Malaysian fans of the Japanese manga series Attack On Titan have just discovered a peculiar difference between the local edition of the comic and the ones published abroad.
Redditor Flamingthunderbanana highlighted to fans on the Titanfolk subreddit yesterday that the giant man-eating humanoids were supposed to be naked and not wearing any shorts, which was how they were depicted in Malaysian prints. The subreddit drew the attention of nearly 12,000 others, who were largely amused by how local censorship laws had affected the manga series by Japanese artist Hajime Isayama, more than 10 years after the series’ release.
“I want everyone to know that the titans are wearing tight pants in the Malaysian version due to local censorship law,” Flamingthunderbanana wrote yesterday, including a photo of a violent scene from the series with stark naked titans while another of the exact same scene showed the same titans wearing tight shorts.
The same modest treatment applied to female titans of the series, redditor ThatUltraGuy101 chimed in with a scene of a mob of titans that included a bare-chested female. In Malaysia, that same female titan was covered up and made to look like she was wrapped in a towel or donning a tube dress.
“Some of you wanted to see how female Titans were censored, so here it is,” the post said.
Malaysia’s strict censorship laws require even the mildest forms of nudity and sex to be banned or erased from all types of media, including illustrations. The Attack on Titan series never showed depictions of genitalia in any of its 30 volumes.
Others joked that the Malaysian titans should wear completely different clothes like a tuxedo, for example, Redditor MorningStarGuy said.
Attack on Titan was released by Kodansha Comics in 2009. The story is set in a world where humans are at risk of being killed by giant man-eating titans living outside the walled cities.
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