Pure TokyoScope PODCAST #85: Translating Akira Toriyama! The Alexander O. Smith Interview!
Patrick Macias and Matt Alt bring you pop culture from Japan!
In this episode of the PURE TOKYOSCOPE Podcast, authors Matt Alt (Pure Invention: How Japan Made the Modern World) and Patrick Macias (Mondo Tokyo: Dispatches from a Secret Japan) are joined by translator, writer, and game industry veteran Alexander O. Smith who talks about his experience translating the late Akira Toriyama's classic manga DR. SLUMP for the US market!
SHOW NOTES!
Alexander O. Smith is a professional Japanese to English translator and author. While his output covers many areas such as adaptation of Japanese novels, manga, song lyrics, anime scripts, and various academic works, he is best known for his software localizations of Japanese video games including Vagrant Story, Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, and Final Fantasy XII. He currently resides in Kamakura, Japan, where he operates his own contract localization business, Kajiya Productions, and is co-founder of a translation and publishing company, Bento Books.
LINKS
Alexander O. Smith on Instagram
‘DR. SLUMP’ BY AKIRA TORIYAMA, PUBLISHED BY VIZ MEDIA, TRANSLATED BY ALEXANDER O. SMITH
What is the PURE TOKYOSCOPE Podcast? Well… Author and fellow Substack writer Matt Alt and I have been recording together for over a year now.
Our show is a mix of Japanese pop culture news and features and some of our best episodes to date have been:
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New Book from the Author and Editor of TokyoScope Blog!
Mondo Tokyo - Dispatches From a Secret Japan
On Sale Now!
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I hate using business speak, but. Content providers are always looking for ways to refresh stale I.P. so they can leverage them to a new market and churn that COUGH COUGH GAG VARF.
Ok. I mean to say I would buy the heck out of an annotated Dr. Slump. Not at $50 USD a volume, not under my current circumstances, but yeah. Get that done. Now is the time. Also Discotek needs to pick up the original series.
Robotech exists because Jim Terry’s Force Five didn’t do well. The idea of a syndication package of different shows creates uneven ratings because it’s just a fact that people develop favorites. Picture if you will a syndication package of sitcoms. Seinfeld, All in the family, M.A.S.H., Family Ties and ALF. 25 episodes of each. You sell it as a strip (M-F) run, so eps. 25 of All in the family runs to eps. 1 of ALF. Audience drop off would be frightening.
Macek and Harmony Gold learned this with Robotech. Macross would do really well, the entire first run did well, but in rerun, audience would just crater during Southern Cross, pick up slightly during Mospeada and climb when Macross started again. Stations HATED that. This is why we got the nightmare that was Captain Harlock and the Queen of a Thousand Years. Brrrr.
And it’s really sad because HG had a way to refresh Robotech right in hand. As much as I hate to put this out there I think Zillion could have been made to fit the Robotech story.
There, I think I’ve earned my keep for now. 😁
And chaps aren’t the only thing that is without a butt. Frogs. Frogs have no butt. Like chaps. There. 🤯