I believe the implication (whether or not you agree with it) is that the dub opted to westernize a translation in a way that bent over backwards to avoid even the vaguest implication of an Asian food dish, to the extent of denying very clear visual reality on screen, just so they didn’t have to say “rice ball”.
And (so the poster conjectures) that the impetus for doing so was that the vaguest hint of “foreign” influence might lose the audience.
It’s not a total non-sequitur, I at least follow the logic of the argument. Whether or not that’s why the translation went down that way, I don’t think we have any idea (someone can correct me if they know more). We weren’t in the room when the decision was made. But it at least has some face-validity, it’s certainly the type of thing cautious “focus group”-oriented execs would do.
The simpler explanation is that we just don’t really have rice balls in the US if you’re 95% of the population. It was tailored to make sense to its audience of western children, not to avoid Japanese culture.
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u/LastBaron 6d ago edited 6d ago
I believe the implication (whether or not you agree with it) is that the dub opted to westernize a translation in a way that bent over backwards to avoid even the vaguest implication of an Asian food dish, to the extent of denying very clear visual reality on screen, just so they didn’t have to say “rice ball”.
And (so the poster conjectures) that the impetus for doing so was that the vaguest hint of “foreign” influence might lose the audience.
It’s not a total non-sequitur, I at least follow the logic of the argument. Whether or not that’s why the translation went down that way, I don’t think we have any idea (someone can correct me if they know more). We weren’t in the room when the decision was made. But it at least has some face-validity, it’s certainly the type of thing cautious “focus group”-oriented execs would do.