Recently I've been playing the first Ace Attorney again. I thought since I'm working on the translations again, I should refamiliarise myself with the characters' quirks. I blazed through the first 3 cases, and now I'm on Edgey's case and he's been on trial for over a week now. Poor Edgey. Anyway, a weird thing is in the fanbook, Larry calls Phoenix by his actual surname Naruhodou. But in the English release, Maya gets the Nick-name (see what I did there? Of course you did) from Larry. Before that, she calls him Phoenix. So where did she get Naruhodo-kun from in the original? I'll have to try playing that case again on the DS re-release. Also, in the original, Maya calls Larry by the nickname Yappari, instead of his name Yahari. But in the English, she says his name correctly as Larry, rather than Harry, which is what Mia and Gummi call him. It's strange how they changed that.
Anyway, I was recently looking up my blog online to see if it had been indexed yet (as you do), and came across this post by sophie_inthesky at AO3.
...first, the Valentine’s Day art of Phoenix, Larry and Edgeworth as kids. The story for this one has Nick explain that he dislikes Valentine’s Day because, when he was younger, he received a chocolate from a girl in his class which should have gone to Edgeworth but was mistakenly placed on his desk. Knowing that Nick had a crush on the girl, Edgeworth handed it straight back. The prevailing memory from this incident? "You see, I received a chocolate from Edgeworth that day." What a weird thing to focus on... Of course, everyone listening immediately assumes they were romantically involved. Maya is surprised, but Larry tearfully apologises and says he "should have known better" before Phoenix hastily explains the situation.
It happens again, unbelievably, on White Day. (Traditionally in Japan, on Valentine’s Day women give presents to men, and on White Day men give presents to women.) Through a series of contrived mistakes and rejections, Phoenix claims that he "received a sweet from Edgeworth, that day." Again, Maya reacts with surprise, and Larry tearfully says he should have known better - although this time, Edgeworth is present, and hastily tells Phoenix to stop causing misunderstandings. Phoenix, having attempted to give a sweet to a girl, has it handed back to him by Edgeworth, and again, the memory that sticks with him is of Edgeworth giving him the sweet. The universe repeatedly managing to get them to give gifts to each other in traditionally romantic situations is… just coincidence, right?
The story accompanying the beach art also has Pearl and Maya accidentally buy a pair of too-small bikini bottoms for Phoenix from the Shopping King mall, and Edgeworth sarcastically joking that "whatever happens, you will certainly be the Beach King." It’s a pretty out-of-nowhere remark to make, all things considered.
Firstly, they're wrong, for the simple reason that all your Edgey are belong to me. Secondly, they've made the mistake of taking my translations as accurate.
You see, the Valentine's Day entry was the first I translated, just because it looked the funniest. And back then, my skill level was n00b. Like, I totally bluffed my way through these translations. I showed Phoenix's おまえももらったのか?! line to my friend Kei-chan, and asked if he was talking about peaches (もも). And she explained that it means, "You got one too?" And she had to explain that これはどうも doesn't mean "this is too much", as I thought, but "hello". I didn't feel comfortable asking her to help me translate the whole book, so those were the only lines she helped me with, and I slogged through the rest myself.
I used zKanji for the dictionary, which although good, was not as good as the Akebi app I use now. I relied on machine translation for the bits where I got absolutely stuck, and we all know how bad machine translation can be. And this was almost 10 years ago.
Anyway, I've had that big disclaimer there from the beginning. I'm not fluent, I doubt I ever will be, my translations are not accurate. I have a native speaker now who helps me out when I get absolutely stuck, but for the most part, my translations should be seen as nothing more than providing the gist of what's happening in the pictures. It would never be admissible in court! It still takes several hours to translate one page. I'm not good at this!
So like I said, the Valentine's and White Day pages were the first I worked on. And I recently corrected them to fix the various mistakes I made. This person seems to be focusing on Larry's そんなコトになってたなんて、オレ！ line, which to be honest, I'm still not entirely sure how to translate (I'll ask my language buddy when she has time). But my understanding of this line now (as opposed to 9 years ago when I think I just took a wild stab in the dark) is that he had no idea such a thing happened. (see here). So in fact, it's the opposite of what this poster said, and there was nothing to indicate that Edgey had a thing for Phoenix. I mean, if we're going by that logic, then on the next page, Edgey gave Maya a White Day gift, so he's playing the field, I guess?
Guys, Phoenix's "I received a chocolate from Edgeworth that day" was clearly done for comedy. It's right there for all to see! It's a running theme of the trilogy that Phoenix is the hapless victim of Maya's teasing and Larry's histrionics. Like, how much can you stretch this? Stop trying to make "fetch" happen!
The other line used as "evidence" is Edgey's どうやら今日は、キミが浜辺の王様、だな on the Swimming in the Sea entry. I haven't got round to updating that one yet. Anyway, I didn't know what どうやら meant back then, it probably wasn't in my dictionary. It seems I've written "However things go today, you will most certainly be the Beach King" which is wrong. Where did the "certainly" even come from? More accurately, it's, "It seems today, you are the Beach King." He's clearly taking the mick. It's not "out of nowhere". It's a joke referencing the earlier shocking pink Shopping King.
This picture has nothing to do with anything.
The only thing I can take from this is he uses kimi rather than kisama (which he uses for Larry) or omae, which shows he has more respect for Phoenix (and Maya) than he does for Larry (kisama is very rude), but still sees him as somewhat "lower" in status (I just know someone is going to latch onto the fact that some males also use kimi with their girlfriends, but let me remind you, Payne also uses kimi when talking to Edgey and Phoenix, so go to town, shippers). I just really don't get how these crazy fangirls' minds work, and I say this as a crazy fangirl!
If anything, Edgey comes across as aro-ace. At least in the OT and AAI, he's never shown having any attraction/romantic interest in anyone, unlike Larry, Phoenix, Mia, Gummi, etc and he's oblivious to women swooning over him.
Ace Prosecutor, indeed.
Takushuu himself said, "I tried to paint a picture of the intensely strong bond of friendship that two men can share". Takushuu has spoken. The canon is that they are friends!
Man, it's crazy how people will twist things just to fit their ship! Like, fantasise all you want, no one cares, but there's no need to fabricate evidence (pun intended MOAR) to fit your wet dreams. Just admit you're hot for BL and move on! Gosh! Ironically, the post is called "Evidence is Everything".
As a space elf*, I'm a little confused by how obsessed humans are with pairing people up. I find friendships way more interesting. There's just something so wholesome and sweet about loyal, life-long friendships. Come to think of it, most of my characters remain single. Well apart from Tony's/Jasmine's stories, I guess. And that's because they're based on my established Sims characters, for whom pairing up was one of their life goals, so it kinda went down that way. そんなコトになってた。な？
But in my KI fanfic, and Ferys's Band of Idiots stories, the only couples are the ones that had to happen for the kids to be born. Come to think of it, the chapter when Kiki's parents were actually a couple was the shortest one. I just think family dynamics and friendships are way more interesting to read and write about than romantic relationships. I also think the same can be said of real life, but I'm just a space elf, so what do I know?
*obviously, I'm not actually a space elf. But I just make more sense if you think of me that way. I also literally just this moment realised that Kiki's name contains the initials for Kid Icarus. Whoa.