#i didn't even grow up with the english dub yet still.....

[trulyhblue]

Home Away From Home

Lauren Hemp x Aussie! Reader

Warnings: fluff, but awkward.

A/N — I know Caroline Weir scored the two goals in the Man City game that I talk about, but I've changed it a bit :)

Masterlist

______________________

Growing up in Australia was among the greatest privileges you had as a child.

Even in the midst of your career — a job you've dreamed of since you were little — your home soil was indescribable; nothing could beat the familiarity of home.

When the 2023 World Cup was announced to take place in Australia, you were feeling the effects of homesickness after six long months in Europe. You were signed by Manchester City at Nineteen, playing a critical midfield position after being a regular sub for your old club back in Australia. Your parents were sceptical of you leaving so early to such a big club. In no way were you prepared to face the challenges of adulthood as a whole other country, on the opposite side of the Earth.

You had only been playing for the Matildas for a couple of months when you were first signed to City, and it wasn't until the following year when your fellow Aussie teammates Alanna, and eventually Hayley and Mary, that you had the comfort of home to nurture you during rough patches.

Your family was your biggest supporter. Growing up, they sacrificed everything to meet the needs of their football journey. Your parents would leave early from work early to take you to training and surrender endless personal endeavours so that you could prosper in your dreams of going pro. You were very grateful for all that they had done, and as a result, their sacrifices became your motivation to be the best you could possibly be. You lived and breathed football. Everything revolved around football.

But when you moved to City, you found yourself stuck in a trance by a certain English Blonde.

For the most part, you kept to yourself at training. You didn't want to cause any trouble, and it seemed that most of the girls knew each other from youth squads, prior teams, or roommates at National Camps. You struggled to find your place in the squad at first. Being a relatively young team, you had lots of girls around your age, willing to be your friend, but the absence of home and lack of connection to the United Kingdom combined to make your personality shrink under a dismissive persona.

When Alanna joined City, you offered your apartment to her, having come from North London beforehand. Over the next months, you found comfort in the familiar Aussie accent, finding solace in the sliver of home you felt so distant to.

You still remained shy at training, trying hard and pushing out of your comfort zone every time someone had a conversation with you. Alanna found it hard to believe how introverted you were, having seen your confidence shine at Matilda’s Camps, and the Manchester Girls couldn't believe their ears when Alanna told them about how you were at home.

When Hayley came, you were smiling more. It wasn't that you weren't happy at City before the Australian girls arrived. You were thriving. In the 2020/21 season, you were dubbed as Young Player of The Year and had four ‘Player Of The Match’ awards under your belt. You worked extremely hard to make the starting eleven regularly, and people would often compliment your subtle but impressionable skills on the field. You weren't fast, but you were technical. You thought of the play that hadn't happened yet, shaping the game with unexpected yet calculated crosses. For two years, you had the second most assists in the WSL, merely missing Beth Mead.

In all honesty, the effects of having the reminder of home did help to boost your performance not only on the pitch but behind the scenes as well.

You can remember tapping your hands against the rim of your cubby, your home kit baggy on your figure. It was a very important game today — the final of the FA Women’s League Cup — against reigning champions Chelsea. You were starting, and your family had flown over to watch.

Your nerves upon walking out were tremendous. This was your first time starting in a final in the WSL. You don't remember a time you felt your hands shake this much. Alanna and Hayley were preparing for the match on either side of you, their faces impassive when both teams lined up in the tunnel of Cherry Rose Records Stadium.

Your heart was thumping out of your chest, palms sweating as you took your spot on the field.

When the whistle blew, you tuned everything out.

A powerful shot from Sam Kerr left Chelsea in the lead halfway through the first half. You tried hard to maneuver your way through the likes of Charles and Ingle, passing to Georgia and Keira as you struggled to pass Chelsea’s defence. Lucy was given a yellow which heightened the tension reeling in the stands. You buried the apprehensive bile rising in your stomach when the halftime whistle blew, signalling everyone to rush back to the changing rooms.

You placed your head in your hands, taking slow, desperate sips of your water bottle as you listened to the pep talks from all the players. Gareth Taylor, your manager, was shouting encouragement from across the room, staring into each and every one of your eyes, assuring the team that they could make a comeback.

“I want you to want this.” He said, circling the room with so much fervour that the room felt warmer. “I want to see the determination in your eyes. I want to see it in the tackles, the plays, the kicks, everything. The opportunities you making are good, they just need more precision.”

It was almost the start of the second half when Gareth asked for you, leading you over to the other side of the changing rooms, towards the shorter figure of one of your teammates.

Lauren looked just as nervous as you, but you hoped that you his your nerves a little better than her. Her blonde hair was held up in a pony, and small wisps of baby hairs framed her face after being exempted from the wind. She was a year older than you but has been in Manchester since 2018. Other than the odd, unusual sentence or two, neither of you had properly interacted.

Lauren looked up at you, her beady eyes locking with yours as she licked her lips, exchanging glances with the floor and you, awaiting the purpose of the conversation.

“I want you two to work together this half.” Your Manager urged. Both you and Lauren looked at him in surprise. He must've caught on since he held his hands up. “I know we haven't practised much between the two of you, I know. But Y/N, your crosses over the head of Chelsea defenders will inevitably shape up some opportunities for Hempo. Lauren, you know what to do when something comes up. I believe that truly, alright? Do you understand?”

You were still mulling over Gareth’s words when the whistle blew for the second half, but you felt an uncertain pair of eyes look out for where you kicked the ball. The surveillance of the English forward did not irk you. In fact, it pushed you to do as you were told.

It was two minutes in when an opportunity arose. You were given the ball by Alanna, who had pelted it away after a scary interaction with her and Kerr.

Gareth’s words played in your head, taunting you as the blonde’s eyes watched your actions intently. You were hesitant to do as he said. This was the one game your parents were here to see. Never once had they been to Europe, having not had the money to be able to fund both your football and fancy holidays overseas. You wanted to make them proud. You didn't want to risk such an important opportunity for it to go out or concede and let your team down.

You found Georgia and kicked it by her. She followed it up the middle of the field, passing it to one of your forwards, hand up in celebration when it went past the Goalie.

But for some reason, you couldn't find it in you to celebrate. You refused to meet the eyes of Lauren, who was no doubt throwing you a disappointed glance. You could feel the betrayal radiating in violent waves. You ran back to your starting position without a peep, determined to shake the guilt with another chance. You needed to win this game. You’d do whatever it took to do so.

Another goal from Ellen White led your team one in front, but it gave no comfort whatsoever in a game like this. If anything, it put the stakes higher. You hated penalties, the feeling of dread and anxiety filling you everything you watched each player attempt to concede. Even more so, you hated taking penalties. The possibility of that happening was enough to motivate you even more.

Guro Reiten was subbed off for Lauren James. A fresh pair of legs was dangerous coming up to the seventieth minute.

Chelsea was drawing closer and closer to equalizing with your second goal, causing an uprise in the tension between both the teams and the people watching. You grew more angsty when one of their attempts hit the crossbar, but when it landed near Keira’s feet, being shot past to where you stood, you knew this was now or never.

You sprinted down the wing with Georgia by your side, but you were only focused on the blonde in front of you.

“Here! Here!” Georgia screamed, holding out her hand to signal to you that she was ready. You contemplated it. There had been many times when Georgia had done that, and you had crossed the ball to her, and she had easily swished it past the goalie. You never doubted Georgia for a second, and you definitely knew she would've been able to shoot from where she was — she was clearly onside. But the Chelsea defenders had studied your gameplay back to front, and the same old cross to Georgia was something they had trained for — something you had trained for.

Something clicked in your mind when you met Lauren’s eyes. Something ignited inside of you. She must've felt it too, because she didn't even reach her hand up to signal towards you.

You both just knew what was happening. And that it would work. It had to work.

Without much thought, you kicked the ball to your right, watching as Chelsea gaped in alarm at the unsuspected pass and turn to and from Lauren.

You held your breath, stationery at the sight of Lauren’s risky attempts. She found a steady pace along the sideline stepping past Jess Carter, keeping her back turned to the goal. She used the back of her heel to trick both Carter and Berger. She had scored. Manchester City were winning 3-1.

You were the first to scream, a massive smile on your face as you ran towards Lauren, who spun to find you amidst the swarm of Chelsea players.

The two of you ran into each other with so much force that you both toppled to the ground, rolling around as the rest of your team piled on top of you.

The girls were screaming, you could hear the distant cheers of people in the stands. You heard Lauren’s exhausted huffs as you shovelled your head into her neck. Neither of you said anything. You both just had the silent agreement that what you did was game-changing, and that the non-existent relationship between you was no longer.

Despite the desperate attempts from the London team, the final whistle blew with the score maintaining a healthy lead. Your legs gave out as soon as the game ended, tears threatening to spill from your eyes and onto your cheeks as the weight of the season lifted from your shoulders. You felt a pair of arms lift you up, turning you around. The hug was only recently familiar, but tangible nonetheless.

Lauren held her arms around your waist, leaving you to collapse your arms over her shoulders. You watched her chest rise and fall, however, so slowly, a few choked sobs rang out from the older girl.

“I thought you weren't ‘gonna pass to me.” She said. You don't remember her ever speaking to you directly, but the attention made you blush.

“You could've gotten a double if I did.” You uttered, pulling her out of the hug. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be.” She replied, her cheeks also dusted pink. “I'm just glad it was your assist.”

You wondered if she was trying to make you flustered because you noticed how fidgety she got when you eyed her nervously.

“I mean like— I like you— wait, no, well— I like your assist-”

“Same. I mean— I'm glad you scored from my assist. Like— okay wait that doesn't make sense.”

“I get what you’re saying. That's what I meant.” Lauren muttered back, rubbing the back of her neck in embarrassment. “I wouldn't have wanted anyone else to assist me… in goals.”

“Yeah, same… in goals, yeah.”

Little did you know, your Aussie teammates Hayley and Alanna were standing next to Keira and Georgia, all overlooking the inept exchange between the two of you.

“God, you call that flirting.” Georgia laughed, the other three chuckling along. “Wouldn't want to see what their dates would look like.”

“Bloody painful, that's what.” Alanna sounded, taking a picture of the two of you.

“Wouldnt of expected anything different, to be honest. Both as awkward as each other.” Keira spoke.

And you were as awkward as each other, but that made for the perfect pair. A home away from home.

_____________________________

[self-indulgent-paw-patrol]

You say that in Brazilian dub Zuma and Marshal were referred as females. I'm recently joined this fandom and trying to catch up with new seasons. And only now I noticed that in the dub that of my native language Zuma's been referred as female for 5 seasons straight! (If not more bc I'm only on the end of season 5) How did people managed to screw this up so bad?/notneg

ALFHJDEALFHSJDKFLAHSDJKFHLASJKFA HOLY SHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII- FIVE WHOLE SEASONS--

I HAVE NO IDEA XDDDD You got what my friend wanted the most, female Zuma is real LMAO

My guess is that it's PROBABLY due to the original voices in English being very... Uh. High pitched. Personally I haven't watched the first seasons in English yet, only a couple random episodes, the "Ready, Race, Rescue" special and both movies.

All I know for sure is: The original cast was/is of literal children, with toddler-like voices. And they keep changing the cast apparently because the kids grow up (oh, really?) and their voices become "too deep" for their characters. I constantly joke with my friends that the American/Canadian teen or adult voice actors need a lesson or two from Brazilian voice actors to know how to make children voices for children characters XD With such high pitched voices, the people working with the translation might have seen them as females without batting an eye at other sources before sending the translated scripts for the dubbing studio. BUT FIVE SEASONS STRAIGHT AND PROBABLY MORE OMG I'M DYING THIS IS AMAZING-- SO MANY YEARS PASSED, haven't they checked internet about the show NOT EVEN ONCE if not the original sources they're getting the episodes from in the first place?? This is hilarious (not in a bad way, I'm just legit laughing imagining this)

Zuma probably fell TOO HARD in this category of having such a voice that he can pass as a female with literally no difficulty at all. His round face and the fact he's usually a very calm and chill pup probably doesn't help it either, y'know, "males are agitated and playful and energetic and loud", while "females are quiet and calm and polite" and all that. Including the fact that there's not really body look stereotypes that would be too strong to tell male apart from female. Everest is literally a very bulky pup. The twins Ella and Tuck look nearly the same. Skye's and Sweetie's small shapes/sizes are due to their breeds, not for being females. I could go on XD The only thing telling female and male apart are small eyelashes, they're not even that big!

Brazilian Paramount+ still has ONE single episode with our old dub, it's the episode where they see the Merpups for the first time. I was thrown for a loop when I watched that lol I need to admit it, Marshall and Zuma had nice girl voices in our old dub. They could've been females and nothing would change in the show at all, as Paw Patrol doesn't usually lean on gender roles stereotypes, except that would make the Marshall+Everest ship become a lesbian ship and the Rocky+Zuma ship become a straight ship XD

Biggest proof is that you got Zuma as female SO FAR and nothing changed substantially in the show lore, right? To the point you didn't even notice at all! This is SO WILD. Not many shows can say they could pull that off!!

[enjoyjellime]

Seeing that sheep design is really funny to me, cause It reminds me of when I made a crappy edit of a Wooloo x Alcremie hybrid for fun to use as a profile pic for the game Pokefarm a couple years back. I called it an "Alcwool" lol

My Little Lulu~

(I go on a bit of a rant about Yokai Watch that gets really unrelated from Palworld pretty fast below, sorry)

But also I'm mad because of how many people are liking palworld despite how ripped off it is, like I get that it's "parody" but it genuinely confuses me because I watched Yokai Watch get torn to shreds in the west due to people calling it a "Pokemon ripoff" ..... Just for people to turn around and say palworld is awesome, and "based" and etc, etc, etc. Like???? Those guys are the reason Yokai Watch 3 is now a $300 game??? Plus Yokai Watch was actually pretty original with their Yokai designs, with the only comparisons to Pokemon being some of the folklore creature source material. (Which Pokemon also seemed to have copied Yokai Watch when they made Sun & Moon, so...)

Like I genuinely hated what happened to Yokai Watch in the west, it's actually sad.

When Yokai Watch came out in Japan it became a mass hit, like Pokemon fever in the west in the 90's, and because of that, the Pokemon Company actually had competition for once, they actually had the drive to try and make better games. Pokemon Sun & Moon + UltraSM were made during that time, and from what I can tell, a lot of people consider those games the better ones in the 3D Mainline Titles.

Because Yokai Watch was doing so well in Japan, they (Level 5) decided to bring it over to the west thinking it would do well, or at least moderately good success. But we all know how that went. The west criticized it Badly, calling it a Pokemon ripoff, calling it too goofy or cheesy, complained about the English dub, saying it had no challenge or strategy involved like Pokemon did (Which if you've played Yokai Watch 1 or 2, you know for a fact that's not true, I've yet to defeat Kat Kraydel, shits hard.) It didn't help with Nintendo's way of advertising the game, as memeable as it was.

So with stagnant sales in the west, they opted to only sell a limited amount of copies to the west, specifically the States, cause I couldn't find a copy at all here in Canada, none of our game stores had any copies. Now the only way to play it is from the Eshop(shut down) or a physical copy ($300 :/ )

Then at that time, the Yokai Watch fever in Japan was slowly calming down, and the only things out for Yokai Watch was the fourth game on switch that didn't do as well as they hoped, and a mobile game. I think the mobile game and anime were/are still going in Japan, even having crossovers with Hololive Vtubers (specifically Inugami Korone getting a cameo in one of the episodes. Korone likes Yokai Watch a lot.)

Meanwhile Pokemon Company no longer had competition and were at the top undefeated, so they no longer felt like they had to try and went on to make Sword & Shield, Diamond & Pearl remake, Scarlet & Violet etc. I heard Legends Arceus was good, and I know Pokemon Snap remake was good, but those aren't mainline titles so they don't count.

This got really long I'm sorry, I just like Yokai Watch lol. And I do like Pokemon, I just wish it didn't take them having competition to actually try with their games. Growing up with Pokemon, I started playing with Pokemon X and I stopped playing after Pokemon Sword.

Some of the palworld rig comparisons absolutely look sus but if something like this won a plagiarism lawsuit it would actually set a horrible legal precedent for artists please learn what plagiarism means and think very carefully when discussing copyright law

[spin-in-time]

I was in shock for a bit

Am crying on the bus now

[lesbianakaashi]

The Forgotten Shounen: Katekyo Hitman Reborn

This is not a “Why you should watch/read khr” or anything like that. This is just me going into the deep dive and throwing my findings at you. I’m making this because khr used to be my favourite series when I was 15 (I had plushees, posters, tradingcards, the art book etc) and now as an adult I constantly find myself baffled at how unknow it seems to be.

1. Okay first what is khr?

Katekyo Hitman Reborn! or just Reborn! is a series by Akira Amano which was published in Weekly Shounen Jump from 2004 to 2012 (with 42 volumes) and got an anime adaption which run from 2006 to 2010 on Tv Tokyo (with 202 episodes and one OVA).

2. What’s it about?

Khr is a parody of the italian mafia and plays in a world where the mafia is heavily influencial. The protagonist is the japanese middle schooler Sawada Tsunayoshi who is known as “No good Tsuna” because of his failing grades, general weak and cowardly personality and weak physics.

He becomes aware of the mafia world when a 2 year old baby called Reborn arrives at his house claiming to be the greatest hitman and declaring himself his home tutor. Reborn was send by the 9th head of the Vongola famiglia who is ready to retire and looking for a new heir. Which of course, is supposed to be Tsuna and now it's Reborns job to shape him into a worthy sucessor.

Tsuna rejects the violence of the mafia world and refuses the position as the 10th. Thanks to Reborn and his general craziness Tsuna meets different people and starts to make real friendships. Reborn wants 6 of those friends to be Tsuna's future guardians, basically a group of people which will be closest to him in the vongola famiglia. Tsuna might have no interest in those positions but the friendships he builds with them become really precious to him.

Reborns arrivial also brings in the enemies of the Vongola family which leads to Tsuna being forced to engage in battles. Generally Tsuna openly avoids fights and prefers to run away but will put himself in danger for his friends' sake or because of something Reborn did.

Through out the series Tsuna matures and gains strenght but he never becomes a power fantasy. He's just a guy with many flaws who grows through the human connections he makes.

Personally I think the relationship between Reborn and Tsuna is one of the best student teacher reltaionships in all of manga only topped by Mob and Reigen from Mob Psycho 100. Especially the last arc really underlines their unique relationship to me.

Furthermore, khr offers a new and unique battle system: The flames. I'm not gonna go into to too much detail but the general idea is that one fights with their dying will flame which basically turns off your the savety switch so you can fight with everything you have. The flames are seperated into different categories such as: sky, storm, mist, rain, sun, lightning and cloud and have different attributes asigned to each one. Tsuna's use of the sky flame and his transformation when using it is still one of my favourite shounen transformations to this day.

3. What happened?

The series did really well and then not so well over the course of its serialisation. After the manga got an anime adaption it increased in populairty and video games, light novels, and other products such as CDs were created based on the series. Reborn is one of the best selling series of Weekly Shōnen Jump and has sold around 30 Million volumes overall. It was and still is very popular in Japan but rather unknown in the west.

According to the article "The Rise and Fall of Weekly Shonen Jump: A Look at the Circulation of Weekly Jump" khr was the 10th bestselling series in Weekly Shōnen Jump, with a total of 7 million copies sold in 2007.

This number increasing to 15 milion in 2008. Which placed khr into the 4th best selling series of 2008 in Japan.

Between 2008 and 2010 those sales declined but still kept strong with khr as the 6th top selling manga in 2009, 8th best selling in 2010 and then 24th best selling in 2012.

In November 2014, readers of the Da Vinci magazine voted khr number 17 on a list of Weekly Shōnen Jump's greatest manga series of all time.

After the anime came to an apprupt stop in 2010 for unknown reasons the manga sells took a visible hit. (Apparently the studio wanted to put the anime on halt because they were busy with other projects and give Akira Amano time to develop her story but I couldn't find any source for this claim) Furthermore, the rushed last chapters of the manga in 2012 declined the popularity of the series even more. There's no offical statement as to why the manga was ended in such a way but it's reasonable to assume that Jump either cut it considering the decreasing sales or Akira Amano choose to end it for personal reasons.

Nontheless, Tsuna not being included in Jump Force (a fighting game where you can play as different characters from Jump) in 2019 even tho he made it in earlier Jump Stars games also underlines the decreased interest in the series.

Rumors on a reboot or anime adaption of the last two arcs surface from time to time but are genereally unlikely. Artland the studio which made khr has gone bankrupt around 2015-2016. It might be taken on by another studio but rather uncommen especially with such an old series.

4. Art style

The khr anime ended over 10 years ago and the old art style might not be appealing to newer audiences.

Especailly because the anime adaption follows Akira Amanos old art style which heavily developed within the years. Here a picture comparing characters in the new art style:

A modern anime adaption in the new art style would be aesthetically pleasing. It would probably look similiar to Psycho Pass since Akira Amano did the concept art for this series.

(My personal art student hot take is that both art styles are unique and fun. Up to this day Akira Amano still has my favourite art style and even if the amount folds in the characters clothing is a little extreme I love it dearly.)

5. Criticism

The show is not without flaws and even if I greatly enjoy it it wouldn't be right not to adress them.

Daily Life Arc:

A lot of people view the first 20 to 25 episodes as fillers and quickly lose intererst in the series. This is due to the fact that Akira Amano inteded the series to be a gag manga and focuses the first chapters on world building, character introduction and comical narratives. It's rumored that the decision to develop the story into a battle shounen was made because the sales weren't doing well enough at first. So the first chapters/episodes may seem titidious but are necessary for the story and the development of the characters. The tonal shift from a more gintama like gag manga to a darker battle focused story can also be offputting to some viewers.

Either way a lot of people blame this arc when discussing why khr never got an english dub or didn't end up on Toonami. I've also read that the manga never finished serializing in the north america. However, it finished in other western languages like german and spanish.

Censoring:

The anime censors A LOT. From Gokudera's smoking habit, Yamamoto's whole character arc which deals with heavy themes such as depression and suicidal thoughts. The general bloodiness of the manga was censored and sometimes whole chapters and characters were left out even if those were important to the devolopment of others.

Filler episodes:

Out of the 202 episodes the anime has around 29 filler episodes which makes roughly 14 %.

Sexism:

Even if Reborn was written by a woman most female characters are rather flat and their storylines often tied to a male character in one way or another.

Genereal things:

Khr, like many other long running series, is sometimes criticised for a lack of world building or unpopular narrative choices.

6. Hope?

Khr isn't exactly dead. As stated before the series is still very popular in Japan and still gets new merch pretty regulary. There are also petitions floating around for a reboot or a new anime season but those never get a lot of traction. Furthermore #Reborn2期アニメ化 (#Reborn2ndAnimation) used to get some traction on twitter not too long ago. Last year the Anime News Network did a poll on which anime the readers would like to see a rebooot of and khr placed second.

Either way here's a collection of recent khr things I could find.

- In 2018 a new bluray set was released in north america

- The khr stage play reached yet another new season

- A mobile game was released last year

- Currently ongoing anime cafe event called "Concerto di Vongola"

- Last month there was an event with the former VAs and stage play actors where they discussed their favourite khr episodes.

- There has been an increase in blind reacts to the openings on youtube which might bring in a new fan base. The biggest one I could find had around 90k views and was made in 2019. On this note check out the soundtrack. The first openeing Drawing Days by SPLAY still makes me go insane (but I'm biased of course)

There also renewed hope for a new season/reboot because Shaman King, Inuyasha and Bleach got anounced for new seasons after a long hiatus. It's important to keep in mind that the circumstances for those series are differnt tho. For example bleachs new anime is often tied to the immense success of the gatcha game.

7. Conclusion

Khr is a series which used to be a flagship for Weekly Shounen Jump and is deeply beloved by it's fans, especially in Japan. It influenced other shounen series like bnha. It would be nice to see it gaining a bigger fanbase in the west :)

[magicalgirlagency]

huh? did something come up about the Saban Moon pilot? isn't it considered lost media? (sorry if this question makes you uncomfortable btw, i'm just a bit out of the loop)

A youtuber named Ray Mona has recently uploaded a 2-parter documentary entitled "The Western World of Sailor Moon", and in the second part of the documentary, it's revealed that the pilot for Saban/ToonMakers' Sailor Moon has been found after all these years.

It turns out, that the pilot has been on the Library Of Congress this whole time. The documentary was solid and had good quality, but this revelation was pretty anti-climatic, if you ask me.

This rant of mine will be basically a more detailed version of my ramblings from my previous post's tags, so hold on tight, this'll be long.

When growing up, english dubs of anime were a major annoyance to me. I didn't knew why, but they always have rubbed me the wrong way.

I couldn't articulate on why I hated english dubs so much; it'd always boil down to "I don't like it", and that was it. But now, since I am an adult, I can express and criticize with much more ease.

Sure, Saban Moon isn't an eng dub, but it is an americanized material that derivates from a japanese one. And not only it's americanized, but also horribly disconnected from the source material. It's Sailor Moon only in the name.

It's like how FATE: The Winx Saga only has the names of the characters, but it's all so horrendously divorced from its series of origin and all feels so fanfic-y (and not the good kind of fanfic-y).

You see, the issue that I had with older eng dubs was that the West would purposedly erase japanese culture (like how in 4Kids' Pokémon, they would change onigiris/riceballs into jelly-filled doughnuts), and this would escalate into even dumber things (like how in 4Kids' One Piece, the marines' firearms would be replaced with water guns).

The eng dubs were racist and stupid. Basically, american television, designed to appease the sensitive masses. This description may seem harsh to some, but it's the truth! And Sailor Moon was no exception.

Specially when it came to LGBT+ representation. Like how Zoisite was changed into a woman to censor his relationship with Kunzite.

Or when Sailors Uranus and Neptune were made into cousins, and this has only made their relationship awfully incestuous and weird.

Or when they pulled a Zoisite yet again, but with Fish Eye instead when the Dream Arc was on (in the 90's, each of the Amazon Trio had specific target preferences for their victims, and Fish Eye would target men).

And there are rumors that the Stars Arc was left undone because the Sailor Starlights would've cracked some eggs in early years...

So yeah, not only older dubs were racist, but they were homophobic, too! Yep, typical american television!

And of course, SABAN had a hand in all of this. I mean, those are the folks behind that atrocious Pretty Cure dub! I mean, really! Glitter Force?! Even though the original title consists of english words?! BLERGH.

Yeah, yeah, I know that we would've gotten a wheelchair-user Mercury and a black Jupiter, but at what cost?! If it's from a frankensteined abomination of a show that erases the japanese heritage of the original, then I don't want it.

And I don't know if I should feel honored or offended that Sailor Moon almost shared a name with me... sure, "Victoria" sounded like a much better option than the obvious and spoiler-y "Serena", but still...

Saban Moon was also going to be a Space Opera of sorts, with the emphasis being put on the alien heritage of the characters, which it could've been great if it weren't for the fact that it's Saban Moon.

It was clear that they wanted to do their own thing, their own series with their own stories and their own characters, but they had to butcher pre-existing material for it.

Why couldn't they have done the Inspector Gadget approach? Inspector Gadget was created because DiC couldn't bring Lupin the Third to the West at the time... and it worked! People loved Inspector Gadget! It's a timely classic!

Anyways, I HATE english dubs. They deliberatedly lie to you about its content, and treat you like an idiot. The only eng dubbed anime that I've actually enjoyed was DragonBall Z. But other than that, "Subs, Not Dubs" is the only way for me.

[aliasl]

oooh jeez this thread is disgustingly long. I don't know how to shorten it either. I've never been big on adding my own thoughts to posts, so maybe i'm not very good at it. recently, I had a long response on someone else's post and got great feedback and a new mutual! amazing feeling! then, on another post, it turned into a long argument where the other person was just not willing to admit they weren't 100% right and presented themselves as a "reasonable person who just wanted a bit of a debate," but then I went to their blog and saw how delusional they were and emotionally wrapped up in their bad faith reading I was arguing against. I'll be honest: you're kind of in the middle.

I have a point to prove, and I think you got a lot of stuff wrong, but I wonder at how useful this conversation is. You're clearly enjoying yourself. I'm not trying to invite you to join my cult. I made a throwaway comment, as a Destiel fan, on a post that I felt was disingenuous and I didn't see the numbers add up - even in something as basic as fanfiction. You know, it was a big fandom celebration when Destiel reached 100k tagged fics on ao3, so that was on my mind as an easy metric. And, as I said, number of fics doesn't equal number of shippers (waaaaaayyyyyy less people write than casually enjoy a ship), but it was such an easily pointed to discrepancy. THEN, you tell me "no but there's actually so much lost Gundam fic (and not just in English either)," which... that's why it's not a good metric, as I said. Also, why are you bringing language and nationality into this anyway?

I'll tell you why: because you've built *looks back in post to remember* SULEMIO into more than it is. To ship Sulemio is to be a Good Shipper! We are citizens of the world! Yuri is the underdog to American yaoi! Sulemio is the Gundam flagship, representing half a century of Anime! We are the "Silent Majority" of feminist Women speaking up, not to be silenced by the Loud Majority of what must be self-hating women that would ship Two White Men!

And to argue all that, you've conflated Sulemio shippers with Gundam fans and disrespected Supernatural fans. So, when I said you seem "young," I hadn't looked at your blog yet. Turns out you're late 30s? I'm younger than you, but I'm in my 30s too. So I'll just come out and say what I meant: you seem really immature (at least in so far as I've come to experience of you).

"Supernatural is just, not a recognized name outside of America or Tumblr. Everybody knows of Gundam." Are you trying to play the underdog or the topdog? I mean, do you think you're punching up or down? Because you're either a bully, unjustifiably taking shots at a small ship... or you're delusionally starting a fight out of resentment that a ship like Destiel seems to dominate Tumblr so much. (I know which one I think it is.)

AND ANYWAY Supernatural is recognized outside of America and Tumblr. That's just a stupid argument. There's foreign language spn fics on ao3 written by non-Americans... there's Supernatural DOUJINSHI... the conventions... and since you seem like such a weeaboo, there was even the terrible SUPERNATURAL ANIME. MADE BY MADHOUSE (who did a terrible job on the OVA, but you still have to put respect on Madhouse's name), VOICED IN JAPANESE BY THE SAME ACTORS WHO DUB THE SHOW IN JAPAN.... Also, Supernatural was part of the "Big Three" of Tumblr: Doctor Who, Sherlock, so on. You know, just a disgusting melting pot of British and American TV whose fandoms were started on Tumblr, but Tumblr helped GROW (except for Sherlock; he's dead now, may he never come back)...

Moving on. "False: Light novels are the name given to fanfiction [...]" .... Actually, I'm gonna have to call false on your calling false. "Light novel" basically means Young Adult novel. It's "light reading," compared to heavy novels. Just Google these things before you make absolutist statements. I've read some light novels - I'm a big NISIOISIN fan, and I know that some of his work is fanfic, but it's a looooot of original work, and they're all classified as light novels. Light novels are PHYSICALLY PUBLISHED works, sold for money, whereas fanfic (especially in the US where copyright law is different) is vast majority posted online, for free. They are not the same. Yet another reason not to use fanfic or light novels as a metric for counting fans.

[In response to my description of fanfic - specifically gay fanfic - as a a process of making up for what's missing] "So this is born of a narrative of creativity as a means of filling a percieved void (which is an idea rooted in productivity/commercialist framing and is a relatively new idea that doesn't exist everywhere internationally), rather than as being inherently additive." How could it be "commercialist" if I'm talking about writing fanfic, something that you don't make any money on (unless you're going to repackage it later as original work a la 50 Shades of Gray)? I don't really see a difference between "adding what you see as a missing ingredient" and "inherently additive" - just adding more of the same. Either way, my point stands that writing fanfiction (derivative work) comes from a place of wanting more than we got "on our screens." My bigger argument was that the noteworthy fujoshi (non-pejorative) fanbase that Gundam has was not because Gundam is such a LGBT Positive series, but because a certain subsect of fans was eating up the queer baiting and then creating art that made the subtext/implied explicit. Because you're right, everybody's heard of Gundam, but I've never heard about how gay Gundam is (and I watch a lot of anitubers and LGBTQIA+ creators). Which makes me think you're blowing things out of proportion, based on the fanbase that you interact with (and probably isn't in the majority), and not on the actual series.

Which... I'm not gonna do all that research on Gundam. This started as a Destiel vs Sulemio poll. Then you started talking about the whole series to try and inflate the numbers. But also gotta account for all the lost media. And on and on.

Gundam is too mainstream to be The Gay Show you say it is. Gay marriage isn't legally recognized in Japan. Female fans of gay ships are called "rotten women." Yaoi means "no plot, no meaning" like it has no substance. "Watch Char's Counterattack. Again, look up the historical context of Yukio Mishima. Char Aznable is very aggressively bisexually coded by Japanese social expression every chance the creator gets. It absoloutely is not ambiguous." You keep assigning me homework because you can't explain things well enough yourself. "Aggressively bisexually coded" was not considered unambiguous enough when it was the Supernatural fandom and Dean Winchester; we aren't satisfied with "coding" like The Hayes Code is still enforced and censoring artists' true expression, and I would tell you the same. Gundam the show AIN'T AS OUT AND PROUD as the BL the fans make.

"Oh okay you're upset about numbers. You lost the poll. Which one of these two franchises are people talking about. Which gets regular numbers across all of social media, and isn't a dying ember held onto by a small minority?" We are all in our own bubbles was my point from the beginning. I don't feel that Destiel lost to Sulemio, I feel that the "winners" are delusional and that pitting ships against each other (especially cross-fandom) is, frankly, cringe. It's debate pervert territory. It's starting a competition that has no meaning, and the people who try to make it meaningful are in need of a reality check. As far as I'm concerned, Supernatural still gets "regular numbers" across social media; podcasts and articles on news sites. Not only is it not a dying ember, the third to last episode - Castiel's romantic declaration of love (which trended on Twitter ABOVE the US election when it was Biden v Trump and Georgia's swing state votes were being counted - you know, nail-biting and important political shit) brought in a whole new, huge audience that made the confession scene a meme because they didn't have context for what they were seeing and then watched the show... There's also constant talks of the show coming back, most certainly in large part because people care about Destiel.

And you must be somewhat aware of that because I see Sulemio memes on your blog that are copy-paste the Confession Scene meme, which was big enough to break containment and is now just a meme for announcing important news on Tumblr. Has Gundam ever "broken containment" like that? Because you're implying the series is a big deal, but I can honestly say I can't think of any Gundam memes, let alone Witch from Mercury Gundam, which you hold aloft as the Champion over Destiel, which you malign.

"Most shippers are able to be polite enough to not egregiously and erroneously claim an entire social media platform is "their website". I'm sorry that this is how you learn of how you are percieved by other fandoms for your past of behaviour. Its unfortunate."

And what are people supposed to think about this? ^ You think you killed Destiel? You think it deserves to die? Does it make you feel big? Because some Destiel fans pissed you off before? You're going to treat me, just one person, as a monolith and guilty of all the "past behavior" of some of my fellow shippers? What did we even do?

Calling Tumblr "the Destiel site" is not egregious and erroneous. It's not a bad thing to be, and Supernatural rose to popularity on here, evidenced by being part of the aforementioned "Big Three," in huge part because of Destiel. Because Tumblr is a platform well-suited to long analysis, the subtext of Supernatural became clear, and in part because fans shipped it, it became canon! So calling Tumblr "the Destiel site"... it's something we're proud of. Yeah, it's tongue-in-cheek, and anyone could tell you Tumblr is more than one ship. It's certainly more than Gundam or Sulemio. https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/events/destiel-vs-sulemio-tumblr-top-ships-bracket : This is us. It's stupid. I'm arguing here because I care about Destiel and numbers didn't add up and you kept @'ing me. Less than 70k votes on the poll, it's not a big sample size, and people like you wear it like a badge of honor.

"No, these are conversations I have heard about destiel shippers from other fandoms. I have heard these conversations for years now. Your behaviour does nothing to discredit the things I have heard." So cliquey. You are badmouthing people who have done nothing to you, and you're mad at me for my behavior? I've been nice enough to respond to you, even when you've gotten so much wrong, put way too much importance on it, and dismissed any common ground. You are being a debate pervert. You want to fight. Well, I'll let you in on the secret to winning: don't engage. Like me. I, for one, am done. I've heard enough, I've argued my points, and you've given me a bad impression of the Gundam fandom. You're not as young as I initially perceived you as, but I know you could continue to grow. I end where I began, urging you to just enjoy what you enjoy, see it clearly for what it is, not quibble about numbers, extend grace to others, get better at writing, do your resource and cite your sources, and let go of this resentment you have for a ship you don't ship, a show you haven't seen, people who haven't done anything to you.

UPDATE: The Destiel/Supernats aren't taking this well -- explaining my reasoning for the history I gave, and why Destiel is not the big bitch of shipping that it thinks it is

An update to THIS:

"This is just a marketing thing, Gundam is a giant robot show, only men watch it!"

Gundam's fandom is silent majoratively feminine:

"But its not gay, its about giant robots!"

Gundam is very gay. The entire climax of the first story is a riff of Yukio Mishima lmao

The climax of the Amuro/Char arc of Universal Century Gundam (expounding from first Gundam circa 1979), Char's Counterattack is somewhat on the history of Japanese disillusion with liberalism which notably climaxed with the life and history of Yukio Mishima.

You know. THAT Yukio Mishima.

The one who wrote FORBIDDEN COLOURS.

It was so gay that the fanfiction inspired by it became its own damn anime:

And that's just Charmuro, let alone Charma or a billion other ships just in OG Gundam alone.

We've got This is before we get to Guin Sard Lineford and Yamagi Glimerton (both verrrrry gay), Tieria Erde (a genderqueer trans-coded character who transcends gender entirely in their arc) and a bunch of others.

Gundam was always gay.

"I don't see the numbers"

"That doesn't seem like much, Supernat is at least 2x this"

Sooooo the amount of content you do see isn't representative of how much even got written, given FFN had a huge content purge.

First, let's start with the relative proportion of users: If we're analysing the concept of fandom, we first have to look at who had access to the internet in the first place to publish works.

Yeah that's a pretty sizable difference.

Wing's fandom actually exploded in 2000, but got capped VERY early, distributing itself to fansites when FFN fragmented and collapsed.

Why?

Content purges!

"Isn't there some sort of online archive of this stuff?"

Sure, if you wanna dig through tons and tons of Angelfire and Geocities pages which have mostly disappeared. Otherwise, no! There is no archive of this stuff?

"Why?"

They've since rolled back on this but it means there's a massive amount of lost media out there, including the discussions on it and thus there's an entire history you didn't get to experience.

Its actually very difficult to reach people who've been involved, since it was so long ago that very few people remember, and a sizable proportion of that population have actually died.

"But what about SF fandoms? We have ancient records of stuff like Spirk!"

See unlike physical media like zines, when a server goes offline or there's a data-loss, or something like that there is no surviving copy of the thing in question.

The net result is we have this weird hole where content just vanished, and its now considered lost media. The work of many artists, designers, writers, even videos of events are just lost media because we didn't have the archival mentality adults develop.

You're not gonna hear about all the X-Files stuff or Frasier fanfictions or GW stuff because of these purges and the lack of physical media. FFN users were teens, not adults with resources like US/EU/JP SF fans, who had archival tendencies due to their long history.

So there is this supermassive black-hole in the history of fanfiction running between 1998, and 2008 and some of the only evidence of it are worksafe works and fansites which the owners have long since forgotten about because folks moved on. Moving on is a normal part of fandom.

So to those of you just saying "supernatural is losing to a pair of dumb anime girls" or "urgh this is just a trend tumblr will get over it and go back to supernatural"...

Uhhhhh no they won't, actually?

Supernat's fans mostly seem to be waspy Americans. Gundam is kind of a global phenomenon, one which has traditionally had a silent majority female audience, a vocal minority male audience -- and every time that majority has spoken up, its coincided with a content purge, or a TOS change that mysteriously biases American derived fiction over Japanese derived fiction.

Funny that.

tl;dr:

NATURE IS HEALING

[brian-in-finance]

On Outlander, Caitríona Balfe has spent five seasons dubbed "Sassenach," a Scottish Gaelic word for an English person or outsider — but in Belfast, she's anything but one: the Irish actress, 42, portrays a version of writer-director Kenneth Branagh's mother.

Known simply as Ma and seen through the eyes of her 9-year-old son, Buddy (Jude Hill), she is struggling to raise and protect her two children in 1960s Belfast when the nationalist fighting known as the Troubles erupts, plunging their family and way of life into uncertainty.

"It was very present," Balfe tells EW of the threat of violence that was a constant for her while growing up in the Republic of Ireland. "It was always on the news, and we had bomb scares in our town. Even though I didn't grow up in Belfast or the North, it still felt very close."

Balfe had long been searching for a story set in Ireland and was immediately touched by Branagh's original script inspired by his own boyhood memories. "It touches you in a different way when you're doing something that is from your own people," she reflects. "Ma felt very familiar to me, and there were things about her struggle that I could relate to — things people in my family had gone through."

Belfast doesn't dwell on politics, but on the intimate impact a complex situation has on one family. "Very rarely do you get a script that deals with that kind of subject matter that isn't in some way about the ideology," she says. "I'd read so many scripts before that seemed to glorify one side or the other, and I wasn't interested in being part of that conversation. This was something that really looked at the people and how everyday life was affected."

One scene in particular rang true. In the midst of a riot, Ma forces Buddy to return to a grocery store he helped ransack to return a stolen box of cereal. "Anyone who has an Irish mother understands that scene," she says with a laugh. "You will do the right thing and it doesn't matter at what cost."

Shooting the scene proved almost as harrowing to film as it appears on screen. The team had only one chance to get it right because they didn't have the budget to rebuild the shop once it was destroyed. "I don't think anyone had accounted for the fact that we had 20 to 30 stunt guys who had been in lockdown for five months and had a lot of pent-up aggression," she says. "There were shelves everywhere and they were just going hell for leather. I remember just picking Jude up and putting him under my arm and pushing our way through."

Shot in the U.K. between COVID-19 lockdowns in 2020, the set was, as Balfe describes, a "beautiful little bubble." The sequestered crew began to feel like a family, finding joy in the midst of crisis. Balfe describes a warm set, full of shared stories, impromptu football matches, and Jamie Dornan (who plays Pa) and Hill messing around with a pair of stilts during downtime.

"There was a freedom on the project," she recalls. "That's something I'll try and take into the next one." Part of that freedom also came from performing opposite children. "Jude's instinctual and is just playing," she says of Hill. "So you have to be the same way. It's nice to allow that to be part of your performance."

After a series of period pieces (including a memorable turn with Christian Bale in the '60s-set Ford v Ferrari), Balfe is itching to do something contemporary. But first, she faces the gauntlet of awards season. She's earned four Golden Globe nominations for her work on Outlander, but is now garnering some of the best reviews of her career for Belfast, a performance of nimble subtlety and abundant heart.

She tries not to think about awards chatter too much. She welcomed a son in August, and, she says, "mostly my head these days is nappies and bedtime and that kind of thing."

"Those things are so out of your control," she adds. "If it happens, amazing. If it doesn't, well, this film is one of the best experiences I've had so far working. You have to just think about that and if anything else comes along, then it's gravy."

For her, portraying Ma was reward enough. "She's so comfortable in her own surroundings and such a force to be reckoned with, but has such fear about stepping into the unknown," Balfe says of the matriarch. "How can you be such a confident person but within this very small space?"

She's legitimately curious about the question. After time-traveling on Outlander and roaming the world, Balfe has gone deepest in a role that's closest to the heart.

Remember… I'd read so many scripts before that seemed to glorify one side or the other, and I wasn't interested in being part of that conversation. This was something that really looked at the people and how everyday life was affected. — Caitríona Balfe