CAA: Christian Anime Alliance

I'm almost half way through the dub of Spice and Wolf*, and for the most part the name change from Horo to Holo hasn't bugged me too much. Part of it because I saw the first episode at AWA and it was dubbed, and the second because they don't say her name too much. Still in spirit it bugged me a bit that they bothered with a name change. I've noticed this isn't the first time this has happened with a character in anime. For example Lina Inverse apparently is Rina Inverse.

So for my questions.

Do you Horo or Holo?
Do name changes bug you?
Do you follow a general rule when talking about a character with aliases?
Do you know why they do the name changes?


(*Please try to avoid spoilers in your reply.)

It doesn't bother me because her name is Holo.[quote="Yen Press"]Also, just to quickly address the comment about the decision to use “Holoâ€

When it wasn't official, lots of people said Horo (I was one of them because come on, Holo?). However if the creator says "No it's Holo" then that's that, that's her name. I think blkmage also said in one issue she writes her name down and it clearly says "Holo" so that would confirm it, much how the wanted posters in One Piece confirm Luffy and Zoro's names. I still remember the first scans of One Piece where they named him as "Rufi" because that's how it sounds in Japanese.

This kind of thing happens all the time in manga and anime. I also remember the old Death Note scans with "Raito" in them. But then I remember what someone on another forum said: Honestly, the Death Note pronunciation is freaking weird, since there's no way the average Japanese is going to look at a kanji and say "oh, it's spelled like 'tsuki' but you say it 'Light'".

OH JAPAN.

[spoiler]It's Korbo[/spoiler]
More seriously, if you pronounce it properly in Japanese, it doesn't matter, because they both sound the same and are equivalent. In most cases, it doesn't matter, so if you really want to, just go with whichever one makes you feel less awkward. On the other hand, there are the cases where people insist it's Arucard, to the dismay of most right-thinking people.

It's just like how Kirara in Inuyasha is often pronounced Kilala.

Ah that makes sense. I've decided I'll go with Holo which will take some getting use to.

That's good to know that L and R are the same for the Japanese. That clears up a lot of confusion I've had over the matter. I guess that means they'd get really confused if you started talking about the "role of lore" in society.