Symphogear, Season One. Discotek’s BD release vs Fansubs.

Don’t give up on subbing

The history of Symphogear translations is a special kind of mess. While on the fansubbing side it was picked up by Commie-subs who carried it through all seasons, on the “legal” side we were witnessing a long ping-pong match. The first season got a simulcast by Funimation, the second season earned a whole bunch of nothing, the third one was picked up by Crunchyroll, but they didn’t add the first two into the catalogue until months later. The fourth season had absolutely nothing once again, with the final, fifth season appearing on Crunchyroll, but without the preceding one initially. Yes, again. On top of that, the subs you see on Crunchyroll were provided by MAGES., whose translators put some effort into making mediocre-at-best subs for the first three seasons, and put a lot of effort into turning the subs for the last two into a complete disaster.

And then comes Discotek, the savior of all things cool and retro. Symphogear is an extremely niche anime franchise in the west, so having any kind of home release felt like a miracle. On top of that, Discotek usually has decent translations, which means that we can finally get something good on the “official” side of things. Or so we thought. At some point before the release, their translator has shared some of the screenshots, and it looked like a fair amount of effort and thought was put into the work. And apparently the translator is a big fan of the show, so that’s pretty cool.

…right?

Swan Song of the Editors

“Alright, alright, we get it, Johnny. It’s bad, isn’t it? Stop with the ominous lines already.”

No-no-no-no, it’s not that simple. I think it’s unfair to call the Discotek subs “bad”, but they definitely have some issues. And in this post, I’m going to show you what we found while watching Season One with these subs. There is a lot I could potentially cover, but I’m going to focus on the key parts of it and the most noticeable lines. Let’s set the stage.

Our fighters are: Commie-subs (C) - the current translation of choice when it comes to Symphogear S1 subs, bar some terminology decisions. Discotek (D) - the official US home release of Symphogear S1.

My co-judge here will be my co-editor Gantann, who agreed to participate in the special disco-flavored rewatch, and provided a lot of useful input. Arguably, the MVP of this post. Note that our opinions on the editing decisions are subjective, and your personal view of certain words and phrases might be different.

On the screenshots you will see C’s lines on top, and D’s lines in the bottom, in their old-fashioned yellow. Let’s begin!

Episode 1: Rock their socks off

So, D is giving Kanade a voice “with attitude”, using phrases like “this sucks” etc, and here we have the massive bossman Genjuurou, who she calls 旦那(danna), which in this context means a casual “boss”. My co-editor thinks that using “bossman” here sounds more like an “older dudes’ dude-dude relationship”, and using just “boss” would be a better choice for the voice. Kind of a minor thing, but it caught our attention.

Eventually we’ve noticed that Kanade’s voice in D’s subs is dangerously close to the “How do you do fellow kids?” level of teen-speak writing.

C is flexing with (appropriate) proverbs, while D is more straightforward. Both work, but D’s simplicity wins here, which is useful considering that this quote will come back later.

My co-editor pointed out that the “phonic gain” in D’s subs is less of a proper noun compared to C’s. Knowing Symphogear, playing with terminology is dangerous. Let’s hope it doesn’t bite them in the back later.

D is going full literal here, but ends up being a bit too wordy, which is probably the reason why C decided to cut the line, but overdid the cutting. A solid middle ground is required. My co-editor on the spot came up with “The people need the sword and spear to defend them!” which in my eyes is a bit cheesy, but also this is Symphogear so why not.

(ネフシュタンの 鎧？)

I assume that on the D’s side this is not a mistranslation, but rather an editing decision, because Genjuurou has a pause before the last word. Still, it doesn’t make sense in context, because his reaction with the D’s line is basically “Oh, I get it now, it’s an armor!”, even though there’s nothing happening at the moment that would suddenly push him to make that revelation. Besides, it’s hard to believe that with Ryouko on the team they wouldn’t know what Nehushtan is.

D’s line with “on” is obviously a better choice here. But there’s a catch. Make a mental note of this line, because we’ll come back to it soon.

While C is closer to the original line, D makes a rational decision to tell us the meaning of the line.

The original line is deliberately vague and doesn’t mention “people” (it uses 連中, which is like “these bunch” or “those guys” or “this group”, depending on the context), and it’s clear by looking at the visuals that Kanade goes for the double meaning. C managed to come up with a line to reflect that, while D either didn’t get it or decided to play it their own way.

Time to talk about the elephant in the room. While the discussion about 絶唱(zesshou) is a topic for a separate post, there’s one thing that needs to be said. D’s team made this decision with full foresight of what’s going to happen later in the series (or is it “hindsight”?), and full understanding of the terminology. C was subbing this show ongoing, only having s1e1 as their context, and later made the decision to keep running with it, becoming prisoners of their own choice. D has no such excuse. I would make a conclusion like “they’ve decided that it just sounds nicer, but even for that there are better options”, but the translator has already answered the swan song question with a following reply:

I am genuinely curious what this is about. Maybe we’ll find some answers later? In any case, let’s continue.

C is jumping on that クライマックス(loanword “climax”) and using it as it is. D is going with a sensible choice here.

D is straight up more clear on the meaning here.

This is Hibiki’s line, and something tells me that her speech is not fancy enough to say things like “I haven’t so much as laid eyes on her yet.” Might be just me.

Section 1 is so irrelevant, C probably forgot it exists. But it is there in the original line.

Terminology corner: C has “Disaster Relief Squad” (they’ll drop “JSDF” later), while D went with “Irregular Threat Response”. In my eyes, both are fine, while my co-editor thinks D’s version is a bit better. And both are definitely better than the “official” name of “Singular Disaster Anti-riot Unit” that appears at some point in the series.

We’re genuinely curious if anyone ever said “nightingale of the school” in real life.

Now this is a very specific choice of words to end up being exactly the same. Fun.

And here we are. Remember when in D’s subs Kanade said “Don’t give up on living!”? While C kept consistency with their choice, D decided to spice it up, and not in a minor way. My first assumption is that this was made to show the difference between Kanade’s and Hibiki’s speech (they say the same sentence with slightly different accent on the word). My second assumption, however, is that D assumed this as a logical continuation of what Kanade said to Hibiki. Basically, like a conversation:

• K: “Don’t give up on living!”
• H: “We’re not going to give up on living!”

In any case, 生きるのを諦めないで from Hibiki to the little girl is very much the same “Don’t give up on living!” as the one that Kanade said to Hibiki. Hibiki does not reply to Kanade in this scene — she repeats Kanade’s words and actions.

This is relatively minor, but “Beat of Awakening” definitely sounds cooler, and also makes it easier to use in future references.

Episode 2: We were quite brusque

D (on the top here) went with quite a choice. Din is “noise”, yes. But maybe simple is best. At least in my opinion.

Earlier Hibiki was saying that she felt like she “imagined” Zwei Wing saving her at the concert 2 years before, and now she confirms that Tsubasa was indeed in a gear back then. D’s line makes this more clear.

“You can’t do that. It’s gotta be ‘something warm’. You can’t specify, it has to be vague as hell. That’s the line.” — my co-editor, a diehard Wild Arms fan.

The implications of D’s line here are basically “If it isn’t for us, you’re all doomed!” The “guardians of mankind” goes better with them being a secret organization, and just for the general tone.

That’s not how Hibiki talks, even when distressed. Come on. (The context here is that that’s her reaction to 2nd Div “looking into her past” by looking into her bag.)

That’s an interesting way to go for the standard 失礼しました on D’s side. It works in context, but I’m not sure if anyone would actually use it this way in real life.

That C line sounds really sad. Well, it’s not like Hibiki has too many friends, but even at that point in the story, certainly more than one.

In our opinion, C’s “sunshine” is better because it naturally slots into English and into the script of the show. Especially if you look into some of the future instances.

That’s an amusing way of D to spin that line. Looking forward to more of this later.

We arrive at the interesting split for 助けられる(tasukerareru) here. The word itself can mean either, so let’s address the context. As the first episode established, her hobby is helping people — this mindset existed before she became a superhero. It definitely feels like going with “help” at this point in the story is a better choice.

Episode 3: You have no steel

The English writing in the bottom is by C, and D has only provided the title. Sure, this text is not that important, but I’m the kind of person who likes to give additional points for effort.

Here we get to the first use of the legendary 平気 へっちゃら(heiki hecchara). C actually changes this later when it becomes more relevant, but D has the “foresight”, so for now we’re going to assume that this is their decision for this phrase. While my co-editor thinks that going with “OK” for the first part is a better idea and the rest is fine, I personally want to add that for the future usage it would nice to make it less Hibiki-oriented, like “It’s OK, everything’s fine.”, because there are scenes where she says it while talking about something/someone else, and not herself. Even with that in mind, there are many options to choose from, so I’m not going to have a “perfect” solution for this.

This is right after Ryouko says “She really caught my interest.”(C)/”The girl does make you pay attention, though.”(D) while watching Hibiki and Tsubasa fight each other on screen. Not sure where the “bully” comes from, probably just another instance of “character voice”. It’s an attempt, but we can’t say it’s a good one.

So that’s how D is gonna do Tsubasa, huh? Let’s see where it goes.

Insufficient steel. 3 lines before this one, Tsubasa says “Then steel your heart and fight me!”(D), which is perfectly fine, but turning it into a noun like this? Why? Even with Tsubasa’s character voice in mind, there’s nothing wrong with the same “determination” that C used.

This is after Gen’s previous line “This wasn’t like you, Tsubasa.”(D) If this is D’s way of saying “Did you even try to aim?” then it’s a very special one. Almost lewd.

This is where D’s choice is certainly more appropriate, while C’s might feel like going a bit too far with the phrasing. Or maybe that was deliberate.

Normally, C’s “last gig” would be fine for Kanade’s voice, but this is probably not the scene to use it. Unless we assume that she just goes like this no matter the situation.

Don’t know what’s with D trying to make Gen sound immature. Or maybe “hip with the kids”? Like, yeah, he’s quite a fella, but not to this level, in my opinion.

Innuendos are fun. I shall leave this one to your judgement.

Did not expect C to take お疲れ(otsukare) that literally. But I feel like it was deliberate, to add flavor to Hibiki’s line.

Episode 4: A waste of space

I’m pretty sure C’s translation back then was by ear, which is why they didn’t get 人気者(ninkimono), which basically means “popular person” or whatever synonym you can use for it. D’s is perfectly fine. If I were to do it, I’d use something like “Don’t get too cocky, pop star!”

Time get into D’s Chris. I’m sure you were waiting for this as much as I was. So far it seems fine, but we’ve only just begun.

That’s the first appearance of Chris’s legendary ちょせぇ(chosee). It’s hard to blame anyone for not knowing what it is (as it’s a part of “Kanekonese”), but since D’s release has the interview with the seiyuu translated, they should be aware of the existence of this word, so we’re going to assume (at least for now) that this is their choice.

Note: As far as I’m aware, this word is a shortened version of ちょろくさい(chorokusai) — when directed at a person it can mean “weak”, “dumb”, or “slow”. When referring to a task it can mean “too easy” or “no big deal”.

D is closer to the original here. Flavor included, of course.

Meanwhile, Tsubasa here just goes full dramatical ham. But on C’s side, not D’s! That’s interesting, because both C and D spice up Tsubasa’s dialogue, but C is generally more tame (making it easier to keep the voice consistent), while D is usually the one going ham in specific places.

This is the first time where Tsubasa’s ever-so-favorite 防人(sakimori) comes into play fully charged. Specifically, she tells that she’s gonna show Hibiki what the real “resolution”/”determination” of “sakimori’s way of life” is. Here, C probably falls victim to the translation happening ongoing, as usual. The power of foresight is on D’s side but they’re not using it for some reason. Don’t get me wrong, the meaning of the line is technically there, but the key part of the flavor isn’t. And isn’t the flavor exactly what D seems to be pushing so hard for the characters?

Wait a minute, D has put a diacritic in Fine in the zesshou lyrics? And the word is also capitalized. That’s like a double crime.

Let’s check with the official text from the booklet!

I can only assume that the translator decided to make a bold assumption that the “fine” in the text refers to Fine the character. However, this was never mentioned by anyone or anything across all 5 seasons of the show, any side content or any of the interviews with the creators. And the text itself is written in a made-up language. Solidifying a meaning in a place where it’s supposed to be unclear is a very bold move, and can potentially create misunderstandings for the viewers.

And now 防人(sakimori) is suddenly a “guardian”. …in both versions? Huh?

Another very specific choice of an English word that lines up perfectly in both versions. Fun.

Super duper martial. Ultimately martial. Sure, maybe this is minor, but surely there’s nothing wrong with going with just “super cool martial arts”. Or is this another “character voice” moment from D? Then why like this, of all variations?

Episode 5: Now always is never again

Points to D for getting the Rocky reference.

How often does anyone call you “future champ”? Or maybe my life is just too sad.

D’s “Regular Headache” is a fun take, but C’s “Disaster Squad” is too perfect. Just this joke alone is a good enough argument for me to lean towards C’s choice of the name.

Here they talk about the government potentially using Symphogear as a diplomatic ace up their sleeve, and Tomosato just throws this line out, and on D’s side it is more literal. It’s kind of a weird line even in context, but it’s there.

Now that’s a way to spin Hibiki’s line by D. To quote my co-editor, “It’s not something Hibiki would say at all. That’s what an arrested development millenial would say.”

This is such a line, and once again it’s exactly the same for both. Fun.

Let’s talk about making the lines “digestible”. Since we’re working with subtitles that tend to be very limited on the time given, it’s nice to phrase things in a way that allows the viewer to read a line in time and understand its meaning. It’s a tough balance to handle — I know that from experience — but the job requires it. So, seeing stuff like “Except now always is never again” on top of a good 3 second pause after the previous line, really makes you think for an additional second or two before you get what the line means.

D’s gonna capitalize “Irregular Threat” but not “swan song”? Their logic does not reach me.

I’m leaving this one for posterity because we did some research, and the answer was “Don’t bother thinking about it.”

南無三(namusan), also known as “saying holy shit and oh my god at the same time”, makes its first appearance in the show. You gotta roll with whatever fits in context, and I guess D decided to create this catchphrase for Gen to use here and in the future. Let’s hope they won’t forget about it. My co-editor suggested using “Good Lord!” and I feel like it’s probably the best choice for this.

Somehow, D’s Ryouko’s character voice is the only one that feels consistent whenever she appears.

Episode 6: Brazen and simple

“Leash”? Did you mean “unleash”, or are you just trying to use “leash” as a “put a leash on its power”? If it’s the latter, then it’s a weird choice.

Phrasing.

And here D directly says that helping people is Hibiki’s hobby. I called this in my last point in the Episode 2 section — right now Hibiki’s mindset is still more in the “helping” rather than “saving” mode. Keep it in mind, because we’ll come back to this later once again.

If you’re familiar with the series well enough, you already know what kind of reaction we had to this. And we know that D’s translator is familiar with the series as well. For those who are unaware — this is one of the key Hibiki lines, and it’s going to reappear in the series a couple of times going forward, usually in the hypest moments of it. Let’s start with the obvious part — why on Earth would Hibiki use “brazenly”? Is it the best possible synonym you could find? On top of that, putting “simply” at the end kinda loses that final “punch” that’s supposed to finish the line. It’s a strong line, and the best way you can go about listing these things is to escalate from less powerful to more powerful. Using the most direct and straightforward language (get it?). Not that the C’s version is perfect either — you can do better than that — but it’s a preferable option between the two.

D’s line not as harsh as C’s? For early Chris? We honestly expected D to just go wild with her, considering how hard they (are trying to) go with character voices. Interesting. “I might’ve chosen ‘you little shit’.” — my co-editor.

Nevermind. Reverse Uno! Also, “spilling”? Not “spouting”? Interestingly, she also uses “spewing crap” in one of the next lines.

It’s like watching the subs clash in a battle. At this point I’m just leaving all these Chris lines for the readers to judge.

And here Hibiki uses the previously mentioned phrase in the battle, for the first time of many. This is why I brought so much attention to it. Like, come on, anything but “brazen”.

Episode 7: Explain it in anime tropes

I wonder what’s the reason for D’s “endless barrage” — are they trying to give a hint for the upcoming Ichaival appearance? In that case it doesn’t really work that well. I’m sure the phrasing of the original title was very deliberate.

Speaking of. This one is a pretty fun take by D.

And here C punches up the classic kono onna while D doesn’t.

Not sure about the approach to Tsubasa’s conclusion — I think D went a bit overboard and articulated the line in a Hibiki way, not Tsubasa way.

Fine’s line in the background. I kinda appreciate the attempt at the flavor that was made by D here (and in the line before it). Let’s see if it lasts.

Another hit by D on Itaba’s lines.

Let’s not forget that C can also do well with the character voices.

Episode 8: A song of death

“Unchecked” as in “unrestrained” probably. On the other hand, D went more to the literal side, but it’s kind of a weird title in the first place, so both are fine.

Itaba keeps being the highlight of D’s editing.

D is just doubling down, aren’t they? I think overdramatizing the line to the “song of death” only creates more potential confusion among the viewers, leading them to the “suicidal” meaning of zesshou (when it isn’t).

Don’t got paper. I don’t know how to feel about this approach of D, since it doesn’t seem to be consistent enough across Chris’s lines.

Whoa, whoa, hold on! C here went on the pure literal path, while D decided to sound more dramatic, which worked for the first two lines, but the third one is way overboard. It’s one of those places where you need to be sensitive with your lines, but D decided to pull things out of nowhere. And I don’t think there’s any explanation for this choice that would make sense.

This is after running during the public alarm. “They’ll go through innocents to get to me.” — Who? Fine? Noise? Noise certainly don’t care. Fine does, but Chris already knows who she is. You can probably guess that C went close to literal here, and the meaning was probably “People will die(/died) because of me(/my current situation).” It seems that D’s translator understood this, but the result ended up not perfectly within context.

Episode 9: Life is short so love hard

It’s like sugar free, but for your body damage.

And now suddenly they use “Sentinel” for sakimori? Again, D’s “foresight” seems to be inactive. Remember, consistency is king!

“A huge pain” from C is probably not very Tsubasa-like here. Although a bit later Ogawa thinks that Tsubasa has changed, so maybe that was intentional. Also, “painful by nature” is quite a way to put it.

I wonder if the line is a reference to “The Night Is Short, Walk on Girl”, but nonetheless D pushes Ryouko’s character voice successfully once again.

For someone who was recently afraid of a lewd magazine, Hibiki sure is eager to know those “steamy details” on D’s side.

Seems like the commitment to the sentinel is fully confirmed now. Where was it before this episode? We just don’t know.

Episode 10: One on high

This one was always tough. For those unaware, the title of this episode is the title of Chris’s second song from the first season. Both versions are kinda there, but D took a direct approach with laying down the meaning as it is, and I think it works better between the two.

An interesting difference in voice. The meaning is almost the same, but the tone changes. Not sure if I lean to any of the versions, but I will leave this here as an example of why it’s important to not only translate correctly, but also consider the character voices.

There’s also a lot to point out in the dialogue with Genjuurou that comes right after this, but I’m going to skip the details because this post is already stupidly huge for what it is. To summarize, it follows the same pattern: both translations are technically correct, but there are slight differences in tone — nothing too critical, but it is noticeable. I like C’s flow a bit more, but D did a pretty good job as well.

Speaking of this post being huge, at this point we’re approaching 100 screenshots, and if you got this far, congratulations! You probably care a lot about this. And also, you’ve probably already made your own conclusions by this point. Which means that it’s time for us to pick up the pace.

Technically correct (from D), but is it really the best kind of correct? C went with using the “meaning” rather than the “words”, which is usually my personal preference.

It’s interesting that C went with “I’ll become as strong as you” and D went with “I can be strong enough”. They’re talking about Miku staying at Lydian to help people with evacuation if necessary, and while the original Japanese line has the future tense, this doesn’t invalidate D’s take on it. Either way works fine in this context.

D’s Chris is ready to THROW HANDS.

D is really trying with Chris. Really trying.

Episode 11: A ghoul from the past

Again, different flavors of a similar thing, but C’s version is just more powerful for this legendary line.

This is the line that goes right after. What Fine is saying here is kinda like “Still, as long as you’re just an ordinary human…”, implying that she can beat him because she’s a being above humans. With that in mind, you can probably guess why D’s line fits more than C’s, despite being further away from a literal translation. Once again, it’s all about the meaning.

This is where Fine explains taking over Ryouko’s body, and for some reason “ghoul” made us giggle. Valid, given the context, but funny nonetheless.

D’s line is correct. There are no implications about Fine’s intentions from this line specifically (though we’ll get into those right after).

Come on, D, you were trying so hard before with her lines. C is just smashing here.

Episode 12: Inviolate truth

Gamer Itaba confirmed.

Strong character voice was supposed to be D’s entire shtick, but C seems to be nailing it more often, as we go deeper into the season.

Another identical line from both sides with a fancy choice of words. I don’t want to build a conspiracy here, because such coincidences can definitely happen. It’s just fun to point it out.

The “demigod”/”paragon” is 新霊長 in the original. The Kanekonese is strong with this one, though personally I think “paragon” is closer to the intended meaning.

Episode 13: Because this world has…

It’s funny that I’ve kinda bashed D for using “save” instead of “help” in the early parts, but now, in the part where “save” truly matters and makes perfect sense to use, they’re using “help”.

Ah, the good old やっさいもっさい(yassai mossai). Definitely can’t get it by ear, which is probably the reason behind C’s decision to just insert something that works. For those unaware — it’s the name of the representative dance of Kisarazu city in Chiba prefecture. It has a long history and an explanation that is way beyond the scope of this post.

Oh look, D kept the ちょせぇ(chosee) consistent! C doesn’t have anything for this line, for whatever reason.

Good line, D. Not sure if the timing is good, but I can forgive it.

Different interpretations of 束ねる (“to bundle”/”to govern”), I see. As always, the context matters.

(だってこの世界には 歌があるのだから)

Oh, come on. I really want to hear D’s excuse for using “music” here when the entire show is dedicated to songs so much. Like, at this point it’s not even a translation question, it’s a “Did we watch the same show?” question. I didn’t want to end this post on a disappointing note, but this is literally the last line of the last episode. I don’t really have anything to add here.

 

So, what’s the final conclusion on the state of Symphogear subs? To quote both translations…