Dragon Ball Rewatch, Week 17 - DB episodes 76-80

[Adamant]

What I questioned is if ten could actually be an approximation of tian (I didn't think it was, but I don't know enough to say), and whether Mandelin made an error.

Yes, "ten" is how you'd approximate the mandarin "tian" pronunciation of 天 in Japanese. You can see here how Shi Tianlong's name is approximated as "Shii Tenron".

So yeah, that "Tenlong" spelling is weird and doesn't make much sense. It's like calling Goku's Dragonball "Suushinqiu".

[MyVisionity]

What I questioned is if ten could actually be an approximation of tian (I didn't think it was, but I don't know enough to say), and whether Mandelin made an error.

Yes, "ten" is how you'd approximate the mandarin "tian" pronunciation of 天 in Japanese. You can see here how Shi Tianlong's name is approximated as "Shii Tenron".

So yeah, that "Tenlong" spelling is weird and doesn't make much sense. It's like calling Goku's Dragonball "Suushinqiu".

Thanks, that is helpful to know. And yeah it makes it even more confusing unless it's just an error.

The only other thing I can think of is the furigana being written with hiragana instead of katakana. Maybe that means you stick with the approximated "Tenron" instead of "Tianlong"? Which while odd, would make some kind of sense at least. That still wouldn't explain Mandelin's hybridized "Tenlong" though.

[Robo4900]

So, I'm a little behind.

Anyway, I noticed some reused animation in episode 78:



Background's different, so it's not outright stock footage, but it's definitely the same animation.

Anyway, while I'm here:
Blue Travellers - confirmed as a really adorable sequence.
Goku catching the four-star ball in the air is fantastic.
Oopa reuniting with his dad is really sweet.
... I love this entire sequence of episodes that end the Baba arc.
In a way, though, this ending is a bit bittersweet -- this is arguably the end of the "Adventure era" of Dragon Ball. Outside of filler, we won't see stories of Goku and the gang wandering around and going on adventures again until GT briefly tried it on before drastically changing direction (for the better; I don't think the brief adventure period of GT worked).