In some cases, pop culture references were added or changed for a North American or international audience. Some English dubs of the anime or manga have eliminated many adult jokes and mature themes from the original version. ChangesĮnglish-language versions of Crayon Shin-chan have gotten around these translation and censorship problems in numerous ways. There’s also a lot of toilet humor and fart jokes in Crayon Shin-chan. They can get away with things in Tokyo that they would not in Topeka. Again, Shin-chan doesn’t seem to mind, but the international distributors would.Ĭensorship standards are different in Japan than they are in the United States and elsewhere. Some of Crayon Shin-chan ’s translation problems are based on the problem of having inappropriate or offensive words coming out of a little kid’s mouth.Īs a little kid, Shin-chan often has little or no idea that what he’s saying or doing is inappropriate (or if he should know, he doesn’t care).īecause the protagonist is only five years old, there’s a lot of little kid nudity in Crayon Shin-chan. Shin-chan can also misinterpret words or phrases, leading him to do weird things when given instructions. Saying “okaerinasai” (“welcome back”) instead of “tadaima” (I’m back”) might be trickier to explain, but understandable for an international audience. Some of these jokes are easier to understand than others - getting pool and cool mixed up, for example. There are a lot of jokes which depend upon understanding how the language is supposed to operate. Unfortunately, this can also make it hard to translate Crayon Shin-chan properly and faithfully from the Japanese version.
Īs parents know, kids are still learning language and proper pronunciation, and words can come out wrong. In real life, little kids can be (unintentional) experts at malaprops and spoonerisms. With Crayon Shin-chan, a lot of the comedy comes from wordplay. (Much of what he does is fun for the audience but frustrating to his parents.) Lost in TranslationĬrayon Shin-chan tells the story of Shin Nohara, his family and friends, and all of the various real-life adventures that he gets himself into. But a lot of what happens in Crayon Shin-chan is very different from those other examples.