Dark Horse vs. Hawks

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rubberchicken
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Dark Horse vs. Hawks

Post by rubberchicken »

I read most of Berserk via that Hawks' fan translations, but I've been steadily replacing them with the official Dark Horse version (aside from the elusive vol. 15, I have everything up to the fight with Ganishka's monsters on the beach). Since then, I've noticed quite a few differences in the translation. Aside from some matters of word choice, and a few obvious flubs (like having the King of Midland knight the entire Band of the Hawk, rather than just its unit commanders), there are still places where the official version and the fan version say completely different things, such that you have to wonder what the original was like.

In volume 14, while Guts fights the pig Apostle, the Dark Horse version has Godo worrying that Guts' new sword isn't up to fighting monsters like this - which makes sense when you consider that the sword breaks on the very next page. The Hawks version, on the other hand, seems to have him in awe of the Apostle's unnatural... Apostle-ness:

DH: "This is bad... I doubt it would nick, no matter how many people he cut with it... but I didn't make that.. for cuttin' inhuman things!"

Hawks: "To think of how many men it must've killed, it's got too many damn teeth... How could such a thing have been made? It's an inhuman killer!"



Later in Vol. 14, when Jill chases Guts and apologizes for not warning him after he's been chased out of the village:

DH: "No kidding. Thanks to that, I missed out on some valuable info."

Hawks: "Forget it. You gave us a lot of other useful information." (Completely opposite meanings, here.)



Then in Vol. 16, during Jill's monologue at the end of the Lost Children chapter...

DH: "Maybe the fluid from that cocoon he doused me with, mixed with Rosine's blood, washed away my childhood."

Hawks: "While she had me basking in that cocoon... some of Rosine's blood may have mixed with mine; maybe it will flow on in my own children."



There were other examples that jumped out at me while I read, but these are the only ones that spring to mind right now.

Does anybody know which of these were "closer" to the original? I didn't question them at all when I was reading the scanslations, but then when I bought the DH version, I kept stopping and thinking "wait a minute, that's not what he says!"
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DrPepperPro
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Re: Dark Horse vs. Hawks

Post by DrPepperPro »

Dark Horse is more reliable than haWks in general.

But I did check each of these just to see.
1. DH is correct.
2. DH is correct, I think. Hard to tell with Guts talking so casually.
3. DH is correct.
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uncempt
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Re: Dark Horse vs. Hawks

Post by uncempt »

I haven't got the raws to hand, but I'd bet those were all cases where the translators made up the end of sentences which were unfinished in the original. Word ordering is different so you can leave out the verbs in Japanese. The only alternative is to produce an unreadable script along the lines of "big one... nicks...? how...? killing...!?" which I don't think anyone would appreciate :) The advantage that obviously DH have is that they can ask Miura what was meant if they need to. Or look ahead and work out what fits best.
Triko
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Re: Dark Horse vs. Hawks

Post by Triko »

DrPepperPro wrote:Dark Horse is more reliable than haWks in general.

But I did check each of these just to see.
1. DH is correct.
2. DH is correct, I think. Hard to tell with Guts talking so casually.
3. DH is correct.
Good to know, the discrepancy of the translations between the old hawks and Dark Horse has been nagging at me for awhile too. I deleted all those old manga scanlations long ago, and just rely on the Dark Horse versions.
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Sandman
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Re: Dark Horse vs. Hawks

Post by Sandman »

Necro :twisted:

So I picked up Volume 38 for Christmas and I noticed that the studio changed and some other little things like type size and font of the lettering... anyone else notice?
Image
Thank you sir, may I have another :twisted: :whip:
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