Getting home, this afternoon, I picked up my mail, as I usually do, hoping to find some lyrical epistle from a secret admirer. Alas, as always, there was no such joy to be found. I had to content myself with some bills and a flyer from a local brothel. Nothing exceptional… Oh but wait, there’s something else!
It was a little booklet, the likes of which I had never seen before. The front page was graced with a rather clumsy drawing. Living in the land of manga I could hardly believe anyone would have the gall to print such a hatchet job when so many talented draughtsmen go hungry.
I opened it and started reading… I found inside the ramblings of a raving lunatic illustrated by a six year-old bad-tripping on LSD. I was frightened but then it dawned on me: I was holding in my hands a genuine Japanese Chick tract!
You know, if it wasn’t for the SDMB I wouldn’t have known about Jack Chick. Until now, he was some sort of character from faraway lands lacking any sort of actual reality.
I just showed it to some friends and had a hard time convincing them that this wasn’t just a lone schizophrenic patient with a laser printer. I have to admit, though that the translation to Japanese really brings out the crazy. Especially with evolution being less than a non-issue here, this sort of propaganda is just frightening people away from Christianity.
Eh, whoever put that in my mailbox, I really have to wonder what they were thinking.
I would bet that a booklet like that might have a LITTLE more impact in Japan if it didn’t depict a bunch of WHITE people yammering back and forth. Particularly, the guy arguing the booklet’s point of view is WHITER THAN WHITE – he makes Pat Buchanan look like Malcolm X. Could the artist, if he wasn’t willing to go the extra mile and produce an Asian version of the strip, at least color the guy’s hair in and make him look less like a member of the Hitler Youth?
On the list of things this tract got wrong this is far behind its crime on draughtsmanship and the fact that its hysterical attack on something that is universally unchallenged makes it sound like it’s coming from some deranged cult leader… Oh wait, that’s too far off the mark, I guess.
Actually, I shudder to imagine what East Asian characters would look like.
Sure, Chick’s insane, but you had already made that point; I wanted to say something other than, “Me, too!”
A “crime on draughtsmanship”? You know, I’ve been on this board for several years and have enjoyed many a thread tearing down Chick tracts, but you’re the first person I can recall who really had a big problem with the quality of the artwork. Then again, maybe a lot of other people do also, but forget to express it because they are too amused/reviled by the message to think about anything else.
Oh yes, I understand that these are just translated (by volunteers) but you’re right that the choice of characters doesn’t help at all.
Actually, I recall jokes being made about his shitty skills. In the context, though, it’s an important point. Manga is big here, it’s not just big, it’s everywhere. It’s absolutely normal to try to sell a religion using comics. However, his drawing is so abominably sub-par for Japan that there’s no way in hell (HAW HAW) he’s ever going to convince anyone with that rag.
You can definitely have some adventures in Gifu. I had an exciting experience in a “club” in the Yanagasi (sp?) district on one of my first trips to Gifu. The next day, after telling my story about having to pay $40.00 for one beer, my Japanese counterparts explained the difference between Yanagasi east and Yanagasi west. (I’m not sure what I would have gotten for the $300.00 they wanted, but at least the girls were hotties!)
Yeah, Chick really should have a special tract for Japan. Something like…
Cover- Heroic silhoutte against white backgroung with red rising sun. Title The Real Hero
(NOTE- This tract would have to have two panels on most pages. I dislike straying from the original one panel per page format, but what are ya gonna do?)
First Panel-Oni, Zoanoids, and members of Team Rocket menace a quivering crowd of innocents. “Now, you’re ours! Hah Hah”
Second Panel-Big explosion and sound effects
Third Panel-We see Ultra Ranger Scout Man standing amidst the rubble of a fallen wall.
Fourth Panel- The crowd, we see huge smiles and several women doing the standard manga puppy love face. “Ultra Ranger Scout Man! We are saved!”
Fifth Panel- Oni, Zoanoids, and Team Rocket. All are terrified and have a single, giant drop of sweat on their foreheads. “Ultra Ranger Scout Man! We Are Doomed!”
Sixth Panel- URSM lets loose with an energy ray “Heroic Bright Blast!”
Seventh Panel- A Zoanoid goes down. Its eyes are large X’s.
Eighth Panel-URSM hurling a spinning object “Brave Heart Boomerang!”
Ninth Panel-An oni is knocked off its feet by the boomerang.
Tenth Panel- URSM shooting his fists from his arms “Fists Of Justice”
Eleventh Panel- Flying crowd of baddies, all comically bruised and tilted.
Twelfth Panel- Crowd “Oh, thank you Ultra Ranger Scout Man!”
Thirteenth Panel- URSM salutes the crowd and flies off.
Fourteenth Panel-URSM sits in his lair, playing a video game and eating ramen(Which is perched precariously on the console). Thought bubble “Super powers, the love of my fans, and an X Station console! What more could anyone need?”
Fifteenth Panel- URSM spills the ramen on the X Station. There are sparks and smoke.
Sixteenth Panel-URSM Standing on clouds. In front of him is a man with a large glowing book. The man is fat, bald, and has a head larger than his torso. URSM “Wha!? Where Am I?”
Seventeenth Panel- “You’re dead and stand in judgement. This book will tell me if you can get into Heaven”
Eighteenth Panel- URSM, his head tilted to one side, a big grin on his face “Heaven?! Eternity with babe angels!” Tiny visions of Dojin babes with wings and halos dance around the last words.
Nineteenth Panel-Bald guy “Not for you. You never did the important thing.” URSM"Wha!?"
Twentieth Panel- BG “You never acknowledged the real hero- Jesu Chan!”
TwentyFirst Panel-Space, a demon with burning eyes, claws, fangs, and tentacles reaches out to take the planet in his claw. “All men, every one, were damned by sin.”
TwentySecond Panel-Jesu Chan riding his transforming angel cycle down towards the waiting womb Mary “But G-d so loved us, he sent his only son, Jesu Chan, to save us.”
TwentyThird Panel-“Jesu Chan suffered and died to free us from sin.” Jesu Chan wearing his Lightning Thorn Crown, and mounted on his Pokecross is using his Perfect Sacrifice move to drive out the devil.
TwentyFourth Panel-BG angry, a big, throbbing X vein on his forehead, spit flying from his mouth “But YOU never accepted Jesu Chan! No heaven for you!”
TwentyFifth Panel- URSM terrified “But what about all my good deeds?”
TwentySixth Panel-BG “Good deeds can’t save you from sin. Jesu Chan is the only one who can save you.”
TwentySeventh Panel-BG pulling lever, a trapdoor opening under URSM
TwentyEighth Panel- Demons with many large phallic tentacles surrounding the terrified URSM.
TwentyNinth Panel-Darkness with some large characters ‘Hurt’ ‘Pain’ ‘Fear’ and ‘Tentacle Rape’
Inside Back Cover- If you want to defeat the sin monster, you must accept Jesu Chan! Say “Oh Jesu Chan, I accept you as my savior! Enter my heart and use your Saviour Power to take away my sin! I want to digivolve into one of your followers!”
ArrMatey!, according to my Japanese friends, the difference is that the clubs on one side are run by the Yakuza (Japanese mafia). These clubs have girls for rent and all kinds of shows. The other side has regular clubs. I didn’t realize when I went in (everything was in Japanese) that it was going to cost me $300.00. All I wanted was a beer. Gifu is (by Japanese standards) a small city and nobody in the club spoke English. I finally got them to understand that I didn’t want a girl or a show so they charged me $40.00 for a beer and threw me out.
Panel 6 - at least on the English version , the unbubbled words at the left of the frame say “HAW HAW” - I’m not sure how faithfully it has been translated though.
In the Japanese version of “The Long Trip,” the phrase “Haw Haw Haw” is translated quite differently. But in this case, the phrase is in a speech balloon instead of just being background noise, so I would guess that the translator was a little more rigorous about how it was translated.
The “Haw Haw Haw” in “The Long Trip” comes right at the end, incidentally.
It reads “hou hou”. In The Long Trip, the devil says: “ha ha ha”. Neither sound like laughing.
Gifu city is certainly no metropolis. It is, however, one of the three capitals of sex, or so I have been told. There are not one, but two red light districts, one of which being Yanagase. Together they occupy a very important chunk of the downtown area. The western side of Yanagase is sleazier, though the eastern side is pretty sleazy also.