Sound section (+ subtitles):
The sticking point as always with Manga authored discs comes down to the subtitles, as once again they are limited to only being able to show one caption on screen at a time. In Attack on Titan, with very little on screen text to translate, that only becomes an issue in the eyecatches (the bits at the halfway point of an episode where the jargon of the show is explained), and the subtitle translations flash by at that point far too quickly to read. There’s also a mistimed sub in episode 8, where one person’s dialogue subtitle flashes on screen while someone else is speaking. Other kinds of mistiming appear when characters have long speeches. They may say one line, and two lines of subtitle will flash up, they then speak two sentences, and one line will flash up.
There’s the odd typo, I noticed one incomprehensible subtitle in episode 11, but by far the most head scratching of aspects is the looseness of translation. This is a subtitle script that aims for a colloquial feel to the script, rather than remain close to the original Japanese. Even I, who've managed to pick up a few words, enough to be of no use whatsoever, notice when the subtitles bear no resemblance to the Japanese dialogue. For one thing, in the Japanese, the characters use each other’s names a lot more than is evident in the subtitle script. I would love to know if Manga used Funimation’s subtitles, created their own, or a mixture of the two. The subtitles not being locked on this release allowed me to watch a few scenes in English with subtitles. Most scenes had translated subtitles that differed from the dub, but then a scene would pop up with dubtitles, printing the dub script verbatim. Unsurprisingly, these were the scenes that had the loosest subtitle translation. Oh, and once again, the theme songs are only translated on the full subtitle track, not the signs only track.
Extras:
The Bonus DVD is available only in the Collector’s Edition. It isn’t with the standard DVD release, and neither is it with the standard Blu-ray. So only Blu-ray owning fans have the chance to watch these extra features, even if they are only on DVD. Here’s the kicker. In the US release, and the Australian release, these following extras are on the Blu-ray. Manga stripped them out for their Collector’s Edition when they re-authored the discs.
You get the textless credit sequences, and yes, because they are on the DVD, they have PAL speed-up to the music. You also get the US trailer.
Conclusion:
The biggest issue is Manga’s presentation of it. I’m going to withhold judgement on the subtitles and not throw my toys out of the pram, as I do not know at this point if they used Funimation’s subtitle script or commissioned their own. But I don’t appreciate those moments where I recognise that the subtitles are completely different from what is spoken by the characters. That throws me out of a show. But Manga dun goofed when it comes to the extra features. Stripping the HD extras off the perfectly good (and in Australia Region B) Blu-ray masters and sticking them on an SD DVD is bad enough, but restricting that DVD to the collector’s edition is unfair. We also miss out on the eye-catch gallery the US and AU releases had. In effect, our Collector’s Edition when it comes to on-disc extras is inferior to the US and Australian standard editions. We do get the artbox and the booklet though.
Here’s the kicker. There’s no Collector’s Edition of Part 2 of Attack on Titan in the UK, just the standard editions. There’s no mention of whether those standard editions will contain a third bonus DVD. We have no way at this time of knowing whether we’ll get to see episodes 14-25 of the Chibi Theatre, the Anime Expo featurette, the eyecatch gallery or the textless credits, although we probably will see the final two commentaries. Manga have confirmed that the second half of the booklet will be in the Blu-ray collection though.
If all you care about are the episodes, the main content, and are an English dub fan, then by all means buy the UK release of Attack on Titan. I’m not convinced by the subtitles we get, but that’s not a red flag issue for me. But the inveterate collector in me cannot in all conscience recommend this release when there is better available. If you care about extra features, and all the cool gubbins, then you will want it all in HD, just like the show. And for that, there is the Region A locked US release if you are capable, or the Region B Australian release, although unfortunately the gorgeous Limited Edition Australian Part 1 sold out months ago. Their regular edition is still better than this release though.
