Anubi's response to Are 4kids network getting lazy with voice acting?

This response has Japanese characters in it. If you see a bunch of question marks, squares, or funky things, your computer doesn't have Japanese text support. The reason for the main different translations of the names/attack names of the Mew Mews comes from the Japanese writing system. The crazy Japanese do not have the alphabet like we do, instead they have more characters than there are people in China. Luckily for us, the characters we are going to focus on are katakana and hiragana. Katakana is used mainly for foreign words. Hiragana is used for words that don't use Kanji. Kanji is the other form of writing, which uses a single character to represent something, or can be combined with other characters to mean something else. There are about 7000 Kanji in total. But that is irrelevant. Let's take a look at katakana and hiragana. They are based on syllables. For example: アヌビ is Anubi, or A-NU-BI is the katakana for my name. あぬび is Anubi in hiragana. Are you following? No? Don't worry. The Japanese don't know how to read it either. They just make creative guesses depending on what Pokémon it most resembles. Now that that's aside, let's look at the names. The characters' normal names are written in hiragana, while their Mew names are written in katakana. Here are their normal names: いちご Ichigo. I-CHI-GO みんと Mint. MI-N-TO れたす Lettuce. RE-TA-SU ざくろ Zakuro. ZA-KU-RO Pudding's name is written in Chinese, so we will not deal with that. There is no "l" in the Japanese language, so "r" is used in its place. And here are their Mew names.ミュウ is Myuu, or Mew. イチゴ I-CHI-GO ミントMI-N-TO レタスRE-TA-SU ザクロZA-KU-RO プリンPU-RI-N Purin means "Pudding", for the record. Is your brain melting into a mass of squiggly lines yet? Good. Let's move on. Weapon names. ストロベルベルSU-TO-RU-BE-RU-BE-RU, or Straw Bell Bell. How does this become Strawberry Bell? Well, technically it doesn't. It is probably intended to be a pun. The Japanese love puns. ミントーンアローMI-N-TOO-N-A-ROO, or Mint Arrow. Not quite sure what the held "o" (ーmeans to hold on to a syllable) or the "n" are there for. レタスタネットRE-TA-SU-TA-NE-TO. There is no "ca/ka" sound in it, you will note. プリングリングPU-RI-N-GU-RI-N-GU Presumably, the "gu" at the end of "Purin" is there to be cute or rhyme. ザクロスホイップZA-KU-RO-SU-HO-I-PPU Zakuross Whip. Another pun, as "ku-ro-su" is cross, which could make it "crosswhip" Attack names! リボーン is RI-BOO-N, or Ribbon ストロベリーチェーック SU-TO-RO-BE-RII-CHEE-KU Strawberry Check ミントエコー MI-N-TO-E-KOO or Mint Echo. Pretty self-explanatory レタスラッシュRE-TA-SU-RA-SSHU Lettuce Rush プリングリングインフェルノ PU-RI-N-GU-RI-N-GU-I-N-FE-RU-NO Pudding Ring Inferno リボーンザクロスピュア ZA-KU-RO-SU-PYU-A This is the one that is most questioned. While the fansub group translates it as "Zakuro Spear" it is probably meant to be "Zakuross Pure" http://mmpu.smuncensored.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=82&start=24 For a bit more information, the board member GracieLizzy posted a bit about the translation of things. This concludes Anubi's study of the crazy Muslim languages. Hopefully this will give everyone a newfound appreciation of the 26 letter English alphabet, and want to use it properly and stop using numbers to represent letters and give words pointless shortenings.