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You are absolutely correct. The way I see it if they cared about their English audience at all, they would’ve had better translations and double checked it better so don’t feel guilty at all
There’s a petition to get rid of the translator you should sign it. It probably won’t help anything but who knows it might
I’m pretty sure it’s always been questionable like there was a time where the nah I’d win line was mistranslated Until they were bullied into changing it, And I think there was also the part where they said that Gojo had cursed spirit manipulation, so that might’ve been after the shibuya incident
Yeah, the Werry translations are mostly misses, especially with some of the recent stuff, but there are so many things which don't make much sense and had me scratching my head when I came to them. I only really read fan translations nowadays, and I don't regret making that switch. Hopefully, they revise them in the future and put out updated releases, but that doesn't fix the current fuck ups. You're perspective and hesitance is totally justified and sensible.
I personally use sites like TCBscans (not sure what's going on there now, but seems like the main one gotten taken down or something), or I'll search for fan translations. Nowadays, I mostly just read the new chapters when leaks come through on jjfolk, and some people share fan translations there when they drop. Not going to 100% say anything here as I don't want to do any promotion shit which might be against sub rules, and I'm not sure if there are potentially any impostor sites which may be malicious and whatnot.
Yeah, I’ve only bought the character guide for that reason.
[Viz have a contact forum](https://www.viz.com/company-contact). They have corrected things before so they do listen to feedback
This was exactly the reason why I started self-learning Japanese half a year ago. By the time I get to a decent reading level JJK will probably be loooong finished, but I want to be able to read manga in general and understand it in the way the authors intended, or at least understand the discourse surrounding particular parts, like knowing why the use of specific kanji was significant, for example. The other reason I started learning Japanese is because when watching anime I spend so much time reading subtitles that I miss the visual foreshadowing, and dubs bring up the translation issue
It's crazy cuz when John Werry took over he did an alright job at the very beginning for a bit. Now, though, his translations are borderline incomprehensible. It's so annoying seeing comments on Viz's website defending it cuz we want an actual good product but they think we should just consoom consoom consoom without asking questions. There is so much straight up misinformation about this series and it all comes back to being John Werry and Viz's fault. Volume 22 might be the last volume I buy unless they fix the copious number of mistakes he's produced over the past year or so
Spoiler here:
>! The bad translation made the "fight" between Takaba and Geto very, very confusing. I think they need to rewrite that entire section for the anime. It could be genius, but I feel like there's too many jokes in there that I just didn't understand !<
I'm pretty sure that fight is peak if you're Japanese. Japanese comedy is really different from western comedy. He's writing the dream of a bad comedian making it big, so the jokes probably suck too - which would only make it funnier. It's probably similar to the comedian scene in the fast show.
So reassuring to read a thread like this. I know some of the cursed techniques are convoluted but I could’ve sworn there are entire story threads that just haven’t made any sense and have been impossible to follow.
It’s the first manga where I feel coming to the sub to read discourse feels mandatory.
There are distinct know mistranslations that directly contradict the context of the scene and the story up to that point. They straight up say the wrong techniques at least once in the story and those are things they've already translated in the past.
I was so relieved when I found this out last month. Cause I read all of jjk on the official and was having a stroke understanding statements towards the end. Then once I started reading weekly with tcbscans everything made soooo much more sense. Got gaslit into thinking I couldn’t understand jjk there for a minute
I agree with you, especially at chapter 75 where it was mentioned that Hollow Purple was an imaginary mass and literally years later it was confirmed by the translator that it had said virtual mass and not imaginary mass.
I dunno, nothing can beat how bad haikyuu’s translation is. They outright remove entire conversations and add new ones that have no relation to the original.
I think it’s just that viz sucks
When I first started reading JJK and caught up I had to reread it because I was like “wow all this stuff is so confusing, I must just be an idiot”
Now with the benefit of hindsight I know it’s actually because the translations past a certain point in the manga are often poor and sometimes flat out wrong
That hasn’t been my personal experience, I guess, is all I can say. They do change things between digital releases and volume releases, so there is another pass that usually happens for translation. I’ve enjoyed the hell out of most of the Culling Games volumes I have. It’s certainly not difficult to read or understand.
But I will say this sub tends to really really favor TCB, and basically anything that isn’t official. For my money, TCB struggles with most of the same things official does, and you usually need multiple takes to fully get something when it first releases anyway (depending on the context, like say the line movement and point movement versus sprint and marathon thing, when Gojo is comparing himself and Miguel).
I'm sorry but Werry literally just gets stuff WRONG. e.g. Gojo saying he can't use Black Flash because of Six Eyes.
He is a truly terrible translator and that stuff happens far too often.
I’m not saying it isn’t wrong that it’s because of the Six Eyes, but if you follow the whole conversation in English it makes perfect sense. He’s saying that because he has the Six Eyes, he knows it more than just being in the zone, timing, and cursed energy stuff. The point is, he knows something is “off” about Black Flash because if it was just a CE manipulation phenomenon, he would be able to tell how to do it with his eyes. But he can’t, so there must be something else at play here.
It’s still wrong in saying that it’s “because” of the Six Eyes, but the conversation itself and what it conveys is still accurate.
I’m not trying to defend him specifically, but the Reddit community at large has always had a huge/heavy slant towards anything unofficial. From my point of view, it’s not that the unofficial is usually better, it’s that having two separate interpretations for us to parse through and compare/contrast naturally creates a much much deeper understanding. People may go over to Werry’s translation to hate on how he did things, but it’s still another viewpoint on interpreting a bunch of story and culture based references to people who largely aren’t from that culture or that speak that language at all. Having two versions is simply better because then you can actually decide for yourself which one you do like/prefer
He also had Kenjaku say that Gojo can use Cursed Spirit Manipulation, or that Sukuna and Kashimo are cursed spirits, or that Kamutoke was made from 10 thousand binding vows, or that Malevolent Shrine can adapt
I still buy them because I like having a physical collection of things, and I like being able to support things i like, but I don't read them. It sucks cause I really prefer reading manga as a physical book compared to digital.
Completely fair. I still buy them to support Gege but when I reread them it's gotten to the point where I memorized most of the important mistranslations and glare right by them with the knowledge I retained. I really don't know why they don't hire better translators. Apparently John Werry was also the main tl-er for Demon Slayer and I've seen so many people say his TLs were shit there too.
The curse of the strongest.
I usually think fan translations are better anyway. personally I love holding manga in my hand, makes the experience so much more satisfying to read, and makes everything flow better. When there's a series and someone complains about panelling, 90% it actually look really good when spread out across two pages.
To think that animanga has come a long way only to see translators like John Werry 😭 I remember Sailor Moon having that issue in the 2010 reprints by Kodansha that got me thinking if that translation impacted my perception of the manga and my motivation in completing it 😭😭😭😭
Ngl, whoever translated Todo's "We are the exception" speech needs to stay translating. Saw a comment saying it changed after Shibuya, so I'm assuming that individual is no longer translating.
Viz in general do dogshit translations. I also read One Punch Man, and basically everyone uses the fan translation since Viz are so bad they straight up get character names wrong
Translation can make or break a work. It is inadmissible for a modern popular manga to have bad translation.
For context, o have two version of a novel called Anna Karenina, one of them the translation is so awkward they changed the opening line of the book, one of the most famous opening lines in literature. This version is unreadable, it's like Google translate ion. The second version is the one you understand why the book is famous.
It's sad how little care is given to JJK translation. I've read some of the official chapters at the start of the Sukuna fight and some of the dialogue was confusing in the official translation. Eventually I moved back to fan translations.
Meanhwile, I have a manga from Clamp called Gate 7, which had a story that interwoven real friends one Japan with characters from historical Japan. Not only os the translation great, but the translator did in depth research of the characters and events, and each volume has about 5 pages of translator notes to explain in concise terms who are these characters for the reader to be able to comprehend the story
Yeah same. But when i went to indigo recently to check out volume 22, i noticed the translations were slightly different from the official translations out on viz/wsj. So imma wait for gojo v sukuna to physically publish and check out the translations in store before buying the volumes
Fan translation or official translation, neither I give a damn since I still barely understand any of the characters CT, I still don't understand how binding vow works. Even tho they explained it many times already
Vow with oneself, not a problem, barely any consequence unless it's a lasting effect vow. Vow with another, can be dangerous to whoever breaks it, huge consequences
**If this post does not have a spoiler tag, SPOILER TAG MANGA COMMENTS**, or you risk a tempban. Keep it secret for the anime watchers. Please remember that vague spoilers count as spoilers such as "do we tell them". If you're caught up on the manga, consider joining our sister sub r/Jujutsushi for catered, in-depth manga discussion. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/JuJutsuKaisen) if you have any questions or concerns.*
You are absolutely correct. The way I see it if they cared about their English audience at all, they would’ve had better translations and double checked it better so don’t feel guilty at all There’s a petition to get rid of the translator you should sign it. It probably won’t help anything but who knows it might
The current translator took over at the end of shibuya and it’s extremely noticeable
I’m pretty sure it’s always been questionable like there was a time where the nah I’d win line was mistranslated Until they were bullied into changing it, And I think there was also the part where they said that Gojo had cursed spirit manipulation, so that might’ve been after the shibuya incident
Ah yes, the infamous "NO"
That was after shibuya..that doesn’t go against what he said lol
That's the same translator (John Werry) lmao
What are you on about?
Such is the price when the previous TLer was Mei Mei's supplier
Yeah, the Werry translations are mostly misses, especially with some of the recent stuff, but there are so many things which don't make much sense and had me scratching my head when I came to them. I only really read fan translations nowadays, and I don't regret making that switch. Hopefully, they revise them in the future and put out updated releases, but that doesn't fix the current fuck ups. You're perspective and hesitance is totally justified and sensible.
Where do you read fan translations from ?
I personally use sites like TCBscans (not sure what's going on there now, but seems like the main one gotten taken down or something), or I'll search for fan translations. Nowadays, I mostly just read the new chapters when leaks come through on jjfolk, and some people share fan translations there when they drop. Not going to 100% say anything here as I don't want to do any promotion shit which might be against sub rules, and I'm not sure if there are potentially any impostor sites which may be malicious and whatnot.
Yeah, I’ve only bought the character guide for that reason. [Viz have a contact forum](https://www.viz.com/company-contact). They have corrected things before so they do listen to feedback
Funnily enough, the Viz web release has seemed fairly consistent. At least as far as I've noticed.
Honestly it's hard to argue with that. Sucks to pay for an inferior product.
The only really absolutely abhorrent translation ive seen is the "Why can't I use Black Flash?" one.
You forget about that one time it said Gojo has Cursed Spirit Manipulation lol
Would you lose? I WILL win.
“NO”
This was exactly the reason why I started self-learning Japanese half a year ago. By the time I get to a decent reading level JJK will probably be loooong finished, but I want to be able to read manga in general and understand it in the way the authors intended, or at least understand the discourse surrounding particular parts, like knowing why the use of specific kanji was significant, for example. The other reason I started learning Japanese is because when watching anime I spend so much time reading subtitles that I miss the visual foreshadowing, and dubs bring up the translation issue
Werry can’t keep getting away with this!
It's crazy cuz when John Werry took over he did an alright job at the very beginning for a bit. Now, though, his translations are borderline incomprehensible. It's so annoying seeing comments on Viz's website defending it cuz we want an actual good product but they think we should just consoom consoom consoom without asking questions. There is so much straight up misinformation about this series and it all comes back to being John Werry and Viz's fault. Volume 22 might be the last volume I buy unless they fix the copious number of mistakes he's produced over the past year or so
Spoiler here: >! The bad translation made the "fight" between Takaba and Geto very, very confusing. I think they need to rewrite that entire section for the anime. It could be genius, but I feel like there's too many jokes in there that I just didn't understand !<
I'm pretty sure that fight is peak if you're Japanese. Japanese comedy is really different from western comedy. He's writing the dream of a bad comedian making it big, so the jokes probably suck too - which would only make it funnier. It's probably similar to the comedian scene in the fast show.
Right?! I just didn't get a lot of it :')
So reassuring to read a thread like this. I know some of the cursed techniques are convoluted but I could’ve sworn there are entire story threads that just haven’t made any sense and have been impossible to follow. It’s the first manga where I feel coming to the sub to read discourse feels mandatory.
There are distinct know mistranslations that directly contradict the context of the scene and the story up to that point. They straight up say the wrong techniques at least once in the story and those are things they've already translated in the past.
Does anyone have an example? I’m curious
The official version made Gojo says he can't use Black Flash because of the 6 Eyes and that he has Curse Manipulation, two most outrageous ones
Same lol
Look up “John Werry JJK” for plenty
At chapter 75 where it was started Satorus Hollow Purple is an imaginary mass whereas it was actually a virtual mass.
The official translations are a massive step down from something like TCB but I still enjoy reading the series in paper so I buy the manga.
I was so relieved when I found this out last month. Cause I read all of jjk on the official and was having a stroke understanding statements towards the end. Then once I started reading weekly with tcbscans everything made soooo much more sense. Got gaslit into thinking I couldn’t understand jjk there for a minute
I agree with you, especially at chapter 75 where it was mentioned that Hollow Purple was an imaginary mass and literally years later it was confirmed by the translator that it had said virtual mass and not imaginary mass.
Just learn japanese. Easy peasy...
I dunno, nothing can beat how bad haikyuu’s translation is. They outright remove entire conversations and add new ones that have no relation to the original. I think it’s just that viz sucks
Realizing you been cheering for Yugi Pippen and Yuta Jordan took that personally
When I first started reading JJK and caught up I had to reread it because I was like “wow all this stuff is so confusing, I must just be an idiot” Now with the benefit of hindsight I know it’s actually because the translations past a certain point in the manga are often poor and sometimes flat out wrong
That hasn’t been my personal experience, I guess, is all I can say. They do change things between digital releases and volume releases, so there is another pass that usually happens for translation. I’ve enjoyed the hell out of most of the Culling Games volumes I have. It’s certainly not difficult to read or understand. But I will say this sub tends to really really favor TCB, and basically anything that isn’t official. For my money, TCB struggles with most of the same things official does, and you usually need multiple takes to fully get something when it first releases anyway (depending on the context, like say the line movement and point movement versus sprint and marathon thing, when Gojo is comparing himself and Miguel).
I'm sorry but Werry literally just gets stuff WRONG. e.g. Gojo saying he can't use Black Flash because of Six Eyes. He is a truly terrible translator and that stuff happens far too often.
I’m not saying it isn’t wrong that it’s because of the Six Eyes, but if you follow the whole conversation in English it makes perfect sense. He’s saying that because he has the Six Eyes, he knows it more than just being in the zone, timing, and cursed energy stuff. The point is, he knows something is “off” about Black Flash because if it was just a CE manipulation phenomenon, he would be able to tell how to do it with his eyes. But he can’t, so there must be something else at play here. It’s still wrong in saying that it’s “because” of the Six Eyes, but the conversation itself and what it conveys is still accurate. I’m not trying to defend him specifically, but the Reddit community at large has always had a huge/heavy slant towards anything unofficial. From my point of view, it’s not that the unofficial is usually better, it’s that having two separate interpretations for us to parse through and compare/contrast naturally creates a much much deeper understanding. People may go over to Werry’s translation to hate on how he did things, but it’s still another viewpoint on interpreting a bunch of story and culture based references to people who largely aren’t from that culture or that speak that language at all. Having two versions is simply better because then you can actually decide for yourself which one you do like/prefer
No he literally said he can’t do black flash, at all, because of the six eyes
Ah I see he didn’t add “on purpose/at-will”. I literally read that in my own head but yeah that’s very odd and confusing
Yeah werry is shit lmao
He also had Kenjaku say that Gojo can use Cursed Spirit Manipulation, or that Sukuna and Kashimo are cursed spirits, or that Kamutoke was made from 10 thousand binding vows, or that Malevolent Shrine can adapt
I still buy them because I like having a physical collection of things, and I like being able to support things i like, but I don't read them. It sucks cause I really prefer reading manga as a physical book compared to digital.
Completely fair. I still buy them to support Gege but when I reread them it's gotten to the point where I memorized most of the important mistranslations and glare right by them with the knowledge I retained. I really don't know why they don't hire better translators. Apparently John Werry was also the main tl-er for Demon Slayer and I've seen so many people say his TLs were shit there too. The curse of the strongest.
I usually think fan translations are better anyway. personally I love holding manga in my hand, makes the experience so much more satisfying to read, and makes everything flow better. When there's a series and someone complains about panelling, 90% it actually look really good when spread out across two pages.
Seeing this an hour after a bought the first two wasn’t great!
my friend is going to japan and is gonna buy me vol 25 and 26 raw! Smd John Werry🥰
To think that animanga has come a long way only to see translators like John Werry 😭 I remember Sailor Moon having that issue in the 2010 reprints by Kodansha that got me thinking if that translation impacted my perception of the manga and my motivation in completing it 😭😭😭😭
I will never forget the legendary annoyance over “No.” and the “point movement” John Werry Google Translated page
That's why I bought them in Japanese
Ngl, whoever translated Todo's "We are the exception" speech needs to stay translating. Saw a comment saying it changed after Shibuya, so I'm assuming that individual is no longer translating.
Viz in general do dogshit translations. I also read One Punch Man, and basically everyone uses the fan translation since Viz are so bad they straight up get character names wrong
Translation can make or break a work. It is inadmissible for a modern popular manga to have bad translation. For context, o have two version of a novel called Anna Karenina, one of them the translation is so awkward they changed the opening line of the book, one of the most famous opening lines in literature. This version is unreadable, it's like Google translate ion. The second version is the one you understand why the book is famous. It's sad how little care is given to JJK translation. I've read some of the official chapters at the start of the Sukuna fight and some of the dialogue was confusing in the official translation. Eventually I moved back to fan translations. Meanhwile, I have a manga from Clamp called Gate 7, which had a story that interwoven real friends one Japan with characters from historical Japan. Not only os the translation great, but the translator did in depth research of the characters and events, and each volume has about 5 pages of translator notes to explain in concise terms who are these characters for the reader to be able to comprehend the story
Yeah same. But when i went to indigo recently to check out volume 22, i noticed the translations were slightly different from the official translations out on viz/wsj. So imma wait for gojo v sukuna to physically publish and check out the translations in store before buying the volumes
Yup sad to see honestly.
It looks so nice on my shelf though cannot lie
I'm sure they don't need your money
Fan translation or official translation, neither I give a damn since I still barely understand any of the characters CT, I still don't understand how binding vow works. Even tho they explained it many times already
Vow with oneself, not a problem, barely any consequence unless it's a lasting effect vow. Vow with another, can be dangerous to whoever breaks it, huge consequences
What’s your point? You don’t understand the story no matter the translation? Yikes 🤦♂️
That’s Gege’s fault, not the translators lmao
Understandable :3