Fall 2024 was irrefutably the season for Dan Da Dan fans. Not only was the Science Saru anime wowing folks every Thursday, its ongoing manga was showing out every Tuesday, giving fans of both reasons to wake up in the morning with a pep in their step at the beginning and end of their week.

Seeing as we’re still a way out from the anime’s second season and the manga is currently on hiatus, we decided to follow up on our interview with the anime’s director by chatting with Dandadan (the manga is spelled without spaces, unlike the show title’s stylization) manga translator Kumar Sivasubramanian to learn how its literary sausage is made for English-speaking sensibilities.

Isaiah Colbert, io9: In the manga translation industry, do translators have to audition or pitch themselves for series like Dandadan, or do publishers arbitrarily assign series to translators they work with?

Sivasubramanian: In my case, series have always been assigned to me by editors. I wouldn’t say it’s completely “arbitrary” though. If you have a past working relationship with that editor/publisher, then they might have an idea of your strengths or weaknesses, or even what kind of material you like to translate, and assign jobs accordingly. Also, I’m a freelancer, so they’re more “offers” than “assignments.” If I was offered, say, a baseball manga, I would probably say no, because I know nothing about baseball.

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Source: Gizmodo.com