I'm not a fan of watching subtitled anime. Which really means, I'm not a fan of reading my anime.
I prefer to hear a dub in my native language. I know a lot of anime watchers will try to tell me how I'm wrong, and believe me many have tried. We've all settled into a kind of uneasy peace, a kind of Anime Cold War. I don't bash those who read their anime, and I don't take crap from those who do saying I'm wrong for not wanting to read it.
So, I read some anime this past week.
There was something I really wanted to watch, and it was only available with subtitles. Granted, when I bought it off Amazon, it said there was a dub track, but when I got the item and it was subtitles only, I decided that I would make the time to sit down and give the screen all of my attention.
I would not build a model kit while I watched. I would check my phone. I would pause absolutely every time I needed to look away from the screen for more than a couple of seconds. I would read the anime.
And I noticed something during the first two hour episode of the series. Something that I hadn't caught before. I need to explain.
The anime I'm talking about is Gundam 00 Special Edition. It's all fifty episodes (30 hours) of the series condensed down to about 6.5 hours with some extra spiffy scenes and some altered animation to fix some things they apparently were not happy with for the original release.
Why am I going into all of this? It's a good question, and here's the answer.
For the first time, as I read my subtitles and took in the entire screen, never peeling my eyes for a moment, I saw it.
All the beautiful violence. I'd been missing it. Somehow. I'm not sure. When I can understand the voices via sound, I realized I don't pay as much attention to the action on the screen. At the very least, since I have to read the subtitles, I was much more aware of the action on the screen, anyway.
It was amazing. I need to read some more anime. I'm not saying I'm jumping ship and joining the sub-only crowd. But I have come to appreciate it a bit more.
Speaking of being appreciated, I am getting real tired of having to step in on Twitter to message a company who isn't dealing with my wife and her business in a timely manner.
It's pissing me off. They shouldn't listen to me any more, any better, any quicker, or any more completely, just because I'm a man and she is not. But that's still the world we live in, and today it has disgusted me. My wife is a person, and far more successful at being one than I am or could ever hope to be. She deserves your attention. Not me.
Stick that up your tweeter.
I think I'm going to get one of those Nest doorbells. This past week I was fortunate enough to witness a near physical confrontation between the USPS and Amazon Prime. That war is just heating now heating up, and I know there's going to be blood in the streets before it's over.
And I want to catch it on video.
D.G.
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