3

Near the beginning of the second episode of Hitori no Shita: The Outcast, Baobao reads out details about her new identity as a student supposedly from Taiwan to Zhang Chulan. In the Chinese version of the episode that I saw, Baobao's Mandarin Chinese pronunciation in this specific segment sounds very non-standard. (Elsewhere, her pronunciation sounds normal.) Zhang Chulan in fact remarks that she is speaking 四川话 (i.e. Sichuanese).

Is there any mirroring of this use of a regional language variant in the Japanese dub? If I remember correctly, the subtitles on Crunchyroll, which broadcast the Japanese dub, only have Zhang Chulan indicate that Baobao is lying, but which makes me suspect not. However, as I do not know Japanese, I would like for someone to perhaps confirm this.

Maroon
  • 14,564
  • 14
  • 71
  • 137

1 Answers1

3

I watched the first three episodes of Hitori no Shita, and can confirm that Baobao speaks plain old standard Japanese (hyoujungo), with not a hint of any regional lect. In episode 2, Chulan indeed only states that the details she's reading out are obvious lies.

(It came as a surprise when I learned that she spoke a non-standard variety in the Chinese audio version. Kinda strange that they wouldn't similarly pick a non-standard variety of Japanese for the Japanese version.)

senshin
  • 35,088
  • 25
  • 142
  • 247
  • For what it's worth, I dropped the series after two or three episodes, but my impression was that her pronunciation outside of that specific section was more normal. – Maroon Sep 18 '16 at 14:21
  • 1
    @Maroon Ah, I see. That makes sense - I'm guessing this is funny in Chinese because you wouldn't expect a person from Taiwan to speak Sichuanese? (But there's no stereotype for what a "Japanese-speaker from Taiwan" sounds like, so the joke wouldn't translate.) – senshin Sep 18 '16 at 14:24