Dear VIZ Media,
Thank you for taking the time for reading this e-mail. I am contacting you in regards to the censorship in the vizkid’s edition of Pokémon Adventures (2nd edition).
My question is: why can you show: an Arbok being decapitated, a Nidoking’s eye being gouged out, rotting Zombie Pokémon, a joke about naughty tentacles, two Magmar being frozen and shattered while still alive, Lance blowing up a city in a post 9/11 world, everything regarding the cloning of Mewtwo, but you constantly have to change the words “Die, death, kill” and any allusions to death?
Also, why is it so inconsistent? In the case of volume 4 with the super nerd wanting to “DEFEAT” the gym leaders, while they will gladly point out that he will "DIE" if an attack from Agatha continues. Or in volume 1 where Koga makes it clear that he is going to kill Blue and Red in Lavender tower (even using the word die). But Blue had to reassure the reader that it was a Zombie Pokémon that he decapitated.
As far as I can tell, this isn't an issue of the age rating because in the Best of Pokémon Adventures: Yellow release, which has the same age rating as the second printings and is also under the vizkid’s name, doesn’t have “Die, and Death” censored, the stand out case being Yellow’s line “Lance, it’s insane!! Don’t you see how much death and destruction you’ll bring?!!!” while the rerelease of the seventh volume has the line changed to “Pain and destruction.”
Not to mention, that the Best of Pokémon Adventures: Yellow was taken from your first translation of this series, and it wasn’t censored back then. Why is it censored now?
And another manga you translate, The Legend of Zelda manga, also has the same age rating, get’s mentions of death into the books.
I just want to know why this series is censored now, when the previous releases, and other series with the same age rating, show that death is acceptable for this age rating.
I also want to know if I should start fearing that the Masked Man’s motivation involves stopping two Lapras’ from going into the shadow realm, instead of trying to prevent a tragic accident that separated a child from it’s parents!
Thank you,
A Distressed Fan
While I don't like how they apparently reduce the usage of the d-words and k-words, I don't find it to be that big of a deal. The visual censorship is still pretty bad but I don't mind the reduced outright mentions of death. It isn't like they actually remove the very concept of death in Pokemon Adventures' second U.S. version so really, it's nothing to be really upset and bent out of shape over. Though I don't condone it by any means.
ReplyDeleteThe censorship in the 2nd edition is most likely due to the FCC of today (standards change over time, you know) and not Viz alone or due to the editors of the second edition at Viz having disagreements over what can or can't be shown.
As for the visual censorship, well, they only occur occasionally apparently so really there's pretty ignorable when you think about it. It's nice that you point these things out but the way you put it is so (sorry) fanboyish.
I honestly say that just to be safe they should have rated it for teens because the censorship is annoying and I swear Viz is starting to rival 4kids because they should not be marketing teen manga to childern and I haven't seen censorship this bad since One Peice [4kids aka the killer of anime],plus just because the anime is for kids doesn't mean the manga is for kids also I bought Pokemon Adventures [why did the remove the Adventures subtile] Black and White volume 1 and my copy has one speach bollon in complete and another left blank !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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