Fansub Review: [Commie] Kotoura-san (Episode 02)

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This post was written by Dark_Sage. He is Dark_Sage.

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Because I really like this show, I’m shoving it to the top of my queue.

Table of Contents

Release Information

Visual Quality

Script Quality

Results

Release Information

Episode details.

Release format: MKV (225 MB, 10-bit)

Japanesiness: No honorifics.

English style: American English.

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

Speed: Quick (<48 hours)

 

External links.

Group website: http://commiesubs.com/

IRC channel: #[email protected]

SubCompare screenshot comparisons: http://www.subcompare.com/kotoura-san/

Commie’s fansub reviews: N/A

 

Visual Review

Karaoke.

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_01.55_[2013.01.25_23.20.10] [Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_02.12_[2013.01.25_23.20.34]

Opening. Kawaii font and it matches. I liked how the text bounced around the screen for the background voices.

Rating: Good.

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_22.15_[2013.01.26_14.31.24] [Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_22.54_[2013.01.26_14.30.07]

Ending. Smart font color changes. Wouldn’t say the font itself got me off, but it was good enough.

Rating: Good.

 

 

Typesetting.

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_02.38_[2013.01.25_23.21.20]

I uhh… don’t think those fonts match. Not that I particularly care, but yeah.

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_06.41_[2013.01.25_23.34.12] [Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_06.54_[2013.01.25_23.34.39]

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_12.04_[2013.01.25_23.58.57]

I don’t know what “Mori” means, but let’s just chalk it up to Japan being Japan.

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_14.30_[2013.01.26_00.02.55]

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_16.20_[2013.01.26_00.05.11]

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_17.41_[2013.01.26_00.06.48]

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_17.46_[2013.01.26_00.06.58]

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_19.11_[2013.01.26_00.10.00]

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_23.37_[2013.01.26_00.13.30]

Most of these could probably have been done slightly better, but I’d say they were pretty good as-is.

 

 

Missed Signs:

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_08.35_[2013.01.25_23.42.30]

Kinda small, but I’d have liked to see the name of the school.

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_10.28_[2013.01.25_23.45.24]

The title of the show. Not of particular importance.

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_11.26_[2013.01.25_23.50.03]

Looks like a bitch to handle and we already know what’s going on based on the context.

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_12.01_[2013.01.25_23.58.48]

This should have been typeset. I’d like to know the name of the place.

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_18.13_[2013.01.26_00.07.43]

This could probably have used a sign, but it’s not incredibly important.

 

 

Script Review

Karaoke.

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_01.31_[2013.01.25_23.18.43]

My only issue with the karaoke is that “weird” is kind of weird to use. I’d say “strange” is a better word choice.

 

Main Script.

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_04.07_[2013.01.26_14.20.49]

Kotoura isn’t really someone who’d swear. “I’ve been caught!” would be more in line with her character.

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_05.28_[2013.01.25_23.30.19]

They saa’d into a so. That’s awesome. …Hmm, suppose I should explain this since I wager only half of you will get what I’m talking about with just that first sentence.

“Saa” is just some generic Japanese filler word. You can translate into a lot of things “Well”, “Alright”, “Okay” blah-blah-blah, anyway gist is you can mold it into a lot of things when working with lines. Commie (well, Margaan) went with “So”, which is fine by itself, but not particularly praiseworthy. The great part was italicizing it, pointing out how he/she intentionally made it match the Japanese word’s sound. So when you get to that point, it’s gonna jump out at you, even if you don’t really pay that much attention to these things.

Now perhaps this isn’t the kind of thing you’d particularly think was important, but to me it indicated the editor was confident enough to subtly play with the script and mold it into something more enjoyable than your standard release.

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_07.46_[2013.01.25_23.35.46] [Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_08.21_[2013.01.25_23.41.53] [Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_11.53_[2013.01.25_23.58.35]

Italics.

can

is

You

Yes, these all contribute to the quality of their given lines. We emphasize words in English every day because they can give different meanings to a line. In these cases, the reader is forced to mentally fill in where the emphasis should be, which is not the best of ways to edit a script.

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_09.10_[2013.01.26_14.22.35]

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_09.14_[2013.01.25_23.43.39]

You can’t really train your “power”. What you do is train yourself or train yourself on how to use your power.

“Um, I’d really rather not do any training.”

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_10.17_[2013.01.25_23.46.54]

“I will neither sanction nor obstruct you.” If you’re using “nor”, it’s often a good decision to get rid of any contractions in the line, because nor is kind of archaic, meaning more formality is better.

I suggest switching out the two words you use to antonyms because that favors this sentence’s “nor” structure more. The two I offered retain the originals’ meaning, so there’s little lost in the upgrade.

[Commie] Kotoura - 02 [327C1CF3].mkv_snapshot_13.58_[2013.01.26_00.02.12]

Doughty? What?

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/doughty

Yeah, this doesn’t make sense.

 

 

Results

Watchability: Quite watchable.

Visual grade: B+

Script grade: B+

Overall grade: B+

Normally I’d wait until all my reviews are out before recommending which group to go with, but having suffered through seven minutes of the Fapulous! release, I’m pretty fucking confident Commie is your best choice for this show. And that’s a good thing, because this is a damn solid release (while I didn’t focus on why Commie’s release was good in this review, you’ll see that addressed in the Fapulous! review).
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52 thoughts on “Fansub Review: [Commie] Kotoura-san (Episode 02)”

  1. >choosing an unknown new group over Commie

    Who even does that?
    I only started watching AnimeKoi after you endorsed them on some releases.

    Reply

  2. If there’s one thing I’ve always hated about your editing, Dark_Sage, is how you tend to italicize everything single word that is pronounced differently.

    Yes, is good to know when to italicize certain words in certain cases, but your over-italicizing does more harm than good. Judging when to italicize something just because of a sentence is phrased will resulting very bad cases of misitalization.

    Know this: When using italics for emphasis, you are putting the emphasis in the meaning of the word, not on the word itself.

    Basically, you probably shouldn’t count those 3 unemphasized words as mistakes. I will not comment on the ”so” line, and ”nor” is not archaic, is just not used as often as it should.

    Reply

  4. I don’t agree with your comments about the ‘nor’ line.
    First, in regard to the contraction, I believe leaving the phrase as “I’ll” is fine. Furthermore, I do not consider nor archaic. I use it all the time especially when I’m writing my papers.

    Second, what do you mean “switching out the two words you use to antonyms?” From what you said it seems you want antonyms to “help and condemn,” but only one word you provided would be considered an antonym (help::obstruct).
    —
    As I’m writing this I think I realized what you were trying to say (though, perhaps you could make it a bit more clear). What you want is verb 1 and verb 2 to be antonyms to each other, correct? i.e “I’ll neither {verb 1} nor {verb 2} you.” If this is the case then I suggest “I’ll neither sanction nor condemn you.” I believe that sanction and condemn are better antonyms.

    Reply

      • You guys are doing it all wrong. The actual phrase is “neither condone nor condemn.” It’s actually a pretty stock phrase for this situation. I agree with others saying it’s not really formal/archaic – people just dunno how to speak proper, so they don’t do it right most of the time.

        Reply

  5. Yeah, I only have a problem with the last line. Other than that, this seems like the best release for this show by far.

    Can’t wait for the next ep, such a good anime.

    Reply

  7. http://crymore.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/Commie-Kotoura-02-327C1CF3.mkv_snapshot_12.04_2013.01.25_23.58.57.jpg

    Mori means forest.

    http://crymore.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/Commie-Kotoura-02-327C1CF3.mkv_snapshot_12.01_2013.01.25_23.58.48.jpg

    First kanji is ‘mori’ (forest)
    Second kanji is ‘tani’ (valley)
    Third kanji is ‘ryuu’ (style, method of, school of…)
    So all together… “Style of the forest valley”

    So the yelling of ‘Mori!’ is just Japan being Japan

    Reply

  8. Thanks for the review! You’re quite right about “help”/”condemn,” which I never really got to work; I was going for something more “active” than “condemn”/”condone” but I wound up throwing off the balance of the sentence.

    So you want even more italics? I considered them in all of the lines you mention, but I felt that the script was kind of italics-heavy already and that good writing should be able to emphasis the right idea without requiring the use of typographical shortcuts. Clearly my editing has a ways to go.

    I am very pleased you noticed my “so,” but you give me perhaps more credit than I deserve. I was only half-remembering Seamus Heaney’s famous decision to use the word at the opening of his translation of “Beowulf,” as a way to represent the “hwaet” that traditionally signals the beginning of Old English narratives. I loved the “this-is-the-way-it-is” effect of thusness when I read it, so the “so” in Kotoura is mostly for my own satisfaction. (Be glad that we edited out my incredibly irritating attempt to work the word “Sapphic” into the script as a recurring joke.)

    And yeah, Haruka wouldn’t swear, but “aw, crap!” made me laugh so it got to stay.

    Reply

  9. In the first ep Commie translated the line at 20:11
    from what CR competently had as
    “Still, there’s nothing else I can do!”
    to
    “I’m the only thing I can do!”
    I think I’m just gonna have to go with horriblesubs for this…

    Reply

  11. Are Commie and Fapulous the only ones doing this? If that’s the case then it’s good to know I’m already getting the best release and can just stick to that.

    Reply

    • Horriblesubs is also doing this series, and yes, I know about the complaints towards horriblesubs, but I like their release for this series. I know Commie is the preferred series by Nyaa Torrents, but I think Commie added some unnecessary swearing here or there in this episode. The removal of the swearing seemed to fit the situation better in the Horriblesubs version. So have a look, and watch whatever you want. Sorry if this is just my opinion, but I just wanted to say that the Horriblesubs choice is available.

      Reply

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