[Fish Sandwich]

Faiz 7-8:

These episodes form what I'd consider the ending to the first "arc" of the show, more or less, and are some of my favorites from the whole series. Going back to it, it's nice to find out how well they hold up. This is an extremely strong story with boatloads of development for several of the main characters, a ton of examination of the show's central themes, and that artsy climax where Faiz and Yuuji are fighting their respective opponents to the soft sound of classical guitar music. You just can't go wrong here.

I can't stress enough just how strong the characterization is, though. There's a ton of little plotlines all perfectly intertwining with one another to maximum dramatic effect. It's mostly centered on Kaidou, since he's the new guy, and the arc he has here, where he gradually starts to get over his trauma after bonding with a student at the university he used to go, culminating in him throwing away his guitar at the end, freed of his "curse", is just aces. A+ material from Inoue and a shining example of why melodrama isn't inherently a bad thing. The other half of the story is about Mari trying to work towards her dream of becoming a beautician, and while it's not remarkable the way Kaidou's plot is, it's still pretty good and serves to further humanize her quite a bit.

The part that elevates these episodes even more is that both of these threads are also used to further develop Takumi and Yuuji. Both of them cement the kind of characters they're going to be here, with Yuuji doing some meditation on what it really means to be a monster, and Takumi starting to find some purpose in life. I'm all over this kind of parallel storytelling, and I especially love the way the central message about dreams is handled. The rather cynical Takkun learns to be a little more idealistic after hearing Mari talk about what it's like to have that kind of passion, and the generally quite idealistic Yuuji, after Kaidou frames pretty much the same thought in a much more negative light, has some of his optimism crushed by the end.

Great stuff all around. Unlike the subs for this show. Yeah, on second thought, I'm going to keep complaining about this, because every pair of episodes gives me like at least seven glaring mistakes to choose from. I want people to get an idea of how bad this situation truly is. I'll compromise a bit and try to only mention one per post. Hopefully you can all stand to indulge me.

ということで~、ファイズ翻訳ミスコーナーです～！今日の翻訳ミスはこれだ！



「今ではあのベルトを狙うことは禁止されているんですよ。」

This mistake, originally made by TV-Nihon and imported into Agony's scrub almost entirely unchanged, is a fabulous example of a surprisingly standard translation error. The "accidentally backwards statement". Just like the line I complained about last time, the translator either misheard some words, or made some mistaken assumptions about what was being said. It was established right at the start of episode 5 when the gang got to Tokyo that Smart Brain isn't currently going after the Faiz Gear, and Smart Lady is reminding an Orphenoch targeting Mari of this fact. I assume the confusion was a result of the Orphenoch in question completely ignoring this reminder, but regardless of the reason, botching this makes it sound like the bad guys are up to something they currently aren't.

W 7-8:

Nothing like an utterly inconsequential, kind of dumb arc of Double to wind down with. Well, I say inconsequential, but this is the point where we find out the Sonozaki family is so scummy, even their pet cat is on drugs. Beyond that though, it's a deliberately rather goofy story courtesy of Naruhisa Arakawa, our first guest writer for this show, and to be honest, I actually really dig this arc's style. It's having so much fun with itself that I can't even care if none of the main characters learn anything or grow at all. Er, well, I guess Philip learned how to breakdance. That's something, right? Not as well as Ryoutarou in Den-O, but still.