Wow, look at me just posting up a storm here!

[gnine]

Okay, so here's the thing, over all, liked the ep, thought it was a pretty good start for what looks to be an interesting season. Though, WOW, and to think I thought they had a lot of characters LAST year. Yes, we'll just add a ton more without really dropping any, sounds like a plan. Ever intriguing to be a pinball, bing bing bing between characters we go.

(And on a random side note, before I plunge into my tangent, Mohinder and Parkman, shacked up together? Raising a kid? I'd never really considered that pairing but…but…but, if you *insist*! )

Anyway, here I go. Hiro, in ancient Japn...in Otsu!?…Gaijin…Edo period?!…*splutter*. Okay, better now…Really. Where to start. Like I said in the cut, I can be a bit…finicky, when it comes to Japan. What can I say, I've fanned it, majored in it, and now live here. So…sometimes, the…um…total inaccuracies? They grate…just a bit.

First, um, Otsu? Seriously, *that* is suppose to be Otsu?! (see icon for xparrot's and my original reaction). See, we know Otsu (modern Otsu, but still), it's only a very short train ride away. I watched fireworks there a month ago. And, while this *is* set some 350 years ago, there are certain…details, shall we say, that are lacking. Like fricken Lake Biwa!!! Biggest lake in Japan. (I won't even go into how the mountains and trees and such are all wrong, I know they're filming California, totally different climate, etc, so I guess we'll let that pass) but…um…seeing as that scene kinda looks CGI to begin with…you couldn't put in a freakin LAKE?! Crash course in Japanese, Otsu 大津, means big HARBOR. Oops. Also, notice the *big* part. Little village? Not so much! Otsu was one of the major cities on the Tokaidou (main highway running between Kyoto and Tokyo in the Edo period, which is when this is set).

And while we're on the subject of Edo period, 1671? Over 35 years after the Closed Country Edict, which among many other things, meant death to basically any foreigners caught in Japan, unless you were Dutch or Chinese and even then, they were kept strictly in Nagasaki, anywhere else, Death. On sight. Without trial. Whee. So, um, Brit walking around as samurai? Um…not so much. And even if he *was* somehow getting away with it, he said he came on ship. WHAT ship?! Did he come over as a baby, before the ports closed to other Europeans? He sure didn't seem to be speaking Dutch.

Wait…wait, did he just say a trade vessel the EMPEROR let thru? (just went back to rewatch the scene, making sure he did say he was English (which he did) and um...) Emperor? Uh…you mean Shogun? Daimyou? Cause um, emperor, not so much with the power in the Edo period. And 'kept on to find your fortune"?! In country hostile to all foreigners, where, even if he did somehow come on a legal Dutch ship, would have been warned from even stepping off the manmade Island in Nagasaki harbor to which the Dutch were entirely restricted? And let's hope he's not a practicing Christian (and in that time period, a Brit, chances are he WAS), cause they liked to BOIL those. Literally. (Well, not everywhere…but there is that place near Nagasaki…). Yay for Japan and its natural hot springs.

(oh, and look, subtitling things that she SO did not say. For the most part, the Japanese, as well as the subs, are accurate, far as I can tell. But um…that line there about 'he forged it for payment'? She so did not say that. Way to add extra lines, subbers. )

Well, at least they got the drinking right. Most Japanese heroes seem to have a tendency to do that, in great quantity. Though Hiro seemed to be protesting it at one point…I hope he was just objecting to being ignored over alcohol and not the principal of his hero drinking. Cause…um…what samurai *didn't*?! Classic image of samurai usually comes with sake jug attached.

And oh god did this rant turn out long. Oops. I didn't mean to…it's just…um, I'm a nutter? A very sensitive nutter.

But I *did* like the episode. Really I did, I just, um…Right, shutting up now.

Comments

[ladydreamer.livejournal.com]

ilu

Really. Thanks for pointing this out :D

[gnine.livejournal.com]

Your welcome ^_^

In truth, I'm just seeing this a warm up, really, getting in shape to REALLY rant once SV starts back up ^_-

[captainsblog.livejournal.com]

Apparently, some of us don't even know enough about 21st century Japan.

I have a friend who works at the USN hospital in Okinawa. She emailed me, in response to one of my own comments on the premiere, and asked if I could send her the disk of it I burned, because the NBC iTunes spat is apparently keeping her from seeing it.

But not you.

???

[wednesday-10-00.livejournal.com]

LOL because at the end of last season, when we see Hiro drop into "Japan," I literally groaned out loud because I knew they would totally screw up Edo Japan. I mean, they couldn't even get modern Tokyo right, how are they going to do Edo? But actually, historical inaccuracies aside, I was glad when Kensei turned out to be a gaijin, because when he first started talking, I was like, "God, couldn't they get anyone who could speak Japanese better than that?" And then he took off his mask and I was like, "Oh." (And then his Japanese got WORSE all through the episode. By the end I couldn't even understand him.)

As for the subtitles, I'm pretty sure they write the script in English and then translate any foreign dialouge; it seems to me that it's pretty common for the subtitles to be different from what they're actually saying. (Off the top of my head, any time they mentioned "cubicles," it would be left out of the Japanese dialogue. Gee, wonder why. *eyeroll* And if you watch the episode with Hiro's sister, the subtitles have him calling her by her name and her calling him "little brother," which of course doesn't happen in the dialogue.) I bet the producers (or writers, or somebody) think Japanese culture is "cool," but don't actually know anything about it (and can't be arsed to do a bit of research, I guess).

My favorite thing from the first season though (even more than the kanji clock!) was the supposed Shodou in the sword shop. I think my handwriting is better than whoever scribbled that shit. (And that's saying something, because I have the handwriting of a three-year-old.)

[gnine.livejournal.com]

We don't watch it on itunes *shrug* All bittorrent, all the time, that be my motto ^_^

[gnine.livejournal.com]

I know, we were rather...'curious' at the end of last season about how they'd botch up portray Edo, Japan/Kyoto.

Yeah, noticed the thing with Hiro's sister and what she was calling him...this one just amused me cause it was a full line, and sorta plot-explanatory...and wouldn't even be hard to say in Japanese...they just left it out...*shrug*

I get the sense, too, that the creators/writers are like oh, Japan's cool/popular right now...but don't really have a CLUE, and are not even particularly anime fans or anything...

[naye]

HAHAHA I LUV YOU! XD You've elaborated on EXACTLY the points I kept bitching about through the episode. Poor boy of mine, having to put up with my "but...! but...! but WTF?!". Seriously, though - even with the mask, there's no WAY he could be passing, not with that accent! Even my non-Japanese-speaking boy heard it, and - yes, he doesn't speak Japanese. But he heard it. So that's pretty bad. Also - blue eyes?! DEMON! XD Agh, their Sakoku era Japan, it burrrrrrns. (Where is Biwako, and WHY ARE PEOPLE ACCEPTING HELP FROM A KNOWN GAIJIN??? Because, like you said - BOILED ALIVE. See also: guilty by association, so paying a gaijin to solve their problems? UM. BAD IDEA.)

...I might be just a tad oversensitive to these things myself. Just a little bit.

Also, Claire annoys me. I can get feeling smothered by not being allowed to be the "real" you after a couple of months (or maybe even weeks) of playing by the book, but - one day. She couldn't even try to keep it together for ONE DAY? And then she had to play with fire AND break her leg? Sigh. She disappoints me. (And why are cheerleaders always, always evil? Is that really true? And why wasn't there a teacher around for gym class - or would a teacher just have ignored the bitch queen trying to get the poor girl to do the jump? Because, see, I could see a teacher staying out of subtle bullying, but something where someone could get seriously injured...? HELLO LAWSUIT!)

[ayabai.livejournal.com]

yah the whole nippon past thing really bugged the hel out of me.
george takai's fairly awful japanese still amuses the hell out of me. ando has better japanese, and he isnt even played by a nihonjin!

[stitcher2ficcer.livejournal.com]

Hi there. Haven't watched any of Heroes yet, so I can't comment on your review per se. But I laughed when I read the link line on my F-list, so Dad wondered at my laughter, and I read it to him... so he asked to hear your critique. After my reading that to him, his comment was, "Boy, she's growing up to be her father's daughter. I've been doing this for thirty years, tearing historical films and costume dramas apart."

Speaking of which. We rented the first two episodes of "Rome" last weekend from the store in Townsend, where we looked for but did not find "Dr. Who." You should hear Dad laughing his way through that one. He was disappointed because in two whole eps he never heard anyone say, "Hail, Caesar," and SPQR wasn't plastered all over the place. God help us if he ever produces an historical drama!

[xparrot.livejournal.com]

We knew they were gonna mess up the Japanese stuff. Still. Bwahah! (though the accent...I dunno, I don't think they'd peg it as a foreign accent, not when no one has heard one. In Samurai Champloo there's the Dutch guy and they notice his Japanese is weird but it takes a bit of a mental leap to get from that to Gaijin; the Japanese are strange about foreign accents. The blue eyes, though...yeah, that's a problem. And where the heck is Biwa-ko?!
...and I'm not gonna get into making Hiro's hero a Western dude, though there's a bit of me that can't help but be disturbed. Yeah, I know, American show, naturally it's ethnocentric, same as British shows and Japanese shows, but...)

I still like Claire, but am managing that by blaming bad writing instead. The HS stuff is so awfully overplayed, all of it, and that scene in the gym (I think it was afterschool practice? but still, yeah, there should've been teachers around) was so contrived it was painful. (Mr. Bennet's new job is also overplayed, but it's also AWESOME so is forgiven. Oh the badassery!)

[gnine.livejournal.com]

See also: guilty by association, so paying a gaijin to solve their problems? UM. BAD IDEA.)

EXACTLY!!

And the Claire thing, yeah, was bothering me and neechan right from the beginning. And I agree, her not even being able to stay normal ONE DAY is a little...annoying :-p

[gnine.livejournal.com]

Hehe, the Japanese accents have been amusing the hell out of us! If the show gets brought to Japan, I'm verrrry curious what people will think!

[gnine.livejournal.com]

Hehhe, yup, I am my Daddy's daughter, too ^_^ These flaws, though, you don't need to be a historian to find flaw with. Just having the barest bones of Japanese knowledge makes you go *what?!*

I'd heard about Rome, other than the historical inaccuracies, how is it?

*huggles to you both*

[naye]

Hmmm. Okay, the accent isn't my biggest problem, but the white man coming in to be the hero in Japan? If he actually is the real hero of legends (as opposed to Hiro or someone else just taking his place), that's pretty seriously disturbing. Not just a little disturbing, but a LOT disturbing. However, I'm holding on to the hope of there being some kind of twist to the whole thing. Which STILL doesn't explain why there's a freaking UNMASKED GAIJIN wandering about and nobody seems to CARE, or where the hell that huge lake went, but at least it'll just be stupid, instead of being incredibly appalling.)

I dunno. It's - I guess they need someone to be the emo teen now that Peter's off being an amnesiac. (Okay, so he wasn't exactly a "teen" last season, but he did enough emo-ing that he counts as an honorary teenager in my eyes!) But why pick Claire? I liked Claire, but now she's being stupid, and it annoys me. Ah, well. Hopefully there will be more plot and less high school soap opera soon! (Mr. Bennet's new job, though - HEEEEEEEE! That was beautiful, so I totally forgive him - which is good, since it makes it easier for me to forgive Claire, too.)

[naye]

So now that they've annoyed me, I'm waiting for the twisty pay-off! It can't be as simple as it seems... Actually, the pay-off for Claire being stupid was Mr. Bennet being stupid in the same kind of way, except that was awesome, and makes it kind of cute how very much she is her daddy's girl.

[utopiantrunks.livejournal.com]

Hehe. ^^ I don't watch the show, but I nonetheless found this rant both amusing and informative. XD

(THIS IS MEREDITH. using her silly jpop rps account. XD)

[acchikocchi.livejournal.com]

So remember that, ahem, fine gay pirate tradition, to which Fortunes of War belonged?

I FOUND MORE.

*dying of laughter*

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