PP: custommasked aa, dehalo, denoise, deband, regrain
Audio and subs are modified Crunchyroll
Source-Encode Comparison

It turns out that the moment the officials cannot copy the novels word for word, they fall apart in many different ways. I edited all the lines that made no sense in context of the animation or that were plain nonsense. Also, we do actually have song translations, but chose not to put them during these in-episode songs as things become too cluttered with the credits, dialogue, and songs all at the same time. Should that apply to every episode, songs will just be included in batch. Anyway, this episode was very fun.

Should I watch this adaptation, or should I watch the 1979 one instead?
This new adaptation makes no attempt at replacing the previous anime adaptation. Whereas Takahata’s interpretation was very faithful to the source material, this adaptation cuts a lot of content in order to streamline the narrative and up the pace, and will likely cover much more content (the first episode covers five episodes worth of content in the 1979 adaptation). The previous adaptation has a much more restrained storyboard and presentation and focuses on preserving the brilliance of the source’s writing; this new adaptation has a much flashier storyboard and colours, and far more expressive character animation. Takahata’s take on the work placed much more importance on letting each scene linger, resulting in storytelling that is more affecting, subtle, yet grave, and its designs are stripped of the common shoujo flair of the time. This adaptation has a much lighter tone, is rewritten to be more humorous and fun, but foregoes much of the detail in the source which make up its brilliance in favour of a more lighthearted and immediate way of storytelling.

They are fundamentally different approaches. Fans of the previous adaptation may find some of these changes disagreeable (I know I do), but they are purposeful. And I think that is for the best. There already exists a meticulous and faithful adaptation of the source material, directed by one of the all-time greats, so trying to do the same thing again would be pointless. Either way, both approaches are great. I highly recommend you watch both. (A little birdie told me there may or may not be a new 1979 release in the near future…)

Encode, QC, “Edit”: Moelancholy
Styling, Timing, Typesetting: Nyarthur

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