A reassurance... hmm... sorta
So a little bird tells me that there's some rumblings over "space kitaaa" being left untranslated, or something.
The short response: It's just a promo, have a sense of humor. We may change it, we may not.
The long response: Normally when we leave stuff in Japanese, there's a sort of reasoning for why it's done that way. Either it's to keep in line with how we do things stylistically, or it works better to fit the Japanese nature of the show, or it's a joke that wouldn't work otherwise, etc.
When I woke up at the fine hour of 2 PM on Sunday, the Fourze promo was for the most part already done. Luna originally had that line as "Space, here I come!" which would have been perfectly fine. I wanted to use "Space is awesome!" since kita is the past tense of "kuru/to come", but it's also used as a generic sort of expression of elation, as many of you have seen in Densha Otoko.
So while talking with Magenta, I guess Luna decided to change the translation since she heard it was the tagline for the show. She asked me what I thought the new line should be, and I jokingly replied "Space kitaaa!" I mean, I just woke up super late and I had stuff to do, I'm not in super translation mode. And to my surprise, she liked it.
And this is where I defend that decision. When it comes to meaning, context is everything. In a show like Densha Otoko, where it's very much about Japanese culture and its slang, keeping kitaaa was very much fitting for the show. In a 15/30 second promo, there's really no telling what's going on when that line is said. I didn't think the guy saying it was in space, Luna did, etc. And while any number of translations could have gone in there, "space kitaaa" was a nice throwback to Japanese culture as it presents itself in these shows.
The translation will probably change when we find out more about what's going on in the scene. But... if kitaaa really fits and there's a good reason to keep it... or if people in general just like the way it sounds, sure, we might just keep it this way. Again, just a promo.
Finally, this was clearly all Mag's fault. Saboteur!
