Utena Fansub Ep 20 Translation Notes

Revolutionary Girl Utena Episode 20 Wakaba Flourishing.mkv

Girl 1: 何言ってんのよ！あんた西園寺先輩の生写真買ってたじゃない！
Girl 2: そういうあんただって、先輩の縦笛舐めてたでしょ？！

This exchange was a perfect example of why I’m so glad to be doing translation non-professionally under my own terms — I don’t have to worry about censorship! Let’s look at some of the existing translations first (which are, in my opinion not only poor but incorrect!)

Girl 1: What are you saying? Weren’t you the one buying pics of Saionji-sempai?
Girl 2: Weren’t you the one looking to steal a kiss off of him? (from ohtori.nu)

Girl 1: You’re one to talk! You used to buy pictures of him!
Girl 2: And you wanted a kiss from him, right? (from internet archive video subs)

These translations have been extremely censored and softened. This is what the girls are really saying:

Girl 1: Look who’s talking! Didn’t you buy creepshots of him?
Girl 2: Oh yeah? I know you tried to lick his recorder after music class! (my translation)

The key word in the first line is 生写真 (namajashin). This is a combination of two words, 生 (nama: raw) and 写真 (shashin: photo). 生写真 as a popular term originated in the 60s, when fans would take photos of boy/girl bands at events and then sell them. They were 生 (nama: raw) because they were unprocessed, unedited, and not distributed by magazines or other popular media. These days, the term 生写真 is often used to describe unsolicited film photographs of j-pop idols and other similar figures.

To talk of 生写真 of a school student implies several things. One, that the subject is extremely popular, like a teen idol. Two, the photos are unsolicited and likely polaroids. Three, that the photos are then purchased for “private use”, which is always some level of creepy, even if it’s just pinning them up on your bedroom wall.

What does the above act describe? It sounds very similar to taking and selling creepshots. So despite 生写真 not meaning “creepshots” in every context, in this context it certainly does.

The other censored phrase here is 縦笛舐めてた — literally “you were licking his flute/recorder”. This censorship is egregious! The girls are doing some serious non-consentual indirect sexual acts here (which are a lot more normalised in Japan but I digress), and the other translations are content to pretend the girl was just “trying to get a kiss”! Reading those translations actually made me angry. Whenever I see something like that, I find so much more motivation for this project — I just can’t abide a brilliant show like Utena being tainted by such terrible translations!

This is the first instance of a translator note in the entire project! I felt it was okay to put here since it’s just on the title card so it’s not too distracting. The main purpose of this is to provide some context for the leaf shaped hair clip that Saionji makes. The fact it was personalised to her and then given away to Anthy makes the gut punch moment hit so much harder in Japanese that I felt like I had to provide the English audience with this as well.

Utena: Well, you’ve really been thriving recently. And uh…
Wakaba: And?
Utena: And you’re… glowing. (my translation)

I’m really proud of this translation! The problem here is the Japanese phrasing. In Japanese, the verb なる is a lot more common, less verbose, and less formal/academic sounding than the English equivalent, “become”. So when Utena says:

その…とても綺麗になった。(lit. Uh, you’ve become very pretty.)

It sounds weird no matter how you say it in English. The other translations try their best, changing “become” to “gotten” for example, but they still sound a bit funny. They certainly don’t sound like a natural compliment one school student might give another.

Utena: Uh, you’ve gotten really pretty. (ohtori.nu)

Utena: Well… You seem even prettier, too. (from archive.org subs)

So when I came up with “you’re… glowing”, I was so happy. It sounds natural, but it also perfectly conveys all of the nuance behind the original Japanese statement!

あれ？狐の嫁入りだ。

Word by word translation: “Oh, a kitsune wedding.”

Translating only the meaning intended as spoken: “Oh, a sunshower.”

Final translation: “A sunshower. A kitsune must be getting married.”

One word for sunshower in japanese is “kitsune no yomeiri” (fox wedding) which I think comes from some myth or other, it’s not super clear. Here, Utena is actually just saying “oh, a sunshower”, but in the translation I was tempted to add this extra sentence to give context that the following shadow play is elaborating on a japanese cultural connection between “kitsune marriage” and sunshower. If the shadow play didn’t make any references to the myth, I probably would have just translated this as “Oh, a sunshower”

Hopefully the punchline comes across in this shadow play! I feel like I did my best at providing exposition on Japanese culture while still feeling natural.

I don’t really have much to say about this last line but I was just really proud of it:

Mikage: 君の持っている物の中で一つ欲しい物があるんです。何、大した物じゃありませんよ。

Mikage: You have something that we want. In fact, you wouldn’t even miss it.

With Wakaba in frame, it almost suggests that he won’t miss her once he’s back at the academy. By giving the hairclip away, he’s throwing Wakaba away too. He may not know the extent to which he is doing this, but he certainly is doing it.

In fact, I was very happy with the entire Saionji-Mikage exchange. I’m just proud of this episode in general! Go watch it!

Thanks as always to @dontbe-lasanya for their fantastic editing! There was a bit more discussion around certain sticky spots that they really helped with in this epsiode.

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Rose divider taken from this post.