...This show is such a masterpiece in comedy that I’m soooo very fracking happy that they’ve done a dub that I can watch when I just want to chillax. Voice acting is A+, and there’s no probs with rewatching this show once every half a decade (after I’ve forgotten the actual gags, ...mostly..., but am dying for the nostalgia!). Such a comfort show for me... :3
Well, this ‘Dubbed Nichijou’ is a work of art, so even if it’s one of those “super slow slice of life comedies”, I don’t even care. The gags are perfectly timed and artfully setup (so much so that I find myself dutifully noting how Nichijou times and arranges their jokes for the sake of my own), so I grow every time I watch this show. Besides: you can tell that Nichijou was a work of passion/project of love, so even if the alternative is a ‘modern anime’, Nichijou kicks the shit out of just about everything in terms of comedy (... though I loved that Highschool Boys show), so I can’t even blame “nostalgia” for wanting to rewatch this!
Regardless though: Nichijou really is a journey, huh. So many moments I wouldn’t normally sit through, that I happily endure for the guaranteed payoff - like that arm wrestling gag that’s soooo very-close to being awkward but genius’ly pulls it off! The whole show ends up pulling through every time, which is what differentiates itself from ‘the status quo’ for me. Man... an English Dub... I’m soooo happy, ahaha.
Great times, and classic hits - namely, Nichijou! ’Rejoice!’ for, more excuses to rewatch this golden, unique gift! I mean, it’s not like we have many options. Anime-comedy might make me smile, but nothing makes me pray to the Lords of Fawn like Nichijou does. :D
Anyway. I know when I first watched the first 5 episodes, I dropped this show. With the English Dub now available, things have changed (... I think...); so, this show is way more accessible to English audiences now! After all: I think one of the major issues with Japanese Anime Comedy is their ‘flow’. The ‘flow’ (or ‘pacing’) of comedy is extremely important—but equally so is “how they feel”. Nichijou grew on me when I finally stopped dropping it and forced myself to watch the whole thing (... admittedly, I was in a “mood” that day (lol, “day”? Nice confession la... “A day well-spent” though, right? ...right?)...) ... ... -_- , Anyway... After a certain point, everything ‘fell into place’, and I began loving the show instead of finding it ‘inwardly’ exacerbatingly-boring. I didn’t know why, at the time, that I couldn’t appreciate such a widely loved series—but I get it now. Even for someone like me who’s watched/read over a good 400-600+ series [dont double-check that fact, I don’t record everything since I’m a spazz xP], I still had problems “translating the jokes”... Yes, at a certain point, it no longer mattered—but!, that wasn’t how I felt when watching the dub of the first several episodes (ya know, up ‘till it eventually fixes itself through ‘accumulation of xxx - be it ‘how much we’ve sunk into the show’, or ‘how they utilise ongoing gags to amplify later gags’, or, unbelievably for an episodic comedy-slice of life, ‘significance of context built through storytelling and/or world-building, aka “context & setting payoff”’), and I really put that down to ‘the feeling’.
Comedy relies on “connection” and/or “friendship” - that is, a joke relies on garnering your “good side” when it’s the type of joke you’d call ‘friendly’ (that is, as there’s cynical jokes and many others that either don’t need this prerequisite or, conversely, want the opposite) - and, unfortunately (for the Jap version), Nichijou is to be considered a “loving jokester”... :/ . As a result, being in another language demands another set of “cultural utensils” for ‘Joking Around’ to be understood at a “1:1 ratio”, so to speak; there is genuinely a ‘language barrier’ with Nichijou (or so I am inclined to exclaim)! [...And exclaim I shall!] {Hail! The Lord of Fawn!}
... In other words: be you a ‘first-timer’ with Nichijou, or be you someone who dropped it because it “felt like hard work”, I promise you it won’t feel like “hard work” now that it’s in our native tongue! See, that’s the difference. Nichijou was meant to be ‘light humour with a genius punch&timing’, but it couldn’t ‘be that’ when we’re working hard to make sense of a constant stream of subtitles, fast-moving images with complicated gestures aligned with the punchlines, etc (whilst paying attention to the subtitles + grammatical implications + (intentional yet unofficial, thus ‘subjective’) significance of the Translator in/at their wording, whilst watching the ‘moving images’ onscreen and whatnot - aka TONS of either superfluous or potentially-significant information that we can only GUESS AT in the moment.... THIS IS ~NOT~ HOW NICHIJOU IS ~MEANT~ TO BE APPRECIATED! No, in fact, it’s the opposite—thus therein lies the problem). ...
[breathes deeply]
...Just try Nichijou when it’s a relaxing, light-hearted show that... that...
...that BLOODY-WELL FEELS LIKE A LIGHT-HEARTED SHOW - instead of all the ‘hard work’ that neeeeeedlessly goes into ’interpreting’ it! Seriously, we’ve been doing this wrong this ENTIRE TIME! Like you hope you never hear a date say to you: “it’s not you - I really mean it - it’s... it’s... me...”. Look, we never had many alternatives, right? How were we to know better? But look here: by now most of us understand the difference between ‘entertainment that makes you think (and maybe even learn/enlighten)’ and ‘junkfood entertainment, aka brain-autopilot’. Then, what if you’re constantly juggling the act of ‘reading subtitles’ with ‘also trying to interpret scenes/gestures/human reactions’ AND ‘the audio/vocal significance of another Language AND Culture’? That’s right: it becomes ‘entertainment that makes you think’. Beyond that too, I’ve already said this, but for the sake of my case: Comedy is about ‘timing’ and ‘emotion’ as well as ‘connection to audience (like becoming or being our friend, even) and relatability/personal-understanding’. ... With all due respect, I can’t do that with another language EVEN AFTER all the time I’ve spent with anime, manga, and light-novels. It’s just not... natural to me. I can do the translation bit, but I won’t know the “nuances” unless I can speak it myself. ...This.Is.A.Big.Deal. From a light-hearted show that just “rolls off the tongue” to the equivalent of an ”art-expose of high-society” - we are... just.simply.doing.this.wrong. Well, this was at least a revelation to me and it’s changed how I see and view ‘Dubbed Anime’ altogether - well, but suit yourself of course.
PS: I was intoxicated during my review of Nichijou - that is, the entirety of Nichijou. It.... was amazing. I loved every second, every scene. .... Err, well, I was intoxicated here too. Frankly, thus this started as a response to ‘the discussion on MAL for episode 3’, ahaha. It just became too passionate as I realised how different Nichijou felt when it was Dubbed, and that there’s not enough people discussing the significant change of Nichijou with this God-Send Dub! Please, I know how boring and cr@p the first, ...well, potentially the first 10 episodes can be, but I genuinely believe that this is an issue of native tongue vs interpretation vs ”sync with language”. This show speaks for itself, and there’s nothing I can say besides celebrating how hilarious, relaxing, and enjoyable this show is as nothing else is really significant - genuinely. Watch this show in Dub after work or before sleep - you’ll thank and love me for this tidbit later, I guarantee you!!! :3
Hint: If the score system is “retentive-bs” to you, skip this enclosed space.
——————
[Oh, in case you’re annoying, ‘Story=6’ is because, “well derrr”, there’s hardy one in an episodic comedy! Sigh, why don’t you know that la? What? “Just set it to 10 then”? Gosh, take your idiosyncrasies over to an episode of Nichijou and relax a little - honestly, now we both need it. :3 (... I’m still not changing a ‘technicality’ though - ~“episodic shows” deserve a punch to the ’nerve-central’ for betraying the !TRUST! and !EXPECTATIONS! of The Great MAL-senpai!!!~)
{Hail Fawn-sama For Forgiveness}
...takeahint.exe]
———
— {Bless the Lords of Fawn, and bless whomever is responsible for the Dub of Nichijou} —
Enjoy this gift, cos we damn-well never get animation quality or retrospective, goofy comedy that you can fall asleep to, ever - as in, fracking ever! It might be a long time till the next “Nichijou” too. ... Don’t let this gift perpetually be misplaced as anything but ‘the greatest anime comedy to relax thoughtlessly or fall asleep to’—seriously, if you (now) watch this properly, ie the way it would have been for native audiences, you’ll absolutely (spiritually) thank me later.
10/10, easily. If 11 was possible, it’d be my privilege to see Nichijou detonate MAL too - its overall perfection deserves no less!
