Sakuratetsu Taiwa-hen: Research Notes

Tucker

Author

• Fujisaki, Ryuu 藤崎 竜（ふじさき りゅう)
  • “Fuji-sahkee, L’yuu”
  • To get the Ryuu/Lyuu pronunciation accurate to Japanese (as a single syllable), practice saying the syllables “loo” (being mindful to only touch the front bit of the tongue to the top of the month when pronouncing the consonant) and then “yuu.” Then, practice sliding your tongue from the L position to the Y position. That sliding motion is how you get the consonant sound in Japanese usually written as “ry”

Title

• Sakura Tetsu Taiwahen サクラテツ対話篇
  • Tie-wah-hen
  • Taiwahen is a weird word. Think of it as meaning “dialogue” or even as “oral history”

Characters\

• Sakura, Tetsu 桜テツ（サクラ テツ）
  • “Saku-rah, Tetsu”
  • Personal name is just written out in kana, but it’s probably a reference to “iron,” which seems to be a naming motif in this family
• Teppei 鉄瓶（テッペイ）
  • The double P isn’t just a spelling thing! It’s a long consonant! For consonants like [p] that you can’t really stretch out like an [s] or [f] or something, you pronounce it “long” by inserting a very short period of silence in which you build up pressure at the place of articulation (for [p], that would be your two lips pressing together) and then release it. This is even reflected in written Japanese — it you look at the kana version of this name,   テッペイ, the small ッ character represents the aforementioned beat of silence!
  • SO, for writing out the pronunciation of this below, I’m going to use ッ to represent the beat of silence you can’t really represent with Roman characters.
  • “Teh-ッ-pay”
  • Name written as “iron vessel” (tetsu + hei with a rendaku sound change)
  • They keep calling him Keppei, but that appears to be a major translation error!
• Kusan 久散
  • Kuh-sahn
  • Doesn’t have the same iron motif as the siblings. Written as “long ago, scattered.” Not really sure what’s up with the name choice, but apparently it is a real Japanese female name.
• Sakura, Boke 桜ボケ（サクラ ボケ）
  • Bo-keh
  • Name is a play on words, of course. Grandpa’s personal name is just written out in kana syllables. When the name Boke is written in kanji, it’s usually as 歩危, which means something like “he who walks through danger.” However, this is a homonym with the word 惚け, which means senility or generally having a screw loose in the head.
• Ide’i, Furato 出井富良兎（イデイ フラト）
  • “Ee-deh-ee, Fuh-la-toe”
  • Weirdly enough, the “ei” in her family name are two separate syllables, rather than the long [e:] sound that the Roman characters typically represent. For that reason, I wrote the name above with a ‘ to represent the separation between the syllables.
  • Name is pretty weird. Family name means something like “riches from out of a well,” while given name means “good rabbit.” However, I suspect the given name Furato was chosen due to it sounding like the English word “flat”...you can probably guess why.
• Nietzsche
  • Named after the German philosopher, obviously
  • Everyone in the US pronounces his name super badly. “E” at the end of words in German never sound like the y at the end of many words in English!
  • For a more accurate pronunciation: “knee-chuh” ….this isn’t perfect, but it’s fairly close!
    • [btw, the combo of letters “tsch” is the German equivalent of the sound we write as “ch”....it’s because that sound is way less common in German and is seen more as a combo of “t” and “sh” (“sch” in German)]
• Augustinus アウグスティヌス
  • Huh, the Japanese form of this suggests that this is actually pronounced like the Romans would have!
  • “Ow-goose-teen-noose”
  • Just means “son of Augustus (he who is venerated)” in Latin
• Schobenhauer
  • “Show-ben-how-er”
  • Seems to be super broken German combining a past participle of schieben (to shove) and “Hauer” (digger/miner). So, together it’s probably suggesting “someone who’s been shoved in a hole that’s been dug” or “shoving it in and digging around”....yeah, you be the judge.
• Ide’i Kiseno 出井 紀世能（イデイ キセノ）
  • “Ee-deh-ee, Kee-seh-no”
  • Personal name seems to be made up by the author…”written account” + “world” + “talent/ability” … seems to suggest that his talent is revered around the world
• Rakan 羅漢（ラカン）
  • “Rah-con”
  • Name seems to come from some obscure Buddhist term…not sure if it has any significance.
  • Kanji on his briefs are “northeast” and “heart”...I have nooooo idea why
• Heidegger
  • “High-deg-er”
  • Doesn’t seem to actually mean anything at all in German….”Heide” means “pagan,” but I really doubt that’s significant.

Other

• Atenai Highschool/Prefecture/etc.
  • “Ate-nai” just means “has no address”

MaxyBee

Author: Ryu Fujisaki

• Prior works:
  • Psycho+ (1992-1993, 2 volumes, Weekly Shonen Jump)
  • Hoshin Engi (1996-2000, 23 volumes, Weekly Shonen Jump)
    • 90s megahit, anime (known as Soul Hunter in the west), video games, drama cds, a stage play, THE WORKS. Faithful anime remake Hakyu Hoshin Engi in 2018, along with a one-volume sequel manga) Available from Viz and in the Shonen Jump Vault
• Works after this:
  • Waq Waq (2004-2005, 4 volumes, Weekly Shonen Jump) Available from Viz and in the Shonen Jump Vault
  • Shiki (2008-2011, 11 volumes, Jump SQ)
    • Adaptation of a popular horror novel by Fuyumi Ono, and early hit for SQ. Vampire shenanigans. Had a popular anime adaptation, which is he only official way it came out in English, but other means exist.
  • Kakuriyo Monogatari (2013-2015, 8 volumes, Weekly Young Jump)
  • Legend of The Galactic Heroes (2015-present, Weekly Young Jump, then transferred to Ultra Jump. Currently at 24 volumes)
    • A modern manga adaptation of that legendary sci-fi novel series that has spawned endless spin-offs, manga, anime, whatever you want. The latest film of the current anime adaptation is literally releasing around when you put this episode out.
• Who they were an assistant for: Unknown.
• Notable assistants:
  • Yasuhiro Kano (Pretty Face, Kiruru Kill Me)
  • Munenori Michimoto (A-O-N, Daisuou)
    • Both are referred to as close friends, but they helped him on his comics and THAT COUNTS ON THIS SHOW.
• Completely optional gabbing by Maxy about Ryu Fujisaki:
  • You’ve covered a lot of notable authors on the podcast, whether through their canceled works or when you’ve indulged in a hit. Fujisaki is somewhere around the top 5 of all those creators in importance and reputation. We don’t talk a lot about him in the west for whatever reason, but he’s got a hell of a body of work, and is one of my personal favourite authors of all time. Regardless of how you rate Sakura Tetsu Taiwahen, I hope you’ve enjoyed the experience, and will hopefully return one day for his other translated failure, Waq Waq. You’re safe from Psycho+, which is actually quite bad. No-one seems to want to license or scanlate it.

Publishing

• Series it replaced: Grand Vacan by Kazushige Hamada
  • A two-volume, 11 chapter flop that featured in its cast WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, FRANCES DRAKE, AND QUEEN ELIZABETH IN CHILD FORM. WHY CAN’T I FIND THIS SERIES ANYWHERE.
• Series that replaced it: Pretty Face, by Fujisaki’s dear friend Yasuhiro Kano
  • A series about a guy getting in a bus crash and getting his face accidentally rebuilt to look like his crush. Chaos ensues. Viz released it.

Manga Itself

• Astute readers will spot that Ryu Fujisaki’s career to this point mirrors Yoshihiro Togashi to a scary extent. Both had flops out gate that no-one remembers, a one-shot collection, then a HUGE HIT, then pivoted into weird sci-fi. They diverge a lot from here, with one doing lots of different projects and the other doing a lot of stuff within one giant never-ending project. It’s weird.
• The replacement manga at the end continues a gag from Hoshin Engi where Ryu Fujisaki’s comics always gets replaced by comics by NEW Ryu Fujisaki.
• The series numbering gets weird, with four different chapter 11s and such. This was the same in the magazine, and is confusing as hell. I’d blame it for the cancellation but there’s a LOT you can blame long before that started happening.
• I gave this manga five stars, despite it being stupid, stupid, dumb, stupid chaos.