Fansub Review: [Commie] Suisei no Gargantia (Episode 02)

This post was written by Dark_Sage. He is Dark_Sage.

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Valvrave is what Gargantia wishes it could be. Get mad if you want, it won’t change reality.

Table of Contents

Release Information

Visual Quality

Script Quality

Results

Release Information

Episode details.

Release format: MKV (539 MB, 10-bit)

Japanesiness: No honorifics.

English style: American English.

Encoding details: http://pastebin.com/ct9Sh2hk

Speed: Quick (<48 hours)

Note: Unlike UTW-Vivid, Commie has the actual Ending video.

 

External links.

Group website: http://commiesubs.com/

IRC channel: #[email protected]

Fansub.co screenshot comparisons: http://fansub.co/suisei-no-gargantia/

Subbusu screenshot comparisons: N/A

 

Visual Review

Karaoke.

[Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_02.10_[2013.04.16_18.59.52] [Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_02.38_[2013.04.16_19.00.53]

Opening. Doesn’t look that good to me, but I suppose I’d do something similar if I were figuring out what to go with.

Rating: Okay+.

[Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_22.57_[2013.04.20_02.56.53] [Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_23.04_[2013.04.20_02.57.10]

Ending. Not sure what they’re going with here, but it’s legible at least.

Rating: Okay.

Yeah, I didn’t pay much attention to the OP/ED for this show, cuz Gargantia is just a boring version of Fractale.

 

 

Typesetting.

[Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_03.31_[2013.04.16_19.02.04]

And… that’s it. Commie’s typesetter sure had to put in a full day on this one.

 

 

Script Review

Main Script.

[Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_00.49_[2013.04.16_18.52.24]

But he means harm in his language? This is a bit confusing if you take the line straight. But I suppose it’s only an issue if you expect fansubs to help you understand the show you’re watching.

[Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_01.18_[2013.04.16_18.54.17]

[Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_12.27_[2013.04.16_19.16.30]

I liked how Commie handled the language barrier across these two screens. I’d normally expect both these lines to be in the same font (because they’re speaking the same language), but by switching up the font for the robot’s speech and the humans’, it adds a nice bit of flavor to the release.

[Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_14.00_[2013.04.17_23.30.09]

Unfortunately, Commie couldn’t keep my enjoyment up for long. They’re known as paper bag subs for a reason.

In this line, it’s Ledo speaking to the robot. Logically, a third font should be used, or the second font should be used here and the first font be used for those previous two screens.

[Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_01.06_[2013.04.17_22.51.56]

Being an aide does not confer a rank — it’s a fucking job. I question the “Aide” translation as well.

Ridget isn’t a paper-filer — she has a position of importance in the fleet. And when you’re doing negotiation, you don’t present yourself as some minimum wager. “representative” is a much better option here.

[Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_01.13_[2013.04.16_18.53.08]

And me asking you to please English, but that doesn’t mean me gonna get it.

[Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_01.29_[2013.04.17_22.53.15] [Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_01.31_[2013.04.17_22.53.21]

Not a fan of how Commie handled Chamber’s speech at all. It varies between the stereotypical “translationgrish” (Me no enemy. Me friend. Friendddd.) and full-on sentences. And it’s done arbitrarily.

Of course, that doesn’t make much sense, considering MC-chan comments that his English (or Earthglish) keeps getting better and better.

What they should have done is what UTW-Vivid did, where Chamber gradually moves from translationgrish to complex sentences.

[Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_04.39_[2013.04.17_22.59.59]

The timing is a bit off throughout the release — lines often feel too short or too long. Here, it’s the latter.

“It’s one tough son of a gun.”

[Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_05.54_[2013.04.17_23.05.11] [Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_05.55_[2013.04.17_23.05.17] [Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_05.59_[2013.04.17_23.05.36] [Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_07.01_[2013.04.17_23.14.34] [Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_07.02_[2013.04.17_23.14.23]

To understand what Commie was thinking here, I’d need a lobotomy, and I’m not quite willing to go that far for these reviews.

[Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_09.04_[2013.04.16_19.11.41]

Reading this straight, it seems like the “they” (MC-kun and Robot-chan) are the ones who “should become friends”. But in the second part of the sentence, he’s actually talking about MC-kun/Robot-chan becoming friends with the entire fleet.

Kind of different. Kind of matters.

[Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_12.10_[2013.04.17_23.26.35]

Conjecture: calling it a “peace offering” would make you sound less like twats who are trying way too hard to use terms you might have once seen in a Dragonlance novel.

[Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_14.04_[2013.04.17_23.30.40]

Here, Chamber is simply repeating what Ledo is saying. Hm, actually, isn’t there a name for that?

Oh yeah, quoting. And by golly, I heard they just recently invented punctuation for that term. Think they called it a quotationary mark or something.

But I’m sure those geniuses over at Commie know what I’m talking about. They’re usually on top of the latest trends.

[Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_15.43_[2013.04.16_19.24.32] [Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_15.47_[2013.04.16_19.24.23]

I suspect that Commie never intended for these subs to be viewed by an English-speaking audience.

[Commie] Suisei no Gargantia - 02 [39F86A78].mkv_snapshot_18.31_[2013.04.16_19.28.16]

The one salvager? While I do agree that Bellows is the only important one, it seems to me like this line is meant to encapsulate the lesser humans too.

salvager’s -> salvagers’

 

 

 

Results

Watchability: Watchable.

Visual grade: B-

Script grade: C+

Overall grade: C+

This release isn’t hard to understand, but the main script is slightly worse than what I highlighted here.

Overall, it’s a passable effort. Nothing to blow your load over, but the subs will suffice if you just wanna watch the show.
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20 thoughts on “Fansub Review: [Commie] Suisei no Gargantia (Episode 02)”

  1. “And me asking you to please English, but that doesn’t mean me gonna get it.”

    This one is sooooo good. I laughed so hard at this.

    “Valvrave is what Gargantia wishes it could be.”

    This one isn’t so funny. What are you getting at exactly? Do you think the show is aiming for sensationalism?

    Reply
  2. Hoping that UTW’s translation is better. Though I agree the show doesn’t soar to the epic heights of Valvrave, it’s still enjoyable. UroGen is writing the scripts, so there’s hope there.

    Reply
  3. >But he means harm in his language? This is a bit confusing if you take the line straight. But I suppose it’s only an issue if you expect fansubs to help you understand the show you’re watching.

    Eh? He definitely means their language, he could tell them in his language if he wanted to, but it would be a wasted effort.

    Reply
  4. >but by switching up the font for the robot’s speech and the humans’, it adds a nice bit of flavor to the release.

    Using one font or the other is actually based on whether it’s the Earthlings or the “aliens” speaking, actually. Not robots vs humans.

    Reply
    • Which doesn’t make sense.

      If I’m talking to you in Arabic, Arabic abjad would be displayed. And if you’re talking to me in Arabic, Arabic abjad would also be displayed. This release (and UTW-Vivid’s) doesn’t follow that logic at all.

      Reply
      • Not disagreeing per se, but I also love how the series changed WHO is speaking the gibberish and who is speaking nihongonese, based on which character started talking first in the scene/who the scene centers around. It confused me a couple times when the audio switched too; the sub font swap was less jarring. Now, I haven’t gone back to see if there’s any consistency between the ‘random’ font changing, and the equally ‘random’ audio language changing, but I’d like to hope that one of these groups made a connection there that we missed.

        Reply
  5. Nah, Gargantia doesn’t wish to be Valvrave.

    Gargantia wishes to be Madoka. But sadly, Gargantia can’t be Madoka.

    Gargantia also wishes to be better than Psycho-Pass, but that one’s very easy to achieve.

    Reply
  6. Personally, I’m quite liking both Gargantia and Valvrave. So far the only thing I don’t like about either of them is the shitty CG.

    Reply

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