#''Why don't you upload the non-localised version to those other sites as well?'' I just dislike uploading a thing twice to the same place

[jojotranslates]

Fansubs released for Bamse (1972-1981)

So a little while ago, @the-best-fictional-turtle held a tournament about fictional turtles. Skalman, one of the central protagonists from Swedish children's comic Bamse, somehow made it in. On my sideblog, I joked that I'd translate every single comic in the franchise's 57-year long history if he won. And well... He actually won!

While I genuinely can't translate the whole comic as promised, the creator's animated shorts made in the 70's and 80's have now been subbed. These shorts are missing a lot of the modern cast, and the comic's strong educational tone is not as apparent here. But if you like funny little animals going on funny little adventures with some bonkers sound effects you may enjoy it!

The series is legally available on SVT Play for free*: here's a very basic guide on how to use the site if you don't know Swedish.

That being said, I'm going to do something different than usual. Characters are often named after their species and/or character traits in this series... So this time I would like to provide two versions of the subs:

With no localised names (on Dropbox) - ready!

With localised names (OSS, Subscene, & Dropbox) & other corrections if necessary - eventually

Under the read more there is more info on what exactly I plan to localise and how well (or poorly) I'm doing with those plans.

Happy watching!

Like I said I can't localise the whole franchise, but I still want to leave some doors open for the future when picking names.

So:

First I have to address Vargen. You'll notice that he gets called "the wolf" even in the un-localised version. This is because, according to his backstory, he doesn't have a proper name. His caretakers just called him "vargen"/"the wolf" despite being wolves themselves. So just in case I decide to translate the stories detailing this backstory one day, I couldn't give him a name either. sorry wolf :(

Bamse is a tough one, and I'm leaning toward not localising it. Even the official localisation gave up and just called him "Bamsy"! For comparison, the word "bamse" in Swedish is usually an adjective meaning "big", and occasionally a noun referring to a bear. So even though Bamse is a fairly small bear, it fits him well... I guess Teddy would have been a decent name for him, but there is a comic typically considered the "prototype version" of Bamse which features a similar protagonist already called Teddy. And later in this series, Bamse actually has a son called Teddy... So no dupes allowed.

Lille Skutt -> Good grief. The official localisation called him Little Frisky. But in the original both he and his son are named after terms related to jumping, so I would prefer to save that theming for later. Hopper always sounds nice, so Little Hopper... Then his child could remain "Mini-Hopp" (with or without that extra p). But their names become too similar then? I'm still frantically looking through naming sites and can't find anything useful... of course the anxious little guy would cause me the most stress trying to think of a name for him EDIT: A simpler alternative would just be Little Jump... Thinking I might settle for that for now.

Skalman -> Shellback. Taken from the official English localisation, which actually called him Professor Shellback. I'll cut the Professor to save space in the subs/speech bubbles. (For comparison, his original name means Shell man.)

There are a number of side characters with a "human" first name and species as their last names, i.e. Mickelina Räv and her parents (foxes), Ola Grävling (racoon badger sorry), Annika Anka (duck)... I'll probably just translate the species and leave the names alone. (Nina Kanin didn't show up in these shorts but might be an issue later, since her name is supposed to be a palindrome as well as a reference to her being a rabbit...)