The group discussion

The focus group discussion of the non-expert group was launched by an extensive list of complaints by B. The overall experience of watching the film had apparently been unpleasant and disappointing for her: the story had no plot, it had too many visual elements, too many sound effects and it was difficult to concentrate and that one of the characters was called

“woman” at least twice. She was not interrupted once during these statements and she seemed not to evoke any particular reactions from the others by her comments. The negative notions made by B did not extent to translation or subtitles in any way. This negative stance could also indicate that B had not been particularly attentive during viewing. After B’s initial comments, A offered a more positive review by stating that the film, apparently in her mind thinkable as light entertainment, was “perfect for Sundays” and ideal when one does not want to think of anything in particular. When prompted further as to what feelings it evoked to learn that they are about to see an animated film, informant A thought of it as “lovely,”

something else for a change.

In general, A and B were the most active participants throughout the discussion. When prompted about any further views concerning the films reception, informant A had noted particularly that it was difficult to retrieve any specific elements from the film. She also stated that, since the informants had not received any preceding instructions, she did not know what to look for. B immediately agreed and presented an extensive list of potential viewpoints:

where the informants supposed to follow the plot of the film, the characters, their personalities, their way of speaking, the English and dialect or perhaps the connection between the translation and the original dialogue and how it had been translated? Again, she presented these views without evoking noticeable reactions from the rest of the group.

Later on B continued to express her general feelings of rejection by stating that she never watches television or animations and in fact detests them and that it was difficult for her to watch the film. She continued by stating that she could not, in the first place, relate to the position of potential spectators of such a film which, according to her, was childish and better aimed at “pre-teen age boys” and that the very idea of watching a film of this type is strange.

But, since they are produced and distributed in the first place, there must be a demand. None of these views created any discussion or further arguments from others.

As for any amusing instances during viewing, two particular scenes were mentioned, one by B and another by A. B mentioned a scene with two robot characters: a famous robot actor, Calculon, is lying alone in his bed while he suddenly learns that he is not alone. In the bed he finds another robot, a fan named Bender. Calculon asks who he is:

Example 15.

Speaker Original Translation

Calculon Who are you? Kuka olet?

Bender Bender, your biggest fan. Bender. Suurin fanisi.

Calculon Are you going to murder me? Aiotko murhata minut?

Bender Unlikely. In my mind we’re

(Bender presents a crude, self-made diorama of the two characters together) Calculon Sir, your derangement is

According to B, the very idea of someone being appointed as someone else’s official stalker could not be done in real life and the scene exaggerated a terrible and serious thing. She uttered a colloquial Finnish translation stalkkeri for the original English wordstalker. Such a word was not present in the subtitles as it was translated asvainoaja; consequently she based this word on the original, spoken language. The reason for this could simply be that the English word stalker happened to be more memorable for her during this particular instance

than the Finnish translation. She also pointed out that this was the only funny instance she could think of.

A, on the other hand, mentioned a scene that she found amusing. The scene included one of the particularities of the world of both the Futurama-series and the films: a suicide booth.

This means a particular booth resembling a telephone booth available on the street for the general public which offers methods for committing suicide. One character enters the booth and places his order for a particular kind of suicide. Suddenly, the floor of the booth opens and the character falls into a secret location. The voice of the booth declares while automatically printing a receipt:

Example 16.

Speaker Original Translation

Suicide booth You are now dead. Please, take your receipt.

Sinä olet kuollut nyt. Ota kuittisi, pyydän.

Informant A gave an approximate Finnish translation remembering that the suicide booth had declared “you are dead.” These were the only noticeably amusing scenes mentioned and they did not evoke further reactions or discussion.

As for unpleasant notions of the film, the informants were invited to express any emotions that truly would have made them react strongly. Informant A mentioned one particular scene unpleasant. One of the characters, a generically built marine character, vomits twice. This is because, as he mentions, he has two stomachs, one for fresh water and one for salt water.

According to A, she personally disliked any display of vomiting be it by a living actor or an animated character. B had found the vomiting scene more amusing but did not approve the suicide booth, as committing suicide is something so “final.” She also mentioned a scene with shooting lasers that really hurt her eyes and she had to look the other way. In response to B, A found the suicide booth-scene amusing and thought of it as a “brilliant joke.” These opposite views by the two particularly talkative informants neither evoked debate nor reactions from the two other members of the group.

Informant B mentioned that the film had no outside narrator and that it was based on interaction and communication between characters speaking casual, not formal language.

Whether she referred to the original dialogue or the subtitles or both of them did not become clear. But the subtitles were not, as a whole, constructed in a particularly casual manner. Yet it would appear, based on her general viewing behavior during the film, that she had not been particularly attentive and was coerced to watch the film and to discuss it afterwards.

Informant A mentioned that, as the characters appeared to represent several ethnicities, no stereotypes were apparently brought forward during the course of the story.

When asked if anything remained unclear in the film, no comments about the language or translation came up in the conversation: informant A stated that the film was not to be explained rationally. C simply mentioned that one should be familiar with the series, otherwise something could remain unclear.

As for the linguistic structure of the subtitles, the initial remarks suggest that the structure of the subtitles in general was not seen as particularly problematic. When asked whether the subtitles were helpful in understanding the film, informant A commented that there were, in her opinion, no complicated phrases and that the original English language was simple. C stated that she would have been able to understand the main points of the film and, at worst, a couple of jokes could have remained not understood. According to B, the film contained some amusing phrasing and the subtitles allowed to see how they were translated into Finnish.

What she meant by “amusing” did not become entirely clear, but she mentioned an example where the subtitles did provide help in comprehending an instance: a phrase by one of the characters Sally in the alley (the complete original expression was Sweet Sally in the alley) was translated, according to B as something like Voi hyvänen aika (roughly ‘Oh my goodness.’) (Actually the phrase was translated as Voi herranjumala meaning roughly ‘Oh my God.’) According to D, general screaming and shouting is not always understandable in animations but they do not have to be understood word-for-word. She could not think of any specific examples from the film.

When asked whether there were any instances where the subtitles did not help at all, there was an initial silence in the group. Then D mentioned that, according to her, the subtitles are not helpful only when the translation is completely wrong. According to D, subtitles occasionally contain misspellings. She could not, however, think of an example from the film. Instead, she mentioned the original translation of the slogan The truth is out there from the television

series The X-files. As D pointed out, the slogan was originally translated rather literally as Totuus on tuolla ulkona, which could be regarded as unnatural use of Finnish similarly to, say, the unidiomatic Finnish word lomanen as a translation for mini-break in Tuominen’s (2012: 162) study.

When prompted to think of any potential instances where the subtitles could have been thought of as entirely wrong and generally invited to point out any potential errors, only three examples of concrete errors were brought up during the conversation, all mentioned by C. In one scene, Bender, a robot character, enters the suicide booth mentioned earlier. The booth asks him how he would like to die:

Example 17.

Speaker Original Translation

Suicide booth Please select mode of death. Valitse kuolintapa.

Bender Clumsy bludgeoning, please. Kömpelö nuijinta, kiitos.

Suicide booth You have selected clumsy

According to the original dialogue, Bender accepts the offer as a “treat.” However, the English expression to treat oneself is completely misunderstood and the Finnish translation tells something completely different: Bender refuses the offer and decides to scoop out his eyes himself. C did state that she was not certain as to what was precisely said apparently neither in English nor in Finnish, but the fact that it had been the center of attention does suggest that it was, in one way or another, memorable and probably problematic.

Other observations made by C included, in particular, retained English words in the Finnish subtitles:Mom andBigboots. These were evidently very noticeable. The wordMom referring to someone’s mother was retained in the translation as if it were a given name. C asked why such a simple word had been retained. In example 18, Amy is talking on the telephone with

her mother. Amy’s husband has recently died and the mother asks why Amy is feeling sad.

Amy replies:

Example 18.

Speaker Original Translation

Amy My husband died, Mom. Mieheni kuoli, Mom.

Another retained word, Bigboots, was mentioned in a scene where Bender addresses Leela, a character who characteristically always wears boots. Bender greets her by saying:

Example 19.

Speaker Original Translation

Bender What’s up, Bigboots? Miten menee, Bigboots?

Informant A actively agreed to this, as she apparently had noticed it as well. It would then appear that the retained expression had caused confusion and processing to whoever had noticed it. However, informant A expressed uncertainty regarding this scene and seemed to be open to the possibility of a character having been mentioned by name. She apparently believed that this was possible.

Despite the general and active rejection of the product by B, she stated, in the same context of rejecting the film and the idea of watching such films, that she believed that the film was appropriately translated. It was remarkable to discover that this very argument, which is at the center of this study, evoked no apparent reactions from others. In other words, after this comment none of the other informants were specifically willing to criticize the alleged appropriateness of the translation. D, too, did not deem the quality of the subtitles bad, but she complained that the translation was occasionally not particularly lively. C seemingly agreed and referred to an example mentioned earlier by B, the expression Sally in the alley. There was no certainty as to how it had been translated word-for-word, but the remembered translation Voi hyvänen aika was seen as less vivid (the actual Finnish translation was Voi herranjumala, which loosely means ‘Oh my God’).

B, despite her seemingly negative sentiments, did aptly point out that things cannot always be translated in the same way in every language as certain things only exist in one language and not in another. Consequently something sounds more amusing and better in one language than in another.

When asked to point out any potential scenes or items that would evoke any comments concerning anything linguistic, the language, as a whole, evoked very little criticism.

Informant A described the language as clear by presentation. She did, however, specify that, according to her, there was no continuous screaming present and that she had not heard anything particularly striking. Apparently she meant that, in her opinion, animated films often contain screaming. Whether this lack of screaming or “not hitting the ears” referred to the subtitles or the original dialogue of the film did not become entirely apparent, but such a serene view did not, in any case, cause any criticism or further comments from the other members, which does suggest that this point of view, whether related to the source language or its translation, was not rejected by others and that the general linguistic quality, as a whole, was deemed generally appropriate.

Interestingly, A also mentioned that she believed that the sentence structure is generally shorter in animations than in films featuring human characters. Because of this perceived shortness of sentences, there would probably, according to A, not be that many mistranslations or “bloopers” in the translations of animations. This created quiet acceptance and nodding in the group without arguments or further comments. Consequently, despite all of the examples of questionable translation solutions, the overall quality was not rejected and it was seemingly deemed acceptable as a whole.

The fact that the informants were unable to take notes during viewing came up in the discussion particularly by B, who found the situation frustrating and mentioned, in accordance with A, that it was difficult to recollect things afterwards. A mentioned having noticed things during watching, but that she could only recollect a few instances afterwards. This apparently raised silent agreement in the group.