This post was written by Dark_Sage. He is Dark_Sage.
Reviews. Now with a “Watchability” rating for those who don’t care about kara/typesetting/good English.
Oh, and Commie did a bang-up job here.
File size: 491 MB (Yes, really.)
Release format: MKV
Japanesiness: None, and there damn well shouldn’t be any. They make great effort in the anime to forgo honorifics and say “Yes” instead of “Hai”. Additionally, the setting is in Europe so this should all be pretty Anglified anyway.
Fun fact: Whine-subs was originally planning to sub this simply so we’d have something to do this season. But we determined that even if we had a better release, due to the quality of the work that Doki/Commie will do on this show, it would be a waste of time for us to enter our hats into the ring. Oversubbing isn’t a good thing.
Karaoke. Plain, dull.
Typesetting.
Turn-up Book?
Uhh, try “Pop-up Book”. You know, the type of book which this is episode is about. ._.
Even if a person’s name ends in an “s”, to properly reflect ownership, you still use an apostrophe followed by an “s”; NOT just an apostrophe. You use the apostrophe alone when you have a plural word that ends in an “s”.
There is absolutely no need for ellipses here.
More like The World in the Gourd. You don’t need to capitalize the second “the”. I wish this was just a mistake, but they did this twice.
Each other = for two people
One another = for three or more people
As there are more than two humans in the world, use “one another”.
this book dates to the early 18th century.
Watchability: Quite watchable. Relatively few errors that are mostly insignificant. The fanciful language may be difficult for those inexperienced with the English language.
Overall grade: B+
Commie did a great job.
About turn-up book.
Niconico had Dalian saying turn-up book and Huey saying pop-up book but the editor changed them both to pop-up without realizing the episode title was turn-up book (partially my fault) which caused the inconsistency with the typesetting.
So would you have kept turn-up book/pop-up book as NicoNico had it, or do you think they should all have been “pop-up book”?
Personally, I’ve never heard of “turn-up book” before.
I don’t know Japanese, but I could tell that they were saying two different things. I’d need to get a translator’s opinion on that.
Then again, I’ve never heard turn-up book either.
As for the other errors, the one another thing, the world in the gourd capitalization, and the “…?” were all also present in the NicoNico stream.
Surprisingly, NicoNico actually had Wes’s (looks like the editor added that mistake in) and the line about the book was “this book is early 18th century.” so it looks like the editor introduced the error while trying to reword that line.
A turn-up book is in fact a predecessor to the modern day pop-up book and a different thing.
They one referenced in the show is a real thing, google enough and you’ll find it.
Basically a “turn-up book” had flaps and things which were mildly interactive for children, but nothing that “popped up” like the later pop-up books.
To clarify more: What Dalian is saying is that the Phantom book is a pop-up book, which is odd because it predates the first Turn-up books which are considered predecessors to pop-up books.
I.e. the phantom book was a “true” pop up book, and the reason turn-ups were developed in the first place was in an attempt to recreate the effect (but obviously not perfected until later due to lack of printing tech).
The difference is crucial here.
I have a feeling you’re reading way too much into something which is all-in-all unimportant to the show as a whole.
Never said it was important to the show as a whole. It’s important to the plot of this single episode. Or rather, the identity of this particular Phantom Book and the explanation of its power.
Thanks for the review! Show SEEMS interesting.
“this books dates to the early 18th century.”
Fixed the mistake but added in your own there D_S? Referring to “books.”
“Even if a person’s name ends in an “s”, to properly reflect ownership, you still use an apostrophe followed by an “s”; NOT just an apostrophe. You use the apostrophe alone when you have a plural word that ends in an “s”.”
Incorrect. Both are valid.
I follow the same rule for this that I do for “alright” and “all right”. In some circles, both are valid. In all circles, one is valid. You will never be marked off for having “all right” and s-words ending in ‘s. You will sometimes be marked off for having alright and s-words only ending in an apostrophe depending on the English guidelines being used.
‘alright’ is never right and is generally only used by people aren’t aware or are lazy. It’s not a rule or a guideline but rather that one should avoid mangling the language.
But some people disagree with the extra ‘s’ after an apostrophe. It’s a guideline rather than a rule. And for what it’s worth, I have yet to see a good, non-arbitrary justification for the extra ‘s’. It might be the minority position but that doesn’t make it wrong.
At the beginning of the ED the title appears as “The Mystic Archives of Dantalian.” Using “Bibliotheca Mystica” seemed rather unnecessary.
Just a question: If the watchability of an episode isn’t effected by typeset/kara/good English, then what other criteria do you take into account? Audio and video quality? I’m confused on the factors you take into account to determine the watchability of an episode.