This was recently brought to my attention. In episode 12 of Miss Kobayashi's Maid Dragon, when Lucoa turns up at the door clad in a hoodie, the subtitles read: >What's with that outfit? >Everyone was always saying something to me, so I tried toning down the exposure. How is it? >You should try changing your body next.
There have been no complaints about these translations, and they fit the characters perfectly. Lucoa has become concerned about to attention she gets but we get nothing more specific than that. Tohru remains critical of her over-the-top figure and keeps up the 'not quite friends' vibe between them.
But what do we get in the dub? In parallel: >What are you wearing that for? >Oh those pesky patriarchal societal demands were getting on my nerves, so I changed clothes >Give it a week, they'll be begging you to change back
It's a COMPLETELY different scene. Not only do we get some political language injected into what Lucoa says (suddenly she's so connected to feminist language, even though her not being human or understanding human decency is emphasized at every turn?); we also get Tohru coming on her 'side' against this 'patriarchy' Lucoa now suddenly speaks of and not criticizing her body at all. Sure, Tohru's actual comment in the manga and Japanese script is a kind of body-shaming, but that's part of what makes Tohru's character. Rewriting it rewrites Tohru herself.
I don't think it's a coincidence that this sort of thing happened when the English VA for Lucoa is the scriptwriter for the dub overall, Jamie Marchi. Funimation's Kyle Phillips may also have a role as director, but this reeks of an English writer and VA using a character as their mouthpiece, scrubbing out the 'problematic' bits of the original and changing the story to suit a specific agenda.*
This isn't a dub. This is fanfiction written over the original, for the remarkably niche audience of feminists. Is this what the leading distributors of anime in the West should be doing?
As a feminist myself, this really pisses me off.
Joshua Diaz
>giving a shit about dubs
Isaiah Myers
This shit has happened a few times recently, dub companies have gotten worse recently.
Zachary Myers
>dub companies have gotten worse recently Is that even possible? I thought they were already rock-bottom.
James Morris
It was recently brought to my attention that you've recreated a thread that was just deleted.
Jose Campbell
Shit-eaters deserve the most rancid shit possible.
Ethan Perez
>watching the dub
Lucas Torres
Normalfags and SJWs deserve nothing but shit.
Jackson Martinez
proofs?
Juan Cruz
Is this actually real?
Colton Hughes
And you copy-and-pasted the entire post from Reddit.
Thomas Kelly
There is the "don't slut shame me" Kobayashi says to Kana on episode 2.
Elijah Brown
This is a pasta from reddit's r/anime board. Mods please delete this garbage. OP if you want to make a thread about this shit try to be original about it.
Josiah Young
Only a redditors would know that.
Samuel Lee
Or anyone who Googles any specific sentence in the OP.