But Michiko isn't simply a poor parent. She's practically unfeeling. She brings Hatchin to tears on a regular basis and then just sorta shrugs it off and stares blankly. If Michiko doesn't have a personal revelation soon, I think her chances of being a worthwhile protagonist are lost.
See, I think this is where the characterization between the Japanese and English differs. I got much more of a sense that she was kind of a sad, regretful character in Japanese who just put up a hard face at times because that's the only way she knows how to deal with problems. She had a shitty childhood and has fucked up constantly in her life, and she continues to fuck up when she's only trying to do what she thinks is right for Hatchin (and, having grown up as an orphan, she obviously wants to give Hatchin a better life than she had by reuniting her with her father, regardless of whether she's stated that's why she's doing it or not). She's a terrible parent to Hatchin and almost never really takes the correct course of action in dealing with her because she never had a parent herself, or really anyone even close. The closest thing she had was an orphanage director who
sold children. So of course she has no idea what's she's doing and constantly says and does the wrong things. She's not a good person, but it's not because she's
trying to be a bad person (at least when it comes to Hatchin...the other stuff is another matter).
Virtually none of that really comes across in the English version so far, aside from just the rarest of glimpses, even though we've already been given all of that information via one form of exposition or another. We've already been shown some of these events in her past that have sort of made her the woman she is today, but I don't feel like they've really resonated or informed our opinion much of the woman we see in the present. What we're left with is a woman who has pretty much the same aggressive tone at all times, comes across cocky and hard at everyone, including Hatchin, constantly, and doesn't really seem to have any setting other than "attitude."
I just looked ahead at a scene from next week's episode to check the Japanese and English versions against each other, and despite the fact that the scripts between the two are nearly identical, with just a couple wording changes here and there being the only real differences, and of course the animation being the same, Michiko comes across waaaaay bitchier in the English version than she does in Japanese (to be fair, Hatchin also comes across a bit sassier in some lines in English, though for the most part she's more consistent and closer to her Japanese counterpart in tone than Michiko). It's just entirely in the voice. The tone, the inflection, the decibel level at times, etc.
Which, by the way, isn't to necessarily say the Japanese acting is
better across the board, per se. For example there's at least one line in that scene I mentioned where Michiko's facial expressions suggest a tone somewhere in between the two dubs, perhaps even closer to the English voice than the Japanese. I'm just saying that's it's a different presentation that gives a slightly different impression of the same character, even with her words and deeds being more or less exactly the same.
I'm also finding I'm generally enjoying the show a little bit less than I remembered this time around, and I think it's because of Michiko.
