that I knew that this was something even large publishers do in their translations.

As I mentioned — even though I've developed rather thick skin after getting into scanlations — I felt horrible after the initial backlash, and almost completely lost motivation to work on the series, however after hearing voices of support from fellow translators and Japanese readers who can tell just how #thicc Nanami's accent is, it made me feel that I made the right decision after all, as many of them agreed that it would be somewhat of a character assassination to make her speak standard English in the translation.

TL;DR
I've heard the negative opinions, and I understand where you're coming from, but understanding doesn't mean I agree with you. The accent stays, because I feel that it is the best way to translate convey the original content in English. You can either accept it, or move on.

I think that's all absolutely fair. It might've gotten lost in my lengthy posts, but I actually agree with you on virtually everything. Something like Scots is probably the best way to represent a dialect like Hakata, and you definitely shouldn't feel bad or discouraged because some people are jerks about an honest decision you made in good faith.

Also, I am super grateful to have this series being translated, because it is so refreshing to see adults dealing with being gay as adults. So thank you for taking the time to work on this, and you are doing a great job. It was never the intention of my giant walls of text to make you think otherwise. ;p

last edited at Aug 23, 2018 8:16PM

MarqFJA87 posted:

When "Fuck the Police" goes literal

Except she's not a real police officer, as far as I can tell...

She rides in a police car. What else could she be?

A very committed cosplayer

Cute. ;p

But no way. Impersonating a cop is a crime. If she wasn't actually a cop, that's the worst possible disguise for a kidnapper. It's way more probable she's just crooked.

I just read the kimi Dake no Ponytail stories to get a full understanding of things but I'm still a bit confused. I understand MC in this situation as identifying as Agender or non-binary. I just...Like are the other characters transgender or just no? Beside that I'm going to give this series a chance and hope for the best.

Well, Suzu is a boy, he just likes to crossdress, the other characters we probably will discover over time.

From the general assumptions everybody seems to make about the agender kid, I'd say it's likely they're all pretty similar to each other.

Whoa, some (somewhat) serious non-binary manga? Where's this coming from?

But that male lead strikes me as 700% stereotypical lead in comparable stories so that makes my interest plummet to unfortunate levels ...

yeah the surrounding cast do not give me much hope for this to be done well

Eh, I dunno. If I was going to do something like this, I would probably couch it in a bunch of familiar tropes. The goal is to help your readers understand something they might have unconcious biases against. Presenting that in a familiar framework can help a lot with that sort of thing.

That is their problem if they read something for free and don't even bother to read everything translator included in their work. All this only make Ropp want to quit translating, so you can all thank people like that for this. You are honestly so spoiled and ungrateful/ She shouldn't have tl it in the first place and you should just read it yourself or pay her for translation. Yet she is spending her free time and yet people complain non stop and wants everything to cater to them.

I think you should curb the 'spoiled and ungrateful' talk and tone down the defensiveness. I don't know if that's directed at me, or if I'm just catching the edge of your disdain for the people that are bitching, but I'm just talking about what is inevitably going to happen, I'm not making a judgement on whether it's right.

-Please- actually read what I'm saying instead of just being defensive at me because I'm explaining a position you disagree with.

I definitely don't want Ropp to quit translating, and I'm not trying to make her feel bad. If you actually read my post, I'm trying to offer constructive discussion on how to handle the problem. I actually read the translator's note, and I've commented repeatedly on here that I understand the reasoning. But I recognize that many people blow past those pages, because they often don't hold much of interest. If that's going to piss you off, well, get over it, because it's never going to go away entirely, and not everybody that comments on it is some awful shallow person that deserves disdain.

Using accents associated with the English language to represent accents associated with Japanese is a tough sell, because you bring all the baggage of people's prejudices and stereotypes along with them.

Only if you are shallow person who only focuses on stereotypes. Become better person and then you will enjoy this translation no problem.

Oh, bullshit. The entire point of prejudices is that you don't know they're there until they butt into something, but that isn't even the point of what I'm saying.

What I'm talking about is the unconscious associations people make when they hear a particular accent.

What do you think is being conveyed when you see a southern drawl written into a character's accent?

A shallow person might immediately think "Hick, hillbilly, redneck" or any number of perjoratives, But even without being mean about it, there are other associations that many people would think of: "Rural, laid-back, outgoing" These are stereotypes, but they're not negative, and they're often correct anyway.

Kansai->Southern happened in the first place because stereotypes for Southern people are similar to the stereotypes that Tokyoites carry towards people from the Kansai region. That's important not because the stereotypes are true, but because it better translates the intent of the author.

A manga artist gives a character Kansai dialect for a -reason-. They're either trying to play off the stereotype or subvert it. Either way, they are always aware of it, and the stereotype itself PROVIDES CONTEXT FOR THE CHARACTER.

One person on here was like Scottish=engineer. They say it's not a star trek thing, but I'd bet you a pound sterling that the reason they have that association is because they've seen a lot of Scottish scientists and engineers in fiction, and most or all of those Scottish engineers were homages to Scotty from Star Trek.

What stereotypes do people associate with scottish people? Stubbornness? Sass? Rebelliousness maybe? Tendency to swear? Fondess for alcohol? Being aware of those stereotypes doesn't mean you -buy into- them, but when you encounter a character in fiction with a scottish accent, they come to mind, and they inform your perspective on what the author is trying to do.

This is why I question whether Scottish is a good match for Hakata. Because why did the author give her a Hakata dialect in the first place? What stereotypes exist? Is the author subverting them or playing into them? Do the same stereotypes carry across to the English reader if you give her a Scottish accent? I'm not saying it -isn't- a good match, mind you, I have no idea.

Also everyone on dynasty discord were fine with it and made fun of people who complain here about it.

Sitting in an echo chamber of likeminded people and making fun of people who you don't agree with accomplishes NOTHING constructive. Maybe you should try having a discussion about -why- so many people are complaining and what can be done to cut down on it.

last edited at Aug 22, 2018 10:03AM

There are also implications that she only dated him so she could live out an “ideal life” - i.e. get married, have kids, have a career and so on. Chapter 1 sort of hints that she’s had history with girls, and chapter 3 takes that even further with her pointing out what her “type of girl” is like.

Although this isn’t what you’re necessarily implying, I’d like to stress that just because she’s dated a guy doesn’t have to mean that she’s bisexual.

Chapter 2 pg 6, "Meanwhile, I dinnae feel like I'll be able to find a new boyfriend, or even a girlfriend, for that matter..."

How is she not bisexual?

She frequently expressed that she is trying to conform to a standard life. It is not uncommon in cultures like Japan, with prejudiced mainstream subcultures, for closeted gay people to force themselves into "normal" relationships, dating the opposite sex even if they're not into them.

She had a "fiancee", But she described calling him as "a duty I can't forget". That is not how someone talks about conversation with a loved one that they were into that they miss being with. She talks about how marriage is on the checklist of her life. She consistently talks about it as though it doesn't matter who with. When she's stressed out from Kae-chan not picking up the phone, she literally says it's the first time she was happy that her boyfriend was there for her, at which point we find out she has a history with girls from college, he thinks she isn't into him, then he dumps her. Her literal reaction is "I thought since we were so far apart, he wouldn't see through me." indicating that yeah, he hit the nail on the head. She's barely depressed and doesn't shed a single tear.

She -could- be bi? I mean it isn't impossible, but there's no evidence of it. Her relationship with her boyfriend was definitely not something she was actually into at all.

last edited at Aug 22, 2018 8:39AM

If by widely you mean majority of people don't mind it/like it, then yes.

Yeah, calling bullshit on that. 90% of the comments are talking about the dialect. If your claim was true then the majority would be about the story. But its not, the issue with the odd dialect has overshadowed any discussion about whats actually happening in the manga.

You're both probably right and wrong. People with complaints are more likely to post, but a lot of people just -don't post-.. Most people either just accept it/deal with it in silence, or just stop reading because it annoys them. The truth of the matter is we don't KNOW how the majority of readers feel about it. It is certainly contentious here on the forum, although there are a lot of people saying positive things in response to the complaints.

But no matter what, the complaints are going to keep coming in indefinitely, because no matter how well intentioned the reasoning for the accent is, a lot of people -do- skip translator's notes, and so new readers are always going to be wandering in without having read the explanation. They're gonna see a bunch of people complaining about the accent, and immediately gripe-post questioning why it's still going on if so many people have the same reaction they did.

I mean, best case scenario is that this is going to be a perpetual game of whack-a-mole for the duration that this is being translated and posted on this site.

I get the translator's reasoning, and I agree with it in principle, but no matter what, every solution to that problem is a compromise. Using accents associated with the English language to represent accents associated with Japanese is a tough sell, because you bring all the baggage of people's prejudices and stereotypes along with them.

Kansai/southerner kind of works because the stereotypes are similar, and we've all become kind of accustomed to that one, but some people still find it distracting. Are Kyushu/hakata stereotypes similar to Scottish stereotypes? I don't have the slightest idea.

But keeping it constructive, what are the options? Changing the way it's translated means some understandable frustration for Ropponmatsu and also maybe the readers that like the accent. The accent -does- convey the general idea well enough. Nanami has an accent that is very distinct and makes it hard for people around her to follow everything she says when she slips into it. It's not that hard for the readers to follow. I do think adding disclaimers (big text "ABOUT THE ACCENT") to the beginning of each chapter might help drive home the idea and reduce complaints here, but I am pretty sure, as mentioned, that no matter what, we're going to have to knock down complaints in this forum topic pretty continuously. I'd hate to see Ropponmatsu get sick of that and quit translating over it.

The alternatives? I mean, switching to a different accent isn't likely to result in anything different. Switching to a southern accent would just get people mis-coding her as kansai, and anything else runs into the same difficulties as scots. They could stick brackets or braces or something around her dialogue when she speaks in hakata, but it doesn't quite carry the same effect. I think that's probably the best alternative, as dropping the accent entirely does kind of change her personality and could even just straight up require rewrites of scenes depending on what goes down in the future. (I'm speculating there, I haven't read ahead)

I think the best option is probably to just stick with giving her an accent, and maybe running the dialogue past an actual scottish person for authenticity if possible, and just get used to having a padded mallet at the ready to deal with the inevitable complaints.

I can only read it as an angry man's voice. Fairly unpleasant.

Youtube "Merida Wreck it Ralph 2"

Here's hoping they kiss in the next chapter, but that's wishful thinking

sobs

So here's to hoping they kiss by the end of volume one!

What kind of accent would they kiss in?

Deep appalacia.

Worst. Kidnapper. Ever.

Bwahahahahahhahaha!

Boys talking to Yamada makes Kase-san RILLY nervous. So her reaction to the celebrity gardener is within that context.

Duh. A fifty-year-old father of 8 as a potential rival to Kase-san tips over from humorous insecurity into humorous total paranoia.

And there is not enough nothing in the universe to measure how little I worry about Yamada taking up with a guy. Any guy. In any universe.

I don't think she views him as a rival so much as she's afraid he might try something against Yamada's will.

You’re not suggesting that’s a more rational fear than anxiety about possible alienation of Yamada’s affection by Fertilization-sensei, now are you?

Well, I mean, yes? The odds of that guy being a pervert seem significantly more plausible than the odds of Yamada dumping Kase for him or cheating on her with him? I'm not saying it isn't irrational, but it's at least plausible at that point. ;p

I always wonder in these impoverished young single person suddenly has to go broke and live in abject, precarious poverty to accommodate monsters and supernatural beings - how, exactly, did they all get by BEFORE they enslaved the human through their exreme kindness? I realize it's to show character - but some of that character seems to be over-the-top impractical.

So, A: There's no poverty here. Mahoro lives in a house in Tokyo. This girl is clearly f---ing rich, it's just that she has to spend a lot on living expenses. Even so, she didn't think twice about taking in Nene. She does fuss over money, but that seems more like a personality trait than a product of circumstances. (Otherwise, she would've swallowed her pride and sold the "WeeU") I assume her family is well off and she spends her substantial allowance on feeding the ayakashi. Whether she needs to is ambiguous? Yukime suggested they don't need to eat, being ghosts, but Kii and Kuuko immediately objected. I suspect that's more about them liking to eat than needing to. It'd be a bit odd for Yukime to not know at this point that she needs to eat. That said, if they do need food, it's not like it'd be hard for them to sneak what they need here and there, since anything they pick up appears to vanish from existence instantly.

B: As for what they did before Mahoro, they explicitly address this. Before Mahoro, her grandmother took care of the place. Before her grandmother moved in, the ayakashi were hiding in the empty house. Kii was the zashiki-warashi for the house, so she was already there, and Kuuko and Yuuki met when Kuuko was the god of Yuuki's villiage. They have presumably been wandering the country together as ayakashi for a couple centuries, and know how to take care of themselves.

last edited at Aug 14, 2018 10:22PM

Boys talking to Yamada makes Kase-san RILLY nervous. So her reaction to the celebrity gardener is within that context.

Duh. A fifty-year-old father of 8 as a potential rival to Kase-san tips over from humorous insecurity into humorous total paranoia.

And there is not enough nothing in the universe to measure how little I worry about Yamada taking up with a guy. Any guy. In any universe.

I don't think she views him as a rival so much as she's afraid he might try something against Yamada's will.

As the chapters go on I've been getting the suspision that maybe this teacher can read thoughts too. I'm not even fully sure of my basis for this, it just feels like she figures out a bit too much sometimes.

I was thinking that she can't read thoughts, but perhaps emotions.

I'm pretty sure she's just observant.

Mh? Someone whose thoughts she can't read? Or has similar powers?

Also: not enough sensei.

Also also: Suzuki, Suzuki, Suzuki, Suzuki. ... Honda, Honda, Kawasaki?

Seriously, I wanna know the story behind group Suzuki.

Sooo, isnt' this the first time this manga has ever flipped to Kase's POV? No "My cool girlfriend that sometimes seems like a boy" here.

If you don't get this you're simply a low-iq pedestrian. You need a very good understanding of alternate history world war 2 fiction and postmodernist expression theory to grasp this series. It's okay to just give this one a pass and go back to your narutos and citruses while the REAL adults discuss this manga.

I for one find it deeply engaging.

I think this is an interesting comic, but please, get the fuck over yourself.

Oh, also, I like the way they subverted the "I'll make her cute!" trope:

"I can make you cute! It'll be so fun and then you can be cute and popular with me in the cool kids club!"
"But I don' wanna."
"Okay! Then I'll make myself plainer and be inconspicuous and chill with you in the nerds clique!"

People were heavily bitching about Fujishiro being shallow and trying to pretty up Kurokawa, but that really kind of shows that she just wants to be with her one way or another, and is willing to do whatever it takes to get them in the same clique.

I mean, it's still going to be a colossal mess one way or another, but it's cute that she's trying so hard.

The one character I myself find kind of puzzling is Fujishiro. Okay, so being dumped by her trophy boyfriend was a big shock, sure... and being comforted by Kurokawa was nice, yeah... but going from there to "I'm-a dumping all my old friends and I'm-a relinquishing my queen bee position and from now on I'll live with Kurokawa in a cozy little hole in a quiet corner of the classroom, just the two of us, forevah!" is, like, kinda too big of a leap... obviously there's something in her psychology that escapes me...

Very good point. Definitely noticed this. Hope there is something to it.

I don't think it's super complicated. She's on the rebound from a bad breakup, Kurokawa was there for her at a critical moment. She's infatuated, and she is in the process of discovering she likes girls. (or a girl, at least)

She probably hasn't even figured out -why- she is so desperate to be around Kurokawa yet. She just knows she feels excited and happy when she's around, and running into that is how she's coping with the trauma of having someone cheat on her and dump her. (pretty cruelly, at that)

My take on the friends: People on these forums seem to have this attitude that if somebody does something bad, they're awful and terribad and they should be hated and reviled.

These characters are literally children. They are stupid, and inexperienced. They don't know how to process emotions, they have no barometer for what's great or terrible. They are learning to socialize and interact while stumbling around each other, and they -are going- to screw up. All the time.

When I was in middle school/high school, I had falling-outs with various friends several times. Sometimes it was because I'd done something wrong, sometimes it was just that they misunderstood something or came to a bad conclusion on their own. It worked out eventually for the most part.

Kurokawa's friends are thinking of distancing themselves because they don't know what's going on with her and Fujishiro, and they're afraid of getting caught in the blast radius when things blow up. Yeah, that's not the morally correct thing to do, but they're kids. They're allowed to be a bit stupid about things. That's the point of the story, to watch as they learn these lessons and grow up.

last edited at Aug 13, 2018 3:28PM

Or maybe "Tsubasa Fights All the Tropes".