Episode 7: "Sakura's First Attempt As A Thief" or "The Mysterious Painting"
Introduction to the Experiment
Episode 6
Episode 7: Sakura's First Attempt As A Thief (Card Captor Sakura) or The Mysterious Painting (Cardcaptors)
It is nighttime at a museum. A guard is doing his rounds and he passes by a painting that has a weird woman painted on it while a young boy sneaks around outside. It cuts to Sakura, who is sketching Kero. She finishes and Kero does not like her depiction of him. The next day, her class is going to the museum to sketch the sculptures there. At first, Sakura and Tomoyo stay together inside the museum to sketch this weird huge sculpture but then the other girls want them to join them outside. Sakura decides to go since she's done sketching but she can't find the way out. As she's searching for a way out, she sees a little boy with one of those knives that painters use when they work with oils. I have no idea what they're called. Anyway, the boy is going toward the weird painting that was shown during the opening scenes and the security guard tries to stop the boy from damaging the painting. The boy claims he does not want to destroy the painting; it's already been vandalized and he wants to restore it because it's his father's painting of him. As the boy leaps toward the painting, the woman in the painting moves into a hushing gesture and, to Sakura, all sounds go away. As suddenly as it happens, it stops and everything returns to normal and the security guard leads the boy away. Sakura tells Tomoyo about this experience and Tomoyo guesses that it may be a Clow Card. Later that night, Sakura sneaks out of her window but is caught by Yukito. Yukito asks where she's going and Sakura lies lamely. Yukito sees through her lie but decides to let Sakura go on her merry way and not tell Toya that she's gone. Sakura meets up with Tomoyo and Kero explains that it's the Silent Card. It hates loud noises and has to power to remove sound and... something else. What else? Kero doesn't know because the Silent Card doesn't talk much so he hasn't figured it out yet. So they sneak into the museum, knowing that the guard will pass by the painting in an hour. As they're sneaking around, they encounter the little boy again. It turns out that he is the child of a famous painter who died recently. The painting in question is of the boy during their last vacation together so that's why he's so determined to fix the painting. Sakura wants to help but she can't have the boy see her do magic so Tomoyo has to distract him. But the Silent Card hushes them and somehow, they end up outside. Apparently, that's the other power the Card has. So, they try again and again, trying to be quiet enough to placate it but it's no use. Eventually, time's up and the guard catches the little boy on the third attempt. Sakura and Tomoyo are outside, wondering what to do. Then Sakura uses the Shadow Card to project her shadow to the other side. First, she knocks over the security guard so the boy can escape and then uses her shadow to seal the Silent Card. Once this is done, the boy comes back, claiming that he failed again. But no! The painting is restored and shows... a long-haired little girl. As the boy runs toward the glass to look at the restored painting, his hat falls out and out comes a long mane of hair. He is actually a she, much to Sakura's embarassment. The little girl thanks them for their help and they part ways. Little do they know that someone is watching them, standing on a high tower, dressed in a green costume, holding a glowing magical board and saying, "I sense a Clow Card" (Japanese) or "There's a Clow Card nearby" (English).
Want to watch for yourself?
Card Captor Sakura Episode 7 (All)
Cardcaptors Episode 7: part 1/3
Cardcaptors Episode 7: Part 2/3
Cardcaptors Episode 7: Part 3/3
Edit: Here are some alternative videos
Cardcaptors Episode 7: Part 1/3
Cardcaptors Episode 7: Part 2/3
Cardcaptors Episode 7: Part 3/3
This is a huge filler episode that is filled with plot holes. I mean, seriously, half of the time I was going "Wait, what now?"
Hm, both of the titles are pretty lame. The Japanese makes no sense (God damn it, she's not stealing anything) and the English is just boring. Since I have to choose, I'll pick the English since it actually describes the plot. The youtube video cuts it short so I didn't get to see Kero's Corner or the whole "Card of the Week" thing but I did manage to catch the CotW providing yet another spoiler. Now that Syaoran has appeared on screen, they can't get their kicks out of spoiling the hell out of us about him so they decided to show us Meiling! Hi, Meiling, even I don't know who you are except from reputation, nice to see you fighting the Fight Card! Edit: The alternative version of the videos does not contain the Card of the Week but it includes Kero's Corner, which you can watch.
Before I go into the multitude of plot holes that's in the script, let's go over the changes made by the English production.
As always, there are cuts and line changes. Most of these are trimming the fat and do not affect the story much. However, there are some line changes that are worth pointing out.
One I didn't like as much was Sakura's evaluation of the talk with Julian. In the Japanese version, Sakura wavers back and forth dreamily about how Yukito thinks she's a bad girl but he did help her out so it's not so bad. In the English version, she just remarks that Julian must think she's weird. Why are the English dubbers minimizing the crush so much? It's funny! It's for laughs! It's one of the few times that a older man/younger girl "relationship" is not creepy as hell because it's just a puppy love crush! It's a funny scene that I wish they hadn't cut.
Actually, on second thought, they're not minimizing the crush. Sakura is sad that Julian thinks she's "weird" so we can still assume that the crush is intact. But, still, I kind of like the back and forth thing better.
Three changes I liked were these ones. One, Alex is not nearly as dumb as Yuuki is. When Kero does his "go away or I'll punish you!" routine, Yuuki is acting like this is a real threat. Alex acknowledges that it's probably a prank. Two, Madison doesn't claim that Sakura is "an elegant thief". Seriously, does Tomoyo like getting Sakura in trouble? At least Madison has a brain cell and realizes that implying that Sakura is really a thief will not win Alex over. Three, after everything is done, the final conversation between Sakura, Madison, and Kero is completely different than the Japanese version. It comes off as a bit more appropriate for the situation and more natural. I could actually imagine three people having the English conversation rather than the Japanese one.
I'm iffy about the line change given for the guard. In the Japanese version, after Sakura seals the Silent Card, the guard runs in and declares that the painting's been altered and it's a disaster. In the English version, he claims the place is haunted, no mention of whether the painting being restored is bad or not. On one hand, the latter is better, since the painting has in fact been restored so it's not damaged so it's not a disaster, although the painting restoring itself would be freaky. On the other hand, the former is better because the whole point was no one believed Yuuki/Alex that there was something wrong with the painting. So the painting changing would be considered bad.
I'm also confused as to why they bothered changing the "guardian angel of the museum" to "god of the museum" in the English version. In English, "guardian angel" actually makes more sense since that is part of our culture and would be seen as less Pagan than claiming that he's a god. I mean, the show already got heat for using Tarot-like cards, so why have Kero change a perfectly acceptable line to Western viewers to something less acceptable? It's a nitpick but it bothered me.
The voice acting choice for Alex was really bad. Yuuki's actress sounded androgynous enough that you could buy that this kid was a boy when you thought it was a boy and you could also buy that she's really a girl. Right before the reveal, I actually started to wonder if it was Honey from Ouran High School Host Club's voice actress (Honey is a male character played by a woman meaning I still bought that Yuuki was male) was Yuuki's voice actress. Alex's actress didn't even try to sound like a little boy. She sounds like a girl the entire time, an annoyingly squeaky girl for that matter.
And the not-so-mysterious-for-Cardcaptors-viewers-because-he's-in-the-opening-and-the-Card-of-the-Week-segments boy at the end? Holy crap, he sounds deep delivering that line. I don't remember the voice actress making him sound that deep during his introduction in the next episode but I'll have to wait and see. Maybe the English dubbers didn't realize that the boy at the end of this episode is Syaoran and gave him a different actor? Maybe the actor quit? Who knows? Maybe I'm overestimating the deepness here.
Speaking of the last scene, was the gong sound really needed to introduce him in the English production? Seriously, a gong? "Hey, guys! We're sort of introducing a character from Hong Kong! Let's have the first sound the viewers hear when they see him be a gong! That's not stereotypical whatsoever!" Maybe I'm overthinking this too.
But really, this episode's main problem was the plot holes that ran rampant.
1. Okay, so one of the Silent Card's powers is making people go away from the area, right? It does this when Sakura tries to seal it at nighttime and the little girl tells them that it happens every time she's tried to get close... Except for the first time we see it in action when it hushes the room but doesn't move anyone anywhere! Why didn't it do it then? Didn't want to cause a scene? What the hell?
2. And why hasn't anyone noticed that the painting's been altered by the Card? Surely when the family gave the painting to the museum, it was intact and normal, right? So, why haven't the museum people taken it down for repair since it's obviously been changed? Especially since some kid keeps breaking in every day trying to fix it, yelling that its father's painting has been doodled on?
3. And how come this kid can break in so often? For that matter, how does Tomoyo steal the security guards' schedules? How does Sakura break into a heavily guarded museum? Does she have a Lock Pick Card that she forgot to mention? Why does she never trip any alarms, especially when they knock down that vase? You can't just walk into a museum after hours! They have massive security systems! This has to be the least secure museum in Japan. At least Sakura has magical powers, what's Yuuki's excuse?
4. And where is Yuuki's mom during all of this? Why isn't she going down the museum every day demanding that they fix the painting? Especially since it's supposedly her favorite one!
5. And why does no one ever figure out that Yuuki is the daughter of the famous painter? I mean, I assume that Yuuki got taken to the security office and got picked up by her mom and then they would realize that these two were related to the painter of the painting that Yuuki was screaming about being damaged. So why didn't the museum people fix the painting?
6. And Yuuki's long, flowing mane of hair would have never stayed in that hat without some serious bobby pins or a clip. Yuuki does a lot of running and head moving before it slips off at the end. I once had to shove a ponytail into a marching band hat and I had a bear of a time getting all my hair to stay in it. There's no way Yuuki could have kept her hair up like that the entire time!
7. And what the hell is Yukito thinking letting Sakura go off like that? Sakura is seriously ten years old and she's sneaking out in the middle of the night. There's no way I would have let her go without asking where she was going! And what is Yukito doing there if he wasn't even sure that Toya was home? Just wandering the streets, hoping that Toya would be there?
8. And Not-So-Mysterious boy seriously stinks at his job. The Silent Card has been creating mischief at least all day long and it's only at the end when it's all said and done that he's, like, "I sense a Clow Card". Is it the one in Sakura's pocket? Because you certainly had time to catch it yourself if you would have just gotten down from that tower you're standing on an hour or so ago! And why is he standing on that tower anyway? I mean, how did he get up there?
9. And speaking of all day long, how come no one else got shoved into the courtyard? I mean, people were talking around Sakura when she first encountered the painting and it's not like a museum is a tomb. People do, in fact, speak, sometimes above a whisper, in museums! Why didn't this happen to anyone else?
And these are just plot holes that popped out at me. I'm sure if I watched it again, I'd find more. This was a very badly written episode.
So, in a very close competition, both had merits and downfalls but the English version made the error of having an inappropriate voice actress for the plot point character so I judge these episodes to be...
Different, with the Japanese Card Captor Sakura being the superior.
Episode 8
Episode 6
Episode 7: Sakura's First Attempt As A Thief (Card Captor Sakura) or The Mysterious Painting (Cardcaptors)
It is nighttime at a museum. A guard is doing his rounds and he passes by a painting that has a weird woman painted on it while a young boy sneaks around outside. It cuts to Sakura, who is sketching Kero. She finishes and Kero does not like her depiction of him. The next day, her class is going to the museum to sketch the sculptures there. At first, Sakura and Tomoyo stay together inside the museum to sketch this weird huge sculpture but then the other girls want them to join them outside. Sakura decides to go since she's done sketching but she can't find the way out. As she's searching for a way out, she sees a little boy with one of those knives that painters use when they work with oils. I have no idea what they're called. Anyway, the boy is going toward the weird painting that was shown during the opening scenes and the security guard tries to stop the boy from damaging the painting. The boy claims he does not want to destroy the painting; it's already been vandalized and he wants to restore it because it's his father's painting of him. As the boy leaps toward the painting, the woman in the painting moves into a hushing gesture and, to Sakura, all sounds go away. As suddenly as it happens, it stops and everything returns to normal and the security guard leads the boy away. Sakura tells Tomoyo about this experience and Tomoyo guesses that it may be a Clow Card. Later that night, Sakura sneaks out of her window but is caught by Yukito. Yukito asks where she's going and Sakura lies lamely. Yukito sees through her lie but decides to let Sakura go on her merry way and not tell Toya that she's gone. Sakura meets up with Tomoyo and Kero explains that it's the Silent Card. It hates loud noises and has to power to remove sound and... something else. What else? Kero doesn't know because the Silent Card doesn't talk much so he hasn't figured it out yet. So they sneak into the museum, knowing that the guard will pass by the painting in an hour. As they're sneaking around, they encounter the little boy again. It turns out that he is the child of a famous painter who died recently. The painting in question is of the boy during their last vacation together so that's why he's so determined to fix the painting. Sakura wants to help but she can't have the boy see her do magic so Tomoyo has to distract him. But the Silent Card hushes them and somehow, they end up outside. Apparently, that's the other power the Card has. So, they try again and again, trying to be quiet enough to placate it but it's no use. Eventually, time's up and the guard catches the little boy on the third attempt. Sakura and Tomoyo are outside, wondering what to do. Then Sakura uses the Shadow Card to project her shadow to the other side. First, she knocks over the security guard so the boy can escape and then uses her shadow to seal the Silent Card. Once this is done, the boy comes back, claiming that he failed again. But no! The painting is restored and shows... a long-haired little girl. As the boy runs toward the glass to look at the restored painting, his hat falls out and out comes a long mane of hair. He is actually a she, much to Sakura's embarassment. The little girl thanks them for their help and they part ways. Little do they know that someone is watching them, standing on a high tower, dressed in a green costume, holding a glowing magical board and saying, "I sense a Clow Card" (Japanese) or "There's a Clow Card nearby" (English).
Want to watch for yourself?
Card Captor Sakura Episode 7 (All)
Click to viewCardcaptors Episode 7: part 1/3
Cardcaptors Episode 7: Part 2/3
Cardcaptors Episode 7: Part 3/3
Edit: Here are some alternative videos
Cardcaptors Episode 7: Part 1/3
Cardcaptors Episode 7: Part 2/3
Cardcaptors Episode 7: Part 3/3
This is a huge filler episode that is filled with plot holes. I mean, seriously, half of the time I was going "Wait, what now?"
Hm, both of the titles are pretty lame. The Japanese makes no sense (God damn it, she's not stealing anything) and the English is just boring. Since I have to choose, I'll pick the English since it actually describes the plot. The youtube video cuts it short so I didn't get to see Kero's Corner or the whole "Card of the Week" thing but I did manage to catch the CotW providing yet another spoiler. Now that Syaoran has appeared on screen, they can't get their kicks out of spoiling the hell out of us about him so they decided to show us Meiling! Hi, Meiling, even I don't know who you are except from reputation, nice to see you fighting the Fight Card! Edit: The alternative version of the videos does not contain the Card of the Week but it includes Kero's Corner, which you can watch.
Before I go into the multitude of plot holes that's in the script, let's go over the changes made by the English production.
As always, there are cuts and line changes. Most of these are trimming the fat and do not affect the story much. However, there are some line changes that are worth pointing out.
One I didn't like as much was Sakura's evaluation of the talk with Julian. In the Japanese version, Sakura wavers back and forth dreamily about how Yukito thinks she's a bad girl but he did help her out so it's not so bad. In the English version, she just remarks that Julian must think she's weird. Why are the English dubbers minimizing the crush so much? It's funny! It's for laughs! It's one of the few times that a older man/younger girl "relationship" is not creepy as hell because it's just a puppy love crush! It's a funny scene that I wish they hadn't cut.
Actually, on second thought, they're not minimizing the crush. Sakura is sad that Julian thinks she's "weird" so we can still assume that the crush is intact. But, still, I kind of like the back and forth thing better.
Three changes I liked were these ones. One, Alex is not nearly as dumb as Yuuki is. When Kero does his "go away or I'll punish you!" routine, Yuuki is acting like this is a real threat. Alex acknowledges that it's probably a prank. Two, Madison doesn't claim that Sakura is "an elegant thief". Seriously, does Tomoyo like getting Sakura in trouble? At least Madison has a brain cell and realizes that implying that Sakura is really a thief will not win Alex over. Three, after everything is done, the final conversation between Sakura, Madison, and Kero is completely different than the Japanese version. It comes off as a bit more appropriate for the situation and more natural. I could actually imagine three people having the English conversation rather than the Japanese one.
I'm iffy about the line change given for the guard. In the Japanese version, after Sakura seals the Silent Card, the guard runs in and declares that the painting's been altered and it's a disaster. In the English version, he claims the place is haunted, no mention of whether the painting being restored is bad or not. On one hand, the latter is better, since the painting has in fact been restored so it's not damaged so it's not a disaster, although the painting restoring itself would be freaky. On the other hand, the former is better because the whole point was no one believed Yuuki/Alex that there was something wrong with the painting. So the painting changing would be considered bad.
I'm also confused as to why they bothered changing the "guardian angel of the museum" to "god of the museum" in the English version. In English, "guardian angel" actually makes more sense since that is part of our culture and would be seen as less Pagan than claiming that he's a god. I mean, the show already got heat for using Tarot-like cards, so why have Kero change a perfectly acceptable line to Western viewers to something less acceptable? It's a nitpick but it bothered me.
The voice acting choice for Alex was really bad. Yuuki's actress sounded androgynous enough that you could buy that this kid was a boy when you thought it was a boy and you could also buy that she's really a girl. Right before the reveal, I actually started to wonder if it was Honey from Ouran High School Host Club's voice actress (Honey is a male character played by a woman meaning I still bought that Yuuki was male) was Yuuki's voice actress. Alex's actress didn't even try to sound like a little boy. She sounds like a girl the entire time, an annoyingly squeaky girl for that matter.
And the not-so-mysterious-for-Cardcaptors-viewers-because-he's-in-the-opening-and-the-Card-of-the-Week-segments boy at the end? Holy crap, he sounds deep delivering that line. I don't remember the voice actress making him sound that deep during his introduction in the next episode but I'll have to wait and see. Maybe the English dubbers didn't realize that the boy at the end of this episode is Syaoran and gave him a different actor? Maybe the actor quit? Who knows? Maybe I'm overestimating the deepness here.
Speaking of the last scene, was the gong sound really needed to introduce him in the English production? Seriously, a gong? "Hey, guys! We're sort of introducing a character from Hong Kong! Let's have the first sound the viewers hear when they see him be a gong! That's not stereotypical whatsoever!" Maybe I'm overthinking this too.
But really, this episode's main problem was the plot holes that ran rampant.
1. Okay, so one of the Silent Card's powers is making people go away from the area, right? It does this when Sakura tries to seal it at nighttime and the little girl tells them that it happens every time she's tried to get close... Except for the first time we see it in action when it hushes the room but doesn't move anyone anywhere! Why didn't it do it then? Didn't want to cause a scene? What the hell?
2. And why hasn't anyone noticed that the painting's been altered by the Card? Surely when the family gave the painting to the museum, it was intact and normal, right? So, why haven't the museum people taken it down for repair since it's obviously been changed? Especially since some kid keeps breaking in every day trying to fix it, yelling that its father's painting has been doodled on?
3. And how come this kid can break in so often? For that matter, how does Tomoyo steal the security guards' schedules? How does Sakura break into a heavily guarded museum? Does she have a Lock Pick Card that she forgot to mention? Why does she never trip any alarms, especially when they knock down that vase? You can't just walk into a museum after hours! They have massive security systems! This has to be the least secure museum in Japan. At least Sakura has magical powers, what's Yuuki's excuse?
4. And where is Yuuki's mom during all of this? Why isn't she going down the museum every day demanding that they fix the painting? Especially since it's supposedly her favorite one!
5. And why does no one ever figure out that Yuuki is the daughter of the famous painter? I mean, I assume that Yuuki got taken to the security office and got picked up by her mom and then they would realize that these two were related to the painter of the painting that Yuuki was screaming about being damaged. So why didn't the museum people fix the painting?
6. And Yuuki's long, flowing mane of hair would have never stayed in that hat without some serious bobby pins or a clip. Yuuki does a lot of running and head moving before it slips off at the end. I once had to shove a ponytail into a marching band hat and I had a bear of a time getting all my hair to stay in it. There's no way Yuuki could have kept her hair up like that the entire time!
7. And what the hell is Yukito thinking letting Sakura go off like that? Sakura is seriously ten years old and she's sneaking out in the middle of the night. There's no way I would have let her go without asking where she was going! And what is Yukito doing there if he wasn't even sure that Toya was home? Just wandering the streets, hoping that Toya would be there?
8. And Not-So-Mysterious boy seriously stinks at his job. The Silent Card has been creating mischief at least all day long and it's only at the end when it's all said and done that he's, like, "I sense a Clow Card". Is it the one in Sakura's pocket? Because you certainly had time to catch it yourself if you would have just gotten down from that tower you're standing on an hour or so ago! And why is he standing on that tower anyway? I mean, how did he get up there?
9. And speaking of all day long, how come no one else got shoved into the courtyard? I mean, people were talking around Sakura when she first encountered the painting and it's not like a museum is a tomb. People do, in fact, speak, sometimes above a whisper, in museums! Why didn't this happen to anyone else?
And these are just plot holes that popped out at me. I'm sure if I watched it again, I'd find more. This was a very badly written episode.
So, in a very close competition, both had merits and downfalls but the English version made the error of having an inappropriate voice actress for the plot point character so I judge these episodes to be...
Different, with the Japanese Card Captor Sakura being the superior.
Episode 8