Collectr's Blog

Here's the latest status report. Since the last report, Shirokuma Cafe, Kakyuusei (1995) v2, Sei Michaela Gakuen Hyouryuuki v2, Oz, and Hi-Speed Jecy have been released.

Projects underway:

Tokimeki Tonight completion - 27-30v2, 31-32 done, 33-34 at release check. We've obtained better raws from a recent Animax rebroadcast and are redoing all the episodes.

Ehrgeiz - from new Laserdisc rips. All episode at release check.

Sanctuary - from new Laserdisc rip. At fine timing and editing.

Bite Me! Chameleon - at translation check and editing.

Bavi Stock 1 and 2 - translated and timed. At translation check.

Stop!! Hibari-kun - 1-16 translated, 1-2 timed.

Projects under consideration:

Alakazam the Great - English subtitles with Japanese audio, instead of English dub. Needs translation or translation check.

Maple Story completion - needs transcription of hardsubs (OCR has failed).

Cosprayers DVD - awaiting subtitle transcriptions, encodes.

Hashire Melos - from new Laserdisc rip.

I have shelved the DVD version of Gosenzosama Banbanzai!, at least for now. Based on episode 1, it needs a thorough translation check, and no one is interested. Another group wants to pick up Lady Georgie, using the Italian DVD ISOs, so I have shelved that project as well.

I have raws for lots of other interesting shows likeTenkousei, Kyoukujitsu no Kantai, the Code:Breaker OVAs, Ear of the Yellow Dragon, Dokushin Apartment Dokudami, Nora 1 and 2, and so on, but no resources (particularly translators and QCs) to pursue them.

[Updated 02-Nov-2015]

The Orphan Fansubs nostalgia tour continues with a new version of Sei Michaela Gakuen Hyouryuuki (St. Michaela School Drifting Story). In the original release post more than a year ago, I said, "If a better source turns up, I'll release a new version." Well, it did, so here's the new version.

This release is part of Orphan's ongoing collaboration with Piyo Piyo Productions. Erik has an extensive collection of Laserdiscs, many of which have never been released on DVD or Blu-Ray. He also has a setup for near-lossless ripping, which facilitates encoding of these sometimes recalcitrant media. Tomoe's Run and Sei Michaela are just the first of what I hope will be many releases from this treasure trove.

In the original release post, I described, as best I could, the intricate and convoluted plot of Sei Michaela. It didn't make much sense then, and on repeated viewing, it made even less sense. To start with, it's not clear when the anime takes place. Because of the Japanese military uniforms and the World War II fighter planes, I thought it was set during World War II, but that has proved incorrect. In one exchange, the girls talk enviously about visiting the "discos in Roppongi," which implies at least the 1980s. In another, they talk about needing to train in martial arts in order to play "Oscar in the French Revolution"; Rose of Versailles began publication in 1982. So the anime is clearly taking place in "contemporary" times, e.g., the 1980s... except when it isn't. Let's try to straighten out the timeline.

The roots of the plot start during World War II, with the romance between a Japanese office, Karino Daisuke, and a well-born woman and mother named Yuko, who is mostly notable for having a star under her left breast. Yuko's daughter Yumiko falls in love with Daisuke. When she discovers that he is her mother's lover, she is heartbroken and becomes a nun.

Fast forward to the 1980s. Yumiko yearns to be seventeen again and in the arms of Daisuke. Somehow this summons him through time. He seduces her, and together they set in motion the "Michaela project." This involves setting up a strict Catholic school for girls that teaches singing, dancing, and martial arts to create a "Girls Crusade." The girls think they are training to become members of the Takarazuka Review. In fact, Daisuke intends to take them back in time to become "comfort women" for the Japanese Army in the Second World War. This will somehow inspire the soldiers to greater heights of valor and turn the tide of battle.

Daisuke's and Yumiko's nefarious plot in turn summons the attention of fallen angel (and intersexual) Hans Heilner, leader of the failed 13th century Children's Crusade. Hans travels through time and enrolls at the school disguised as a girl, Mimura Aiko. Hans wants to take the Girls Crusade back in time to defeat both the Church and God. It also attracts the attention of ninjas from the 17th century Shimabara Rebellion. They want to take the Girls Crusade back in time to fight the Tokugawa Shogunate. So there are three sets of time travelers - Karino Daisuke, Hans Heilner, and the Shimabara ninjas - all of whom want to use the Girls Crusade for their particular cause.

At least, I think that's what's going on. There's quite a bit that's unclear. When Hans Heilner and the Girls Crusade reach the Shimabara Rebellion, they actually fight against the rebellion's leader, Amakusa Shiro. Yet in the concluding scene, a new timeline covering the World War II era has come into effect. Yuki is now the loving wife of Gonza, who was her servant in the original (historical) timeline. Gonza says that Hans and Amakusa created the peaceful, religion-free, nationalism-free world that now exists. So what was the outcome of the Shimabara Rebellion? What did Hans and the Girls Crusade supposedly do back in the 17th century, or even earlier? These questions are answered in the sequel, Sins of the Sisters... maybe. Or maybe not.

I'd like to again thank all the folks involved with this:

Translation: anonymous
Spot translation check: convexity
Timing: Eternal_Blizzard
Editing: Collectr
QC: Calyrica, CP
Raws and Encoding: Piyo Piyo Productions

This new version has allowed for additional QC, and there are numerous small changes and fixes throughout. This release is in two episodes, reflecting the organization of the Laserdisc.

Enjoy the improved video of this new encode. And if you figure out what's actually going on, be sure to let me know, okay?

When I got my hands on Piyo Piyo Production's (that is, Erik's) first version of Oz, a 1992 two-part sci-fi OVA, I knew that Orphan had to sub it. Here was one of the better early 90s OVAs, and no one seemed to know it existed because it was marooned on Laserdisc.

The original encode didn't meet Erik's exacting standards, so he encoded it anew from his own Laserdiscs.The rest of the Orphan team was equally enthusiastic about the project. convexity translated it from scratch, m74 timed it, I edited and styled (there's very little typesetting), and Calyrica and Eternal_Blizzard did quality checking. Orphan Fansubs now proudly presents the results.

Oz is set in a post-apocalyptic near-future, following World War III. Much of the world has been reduced to desert. The surviving population has fragmented into many nations, and they're all fighting over the planet's declining resources. The only hope seems to be the legendary Oz, a lost laboratory founded by eminent scientists. Filicia Epstein, the surviving daughter of a family of prominent scientists, sets out with a mercenary named Yo Muto on a quest to find Oz and, she hopes, her missing brother Lyon, who is rumored to be there. Filicia and Muto get a lot more than they bargained for.

The scientists at Oz - well, Lyon at least - have been developing androids (called cybernoids or bioroids in the show), patterning their brains on Filicia's and Lyon's mother, Pamela, who (it turns out) was a homicidal maniac. Her murderous tendencies have been inherited not just by the androids but by Lyon, who wants to rule the world (of course). Lyon controls not only the Oz androids but a laser-based space weapon that can destroy anything on earth. With the odds heavily stacked against them, Filicia and Muto must find a way not just to survive but to stop Lyon and destroy the technology of Oz.

Oz is far from perfect, of course. It suffers from any number of improbable coincidences and deus ex machina plot twists, which are needed to rescue the main characters from the predicaments they get into. For example, the neutralizing of the space laser occurs far too quickly and easily (although if Lyon had watched Akira, he would've realized that controlling a space weapon is not all it's cracked up to be). None of the characters has much depth. The main android, 1019 is probably the most complex character, which says something. Still, it's well animated and very entertaining, and it does pose some interesting questions on what it means to be alive versus a machine, and human versus an artificial intelligence.

Oz was made just as Yawara! was wrapping up, so it's not surprising to see some overlap in the voice cast. Matsumoto Yasunori (Yu Muto) had a non-featured role in Yawara!, but he's all over OVAs of that era; for example, he plays the lead role in Starship Troopers. Fujita Toshiko, who shows great versatility as 1019, played Inukuma Tamao, Yawara's mother. Mitsuja Yuji (Lyon) had a bit part as Yawara's crush in the first episode. And Minaguchi Yuko (Filicia) was Yawara-chan herself. For me, it's a bit startling to hear Filicia Epstein, girl genius, talking in Yawara's nasal cadences.

Enjoy Oz in this first English edition!

As I've said before, I'm really fond of OVAs from the 80s and 90s. Orphan Fansubs has been very lucky to get help from two Laserdisc collectors, Erik of Piyo Piyo Productions, and ics- of lamonae. That has given us access to all sorts of rare shows that never made the transition to DVD. Hi-Speed Jecy has been on my wish list for a long time. Thanks to favorable circumstances, Orphan can bring you the entire series.

Like many Orphan projects, Hi-Speed Jecy has a rather checkered history. Anime Classic Rips (ACR) did the first three episodes and then dropped the show. Erik did four more on his own but ultimately grew dissatisfied with the quality of his initial encodes and stopped. The project lay dormant for three years after that.

Earlier this year, ninjacloud, Orphan's raw-hunter extraordinaire and part-time timer, found a complete set of Jecy raws on the Internet. That led me to reach out to Erik to see if I could use his scripts for episodes one to seven. To my surprise, he had scripts for all twelve episodes. Further, the news that Orphan was restarting the project gave him the impetus to go back and do new encodes of Jecy with an improved setup. Finally, the original translator volunteered to polish up the scripts. So this version of Jecy is translated by Ametuchi, timed or retimed by macros74 and ninjacloud, edited and typeset by me, QCed by Calyrica and konnakude, and encoded by Erik from his own Laserdiscs. Yay!

Hi-Speed Jecy is another OVA set from Studio Pierrot (they also did Dallos and Gosenzosama Banbanzai, among many others). It's based on a series of light novels and has a considerable backstory that the anime doesn't really flesh out. The hero is a young man named Jecy Moore. (It should be Jesse, of course, but the name is hardsubbed in the title.) His parents were killed by the evil Bismarck criminal gang when he was a youngster, and he has vowed revenge. Jecy hates weapons of all kinds. His only advantages are super-human speed and an organic, sentient spaceship named Paolon, which was created by an ancient, long-vanished alien civilization. Paolon can warp faster than light, absorb energy beam attacks (they act as food), beam people in and out, and otherwise dig Jecy out of the numerous scrapes he gets into. Jecy's closest friend is a beautiful young girl, Tiana. She's actually an artificial life form, created by Paolon as a companion. Jecy loves her but treats her more like a little sister.Tiana aspires to rather more than that, like any normal young woman, but Jecy is too guilt-ridden about the events that led to Tiana's creation.

Another major character is Falk Green, a priest of the Heartland Order, which is more fully fleshed out in the source novels than in the series. The Order believes that the universe is actually Hell, and that redemption must come through suffering. Accordingly, the Order's priests go around "saving" criminals by killing them painfully with a specialized weapon called a nerve gun. Falk is a classic "worldly priest" trope. He drinks, smokes, womanizes, fights, and generally enjoys himself, while always staying aligned to his mission. (German in the more recent Garo is another example of this kind of character.) Jecy is much more of a straightarrow and deeply opposes Heartland's murderous ideas, but he recognizes Falk's value in a fight.

The villains are the usual one-dimensonal cartoons. The patriarch, Lou Bismarck, seeks immortality and mastery of the universe. The eldest daughter, Jera, is a murderous strategist who has a yen for Falk. The only son, Cross, is a psychopath who just wants to blow things up and kill people, particularly Jecy. Only the younger daughter, Telaine, shows any depth, caught between family loyalties and her feelings for Jecy, which she never quite acts on. The Bismarck family seems able to run rings around the galactic military and police with ease, so why they act as criminals, rather than buying up politicians wholesale as in current times, is a bit of mystery.

Like many space operas from 25 years ago, Jecy has its weaknesses. Although the opening and ending songs are enjoyable, the background music is one cliche after another. (The "tension" music in episode 11 stands out as particularly hackneyed.) The plot is full of improbable coincidences and devices, many of which serve to get Jecy or Falk out of impossible jams. And Tiana simply doesn't have enough to do. She mostly stands around, looking pretty or being a damsel in distress. The other female characters, in contrast, are bold and active, whether for good or evil.

Despite these issues, Hi-Speed Jecy is a good watch. It provides glimpses of an interesting and rather dark alternate universe, populates it with an action-packed plot, and wraps up conclusively. I'm really puzzled why it was "left behind" on Laserdisc, when so many less deserving shows have been reissued on DVD or even Blu-Ray. It has action, explosions, heroes, villains, and even a little fanservice (equal opportunity, I might add). What more do you need?

Orphan is proud indeed to bring you Hi-Speed Jecy. As Miss Sasako always said, enjoy!

With some OVAs, like Oz, Hi-Speed Jecy, and Sanctuary, I'm baffled about why they were left behind on Laserdisc or VHS and never released on DVD. For others, though, the reasons are kind of obvious. Bavi Stock falls into the latter category.

Bavi Stock I and II are mid 80s sci-fi OVAs. They have the same characters and universe but were done by different studios. As a result, they are qualitatively very different, with different character designs and stories. Bavi Stock I is barely passable, if you're feeling generous. Bavi Stock II is utterly lame. Bavi Stock I never made it past Laserdisc. Bavi Stock IIdidn't even get that far and languished on VHS. I don't propose to rehearse all the deficits of these two shows; there's a very complete and utterly damning analysis here.

Bavi Stock I is set in a group of floating islands known as the Bentika Empire. The only opposition comes from the GPP (Global Police Patrol?), whose symbol is a friendly-looking turtle in a police uniform. The story begins with GPP officer Kate freeing Princess Mooma and convicted murderer Bavi Stock, both of whom hold information vital to defeating the Empire. By accident, she also rescues another prisoner, Bavi's scheming cellmate Sammy. However, the whole "defeat the Empire"Macguffin is promptly lost in an incoherentchase plot, as the Empire's psychokinetic villainess Lus Mila and her android assassin Eyesman pursue the good guys through and around a high-stakes hovercraft race. Bavi's crime, Sammy's scheme, and Mooma's power are never explained or even explored.

Perhaps the loose plot threads were supposed to be resolved in Bavi Stock II, but it was done by a different studio and went off in a totally different direction. The good guys are now galactic treasure hunters, and beyond the floating islands of theBentika Empire is a normal-looking universe. The episode starts out on a comic note. Then Our Heroesfly to a heavily forested planet that is stolen from Return of the Jedi, right down to a goofy-but-competent R2D2 ripoff and forest-loving pseudo-Ewoks. There they again encounter Lus Mila and Eyesman and, in scenes inspired perhaps byRaiders of the Lost Ark, unlock the secrets of Mooma, Bavi, and the Sacred Vessel, whatever that is.

Then why did Orphan do these shows? Well, it seemed like a good idea at the time. Bavi Stock I has been on the BakaBT list of "old shows needing subtitles" for ages. Orphan has generally had good luck with 80s OVAs, so we went ahead with the project. But our luck ran out with this pair.

Moho Kareshi translated, macros74 timed, I edited and typeset, and Calyrica did QC. Bavi Stock I was encoded by macros74 from a Laserdisc rip by an anonymous collector. Bavi Stock II was encoded by Erik of Piyo Piyo Productions from a VHS rip by the same anonymous collector. There is some VHS tracking error at the bottom, but on the whole it looks fairly good.

So as Yogi Berra said, some days you win, some days you lose, and some days it rains. I'm still excited about OVAs from the 80s and the 90s. Sometimes even the bad ones, like Ear of the Golden Dragon, have enough laugh-out-loud value to make working on them worthwhile. Unfortunately, there aren't many yucks in the Bavi Stock OVAs, unless you give them the full Mystery Science Theater 3000 treatment, which they richly deserve.

Eight months ago, I wrote:

Tokimeki Tonight has been on my list of orphan series for a long time, but I didn't think there was much chance to do anything about it. Then, in fairly short order, I found raws, a translator, and best of all, a member of the original Saitei team who had access to the scripts, karas, styles, etc. konnakude made it possible to revive this show, and Orphan is proud to present the next episode. It's an Orphan-Saitei joint project and has the approval of the Saitei group leader, who had to give up fansubbing due to real life issues.

Well, I was premature in thinking that Tokimeki Tonight would be finished quickly. It has taken far longer than I expected to complete the series. The tragic death of our colleague CP blew an irreparable hole in the QC team; Tokimeki is the last Orphan series he worked on. Then the project leader, konnakude, was out for several months between family vacation and real-life issues. Finally, the availability of new raws from the Animax rebroadcast led us to delay further work until September.

The new raws are a significant improvement on the Internet raws we had been using. They have more vibrant colors, better detail definition, and improved image stability. (Perhaps they presage a future remastered DVD or even Blu-Ray release? That certainly proved true for Yawara!) That in turn has led to some changes in the scripts. Eternal_Blizzard redid the karaokes for improved legibility and more accurate timing. The typesetting has been redone to match the colors and stability of the new raws. And of course, the additional time has allowed for further QC. The styling remains unchanged, to match the Saitei releases, although vertical and horizontal margins have been increased.

Tokimeki Tonight is a harmless early 80s comedy series about a high school girl, Ranze Eto, who happens to be the daughter of a vampire and a werewolf. She really just wants to be just a normal girl, pursue her high-school crush, Makabe-kun, and fend off her rival, Kamiya, who's from a yakuza family, but she has these powers - which are sometimes great to have and sometimes not so great. There's not much plot continuity, so each episode can be taken on its own, once you understand the basic premise.

This is the first Orphan project for which I was not the project leader and the editor. konnakude fulfilled both roles admirably. Moho Kareshi translated the scripts, and kokujin-kun graciously agreed to check them. Ephemere timed the first episode, ninjacloud the other seven. I did the typesetting and shared QC with CP, pheon18, and Eternal_Blizzard. Eternal_Blizzard redid the karaokes; Juggen timed the additional ending verses in episode 34. bananadoyouwanna encoded the raws from the Animax transport streams.

So at last Tokimeki Tonight is no longer an orphan series and can be appreciated in its complete and unadulterated silliness. Sit back, relax, and don't let the vampires bite.

Continuing our exploration of 1980s OVAs "left behind" on old media, here is M74's High School Agent. This cheerfully loopy action show features Kanamori Kosuke as a high school student who is dragooned by the UN into being a secret agent. Kosuke apparently made the mistake of hacking into the UN's network and accessing secret files, so they offered him a choice: be an agent or be killed. Now Kosuke spends his weekends taking orders from Ms. Ishii and pursuing criminals and terrorists world-wide, instead of going on a date to Tokyo Disneyland with his crush, Satonaka.

High School Agent never made it past VHS, and that's sort of understandable. The premise and plot are completely bonkers. In the first episode, Kosuke confronts an evil colonel who stole an ancient gypsy stone that possesses amazing properties (Temple of Doom, anyone?). The second is even more over-the-top, involving a dastardly plot by neo-Nazis in South America to seize power again. Nonetheless, the show is a hoot. The action moves along swiftly, there are satirical salutes to other shows, and Kosuke remains true to his adolescent self, constantly whining that he wants to be somewhere else even as he battles the bad guys and saves the day.

The translation was done by an anonymous contributor. M74 timed and QC'd, while I edited and typeset. The raws are from ARR and are about as good as a VHS source is likely to be.

Enjoy another forgotten OVA from the 1980s!

Sanctuary is as close to the quintessential 90s OVA as you can get. It has yakuza, corrupt politicians, nudity, sex, and violence. It moves along at a breakneck pace for an hour, with nary a dull moment. That makes its fate inexplicable. The OVAs were abandoned after one episode, and the one that was released never made it to DVD.

Sanctuary is based on a ten-volume manga of the same name by Ichigami Ryouichi andFumimura Sho. It chronicles the parallel stories of two Japanese school friends, Hojo Akira and Asami Chiaki, who as youngsters survived the killing fields of Cambodia. The two are determined to create a safe haven for themselves - the "sanctuary" of the title - in the treacherous terrain of late 20th century Japan. Based on a game of rock-paper-scissors, Hojo takes the "dark path" and becomes a yakuza, while Chiaki takes the "light path" and goes into politics. They covertly support each other as each attempts to rise to the top of his chosen field.

The OVA is unsparingly bleak in its portrait of Japanese society. Politicians are shown as thoroughly corrupt: reptilian old men only interested in money and much younger women. The yakuza don't fare any better: they're portrayed as greedy, cowardly, and backstabbing. Hojo and Chiaki are ruthless in their pursuit of their aims, manipulating others and themselves to acquire power. Only the Deputy Chief of Police, Ishihara Kyoko, seems to stand above the fray, but that changes in later volumes of the manga. The sex is explicit for a non-hentai anime, and the violence is quite graphic. This OVA is NSFW and most definitely not family-friendly.

The voice acting is very good. The leads are played by Hayami Sho (Hojo Akira) and Nakata Kazuhiro (Asami Chiaki), who are still active in the industry twenty years later. Tsuru Hiromi (Ishihara Kyoko) has had recurring roles in the Ranma and Dragon Ball franchises. The background music is a jazzy score well-suited to such a noir OVA. The ending song, A Baby's Born, is sung by American jazz vocalist Chris Connor. It suits the mood perfectly. The soundtrack is very rare; if anyone has it in digital form, please let me know.

Orphan's version of Sanctuary is technically a resub. The script is based on the original US VHS subtitle. It has been completely translation checked, because the original subs were a bit loose in places, retimed, and fully typest. In addition, the Laserdisc contains an extra and a few minutes of promotional material not present on the VHS version. The extra is an illustration gallery of Ichigami Ryouichi's color drawings and demonstrates the subtlety and vitality of his work on Sanctuary.

M74 transcribed the original subtitles from HansDampf's VHS rip and then timed them. kokujin-kun translation checked the whole show and translated the signs and promotional material. convexity translated the manga captions in the Image Gallery. I edited and typeset. Calyrica, Juggen, and Skr did QC. Erik encoded from his own Japanese Laserdisc.

Is Sanctuary an example of a show discontinued because it was too critical of the Japanese establishment? It is unsparing in its portrait of Japanese politics and its criticism of the ruling LDP (lightly disguised as the DLP in the original Japanese). In this century, Japanese anime has tended to be much more indirect in its criticism or satire of Japanese society; the kind of direct critique featured in Sanctuary no longer happens. (Japan's press has been muzzled by restrictive laws in the last few years; Japan now ranks 61st on a world-wide index of press freedom.) While American cartoons have gained a biting edge with shows like The Simpsons and South Park, Japanese anime has lost its sting. The satiric intent may still be there, in shows like Un-Go and One-Punch Man, but it's disguised. It makes me nostalgic for shows like Sanctuary.

Time to look back on 2015. At a personal level, there were quite a few changes: I retired after 50 years in the computer industry and also welcomed a third grandchild. And then there was anime...

Orphan Fansubs

This has been a year of staff changes as well. Orphan lost a wonderful colleague, CP, to illness; other staffers retired due to personal priorities. But the team also welcomed new members, including two Laserdisc collectors, ics- and Erik, who have provided pristine sources for rare OVAs; an encoder, bananadoyouwanna, who has created original encodes when source material is available; and a jack-of-all-trades, Skr, who has been my colleague in several groups.

Projects completed this year:

D4 Princess. This short-episode comedy series was no world-beater, but it deserved better than being abandoned three times.
Kakyuusei (1995). This soft-core hentai never made it to DVD, and only the first two episodes were ever subtitled in English. Later in the year, we were able to get better raws, ripped directly by ics- from his own laserdisc, and released a second version.
Tomoe ga Yuko. The first release based on Erik's collection. This early 90s OVA is a terrific example of the genre and a good watch.
Shirokuma Cafe. Orphan's "great white whale," a 50-episode Blu-Ray resub that required extensive typesetting. It remains as funny and sly as it was on first viewing in 2012.
Parol no Miraijima. This "orphan" of the Anime Mirai 2014 class is a charming and colorful OVA about innocent creatures confronted with human civilization in all its complexity. In addition to the 720p release based on an Internet raw, bananadoyouwanna encoded a 1080p release from a BDMV. A joint project with M74.
Sei Michaela Gakuen Hyouryuuki, version 2. This release was also based on Erik's laserdisc collection.
Oz. Yet another release based on Erik's collection. This unjustly neglected sci-fi OVA from the early 90s was one of the best shows I worked on this year.
Hi-Speed Jecy. This orphan rescue featured new encodes directly from Erik's laserdiscs. It's a sci-fi OVA series set in a dark and violent universe and is another good watch.
Bavi Stock I and II. Orphan's luck with 80s and 90s OVAs ran out with this pair from the mid 80s. The less said by me, the better.
Tokimeki Tonight. The completion of this orphaned 80s comedy series took rather longer than expected, primarily in order to get better raws, but it's good, clean fun.
Sanctuary. This 1996 extremely noir OVA was also based on a new encode from Erik's laserdisc collection. It is a "must watch" for any fan of the genre.

So that's eleven projects finished - twelve if you count both versions of Kakyuusei. Not bad!

Work for Other Groups

FFF. I edited Akatsuki no Yona (and its OAD), Juuou Mujin no Fafnir, Shokugeki no Souma, Ore Monogatari, the Hoozuki OADs, Sakurako-san no Ashimoto ni wa Shitai ga Umatteiru, and Noragami Aragato. I QCd the Blu-Ray releases of Dakara Boku wa, H ga Dekinai and Petit Gargantia.
FroZen-Evil. I timed and typeset the Miyuki music video. I continued to edit Laughing Salesman and the Yawara! Blu-Rays and to QC Psycho Armor Govarian. I also did some fill-in typesetting. All these projects are on slow-roll.
Kiteseekers. I did some fill-in typesetting on Milky Holmes S4 and Eriko.
M74. I collaborated with M74 on Parol no Miraijima andHigh School Agent.
Magai. I QC'd several short films for Morellet's group.
Kaitou. I editedYoung Black Jack.
C1. I continued to edit Kakyuusei (1999), which is moving slowly.
OddJob. I edited an as-yet-unreleased OVA series.

Akatsuki no Yona was, hands down, the best current series I worked on all year (although I like Noragami quite a lot). I hope for a second season, but I'm not holding my breath. In general, I find current anime uninteresting, but you know that already. Still, I'm usually willing to help other teams out - particularly if I can get some help in return.

Looking Ahead

There's no shortage of raws for unsubbed shows; I think I have more than 30 stashed away at the moment. Translation and translation checking are the greatest bottleneck, as it is for most groups, and then QC. So we'll continue to do a mixture of original translations and resubs, focusing on the obscure, the incomplete, and the neglected.

If you'd like to help, give me a shout. Please note, however, that experience is required.

Orphan's a small group, and the task of assembling a release and readying it for distribution usually falls to me. Over time, my release flow has become more and more elaborate, but every step plays a part in assuring a decent (though hardly flawless) result.

Create a backup copy of the script for later comparisons.
Apply any remaining quality control (QC) reports.
Create chapters. (I use the chapter editor in mkvmerge.)
In Aegisub, check the signs, the OP, and the ED. These are areas where subtle mistakes may have occurred and been overlooked during QC. In particular, check that signs are timed correctly, and (in a multi-episode series) that the first and last lines of the OP and ED haven't been clipped off by a cut-and-paste error.
In Aegisub, run a final spell check.
In Aegisub, collect the fonts for muxing. Pay attention to errors about missing glyphs. While CCCP on Windows makes reasonable choices about substituting other fonts, VLC or non-Windows systems may not.
Mux the release with mkvmerge, and save the mkvmerge settings in case you need to revisit the result. I tend to label tracks as well as language-code them (except the video), and I fill in the "global" segment field with the file name, because VLC displays it.
Check the muxed file with "mkvmerge -i file.mkv". This will show whether all parts are present, including the chapter file, and whether all fonts have the right MIME type (x-truetype-font).
Play the release and verify the track names.
Verify the chapter navigation points.
Watch the release from end to end. This is the only way to catch any missed lines, encoding glitches, and other faults that can be overlooked in Aegisub. Apply corrections as needed.
Using Aegisub, export the revised subs, without tags, as a plain text file. Use a text editor to join lines that were split and remove \N, multiple spaces, signs, songs, etc.
Open the exported, fixed subs in Word and run the grammar checker. This also acts as a final spelling check. Apply corrections to the script in Aegisub as needed. The Word grammar checker isn't perfect, but it will help find homonym errors (your/you're, there/their).
Check the differences between the final script and the initial script with a graphical difference checker, like WinDiff. This is to make sure that all corrections were applied properly and not fat-fingered.
Remux the release with the final script, using the saved settings.
Spot check by verifying that key differences highlighted by the difference checker are in the final file.
Calculate a CRC32 for the final file. (I use a command line utility called fsum.)
Rename the multiplexed file to [group] series - nn [CRC32].mkv (or your favorite convention).
Create a patch file that will patch the raw to the final release. This allows team members with the raw to create the final release for seeding. (I use a tool called PatchCreator.)
Create a torrent for the released file. (I use uTorrent.)
Create a SFV (CRC32 checking file) for the released file. (I use QuickSFV, but it's got compatibility problems with Windows 7.)
Upload the torrent to your favorite tracker.
Announce the torrent on your favorite sites.
Profit!

I know it seems like a lot of work - it is a lot of work, in fact - but I've added all these steps over time to address problems that got through simpler flows.

Here's another from Erik's Pile of Laserdisc Goodness: Next Senki Ehrgeiz, also known as just plain Ehrgeiz, probably to maximize confusion with the fighting game of the same name and year. This 1997 series was one of the first mecha shows on late night anime. It was licensed in the US by AnimeVillage (the predecessor of Bandai USA) and released with subtitles on six VHS tapes. After that, it slipped through the cracks. The show was released in Japan on Laserdisc, and a DVD version was promised, but nothing happened. If people know the show at all, they know it from the mripsencode of the US VHS tapes.

Next Senki Ehrgeiz draws its plot straight from the Gundam cookbook, with the Earth government embroiled in a war against the Next space colonies, using mechas called Metal Vehicles or MVs. Complicating matters are a party of Earth revolutionaries, known as Terra, who want to create peace by waging war against the Earth government; and a band of outlaws living in an abandoned space colony, Next 7. All are catalyzed into action (although the Earth government disappears from the story early in the show) by the appearance, or reappearance, of a super-mecha with a mind of its own, the System with Absolute Consciousness, called SAC, or S for short. For a more elaborate exegesis of the plot, I refer you to this review.

I don't usually like mecha anime or work on it; the last one I remember before this was Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann, and that was only because of Youko. Nonetheless, I found Next Senki Ehrgeiz a pretty good ride, despite its lack of originality. Each faction has compelling characters to capture the viewers attention. For Next, it's the ambitious Captain Akane Aoi and the mysterious cyborg Mr. Arnold; for Terra, their psychic leader Hal and his loyal lieutenant Galbraith; for the outlaws, the energetic free spirit Jay and the veteran warrior Balzak.The show spins the parallel stories of the Next military, the Terra revolutionaries, and the outlaws together to provide narrative momentum. The central mystery of the nature and intentions of S remains unknown until almost the end of the show. And there are LOTS of explosions. What else do you need?

Well, one thing I don't need quite so much of is the Next 7 orphans, Ken and Ann. They're used too often as plot crutches. For example, an early episode revolves around getting critical medicine for Ann, while a later one is about getting critical medicine for Ken. They're fine in small doses, but they're nowhere near as interesting as the Next 7 adults (sorry, kids).

This release uses the R1 subtitles from the VHS release. They seem pretty good (aside from a few obvious clunkers that have been fixed). macros74 transcribed and timed the subtitles; OCR didn't work on the sickly green VHS subtitles. deltakei translated the signs in the specials. I edited and typeset; Juggen did the karaokes; Calyrica and konnakude did QC; and Erik encoded from his own Japanese Laserdiscs. The result is notably better video and more readable subtitles than in the VHS version.

Speaking of karaokes, the opening song, Dream Jack, is a knockout, a hard rocker by Humming Bird that's perfect for a mecha show. The ending song, One Voice for Ehrgeiz by Mariko Fukui, is a soothing slow number for decompressing after the action. The background music is serviceable and appropriate. The original soundtrack hasn't turned up on the Interwebs yet.

The lead seiyuu were all veterans. While Iwata Mitsuo (voice of Jay) had lead roles in Akira and Onegai Teacher, Sasaki Nozomu (voice of Hal) and Ichijo Miyuki (voice of Aoi) mostly had featured roles; for example, Miyuki provided the voice of Jody Rockwell, the Canadian heavyweight judo player in Yawara! The voice cast is uniformly good.

This release also includes the six specials that were included with the even-numbered episodes. These specials use footage from the main episodes; there's nothing new. The first special, in episode 2, acts as a teaser and combines scenes from many different episodes. Later specials are basically just recaps. The episodes are chaptered, so it's easy to get to (or skip over) the specials.

So here's Next Senki Ehrgeiz in as nice a version as we're going to get unless some Immense Power (as S is referred to) decided to rescue it from oblivion and make a remastered DVD release. Hope you like it!

Here's an unusual (for Orphan) foray into near-contemporary anime: Minna Atsumare! Falcom Gakuen SC (or more simply, season 2 of Falcom Gakuen), which aired less than a year ago. This is also the team's first foray into the ultra-short episode format: each episode is just under two minutes.

I liked the first season of Falcom Gakuen, which was subbed by Migoto, for its sheer absurdity. Even though I knew nothing about the underlying games, it was clear that the characters had been morphed beyond recognition for comic effect. However, season 2 came and went without subtitles. When raws became available, I decided to sub the show. Because all twelve episodes had less dialog than one standard anime episode, it didn't seem like heavy lifting. Nonetheless, I decided to invite RTM, the leader of Migoto, to join the team, creating an Orphan-Migoto joint project... and I'm very glad I did.

Falcom Gakuen SCproved much harder that I thought it would be. Despite the short episode length, there were more signs in 90 seconds than in most standard anime episodes. The breakneck dialog included a great many puns and references thatmost of us missed entirely. Fortunately, RTM knew the Falcom ouvrevery well. His thorough checks and astute suggestions ensured than the subs incorporated as much of the Falcom lore as possible.

Moho Kareshi translated the episodes, and convexity checked the translation. ninjacloud timed, I edited and typeset, and Calyrica and konnakude did QC. RTM both checked the scripts and encoded the raws. The typesetting, including the "opening song," draws heavily on Migoto's subs of the first season.

There's not much I can say about Falcom Gakuen SC as a series. The jokes fly fast and furious. Some of them hit; some of them don't. I suspect more would hit if I knew the underlying games, but even so, there's enough breakneck humor to keep me smiling. I hope that will be true for you as well. A few notes:

In episode 5, one of the characters says that Rapp and Angelica sound alike, which they deny. Both are played by the same voice actress, Shindo Naomi.
In episode 6, Dark collapses on hearing the name of Legendary Assassin Yin, because he mishears it as Gin (silver), his weakness.

In the meantime, quoting the show's two-word motto (and opening song): Go Fight!

Orphan Fansubs has always been a small group. It started as a one-man shop (me) and gradually expanded to a core staff of half-a-dozen regulars. However, a combination of bountiful sources and the natural ebb and flow of team members (mostly ebb, alas) has now reached a critical state. Most of our projects are stalled for lack of resources, while the availability of interesting raws has continued to increase.

I am looking for one or more translators/translation checkers and one or more QCs. For the moment, resources for timing, editing, typesetting, and encoding are sufficient.

These projects use original scripts and are stalled on lack of translation checking (and sometimes, song translation):

Code:Breaker OVAs 2 and 3. From DVD ISOs. 2 episodes.
Joker: Marginal City. From laserdisc. 1 episode
Ear of the Golden Dragon: From laserdisc. 2 episodes.
Saiyuuki (1960). From an ARR encode. The US version, Alakazam the Great, has an entirely different script and musical score. 1 full-length movie.
Stop!! Hibari-kun. From DVD ISOs. 35 episodes.
Boyfriend. From laserdisc. 1 full-length movie.
Techno Police 21C. From laserdisc. This has only been available as a VHS dub. 1 episode.
Bite Me! Chameleon. From Internet raws. 6 episodes, double length.
Marginal Prince incomplete episodes (9-13). From Internet raws. 5 episodes.

These projects require original scripts and need a translator:

Dokushin Apartment Dokudami-sou. From laserdisc; ecchi. 3 episodes, double length.
Greed. From laserdisc. 1 full-length movie.
Wolf Guy. From laserdisc. 6 episodes.
Condition Green. From laserdisc. 6 episodes.
Sanada 10 incomplete episodes (10-12). From DVD ISOs. 3 episodes.
Nora and Nora 2 (Twinkle Nora Rock Me). From laserdisc. 2 episodes.

These projects use existing subtitles and are stalled on lack of translation checking:

Gosenzosama Banbanzai DVD softsub. A check of episode 1 showed that the show needs a full translation check. 3 episodes (2-4; 5-6 were done by a different translator).
Every Day Is Sunday. From laserdisc. 6 episodes.
Yume Tsukai. From DVD ISOs. 12 episodes.

There are even more possibilities, but I think you get the picture.

A translator/translation checker candidate needs to be proficient in spoken Japanese (old shows don't come with closed captions) and have an adequate command of English. A translator/translation checker does not need to be a native English speaker, although that doesn't hurt, of course. A QC candidate needs to have experience with fansubbing tools (particularly Aegisub) and to understand how to check not just dialog but timing, signs, and video quality.

If you're interested - even in just a subset of the projects - I'm on IRC almost all the time under my Collectr handle.

Returning to our original mission of completing unfinished shows, Orphan presents the second and third Code:Breaker OVAs. The first was subbed by Hatsuyuki Fansubs, although the release has a problem: some of the fonts weren't muxed in, notably the main dialog font. An unofficial patch to add the missing fonts can be found here.

Code:Breaker is a tense little series in which high-school martial arts heroine Sakurakouji Sakura suddenly finds herself in the midst of a secret society of superpowered vigilantes, the Code:Breakers, who in time-honored anime fashion use their powers to ruthlessly kill anyone they (or their superiors) regard as evil. Sakura becomes a cross between their warden and their mascot, and the show itself seems a bizarre hybrid between shounen and otome, with the Code:Breakers acting as both action heroes and Sakura's quasi-harem. It seemed to end inconclusively, in the time-honored shounen way, with the death of the apparent Boss leading to the discovery of the next Boss.

When the Code:Breaker OVAs were announced, I hoped that they would continue the main story and provide a greater degree of closure. Alas, it was not to be. The OVAs are collections of comic or ecchi vignettes. The Code:Breakers' superpowers are not used much, and the theme of battling evil disappears entirely. Instead, we get a Valentine's Day story, a White Day Story, a beach episode, a hanami (flower-viewing) story, a Christmas sketch, and a couple of mini-episodes about Nyanmaru as the hero of a children's show. It's all played for laughs and fanservice, with Sakura's and Ouji's assets prominently on display. In short, harmless fun - or mostly harmless.

Moho Kareshi translated both episodes, and Skr checked OVA 2. M74 timed the episodes,I edited and typeset, Juggen created new karaokes for the OP and ED, Calyrica and konnakude QCed, and bananadoyouwanna encoded from DVD ISOs.The OP and ED romanji are from the Hatsuyuki release, but the English translation is from the R1 DVDs. Hatsuyuki was also used for Nyanmaru's song and the styling of the chapter names in OVA 2.

Note: the nyaa torrent site is having chronic problems due to DDOS attacks. If you cannnot reach nyaa to download the torrent, here is a magnet link.

Here's another lost 90s OVA, Joker: Marginal City from 1992. Based on a manga by artist Michihara Kasumi and writer Maki Yuu, it's a sci-fi thriller set in Blade Runner country, whereit rains all the time and androids (but not cell phones) have been created. The story opens with a string of serial killing involving young women, whose hearts have been removed. On the trail of the killer are a Special Agent named Joker (a cyborg, not an android), who is allowed to be cop, judge, and executioner all at once, and a young policeman, Rikudo Rin.The trail leads to the mysterious Dr. Bayfarm and to one of Bayfarm's creations, an android named Saki. After suitable action sequences, and a pulled-out-of-nowhereplot twist that has the sole purpose of extending the action, the situation is partially resolved, and the episode ends. If it's not Oz-class sci-fi, it's not Bavi Stock-class junk either.

What distinguishes Joker from other 90s noir sci-fi OVAs is Joker's special ability: the cyborg can assume male or female form at will. As a man, Joker is a superhero, fast, lean, and deadly. As a woman, Joker is a "typical girl," pretty and interested in clothes, dating, and romance. Rin and Joker are in love. Joker is affection in both forms, but Rin will only reciprocate when Joker appears a a woman. This isn't a deep exploration of the implications of androgyny (read Ursula Le Guinn's The Left Hand of Darkness if you want that), and its deprecation of a male-male relationship is pretty typical for non-BL anime.

Moho Kareshi translated the episode and the songs. M74 timed the dialog, Juggen styled the songs, I edited and typeset, and Calyrica and Juggen did QC. Originally, we were going to use ARR's raw, but Erik of Piyo Piyo Productions agreed to rip and encode his Japanese laserdisc. The resulting raw has less jitter. The laserdisc picture is not quite 4:3, due to black bars in the original source.

The dialog is not complicated but it is very sparse on names. Rin's superior officer is given neither name or rank; Rin calls him "senpai" (senior). I have used his rank from the manga (inspector), because "senpai" made the dialog feel like it came out of a high-school slice-of-life dramedy. Other honorifics were removed as well, but they were few.

The voice actors were industry veterans who are active to this day. Hayami Sho (male Joker) played Hojo Akira in Sanctuary, a 90s OVA, but he is also working in the current Assassination Classroom. Tomizawa Michie (female Joker) was Latina Ascot in Hi-Speed Jecy, another 90s OVA, and C-Ko in the Project A-Ko series, but she also worked in the recent Magic Kaito 1412. Matsumoto Yasunori (Rin) was Muto in Oz, still another 90s OVA, but he has also appeared in recent shows like the second season of Magi. It's a coincidence of course, but Orphan has released all of the 90s OVAs I mentioned (Sanctuary, Hi-Speed Jecy, and Oz), and they're all worth watching.

I want to thank Crisisi on the FFShrine forum for scanning the booklets for the Joker CD albums. The booklets contained official lyrics for the insert song and the ending song, which facilitated translations. The insert song is an upbeat J-pop song covering a montage of a date between Rin and (female) Joker. It doesn't do much for the story - we already know that Rin and Joker are in love - but it does heighten the contrast between Joker's male and female personalities.

As with Sanctuary, there's a lot more in the manga than in this one-shot OVA, but unlike Sanctuary, the Joker manga has not been translated into English.

As nyaa continues to be unstable, here is a magnet torrent for the show.

Here is Takahato Isao's The Tale of the Princess Kaguya (Kaguya-hime no Monogatari). It is a fitting capstone to his long and illustrious directing career, which began with Horus: Prince of the Sun.This release has one purpose, and one purpose only: to provide a watchable set of English subtitles. We started from Fussoir's rip of the Japanese Blu-Ray and its official English subtitles. The missing lines have been filled in. The timing has been fixed. Language and grammar have been tweaked. The credits have been subtitled. And that's it. Call it Minimally Invasive Fansubbing.

Now, I don't agree with every decision that the creators took about the subtitles. There are no honorifics for example, which seems to be Ghibli's standard practice. I don't mind most of the time, but for a movie set in 10th century Japan, lack of honorifics, and the insight they provide to subtleties of class and role, is a loss. Localizing Kaguya's childhood nickname as "Lil' Bamboo" sticks in my craw because of my general distaste for using American dialect as a substitute for Japanese dialect. The dialog seems highly compressed, perhaps to allow for slow readers. But I suspect most Western audiences would listen to a dub anyway.

ninjacloud retimed the official subtitles. Skr filled in the missing lines; he made no other revisions to the original script. I edited and typeset. Calyrica and konnakude did QC. The raw is from fussoir. Of the many audio and subtitle tracks in the original, only the English and Japanese sets have been retained. The dub is fine, as dubs of Ghibli movies usually are. In fact, it's wordier than the subtitles.

Some viewers may disagree with the removal of the other audio and subtitle tracks and may want a version with French or Chinese audio or subs. For that, Fussoir's original release is just fine. This version is strictly for an English-speaking audience. If you prefer the original release but want to use these subtitles, a package with the script and fonts can be found here.

As for the movie itself: it is stunning in every respect. Its leisurely tempo and simple artwork belie the complexity of its themes and the cumulative emotional impact of the story. It distills the Japanese sense of mono no aware - the impermanence of life - more simply and elegantly than any Japanese movie I have seen. For me, what lingers is Kaguya's heartbroken reaction to the loss of the world she has known and come to love. Takahato is a poet of loss, as he first demonstrated in Grave of the Fireflies. His work here is more understated but no less impactful.

Kaguya can be seen as a tragedy in three acts. The first covers Kaguya-hime's miraculous discovery by a rural bamboo cutter and her joyful childhood in the country. The second and longest section is about her time in the capital and her increasing unhappiness at all the restrictions placed on her in her assigned role as a "noble princess." The last and shortest shows her grief and despair as her time on Earth comes to its end. The first section is joyful, and the third is tragic. The second is in many ways infuriating, but it is also a deep examination of the conflicting requirements of self, family, society, and custom. Some critics have described the middle section as an indictment of unthinking patriarchy, but I doubt that Takahata would agree (just as he has stated, quite firmly, that Grave of the Fireflies is not an anti-war movie). He portrays his characters and their situation, he observes events and interactions, and he lets viewers draw their own conclusions.

The voice actors are drawn from the world of film rather than anime and are thus mostly unknown to a Western anime audience. For example, Miyamoto Nobuko, who plays Kaguya's mother and also narrates, has been nominated for Best Actress at Japan's Academy Awards eight times, but she has never appeared in an anime before. (I saw her in 1987's Tampopo, which is well worth watching.) Takeo Chii, who plays Kaguya's father, appeared in more than 70 films before he died in 2012; Kaguya was his last role, and some extra dialog was recorded by Miyaki Yuji. Kaguya is played by Asakura Aki, a young film actress. The music is by Miyazaki's "house composer" Joe Hisaishi and is wonderfully appropriate and subtle.

The artwork reflects the pared-to-the-bone simplicity of Takahata's later works, first evident in My Neighbor the Yamadas.At times it has the beauty of watercolors, at others the simplicity of children's drawings. It always serves the story. Consider, for example, the dream(?) sequence during Kaguya's naming banquet, when she flees the crass coarseness of the party-goers. The artwork changes from rough and almost ugly as she hears their crude gossip, to the headlong velocity of charcoal drawingas she flees, and then to dreamy watercolors when she arrives back at her country home. The drawing styles reflect Kaguya's feelings and her shifting moods of anger, panic, homesickness, and resignation with little or no recourse to dialog. It's a beautiful, incredibly sad sequence.

Without further ado, The Tale of the Princess Kaguya.

Here is the first English-subtitled version of the 1960 Japanese animated movie Saiyuuki. Up until now, the only available English version has been the 1961 dub Alakazam the Great. As was often the case back then, the script for the dub bears little or no relation to the original Japanese script. The changes in Alakazam the Great were quite extensive: all the Buddhist and Taoist elements were eliminated; the movie was shortened by several minutes; the musical score and songs were redone completely. Despite the attempt to reshape Saiyuuki into generic Disney fare, the movie was a commercial failure in the US.

Saiyuuki was based on Tezuka Osamu's highly popular manga of the same name, which in turn was based on the Chinese classic Journey to the West. Osamu's name was used prominently in promoting the film, although he always denied active involvement in the production. According to some sources, he was displeased with the film's happy ending, and that spurred him to form his own anime company, Mushi Productions.

Saiyuuki is set in China and recounts the adventures of Son Gokuu, a monkey king. Son Gokuu is both powerful and willful. In his arrogance, he challenges heaven itself and is punished by exile to Mount Gogyou. He is eventually released on condition that he accompany a monk named Sanzou to India in order to receive the Buddhist sutras. Along the way he defeats and then befriends the pig-man Cho Hokkai and the ogre Sa Gajou. Together, they must confront and defeat the terrible bull demon Gyuumaou before Sanzou can accomplish his mission. The core cast is supplemented by Rin Rin, a love interest for Son Gokuu, and Shouryuu, a mischievous imp whose head horn doubles as an antenna for a 1960s mobile phone.

Like the original manga, Saiyuuki is a mishmash of styles, with plenty of anachronistic elements. Broad comedy is mixed in with action and chase sequences. Western influences coexist with Asian styling and thought. For example, the gods are depicted with angelic halos, and some of its denizens are from Greek mythology. When Cho Hakkai is trying to impress his bride-to-be (actually Son Gokuu in disguise), he appears successively in formal Western attire, then a Russian Cossack costume, then as an Indian chief, and then as a hula dancer. Still, Saiyuuki is recognizably a children's film in the 1950s Disney mold. Action sequences alternate with slower sections to allow kids to "cool off." Songs are used to underline the characters or delineate chapters. And despite trials and tribulations, the good guys triumph.

Saiyuuki was Toei Douga's third color animated film. The animation is fluid and represents a real advance over the studio's previous animated movies. Despite that, I find ita bit bland. There's really nothing to engage an adult, and there's a lot of padding. I prefer Takahata Isao's Horus: Prince of the Sun, which shows signs of his unique directorial sensibility, even though it too is a G-rated children's movie. Horus is lively, while Saiyuuki is frenetic. However,Saiyuuki was a greater commercial success in Japan.

This is Orphan's second Journey to the West-themed project, after Tezuka Osamu Monogatari in 2014. Both projects originated with Al_Sleeper in the BakaBT community. For Saiyuuki, he provided the encoded raw and a very rough English translation as a starting point. Magistral (also from the BakaBT community) redid the translation and filled in some of the rough spots; then convexity gave the script a complete going over and translated the signs and the songs. M74 timed, I edited and typeset, and Calyrica and konnakude QCed. The raw is from ARR, minus their Russian voice-over track and subtitles. The encode is serviceable, but the source suffers from jitter and transcription problems. The film really needs restoration and a Blu-Ray release, butthat seems unlikely.

A few translation notes:

ri is an old unit of distance, equal to 3.927 kilometers.
Gogyuu, the mountain where Gokuu is imprisoned, takes its name from the five elements of Chinese medicine: earth, wood, metal, fire, and water.

So even though it's Tezuka Osamu at one remove, enjoy Saiyuuki!

The good folks who run AniDB have pushed back on my habit of including other groups in Orphan's file names, unless the project is an official joint. These "unofficial" joints create extra work in submitting files and in maintaining the database. I understand their concerns, so Orphan will be changing its crediting policy.

Unless a project is a formal joint, releases will be under the [Orphan] label alone. All contributing groups will be recognized in the fansub credits and in the blog release post. Thus, The Tale of the Princess Kaguya is the last release under the old policy. This change will simplify dealing with crowd-sourced anime resources like AniDB and BakaBT.

In Orphan's history, there has been a number of official joint projects:

Tokimeki Tonight, done with Saitei.
Minna Atsumare! Falcom Gakuen SC, done with Migoto.
The Diary of Anne Frank, done with Licca.
Submarine 707, Parol no Miraijima, Harukanaru Toki 2, done with M74.
Ninku: Knife no Bohan, done with Live-eviL and Soldado.

Everything elsewas an attempt to be courteous and should be considered unofficial.

I don't plan on cleaning up the "unofficial" joint releases in the AniDB database, but I don't mind if someone else wants to submit the necessary change requests.

Here's a genuine curiosity: the 1994 version of Chuumon no Ooi Ryouriten (The Restaurant of Many Orders). This famous Japanese short story had already been animated twice, once in 1958 with puppets, and once in 1993 in silent-movie mode. This version, which followed only a year later, is conventionally animated.

What makes thisOVA unusual is that after release, it seems to have vanished almost without a trace. It isn't listed in any of the standard anime databases. Further, it doesn't appear on the web site of its production company. Apparently, it was released to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the death of the story's author, Miyazawa Kenji, along with another OVA based on one of his stories, Yukiwatari. However, Yukiwatari is well documented and has a full 480p encode; Chuumon (1994) is not and has only a 360p encode.

For Orphan, Chuumon is a happy accident. Our "want ad" for translators actually got a response, and one of the new team members had the show translated and timed. It took only a minor amount of polishing to get it ready for release. Iri translated and timed the script, Yogicat polished up the timing, I edited, and Calyrica QC'd. There is no typesetting to speak of; the raw, from hSa, is too small. The raw has the usual VHS defects, but there is no other choice.

Miyazawa Kenji was a famous Japanese author. Among his books and short stores are Night on the Galactic Railway, The Life of Guskou Budori, Matasaburo the Wind Boy, and Gauche the Cellist, all of which have been animated, some of them multiple times. Chuumon no Ooi Ryouriten comes from an early collection of stories intended for children. It describes the misfortunes of two hunters who get lost in a strange forest. More than that I cannot reveal without spoiling everything, but let's just say that it's closer in spirit to Roald Dahl than Walt Disney.

I hope that this release spurs more interest in this obscure show. I would love to have more information about it as well as a better encode. If a better encode does surface, Orphan will do a v2, as we have for other shows.

As I was editing Ear of the Golden Dragon (Kouryu no Mimi), I was irresistibly reminded of a Monty Python sketch called Hell's Grannies, which features "gangs of old ladies attacking defenseless, fit young men". As the sketch goes increasingly off the rails, a by-the-book English colonel intervenes and shuts it down, saying, "Started off with a nice little idea about grannies attacking young men, but now it's got silly." That's how I feel about Golden Dragon. It started off with a nice little idea about a Romeo-and-Juliet romance across warring clans, but then it got silly.

How silly? Well, on one side is the ancient Natsume clan. The clan leader's left ear has the power of the "golden dragon." When this power is unleashed, the leader changes appearance from a boy to an action hero, and he becomes the luckiest man in creation, who"can make any woman submit to his will," according to the narrator. That's quite an ear(ful).On the other side, equally ancient, is the Mina clan of beautiful women, whose sole purpose is to destroy the men of the Natsume clan. They can hold dozens of poisonous needles in their mouths without getting nicked. They can seduce any man in creation, thereby attaining, among other things, a stranglehold on the Japanese government. And they are masters (mistresses?) of disguise.

Natsume Kiroemon, 45th leader of his clan, rescues Shijo Kanako, of the Mina clan, from the clutches of the ne'er-do-well son of a powerful politician. Of course, they fall in love and, by the end of the first episode, into bed. But Kanako recognizes that their Love Is Not To Be and returns to her family in Kyoto. Kiroemon is determined to rescue her and bravely charges into this nest of succubi, who make more progress with him than one might expect of a Virtuous Hero. After Kiroemon encounters and defeats various villains - including three ninjas who have kanji on their foreheads (so you can tell them apart) and a human-sized version of a Titan from Shokugei no Kyojin - Kiroemon and Kanoko are reunited, presumably to live passionately ever after.

In short, Ear of the Golden Dragon is the usual 90s OVA mix of sex, violence, and nonsense. The sex scenes are reasonably graphic for a non-hentai anime, there are buckets of blood, and the plot makes no sense at all. Not every 90s OVA can be Sanctuary. A "deeper" (or more scathing) review can be found here.

Moho Kareshi translated the dialog. Iri, who recently joined the group, translation checked the dialog and translated the songs. ninjacloud timed, I edited and typeset, calyrica and konnakude QCed. The raws were encoded by Erik of Piyo Piyo Productions from his own Japanese laserdiscs.

Morikawa Toshiyuki, who plays Kiroemon, has had leads roles in Gallery Fake and all three series of Junjou Romantica, but he's best known to me as Panda Mama in Shirokuma Cafe.Hisakaya Awa, who plays Kanako, has had a long career of featured roles, including Skuld in all the Ah! My Goddess shows. The script doesn't give them much to work with, but they survived and went on to better things.

Here's a contemporary advertisement for the show:

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.

Ear of the Golden Dragon isn't top drawer material, but it isn't the worst 90s OVA you might watch either.

Orphan Fansubs Status Update

St. Michaela, Take 2

We're Off to See the Wizard...

Hi-Speed Jecy

Bavi Stock

Tokimeki Tonight, Take 2

High School Agent

Sanctuary

2015 in Review

Checking a Release

Next Senki Ehrgeiz

Falcom Gakuen S2

Uncle C Needs You! (Recruiting)

Code:Breaker OVAs

Joker: Marginal City

Princess Kaguya

Saiyuuki (1960)

Simplifying File Names

Chuumon no Ooi Ryouriten (1994)

Preposterous! (Ear of the Golden Dragon)