grundle

Season 2 of Magnum P.I. has an episode called "The Jororo Kill." In the first scene after the opening credits, there's a conversation that takes place in French. In the original broadcast and syndicated airings of this episode, there have never been any subtitles during this scene. The reason is that the creator of the show assumed that the audience was intelligent enough to understand the conversation based on the context in which it takes place. I don't speak French, but I have never had any trouble understanding what is being said. I've seen this episode on TV at least 10 times, and probably more. There's a surprise at the end of this scene, and even after having seen it so many times, and knowing what the surprise is, it still has a powerful effect on me. This opening scene sets the tone of the entire episode.

But on the region 1 DVD of this episode, they added forced English subtitles to this scene. This dumbs it down. It's also distracting and annoying, because I prefer to be able to see the picture without any obstructions. The forced subtitles greatly decrease my enjoyment of this scene, and greatly lessens the impact of the surprise.

speedyray

I have not made it to that episode yet, but that is a shame. I know I watched the French Connection II the other day and alot of that film has people speaking french and no subtitles, as you were saying, it was not important that you know exactly what they are saying. It is not a big enough change for me to get up in arms over, but it does add to my list of things that universal has done to piss me off.

grundle

Maybe after you watch it, you could post your opinion on it.