Squid Game is no doubt the most popular TV show today on Netflix globally. However, it also has its fair share of controversy.
The viewers are debating over the accuracy of the subtitles on the show. Some feel that Netflix may have changed the meaning of some scenes due to the inaccurate subtitles, Fox News reported.
Netflix Changes Squid Game Character?
Squid Game is the most popular Korean TV drama series today, and millions watch it worldwide. So, it wasn't a surprise that the subtitle issues caught some of the netizen's attention.
Youngmi Mayer, the Feeling Asian podcast host, shared a video about her review of the show and its subtitles on TikTok. According to her, the viewers are "missing so much" because the dialogues in Korean are in-depth but poorly translated in the subtitle.
She took Ha Mi-nyeo's (Kim Joo Ryeong) character as an example. According to Mayer, her name is translated as "beautiful girl," which is interesting. However, her dialogues are allegedly constantly botched in the translation, and every little thing she says is "f--ked up."
Mayer speculates that it's probably because Mi-nyeo is a low-class character, and she's like a gangster.
"She cusses a lot and gets sterilized," she added.
"Everything she says is not aligning, so you are missing a lot about this character," she added.
READ: Squid Game Season 2 Predictions & Theories: Old Man Player 001 Is Gi-hun's Father?
Squid Game Scenes That Mean A Lot But Viewers Missed
@youngmimayer#squidgame♬ original sound - youngmi
Still discussing Mi-nyeo's character, Mayer highlighted the scene when she tried to convince the players to team up with her.
"I'm not a genius, but I still got it worked out," Mi-nyeo tells Gi-hun (Lee Jung Jae). However, according to Mayer, the actual translation of what the actress says is, "I'm very smart, I just never got the chance to study."
Mayer said that scene is a significant matter in Korean media. It talks about a poor person who is smart and clever. She stressed that it is a significant detail about the character.
She also pointed out Gi-hun (player 456) and Oh Il-nam's (player 001) conversation when they were about to play the marble game. According to her, the dialogue means "there is no ownership between me and you," not "we share everything." The inaccurate subtitle is a huge miss for her because the conversation is the entire point of the whole episode.
She stressed that it was only a small sentence, but it didn't make sense at all in the translation.
Squid Game English-Dubbing Actor Reacts
Edward Hong, who was part of the English-dubbing cast of Squid Game, said he was happy to be working with Koreans and Asian descent for the project. With regards to the debate of the accuracy of the translation, he said they could call out if something is not right.
"Korean actors — even if not fluent — can call out something if it's not right," the actor, who played a priest in the series, told NBC Asian America. "The way Korean religious people — especially pastors — talk is a very specific way of talking. That's something I knew all too well from being stuck in those Korean church services as a kid."
Several netizens agreed that the subtitles in K-dramas are poorly written. However, some said they didn't want to be critical because translation is not easy and is an underpaid skill in the industry.
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