Futatsu no Sokoku – Episode 2 END

The latter half of the special focuses on the Tokyo Trial that took place following the unconditional surrender of Japan in WWII. It puts a human element to the trial, showing not just the intense debate between the prosecution and the defense, but also the translators torn in between. It shows how the translators–often with ties to Japan–struggles with the responsibility, and ultimately the decision that falls upon the accused.

In the background of the Tokyo Trial, the drama unfolds around the surviving Japanese and Japanese-Americans living in Japan and each of their reactions. Some people like Charlie are taking advantage of the situation to increase his influence, while Tadashi is scraping by to live. Hiroko, working at the bombing hospital, faces countless bomb victims. The nail on the coffin for her was seeing her own sister get admitted to the hospital.

Translation Notes/Trivia

• In one part of the translation where Emmy asks Ken what he wants to eat and he says “soup”, the literal translation is “tea poured over rice.” It’s like a poor-man’s food, or very simple food, so I translated it to “soup”.

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Futatsu no Sokoku SP Part 2A [EN][Blitz].mkv
(960×540 | 00:51:54 | 337MB)

Futatsu no Sokoku SP Part 2B [EN][Blitz].mkv
(960×540 | 01:07:00 | 402MB)

Commentary

I had actually found out what happens to Kenji in the very beginning when I was researching character names. So all through the last portion of the episode, I kept waiting for “it” to happen and it was very stressful for me.

This drama was fantastic. I loved the focus it placed on human emotions and reactions to world events. I loved all the actors for showing the wide range of frustration and disappointment and anger that each of them felt in response to the world that’s out of their control. The conflict between the characters were very real and believable. (Heck, even today, we can see toxic relationships like the ones Ken and Emmy had, where both sides were at fault.)

One thing that really bothered me about this production is the use of English. I understand it was critical for several main characters to speak in English. However, the producers must not be very fluent in English because there were several times when actors had stuttered and they used it as-is. One of the reason why I decided to transcribe all the English was because half the actors’ English was very hard to understand.

I’m also very proud of the Chinese translation I did because 1) the Chinese speaker is actually Japanese, and his Chinese accent is horrible, and 2) I’ve only taken 3 years of Mandarin in high school.

Story: A
Actors: A
Cinematography: C