Japanese in Heroes - Part I
This video may contain SPOILERS. Don’t say I didn’t warn you!
1 - Hiro Nakamura (Masi Oka : solid 9)
2 - Ando Masahashi (James Kyson Lee : 8ish)
3 - Boss at Yamagato Industries (Tohoru Masamune : 10; flawlessly unintelligible)
Heroes is a fascinating drama if for no other reason than it prominently features English-subtitled Japanese language in segments of the show. (If you missed my deconstruction, take a minute to check it out if you like.) What’s more interesting is that very few of the actors speaking in Japanese actually grew up in Japan. In fact, by my count, only one did. Now that Heroes is gaining momentum with its sights set on Japan with Season 1, and since Season 2 has just premiered on September 24th elsewhere, I thought we could take a look at the use of Japanese in the show (during Season 1, obviously). Therefore, I’m releasing a series of videos to cover all of the Japanese speakers from Season 1. I trust that the brevity of the clips combined with my intention to comment about them makes this fair use. There is at least 15 minutes of footage from Heroes that I culled from Season 1 specifically to make these videos, though I’ve cut it as much as possible. When you add my commentary (which is as concise as I could make it…to the point that some might say it’s meaningless) the full playtime gets even longer - hence the separate posts. Rest assured, however, that you won’t be watching me chew at any point in this series. First, to preface the videos, I’m going to list the people who utter at least one word in Japanese, in order of their appearance in the series. For the post wherein the actors appear in the video clip, I’ve placed the actors’ names and my completely subjective (read: exaggerated) Japanese language rating on a scale of 1 to 10 in parentheses - 1 being lousy and 10 being stellar. (If I missed any Japanese speakers, PLEASE let me know in the comments.) Here goes nothing. By the way, you’ll see more of Hiro and Ando as the other videos are released. Just in case this video wasn’t long enough for some of you. Also, my commentary will grow and flesh out a bit as the series continues. Feel free to add some comments, as well!
Still to come:
4 - Detective Furakowa
5 - Charlie Andrews
6 - Kaito’s Assistant
7 - Kaito Nakamura
8 - Kimiko Nakamura
9 - Noah Bennet
10 - Claude Rains
The following YouTube clips are extra shenanigans, just for fun.
I came across this video at Japan Probe, which picked it up over at the Ying-Yang Report.
Come back soon for Part II. 