Consequences of Joining Fansub

At about the time Season 5 of Supernatural started airing in America, I discovered a newly established Chinese fansub group named 'Evil Union', created for the purpose of providing the fastest translation of Supernatural to its Chinese fans hours after it airs in the US. At that time I was at the height of my obsession for the series, and with little hesitation, I contacted the group's admins and applied to join them.

They put me through a test, translating a promo, and soon let me into the group itself. When I first joined I was more than eager to lend my English skills to help any fan out there. At the start it was wonderfully fulfilling, seeing my work, my translations being integrated into the episodes, seeing people enjoy and even praise the quality of our work, it had been amazing.

But almost immediately after I finished subtitling my first episode, I stopped enjoying the show.

I don't know how much I should contribute to the stress of the speed-centric fansub group, and how much to my satisfaction with the season itself. But after the finale of Season 5 aired, I stopped watching Supernatural.

Every Friday, immediately after the episode was downloaded onto my hard-drive, I had no choice but to sit at my computer and watched fragmented pieces of the show. In the group's early days there were times the English subtitles would not be released fast enough, and twice I had to transcribe the entire 40 minutes worth of dialogue because I was the only one whose listening skills had been decent enough.  Every week I was forced to watch and listen to the same 8-15 minutes of footage over and over again trying to make sure nothing was missed and the dialogue done rightt. More often than not, scenes made little sense and endings were often spoiled. I was the one who had to edit other people's work to make sure no major errors were present, and by the end of the process I'd often have parts of the dialogue memorised.

It no longer mattered if I re-watch the episode later. Nothing was as funny or as surprising as it would have been and all I could remember watching the same scenes were the times I had to replay three seconds of dialogue because Misha had been mumbling or the English subtitles looked wrong.

Watching Supernatural had suddenly became the equivalent of work. The project which I'd volunteered to join out of my love for the series became a weekly chore I had to suffer through, and yet I could not bring myself to leave. Days of random chatter in the group's chat-room had been so much fun, I'd met a group of like-minded Supernatural fans who I'd grown attached to and I couldn't bear to leave them behind.

Because of the way the group was managed, many people had been leaving the fansub group unhappy, and after the break I also stopped going back. Not because I hated the management, but because I just had no more passion for the work, or the series itself.

It's been over a year since that experience, and I sometimes still wonder. If I never joined fansub, would I have kept my love for Supernatural? Would it have lasted until even today? 

I guess I'll never know.