After 14 long years, we’ve finally released what has to be the definitive edition of Yawara! A Fashionable Judo Girl for the English-speaking world. You can’t get this series anywhere else in this format thanks to licensing hell. And for this release post, what better way to commemorate this milestone than to engage in some painfully boring and navel-gazing oral history?
If you recall, the Yawara digital fansub project started with the 2003 release by Live-Evil. Those subs were based on earlier VHS fansubs released by the groups Newtype Animation and Neko Creations. Froth-Bite led by the translator Sylf joined the Live-Evil project partway through, then the series was officially suspended at the midway point in 2009, in deference to AnimEigo’s license. But AnimEigo released only one 40-episode DVD box set then quit, so that meant the fansubbers had to rescue the series again. (Thank god I bought the box set when it came out, because now the price has doubled or quadrupled in value depending on where you look, lel)
In 2011, Saizen decided to join the joint with Live-Evil and Froth-Bite, thus giving birth to the “FroZen-EviL” label. Because I was a fan of Yawara purely because I was an utter degenerate (if you know, you know), I jumped at the chance to join the new joint as a quality checker. Unfortunately, the previous translator Sylf was unavailable because he was burned out by K-On of all things (maybe). Another translator (Urasawa, aka blakbunnie27) stepped in and translated one episode before dropping it, so I volunteered to take over the translation and the rest was history.
Now fansubbing the DVD took a shorter amount of time (2011-2013) because there was no typesetting apart from the last episode—everything was \an8 just like the simulcasts. This project could have never gotten off the ground without the generous support of our quality checker ConsiderPhlebas, aka CP the ultimate anime fan who bought us the R2 DVDs that none of us unemployed NEETs could ever afford.
CP went ahead and did one better and bought us the R2 Blu-ray box set for some ungodly amount, so two years later in 2015, we decided to go ahead and redo the series in all of its 720 vertical pixel glory. By that time, I had learned how to typeset, so I stupidly agreed to take on that role and give the fansubs that added value (?) That was on top of the double duty of translation checking the scripts.
Then, tragically, on this month in 2015, our friend Olle Morell (CP) lost his lengthy battle with bladder cancer and departed from this earthly realm. With his passing, the Yawara BD fansub became a memorial project in celebration of his life and legacy.
This project took a full decade to complete in large part because I stopped being a quasi-NEET and became a full-time salaryman with less hours and energy to spare. But I’m glad I kept at it, and it was a small miracle that most of the team we had back in 2015 remained intact to this present day, despite the delays. I truly hope CP is proud that we kept his memory alive to the end.
So without further ado, my shout-out to the teams who made the Yawara fansub a reality. The list, which may or may not be exhaustive, includes those from the Live-Evil solo project and the Live-Evil/Froth-Bite joint:
• Translation: Hiroko Hatanaka-Sukoenig, Anastasia Shimabuku Moreno, tofusensei, Sylf, blakbunnie27, kokujin-kun
• Timing: Juggen, sangofe, ninjacloud, Skr, Neko-chan, Sylf
• Editing: Collectr, Mamo-chan, Yoshu-sama, Neko-chan, Michael Studte
• Typesetting: tanman508, tofusensei, gumbaloom, kokujin-kun
• QC: CP, Juggen, Mamo-chan, Saji, Rosti, TougeWolf, sangofe, Moelancholy, Ayanami, retro, Skr, tlynnec, it06128, BeeBee, Ironman, konnakude
• Karaoke: Juggen, tanman508
• Muxing and release: Sqall, Juggen, FD
• Encoding (DVDs): Skr, toster, gumbaloom, digitize
• Encoding (BDs): Suzaku
• Raws: CP (R2J DVDs and BDs)
• Special thanks to: convexity
• Not-so-special thanks to: bmfrosty
[FroZen-EviL]_Yawara_-_118_-_124_[720p][Blu-Ray].mkv
MD5: n/a
